Annette waited until the Stuarts were out of sight and then launched her canoe into the crystalline blue waters of the big lake. It was one of the great jewels of Quetico, a long, winding bottomless lake that stretched more than twenty miles across the northwest quadrant of the park. Paddlers experienced it like a series of small lakes connected by narrow passages, each as varied as if they had portaged through a series of four or five lakes.
Annette glided into the big water, turning south as she emerged from the portage bay. An hour later she stopped for lunch on a rocky beach. While Chaos romped and swam, she filleted the trout and left the entrails and skin on a high rock that jutted into the lake. Gulls were circling in the sky before she finished washing the knife and her dishes. Every trace of the fish parts left on the rock would be gone within an hour after they left.
The gentle breezes of morning gave way to mild afternoon winds out of the southwest as Annette entered the lake’s popular Narrows, a five-kilometer stretch where the shores pinched in to widths of less than fifty yards in places. The area was easily accessible from several popular entries into Quetico and featured good bass and walleye fishing, idyllic campsites perched atop the forested rocks on each shore, and protection from prevailing winds. It was one of the most popular destinations in the park.
As she pressed on, she considered how much farther to go. If the weather held and she worked at it, she could get within two hours or so of the island today. On the other hand, if she arrived too early in the morning, she’d already be there when Pender came along and that might look a little anxious, a granny trying too hard. Which was uncomfortably close to the truth, the more she thought about it.
No, she’d paddle on a while longer but camp early. The Sturgeon Narrows gave way to two kilometers of open water, then the lake narrowed, widened, and narrowed again. She stopped in the midafternoon, taking a campsite perched like an eagle’s aerie above a boulder-strewn stretch of waterway that separated the mainland from a sheer-sided island by maybe fifty feet. Getting her gear up to the campsite was a vigorous workout, but the view was worth it. Chaos romped in the forest while Annette set up her camp and gathered wood for an evening fire.
As she laid out neat stacks of kindling, starter tinder, and bigger pieces of wood sawed to length, she wondered where Pender was and what he was doing. An image came into her mind: What if he happened along tonight, trying to make time, running out of daylight, saw her fire? She imagined him hailing the campsite from down below, asking if he might pitch a tent somewhere, use her fire for a quick meal. Him coming up the slope, the two of them slowly recognizing each other, him kissing her like when they were kids . . .
Chaos charged out of the woods and ran a circle around her, tongue out, tail wagging. He sat next to the fire pit, tail still wagging, looking her in the eye, his body tense with anticipation.
“You like it here, I guess,” said Annette. She straightened from her labors and went to her food pack to set up her kitchen. The dog fell in beside her, step for step, still looking her in the eye, tongue still out, wet with saliva now.
“Oh, you like it here because you’re hungry, right?”
As she knelt to set up the stove on the rocks of the fire pit, Chaos snuggled next to her, expertly pushing his cold, wet nose under her arm, then tilting his face upward to lick her.
“Stop that, you rogue!” she laughed and pushed his face away from hers. “No French kissing on the first date.” He wagged his tail. “Or the second. Or any time with dogs, okay? Get it?” He wagged his tail as if in agreement, but she didn’t take him seriously.
Pender was nowhere near Annette at that moment. He was more than a day behind her, camped on a swampy little lake where his body gave out in the early afternoon. Healthy, he would have pressed on for hours, wouldn’t have stopped until he knew he could get to Annette’s island the next day.
But he wasn’t healthy. Seven hours of paddling and portaging had left him in anguish. His back ached and sent out shooting pains when he moved too far or too fast. It affected everything he did, attacking his will like a ruthless enemy wielding a white-hot knife. The route that followed his difficult portage that morning had looked easy on the topo map, but it played much harder. By the time he launched into this dark, swampy lake, he had nothing left. It was all he could do to load his canoe and begin scouring the shoreline for a place to camp. There were no established campsites on this lake. This was the kind of lake where only the desperate camped, the ones who ran out of daylight or energy or luck when they got here. Like Pender.
All he really wanted was solid ground a few feet above lake level. An open area where he could set up his tent would be nice. He’d cook over the gas stove again, no problem.
He settled for a point that sat three or four feet above water level and sloped gently upward for twenty yards or so, then gave way to a bog in an advanced state of atrophy. The point was covered with grasses and scrub, and held some late-season mosquitoes. He found a small flat area covered by grassy growth but free of woody brush. He pitched his tent in the knee-deep grass, hoping the soft vegetation might cushion his sleep. After that, he sank two sticks in the soft earth and put his boots on them to start drying out. Then he sat on a rock and slowly stretched his taut back muscles, arching, bending forward, turning gently from side to side. He lay on his back and pulled his knees to his chest, then repeated everything, over and over. It hurt like hell at first, but after he worked it for twenty minutes or so, his back loosened and the aching ebbed to a tolerable level.
He picked his way through the scrub and grass to explore what the point had to offer, which was pretty much nothing. It was a featureless, bland piece of real estate, one end dipped in a dreary lake with stained water, the other leading to a few sparse trees and acres of reeds and low-lying bog vegetation.
He found a rock that had two flat sides to cook on and set it up beside his sitting rock. As he boiled water for his freeze-dried dinner, he scribbled an emotional note to Annette in his journal and another to his daughter . . . in case he didn’t make it out alive. As he wrote, he realized how depressed he was, contemplating death when really, it was just discomfort he was suffering from. And he realized how important the rendezvous with Annette had become to him.
