Northern Lights

"You blame yourself ?"
    "I'm the only one who came out of that alley alive." Temper died and left his eyes dull and tired. "Who else is there to blame? Turn off your recorder. We're done here."
    Max leaned forward, shut off the machine. "I'm sorry to have hit a sore spot. There's not much public around here, but what there is has a right to know."
    "So you guys always say. I need to get back to work."
    Max picked up the recorder, tucked it away, then rose. "I, ah, need a picture to run with the story." Nate's silent stare had Max clearing his throat. "Carrie can come find you a little later. She's the photographer. Thanks for your time. And . . . good luck with the snowshoeing."
    When he was alone, Nate sat very still. He waited for the rage, but it wouldn't come back. He'd have welcomed it, the wild, blinding heat of fury. But he stayed cold.
    He knew what would happen if he stayed frozen. He got up, his movements slow and controlled. He stepped out, picked up a two-way.
    "I've got to be out awhile," he told Peach. "Something comes up, you can reach me on the two-way or my cell."
    "Weather's coming in," she told him. "Looks to be a bad one. You don't want to stray so far you're not tucked back in by dinnertime."
    "I'll be back." He walked out into the entry, piled on his gear. He kept his mind a blank as he got into his car and drove. He pulled over again in front of Hopp's house, walked to her door and knocked.
    She answered, wearing a pair of reading glasses on a chain over her thick corduroy shirt. "Ignatious. Come on in."
    "No, thanks. Don't ever ambush me like that again."
    Her fingers ran up and down her eyeglass chain as she studied his face. "Come in, we'll talk."
    "That's all I have to say. All I'm going to say."
    He turned, left her standing in the doorway.
    He drove out of town, pulling over when he was clear of houses. There were some people skating on the lake. He imagined they'd be coming in soon, as the light was already going. Farther out on the plate of ice was somebody's ramshackle ice-fishing house.
    He didn't see Meg's plane. He hadn't seen her since they'd watched the northern lights.
    He should go back, do what he was paid to do. Even if what he was paid to do wasn't a hell of a lot. Instead, he found himself driving on.
    When he reached Meg's, her dogs were standing at alert, guarding
    the house. He climbed out, waited to see what their policy on unexpected company might be.
    Their heads cocked, almost in unison, then they loped forward with a friendly edge to their barks. After some leaping and circling, one of them raced off toward the doghouse, bounded up the steps and through the doorway. And came back carrying a huge bone in its mouth.
    "What's that from? A mastodon?"
    It was gnarled and chewed and slobbered on, but Nate took it, deducing the game, and hurled it like a javelin.
    They took off, bumping and bashing each other like a couple of football players racing for the pass. They dived into the snow, came up covered with it. The bone was clamped in both of their jaws now. After a quick and spirited tug-of-war, they pranced back as if they were harnessed together.
    "Teamwork, huh?" He took the bone again, hurled it again and watched the replay.
    He was on his fourth pass when the dogs raced away from him, making beelines for the lake. Seconds later, he heard what they had. As the rumble of engine grew, Nate followed the path of the dogs down to the lake.
    He saw the red flash and the dull glint of the lowering sun on the glass. To Nate's eye she seemed to be coming in too fast, too low. He expected her skis to catch on the treetops at best, for her nose to crash into the ice at worst.
    The noise swallowed everything. With nerves dancing over his skin, he watched her circle, angle, and slide down on the ice. Then there was silence so complete he thought he could hear the air she'd displaced sighing down again.
    Beside him the dogs quivered, then bunched, then leaped from snow to ice. They sprawled and slid and barked in utter and obvious joy when the door opened. Meg jumped down, her boots ringing. She squatted, allowed herself to be licked while she energetically rubbed fur. When she straightened, she grabbed a pack out of the plane. And only then did she look at Nate.
    "Somebody else crash fenders?" she called out.
    "Not that I know of."
    With the dogs dancing around her, she crossed the short span of ice, climbed up the slight slope of snow. "Been here long?"
    "Few minutes."
    "Your