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  “Maybe for a day,” he said. “But we thought you could hang out up there for a few days, maybe more. Get lucky and catch the poachers in the act.”

  “Then what do I do?”

  “We’ll keep a car with two men at the base of the trail as backup,” he said. “You call them when you make contact. Keep tailing them until our guys can nab them.”

  “It’s a damn big mountain,” I said.

  “The target area isn’t,” he said. “They’re driving up a trail access road east of Banner Elk off 105, we think.”

  “You think?”

  “That’s what the hikers did when they found the carcasses,” he said.

  “Let me get this straight,” I said. “It’s January. I’m about to freeze my balls off on my own property, and you want me to hang out on Grandfather Mountain hoping that I’ll stumble across some poachers who can mountain climb and navigate terrain that the WRC can’t. Is that about it?”

  “Pretty much,” he said. “I know it doesn’t sound like much fun.”

  “Is it poaching because of where it’s taking place?”

  “That and the season is closed,” he said. “Double trouble if we can catch them, but mostly we can’t allow a precedent to be set. Grandfather is sacred land around here. No development and no hunting is part of its charm. It’s an important part of tourism in this part of the state.”

  “I can understand that,” I said. “My problem is I’ve never been up there. We meant to check it out during fall foliage, but time slipped away from us.”

  “We’ve got the target area narrowed down fairly well,” he said. “Your issue is going to be who you’re dealing with. They won’t be your average middle-aged beer drinking hillbilly. They’ll be young and fit, armed with rifles. We don’t want you to confront them, just track them for us.”

  “I don’t think I can stand staying up there overnight,” I said. “I’d need shelter.”

  “They can’t possibly stand it either,” he said. “Probably driving up the access road before daylight, making their kill, and coming out before dark.”

  “Why don’t you just park up there and see them coming in?”

  “It’s not against the law to drive up there,” he said. “We want to catch them in a crime. Put a stop to their activities. Make a big fuss about it to deter any future efforts to hunt up there. The governor has even taken an interest in this.”

  “Grandfather Mountain in January,” I said. “I once spent my winters in the Bahamas.”

  “You can always say no,” he said.

  “I should say no,” I said. “But since we talked last I got full approval to help you guys if and when you asked. If I turn you down now, she might change her mind.”

  “Does that mean you’ll do it?”

  “Christ, Rominger,” I said. “Grandfather Fucking Mountain in January. Couldn’t you have found a meth lab down in the valley someplace?”

  “Maybe next time,” he said.

  “Son of a bitch,” I said. “Give me a day or two to outfit properly. I’m in.”

  “Thanks, man,” he said. “And good luck.”

  We worked out some details concerning communication before he left. I didn’t feel like splitting any more wood. I walked up the hill to the cabin and told Brody what I’d agreed to.

  Eleven

  She said that I was a glutton for punishment, before digging through the closet and dresser for my warmest outdoor clothing. I didn’t own actual ski wear, as many did in the High Country. I didn’t much care for skiing. I did have long johns, heavy outer pants to wear over jeans and thickly insulated flannel shirts. I was most worried about my feet. My hiking boots weren’t insulated, though they were waterproof. I had one good pair of wool socks. I’d need to wear them over the top of regular socks.

  I had a decent pair of warm gloves, but they’d never been tested in the conditions I was about to face. I had a warm hat and a hooded jacket to keep my head covered. I couldn’t get too carried away in search of warmth because I needed to maintain freedom of movement. I didn’t plan to sit in one spot and hope the poachers came to me. I’d listen and observe, then walk towards any sign of them. They wouldn’t know I was there. One reason is that I’d be moving like smoke. The second reason is that no one in their right mind should be up on that mountain in January.

  If things worked out as planned, they’d never know I was there until their court date. If things went poorly, I’d be outnumbered and outgunned in strange territory. I could only hope that the deer killers weren’t people killers too. Most men aren’t capable of taking a life under normal circumstances.

