I had taken lukas to the big kennel. He was circling the cage and whining. Probably knew what was going on. A couple of grey elkhounds were next door. They all came to the wire netting and sniffed oneanother.

The crew greeted me when I joined them. Rather than jolly they were shy as people are round here when they greet strangers.

You’ll all know jana the team leader said. And if someone doesn’t and can’t put two and two together she is bror’s sister.

He looked at me kindly. I was taken aback. Should have said something but only nodded.

Besides jana happens to have the best dog he went on.

The owner of the elkhounds frowned.

Then we were handed our hunting passes and an orange reflex cap each. Just in case he showed me our area on the map. He had no need to. I knew every pile of twigs in the smalångerforest.

I buttoned the gps tracker on the dog’s collar and let him go. First he pissed and shat. Then he shot away through the contorta pine shrubs. I waited for a while. Checked the map in the tracker and saw that he ran around here and there without getting a proper trail. No indication of barking. 183

After driving for a couple of kilometres along a forest cartrack I stopped. I loaded cartridges into the magazine put the safety on hung the rifle on my back and set out walking in the general direction of where the dog was.

By then the sun had almost risen fully. The forest smelled pleasantly of the moss and plants that had not been killed by the frost. The contorta pines thinned out into an area that had been logged selectively and replanted in orderly rows on dry ground.

Now and then the tracker crackled. Brisk voices checking things out.

I followed the dog. It was about a kilometre or so in front of me. A couple of hours passed. The head of the hunt wondered where I was. Near the burn I said and trudged on. Tried to remember where the crossing was. The burn ran shallow where I was but the water was freezing. At worst I’d have to wade.

I sat down in a clearing and drank some coffee from my thermos. A squirrel shot up a tree.

Then the map alerted me to the dog. It stood and barked.

I pushed the thermos into the rucksack heaved the gun onto my back and moved quickly across a smaller old clearing. Here the burn had narrowed to a creek. A few stepping stones helped me to jump across it.

The elk was still on the move. Now and then I listened out and checked the gps location. The dog was barking steadily. My pulse was speeding up. It was so long ago and yet so recent. I knew what I had to do.