Day 8

Dr. Bonanza started the pick-up, turned it around and headed to the store. He didn’t stop at the Third Street Market, but took the highway, and stopped at a gas station at the edge of town. He had the man fill it up, and he and Hugo went in to the mini-mart.
“What’s the good word, Joe,” Bonanza said as they entered the mini-mart.
“It’s all good, Bonanza,” Joe said from behind the counter. Dr. Bonanza limped his way to the back of the store, and came out with a twelve pack. He went to the counter and waited for the truck to be done filling.
“I haven’t seen you around lately,” Joe said as they lounged at the counter. He stood about six feet tall, had olive skin, and black hair. He rested his hands on the counter. Hugo thought that he might be Egyptian.
“Well, we been busy,” Dr. Bonanza said. “Have you heard about those dead deer they found down on the refuge?” Hugo shifted his weight to the other foot, trying to act casual.
“I haven’t heard much, just that they found a couple. Why, you heard something?”
Hugo looked at Bonanza, who looked out the window. “I just thought it was strange, two deer showing up dead. One of them was right down by my place, did you know that?”
“I had heard that it was out there somewhere.” The gas computer beeped. Joe rang up the gas and the beer and Bonanza paid the bill. They were about to leave, when Joe said, “There was one thing that old Johnny Meyers said.” Joe continued. “He stops in here sometimes on his way home from work. He said that some of the guys that he works with have been talking that something strange had happened to those deer. He wasn’t sure what it was, but heard that they hadn’t been killed by anything that lives around here…unless maybe it was people.”
“Is that all he said?” blurted out Hugo.
Joe looked at him for a second, then continued, “He also said that he had heard that some ranch animals might be next. Or that they had already been killed.” He looked at Bonanza, and then at Hugo.
“Thanks, Joe,” said Bonanza as the strode out the door, leaving the beer for Hugo to carry.
Hugo hurried into the truck. “Do you think that he knows something that he isn’t telling us?”
Dr. Bonanza started up the truck and scoffed. “Of course he knows something that he isn’t telling us: gas station attendants gossip like old women. He knows more about this and he knows more about a lot of other stuff too. Do I think that he has any more information that will help us out? Hell, I don’t even know what might help us. I don’t even know if we need help.”
He stepped on the gas and pulled out of the station, heading south toward his house. They didn’t take the same route that they had taken on the previous morning, but turned before the drive for Bonanza’s and Olaf’s houses. He explained that they were going to meet Olaf out where the goat had been killed on his place. They came to a barbwire gate. Hugo jumped out, but not enthusiastically. He had no trouble opening the gate and swinging it aside for Bonanza to pull through. Then, to his surprise, he hooked the gate with out drawing blood. He thought of Bonanza’s bandana, smiling inwardly, grateful that he didn’t have a need for it today.
The field that they drove through looked much like Bonanza’s, but it seemed slight different, as all properties do. Maybe the sun shone in a different way, or the angle of the land tilted in another direction, Hugo couldn’t tell. It felt strange that two places that bordered each other should look and feel so different. He felt himself getting weird and so pulled out a can of beer, handing one to Bonanza.
Hugo thought to start a conversation to take his mind from the weirdness, but sipped his beer instead, watching the rocks and grass roll by.
Olaf’s road had been graded more recently than any on Bonanza’s place and so the ride went more quickly and smoothly. They did have to skirt around a couple of soft spots that were filled with water, after the rain of the past few days. The road began to descend and they saw Olaf standing by his truck about a hundred yards ahead. A couple of trees grew off to his left, their right. Hugo thought that they might be elms, but at this distance he was unsure.
As they drew closer, Olaf waved, turned and walked toward the trees. As they neared they saw that the trees stood beside a watering hole, manmade. The trees looked to be alders, not elms. Hugo drank the last drink of his beer and stepped out of the pick-up as Bonanza parked it between Olaf’s and the watering hole.
“Hello, Olaf,” said Bonanza as they came near. “This is my protégé,” he said waving a hand in Hugo’s direction.
Olaf smiled and extended a hand.
After the pleasantries, Olaf said, “That goat, you know, she was one of my best milking goats. I was sorry to lose her.” The walked around the hole toward the farthest tree. Hugo expectantly looked for the carcass, but saw none.
“She was right about here, you know.” Olaf pointed to the base of the tree. Hugo looked, but couldn’t even make out a patch of blood.
“I thought that your goat was still here, Olaf,” Hugo said.
“Oh no,” Olaf shook his head. “I put her in the ground, you know. I didn’t want her to start stinking and get those buzzards down here, you know.”
Hugo looked at Olaf expectantly. “So, the vultures came down then. Had they been at the carcass long?”
