Part 9
By May, the letter allowing Ash to remain at the station was in a folder beside the radio. Getting it had taken weeks of corrected records, veterinary checks, and questions Jack could no longer answer with a convenient “Everything’s fine.” Cal had kept his word, carrying the proposal through the wildlife office instead of leaving Jack to explain it alone.
The approval covered a supervised field study on the remote forestry tract. It did not make Ash a pet or make the arrangement simple. Jack had to keep observations, report problems promptly, and manage access to the station so that visitors did not arrive expecting to meet a tame wolf.
He kept the folder open when he made his reports. There was something steadying about being able to describe what was actually in the room. Cal also asked him to contribute to the district’s new rehabilitation planning, and Jack sent back notes about weather delays and the decisions isolated field crews were left to make.
Ash’s wounds closed gradually. For a while he favored the hind leg after a long outing, and Jack shortened their walks when he saw it. The torn ear remained uneven; the fur over his left shoulder grew back in a rough patch that June still investigated whenever he came in.
At roughly a year old, he was larger than she was. He hunted in the woods during the day and returned most evenings before Jack finished supper, sometimes later, when the long light was thinning between the spruce. At night he folded his body around June on their old blanket, keeping her warm. Jack still looked toward the door when he heard a sound outside; he suspected that habit would take longer to change than any of the paperwork.
June had slowed a little after the hard winter. The pale fur around her muzzle showed more clearly, and she preferred the shorter route up from the creek. But she played again, dropping her front legs and turning sideways when Ash nudged her, pretending offense until he nudged her a second time.
One afternoon they found the last shaded patch of snow beside the woodpile. Ash pushed a paw toward her; she snapped at the air near it, and he sprang away, loose-limbed and ridiculous. Jack stood on the porch with a split log under one arm, waiting for them to clear the path.
He took Ellen’s small photograph from his shirt pocket. He had started carrying it again without noticing exactly when. There she was, laughing over the puppy tucked inside her coat, and there was the same dog below him, trying to wrestle a wolf out of a shrinking patch of snow.
Jack put the picture away and set down the log. When they came up the steps, he crouched to rub June’s chest, then reached around Ash’s neck. For a moment neither animal tried to get past him into the house.
Word of the arrangement traveled beyond the district. A reporter called, then another, wanting pictures and a visit. Jack declined both, explaining that the station was a working place and Ash was a wild animal. He had already spent enough time arranging where people could look.
The more important invitation came in an official envelope. Jack opened it at the kitchen table, expecting another request for records. Instead he found an offer to join the regional office in Fairbanks as its lead specialist on wildlife response.
There was a substantial raise, a housing allowance for a city apartment, and an office from which he could help shape the procedures Cal had asked him to advise on. He read the paragraph about field crews twice. He knew how many calls could end badly when the person asking for help had only weather, a radio, and an instruction that did not fit what stood in front of him.
He walked to the window with the letter. Ash was stretched on the porch, watching the trees; June slept in the warm strip just inside the doorway. The wolf rose when something moved beyond the woodpile, studied it, and settled again.
There would be no equivalent to that porch in a city apartment. The study depended on this tract, this station, the animal’s access to the forest around it. Accepting the post would mean finding other people to care for Ash and leaving June’s days divided between Jack and the place she kept returning to.
He sat down again. The offer was good. He didn’t need to pretend it wasn’t in order to answer it.
For a while he considered the practical advantages: fewer miles on tired knees, a truck somebody else maintained, the chance to get a decision made before the person in the field had to improvise one. He would have liked to be useful that way. He turned the letter over and read the proposed start date.
June came to him for a scratch behind the ears. Jack put the paper down to use both hands, and Ash got up outside at the sound of her tags. He appeared in the doorway, waited, then crossed to the table and rested his head beside Jack’s knee.
Jack reached for a clean sheet of paper. He thanked them for the offer and declined the transfer. He would continue contributing from Black Spruce, he wrote, but he would not be relocating. After signing it, he read the short reply once and put it in an envelope.
He left it beside the truck keys for the next mail run. June had gone back to the doorway, and Ash was standing on the porch, testing the breeze. Jack washed his cup, dried it, and put it away before joining them.
The sun was low over the trees, though there was still plenty of evening left. He sat on the step with June’s head across his thigh. Ash stood nearby looking into the forest, one ear lifting toward a sound Jack couldn’t hear.
There would be another outing before dark. Jack knew that much from the wolf’s stillness, from the weight shifting forward over his feet. He kept his hand on June and moved his boot to leave the steps clear.
Ash glanced back at him, then settled on the board beside them for a little longer. June breathed against Jack’s leg. With the day’s light on the porch and both animals within reach, he let the cup-shaped hollow of his hand rest against her warm ear.