Part 6
Voices carried across the shallows at the ford.
Mike moved behind a willow trunk and looked through his binoculars. The three hunters had reached the opposite side, their dogs restless around them. Greg was pointing along the road toward the refuge buildings. Most of what they said was lost to the river. Mike heard “enclosure,” then “a week,” and saw Seth look uneasily toward the reserve. Paul asked, loudly enough to carry, whether Greg meant to go in after the wolf at night.
Greg’s answer was indistinct. His expression was clear. Mike stayed behind the tree until they took the dogs uphill toward their vehicles. Then he called Sarah and told her what he had heard, making a distinction between the words he could report and the intention he feared. He asked for attention to the quarantine enclosure and the night gate. He filed a full account when he returned, including the gunfire, the dogs, Greg’s threat, and the bag of bills. The money went into the evidence locker under a receipt, out of his hands at last.
His supervisor read the report while Mike waited. The words Mike had actually heard across the water were underlined; the feared break-in was recorded separately as a concern. They had no proof Greg would come back, but there was enough to justify a tighter watch. Ben would check the outer gate at closing. A second employee would walk the service lane during the night shift. Mike passed along the truck descriptions to the officers handling the hunting complaint. He did not tell Ellen the enclosure was safe. He told her which doors were being checked and who had the keys.
The wolf woke to a roof above her instead of branches.
She tried to get up and stumbled. Something warm moved beside her. She found the cub against her belly, breathing steadily, and stayed where she was. The place smelled of fresh shavings, hay, unfamiliar people, and meat. Beyond the shelter stood a wire fence that let in daylight and the scent of trees, but barred the narrow space where she could have run.
She got to her feet as soon as her legs allowed it. The wound on her side pulled when she turned. She tested the fence, then the covered corner, then the gate. The cub followed for a few steps and called for her when she moved too fast. She returned to him and lay between him and the entrance. In the corner were water and a bowl of food.
She did not touch either.
Beyond the wire she could see a stand of firs. Birds moved through it as if there were no barrier, and once a squirrel came down a trunk close enough that the cub followed it with his nose. She paced the same short route until her sore side made her stop. The pup tried to climb the water bowl and tipped its rim into the sawdust. She pushed him back toward the covered bedding. It took her a while to drink from the bowl herself; it was surrounded by human scent, and every movement at the clinic door drew her attention away.
Ellen came to look through the gate. She did not enter while the wolf was standing guard over the cub. Instead she set fresh water in the service space and spoke to Ben about the injury, keeping her movements slow. The wolf watched both of them until they were gone. Late that afternoon she allowed the cub to nurse and drank a little. She left the food untouched.
By the next morning Ellen was worried about how little she had eaten. She changed the bowl and retreated again. There was no need to win the animal’s trust; there was a need to let her recover without making the enclosure another chase. Mike came after his patrol and sat outside the gate for a while. The wolf recognized his boots before she saw him. She rose, yet held her place rather than backing into the corner.
He put a fresh piece of meat inside the service opening, closed it, and went to sit farther away. “Nobody’s asking you to like this,” he said. He had brought Katie’s clinic estimate in his pocket to call about it after work. When the wolf turned her head toward the bowl, he kept his eyes down and gave her space.
That evening, with no one near the fence, she ate. By the third day she was taking food and water regularly. She still moved the cub away from the gate whenever Ellen inspected the wound. The pup, however, had begun to explore, nosing the sawdust and tripping over his own paws. When he strayed too far, his mother caught him by the scruff and deposited him back on the bedding.
Mike returned from patrol each day. He had no reason to enter her enclosure and never tried to touch her. Sometimes he brought the food; sometimes he sat outside long enough to hear the cub call and the mother answer with a low sound. The pace of her breathing had changed. The cut began to close. A week passed without Greg coming near the quarantine fence, though Mike made sure the gates were checked each night. The threat remained in his report, where others could act on it, rather than living only in his head.
On the seventh evening Mike met the night worker by the outer gate and walked the fence with her. They found no cut wire, no tracks at the service entrance. He knew absence of a trespass that night did not settle Greg’s intentions. It let the wolf sleep another night without dogs at the door. Inside the enclosure, the cub slept with his muzzle against his mother’s foot. She raised her head when the two people passed, waited for their steps to fade, and laid it down again.
To read the rest of the story – CLICK the NEXT button 👇👇👇