  I met two state troopers and one WRC officer at four the next morning. Brody dropped me off and went back home. We staged at a small parking area just off NC 105 where the trail began. I was handed a trail map of the north face of Grandfather Mountain. Three red marks designated where the previous kills had been discovered. Sunrise wasn’t until almost seven, so I had time to get up high before we expected the poachers to arrive, if they arrived at all. I had my pack with water and munchies and my weapons. As I started up the trail, the cop cars pulled out. They’d return later so as not to spook our targets.

  It was twenty degrees, which was on the warm side for an early January morning. As long as I was walking, my body temperature was comfortable. As soon as I stopped to rest, the cold began to penetrate my defenses. I kept moving in the dark, trying to get as high as I could before daylight. It was tough going. I’d learned that a lot of folks had someone drop them off at the top of the mountain so they could hike it downhill. Their pickup car would be waiting where I’d met the officers. I wondered why they hadn’t suggested taking me up there and letting me hike down. I’d bring it up at the first opportunity.

  After a few miles of steady uphill climbing, I stopped to listen and take in my surroundings. The sky was beginning to lighten to the east. The poachers, if they were coming, should be here soon. I looked back downhill hoping to see headlights, but all I saw was darkness. I made it another mile before the sun was up. One mile per hour was as fast as I could go without killing myself. I was roughly centered between the kill sites. It seemed a good enough place to rest and wait.

  Now that I could see, I realized that this mountain wasn’t that much different than my own. Old growth trees and rocks covered the landscape. The only buildings on the mountain were at the visitor’s center on the other side. All of it was a state park, covering nearly twenty-five hundred acres of scenic backcountry. I was concentrating on a tiny fraction of that, but even then I could miss the poachers easily. It was simply too vast and wild. They could be a mile away from me, or five.

  As I sat and waited, I listened to the sounds around me. I smelled the crisp winter air. I tried to get in tune with the vibrations of nature here. Hibernating animals had long been asleep. There was no need to worry about bears. Few songbirds stayed over winter at this elevation. The peak above me was almost six thousand feet above sea level. There were no insects about in the cold weather either. At first glance the place was barren, but after a while, I started to pick up on life. A hawk soared above the treetops, looking for rodents. A doe walked along the trail not twenty feet away from me.

  The cold was creeping in so I got up and started climbing again. The sun wasn’t helping much. The evergreens were abundant enough to block it. I was the only human on this part of the mountain, of that I had no doubt. It was going to be a long day. I used the radio the cops had given me to report that I’d seen no activity. The higher I went, the colder it got. I crossed the snow line at about four thousand feet. That was far enough. I didn’t want to leave fresh tracks to announce my presence. I decided to move back down to a lower elevation.

  I found a rock outcropping that would be a good observation post. It was in the sun and warming up as the day wore on. I sat there looking out over the beauty that surrounded me, even in the gray winter months. The view was stunning, and I could see for miles. I studied the trees and rocks lo
oking for the slightest movement. More deer exposed themselves. I supposed these particular animals weren’t wary of hunters. They’d lived their lives in a protected sanctuary. Killing them was akin to shooting fish in a barrel. I could have shot five of them in the half-day I’d been up here.

  I gave it another hour before calling in again.

  “They’re not up here,” I said. “Likely not coming in broad daylight. What do you say we call it quits for the day?”

  “You’re probably right,” the voice came back. “Come on down.”

  Going down was much easier, but I kept my senses alert. The temperature had risen to almost freezing. As long as I was on the move, I was quite comfortable. It would have been a good day to poach a couple of deer, but either they were somewhere else on the mountain, or they’d stayed home. I would have heard any gunshot within several miles. Day one was a bust.

  We shouldn’t have staged where we did. If the poachers had seen the police cars, they’d be spooked. They may have just driven on by. It was a tactical mistake. On the other hand, maybe they’d filled their freezers and did not need to come back again. Maybe they’d chosen to hunt on the opposite side of the mountain, or another mountain altogether. Catching them in the act suddenly seemed hopeless.

