He paused and regarded Charlie thoughtfully for just a moment, but then turned his attention to the claw marks. “Let’s see. Could be a young bear, markin’ territory. They’ll do that, tear the bark off a tree.” He knelt by the gouges in the trunk. “Awfully low for a bear, though.”
“What’s that up there?” Charlie asked, pointing.
Hank glanced up the trunk. “Looks like a knothole. Maybe a bird’s nest in there. Probably nothin’. I’ll give ya a boost if ya wanna shimmy on up an’ have a look, though.” The policeman looked a little wary, but he accepted the trapper’s help in reaching up to the first branch. He pulled himself up and scrabbled for a decent footing to inspect the hole.
Hank stooped down and rubbed a finger across the marks in the bark.
“What do you make of them?” Jackaby asked. “Have you seen anything like them before?”
“Three talons. Looks a lot like the marks Rosie leaves . . .” He trailed off.
“And like the tracks we saw up at the farmhouse,” I added. I could tell the trapper had come to the same thought. “Smaller, but just like them.”
“Them tracks up at Brisbee’s were definitely fakes, though.” Hudson turned to Jackaby. “Unless you know somethin’ I don’t know.”
“The ones up at Brisbee’s were,” Jackaby said. He had a twinkle in his eye. “These ones, though . . .” He shook his head. “No. No, they can’t be dragon tracks. That would be something to see, but dragons have been extinct for thousands of years. Even in biblical times they were highly endangered, which is why they are mentioned so infrequently in the scripture. Something living left these.”
“There’s dragons in the Bible?”
“Really, Hudson? Some of the best verses have dragons. Isaiah has a few particularly vivid passages about divine fury. Not just dragons, either. It goes on about unicorns and satyrs and something else . . . owls, I think.”
“I shoulda gone ta Sunday school more when I was a kid,” said Hudson.
“You said there were some smaller dragons alive today,” I said.
“Yes, fine,” Jackaby said. “A few rare Eastern varieties exist, but they’re scarcely large enough to menace a muskrat. Certainly nothing big enough to do all this.” The conviction drained out of his voice as he eyed the claw marks.
“You see something, don’t you, sir?” I asked.
My employer only scowled. If he intended to answer, his response was cut off by a burst of motion above us, accompanied by the frantic flapping of wings and the snap of breaking branches. Charlie tumbled down, his fingers scrabbling to find purchase. On the last branch, his legs caught hold, and he swiveled abruptly, hanging upside down from the branch like a bat, his uniform flopping over his head. Above him, a brown-and-white owl gave out a shrill screech and fluttered off into the forest.
Charlie swayed back and forth slightly, sighing from somewhere deep within his jacket. “You mentioned somethin’ about owls?” Hudson said with a sly grin.
Jackaby wore none of the same amusement. He continued to regard the jagged marks with intensity, and a somber foreboding had rolled in like storm clouds to hang heavily over his face. His expression sent an icy shiver down my spine.
Again, the clearing erupted in a burst of white light. “Got it!” Nellie sang happily. “That one’s the keeper!”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Nellie Fuller had brought with her a dozen spare photographic plates, and she was eager to capture as many photographs as possible for her article. Brisbee obligingly posed for a few when we returned to the farmhouse, but his enthusiasm had once again ebbed in the wake of the horrific slaughter.