The Curse of the Wendigo by Rick Yancey Read Free Book Online Page B

about Chanler and Larose?”
    “And got nothing from him—nothing of any use anyway. Told us the same thing Larose told Chanler’s poor wife—”
    “Lepto lurconis,”
murmured the doctor.
    “
Lepto
what?”
    He sighed. “The Wendigo.”
    The sergeant nodded slowly, and then the connection dawned on him. His voice shook with wonder as he said, “You don’t mean to say—I never put any stock in those stories. Is
that
why you’ve come? It’s
real
?”
    “Of course it isn’t real,” the doctor said irritably. “It’s aconvenience, like the stories your mother told to frighten you into submission.”
    “You mean those weren’t real either?”
    “No, those probably were. It’s an entirely different species.”
    “The Wendigo?”
    “The
stories
. My good man, I understand Chanler is missing, but I’d hoped I might be able to dredge up information on Larose’s whereabouts . . .”
    “You and half the town of Rat Portage. The man’s melted away like a puff of smoke.”
    “It has been my experience that men do not simply ‘melt away,’ Sergeant. But it seems to me the best place to start is the last person to see both men alive.”
    “You mean Jack Fiddler, but I told you I’ve already talked to him and he claims to know nothing about it.”
    “Perhaps he will be more convivial with someone of the same spiritual inclinations.”
    “I beg your pardon, Doctor?”
    “A fellow monster hunter.”

FIVE
     
    “You Will Live to Regret It”
     
    When the monstrumologist asked where he might find the best man to guide us to Sandy Lake, the young sergeant, whose name was Jonathan Hawk, eagerly volunteered his services.
    “There’s no one knows these woods better than me, Dr. Warthrop. I’ve wandered them since I was no bigger than your boy here. Why, I used to hunt the very same creatures my mother told me
you
hunted—all in play, you understand, and it’s surely a comfort to know none of them were real! My relief arrives from Ottawa this evening, so we can set out tomorrow at first light.”
    The doctor was delighted, saying later we could not have procured a more ideal guide than a member of the North-West Mounted Police. Hawk then inquired as to what kindof gear we had brought along for the expedition. Our passage would be a hard one through dense boreal forest, a hike of more than four hundred miles round-trip. Warthrop admitted we’d brought little but our resolve, just some warm clothes and, he added darkly, as if to make an impression, his revolver, at which point the sergeant laughed.
    “Might do you some good against the muskrats or a beaver, maybe—not much else. There’re grizzlies and wildcat and of course the wolves, but I’ll find you a rifle. As for the rest, leave it to me. I will tell you, Doctor, I had a funny feeling when I spoke to Fiddler—like he wasn’t telling all he knew. But his kind don’t trust us—the police, I mean—and maybe you’re right; he’ll talk to a brother monster hunter.”
    They parted for the time being, each with the highest estimation of the other, though Hawk was clearly the more impressed. He seemed positively starstruck, unable to grasp that the hero of his childhood fantasies was the elder Warthrop and not my master.
    The doctor, his spirits buoyed by this serendipitous turn of events, made straight for the telegraph office, where he fired off a telegram to Muriel Chanler in New York:
ARRIVED RAT PORTAGE THIS MORNING STOP LAROSE HAS DISAPPEARED STOP LEAVING AT DAWN FOR SANDY LAKE WITH SGT HAWK STOP WILL ADVISE
     
    “I can’timagine her reaction when she receives the telegram,” he confided over our supper. His face fairly glowed with the thought. “Surprised, I would guess, but not shocked. I probably should keep mum till I have a definitive answer—I don’t want to get her hopes up. The odds that the poor fool is alive are practically nil, but I fear she might take it into her head to come look for him herself. It would be just like her.