As I ponder my bleak circumstances, I realize that meeting you on the island is what I’ve been living for all these months, he wrote. I have nothing else, no other plan. I’m going to arrive late, but I hope you wait for me.
He ate in silence, gazing at the gloomy lake and the featureless scrub. He had camped in ugly places before, but this was the ugliest. He had contemplated his life under dark skies many times, but this was the darkest. He knew the sun would rise again, the clouds would move on, life would continue. But he didn’t try to deny the melancholy of the moment. What would it be like, he thought, to die here? How would it feel? Would he be angry that his life expired in such a dreary place? Especially knowing that if he had stayed on the other route he could die on a spectacular blue-water lake, in a campsite with a lovely view, tucked in among the red pines, with the breezes sifting like silk through long needles, loons calling to one another.
This would be a lonely place to die, your last view of the planet limited to the grass and scrub scratching your face as you lay on the ground, a grim sky overhead, damp air pushing the spindly stalks in rustling waves.
Would the wolves find him first, or would it be other scavengers? He had often thought he’d like to leave his body to Quetico’s wolves when his time came. He had heard them many times in his travels in the park, but like many trippers, he’d never seen one in the wild. He had always identified with them somehow. They lived alone when times were good. They dealt with the solitude, fended for themselves. Then they packed up when times were tough. They worked together to take down game too large for them to handle by themselves. They functioned as a team, these solitary creatures, until the seasons let them function alone.
It would be an honor to be consumed by wolves, Pender thought. So much better than rotting away in a box.
Annette woke to a clear sky and the knowledge that, if the weather held, she had an easy day ahead of her. Not even twenty kilometers to the island, less than twelve miles. A full spectrum of Quetico paddling: big water, a gentle creek, small lakes, short portages, beautiful scenery. An easy day to make good time and enjoy the most beautiful place on earth.
She spent twenty minutes casting a lure into the narrows as dawn broke. She didn’t catch anything, but that was okay with her. She treated herself to another hot breakfast. There was such a thing as too much fish.
She cooked pancakes and shared them with Chaos, knowing he’d burn off the calories easily on this day of many short portages and settling in a base camp with lots of room for running and exploration.
After washing her dishes, she paused for a luxurious moment to sit on the rocks overlooking the water and the island across the narrows. Chaos came to sit beside her, thrusting his head under her arm, making her pet him. She wondered what Pender would think of the dog. He might not like dogs. He might be allergic to them.
She wondered if he would show up. She thought he would. As a young man, he had taken his promises seriously. She wondered again what he would think when he saw her. Would he see the schoolgirl? The wrinkled granny? The loneliness? The lost dreams? Would he pity her? Think of the sexy young women back in Chicago?
Her eyes moistened. How silly to be so gloomy, she thought. It’s lunch with an old friend, not the continuation of a love affair. It will be good to talk to him, to hear his story. What it was like to be a big name in the restaurant business. To live in a million-dollar North Shore estate. To drive exotic cars, hobnob with women in designer clothes, talk to famous chefs.
As her mind wandered, a canoe came into view, coming from the south. When the paddler stopped below her perch, Annette could see he was a park ranger.
“Hello,” he called from below. He was a younger man, not more than thirty, nice looking, with that unassuming air that many men in rural Ontario had.
Annette returned his greeting and waved.
“Have you seen a solo canoeist in the last day or two?” the ranger asked. “Wenonah in Kevlar yellow? Middle-aged white male, maybe older?”
“No,” said Annette. In the back of her mind she wondered what Pender was paddling. Good God! Could he be in trouble with the law?
“Do I need to be concerned?” she asked.
“I don’t think so,” said the ranger. “Apparently he harassed some fishermen in the Boundary Waters, then ducked into Quetico. We’re just doing a courtesy check, but I don’t think there’s much chance we’ll see him.”
“What should I do if I see such a person?” Annette asked with a quizzical smile. What indeed?
The ranger shrugged. “I don’t know, really. Probably just avoid him.” He tipped his hat, wished Annette well, then continued north on the big lake. Annette wondered if he would encounter Pender. Pender would probably be paddling on this lake today. He could even be camped on the island across the way, but on the opposite side from her. Or he could be a few kilometers to the north or south. She wondered if he was the culprit they were after. It seemed possible. He’d taken revenge on the canoe racers who dumped him and smacked his boss hard enough to make him cry. He wasn’t someone who rolled with the punches, at least not right now.
She wondered what it would have taken for Pender to harass a couple of fishermen. Christy would wonder if he had turned into a homicidal maniac who attacked people like pit bulls attack dogs, just for the sport of it. But she knew he wasn’t. He wrote with the sensitivity of the young Pender she had known in college, and, while that Pender could drive anyone into a blind snit with his obstinacy, he was a poet and a lover at heart.
She wondered if he’d get apprehended and hauled out by the rangers before he got to their rendezvous. It would be heartbreaking, but somehow she didn’t think it would happen. For all his anger and vulnerability, he had an aura about him. Always had. He always landed on his feet.
She smiled to herself as she began breaking camp. What chance did a Quetico ranger have of nabbing Pender? And even if he did, the ranger would probably like him and forget about the whole thing. This was Canada, after all.