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The raft was 14 feet long, inflatable, about 6 feet wide and robin's-egg blue. As the two men searched through the gear, Jennifer eyed the grizzly through binoculars. He was staring at them and their raft, and behind him, she could see a knee-high rubber boot, a tennis shoe, an article of fleece clothing and a bear-resistant food canister, which was unopened. This puzzled her; why was the bear staying around? She looked but could not see a boat or any people. Maybe they were on a hike or an excursion down the river.
Walt, Robert said into the phone, this looks like a bad situation.
He was talking to Walt Audi, a legendary bush pilot who owns a local flying service. We have a bear in a camp with what looks like three smashed-in tents, and at this point we can't see anybody. We don't know where the people are. I think it would be a good idea if you get Search and Rescue up here, quick.
He, Kalin and Jennifer would wait, and maybe the bear would leave, allowing them to cross the river and explore the camp.
Robert knew bears, and in all of his years roaming the refuge, he had never had a bad experience with a grizzly. It was coastal polar bears that had given him trouble. In the interior, however, he felt safe without a rifle or a shotgun -- only the Ruger -- and he knew handguns, dating from his tour as a military policeman in Vietnam. Besides, Kalin and Jennifer each had a can of hot-pepper bear spray.
Still, Robert viewed grizzlies with cautious respect, and he wanted this one to leave.
Get outta here, he shouted across the river. Hey, bear! Take off. The grizzly paid no attention.
Robert slapped a paddle hard on the water -- whap! Whap! He yelled again. Get outta here, bear.
The grizzly, Jennifer thought, was starting to show some interest in them. The river here was narrow, no more than 2 feet deep, and crisscrossed with shallows and sandbars. She knew it wouldn't be an obstacle if the bear decided to cross.
I'd like to go, she said. It was a terrible feeling, trying to reconcile her growing fear with her sense of responsibility to the people who had occupied the camp.
OK, Robert agreed, finally. Let's move downriver a ways.
As they dragged their raft over bars of gravel about 200 yards downstream, Jennifer, an experienced rafter, looked for the fastest current, just in case.
The grizzly had started to move around. They watched him as he climbed into a copse of willows just behind the camp, where he appeared to be feeding. They watched him as he dropped down to the river's edge and started pawing at a black and blue fleece. They watched him as he suddenly started wading across the river, tramping through the water as if there were no current at all, until he stood on their side and then disappeared behind a small knoll.
Let's get out of here! Jennifer said.
But it wasn't that simple anymore. By crossing the river, the bear had changed the dynamic. It would be risky to turn their backs on him, not knowing what he was up to.
Binoculars in hand, Kalin jumped atop a boulder, trying to keep the animal in sight. He's rolling around on the snow and playing. He's probably going to go up on the ridge. Jen, come take a look.
Jennifer paused for a moment. They hadn't come all the way to the refuge for her to be the spoiler. She took the binoculars, found the bear and felt the back of her neck tingling. Her breath came hard.
The bear wasn't playing. He was cleaning himself, and now he was on the move.
At home, Jennifer and Kalin have a big Labrador retriever named Hobbes, and a smaller, mixed-breed Lab named Sally. Whenever Hobbes and Sally are up to no good and know they're being watched, they move in a telltale way. It's a slinking motion, a running side-step and then a stop, a running side-step and then a stop.
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