The Poacher's Son (Mike Bowditch 1)

fence was a heap of trash. I saw an empty tin for a canned ham and a Dunkin’ Donuts box and other refuse that I hadn’t noticed before.
    I stood there gazing at it. “Son of a bitch.”
    Kathy came up behind me. “There’s something else we need to talk about, Mike. The reason I was out this way was because we got another call from Anthony DeSalle. Have you lost your mind? You know better than to have contact with someone who’s made a complaint against you.”
    There was a buzzing sound in my head and I was having a hard time hearing her. It was the sound of the flies amplified about a hundred times.
    “It comes across as a pattern of harassment,” she said. “Mike, are you listening to me?”
    “He was trying to lure it in,” I said.
    “What? Who?”
    “Thompson. He knew I had a trap out there, but he was trying to lure it in so he could shoot it himself.”
    “The bear killed the man’s pig,” she said. “Cut him some slack.”
    “That was three days ago.”
    “He’s allowed to shoot a wild animal destroying his property.”
    “Not three days later he’s not.” I turned and started walking in the direction of the house. “He baited that bear and he shot it illegally. He broke the law.”
    Two medics came out of the kitchen door carry ing Thompson on a stretcher. His pant leg had been scissored off, and his wound was wrapped in a new white ban dage.
    I stepped in front of the EMTs, blocking their way. Thompson gave me a confused, boozy smile. “Is it dead?”
    “It’s dead.”
    “You shot it?”
    “Yes.”
    “Can I have the skin? I always wanted a bearskin rug.”
    It was all I could do not to punch him. “You didn’t tell me you were putting bait out. That’s illegal, you know.”
    His smile drooped at the corners. “It killed my pig.”
    “I don’t care.”
    “It was self-defense.”
    “The hell it was. You baited that bear.”
    “Excuse me, Warden,” said one of the medics. “Can we continue this conversation later?”
    “Get out of the way, Mike,” said Kathy Frost from behind me.
    “The man needs to go to the hospital,” said the other EMT.
    I pointed my finger at Thompson’s nose. His eyes bounced back and forth from my face to the shotgun in my other hand. “You broke the law, Thompson, and after they stitch up your leg, I’m taking you to jail.”
    “No, you’re not,” said Kathy in her hardest voice. “Come on, Mike. Let these men do their jobs.” Her fingers dug like talons into my shoulder. “Let these men do their jobs.”
    I stopped resisting and let her pull me back a step.
    We watched the EMTs carry Thompson to the ambulance. When they’d closed the back door and started the engine, Kathy released my shoulder. “You were out of line back there.”
    “Sorry,” I said. “Drunks just piss me off.”
    “You’re off duty. As of now.”
    “What? I said I was sorry.”
    “Fine. I accept your apology, but I still want you to go home. You’re on vacation as of to night.”
    “What the hell does that mean? Are you suspending me?”
    “Only if you force me.”
    I opened my mouth to speak.
    She held up her long, callused hand. “We’re not discussing this. You’re going home, and you’re going to get some rest. You have tomorrow off, and then you’re on vacation for a week. We’ll talk about the DeSalle complaint when you get back. Maybe by then you’ll have your head together.”
    “What the hell does that mean?”
    “It means we’re all sorry about your father, and we understand how freaked out you must be about it. But if the situation’s screwing up your judgment, then it’s better if you’re out of uniform for the time being.”
    “What about the bear?”
    “I’ll take care of it.” She gestured at my truck. “Go home, Mike. I mean it.”
    Her expression was unflinching. I knew I’d crossed some sort of line with her, and I wasn’t sure how it had happened.
    Halfway across the lawn I turned and said, with half a smile, “You wouldn’t really suspend me?”
    But the look on my sergeant’s face gave me no comfort.
     
    That night I got really drunk for the first time since I’d become a game warden. I took out a half-empty fifth of Jack Daniels a college friend had left behind the last time he’d rolled through town, and I sat on the porch. A mist was rising off the marsh, and the smell of tidal mud and sea salt was thick in the air. A killdeer kept flying back and forth along the creek making a hysterical cry as if it