KCC and Television, Channel 10, the station that talks to the heart of cabin country. Join us on Channel 10, this Halloween, for another entertaining half hour of It Destroyed Our Liebox. Your host for this annual delving into the monsters of the freshwater deep, Oleander Bingham. Your host for this annual spooktacular stories event.
These listener-donated tales of cold water and unseen force will keep your head on us will, as we approach the spookyest time of the year. An empty live box, fins and flotsam, huge holes, ripped in wire work. As the harvest moon rises, the temperatures decline, unspeakable horrors rise from the depths. And make off with your small mouths.
That's It Destroyed Our Liebox. Once again, this Halloween on Channel 10, KCC and Television. Channel 10, the station that talks to the heart of cabin country. From the long shadows at a St.
Paul's Number One, along the slow, swirling darkness in a city. From the winds-flipped shadows of lower town, to the hallowentiness of the Wabishaw caves. Welcome to the special edition of cabin country. Let's find the place where the wind molds down chibi stacks, and the ravens watch for ruthless lambs.
Fill your coffee cup and move close to the fire as we join the iron and thud in the seasonal edition of cabin country. Welcome to the third annual. Third annual Halloween season special hallows eve. I guess you can tell that Bjorn and I are fans of all things Halloween, I guess.
Last year, it seemed like kind of a dud other than our show. It's as a family. It's kind of a dud of a tail end of a COVID. I think kids weren't really going out right.
And I think it was like the first year we just like had our light off and the door locked. I mean, we don't hear near the Yorkdale studios. We don't actually get a lot of kids coming by. We're a smaller crowd out here.
I don't know why that surprises me. When we first moved in a good almost 15 years ago, there were plenty. Lots. Youngsters decked out like minions.
Right. Yeah. Beethoven. I think there was a dog that is not the composer.
You never know. Oh, who do we have here? Just have you very downstairs? Barely always.
Look at you. That's really good. I think there were a lot of, oh my gosh, who were the frozen characters? Oh, yes.
That was really big. Around the time we came in. We were about the wacky fun loving sidekick snowman for Oscar or a little off. And on the right.
Oh, Scarpeeters. Yes, it's good stuff. But yeah, you know, I don't know about you, but for me to hear our intro, our third annual classic intro to the, you know, from alongside the shadowy waters. Right.
There's something about, you know, we've had Halloween's past where the costume is almost too hot. You know, I mean, it's almost 80 degrees out and people are walking the streets with their, which I was fun kind of depressing. There'd be pillowcases full swag. It's just like, come on.
You know, come on. How about the old round plastic pumpkin? You know, I mean, yeah, it's a traditional. And I realize it.
You got to stop home and dump it out and go get more. That's fine. I get it. No one's more of a glutton than I.
But there's something about these Halloween seasons. And this year has lived up to its building. It's been brisk. It's been cool.
You know, and cold winds blowing and leaves flying down the streets and the clouds crossing over the moon. It's just that this is, it feels like Halloween. It feels autumnal. A couple of years ago, like you say, it was a real warm one at the end of October.
Right. And we were having our wood floors put in our home. Right. And the three guys that were doing it were deer hunters.
And they were complaining that, oh, it's too warm. You know, the deer are moving. You know, it's this warm. I'm betting down they're not going anywhere.
So it's good to have a cool autumn. And we had a cool trip. We did. Was it two weeks ago now?
Two weeks ago, yes. As a matter of fact, it went from, in fact, a couple of weeks ago, you came over for our Tuesday night, the odd casting session. You had a pair of shorts. Yeah.
Because it was like t-shirt with them. It was like a wet band. 75 degree day. And by the time we were up at the cabin, it was like 42.
And I know we came in, loaded our stuff into the cabin. I got a fire going, but man, it took like three. Well, again, a little space eaters. Yeah.
Yeah. It was slow to warm up. So it was like it was an introduction. Well, you want a cool fall.
You got it. Here it is. But it was a good trip. It was.
It wasn't. Kind of felt good to get back into a traditional cool. Yes. Cooled cold.
