A Bad Morning in the Mt. B.S.N.F. Campground

 

            Normally, Rick lived a pretty serene life as a National Forest Ranger. He had Dexter for annoying trainee tasks, and a new camp host to help the campers with problems which were beneath his dignity.
            But now, Rick had a problem. It was a doozy.
            There had been actual bloodshed. Not deep in the forest hidden from campers. No!
            Nor was this death the death of a mere deer. It was a camper’s fancy pet German Shepherd. Max. By now, Rick knew that name well, and it made him cringe inside.
            Max had been let out of Richard and Magda’s camper to go potty early in the morning of a spring day. A lovely morning. When Max didn’t return, Richard went looking and calling for him. Oh, he found him all right. There had been Max, in an empty parking spot, eviscerated and quite horribly dead.
            Richard was talking about getting the sheriff’s dept. involved. Magda wept. They mentioned suing the National Forest. Rick didn’t even know if that was possible, but he didn’t relish them trying.
            “There is no way some bear did that!” insisted Richard. “It must have been a person with a knife!” Honestly, that’s how it looked.
            They wrapped their poor dog in a blanket, put him in the back of the camper and left, promising that it wouldn’t be the last Rick heard from them.
            A guy named Fred walked down to the station to file a report. He wasn’t happy either. Fred said that the night before Max had died that he had seen something lurking in the campground.
            “Now this is silly,” said Fred. “I don’t believe in cryptids. But tell me, what looks like a dog, but is seven feet tall, all black and walks on two hind legs like a man? Are you sure you don’t have a crazy person running around in a werewolf costume? A very tall madman?”
            “There are no cryptids,” said Rick, weakly. “They don’t really exist.”
            “I know,” said Fred. “So, it’s your problem. What was it? You don’t want the news up here looking around do you?”
            Rick most sincerely did not want that!
            The next marble to drop was Hannah Tucker, his new camp host. She had been working out fine. No problems. No drama. She liked the job, though it didn’t pay much. He could see her, from the kitchen nook window, all bundled up like it was deep winter, heading for his door. Maybe she had baked something good, he hoped. She did that sometimes.
            But no.
            “Good morning, Rick,” Hannah said when she got inside the office, just getting warmed up. “Or it would be a good morning except that I had visitor last night. Nobody you know, I hope! Something that weighed about a ton was walking all over the roof of that tin box I live in up there and now there’s a leak in the bathroom ceiling!” She stood looking a him, waiting for an answer.
            “Do you have a bucket?” Rick said, feeling cornered and outmaneuvered by circumstances.
            While Hannah was still looking at him, Dexter showed up. He’d been checking things out as he always did in the morning. He had more bad news.
            “The doors are ripped off of the restrooms. Both of them!” he said, looking stunned. “They weren’t locked. Why would anybody do that?” said Dexter.
            “Dear children,” said Rick, “That is the question of the day. Why would any of this happen?”
            He sent Dexter to town to buy a blue tarp for the mobile roof.
            He told Hannah he would get someone up there to repair her roof in a day or so. He said he would put a camera up there in case anything like that happened again. He promised to keep any eye out for strangely behaving animals. There really wasn’t much more he could say.
            When they all went away and left him alone he went out to the parking lot and sat in his truck honking out SOS on his horn. Rick was unsure whether Ralph knew Morse Code, but it seemed appropriate.
            Soon Ralph loomed by Rick’s open driver’s side window. He didn’t appear surprised.
            “Good morning, Rick?” said Ralph. He wasn’t grinning.
            “Can you sit in the other side of this thing?” said Rick.
            “I’ll make it happen,” said Ralph, and he did. It’s a thing he does. Rick knew that too.
            So when they were sitting there together in the front of the National Forest Service truck, Ralph said, “You look like it’s been a bad day, and day just got started. What can I do for you?”
            “Something that looked like a werewolf, according to one camper, cut open a prize dog belonging to a litigious couple of other campers, and something scared Hannah the new camp host by stomping around on the mobile roof, causing a roof leak.
            “I don’t believe in Dogman, Ralph. Tell me there is no Dogman!” said Rick, piteously.
            “Well, Rick,” said Ralph, “Yes, there was a Dogman in your camp. I’m sorry he made such a mess for you. I really don’t like those guys!”
            “Was? What do you mean was?” said Rick.
            “Was, because something happened to him,” said Ralph. This was not the jolly old Ralph Rick knew. This was something else. Something implacable and regal. For a moment Ralph looked terrifying, dark and feral.
            “There was, but is not anymore?” said Rick, rather shaken.
            Ralph nodded, looking more like himself.
            “I gotta say it. You’re the man, Ralph! You are the man!” said Rick.
            “That’s what they say, some of them at least,” said Ralph. “But thanks!”
            “No, thank you!” insisted Rick.
            “Now all you have to do is to make everybody happy again!” Ralph laughed. “Better you than me, old boy!”
            The sun came out, shining a hopeful light on everything, and Rick started think about how he was going to do that very thing. “No problem!” he told himself happily.

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