“Oh no,” Olaf shook his head again. “There weren’t any buzzards. I thought that was pretty strange, too. But I just put her in the ground and covered her up.” Hugo looked around for a freshly dug goat grave, but couldn’t see any.
“What about flies?”
Olaf shrugged. “I didn’t look around for flies, you know,” he said. “I just put her in the ground.”
Hugo stared impatiently. Dr. Bonanza put out a hand to calm Hugo. “What about the brain, Olaf,” he said.
Olaf looked at Bonanza, then to Hugo, and then back to Bonanza. “I didn’t tell anyone about the brain,” he whispered. “How did you know about that? Was your sheep the same way? I looked in her head and there wasn’t any brain left in there, you know.” He shuddered. “I just put her in the ground.” He inclined his ever so slightly. Hugo followed the line of sight down toward the refuge, down the slope.
“What is this all about, Dr. Bonanza?” Olaf asked.
“We’ll tell ya’ when we find out ourselves,” said Bonanza. He moved back toward the pick-ups. “You want a beer, Olaf.”
“Oh no,” He said. “It’s too early in the day for me.” He looked off in the distance, back toward the houses. “It’s too early.”
“Suit yourself,” said Bonanza. He opened the passenger door, pulling out two, one of which he threw to Hugo. Hugo caught it and gingerly opened it, aiming the opening away from himself. Foam sprayed him anyway. He took a long drink, then looked down the slope toward the refuge. He could see the ridge where Mandy and the Duck had found their deer. He could also see the visitor center from here, the small grass patch out in the front still green from weeks of over-watering by the over-zealous head ranger.
Up toward the ridge, but closer to where they stood, Hugo saw movement, or thought he did. Something moving from one bush to a rock outcropping. It seemed too fast to have actually been there. Too fast to have been an animal. He stood and stared at the point where the movement had been. Nothing. He waited as Bonanza and Olaf talked behind him. He felt tense. Then he felt self-conscious. How long had he been staring at that one place? He couldn’t be sure. It must have been an antelope, or a coyote, he thought. But it sure had moved fast.
Hugo shook his head and turned back to the other two. They hadn’t noticed anything.
Dr. Bonanza finished his beer. “Well, thanks, Olaf,” he said as he climbed into the pick-up.
“Oh it was no problem,” Olaf said.
Hugo climbed in and they drove off as Olaf waved them up back up the road.
“Whatever it was,” said Hugo, “it was definitely the same thing that killed your sheep.”
Bonanza stared out the windshield with a far away look in his eyes. “Yes,” he said. “It seems that way.
Bonanza turned off before the highway, taking a dirt track that looked more like the dirt track that they had taken on the day before from Bonanza’s house. Hugo assumed that Bonanza wanted to stop by his house before they met with Mandy and the Duck, though neither one said anything about it.
They came to another gate. On the other side seemed to be all of Bonanza’s sheep gathered, watching them expectantly. Hugo got out and walked to the gate. Bonanza rolled down his window and shouted to Hugo, “Watch out for them sheep. I got the ram in there and if he decides to come through, all the others will follow and there ain’t nothing that you can do about it.”
Hugo found the ram, it stood about three inches higher at the shoulder than any of the others. The ram looked back, his square pupil not giving any hint to his inclinations. Hugo undid the gate and walked it toward the mass of sheep. Bonanza quickly pulled through and stopped as close to Hugo as he could. The ram stepped toward them, but didn’t try to get past. Hugo sat back in the passenger seat. The sheep watched impassively as they drove up toward the house.
“They always know I’m comin’ when I’m over at Olaf’s. They gather there every time.” Bonanza shook his head. “One time, that goddamn ram ran into me when I was closing the gate. I tried to kick him, but he jumped out of the way before I could get my boot on him. Hit me right in the back, here on the left side,” he pointed at his side and twisted it toward Hugo. Hugo wondered if he was supposed to see anything. He didn’t.
The drove in silence the rest of the way, Bonanza grimacing every now and then. Hugo thought that he probably was remembering all the times that sheep had done him wrong. When Hugo had to tend to the sheep, they had butted him in the back, stepped on his feet, and bit him over and over. Hugo hated his stepmother, believing that she was behind each painful encounter, as though somehow she had taught the sheep to harm him. One time, a ram, smaller than the one that they had just seen, but meaner. Had knocked him down and then when Hugo got up, had knocked him down again.
Hugo imagined that the ram smiled with malice, imagined that it was his stepmother, not the sheep knocking him down. Goddamnit, he hated her. He stood up. The ram charged again. Hugo stepped aside and grabbed the ram around the neck. The tried to break it, believed that he could, though he only weighed fifty pounds. The ram pulled him around the barn and out into the yard, scraping him against the doorway on the way out.
When the ram realized that it was outside it stopped and Hugo dropped to the ground. He expected another charge from the ram, but it apparently had lost interest and wandered to a patch of grass.