The Curse of the Wendigo (The Monstrumologist 2)

“Traveling light, Doctor,” our guide said brightly. “Make the best time that way.”

The rifles reminded Warthrop he had left his revolver in our room, and he ordered me to fetch it for him.

He dropped it into the pocket of his duster and said, “Shall we snap to, then, Hawk? I’ll take the rucksack and a rifle. Will Henry can port the rations.”

Startled, Jonathan Hawk said to him, “Your boy is coming with us?”

“He is not my ‘boy,’ and, yes, he is.”

The young policeman frowned. “It’s none of my business, of course—”

“Of course it is not.”

“He could wait for us here.”

“Will Henry is my assistant, Sergeant Hawk; his services are indispensable to me.”

“What kind of services might those be?” He was having some difficulty picturing it.

“Of the indispensable variety.”

“He’ll slow us down.”

“No more than standing on a sidewalk holding a pointless debate, Sergeant. I guarantee you that he is more useful than he looks.”

Hawk considered my “looks” dubiously for a moment.

“I’ll take your word for that, Doctor, but he strikes me as a little on the delicate side. You’re not in New England anymore; this is the backcountry we’re talking about.”

Sergeant Hawk turned to me. “There are no monsters in the bush, Mr. Will Henry, but there are other things just as eager to eat you. Are you sure you want to come?”

“My place is with the doctor,” I said, trying to sound resolute.

He gave up after that. With a shrug of his broad shoulders and a lopsided grin, he slung his rifle over his back and bade us follow. He was a tall man, and his stride was long; he was used to hiking long distances over difficult terrain; and in the days to come the doctor and I would be taxed to our limits, both physically and psychologically, for he was right. We were not in New England anymore.

SIX

“A Different Species Altogether”

We made camp that first night on the northern shore of a vast lake, after a hike of nearly twenty miles along a fairly well-trod path. Canoes had been left on each side of the lake, a courtesy for local hunters and the native peoples who used the trail as a trade route to Rat Portage. The lake crossing took the better part of two hours, so vast was the water’s expanse and so deliberate was our passage, for with the three of us and all our gear on board, the little canoe rode alarmingly low in the water. While Warthrop helped Hawk pitch the tent—he had packed only one, not expecting a party of three—I was dispatched into the surrounding woods to gather kindling for our fire. In the twilight shadows I thought I heard the rustle of some large creature slinking, and I cannot say if that was truly the case, only that the fruitfulness of my imagination seemed to grow exponentially as the daylight faded.

Night had not fully come on, however, before Sergeant Hawk had a merry fire going and a pan of fresh venison sausages frying, and he was happily chattering on like an excited schoolboy on the eve of the summer holiday.

“Now you must tell me something about this monstrumology business, Doctor,” he said. “I’ve seen some pretty strange things in the bush, but they can’t be nothing to what you’ve seen in your travels! Why, if half the things my mother said are true . . .”

“Not knowing what she told you, I cannot speak to your mother’s truthfulness,” replied the doctor.

“What about vampires—have you ever hunted one of those?”

“I have not. It would be extraordinarily difficult to do.”

“Why? Because they’re hard to catch?”

“They are impossible to catch.”

“Not if you find one in his coffin, I hear.”

“Sergeant, I do not hunt them because, like the Wendigo, they do not exist.”

“What about the werewolf? Ever hunt one of them?”

“Never.”

“Don’t exist either?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“What about—”

“I hope you aren’t about to say ‘zombie.’”

The man’s mouth closed. He stared into the fire for a few moments, stirring the flickering embers with the end of a stick. He seemed somewhat crestfallen.

“Well, if you don’t hunt any of them, what kind of things do you hunt?”

“In the main, I do not. I have devoted myself to the study of them. Capturing or killing them is something I try to avoid.”

“Doesn’t sound as fun.”

“I suppose that depends upon your definition of ‘fun.’”

“Well, if monstrumology ain’t about those things, why’d your friend Chanler come up here looking for the Wendigo?”

“I can’t be entirely sure. I would say, though, it was not to prove their nonexistence, since failing to find one would demonstrate only that one was not found. My suspicion is that he hoped to find one, or at least irrefutable evidence of one. You see, there is a movement afoot to expand the scope of our inquiries to include these very creatures of which you spoke—vampires, werewolves, and the like—a movement to which I am very much opposed.”

“And why’s that?”

Warthrop tried very hard to remain calm. “Because, my good Sergeant Hawk, as I’ve said, they do not exist.”

“But you also said not finding one don’t prove they don’t exist.”

“I may say with near absolute certainty that they do not, and I need venture no further than my own thought to prove it. Let’s take the Wendigo as an example. What are its characteristics?”

