Wild Man Island (9 page)

T
HE FACT THAT
I
WASN'T FOLLOWING
a single footprint sent a tingle down my spine. I might be the first human being ever to set foot here, and I might be exploring my own tomb.

Sometimes I had to get down on my belly and crawl forward, choking on the oily torch smoke. Sometimes I had to climb over blocky limestone boulders. Once, on a steep slope going down, I thought for sure the passage was pinching shut. But there was another rabbit hole down there. All the time I was mostly moving to the right and moving down, inside a sort of corkscrew.

After that I was climbing again, and then it was up and down and around and around. I lost all sense of direction. Time was working against me—the head of the torch was halfway gone. I kept trying to push back my fear of the light going out, but the fear was gaining on me. What was I going to do, turn around and try to wriggle my way blind back to the sea exit? Was that possible?

As I stood there I heard faint echoes of what sounded like rushing water. I guessed that a larger cave
was ahead. I followed my torch forward, desperate for a break in my luck.

The passage began to widen. Now it was decorated with fantastic mineral sculptures. The sound of rushing water grew louder and louder. Ahead of me the floor was strewn with bones: ribs, vertebrae, the skulls of small animals with big canine teeth, skulls of bears, and even the skulls and antlers of what had to be caribou.

How old were these bones? How many thousands of years had it been since caribou lived on this island?

Either these animals had died here, or animals or people had dragged them here. There had to be an opening nearby.

I knelt close and peeled my eyes. If only there were human remains, any mark of humans: a scraper, a stone point stuck in one of these bones, picture writing on the walls.

I was so ready to make a big discovery, so ready. But I had no time. There might be something here, but it would take a proper archeological dig to find it. I had to keep going.

I pushed ahead toward the ever-louder sound of rushing water. Seconds later my torchlight fell on a creek flowing through a cavern that took my breath away. It was two hundred feet, easily, from the creek to the monumental stalactites suspended from the ceiling.

Immediately, another surprise: My torch wasn't the only light source. Downstream, the creek and the far slope were lit by natural light from an opening I couldn't
quite make out. The only thing was, could I reach it and could I crawl through it?

Motion in the creek caught my eye. There were animals in the water, live animals. Their heads were above the water at times, then suddenly they would disappear.

A couple of harbor seals. They'd swum here from salt water. What did it mean, that the creek emptied into the ocean underwater?

In another minute I found out why the seals were in the cave. One had a salmon in its mouth. Taking a second look at the creek, I recognized the quick flurries of fish running just under the surface.

A salmon run, and seals, and that wasn't all. Suddenly, from behind a formation that looked like a gigantic frosted cupcake, a brown bear rushed into the stream and swatted one of the seals with a crushing blow. The bear turned with the seal in its jaws and climbed the steep slope toward the light.

On the spot, I knew two things. The first was, if a bear could get in, I could get out. The second was, I wasn't going to even think about it until dark, or I might run smack into a bear. In the dark hours they shouldn't be seal hunting.

In the meantime I had about six hours to kill. When my light ran out I had to be within easy reach of the entrance. Right now I had a chance to make a discovery. This place seemed so likely to have been used by ancient people, I could taste it.

I walked upstream alongside flowing white terraces of calcite. No tracks of bears in the muddy places,
thank goodness. The rooms were so large it was almost like I was in a canyon outdoors. Everywhere I looked I saw magnificent columns, draperies, icing-covered flowstones, doll houses, castles, tiny rooms tucked in the walls and furnished with exquisite miniatures. Yet, all these works were made by nature. What I wouldn't have given for a single human artifact, or simply some ancient graffiti on the wall.

In between the great rooms the cavern narrowed, but I always found a way to continue on one side of the creek or the other.

I entered a room where the rushing water was much louder than before. It was the most spectacular of all, a grotto, a perfect sphere, with the creek spilling from a tunnel at the far end into a pool that took up most of the grotto's floor. Smooth walking terraces led around the pool on either side. Set back from the terraces were freestanding figures that looked like an army of giants standing guard. The underlying rock that made up their bodies was a rich yellow brown, and it was all topped by layers of bright white calcite icing, giving the giants hoods and capes and teeth and ribs.