  I brought my concerns to the attention of the cops once I made it back down. They drove me to Boone to meet with Rominger.

  “I need to go in from a different location,” I said. “Preferably higher up so I can hike downhill.”

  “The only road up is closed until the park personnel arrive,” he said. “We should be able to get access; we just didn’t think it through.”

  “We don’t even know if they’ll try it again,” I said. “Or when. How can we know when to be up there?”

  “Our experience tells us they’ll come back,” he said. “Easy pickings. Unwary deer. Wild area with no witnesses. No previous law enforcement presence.”

  “If we didn’t scare them off today,” I said.

  “We didn’t notice any vehicles that might have been coming into the parking lot,” one of the other officers said. “It’s not visible from 105, and there was no other traffic on the access road while we were there.”

  “Okay, so today just wasn’t their day,” I said. “If you’re going to keep paying me, I’ll keep going back for a while. See what happens.”

  “The boss will pull the plug if we come up empty-handed too many times,” he said. “But we’re still a go for now.”

  “Let’s skip tomorrow,” I said. “Get me up high the day after, well before sunup.”

  “We’ll meet you at the BB&T Bank at four,” he said. “You’ll be near the peak by four-thirty.”

  “Keep away from the trailhead,” I said. “Wait somewhere else close by.”

  “We won’t know if someone goes up the trail,” he said.

  “If they come up, I’ll know,” I said. “I’ll let you know as soon as I confirm.”

  “Plan B has been established,” he said. “I’ll take you home.”

  Rominger dropped me off just in time for dinner. He was a reasonable man, who listened to my ideas. It just seemed to me that the law should be better prepared for this type of scenario up here in the High Country. Maybe they didn’t put too much emphasis on poaching elsewhere, and the hubbub now was only due to it happening on Grandfather. They could keep a car at the bottom of the trail and prevent anyone from going up there with guns, but they needed to catch the poachers to make an example of them. That’s where I came in. I could only hope that my limited experience would be enough to assist in their capture.

  I relayed the events of the day to Brody. She had a fire going, so I took off my heavy outerwear in front of the fireplace. As always, it was good to be home. I sat down to a warm meal with a hot woman and gave thanks for my blessings.

  “Amen,” said Brody. “You sure you want to keep going up there in the cold?”

  “Seems kind of dumb, doesn’t it?” I said. “But yea, I’m going to try again. Day after tomorrow.”

  “What ungodly hour do I need to drop you off?”

  “Four in the morning,” I said. “Or I can take the car.”

  “And leave me here with no vehicle?” she said. “I think not.”

  “Just thought you might want to sleep in,” I said.

  “I don’t mind being here alone,” she said. “I just feel better with a car.”

  “No problem,” I said. “You still alert for ex-police chiefs that might show up?”

  “I am,” she said. “But I overheard at the grocery store that a moving van was at his house today.”

  “Excellent,” I said. “Looks like we can put that episode behind us soon.”

  “And no poachers are going to know where we live,” she said. “No worries there.”

  “Seems like the only people who know we live here are cops,” I said. “Not sure what I think about that.”

  “You’re on their team now,” she said. “Earning brownie points.”

  “This might be the Commander’s way of keeping an eye on me,” I said. “I gathered that he’s curious after all that’s happened since we moved here.”

  “Background checks, FBI involvement, dead bodies,” she said. “I’d be curious too.”

  “I’ll try my best for him,” I said. “Prove my worth.”

  “He wouldn’t ask you to do this if he didn’t think you were worthy,” she said.

  “I suppose not.”

  After a day off, I was ready to try again. My only problem was that the temperature had dropped dramatically. Our thermometer at the cabin read eighteen degrees. By the time the police cruiser made it to the top of Grandfather Mountain, the dashboard told me it was twelve degrees. We stopped on the paved parking lot, so I could get my bearings. When I stepped out of the car the wind almost knocked me over. I quickly got back in the car.

