Chapter 22
The snow began to fall in earnest.
Joe Reacher had been driving for over four hours and what had started as scattered flakes caught in the headlights, had now thickened into a steady curtain that reduced the world to twenty yards of visible road and nothing beyond.
The wipers beat a steady rhythm across the windshield.
The heater blasted dry air that smelled like the engine might be working too hard.
He was deep in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, where the roads narrowed and the towns grew sparse and the darkness between settlements stretched for miles. The landscape had changed gradually over the past hour. Signs of human habitation were rare and the forest pressed in close.
The truck's headlights carved a tunnel through the night. Beyond that tunnel, there was nothing. Just trees, snow and darkness.
Joe liked it. It reminded him of places he'd been.
He checked the odometer. Another thirty miles to the next town marked on the gas station map he'd picked up. After that, the roads got even smaller. Logging roads, mostly. Some paved, some not. The kind of roads that didn't show up on regular maps.
The snow fell harder. The road curved through dense forest, then opened briefly onto a stretch where he could see frozen marshland extending into the darkness. Then more trees. More curves. More darkness.
A gas station materialized out of the snow like a mirage—a single building with two pumps out front and a convenience store attached.
The fluorescent lights inside were harsh and bright against the darkness.
A faded sign read NORTHWOODS FUEL & FOOD.
One other vehicle sat in the lot, a pickup truck with rust eating through the wheel wells.
Joe pulled in, killed the engine, and sat for a moment in the sudden silence.
The snow was already accumulating on the windshield. The temperature gauge on the dashboard read eighteen degrees.
He got out. The cold hit him hard and his breath plumed white in the air. Snow crunched under his boots as he walked toward the entrance.
Inside, the store was overheated and smelled like beer and coffee. There were aisles of chips and candy and motor oil and a hot dog roller turned slowly with three shriveled hot dogs that looked like they'd been there since yesterday.
Behind the counter sat a kid in his early twenties wearing a Green Bay Packers hoodie. His eyes were red-rimmed and glassy. He looked up when Joe entered, then looked back down at the magazine he was reading.
Joe walked to the coffee station, poured himself a large cup from a pot that had probably been sitting there for hours. The coffee was thick and bitter. Perfect.
He brought it to the counter along with a package of beef jerky.
"Four seventy-five," the kid said without looking up.
Joe paid cash. Then he said, "You sell maps?"
"Maps?"
"Yeah."
The kid thought about it. "Maybe. Lemme check."
He disappeared into a back room. Joe heard things being moved around, boxes scraping across the floor. After a minute, the kid came back with a folded map that looked like it had been sitting in storage since Vince Lombardi had coached the Packers.
"Five bucks," the kid said.
Joe paid. Then he said, "You know anything about old logging camps around here? Or mines?"
The kid stared at him. "What?"
"Logging camps. Mining operations. Anything abandoned or still operating in the area."
The kid's expression didn't change. "Dude," he said slowly, "I work here so I can get high every night before I have to go back to college. I don't know shit. And I don't want to know shit."
Joe nodded. "Fair enough."
The kid went back to his magazine that featured a woman in a bikini on the cover, somewhere in the tropics.
Joe took his coffee and map and walked out into the snow.
Back in the truck, he unfolded the map across the steering wheel. It was a local tourism map, the kind they gave away free at visitor centers. Badly photocopied, with hand-drawn annotations marking hiking trails and fishing spots.
But it showed the roads. The small towns. The general layout of the region.
Joe traced his finger north and west, toward the Porcupine Mountains. There were several small towns marked in that direction. Tucked into a fold in the map near the edge of the Porcupines, was a place called Ashford.
It looked promising. Small enough to be off the radar, but smack dab in the middle of the mountains.
Joe started the engine and pulled back onto the highway.
The snow kept falling.
He drove for another forty minutes through the darkness, through forest that seemed to go on forever, past frozen lakes and empty stretches of road where his headlights were the only light for miles.
Finally, he reached Ashford.
It wasn't much. A main street with maybe a dozen buildings. A post office. A diner that looked closed. A hardware store. A bar with a neon Pabst sign in the window.
And at the far end of the street, a hunting and fishing supply store with a hand-painted sign that read ASHFORD OUTFITTERS.
Joe parked in front of it. The lights were on inside, which surprised him given the hour. Then he saw the smaller sign on the door: OPEN 24 HOURS DURING DEER SEASON.
He got out and went inside.
The store was exactly what he expected. Mounted deer heads on the walls, their glass eyes staring down at racks of camouflage clothing and shelves of ammunition.
Fishing rods lined one wall. A glass case near the counter displayed hunting knives and compound bows.
The air smelled like gun oil and canvas and something vaguely animal.
Behind the counter stood a woman in her late twenties, dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, wearing a flannel shirt and jeans.
"Help you?" she said.
"Hope so," Joe said. He walked to the counter. "I'm looking for information about old logging camps or mining operations in the area. Anything abandoned or still running."
The woman frowned slightly. "You a history teacher or something?"
"Something like that."
She shook her head. "I wouldn't know. I don't hunt or fish. I'm just helping out my uncle—he owns the place."
"Your uncle around?"
"He's up at his cabin for the week. Won't be back till Sunday."
Joe nodded. "Any idea who might know? Old-timers, maybe? Someone who worked in the industry back in the day?"
The woman thought about it. "You could try Pike's Bar," she said. "Just around the corner, two blocks down. That's where all the old guys hang out and get drunk."
"Pike's Bar," Joe repeated.
"Can't miss it. Only bar in town."
"Thanks."
"Sure."
Joe walked out into the snow. It was coming down heavier now, accumulating on the sidewalks, on the roofs of parked cars.
He found Pike's Bar exactly where the woman said it would be.
