“And Tom says no. He really can’t do it. So they say okay, we’ll pay you two thousand dollars.”

“Two thousand?”

“So Tom says no, and why are they even asking him to do a hunt in Canada, anyway? He’s never led a hunt up there. They have their own guides. In fact, the Canucks would have a cow if they found out these guys from America were bringing their own guide with them. They probably wouldn’t even let them go out.”

“What did this guy say about that?”

“He said, don’t worry, we’ll take care of it. And then he offered him three thousand dollars.”

“Good God.”

“And Tom said, where do you want to pick me up?”

“Vinnie, who is this guy?”

He shook his head. “Tom said his name was Albright. He didn’t say what he did for a living, but it sounded like he was some kind of heavy hitter in Detroit. The kind of guy who usually gets what he wants. He said he had four other guys who wanted to get away for a few days. You know, just cut loose in the woods.”

“I know that one,” I said. “I get the ‘cut-loose’ type staying in the cabins during firearm season. They stay up all night drinking and then they go out the next morning and shoot anything that moves. They all want that big buck so they can mount his head on the wall.”

“Actually, this was a moose hunt. That’s why they were going to Canada. They said they’d already done the deer thing. They wanted the big game.”

“Moose. Even better. What do those things weigh, like eight hundred pounds?”

“A bull can weigh over twelve hundred.”

“Is it firearm season up there already?”

“Yeah, it’s a lot earlier in Canada.”

“Okay, so for three thousand dollars he said yes. When did they pick him up?”

“Saturday before last.”

I did the math in my head. “That was before I even started working on the cabin.”

“Yeah, it was.”