Cold River Resurrection (8 page)

C
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17

Portland, Oregon

State of Oregon Medical Examiner’s Office

“The hand is a young woman’s hand, and she is, or most likely was, from twenty to thirty-five years old,” Dr. Kathy Dornan said.

“How do you know that?” Chief Martin Andrews asked. He had known Dr. Dornan since she started as a pathologist with the medical examiner’s office. Martin had been a Portland Police Bureau Homicide Detective, and Dr. Dornan had performed the autopsies on several of Martin’s clients. She was now the medical examiner for the State of Oregon.

Dr. Dornan grinned. Martin knew she had to maintain a sense of humor or she wouldn’t be able to do her job.

“Fingernail polish. Slight hand. And a color an older woman, like myself, wouldn’t wear.”

“Those reasons going to go in your report?” Martin asked.

“Sure, and some other, more technical stuff. But look at this,” she said, turning the hand over in her gloved hand. “The hand was severed at the wrist joint, at the end of the radius and ulna. I say ‘severed’ because the instrument was as sharp as a scalpel. One of the fingers was chewed by an animal. The decay is consistent with a body being in the elements for about a week, so not too long before the girl found this. But I am guessing about the temperature during the day and night up there on the mountain. Cold at night in July, and warm during the day, right?” She looked at Martin.

“Yeah, thirty something at night,” he said, looking closely at the hand. “Seventy-five or eighty during the day. If this was found in the trees, that would be about right. Up on one of the glaciers, then it could have been there a long time.”

“And she carried this out?” Dr. Dornan said.

“She apparently thought this was a doll of her childhood,” Martin said. “She was clutching it to her chest when she was found, didn’t want to let it go.”

“Poor thing.” Dr. Dornan said.

“Which one?”

“Both of them,” the doctor said. “I do want to see the body that this hand belongs to, if you ever find it.”

“You sure there will be a body? Couldn’t the person to whom the hand belongs be alive?”

“Oh sure, could be,” Dr. Dornan said. “But in my experience, when you have a severed hand found by a lost hiker, and the hand was in a wilderness area, the body to which this hand was once attached, is deceased.”

Martin nodded.

“And, by the way,” Dr. Dornan continued, pulling off her gloves, “what’s this about Sasquatch on the reservation?”

C
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18

CNN News Affiliate

Portland, Oregon

Stan Perdue thought the CNN reporter, a thirty something woman with blond hair, was perfect. She would act skeptical, look tough, and was going to be astonished at what he was about to say. Bigfoot on the re
servation. Body parts on the reservation, that was something else, and he wasn’t going to talk about it. Territorial secrecy and sovereignty of the rez would work in his favor. He didn’t want a flood of people traipsing around the area. At least, not until he was the one to find Bigfoot.

“This is Linda Chavez, CNN Northwest Reporter, and I’m here with Stan Perdue, leader of the Bigfoot Research Expedition. Stan led an expedition into the wilderness areas in Oregon this past week, most of it in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness.
” She turned to her guest.

“
Stan, of course you realize that many, if not most people, don’t believe that Bigfoot exists.” The CNN news reporter gave the serious news look to Stan. She would do well, he thought, and was perfect for what he wanted.

“Uh, well, you would have to explain that to the people who have actually seen the animal,” Stan said. He was ready for this, and it happened at every news conference. When he was through with this one, he could charge more for the expeditions planned for next summer.

A lot more.

And it wasn’t just about the money. It was about showing the world how something could exist and not be found.

“Didn’t they just find a new species of shark last month off the Great Barrier Reef?” Stan asked, in his best evangelical voice. He was, in fact a proselyte for new converts, and he knew it. “And,” he added in a softer voice, “wasn’t a new species of leopard found in Africa just last week?” He smiled, and continued with a speech he had given a thousand times before.

“I’m sure that your facts about the location of the new species are correct,” she said with a smile. “Why haven’t we found a Bigfoot skeleton now, why not remains, or bagged a live one?”

“Linda, I don’t live in an upscale tornado magnet doublewide. I have a PhD in anthropology. There are many species, and I might add, non-endangered species, that exist here in the Pacific Northwest and we rarely, if ever, see skeletal remains. Bear is one. I would like to hear from a hunter here in Oregon who has seen a bear skeleton.” He sat back, waiting for a few seconds. When Linda Chavez didn’t follow up, he began again.

