Double Cross

Chapter 108

BREE AND I FLEW to Denver on Friday afternoon, then up to Kalispell, Montana, the next morning. Our return flight was early on Sunday, so we had only a day or so to get everything done and find out as much as possible about Tyler Bell, about whatever had been going on up here in the North Woods, and about what he might be planning next.

The drive from Kalispell to Babb took us straight through Glacier National Park. I’d always wanted to see Glacier, and it didn’t disappoint. The switchbacks on the Going-to-the-Sun Road had us alternately hugging a mountain wall, then looking straight down one. It was kind of humbling, actually, as well as beautiful, and would have been romantic-if Bree and I had any time for that on this trip. At one point, she did look over at me and say, “Where there’s a will!”

We got to Babb just after noon on Saturday. Deputy Steve Mills kindly agreed to drive up from the sheriff’s office in Cut Bank, saving us about seventy-five miles on twisting country roads, more than an hour’s trip.

Mills was loose and amiable, and answered our very first question without being asked.

“Met my wife while I was on holiday here from Manchester. Fishing trip, of all things. Twelve years ago, and never looked back,” he said in his proper English. “Once this place grabs hold of you, it doesn’t let go. You’ll see, I’m quite sure. I used to call myself Stephen, not Steve.”

We followed Mills south on 89, past the Blackfeet Reservation, to the tip of Lower St. Mary Lake.

From there, he took an unmarked dirt road for another mile and a half, until we came to a mostly overgrown track on the right.

The side road was partitioned with two police sawhorses, one of them thrown over on its side. I wondered how effective these had been against the likes of CNN and God only knew who else had wanted to visit.

High wheatgrass brushed against the sides of the car as we drove back several hundred yards, then onto a cleared acre or more of land.

Tyler Bell’s cabin certainly wasn’t deluxe, but it was no Unabomber shack either. He had sided it with natural red cedar that blended nicely into the landscape. It was small and nestled in the crook of a west-flowing river, with a gorgeous view of the mountains in the distance.

I could certainly see why someone would choose this place to settle-so long as they had no need for human contact, and maybe murdered people for a living.