The grotto turned out to be as far as I could go. Salmon were leaping up and into the jet of water pouring out of the tunnel at the head of the pool, but I wasn't going to be able to follow. The water in the tunnel would have been chest deep, and there weren't any handholds.

I walked around the side of the great pool, drawn by the place where the creek burst out of the wall.

At the end of the line, I tried to picture ancient people standing exactly where I was standing. This cave would have been quite a wonder; they would have wanted to explore it. Ancient people all over the world had used caves. They were special places, sacred places.

Could they have found a way in?

Yes, through the bears' entrance, or else through the mouth of the creek. Back then, the creek wouldn't have entered the ocean underwater, like it did now. Sea level was three or four hundred feet lower; the stream would have burst out of the cliff, high above the sea, in a spectacular waterfall. The people down below, paddling on the ocean in their skinboats, would have been impressed. Somebody would have said, Let's climb up there and see if we can get inside.

Talk about explorers. They were the originals. Every day, a new world.

I strained to make out pictures on the walls, but they just weren't there. Imagining they had once been, until time and dripping water and minerals had covered them over, made me feel a little less disappointed.

I was about to turn back. My eyes ran up the flowing slope on my side of the stream to a small chamber twenty or so feet above, like an open jewel box decorated with mineral encrustations. Where I was standing was not the last reachable spot in the cave. That little room was.

Torch in hand, I skittered up the slope. In front of the chamber, I perched on a small balcony and looked inside.

I held my breath, afraid to make a sound lest it break the spell.
Here it was,
the prize I'd been hoping to find: a human skull sparkling with a coating of bright gypsum crystals. The chamber was so small, the skull was almost within arm's reach, though it was against the back wall. It took me a few seconds to see that the entire skeleton was there, the bones all covered with gypsum crystals and calcite. Within the crook of the skeleton's arm, on a bed of cave pearls, were three miniature boats carved from ivory.

It was uncanny how close their proportions were to my father's soapstone carving, the one my mother had left at Hidden Falls.

Dad, I thought. Can you see me? I found your proof. A burial, and boats to go with them. Boat people, just as you always figured.

There was even more: in the corner of the chamber, small carvings of seals or sea lions, each with a harpoon sticking out of its body.

My torch was sputtering badly. It was time to go, and quickly. I took another good look, trying to memorize every detail. I removed one boat; it fit in the palm of my hand. The fossilized ivory didn't seem fragile. I tucked it in the deepest pocket of my vest, zipped up my fleece jacket, rebuckled my life jacket. The tiny boat was good and secure.

Time to go. Time to get out of there and get home. I had my prize.

How old was it? That was the question.

While I still had light, I hurried back to within sight
of the entrance the bear had used. Long after my torch had gone out, I waited out the dimming of the natural light from outside. I ate some jerky, dried salmon, and pemmican. When it was all but dark, I made my move.

Knowing full well that a bear might be napping at the opening or very close by, I inched my way through the jagged portal, which reeked with the scent of death. I stumbled across the remains of a small carcass with extremely long finger bones—a harbor seal. It took some time to find my way in the near dark through the maze of trees and boulders outside. I was weary through and through.

What I needed was a safe place to sleep. The stars were coming out, hard and sharp as diamonds. The storm had been replaced by dead calm. The gurgling of a creek down below was the only sound. Through a break in the trees I saw starlight reflected on ocean water. I would stumble over the edge of a cliff if I kept going. I curled into a ball and fell dead asleep.

I
HEARD A FLUTE.
I
MUST BE DREAMING
, I thought, but as I blinked myself awake and shook the cobwebs out of my head, the music was still there.

The sky—what I could see of it from my hiding place—was a hard blue like the sky back home. The sun was dazzling. Animals of some kind were breaking the surface out in the cove. Dolphins? As I shielded my eyes and squinted for a better look I realized they were much larger than that. I was looking at a pod of orca whales. Six or eight black and white orcas were breaching clean out of the water, playing wildly, as if responding to the flute.

If that's what it was, I felt the same way. Something about the beautiful flute melody and this Colorado-blue morning spelled deliverance. Someone had to be playing that flute. Was there a boat in the cove, anchored where I couldn't see it?

