The Poacher's Son (Mike Bowditch 1)

command post. There hadn’t been a manhunt like this in Maine in years.
    Lieutenant Malcomb scarcely acknowledged me as we drove. He smelled strongly of cigarettes. Kathy Frost had told me he’d started smoking again after his wife died last fall.
    “I got a phone call this morning you should know about,” he said. “A man says you harassed him and his son this morning on Indian Pond.”
    “Anthony DeSalle,” I said.
    “Tell me what happened.”
    I straightened up in my seat. “He was putting in a boat at the public landing with his son. I checked his license and registration. I cited him for not having adequate PFDs. He didn’t appreciate being cited. That’s about it.”
    “He claims you were verbally threatening.”
    “Excuse me, Lieutenant, but that’s bullshit.” I tried unsuccessfully to keep the resentment out of my voice. “I think I displayed considerable restraint with Mr. DeSalle. He swore at me repeatedly in front of his little boy. I thought he might take a swing at me at one point. It doesn’t surprise me he made a complaint. I think Mr. DeSalle has problems with anger management.”
    I waited for the lieutenant to speak.
    “That’s my assessment, too,” he said at last. “The guy’s choice of language didn’t win any points with me, either. Maybe that kind of talk works down in Massachusetts.”
    “So what happens now?”
    “I’m not inclined to do anything for the moment, but if this De-Salle makes a complaint in writing, we’ll have to do some sort of investigation. The col o nel wants us to make internal affairs a priority these days. We can’t appear to be covering anything up.”
    The day was increasingly become surreal. In the context of what was going on, this thing with DeSalle was almost comical—almost. Unfounded or not, a citizen complaint could dog me for months. I didn’t need any more distractions.
    “Do you know anything about Deputy Twombley’s condition?” I asked.
    “Just some cuts and bruises,” he said.
    “The sheriff didn’t tell me what happened.”
    “A trooper found the cruiser off the road. It had gone off into a pretty deep ditch. That fool Twombley was handcuffed with his arms around a tree. He said your father attacked him, forced them off the road.”
    “Wasn’t my dad handcuffed? How did he get loose?”
    “Good question.”
    “He can’t have gone far on foot,” I said.
    “The trooper who found the crash saw a blood trail. Twombley says your dad was injured. He says your dad stole his shotgun and sidearm.”
    So my father was armed, bleeding, and on the run. Was there an outcome to this situation that wasn’t bad?
    The lieutenant’s cell phone rang. The person on the other end was the col o nel of the Maine Warden Service—that much I could figure out. But the lieutenant was so monosyllabic, I couldn’t follow the rest of the conversation at all. Not until my name came up. “I’ve got Mike Bowditch with me,” he said There was a long pause. “Yes, sir. I will.”
    Will what? I thought. Will take responsibility for him? Will keep him out of trouble?
    After he finished with the col o nel, the lieutenant checked in with the state police and Division B. I watched our speed increase with each new conversation. But we were still too far away from the scene—a solid half hour, at least—for blue lights and sirens.
    “They’re calling in the reinforcements,” he said at last. “I guess they’ve got Charley Stevens up there in his plane already. You know Charley?”
    “Yes, sir,” I said uneasily.
    Charley Stevens was the retired warden pi lot who showed up at the Dead River Inn on the night of my father’s arrest two years earlier. He was something of a legendary character in the history of the Maine Warden Service—one of those people who is always smaller in person than you expect, given the size of his reputation. I knew he’d retired up around Flagstaff Pond and still helped out the department with his Super Cub, searching for missing hikers, doing overflight moose surveys, that sort of thing. So it was no surprise he was assisting with the manhunt.
    What I didn’t tell the lieutenant was the Charley Stevens and my dad had a long history together, or that the retired pi lot, more than anyone, was probably responsible for my joining the Warden Service. It was a long story and a bad memory, especially under the circumstances.
    Lieutenant Malcomb reached into his breast pocket for a piece of gum but didn’t offer