When I got to the sixth and last cabin, I saw the same kind of mess, and the same kind of emptiness. Every single renter had left. I didn’t imagine any of them would be sending me money, either. Not that I blamed them. If federal agents woke me up to search the place I was renting, I’d stiff the landlord, too.
The only consolation, I thought, was that I wouldn’t have to hear as many snowmobiles for a while.
But wait. There was an envelope on the table. I opened it up and found three hundred-dollar bills. Benjamin Franklin, Leon’s best friend. I couldn’t help smiling.
When I had cleaned up the place, I stood in the center of the room and looked at it. It was the last cabin he had built. The biggest and the best. There was a real kitchen, separated from the rest of the cabin, with its own woodstove. There was even a second floor in this cabin, with a balcony overlooking the living room. My father had built the fireplace with all the stones he had moved or dug up while making the other cabins. Standing there in that cabin, I actually started to feel human again, so I figured I’d stay a while. I brought some wood in and made a fire. I even found a can of good coffee in the kitchen. After I had made a cup and sat there looking out at the snow, I couldn’t stop myself from leaning back on the couch. The warmth from the fire felt too good. In less than a minute, I started to fall asleep. In a half-dream, I was behind Bruckman’s snowmobile again, sliding over the snow.
The tree coming up fast. I can’t avoid it. I’m going to slam into it.
Impact. A loud bang like a gunshot.
I sat up straight, instantly awake. The front door opened and Vinnie walked into the cabin.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said. “You woke me up.”
“Who was laying on the horn in my driveway a couple hours ago?” he said.
“I thought you said Indians only need three hours of sleep every night”
“I never said that,” he said.
“Must have been somebody else.”
“You been cleaning up after the deputies?” he said. He looked around the room.
“Yeah, did you see them this morning?”
“They were just finishing up when I got home,” he said. “They stopped at my place and asked me some questions.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I told them you had a major drug ring going for years. About time they busted you.”
“That’s it,” I said. “No more freebies for you.”
“I brought you some beer,” he said. The bottles clanked in his hands. “Sorry, they’re American.” He gave me a bottle, opened one up for himself and pulled a chair over from the kitchen table.
“Thanks,” I said.
“I figured you’d be having a tough day,” he said. “God, you look terrible.”
“Thanks again. Wait a minute, are you drinking beer?”
“It’s non-alcoholic,” he said, holding up the bottle. “I tried one a couple years ago, figured it was time to try again. See if they got any better at making it.”
“So how is it?”
“I think they need a couple more years.” He tried to screw the cap back on the bottle but couldn’t quite get it to work. “So, now what?” he said. “You’re not still looking for her, are you?”
“Not really,” I said. “There’s no place to look anymore. Why do you ask?”
“I’m just wondering why you’ve gone to this much trouble. You only just met her that one night.”
“Vinnie, she got kidnapped and it was my fault” My head started hurting again, just having to say the words. “She came to me for help and I fucked up. What do you want me to do, just forget it?”
“She was in trouble long before she got to you.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said. “She chose her own path. Step by step. All that shit again.”
“All right,” he said. “All right. Let’s not go through this again.”
“You brought it up,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s just…”
“What?”
“You’re killing yourself over this. And it’s not your fault. No matter what you think. That’s all.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Okay,” he said.
A long silence reigned. We watched the last of the fire go out in the fireplace.
“Alex, this has got to be the best fucking cabin I have ever seen in my life,” he said. “Your father was a genius.”
“He got pretty good at it,” I said.
“You’ll sell it to me one day, won’t you?”
“When you’ve got a million dollars, come talk to me.”
“After all I’ve done for you,” he said.
“Make it two million.”
I finished my beer and then he helped me clean up the place a little more. I could never leave that cabin without making it look perfect. One more reason to never live there myself. When we went back outside, the sun was making another rally, fighting its way through the snowclouds. A single brilliant beam swept slowly over the snow-covered trees like a searchlight.
“What are you gonna do now?” he said.
I thought about it. There weren’t many options. “See what Jackie made for dinner,” I said. “Read the paper.”
“Don’t you get sick of that place? I’m starting to hate going there.”
“It’s either that or sit in my cabin,” I said. “At least this way I have somebody to annoy.”
“Save me a seat by the fire,” he said. “I’ll be in later.”
I drove down to the Glasgow. You’ve got some life, I said to myself. A cabin and a bar and snow up to your ass. When I walked into the place, Jackie took one look at me and winced. “You look terrible,” he said.
“That seems to be the consensus,” I said.
I sat in that bar for the rest of the day. There was nothing more I could do about Dorothy. I didn’t even have any renters to take care of anymore, thanks to the agents. I just sat there by the fire, feeling almost normal again, except for the fact that everything hurt and it took me five minutes to get up to go to the bathroom.
When the sun had gone down, the place started to fill up. Snowmobilers came in fresh from the trail, their faces red from the cold.
The men were all talking about their snowmobiles and where they would ride the next day. There was laughter. Somebody lit a cigarette next to me.
The smell of it. The smoke.
Dark outside. The sound of the men in the room.
It all came back to me. The night she was here in this room. Sitting right here talking to her. The way she looked into the fire when she was talking.
She was so afraid.
I know this. It is not a new thing to me. But now it hits me in the stomach. Now I feel it myself.
She was so afraid.
I thought it was Bruckman she was afraid of. The boyfriend she ran out on. The usual story.
But no.
It was something bigger. Bruckman was nothing.
It was Molinov. I didn’t even know his name that night, didn’t know that he existed. But now I see it. It all comes to me at once. It runs down my spine and into my gut.
What did she say about the wolves? You shoot the wolf closest to your door. But there are other wolves behind him. Bigger wolves. With bigger teeth.
Molinov was the bigger wolf. That’s who she was afraid of all along, from the very beginning.
And now he has her.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
A voice, from far away: “Alex.”
I came back. I was in the Glasgow Inn again, sitting in front of the fire.
“Welcome back to planet Earth,” Jackie said. “Do you want dinner or not?”
“I need the phone,” I said. “Can you bring it over here?”