Hard experience on this island warned me to play it safe. Careful not to snap a twig or dislodge a rock, I edged closer.

As the head of the cove came into view I could see it was extremely rugged. Cliffs hemmed it in on both
sides. The only break in the cliffs was the mouth of the stream I had heard the night before.

As I made my way down the slope, I stopped to watch the whales. Incredibly, they were racing underwater, straight toward the mouth of the creek. I had a good idea that they were rubbing their bellies along the shallow gravels at the head of the cove. I had seen a video of such a thing once, but this was nothing like TV.

A minute later I caught a glimpse of the small gravel beach where the creek entered salt water. Where I had expected to see a boat anchored, there was nothing there. I could still hear the flute.

Suddenly the water erupted at the shore, and the gigantic form of an orca surged onto the beach—after a basking seal or a sea lion? I'd seen orcas do that on the same video. I ran for a better look.

To my amazement, a human form was standing next to the whale, a large figure dressed in bark clothing…the wild man.

The flute player and the wild man were one and the same. I watched as he put one hand on the whale's head, just placed it there, and kept playing.

The whale worked its way back into the water and turned itself around. Its tall dorsal fin knifed underwater and the orca was gone.

I backed away. I couldn't begin to understand the wild man, but I knew I had to get away from him. He wasn't any less dangerous because he'd figured out how to call killer whales out of the ocean. The shore was all cliffs; there was nowhere to go but inland. If I kept
climbing I would spot a route back to salt water.

A mile up the creek I recognized a downed tree that had fallen across the stream. I'd been here before. This was where I'd crossed with the dog a couple days before. I was only a minute away from the hidden entrance to the trail up to the wild man's alcove. I'd come full circle.

The
tok-tok-tok
of a raven came from the cliffs. It might be the wild man's raven, I thought, and hurried upstream.

The bird took to the air and followed me, croaking from tree to tree. I wished I had a way to shut him up, but silence returned to the forest soon enough. The raven suddenly flew back downstream and disappeared.

I had an idea that soon the wild man would know where I was. After that I suspected every raven I saw.

Bears in the creek ahead, splashing after salmon, forced me steeply up to the right. I climbed the face of the ridge, clawing for handholds in the rock and on the roots of the trees. At the thrashing sound of a raven's wings just above me, I flinched. I looked all around but all I caught was its shadow, and only for a second.

When I finally topped out on the ridge, heaving for breath, what I first took for a bush suddenly stood up. It was the wild man, spear in hand. He said nothing, just looked me up and down.

I was so tired of being afraid of him, I didn't care anymore. If I was under the lion's paw, I wasn't going to act like a rabbit. “It's me,” I said. “Nice to see you again. Did you find your dog?”

“No,” he said. He was still studying me, looking for answers without asking the questions. I guessed he was wondering how I got out of the cave.

“I'm not surprised,” I said. “He's probably running with those wolves. I bet they cover a lot of ground.”

The wild man's pale eyes, and then his voice, were full of disdain. “There are no wolves on Admiralty Island.”

“Have it your way,” I snapped. “But I saw them pretty close. Some were gray, some black. I saw them feeding on a dead orca before I ever ran into you.”

“You're making that up. I would know if there were wolves on this island.”

I wondered if his voice was rough as sandpaper because he hardly used it, or if his vocal cords were made of sand and gravel and broken bits of seashell. “I know what wolves look like,” I insisted.

“Must have been feral dogs you saw.”

“Maybe,” I allowed, “but I doubt it.”

He seemed satisfied that I had backpedaled. Just to be contrary, I said, “Your dog was getting pretty torn up by the alpha male. He's lovesick over one of the females. That's why he took off so fast when he found you weren't home, if you ask—”

The wild man shushed me with a finger to his lips. He had his head cocked to one side, listening.

Then I heard it, the faraway howl of a wolf. No, wolves.

The wild man's rock formation of a face yielded to astonishment. “Wolves,” he whispered, his voice etched in wonder. “Wolves on Admiralty.”

“Hello…” I couldn't help saying.

His stare was as sharp as his spearpoint. “Who are you?”

“Andy Galloway,” I said. “I'm from Orchard Mesa, Colorado. Near Grand Junction.”

He just kept staring, as if I wasn't making sense.

“You see this life jacket? I was on a sea kayaking trip on Baranof. I got blown over here by a windstorm, lost my kayak.”

“And what is it you want?” he asked slowly.

“To get off this island! To get home to my family!”

“Don't shout,” he ordered, with a quick glance over his shoulder. “Those
were
wolves. What else do you know about the dog? Do you know a place he might have gone back to?”

Right away I thought of the bear carcass. I remembered how the Newfoundland had fed there, and I remembered the wolf tracks all around. “I do,” I said, “but what about you helping me? If I tell you where to find your dog, can you steer me to help? Is that asking too much?”

“I gave you the spear and the knife. It's summer—food everywhere you turn. That should have been enough to get you by.”

“Get me by? Your dog is more of a human being than you are.”

He bristled like an angry brown bear.

“I'm sick of being scared of you,” I told him. “I hate being intimidated. Tell me how to get off this island and I'll tell you where I think you should look for your dog.”

His hand went to his chin. The wild man pulled on his beard in an agony of indecision.

“Is there a cabin I can walk to? A place where a fishing boat comes to shore?”

He looked away, bit his lip. “There's a village,” he said finally.

“Now we're talking.”

“An Indian village, Angoon. The only civilization on the island.”

I was so surprised. Here was something valuable. It had nothing to do with wanting to help me. He was this attached to his dog.

“Can you take me there, to the village?”

“No, but I can point the way. There's nothing to it. I have to get my dog before those wolves kill him. That's what they'll do.”

“We're going to have to trust each other,” I said. “You tell me how to find Angoon, and I'll be straight with you.”

He nodded, anxious to get going.

“I saw your dog eating meat from a bear carcass that some poachers killed. Lots of wolf tracks around. I think he'd go back there.”

“That's a good bet,” the man agreed, “but what's this about poachers?”

“I didn't see them, but they took the hide and the head and feet, and just left the body, all the meat. That has to be against the law. It was disgusting.”

He spat on the ground. “Disgustingly legal. But I don't have time to jaw about that. Follow me up here a
little ways, I'll set you in the right direction.”

We walked a short distance to a bald spot on the ridge where we could see the mountains above. The wild man pointed out two peaks and described a route between them that would lead to the view of an inlet on the other side. I would know it was the right one by its length; it was called Kootznoowoo Inlet, and it poked eight or ten miles into the west side of the island. All I had to do was walk the south shore of that inlet. Angoon was where the inlet met Chatham Strait.

In return I described the landslide scar on the mountain above the carcass, and how the carcass was out on the tundra grass within a stone's throw of the trees. He knew exactly where I was talking about.

We were both eager to go. I couldn't help wondering if he was about to murder me now that he knew what he needed to know. I still didn't know who this wild man was, or what he was about. Suddenly he said, “Leave that bag with me. Take some food out if you want and stuff it inside your life jacket. And when you get close to the village, get rid of those sandals of mine.”

I must have looked at him like he was quite a few cards short of a full deck.

“Nobody knows where I live,” he explained hoarsely. It wasn't the first time he had told me this. “No need to stir them up,” he added.

For the first time I noticed that his teeth were clean and bright as piano keys. So what? I thought, and said, “I hear what you're saying. I understand. Anything I have of yours would give you away.”

“I would appreciate it.”

He paused uncertainly, then with a grimace, said, “Back at the cannery, I couldn't risk it.”

“I understand,” I said again, not really understanding at all. All I was thinking was, Just let me walk away, whoever you are, without heaving that spear into my back. You have plenty to hide, and if you let me go, I have plenty to tell.

I took some pemmican and some jerky and stuffed it inside my life jacket. I felt it lodge against the ivory boat in my vest pocket. It didn't look like he was going to going to add any apologies about confining me in his stronghold or chasing me in the cave, which was okay by me. I was never less interested in conversation in my life.

I turned and walked away, and I held my breath. I didn't look back until I was out of spear-chucking range. When I did, the wild man had vanished.