“And what about cougar? There are reported to be three thousand to five thousand cougar in Oregon. Have you ever seen one? People do now, sometimes in town, like in Bend around Pilot Butte, but I’ve talked with hunters who have been in the field for fifty years, and have never seen a cougar. We get almost as many Bigfoot sightings as cougar sightings.

“I believe that Bigfoot is an ape, a descendent of the Miocene-period apes, and that we will one day find more evidence to support this. When we have populations of animals, namely the bobcat and gray fox that are almost never seen, it doesn’t mean they don’t exist. I doubt anyone has ever seen either in the woods, but we know they exist in Oregon, northern California, and other northwestern states.” Stan stopped and waited for more questions.

“Now on a more somber note, Stan. What about Jennifer Kruger, the woman who was lost for several days. Was it worth it for your organization to have her go through this ordeal? Isn’t she lucky to be alive
?”

Now we’re getting somewhere, Stan thought.

“I’m glad you asked that, Linda. Of course we are happy Jennifer was found, and that she is going to be alright. Whenever you go into a wilderness area, Linda, you accept that things could go wrong.”

“It was reported that she was found on the Cold River Indian Reservation. Did you sanction a search for Bigfoot on the reservation without the permission of the Cold River tribal leaders, as told to us by the Tribal Council Chair, Bluefeathers?”

“We knew that Jennifer Kruger and her boyfriend, Carl, were going to camp on the reservation. We didn’t think that it would be a bad thing, particularly if we found evidence of Bigfoot.”

“So the end justifies the means?”

“No, not really, but there is a lot of information from certain individuals and families on the reservation of Sasquatch sightings over many decades, centuries, on the reservation. They don’t really talk about it all that much, but almost every person I’ve talked with on the reservation believes with a certainty that Bigfoot exists there in the wild.”

“So you purposely put people on the reservation, covertly?”

“They went in on their own accord. I didn’t go onto the reservation, but I am planning to go back to that area tonight. Near the rez. See what I can see.”

“Thanks, Stan. This is Linda Chavez, CNN News.”

Yes, I’m going back to the area, Stan thought as he left the studio. Not just to the area, but back on the rez. To find Sasquatch. Only this time, I will be the one to find the biped. Become famous. Rich.

In the end, he saw too much.

C
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19

Parker Creek

Smokey straightened up and watched Nathan roll the torso over. He didn’t think the odor could get worse, that sickly, sweet smell of death, but it did.

I’m gonna have to burn these clothes, go to the sweat lodge for a day. A warrior can’t be this close to death and not be cleansed later. As soon as possible.

Nathan tapped the back pocket area of the dress trousers and then reached down and unbuttoned the pants pocket on the left side. “I carry my wallet on the right side,” he said, and he carefully reached in and removed the wallet.

“You don’t carry a wallet,” Smokey remarked.

“Well, if I did carry a wallet, it would be on the right side. Anyway, here it is.” Nathan let the body roll back and stood with the wallet.

“Let’s see who Mr. Dead Man really is,” he said, and Smokey leaned over and looked. Nathan slowly opened the double fold wallet and a fat maggot rolled out and dropped on the ground by Smokey’s feet. Smokey took a step back as Nathan removed an Oregon Driver’s License. The photo showed a man with dark hair, thirty years old, with an address in West Portland. An Apartment. Said his name was Mohammad Kal-leed.

Nathan kept the license out and bagged the wallet in a plastic evidence bag. He bent down again and worked on the man’s shoe, first untying it, and then carefully sliding it off the swollen, putrefied foot. Smokey put his arm around his nose and breathed through his mouth. The shoe was a brown oxford, a dress shoe.

“Let’s see,” Nathan said. “Mr. Kal-leed has expensive taste in shoes. This, and the other one that Mr. Bear has undoubtedly taken to try on somewhere, is a size ten. What you think, Little Bro, maybe five hundred at Macy’s?”

Smokey pointed up.

“Okay, six hundred on sale.”

“I think I should call the boss, let him know what we have found so far.” Smokey walked uphill from the dead man as Nathan bagged the shoe, and took more pictures of the remains and the evidence. He took his cell phone out and punched the speed dial for Chief Martin Andrews.

“Wait,” Nathan said, holding his hand up. “Let’s do a survey of the meadow, take thirty minutes in good light, and we’ll have more information to give the chief. Maybe find the woman. Then call.”

