Part II: Wadena Fishes Big Hard-Hearted River (The Swamp)

Click here if you haven't read part one.

The Tale continues........

In a shockingly unusual state of affairs......Wadena's paws were now muddy (THAT IS a cause for alarm). She looked uncharacteristically stunned. "Face it," she said. "We are in a quagmire. If this were a war we'd be declaring victory and sending token numbers of troops home. Let me be the first to volunteer to go home."

A cold mist began to fall......drifting in softly between the dark spruce trees and forming tiny droplets that hung diamond-like on the tips of the deep green needles. September in the north of Minnesota can be a cruel, fickle and capricious month. The clouds had come quickly and simultaneously with our entry into the swamp and our cool and beautiful sunny day was suddenly a dismally wet, cold and nasty afternoon. Every time I brushed against a branch I got wetter.

"It's not that easy," I said.

Wadena was dolefully staring at her muddy paws and her head snapped up. "Don't give me that."

"Well, it's like this." I said, "We can't just 'go home.' We have to keep moving. We have about a mile to go along the river before we can cut back overland to the road. Besides, we might still catch a fish on the way."

Wadena seemed massively unconvinced. She did, however, turn and press on.

It turned out to be much more than a mile and things got rougher. The brush got thicker, the mud got deeper, and I did something I never do. I sprained my ankle. It hurt. I sat down and took a look at it. It didn't look or feel good. It needed ice and I didn't have any. It needed to be wrapped and I had nothing to wrap it with.

"I am NOT Lassie," Wadena said. "I can't run back to the road and bark and get someone to follow me back here to save you....it's just not a cat thing."

I was busy cutting a walking stick. "Never mind. It's not that bad." I wasn't sure if I was lying or not.

I'd been a runner for many years and in thousands of miles of town and cross-country running over curbs, rocks and rough trails--I had never sprained an ankle. If there was one thing I was sure of, it was that I could always cover ground fast without any problems. Now one slippery rock had undone me. I started to wonder if we might be spending the night in the woods. I didn't mention that possibility to Wadena.

"Ok, let's go," I said.

She seemed heartened by my mobility and ran ahead again. After an hour of slow going, though, she put her (muddy) paw down firmly. She was now looking, not just muddy-footed, but bedraggled. "I need the backpack," she said.

I picked her up and put her inside, zipped up with just her head sticking out.

"Better," she said.

I needed a lift myself. I was limping. I had one good leg and a cat on my back. Either my map was wrong or we had somehow gotten onto a branch of the river that didn't show up on the map. There had been a beaver pond with what looked like another small river inlet and I had ignored it because it looked too small to be anything and it looked even more swampy......I started to get that uneasy feeling that you get when you start to think you just might be lost.

"I think we might be lost," Wadena said.

"Hmmmm....." I said, putting off the inevitable admission.

"You know, if you were more willing to stop and ask directions, we wouldn't GET lost."

"Yeah, right. Very funny.....like I could stop at a gas station.

"Well, you DO tend to just blunder on."

I made a growling noise at the cat on my back.

So she abruptly changed the subject. "Also, I think something is following us."

I walked on. "Oh come on.....I have enough problems."

"That doesn't change the fact that something's following us. I heard it before. It crossed the river to get to our side. Part way splashing through the water and then walking along a fallen tree to our side. It was big. And now that I'm up here, I've seen it moving back there twice."

Having given up any pretense of fishing, I marched silently on through the brush. I was cheered by the sight of a maple tree. Maybe higher ground? The swamp seemed a little less swampy and the brush was thinning a bit. The cold and mist were, however, getting worse. "Maybe you're hallucinating. You might be getting hypothermia."

From the backpack: "Baloney. I'm warm in here now. I heard what I heard. I saw what I saw." It sounded like she had her head inside the backpack now.

I was totally outside in the cold wet. "I'm glad YOU'RE warm! Maybe I'M getting hypothermia and I'm imagining this conversation!"

"I'm warm, but I'm getting hungry. I don't suppose you could catch a fish. We ARE fishing, right?"

"I'm kind of in a hurry. I'd like to sleep at home tonight. And as you've noticed, we might be a little bit lost."

"I know what it is," she said.

"What WHAT is?"

"Duh. The thing that's following us."

More later.