The night suddenly split wide open as Maxine awoke from her customary sleeping place in the doorway of Joe’s office and barked furiously at the front door, the fur on her neck and back bristled up like a feral hog’s. Joe, Marybeth, and Sheridan all turned to the door, and Lucy scrambled from the couch to join them.
“Maxine!” Joe commanded. “Maxine, stop it!”
But the dog kept barking, her barks echoing sharply through the house. She clearly thought somebody was outside.
“What is it?” Marybeth asked Lucy. “Was there a knock?”
“I thought I heard something hit the door,” Lucy said, looking away from the television. “It sounded like a little rock hit it.”
Joe slipped away and strode across the living room. It wouldn’t be that unusual to have a night visitor; people often showed up late to report an incident or turn themselves in. But that usually happened in the fall, during hunting season, not in the spring.
He clicked on the porch light and opened the door. No one. He stepped outside on the porch, Maxine on his heels. The only thing he could see, in the distance, was a pair of red taillights growing smaller on Bighorn Road traveling east, toward the mountains, away from town.
“What was it, honey?” Marybeth asked.
Joe shook his head. “Nobody here now, but it looks like someone was.”
“Dad,” Lucy said, coming outside with her sister, “there’s something on the door.”
“Oh My God,” Sheridan gasped, her hands covering her mouth. She recognized it.
So did Joe, and he was taken aback.
A small dead animal had been pinned to the front door by an old steak knife with a weathered grip. The creature was long and slim, ferretlike, with a black stripe down its back. It was a Miller’s weasel, a species once thought extinct. It was the animal that had led to Sheridan being terrorized years before, and Marybeth being shot.
And somebody who knew about both had stuck one to his front door.
11
THE NEXT MORNING JOE WENT FOR A RUN, FED THE horses, retrieved the newspaper, walked the girls out to the school bus (via the back door, so they wouldn’t have to see the Miller’s weasel on the front), and paced back and forth from the living room to the kitchen, waiting for eight A.M., when he called headquarters in Cheyenne and asked for Randy Pope. He was angry.
“The director is in a meeting,” Pope’s receptionist said, her tone clipped. Joe didn’t think he liked Pope’s receptionist; there was something off-putting and chilly about her.
“Can you please get him out of it?”
“Is this an emergency?”
It is for me, Joe thought. So he said, “Yes,” knowing Pope wouldn’t agree.
Joe listened to Glen Campbell sing about the Wichita lineman while he held. The music was another addition since Pope had taken over, but the choice of songs belied not only another era, but another planet.
Pope came on. “Make it quick, Joe.”
“Someone killed a Miller’s weasel and stuck it to my front door last night,” Joe said. “I tried the emergency number there in Cheyenne last night and they told me you were not to be disturbed.”
“That’s right, Joe,” Pope said, an edge in his voice. “I was at a dinner at the governor’s mansion. It was a get-to-know-you dinner, and I informed dispatch I was not to be interrupted.”
Joe sighed. “Randy, if you’re going to be my supervisor and require me to get authorization from you for every move I make, you need to be available. Either that, or loosen up the reins and let me do my job.”
Marybeth passed by the doorway to his office holding the newspaper. She cocked an eyebrow, cautioning him.
“That would be Director Pope,” Pope said, his voice flat. “Tell me again what happened and what you want to do?” Joe could discern he was measuring his words carefully. Joe vowed to try to do the same. Every time he talked with Pope he ran the risk of saying something that could get him reprimanded or suspended.
“There is a dead Miller’s weasel stuck to my front door with a knife . . .”
“That house is Game and Fish property,” Pope interjected. “It doesn’t belong to you personally.”
Joe stopped pacing and shut his eyes. This is what Pope did, his method—he’d say something so blatant and obvious that it killed the purpose of the conversation in the first place.
“I know who the house belongs to,” Joe said wearily. “And since you own it, how about a new furnace? How about that? How about putting some insulation in the walls and sealing up all of the cracks where the wind blows through?”
Marybeth was hovering in the hall, listening and not trying to hide it. He could tell she was amused, but also concerned.
“Joe . . .”
“Right, you don’t want to talk about that,” Joe said to Pope. “So how about we talk about the animal on the front of my, um . . . our door. The Miller’s weasel is an endangered species, as you know. But it’s more than that. This is personal.”
“So what do you want me to do about it?”
Again, Joe closed his eyes for a moment, contemplating whether or not he should count to ten, or resign immediately. Or drive to Cheyenne and shoot Pope in the heart, which would be the best alternative—or at least the most satisfying.
“I need your authorization to investigate it,” Joe said quietly, trying to keep anger out of his voice. “You said in your memo that you want to be informed prior to me opening any new investigations, so I’m informing you. I want to ride to where the last colony of Miller’s weasels are, and see if I can find any evidence of who was up there to kill one. Then I might need some help from our investigators to trace the knife. I can start interviewing people around here today to see if anyone saw the vehicle or knows who did it.”
The line was silent for a moment. Joe could picture Pope sitting back in his chair, maybe putting his feet up on his desk.
“Joe?” Pope said.
“Yes?”
“There’s a big difference between asking for authorization and telling me what you’re going to do,” Pope said. “This is a good example of the kind of problem I have with you and some of the other game wardens. You act as if you’re the Lone Ranger in your district, that you and you alone decide what you’re going to do and how you’re going to do it. No other law-enforcement officer has that luxury, Joe. Everyone else has to get authorization to proceed. Can you imagine a sheriff’s deputy showing up at work in the morning and saying, ‘Gee, I feel like going out on the interstate highway today and catching speeders and playing highway patrolman instead of staying in the county and following up on all of these annoying complaints.’ Can you imagine that, Joe? It’s time you realized this isn’t how things are done in the real world, where we have to justify our existence to the legislature and the public. Why is it you think you’re special?”
“It’s my problem,” Joe said, opening the front door and staring at the animal pinned to it, the little body now starting to stiffen. “Like I said, it’s personal. Whoever did this didn’t just happen to find a Miller’s weasel. He went looking for it, and left it here as a message. I haven’t disturbed it since last night in case there are fingerprints or other evidence.”
Pope said, “Do you plan to chase the culprit down and shoot him like you did that outfitter in Jackson? Like you’re some kind of cowboy or gunfighter? That’s not how we do things anymore, Joe. This is a new agency, and a new era.”
A new agency and a new era. Another one of Pope’s catchphrases.
Joe had trouble finding the right words to say. He knew he was turning red. When he looked up at Marybeth, she was gesturing frantically for him to “zip it” by sealing her own mouth with an imaginary fastener.