They started, and at the west end, near the tree line, found another shoe.

Nathan looked over at Smokey. “How the hell did he get here? See any tracks?”

Smokey had been wondering about that. How
did
the body get here? There were no roads, no mule or horse tracks, and no people tracks except for Jennifer’s.

“Air drop?” Smokey asked.

“Yeah, I’ve thought of it. Air drop by a plane or helicopter. Don’t see any other way.”

“We’re missing something,” Smokey said. He thought again about Jennifer spending those nights up here.

“Nathan.” Smokey stopped, looking at his friend. “We’re still missing a body.” He  flipped his cell phone open and dialed. Chief Martin Andrews answered immediately. Smokey stood in the meadow and relayed what they had.
A fucking mess is what we  have.

“How long do you think
the body has been up there?” Andrews asked.

“We figured some of the bones Jennifer found have been here over the winter, under the snow. The one body hasn’t been here more than a couple of days. Hard to say, this is a big, rugged area, nobody comes up here.” And then he had a thought, something that had been nagging at him for awhile.
The only people who know just how desolate this is, or who know how to get here, are most likely tribal members. An Indian told the bad guys where to dump bodies.

“You find the person who lost a hand?” Chief Martin asked.

“Uh, no, we haven’t found a woman.”

“We’ll have fingerprint identification sometime today, they tell me. Prints are pretty bad but they should be enough to get a name.”

“We have a name on one of the bodies,” Smokey told him. He gave it to the chief over the phone, name and date of birth.

“We’ll send in a forensic team tomorrow. How long will it take you to hike out to your truck? I want to see both of you tonight.”

Nathan held up his hand. Four fingers.

“Uh, Chief, the old man says we can make it to our truck in four hours. Was that four hours or days, Nathan?” Smokey laughed as Nathan held up one finger.

“See you tonight, Chief.”

It took five hours of a punishing hump, too fast and hard to think. Smokey sweat through his shirt in the first hour, but he wasn’t going to let the old man see how tired he was.

C
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20

Cold River Tribal Police Department

2200 hours

Smokey stood in the shower and washed the sweat of the trail off of his skin.  He tried to wash away the smell of death, but he knew that he would have to go to the sweat lodge and cleanse himself to get rid of the death he had touched and seen. He would put his BDU’s in a plastic bag and seal it so he could burn them at a later time. Everything that touched death must be burned. He dried his hair and put on a clean uniform. For his meeting with the chief later he wanted to wear a uniform, no matter the time, since he didn’t know what he would be doing after that.

He left the reservation, driving across the new bridge over the Deschutes River, the old one destroyed by a madman determined to protect the reservation and its peoples at all costs.

Madman, hell, he was a courageous savior.

Smokey made the fifteen minute drive into Madras thinking they needed answers, and fast. Who put the bodies there, and why? Bodies new and old - that didn’t make sense. A conspiracy that they didn’t need. People from off the reservation, of that he was sure.  He had some thoughts about who might be in league with the killers. There are only a few people who knew their way around the remote areas below the glaciers. Jennifer was caught up in this, and he also had some idea about how the feebs would treat her. They would be sniffing around by tomorrow.

At the hospital, Smokey parked near the emergency room entrance, the only doors open at this time of day. There was a bright halo around the lights of the parking lot, a tired Honda Accord, the single car in the parking spaces making it seem even more deserted. The ER doc’s Mercedes would be around the side, in an alcove, out of sight from mere mortals.

He sat in his car, dialed Chief Andrews on his cell phone and got his voice mail.

“Chief, this is Smokey, I’m at the hospital, will be back to meet you in about thirty minutes. Call me.”

The ER doors slid open, whisper quiet, and he entered the hallway, the reception station ahead and on the right.

Smells like gunpowder in here, can’t be, must be a transient memory. Something triggered by past visits to the ER. Both waiting rooms were empty.

He knew most of the receptionists. They were usually behind the glassed-in reception center, twenty-four seven, but this time, no one was there to greet him.

Funny, and what’s that smell?

And then he knew.

Blood.

Rich, coppery, the Godawful smell of blood and gunpowder.

Smokey touched the Glock at his side and walked to the counter and leaned over. There was a pool of blood on the floor beneath the chair, a dark red corona circling the short blonde hair, the blue scrub suit turning green where the unexpected red touched it. Her body looked as if it had been thrown down, an afterthought, a discard. Her eyes were open, fixed. He tried to remember her name.

