Winter Study

Saw it.

There was light. Adam was hunched over them, his skis making him awkward, a bright light on a band around his head and another on each arm.

“Where’s Ridley?” The question sounded so pathetic it embarrassed A

“I passed him coming out,” Adam said. “Soon as Bob showed up back at the bunkhouse all by himself with a cock-and-bull story about ‘getting things ready’ for when the rest of you arrived, I knew something stunk.”

With a couple of expert movements, he unlatched his skis and stepped out of them, then swung his backpack down and began rustling around in it.

“Ho, ho, ho,” A

Adam smiled. “Like Santa with a bag of toys,” he said.

That wasn’t it at all. Tall and covered with lights, he reminded A

Adam took out a thermos and A

“This’ll help,” Adam said and handed Robin a steaming cup. A

The next cup he held to their mouths for them. A sip for Robin, a sip for A

Dormant hunger raged through A

By the time Ridley roared back into their night following the beam of the snowmobile’s headlight, A

Little of the ride back registered with A

Finally they drove out of the woods and onto the graded road. A

“Ovaltine is on,” he called. “We’ll get you warmed up. I fired up the sauna. Food, heat, hot drinks. We’ll make new women of you. Not that I’m complaining about the old women, not to suggest you are old, Ranger Pigeon. I doubt you are much older than I am.” While he chattered, he helped take the bungee cords from around the three of them. Ridley let him. He wasn’t as spent as A

A

“Give Ridley a hand,” Jonah said, just as if A

“I had the snowmobile warmed up and was about to come looking myself,” he said as he clomped down the snow-covered steps from the deck. “Then Ridley beat me to it. Supper will be ready when you’re ready to eat it. I made beef stew. That ought to stick to your ribs.” He hustled down and elbowed Jonah out of the way to tend to Robin.

“Honey made it,” Ridley said.

“Whatever,” Bob said. “It’s hot and ready.”

“You heated it up. My wife, Honey, made the stew.” Ridley lurched from the machine without any help from A

Copping a feel. A

“Well, let’s get in and eat it before it gets cold,” Jonah said.

Ridley stepped in front of Menechi

“Honey made the stew,” he said. Ridley didn’t yell or curse or threaten, but there wasn’t any doubt, at least not in A

Bob must have sensed it too. He backed down, and A

“I just heated it up,” he said. A

“Robin, you must be about frozen to death,” he said and, curling himself around the biotech, he led her into the bunkhouse.

“Tell Robin to stay away from Bob.” Katherine had said that the day before she died. A

Or if the warning had nothing to do with affairs of the heart.