It was a little bit, kind of damaged too. It was a little wet. Yeah. It was the first night up.
I couldn't really get a fire going. It was a cloud cover the whole bit, but that kind of burned off the next day. We stood on the dock having our inaugural stokeys looking up at the stars and seeing satellites. No, no, no.
It reminded me of, oh gosh, I don't know, maybe like 39 years before that, standing on the dock of my cousin Doug's shack with my dad. Sure. My first duck hunting trip. And we stood on the dock and he pointed out, here's a cigar, a foot?
No, I know. We didn't have cigars. But he pointed out the Andromeda Galaxy and it's 3 million light years away. So we're standing in the cold and the next morning.
I think in our hunting show, like number 3, I go into that. In from a strip where you were in a duck boat with a 4.10. Oh yeah. Yeah.
I'm sorry. And then I took a game at a koot, about 15, 40 feet of dirt. And I missed it completely. Well, if you, all right, go ahead and shoot at it.
And then I missed. I'm sure my dad was secretly very pleased. Oh, yeah. Do anything with a dead koot.
Anyway. So, yes, every were a couple of weeks ago standing out in the dark looking at stars and satellites. And the muskrat. We had a visit.
Swimming in the evening. I'm going to guess that water was, I don't know, 50 degrees. It was that warm. Yeah, it was cold.
I don't know, what do you think? Should we start taping? Yes. Rolling here on our third annual.
The third annual. We have been working toward this episode. We have some special stories. I don't know.
I just want to say this. Make sure you got something hot to drink or whatever. Blanket for your lap and a good spot from the fireplace. And maybe a loved one nearby in case you get to.
Freaking out or something. Right. It's not the neighbor kid, but the flashlight under his chin. Yes, well, I guess this is the equivalent of Bjorn and I holding flashlights under his face.
That's right. Here we go, folks. One of our favorite times of the year is when we go and strap yourselves in. It's about to get weird.
All right then. In the summer of 1975, when I was up north, I stayed for a week at a hotel in Manhattan Beach. There, I met William Steves, an elderly minister who has well-versed in the traditional ghost stories and legends of some of Minnesota's greatest towns and hamlets. One evening when we were alone, he told me about the dreadful grey ghost that had formerly haunted Frode's forest alongside the sprawling waters of the Whitefish chain.
This is his story. After the afternoon in the 70s, two young men, Fudd Hall and Bjorn Wren, arrived at a little village near the eastern shore of Oxbow Lake, the inhabitants of which were mostly locals in the area's retired community. The two were avid hikers taking a break from everyday life. After they had a late afternoon meal at a local watering hole, they asked the landlord to tell them the way to Emily, a smallish town in the area where they intended to stay the night.
There are two ways, the landlord said. The one a good deal longer than the other, but preferable when it's getting dusk. What difference does that make Wren asked? Is it an old logging road or something?
It is very ruddy and rocky in places, the landlord said. But that's not what I had in mind. What did you have in mind, all queried, eyeing him keenly? The barman hesitated.
There's a stretch of the forest two miles from here which has a bad reputation. Roberts? The bar keeps shook his head. What then, Wren asked impatiently?
Well, the landlord said, the folk around here say it is haunted. The young man burst out laughing. You don't mean to say that you believe in ghosts, all said. I'd long wanted to see a ghost.
What is the story associated with the forest? There's got to be one. Let me guess. A murder.
The barman shrugged. There are all sorts of stories, but you'd just laugh. He proceeded to give them directions as to both ways of getting emily. Thanking him and declaring their intention to expose the fraud or rather ghost on his home turf, they selected the road through the forest.
And with their backpacks, once again strapped to their backs, they set off at a brisk pace. At last, the travelers reached the summit of a hill, and deep down beneath them, they saw spread out for some considerable distance, a thickly wooded valley, all dark and mysterious and the uncertain twilight. As they descended into it, they became aware of the funeral-like silence which greeted them on all sides. The dale was in fact so heavily wooded that even the wind, which for the last half hour had been blowing with great force along the surface of the hill, was scarcely to be felt there.