Delores.

Several things registered at once. Smokey pulled his gun and looked around. The hallway was empty.

Gotta check her, can’t go on without being sure.

He looked through the waiting rooms, eyes going from left to right. Nobody here. He stepped around the side of the reception area to the door and entered, looked behind the desk and leaned over.

No pulse. Delores had no pulse and wouldn’t be going home at the end of her shift. He straightened up and peered around the door, down the hallway to the opening to the ER examining rooms. The double doors were standing open, looking neglected, as if they were accusing him, mocking him.

Why weren’t you here when we needed you at the hospital?

Smokey felt the hair stand up on his neck, his face tight.

What the hell is happening here?

And he knew with a certainty that this was about Jennifer, about the bodies up in the wilderness area.

What could she possibly know?

He stood in the doorway of the reception office and covered the hallway. He turned on his portable radio with his left hand and switched to the county frequency.

I need my cell phone.

He decided against putting out the call on the air, and reached over to the desk phone and dialed the county dispatch number.

“Dispatch.”

“This is three oh three, Lieutenant Kukup, Warm Springs.” He spoke softly, walked to the door and leaned out again, looking down the hallway, the phone cord trailing.

“Go ahead, sir.”

“I’m at the hospital in Madras, the receptionist has been shot, the hospital is quiet, I’m going to check the hallways, need some help.”

“Did you say
shot?
”

“Yes, shot, is deceased, I’m in uniform, gonna check further. I’ll have my radio on, but very low.”

“I’ll call someone, people at home.  All of my deputies and city officers are at a fatal accident, ten miles away. Get someone as soon as I can.”

“Do that.”

Smokey hung up, and had a wild thought.

The Indians are here, where the hell are the fucking cowboys when you need them? Gotta do this yourself, Little Brother.

He glanced out the door down toward the ER again and moved out, fast, toward the double doors. At the doors he paused, glanced inside, and then swung around the doorway and up against the wall inside. Doctor Evans lay sprawled on the floor on his side, his arms thrown over his head.

Won’t be needing that Mercedes anymore, Doc.

A foot peeked out from under the center curtain of the examining area, a white shoe.

The nurse was crumpled on the floor in a pool of blood.
Looks as dead as the Doc.

He cleared the room, walking quickly, moving from left to right, and walked quietly back through the examining room. As he approached the double doors, he heard a scream coming from somewhere in the hospital, and then a single gunshot.

Jennifer!

Smokey moved quickly then, down the hallway, his Glock up in front of him, leading the way.

He came to the end of the hallway, and looked around the corner to his right. The nurses station was empty. He looked past the station, walked to the next hallway, and looked left around the corner. The nurses station was empty because the nurse was in the hallway and looked as dead as the others. He thought for the second time

What the hell did you get yourself into, Jennifer?

Smokey walked past the nurse, realizing that he didn’t know where Jennifer was, what room she was in. He slid into the nearest room and looked around.

Empty. He pulled his radio and turned the channel to Warm Springs Dispatch.

“Dispatch, three oh three.”

“Dispatch.”

“Who do we have at the hospital, guarding the SAR victim?”

“Officer Rhoan.”

“Do you know the room number?”

“I believe it’s one thirty
-one.”

“Contact three oh one, tell him that I need help like he did in the school. Ask him to stand by with as much help as he can call in. I’ll explain in a little bit.” Three oh one was the call sign for Chief Martin Andrews, and he would know what to do. There were thousands of people who listened to scanners and he didn’t want this, whatever this was, to get out over the air just yet.

He was in one twenty-five. He went out and glided down to the door of one thirty-one and pushed it open. The bed was empty. Officer Tom Rhoan was sitting on the floor, under the window, his feet splayed out before him, his Glock in his right hand, down by his leg. His head was thrown back against the wall, his mouth open, a neat hole in his forehead, his eyes staring at the far wall as if he were examining a strange and wondrous sight. He wore his hair long, traditional, a braid down across his cheek.

Aw, man. Tom.

And then he had two thoughts at once.

Now this is personal, very personal. And where the hell is Jennifer?
She must be close.

