Dan Silver’s red pickup appeared over the rise, returning home. Where has he been, before dawn? He stopped, reached out through the open window and handed Francesca something wrapped in foil.

“What’s this?”

“Chinook salmon. Fresh-caught. If you don’t have any ice in your icebox, you’ll want to eat it right away.”

‍ ‍ I’m not a fish person, she thought, but left it unsaid.

She cooked the small salmon steak for breakfast in a pan on the Coleman and could not believe how delicious it was—not just because she had been subsisting on tomatoes and crackers with sweaty cheese, but because it was a gift from the fisherman who caught the huge fish in the river that morning. The pink flesh was as soft as butter. Sitting at the table, looking at the garden and the chickens, the dog at her feet, Francesca felt a deep sense of contentment. This was why she had come to the claim, for this feeling. Fresh salmon was a beautiful discovery, and someone who she thought might have good reason to be judgmental had instead been kind to her.

The tipoff came, not from Leon but surely one of his shadowy associates, in a phone call to the Daily Ink. 

“There’s something planned,” said a gravelly male voice Francesca had never heard before. “5 AM, Wild Horse Mountain, lot 65 of the Mammoth Timber sale. Bring a photographer.”

“5 AM, tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow.”  There was a click, and the line went dead.

“I don’t mind the dumb clucks so much,” explained Professor Rubin patiently. “It’s the greedy bastards I don’t like. Human greed, that’s what really sets us apart from our fellow animals, not our stupidity. And of course, our capacity for ruthlessness, even towards our own kind.”

Pointing at a soaring black bird in the distance, Dr. Rubin said, “You’d never find a turkey vulture killing one of its own.”

“I grew up around alligators,” said Leon.

“Huh!” said the professor, considering.

From over near the cabin door, Leon howled one more time, but no coyote was fooled into answering.

“I can’t believe that guy,” said Carlos.

“Yeah. Try not to let him get under your skin,” said Richard. “It’s not worth it. I mean I like argument, I’m going to be a lawyer and all, but he gets drunk and goes too far.”

“It’s gonna catch up with him,” said Carlos, showing admirable restraint, hating Leon but concerned about him all the same, because he was concerned about everyone, because he was, after all, pro-humanity.