It was a low building with wood siding painted dark red, the paint peeling in places. A neon sign in the window said PIKE'S in green letters. Through the frosted glass, Joe could see warm light and movement inside.
He pushed open the door.
The bar was small and dark and smelled like beer and cigarettes and old wood.
Wood paneling on the walls, scarred and stained from decades of use.
A pool table in the back corner, currently unoccupied.
A jukebox near the door playing something country and mournful.
Neon beer signs—Miller, Budweiser, Pabst—casting colored light across the room.
There were maybe six people inside. A couple sitting in a booth near the back. Three men at the bar, spaced out, each nursing a drink in silence. And behind the bar, a heavyset man in his fifties with a gray beard and a Milwaukee Brewers cap.
Joe walked to the bar and took a stool near the middle. The bartender came over, wiping his hands on a towel.
"What can I get you?"
"Whatever's on tap," Joe said.
The bartender pulled a pint of something local and set it in front of him. "Four bucks."
Joe paid. He took a sip. It was cold and decent. He took another sip, then set the glass down and looked around the bar like he was just taking in the atmosphere.
Nobody paid him any attention. That was good.
He drank slowly. Ordered a second beer. Let time pass. Let himself become part of the scenery.
After about twenty minutes, one of the men at the bar—an old guy in a canvas jacket and a John Deere cap—got up to use the bathroom. When he came back, he took the stool next to Joe instead of his original spot.
"You're not from around here," the old man said. It wasn't a question.
"Just passing through," Joe said.
"Long way to pass through. Not much up here this time of year."
"I like the quiet."
The old man grunted. He had a weathered face, deep lines around his eyes and mouth, hands that looked like they'd done hard work for a long time. He was probably in his late seventies, maybe eighty.
"You hunt?" the old man asked.
"Not much anymore."
"Fish?"
"Occasionally."
The old man nodded, like this confirmed something. "So what brings you up here, then?"
Joe took a drink. "Research," he said. "I'm writing a book about the old logging and mining operations in the U.P. Trying to track down some of the abandoned camps and sites."
It was a good lie. Specific enough to sound real, vague enough not to invite too many questions.
The old man's expression shifted slightly. Interest, maybe. Or nostalgia.
"You're talking about the old days," he said. "Before everything shut down."
"That's right."
"Ask Clem over there. He worked in logging.”
He pointed at an old guy, ancient-looking, wearing a red flannel shirt and a hat with ear flaps.
Joe carried his beer down and said, “Clem, can I buy you a beer?”
“My favorite kind of beer is free,” the old man said. Joe signaled and the bartender refilled Clem’s beer.
Joe repeated his cover story.
“Yeah, I worked in logging," Clem replied. "Thirty-two years. Started when I was sixteen, quit when I was forty-eight and my back gave out."
"Must have been hard work."
"Hardest work there is. But it was good money back then. Good money and good men." He took a drink from his beer. "All gone now. The camps, the mills, most of the men. All gone."
Joe nodded. "Where were the main operations? The big camps?"
The old man thought about it. "Depends on what you mean by big. There were camps all over. But the main area, the real center of things, that was around Copper City."
"Copper City," Joe repeated.
"Yeah. Though it's not a city. Never was. Barely even a town anymore. Used to be the center of the mining district, back when copper was king. Had maybe two thousand people at its peak. Now it's got maybe fifty, and most of them are just squatting in old buildings."
"Where is it?"
"About twenty miles northwest of here. Up in the Porkies.”
“The Porkies?” Joe asked.
“That’s what we call the Porcupine Mountains.”
“And our wives,” one of the other old guys said. A couple of the men laughed.
Any specific camps or operations you remember? Names, locations?"
The old man scratched his jaw. "Hell, most of them didn't have names, just numbers. Camp Seven, Camp Twelve, like that. But there were a few private operations too. Smaller outfits run by families or partnerships."
Joe took a casual sip of his beer. "Ever hear the name Kinsman?"
The old man's eyes stared blankly into his glass. "Kinsman," he said slowly. "Maybe. Sounds familiar. But I'm eighty years old and half drunk, so don't count on it."
"Could be a family name," Joe said. "Or a company."
"Could be." The old man shook his head. "Memory's not what it used to be. I knew a lot of people back then. A lot of names. They all blur together now."
Joe didn't push. "Well, thanks for the information. Copper City sounds like a good place to start."
"If you're going up there, be careful," the old man said. "Roads are bad. And there's not much up there anymore. Just ghosts."
"I'll be careful."
The old man finished his beer and stood up slowly, joints creaking. "Good luck with your book."
"Thanks."
Joe finished his own beer, left a ten on the bar, and walked out.
The snow was still falling. The street was empty. His truck was covered in a thin layer of white.
He got in, started the engine, and pulled out the map. Found Copper City marked in small letters near the edge of the Porcupine Mountains. The road leading to it was barely visible on the map—a thin line winding through terrain marked with contour lines indicating steep hills.
Joe memorized the route, then folded the map and set it on the passenger seat.
He put the truck in gear and drove north out of Ashford, toward the mountains, toward Copper City, toward whatever was waiting there in the darkness.
His taillights disappeared into the snow.
Inside Pike's Bar, the bartender watched through the window until the truck was gone. Then he walked over to the phone mounted on the wall behind the bar.
He picked up the receiver and dialed a number from memory.
It rang three times before someone answered.
"A guy just left," the bartender said quietly. "Asked about the Kinsman name."
He listened again.
“Big guy. Tall. Maybe six-six or so.”
"Heading toward Copper City. Left maybe two minutes ago."
The bartender nodded at whatever was being said on the other end, then hung up the phone and went back to wiping down the bar.
Outside, the snow kept falling, covering everything, erasing tracks, turning the world white and silent.