Tamarack County

CHAPTER 13

Stephen looked up from the television when his father walked in. “Were you able to track him?” he asked.

His father said, “Only so far, then I lost his trail.”

Stephen had been watching a basketball game, Notre Dame playing St. John’s, hoping Anne, who loved the Fighting Irish, might be tempted to come out of hiding upstairs and watch with him.

Stephen hit mute. “Where?”

“Where the White Iron River feeds into the lake. A lot of tracks there, all mixed up.” His father sat on the sofa. From the coffee table, he picked up the bag of Cheetos Stephen had been munching on, grabbed a fistful for himself, and put the bag back down.

“Did you find Dexter’s head?” Stephen asked.

“Nope.”

“What did you do with his body?”

His father licked the yellow Cheeto residue from his fingers. “Put it in a big trash bag and put the bag in the Daychilds’ utility shed. The dog belonged to Stella’s brother, and he’s just about to finish up a sixty-day stretch at the county jail. When he’s out, he can decide what he wants to do with the body.”

Stephen scooped a handful of Cheetos from the bag and fed them into his mouth one by one. “Doesn’t make sense, Dad, that kind of cruelty.”

“When we know who did it, we’ll understand more. Where are Jenny and Waaboo?”

“They took Trixie and went sledding.”

His father nodded toward the television screen. “Who’s winning?”

“Notre Dame.”

“Does Annie know?”

“I told her. She wasn’t interested.”

His father shook his head and said quietly to himself, “Damn.” The ring tone on his cell phone chimed, and he pulled it from the holster on his belt. He glanced at the number on the display, said, “It’s Marsha. I gotta take this.” He got up from the sofa and went into the kitchen.

Stephen could hear an occasional question on his father’s end, but mostly there was just the silence of listening.

“I’ll be right over,” his father said, then called toward the living room, “Gotta go,” and Stephen was alone again.

He considered going back to watching the basketball game, but his heart wasn’t in it. He thought about calling Gordy Hudacek and maybe playing some video games. Finally he settled for texting Marlee.

Where RU?

A minute later, she replied, School. Play practice. Done @ 1. Drive?

No car, he texted back.

Got my moms.

Great. CU @ 1.

He’d just ended his message when the house phone rang, and he bounded from the sofa and jogged into the kitchen to answer.

“O’Connors’ residence. This is Stephen.”

“Hello, Stephen. It’s Hank Wellington, from Thunder Bay.”

Henry Meloux’s son. Stephen was instantly concerned.

“Is Henry okay?”

“He’s fine. But he would like to talk to your father.”

“My dad’s not here right now.”

Wellington spoke to someone on his end, then said into the phone to Stephen, “He’ll talk to you.”

“Great. Put him on.”

“Boozhoo, Stephen. It is good to hear your voice.”

“Henry? Is that you?”

“Let me check.” A moment of silence. “Yes.”

He could feel the old man smiling, could imagine his face cut by more lines than a tortoiseshell.

“Is everything okay?” Stephen asked.

“Here,” the old man said. “It is there that worries me.”

“Everything’s fine,” Stephen said.

“That is strange,” Meloux said. “Because I have been dreaming. The same dream three nights now.”

Meloux fell silent, but Stephen didn’t ask about the dream. He knew that when the old Mide was ready, he would tell him.

“Stephen, have you dreamed?”

“No, Henry. No vision dreams anyway.”

Meloux said, “If you do, I want to know the dream. I want to know if it is my dream.”

A long silence followed, and Stephen waited patiently for the old man to continue.

“I saw an evil thing,” the old man finally said. “A majimanidoo.”

Evil spirit, Stephen translated. Devil.

“This majimanidoo is always in the shadows. I cannot see it clearly.”

Stephen almost blurted a question-What was this devil doing?-but he’d learned a long time ago to bridle his impulses when he was dealing with Henry Meloux, to trust that the old man was guiding him.

“What worries me, Stephen, is what this majimanidoo is up to. In my dream, it is always watching your house.”

“Just watching?”

“Yes. But its heart is dark, Stephen, so black I cannot see into it, and I am afraid of what is there.”

“Do you think we’re in danger, Henry?”

“I do not know, Stephen.”

Then Stephen had another thought. “Is it maybe someone we care about, Henry? Do you know the Daychilds, Marlee and Stella?”

“I know them,” Meloux replied.

“Somebody killed their dog last night and cut off his head.”

The old man’s end of the line was silent a long time. “I will dream some more,” he said at last. “Will you tell your father about this majimanidoo?”

“I will, Henry.”

“And, Stephen?”

“Yes?”

“I want you to dream, too. Maybe you can see this evil clearer because you are there and you are young and you have the gift.”

Stephen had visions sometimes, dream visions, but they always came unbidden. He didn’t know if he could dream on demand.

“How do I do that, Henry?”

“When you go to sleep, clear your mind and leave it open. It will be an invitation.”

“I’ll try, Henry.” He was about to say good-bye when he thought of something else. “Henry?”

“Yes?”

“Annie’s home. She’s having some trouble, personal problems, and she needs a place to be by herself to sort things out. I was thinking . . . well . . .”

“My door is always unlocked,” the old man said.

“Migwech, Henry,” he said, offering the old man an Ojibwe thank-you. “I’ll let her know.”

Stephen hung up and stood at the kitchen sink, staring at the faucet, not seeing the shards of broken sunlight that came off the stainless steel but seeing instead Dexter’s shaggy, headless body lying on white snow spattered with blood. The work of a madman or a majimanidoo.

“Who was that?”

He turned and found Anne crossing the kitchen toward the refrigerator. She was wearing a gray sweat suit and her feet were bare.

“Henry Meloux.”

“I thought you said he was in Thunder Bay.”

“He is. He wanted to talk to Dad.”

She’d opened the refrigerator door, but now she stood looking at her brother with concern. “Is he all right?”

“Yes. He’s been having dreams that worry him.”

“What kind of dreams?”

“Seeing evil spirits here, watching our house.”

“Coming from Henry Meloux, that’s serious stuff. Does he know what it means?”

“He doesn’t. But I’m thinking maybe it has to do with the Daychilds.”

“Because of their dog?”

“Yeah.”

Anne nodded, giving weight to the consideration, then she smiled. “And because you’re stuck on Marlee?”

Stephen didn’t bother to argue with that assessment of his relationship. He simply said, “Yeah, maybe.”

Anne reached into the refrigerator and brought out a carton of yogurt. When she turned back to Stephen, he saw that a darkness had fallen across her face. “Or maybe,” she said, not meeting his eyes, “it’s a different kind of evil altogether.”

He had no idea what that meant, but figured it came from whatever demon his sister had chosen to wrestle with alone. He remembered Meloux’s offer. “Annie, Henry says it’s okay if you want to use his place for a while.”

She took a spoon from the drawer, opened her yogurt, tossed the lid into the garbage pail under the sink, started out of the kitchen, then turned back and said, “I’ll go there tomorrow.”

“After church?”

Anne thought about that and finally said, “I don’t go to church anymore.”

She left the room, left Stephen standing thunderstruck, left him suddenly afraid that the wall that stood between what was evil in the world and what was good had begun to crumble.