The only a fitful blast could be heard among the lofty trees, when the pale fall leaves gave out a curious husky crackling. Otherwise all was absolutely wonderfully still. The two men were so impressed that neither spoke until they arrived at the bottom of the decline, and were standing in the almost digian darkness amidst the shadows of the foliage on either side of them. Paul was the first to break the silence.
These must be the haunted woods, he said. Pretty cheerful, aren't they? They are at that, ran replied, looking around and turned to pierce the gloom, but come on, I vote we get out of it as soon as possible. Further on, they came to a wide open spot where there was crossroads.
The shadows were very thick, so thick indeed that they had to slow their pace and proceed with caution lest they should take the wrong route. It was while they were thus engaged, straining their eyes and peeping around them apprehensively, that they became impressed with the certainty of some object moving ahead of them through the gloom. At such an hour for it was now getting late, and in such a dreary place, this was calculated to challenge attention, and ran in hall found themselves gazing at the object with an intensity that was equal parts disbelief and legitimate fear. By and by they were able to see it a little more clearly, and they perceived it as a very tall figure, apparently a man walking at an even pace.
But with immensely long strides, he was going in the same direction as they were and was only a few feet in front of them, but to their astonishment they found that although they accelerated their pace with the idea of overtaking him, they did not approach the least degree nearer. Without seeming to increase his speed, he yet maintained invariably the same distance away from them. They had now struck off alongside a county road they believed to be the right one, and were walking tolerably fast. The figure preceding them, however, was seemingly a no way aware of their proximity, for without once turning its head toward them, with the same measured stride it steadily advanced.
At length, Hall more perhaps to relieve his feelings than anything else called out. Hey there, who are you? There was no response. The figure did not show by any gesture the slightest consciousness that it had heard, but continued striding on at the same rate and at the same distance.
The two friends now suddenly realized that their sense of hearing, which the strangely emphasized silence of the place had rendered abnormally acute, had not caught any sound of footsteps coming from the figure. They could readily decipher the echoes of their own, but the figure seemingly trod with absolute noiselessness. This came as an unpleasant surprise, and soon they became pointly aware of the advent of novel and distinctly uncomfortable feelings. Pride prevented them admitting this, and they were striving to rally their faculties at all events to simulate unconcern when the unexpected happened.
The figure abruptly swerved off the road, and, making for a large wooden gate leading to the gravel drive, came directly into the moonlight. Both rented Hall at once emitted an involuntary cry. Instead of being clothed, the figure was naked. It gleamed a horrible sinister gray.
It had long arms and legs and a peculiarly small and rotund-headed. When it suddenly turned and looked at the two travelers, it revealed a strange and startling countenance. The features were more or less human. The expression in the big, deep, sunken, light green eyes was not.
So frightful was it. So indescribably exultant and devilish, the rented hall shrank back appalled. Too petrified with fear to utter a sound. Fortunately, however, the figure showed no indication to Dally.
Moving onward, still with that same peculiar, lengthy and measured stride, it advanced up the driveway, eventually disappearing from view around a rather abrupt curve. A few seconds later, there was a faint sound in the direction it had taken, resembling a human cry. In a moment or so later, still from the same direction. A repetition of the noise, but much more prolonged and bearing with it the tone of suffering, was quite beyond the ability of words to describe.
There was another pause, and then apparently near, a yell of the most piercing intensity. The animal element seemed to strive for mastery with the human, and its final echoes and scarcely died away before the whole valley became alive with appalling silence. With monics, planted yet horribly menacing, with whoopings interspersed with harsh, discordant cries and clear, hollow echoing laughter. This went on for roughly one minute.
