Page 36 of Battle Mountain

“She was into falconry,” Kany said. “I thought that was pretty cool.”

Joe swallowed and said, “She’s running a bird abatement company now up in Saddlestring. She has lots of falcons to fly and hunt.”

“Good for her,” Kany said. “Please tell her I said hello. You must be proud.”

“I am.”

“Should we take my truck?” she asked.

For a second, Joe didn’t follow what she was saying.

“We can leave your truck at the Wolf and you can get in with me and ride shotgun,” Kany said. “Believe me, if the two of us both drive out of town in the same direction the rumors will start that we’re involved in some kind of big investigation. Then the gossip will start.”

Joe agreed.

“Small towns,” she repeated. Then: “I assume we want to keep this all on the down-low, right?”

“Yup.” Without Joe saying it explicitly, Kany intuited Joe’s intent to keep the search for Rankin looking as innocuous as possible. Shewassharp.

“Let me get the check,” Joe said when they’d eaten. But she quickly snatched it from Yvette.

“The State of Wyoming pays either way,” she said. “I’ll handle this one.”

“Thank you, taxpayers,” Joe said as he stood up and clamped on his hat.

“You’re welcome,” said one of the town fathers from the adjacent table.

—

After leaving hispickup parked in the lot behind the Hotel Wolf and throwing his gear bag into the bed of Kany’s truck, Joe paused at her passenger door while she made room for him inside. Game and Fish pickups served as mobile business offices, and Kany’s vehicle was no different. The cab was filled with clothing, optics, boots for every occasion, ticket and regulation books, weapons, shed antlers, and other detritus picked up along the way in the field. She cleared the passenger seat and pulled a sleepy Jack Russell terrier toward her so Joe could climb inside.

“This is Ginger,” Kany said. “Don’t let her climb all over you.”

“Hi, Ginger.”

Joe found it charming that, unlike every other (male) game warden with a dog aboard, Kany had a Jack Russell instead of a Labrador. He scratched the dog on the head and closed the door. Ginger leaned into him and stared up into his eyes.

“She seems to be quite taken with you,” Kany said. “But she’s a pretty cheap date, to be honest.”

“I like dogs,” Joe said. “We have too many of them at home.”

“Being single, one is all I can handle.” Then, looking southtoward the range that looked like a blue-black battleship on the sea: “Rankin’s main elk camp is at the base of Battle Mountain. I figure we should start there.”

Joe said that made sense to him.

Kany took WYO 130 south through Warm Springs. Joe looked around. As the highway climbed up a hill toward the outskirts of the community, he said, “There are a few more houses than I remember.” He particularly noted a new subdivision under construction in the flats to the west.

“They can’t build them fast enough,” Kany said. “We’ve had an influx in population since the pandemic, like lots of places in the Mountain West. Last I heard, there were fewer than ten houses for sale in the whole valley. It’s a real problem for the businesses here—they can’t hire new people because there’s no place for them to live.”

“Just like Saddlestring,” Joe said.

“If I didn’t have the state game warden station, I couldn’t afford it myself,” she said.

“Where are the newcomers from?”

“Cities.”

—