Smokey reached over and touched Tom’s sleeve, and then went to the door. He went out of the room, fast and down the hallway toward the center of the hospital. He ran past patient rooms, most doors closed this time of night, some open. Images flashed to him as he ran past, an arm flung over a bed, an elderly woman with wisps of white hair sitting up in bed, croaking, “George, is that you?”

He came to a set of double doors and pushed through them without slowing, the doors slamming back as he hit them, and several things registered at once, his feet stopping almost before his brain told him what was in the hallway, twenty feet away.

Two men and a woman, the woman between them, wearing a hospital gown and trailing an IV line, the men dressed in dark clothes, wearing black baseball caps and ski masks, the kind you wear for extreme cold. The back of the hospital gown was open, the woman naked underneath, her body twisting with the struggle
.

Jennifer, they have Jennifer
.

A
nd then he thought . . .

nice ass.

“Let me go!” She threw herself sideways against the man on her right, he stumbled into the wall as he was turning to look at Smokey, a pistol in his right hand. The man on her left was pulled off balance as well. He struck Jennifer with the back of his hand and she screamed, and the man then looked back at Smokey, and Smokey did the only thing he could do at that point.

He sprinted toward the men, yelling, “Get down on the floor, get down, get down!” And he pointed his Glock at the one on the right, the one on the left letting go of Jennifer and reaching for his gun, the one on the right swinging his gun around toward Smokey. Smokey shot him as he ran toward them, shooting three times, fast, hitting the man in the chest with all three and the man on the right went down, clawing at Jennifer as she stood there screaming. The man on the left pushed her away, bringing his pistol up and around, and Smokey shot him from five feet, the last shot hitting him in his left eye, his head exploding, the blood spraying the wall behind him.

The man’s gun clattered away and he fell, dropped straight down as though his legs had been chopped off.

Jennifer put her hand up and swung at Smokey as he reached her side. He caught her hand, talking softly, holding his gun in his right hand. She looked at him, her eyes wide, wet with tears.

“Jennifer. Stop. I will help you.” He put his right arm over her shoulder, feeling her shake. She tried to speak, the words not coming out.

“Jennifer, Lieutenant Kukup. I brought you the doll and flowers.”

“You – .”

She slumped against him and then straightened. She looked down at the man who had struck her, stepped over and kicked him in the neck.

“That’s for hitting me, you creep!”

A noise from down the hallway. People running. Maybe help was on the way, or hospital people. Smokey had shot seven or eight times, the noise should have attracted someone. He was aware that doors were opening, people standing in the doorways of their rooms, looking on, quiet.

A man burst around the corner, dressed like the other two gunmen, dark clothes, ski mask, carrying a short rifle, wearing a baseball cap, this one a Portland Trail Blazer’s cap.

Unfortunate choice of caps, Smokey thought, and shot him.

Doors slammed, people ducking inside their rooms as two more men came around the corner. Smokey snapped off two shots, and the men disappeared.

“Come on!” He grabbed Jennifer and pulled her with him as he moved back toward the double doors, turning to shoot at the end of the hallway, wanting to keep the men back with suppression fire, and then they were through the doors, moving fast, Jennifer keeping up.

“Wait!” She slowed, pulling against Smokey.

“The room, I need to go back to the room.” They stopped at room one thirty
-one and pushed inside. Smokey closed the door. Jennifer walked to the bed and glanced back at Smokey, seemingly conscious for the first time of her open gown, trying to hold it together. She picked up the doll from the bed and held it, looking like a little girl.

Smokey walked to where Officer Tom Rhoan was against the wall and removed the officer’s pistol from his hand and the extra magazines from his belt.

“I might need to borrow these, old friend,” Smokey said, his voice husky, soft. He stood and saw that Jennifer was watching him, holding her doll.

“I’m sorry about your friend,” she said.

“So am I,” Smokey said. “So am I.” He walked toward her and pulled the bedspread from the bed, handing it to her. “Wrap up, we gotta go. Now. I have a feeling those people aren’t gonna quit just yet.”

“But why - .”

“Don’t know, but whatever you saw up there, they don’t want you to recall. Let’s go.”

He opened the door slowly, Jennifer standing behind him, trying to look around his shoulder. The hallway was empty.

“Stay close,” he said. With a look down toward the double doors, he entered the hallway and moved toward the ER, past the examining room with Doc Evans still on the floor, and out toward the front, his Suburban in sight through the glass doors.