She had read about an environmental project was under way to create a continent-spanning chain of wild forests, linked from Mexico to South America, a vast landscape through which the jaguar populations could expand and migrate freely. It was called the Paseo de Jaguar, or Path of the Jaguar.
She studied the map, trying to figure out this particular jaguar’s paseo. There was one important clue.
“Let’s not forget that she also has a cub,” Lorna pressed. “So she’ll be looking for a territory with a rich food supply, rich enough for both of them.”
Jack kept to her shoulder, studying the map alongside her. “But where? If she continues north, she’ll be passing between Adam’s Bay and Lake Washington. That’s deep bayou country. Where do we even begin to search?”
“We start with her food supply. The bayous are the perfect environment for a jaguar. They typically hunt along waterways. In fact, a large part of their diet is seafood. Turtles, fish, caiman.”
Jack turned at her. “The kid we rescued said the cat had torn into a bunch of crab pots.”
She nodded. “Jaguars are opportunistic carnivores. They’ll eat anything. They can even bring down cows and full-grown horses.” She responded to the disbelief in his face. “They’re the perfect killing machine. Where tigers and lions rip out the throat of their prey, jaguars kill by crushing their prey’s skull. They have the strongest jaws of any large cat. Evolved, it’s believed, to help jaguars crack through the iron-hard shells of turtles.”
“If they like turtles, we’ve got plenty of ’em in the bayous. Terrapin, snapping turtles, and all manner of cooters and sliders.”
“Yes, but they’re small and less abundant than our jaguar will need. With her body mass, she’ll be looking for a dense and easily accessible food supply. She won’t stop until she finds it.”
Jack suddenly stiffened beside her.
“What?” she asked.
He leaned closer to the map and ran his finger along the hand-drawn line. He also searched to both sides of the path. His finger stopped and tapped. A name was written under there: Bayou Cook.
Jack straightened and glanced to her. “How sharp is a jaguar’s sense of smell?”
“Extremely sharp. They’re mostly nocturnal hunters, so they have to be able to track prey by scent.”
“How far do you think they could track a smell?”
“Hard to say. Depends on the source of the odor, its strength, the wind direction.” She shook her head. “Lots of variables. Could be many miles if the conditions were right.”
“So if a place gave off a really strong odor and the wind was in the right direction, it could draw the cat. Even from miles away.”
“Sure. But it would have to be a scent that the cat recognized as a food source.”
“You said jaguars fed not just on turtles and fish, but also on caiman. The southern cousin of the American alligator.”
“That’s right.”
“So if there was a concentrated source for such a meal, a place that really smelled strongly-”
“It would definitely draw her.”
Jack ripped the chart from the clips and carried it over to the boat’s pilot. He pointed. “This is where we’re headed. Bayou Cook. Radio the airboats, let them know there’s been a change in plans. We’ll head directly over there.”
“Yes, sir.”
Jack returned, the map in his hand.
“What’s at Bayou Cook?” Lorna asked.
“A tourist site. Draws sightseers year-round, mostly from the cruise ships that dock in New Orleans. You get a swamp tour, an airboat ride, and at the end, a visit to Bayou Cook.”
“What’s there?”
Jack stared hard at her, certainty in his eyes. “Uncle Joe’s Alligator Farm.”
Chapter 13
Uncle Joe had no interest in children, but the camp groups brought in good money.
He stood on the front porch of his house with a tall, frosted bottle of Budweiser resting on the rail. The scorching day only seemed to grow hotter and damper as the sun faded away. It was like that out here. The first hour after sunset, the heat seemed reluctant to leave, overstaying its welcome. But slowly over the course of the night, it began to drain away, making it easier to breathe.
He enjoyed that time of night.
’Course, the beer helped, too.
He took a deep swig and stared across the thirty acres of his property. On the far side, a new campsite had been carved out of the neighboring stand of old-growth cypress forest. It was currently occupied by a troop of Boy Scouts from Baton Rouge, booked for the entire week. Campfires flickered among the tents, and strings of lanterns decorated the encampment. Songs echoed through the early evening, accompanied by the honking of bullfrogs and the occasional hoot from an owl or bellow from a bull alligator.
Between his log home and the campsite stretched the eight pools and pits of the alligator farm. He also had a bobcat exhibit and a shallow pond that held Gipper, a giant snapping turtle. The farm was crisscrossed with elevated walkways and observation decks.
He looked on with pride. It had cost him over half a million to expand the place from a single pond with a few breeding alligators to this singular attraction of the bayou. Last year alone, he had grossed three times his investment.
Of course, some of that money was under the table. As a conservator, he wasn’t supposed to sell the alligators for skin or meat, but it didn’t cost much to grease the palms of local enforcement agents to get them to look the other way. And for some wealthy anglers, newly hatched baby alligators were considered the best bait for bass fishing.
Across the farm, Joe watched a couple men patrol the walkways, rifles at their shoulders. They were the local militia he’d hired earlier today after hearing of some large cat sighted near the coast. He had been warned by radio to evacuate the area, but the Gulf was far away. And he would lose thousands in deposits and campsite rentals from the Scout troop alone if he evacuated.
Besides, the warning was just that: a warning, not an order. He hadn’t let Katrina chase him off; he wasn’t about to let some wildcat do the same. To justify his decision, he had hired four men from the parish’s sheriff’s department. In these hard times, everyone was looking for a little overtime.
Footsteps approached behind him. “Papa, I’m off to feed Elvis.”
He glanced back as his daughter crossed the porch. She carried a cookie tray stacked with chicken carcasses. “Not too many. We have a show scheduled for the morning for the campers. I want him hungry.”
“You can’t starve the old fella,” she scolded him gently.
He waved her away, feeling a welling of love and pride for his only child. At twenty-two, Stella had been accepted to business school at Tulane. The first of his family to attend college. She was aiming for an MBA, but also took classes in environmental law. While his preservation efforts here at the farm were motivated by profit, she was a true conservationist. She knew about his under-the-table dealings, but she had a good head on her shoulders. This was Louisiana. Nothing got done without some backroom bargaining. And besides, many of his illicit profits went right back into the farm and its many conservation programs.
She climbed down the stairs to the first of the elevated walkways that crossed the ponds. Footsteps again sounded behind him, accompanied by a slight shaking of the deck. His wife joined him, wiping her pudgy hands on a dish towel. She took his beer bottle, shook it to judge how much was left, then pulled out a fresh bottle from her apron pocket and handed it to him.
“Thanks, Peg.”
She settled next to him and leaned her elbows on the rail. She sipped at the remains of his old beer. She was a large woman, but he liked her big. He was not exactly skinny himself, with his belly hanging farther and farther over his belt buckle each year, and under his LSU ball cap, his hairline was retreating just as quickly as his belly was expanding.