Tamarack River Ghost Read Online Free PDF Page B

out poachers she enjoyed, when the quiet of the night surrounded her and the never-ending phone calls, reports to complete, and meetings to attend were for another day. On these quiet nights, she had time to think, to organize her ideas, and even scribble down a few notes in a brown, leather-covered journal she always had with her in the truck.
    KA-BOOM,” and a few seconds later, another “KA-BOOM.” Natalie nearly spilled her coffee when she heard the rifle shots. Quickly, she threw the rest of the coffee out the open window, started up her pickup, and headed down the country road in the direction she thought the sound had come from. It was difficult to locate the source of sounds as they echoed through the valley. Perhaps this night she might be lucky and find the poacher in the act, field-dressing the deer or dragging it to his vehicle.
    Father and son turned their pickup into their driveway and parked behind the barn, out of sight from the road. They each grabbed one of the buck’s legs and hauled the animal into the barn, where they tied a rope around its neck, tossed the rope over a small beam, and hauled the deer up so its back feet were just off the barn floor. They did the same with the doe. The father held a small flashlight in his mouth so he could see what he was doing yet not cast enough light to raise suspicion from anyone driving along the road this time of night.
    “Nice pair of deer,” said the son.
    “Yup, nice deer. I’d say the buck would be about 180 pounds, the doe around 150.” The two deer hung side by side.
    “Looks like this oughta do it for a while,” the father said. “All we gotta do now is skin ’em and cut up and freeze the meat. Yup, we’re not gonna go hungry this winter.”
    Warden Karlsen drove slowly along the road, watching and listening, looking for a light, listening for another shot. But the countryside was once again quiet, eerily so.
    She drove by a rather run-down-looking farm and didn’t see the sliver of light coming from the old, unpainted gray barn, so she kept driving.

5. Tamarack River Valley
    Josh parked his Ford Ranger in the Ames County Courthouse parking lot. He had an appointment with the county agricultural agent, Ben Wesley, whom he hadn’t seen since he graduated from college. Now that Farm Country News had given him a promotion and transferred him from the Illinois bureau to the home office in Willow River, he was reacquainting himself with his home county. Josh grew up on a small farm west of Link Lake, twelve miles from Willow River; his folks, now retired, still lived on the home farm. He would now have an opportunity to occasionally visit them. As a 4-H member, Josh had gotten to know the agricultural agent well. He had fond memories of showing cattle at the Ames County Fair and attending the end-of-the-year 4-H achievement program, always held in the courtroom.
    When Josh arrived in Willow River a week earlier, he drove down Main Street and noted the changes that had taken place since he’d left the county. He saw that the population had increased a little, to 3,010, but it was still a small place when compared to cities like Green Bay, Oshkosh, Madison, and Milwaukee. The first thing he spotted was the new Willow River High School, on the west end of town. He noticed a second stoplight as well. For years, Willow River had the only stoplight in all of Ames County. Driving slowly down Main Street, he saw what had been a clothing store and now housed All Such and More, a place that sold used stuff, everything from clothes to books, flower vases to dishes. He stopped there and bought an almost-new leather jacket for five dollars—he’d seen one like it in a Madison store for two hundred dollars.
    As he slowly drove down Main Street he saw the offices of Jensen, Jensen and O’Malley, a law firm that had been in Willow River since the1920s. He drove past the two taverns on Main Street, there since he came to Willow River as a kid with his folks: