Kevin Miller woke John in a dim classroom. He was John’s lawyer when the police questioned John about his wolf encounter, and he had joined Officers Schuster and Foster’s investigation of police corruption in Wolftown.
“Billy told me to wake you up,” Kevin said.
“Huh?” John asked.
“He, Wayne, and I might go to Happy Howlers. Since you are allowed to observe the wolf situation with Wayne, he thought you should be woken up.”
“Another attack?” John asked.
“We hope not,” Kevin said.
John followed Kevin to the principal’s office, where he and Schuster had spent most of the night speaking with an anonymous distressed woman or discussing her between themselves or with Wayne. Since Kevin accepted her as a client, he could not tell John anything else.
“Did Glenn and Rebecca get home safely?” John asked.
“Yeah, don’t worry,” Wayne said.
“Everybody was okay. Deputy Peterson didn’t find a wolf or signs of nefarious activity. I appreciate letting the lady and me talk on the satellite phone. The battery is running low. Sorry.”
“Is she in danger?” John asked.
“Yeah.”
“Use the spare if she needs.” John remained skeptical of police in general, but he worried about the lady’s safety, and he wondered if another emergency happened while he slept.
“I hope we won’t need to,” Schuster said.
Wayne grumbled, “She broke into Happy Howlers, ate our snacks, and might have been involved in attacking Suzanne. And the other victims.”
“She says she broke in and ate for survival,” Schuster said.
“I can’t complain about that, but why didn’t she go somewhere else?”
“How would she get there in the storm? Isn’t Happy Howlers and one house between Wolftown and Thurber?”
Thurber was the Wilde County capital.
“She says she was in the woods,” Schuster said. “The lady gives a lot of details. Some of it can be verified, and some of the verifiable details haven’t been released to the public, so I’m considering her a reliable source. She says she and three men were conducting the wolf attacks. She says she doesn’t want to be in cahoots. The lady’s description of the leader matches the naked man, and—”
“Dennis Laufenberg,” Wayne asked.
“We haven’t confirmed his identity yet. I have to compare his timeline with hers. She hasn’t said why the individual doesn’t wear clothes. Her description of the other guy matches the missing person found dead. He hasn’t officially been identified yet, but I think he is Tyler Wilson. I’m going to call him that. I have no idea who the third man is. When the attacks escalated, he ran away. The lady thinks the leader might be willing to kill him. The lady sounds familiar, but I don’t know who she is.
The leader is making the attacks, she says, ‘look like wolf attacks and like someone is using a wolf strap. If there were signs it was a guy, it’d be too crazy to pay attention to.’ She hasn’t talked much about the wolf straps.”
“Kevin, are you going to say anything about them?” Wayne asked.
“Not again, please,” Schuster said. “Her and Wayne are thinking about talking about the wolf attacks, but she doesn’t trust anyone.”
“And I’ll probably yell at her,” Wayne said.
“And that wouldn’t assist the investigation,” Schuster said.
“When they weren’t attacking people and animals, her and the two identifiable men went into the woods. I’m not sure where the third man went. They’ve got some kind of camp in the woods, and it sounds like she is familiar with the area. The search parties were looking in the same direction as her coordinates.”
“And it’s in easy hiking distance of the Vasquez’s campsite,” Wayne said. “The sites are pretty deep in the woods.”
“The lady says that they were using the sewer system to get around town and evade the authorities,” Schuster said.
“As bad as the dumb wolf hypotheses,” Wayne muttered.
“The third man lifted up the manhole covers for the others to climb out. They conducted the attacks, and he stayed in the sewers. It’s tough to lift up a manhole cover without a tool. Stephanie says that sewer work is dangerous, even if you have the right safety equipment and stuff. The individuals stopped hiding in the sewers because of the rain. It sounds like the lady and the other two men knew each other much longer than they knew the third man. If they were using the sewers, it explains why there were wolf sightings in completely fenced-in sectors that had been thoroughly searched. Wayne, have you thought about the wolf in the sewer question?”
Wayne sighed. “At least muzzle the wolf, but it probably wouldn’t let you put him in a sewer unless you sedated it. A wolf is pretty heavy, so you would need to lower it on a rope or carry it. I’m not going to experiment because I don’t want to get mauled and I’m too tired to make a dummy wolf.”
“Do you have an opinion, John?”
John thought. “It would be a very unhappy, scared wolf. And unhappy, scared animals tend to be uncooperative, even if they have been domesticated and trained. If you got the wolf into the sewer, it might turn on you.”
“And if you sedated it, you would have to wait for the sedation to wear off before attacking.”
“Do they get loopy like people?” John asked.
“Yeah, so that is another problem,” Wayne said. “If they were making it look like wolf attacks, they were using real wolves.”
“Okey-dokey,” Schuster said. “I need to check sewer abnormalities. The lady says that the leader prevented the sewer workers from cleaning out the sewers before the rainstorm, and Stephanie told me the same thing a few days ago.
“The lady says she called in an anonymous tip that Mr. Wilson drowned in the sewers and that he was in a sewer outlet. She told me she knew he had a wolf strap, and she made sure it was found with his body. She didn’t say so in the anonymous tip she originally made. The officer she spoke to told me that the caller had a female voice.
“The wolf responders almost caught the wolves this morning. The lady knows that a wolf responder fell into an open manhole, when, where, his name, and where the current carried him to. Wayne confirmed the details. They were in a residential area, so it’s possible someone overheard, but she was very specific.
“The lady says that she gave an anonymous tip to the police that Suzanne Giese would be attacked, and it would be in a couple minutes. Corporal Henry says that the caller was female. She says that when the leader found out she called a tip, he attacked her the same way he had attacked other people.”
“Shouldn’t she be in a hospital?” John asked.
“She says it is going away on its own. If the leader is violent towards her, she could have been injured much worse before. Or it was a non-life-threatening assault.”
“Or it was what you call attempted assault by a wolf,” Wayne said. “I bet you could train a dog to do it on command, and maybe a wolf. She hasn’t said that they trained the wolves.”
“I can confirm the details about the attack on me and Zach. She knows that Zach shot a hole through the wolf’s snout and that the exit wound was big enough to stick fingers through. She knows the direction the wolf went and approximately where the wolf responders lost track of it. She wants it to be dead but doesn’t think it died from the gunshot wounds.”
“Why not?” John asked.
“Because she says she saw it alive later in the morning. I don’t believe that because she says the same wolf attempted an attack on John and Barbara Lubens. Nobody reported a big hole in the wolf’s face. Am I very detail-orientated or is that something witnesses would remember?”
“Yeah,” John said.
“You are and it is,” Kevin said.
“Was there a scar or something?” Wayne asked.
“No, the wolf looked healthy.”
“I believe that she knows about the attacks, though. She doesn’t know where the wolf went, but she listed hiding places in Wolftown. The wolf responders are looking for wolves, not people, so it’s possible someone missed him.
“She says the wolves weren’t in her control, but I don’t know why. After Mr. Wilson died, she had an altercation with the leader. He threatened to kill her, so she ran away into the woods. She hasn’t said how she ended up at Happy Howlers. She won’t say whether she brought a wolf with her and she won’t talk about anything to do with the wolf in the empty pen.”
“And we don’t know where they put the wolves between attacks,” Wayne said.
“She doesn’t talk much about the wolves,” Schuster said.
“After breaking into Happy Howlers, she saw John’s phone number on the desk and decided to call it. She hasn’t said why, but it sounds like a significant risk to her safety. She feels like it is the best place for her to be.
Wayne asked, “Why would she attack employees, go to their workplace, and ask the owner to help her?”
“People’s decisions in a crisis don’t always make sense to observers,” Schuster said.
“If she wants to tell me and thinks I will tell her to forget about it, she’s wrong.”
“My client hasn’t confessed,” Kevin said.
“Maybe the lady is being coerced into giving the information or it’s part of the plan. I might be gullible, but I wouldn’t say some things the way she said it about someone I willingly aided and abetted. I definitely wouldn’t say it in front of him. She sounds like she is worried about saying it in a situation where he could find out what she said.
“She says the leader will attack her if she asks for help from anyone. She says the leader can stop authorities from responding to her, but she hasn’t gone into much detail. It sounds like he will use threats and wolf attacks. She says he tracks the police movements and the walkie-talkie frequency, so he knows if the police respond to her call. I think if he can do that, he can listen to the sheriff’s department and state police. I told her that the county sheriff’s department had already been there about the wolf Glenn found in a pen, but she won’t discuss it.
“The lady is very scared of the authorities. I’m guessing if the leader can stop the authorities from doing their jobs, he can make them do something to her or he can keep them from investigating whatever he might do to her.”
“Like a chief of police,” Wayne said.
“The suspects are anyone who can be definitely connected to the lady, like in a police line-up. Happy Howlers is not a good place for her to be long-term, but she says she doesn’t have anywhere else to go.”
“If she is scared of the authorities, why did she go there?” John asked.
Wayne led part of the wolf response, but voluntarily and unconnected to the civil services. Happy Howlers was a private non-profit.
“Maybe I don’t count,” Wayne said.
Schuster said, “I’m worried the lady or the leader might try to attack Wayne. She knows who he is and where he works, but I don’t know if she found that out before or after going to Happy Howlers. She probably knows Wayne wants to stop the wolf attacks. She might know he thinks they will continue until someone stops them.”
“Maybe they would have stopped naturally if they were just wolves, but people might not let them. I still think attacking people with wolves is a stupid idea. Apparently, the lady thinks it would work, but I don’t have any data about her. If I do, I didn’t recognize it.”
“It sounds like she intends to stop attacking people. The lady won’t or can’t move herself to a secondary location. She says the storm washed away the place in the woods. She says she literally has nothing with her. So, I can’t tell her to walk to Thurber. No one should hitchhike, but especially her. Wolftown wouldn’t be a safe location. Wayne is letting her stay there.”
“And it makes it easier for you to detain her or whatever,” Wayne said.
“I’d normally say she would be safer in police protection or at least sitting inside a police station. If there is police corruption regarding a homicide, her, Kevin, and me have to be careful.”
“Were homicide investigations corrupt before?” John asked.
“Not as far as I know. Fortunately, we have a very low homicide rate. A few Wolftown officers know I’ve been speaking with a witness. They don’t know much, and we haven’t communicated about her over the radio. The other officers have not always been helpful. Some officers would notice if I asked a couple of officers or former officers for backup. And some officers are unavailable. The lady won’t talk without Kevin present, so they need to be in the same place.”
“In person is better, not just because of the telephone lines,” Kevin said.
“So, Kevin and I are going to take her to the sheriff’s department office. It will be the first time they hear about it. I’m assuming she will let us or I can detain her and transport her with the resources available. It could be tricky and put Kevin in danger.”
“And you,” Kevin said.
“But I’m a police officer. Going to Happy Howlers could be a trap or a trick. Going by myself is stupid, and bringing any civilian is a really bad idea. It probably won’t end well.”
“We should stay sheltered from the storm, but she needs assistance,” Kevin said.
“I was thinking of potential criminal activity, but the weather will suck at best,” Schuster said. “Wayne is part of the wolf response and has a gun. He owns the property, and I need his permission to enter.”
“You have it,” Wayne said.
“Can Kevin write it in legalese—I mean, legal verbiage—and you sign it?”
“Yeah,” Wayne said.
“I’ll write it.” Kevin turned to a fresh sheet of his yellow legal pad. “It is not a legal document, but it will sound authoritative.”
“I’d prefer a warrant, but getting one would be difficult. John is welcome to come if Wayne does. But, Wayne, you’re a bit upset about the wolf attacks and the lady.”
“I’ll behave. I have to go, but I can’t keep up with you young guys.”
“Who are you calling young?” Kevin asked.
“It depends on how old you think you are,” Wayne said.
“Why are you going, Wayne?” Schuster asked.
“Why ask?”
“It’s important.”
“The wolves or whoever keeps getting away, but it needs to stop. I bet she was involved in the attacks. She still needs emergency aid on my property, so I have to be involved. I’m annoyed, but I’ll put up with her.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll go if Wayne is,” John said.
“Any chance you have a gun license?”
“I have one so I can legally operate a tranquilizer gun, but I can’t carry guns,” John said.
“I’d feel better if you had some form of self-defense other than an air-horn.”
“He won’t,” Wayne said.
“Bow hunting? Fencing lessons?” Schuster looked desperate enough to ask, Rodney King riots?
“No,” John said. “Do you want me to carry the tranquilizer gun?”
“It’s better than nothing,” Schuster said.
Wayne began to explain the complete lack of evidence that tranquilizer darts were effective against the wolves attacking Wolftown, but interrupted himself with: “You brought fancy technology, but did you remember food?”
“Yeah,” John said.
“With you? Here? Did you at least eat plain noodles or something at supper?”
“No, I left it in my hotel room because the attacks were in town. And I didn’t think I would be stuck in an emergency shelter. But I’ll be fine, assuming we don’t get stranded in the woods.”
“Why are you assuming that?” Wayne asked.
“I’m an optimist.”
“We have to get some stuff from Kevin’s house and convince Luke to lend us his personal canoe. Kevin and I can do that and you and Wayne get whatever from your hotel room.”
“Will it slow you down?” John asked.
“The hotel is in the same direction as Luke’s house, so we can pick you two up before going to Kevin’s house and going back in the direction of the river.”
“And we must stop by my house,” Kevin said.
Schuster, Wayne, Kevin, and John planned the trip to Happy Howlers.
Because an elderly person sleeping in rain-soaked jeans in 34-degree weather risked hypothermia, John and Schuster argued Wayne should wear John’s fishing waders. Kevin would be active and awake.
“What about you?” Wayne asked Schuster. “You lost a lot of blood.”
“It’s been about nineteen hours, though. I’m fine. Sir, don’t make me put them on you.”
“You’d rip your stitches,” Wayne muttered but stepped into the fishing waders.
Schuster wrote Pastor Mickelson a note detailing where he, Kevin, and John went, including a rough map of their route. He slid it under the office door instead of waking him. Also, he told the lady that he, Kevin, and two other trustworthy people would attempt to reach Happy Howlers as soon as possible.
John left Paula a message, but due to a low battery, told her to call Pastor Mickelson for more information. As John packed his briefcase and stowed it under the table, Wayne called Rebecca. If he had not called again by noon, she should call the sheriff’s department’s non-emergency line.
They left quick messages, worried that the floodwater would wash them away or turn them back to Holy Trinity before they reached the spare satellite phone battery in John’s hotel room.
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