  “It’s blowing like a bitch up here,” I said.

  “You volunteered,” said Rominger, handing me a map.

  “We’re too far from the target area to start from here,” I said. “I’ll freeze to death before I get close to it.”

  “There’s a dirt road running across this ridge,” he said. “Normally we’d need four-wheel drive, but the ground should be frozen solid.”

  “Why didn’t we just come up here in a four-wheel drive?”

  “Didn’t think about it,” he admitted. “We could have gotten the WRC guys to drop you off.”

  “We’re staying one decision behind doing this right,” I said. “We should have it down before it’s over.”

  “This ain’t our area of expertise,” he said. “That’s why we called on you.”

  “I’m hardly an expert,” I said. “But I’d do things a bit differently.”

  “Like how?”

  “I’d just come up here on my own,” I said. “Set up shelter somewhere near the carcass finds. Wait them out silently. Call you when I see them. You can drink coffee at McDonald’s while I freeze my ass off.”

  “We’ve got to be able to respond quickly,” he said.

  “They’ve got to butcher their kill and get back down the mountain,” I said. “You can be waiting for them.”

  “Good point,” he said. “You think they’ll try it today in this cold?”

  “It’s supposed to warm into the twenties,” I said. “No big deal for hunters.”

  We crept down the dirt road with no lights on until we could go no further. I studied the map one last time, tightened up my collar and got out of the vehicle.

  “Good luck, man,” said Rominger. “Call me when you need me.”

  I was alone on the mountain in the dark. The wind drove the cold through my clothes and into my bones. I made a beeline for the trees in hopes of getting away from the freezing gale. It got even darker once I was inside the woods. Only the promise of the coming sunrise gave me any sense of direction. The dim glow to the east guided me towards the kill zone.

  I kept hiking east until I felt I
was directly above the trail we thought the poachers were using. The exercise warmed me just enough to keep going. I started angling down in the general direction of the target area. The sky was lightening enough that I could now see where I was going. I stood behind a thick tree trunk and scanned the mountain below me. There was no movement yet, so I continued downhill. Eventually, I recognized where I was. I located the trail and set up surveillance. I hid behind some rocks that were covered with low hanging evergreen branches. This arrangement mercifully blocked the wind but sitting still let the cold creep back in.

  In spite of my chattering teeth, I allowed my senses to open up and take in any clues the mountain had to offer. Slowly the sounds were amplified. I could smell beyond the pine trees and pick up the aroma of the frozen earth, moss, bark, and the threat of snow in the air. I thought that if I were a poacher, even a dedicated one, I’d be home in a warm bed. The sun finally broke over the mountaintop, and the temperature rose a few degrees. I came out of my hole to get a better look at my surroundings. The colorful leaves of fall were long gone. Bare gray trees mixed with the green of the pines. Cold gray rocks dotted the landscape. It was one inhospitable scene for a lone mountain man.

  I walked around in an effort to warm my body. After a half-mile of downhill hiking, I made a U-turn and retraced my steps back uphill. I realized that I hadn’t seen any deer yet. They must have been hunkered down trying to keep warm too. The poachers probably knew that, but the air was warming with each passing hour. It would be comfortable enough by mid-afternoon. I hunkered down again and continued to wait.

  As the temperature rose, I was able to relax somewhat. I didn’t know a thing about meditation, but I had my own unique way of practicing mountain Zen. I gave into it and flooded my senses with everything that nature had to give. Even in the dead of winter, there was life. I kept taking it in, waiting for that unnatural sound or scent to announce the presence of other humans. Another hour passed before it happened. Someone was coming up the trail — two someones as a matter of fact. They were quiet on their feet, but I picked up on their whispers. I followed them with my ears for ten minutes, when it stopped. I kept listening intently, but they’d settled down to wait for a deer. All I could do was wait for them to shoot. Otherwise, they were just hikers with a gun.