The Poacher's Son (Mike Bowditch 1)

beach, but there wasn’t a soul in sight.
    As we drew up to the dock, a door opened at the main lodge and Russ Pelletier stepped out into the sun. He wore blue jeans and a paint-spattered canvas workshirt that looked too hot for this weather. On his belt was a big knife in a sheath. He didn’t raise his hand or greet us in any way, but remained standing there, smoking a cigarette on the doorstep, while the plane came to a stop.
    “He doesn’t look too happy to see us, now does he?” said Charley.
    “Not really.”
    We climbed out of the plane and Charley tied a rope to a cleat to keep it from floating off. Side by side we walked up to the main building.
    “Morning!” said Charley.
    Pelletier’s mustache needed trimming, and his oil-black hair hung over his forehead in heavy bangs. “Hello, Charley.”
    “Where are all your guests?”
    “Left this morning. Don’t have any more until Friday. You always said I should probably close this place in August, given how little business I get.” He gave a smirk. The full sunlight showed the nicotine stains on his teeth. “But I guess I won’t have to worry about that problem soon, will I?”
    “I guess not.”
    He looked at me over Charley’s shoulder. “You’re here about Brenda, right? She’s over at Jack’s cabin.”
    “You fired her then,” I said.
    “No, she quit. She did it in front of my guests last night. Classy as ever. She doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave, though.”
    “We’ll talk with her,” said Charley pleasantly. “But first maybe you’ll invite us in for a cup of coffee.”
    Pelletier exhaled a cloud of smoke. Was it really possible that he and Truman had set my dad up? I remembered the story Brenda had told about him—how he’d tried to rape her. At this moment, he looked capable of all the bad things she’d claimed.
    “Sure,” he said finally. “Come on in.”
    There wasn’t a trace of welcome in his voice.
     
    We sat at one of the long tables in the dining room, across from him. Through the big plate-glass window that made up the southern wall of the room I could see the aluminum canoes on the beach and Charley’s plane moored at the dock.
    “So I guess you’re looking for a new cook,” I said.
    “Why? You want a job?” Pelletier crushed the butt of a cigarette in an ashtray. “Doreen said she’d help me out until I found someone.”
    His hatchet-faced ex-wife didn’t strike me as the charitable type. He must have promised her a mint in exchange for her help. “It sounds like you won’t miss Brenda,” I said.
    “And she won’t miss me. The only reason she stayed here the last couple years was Jack, the damned cradle-robber. What kind of fifty-something-year-old guy hooks up with a girl that young? It’s disgusting, is what it is.”
    “She was devoted to him?”
    “That’s not the word I’d use. They fought like cats and dogs, but she loved him. Women have always thrown themselves at the guy, for some reason. And I think he loved her, which was a rare thing for Jack. He’s always had some woman in his bed, but he never gave a shit for any of them.” Pelletier’s red-veined eyes met mine. “Except your mother.”
    Charley took a sip of coffee and glanced out the window. “Something’s been bothering me, Russell, and I hope you can help me sort it out. You think Jack killed Jonathan Shipman and Bill Brodeur, right?”
    “Don’t you?”
    Charley scratched his chin. “That’s the thing of it. If he did, I can’t figure out why.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Well, you’re the one with the grudge against Wendigo, not Jack Bowditch.”
    Pelletier leaned forward. “Are you trying to imply something, Charley?”
    “I’m just saying that Jack’s motive doesn’t seem all that strong to me.”
    “You’ve been hanging around this kid too long. I think Jack had plenty of motive.”
    “How so?”
    “Wendigo is shutting me down. That means they’re kicking him out, too. I think he got drunk and pissed off, and he decided he was going to do something about it. I think it was a stupid spur-of-the-moment thing to do—which is the story of Jack’s life, if you ask me.”
    I said, “So how did my father know Brodeur was taking Shipman out the back way?”
    Pelletier glared at me. “What’s that?”
    “Whoever killed those men knew Brodeur was driving Shipman out that logging road. How did my dad know that? Who could’ve told him?”
    “How should I know?” Pelletier asked.