"Be lucky to see a ptarmigan again this year," John commented as he closed the door. "Coffee?"

"Sure."

He got a carafe out of the kitchen, along with a plate of shortbread cookies. Conversation was restricted to "please" and "thank you" until he had finished serving her and had taken a seat across the living room, at a distance that almost but didn't quite necessitate a shout for communication. The interior of the lodge was very masculine, sparingly but luxuriously furnished with sheepskin rugs, brown leather couch and chairs, heads of one of each of every living thing in the Park hanging from the walls. No humans that Kate could see, but then, it was a big place.

It didn't look all that lived in to her, but it fit him. He was a tall man with a lion's mane of white hair, carefully tended and swept back from a broad and deceptively benevolent brow. He looked like he was about to hand down stone tablets. He'd kept his figure, too, broad shoulders over a narrow waist, slim hips and long, lanky legs encased in faded stovepipe jeans, topped with a long-sleeved dark red plaid shirt over a white T-shirt. He had not yet reached an age to stoop, and his step was still swift and sure across the ground. His hands were enormous, dwarfing the large mug cradled in one palm, calloused, chapped, and scarred. His jaw protruded in a very firm chin, his lips were thin, his nose was high-bridged and thinner, and his eyes were dark and piercing. He fixed her with them now. "What can I do for you, Kate?" he said. "I'm guessing this isn't just a social call."

Since she liked social bullshit as little as he did, she greeted this opening with relief. "You'd guess right. It's about Dan O'Brian."

John had always been hard to read, his expression usually remote and unchanging, as if sometimes he wasn't really in the room when you were talking to him.

"What about him?"

"Did you hear they're trying to force him into early retirement?"

"No." He drank coffee. "I hadn't heard that."

"The administration is looking for a change of flavor in their rangers."

He picked up a cookie and examined it. "I can't say I disagree with them."

She smiled. "Come on, John," she said, relaxing back into her chair. "You've got things pretty good right now. You and Demetri are the sole big-game guides licensed to operate in the Park. Between the two of you, you constitute a monopoly. Dan's happy to keep it that way."

He didn't say anything.

Kate plowed on. "Plus, we know him, and he knows us. What if they start making noises about drilling in Iqaluk again?"

"Are they?

"They are in ANWR. I figure if they start punching holes there, they'll look to start punching them other places, too, and Iqaluk is one of the few places in the state that has already supported a profitable oil field."