“Characteristics?”

“Yes. What makes it different from, say, a wolf or a bear? How would you define it?”

Hawk closed his eyes, as if to better picture the subject in his mind’s eye.

“Well, they’re big. Over fifteen feet tall, they say, and thin, so thin that when they turn sideways, they disappear.”

The doctor was smiling. “Yes. Go on.”

“He’s a shape-changer. Sometimes he’s just like a wolf or bear, and he’s always hungry and he don’t eat anything but people, and the more he eats, the hungrier he gets and the thinner he gets, so he has to keep hunting; he can’t stop. He travels through the forest jumping from treetop to treetop, or some say he spreads out his long arms and glides on the wind. He always comes after you at night, and once he finds you, you’re a goner; there’s nothing you can do. He’ll track you for days, calling your name, and something in his voice makes you want to go.

“A bullet can’t take him down, unless it’s made of silver. Anything silver can kill him, but it’s the only thing that can, but even then you have to cut out his heart and chop off his head, and then burn the body.”

He took a deep breath and glanced at my master with a chagrined expression.

“So we have covered most of the physical attributes,” the doctor said in the manner of a headmaster leading a class. “Humanoid in appearance, very tall, more than twice the size of a grown man, extremely thin, so thin, you say, as to defy physics and become invisible upon turning sideways. One thing you failed to mention is that the heart of Lepto lurconis is made of ice. The Wendigo’s diet consists of human beings—and, interestingly, certain species of moss, if I may append—and it has the ability to fly. Another attribute you failed to mention is its method of propagation.”

“Its what?”

“Every species on the planet must have some way of producing the next generation, Sergeant. Every schoolboy knows that. So tell me, how does the Wendigo make little Wendigos? Being a hominid, it is a higher order of mammal—putting aside the issue of how a heart made of ice can pump blood—so it is not asexual. What can you tell me about its courtship rituals? Do Wendigos date? Do they fall in love? Are they monogamous, or do they take multiple mates?”

Our guide laughed in spite of himself. The absurdity of the thing had become too much for him.

“Maybe they do fall in love, Doctor. It’s nice to think we’re not the only ones who can.”

“One must be careful not to anthropomorphize nature, Sergeant. Though, we must leave room for love in the lower orders—I am not inside Mr. Beaver’s head; perhaps he loves Mrs. Beaver with all his heart. But to return to my question about the Wendigo: Are they immortal—unlike every other organism on earth—and therefore have no need to reproduce?”

“They take us and turn us into them.”

“But I thought you said they ate us.”

“Well, I can’t say exactly how it happens. Stories come out of the bush, a hunter or trapper or, more often, an Indian ‘goes Wendigo.’”

“Ah, so it’s like the vampire or werewolf. We are its food as well as its progeny.” The doctor was nodding with mock gravity. “The case is nearly unassailable, isn’t it? Much more likely than the alternative, that the Wendigo is a metaphor for famine and the taboo of cannibalism in times of starvation, or a boogeyman to frighten children into obeying their parents.”

Neither spoke for a few minutes. The fire crackled and popped; shadows danced and whirled about our little camp; the lake shimmered in the moonlight, its waves sensually licking the shore; and the woods reverberated with the song of crickets and the occasional snap of a twig underfoot of some woodland creature.

“Well, Dr. Warthrop, I’m almost sorry I asked about monstrumology,” said Hawk wistfully. “You’ve darn near taken all the fun out of it.”

The men flipped a coin to see who would take the first watch. Though we were but a day’s hike from civilization, we were already well within wolf and bear country, and someone would need to keep the fire going throughout the night. Warthrop lost—he would have to be the last to sleep—but seemed pleased with the outcome. It would give him, he said, time to think, a statement that struck me as rich with irony. It was my impression he did little else with his time.

The burly Sergeant Hawk crawled into the tent and threw himself onto the ground next to me; so small were our quarters that his shoulder rubbed against mine.

“Sort of a queer fellow your boss is, Will,” he said quietly, lest Warthrop hear him. I could see the doctor’s silhouette through the open flap, hunched before the orange glow of the fire, the Winchester propped against his thigh. “Polite but not very friendly. Kind of coldlike. But he must have a good heart to come all this way after his friend.”

“I’m not sure if all of it’s about his friend,” I said.

“No?”

“He thinks Dr. Chanler is dead.”

“Well, that’s my thought too, and why we called off the search. But it’s like this Wendigo. Odds are your boss ain’t going to find him—and that won’t prove he is or isn’t dead.”

“I’m not sure it’s even about finding him,” I confessed.

“Then, what the devil is it about?”

“I think it’s mostly about her.”

“Who?”