It then quite suddenly ceased and was followed by an unbroken silence to save for the gentle rustling of the fast dying foliage and the melancholy sighing of the night's breeze. Then in hall waited a few minutes till they could sufficiently pull themselves together and then continued their hike, eventually reaching their destination without further trouble. A gentleman by the name of Andy Roark, hearing about the ghost of the experience of Paul and Ren, went to the village inn, where the two men had stopped on their way to Emily and prevailed upon the landlord to tell him anything he knew about that grey ghost in the haunted woods, and this is what the bar man had to report. Four years ago, last April, I was on horseback going through the forest in the early hours of the morning.
There's just something about a morning ride. The dawn had only just broken, and the track in places was still dark. Well, when I was pretty near the large wooden gate leading into the old lumber camp, as we call it, my horse suddenly shy, and I saw sitting up by the wayside up against the trunk of an oak, a tall figure. In the uncertain light, I thought it was a man, some wanderer who was either having a nap or was ill.
I called out to him, and as he did not reply, I called again, and was considering dismounting to see what was the matter with him when he suddenly, with amazing agility, sprang to his feet. I then got a fearful shock. He was no man at all, but a grim and ghastly caricature of one. It was gigantic.
10 or 12 feet in height it seemed. It was naked. Its skin, being a glistening, uniform grey, and its face was like that of a death set. A death set, however, with something frightful, luring, and evil in its big, round eye sockets.
I did not have time to observe more because my horse bolted. But when I eventually rained it in and looked around, I saw the thing, whatever it was, crossed the road with enormous bounds and disappeared through the gateway, leading to the old lumber camp. Here are the barkeep paws for a moment. Then, clearing his throat, he went on again.
There were two travelers that the great grey ghost actually touched, or at least one of them. They were walking through the woods when they heard footsteps behind them. They turned and saw following them a great grey shape, whose unearthly long arms trailed along the ground. It was of unearthly height, too.
Its head seemed to tower up into the trees. And the head was a grinning skull. The men began to run, but the thing covered at one stride ten times the ground they could. Closer and closer it came.
The gigantic grey shape that pursued the fleeing travelers. And suddenly a soft, repugnant something like a cloudy hand, half turned to flesh covered the face of one of them like a putrid mask. He shrieked once and fell. The other, pollen and horror, ran on.
The thing did not pursue him. Next morning, a search party from the village sought the other traveler. They found him wandering through the woods half insane. He never recovered.
Here, the barman paused again. There's no accounting for the haunting? Rorcast? There are theories, the landlord said.
Rorcast then inquired of him the name of the president owner of the old lumber camp, having obtained it he went on his way. A week later he was back again in the same neighborhood. In the interval he had written to the owner of the property, and somewhat to his astonishment had obtained permission to stay the night there. The night chosen for the expedition proved to be exceptionally wild and stormy.
Rorcast invited three friends of his, living the countryside to go with him in the buildings. He had chosen them because they were very solid, matter of fact hunters. Not the type of guys who had let their nerves get the better at them. Having first assured themselves no one was hiding anywhere in the main house.
He looked for a spot to commence their visual and finally selected the room Rorke believed from the descriptions given to him was the haunted chamber. It was at one end of the hallway and had two doors, one leading in from the hallway, the other leading into one was a bathroom. It was an oddly constructed dwelling for across the middle of it were two pillars, and on the wall between them a sinister looking tapestry. Four friends sat on the floor, and a row crossed from the room.
Rorke himself facing towards the hall, moor and ross towards the tapestry, and Donovan facing the entrance to the bathroom. At first every now and then they fancied they heard soft footsteps, tip towing up and down the hallway. Once they sounded as though they were in the room, but after a while these sounds all died away and there was nothing besides it. One broken save for the occasional rattling of doors and windows and the beating of the raindrops against the window panes.
One by one the four fell asleep to be awakened by hearing the church clock sonners leave boom out the power of three. Mr. Moor at once rose to his feet. Look here he said, it's morning, nothing's gonna happen now and I have to be at it.
And he suddenly changed his tone and with a wild cry of, oh my god there it is, he staggered back against the wall. The other three looked and in the dim light of dawn struggled to get in through the crevices of the shutters. They saw standing tall between the pillars, a luminous something. Nothing more at first.
Blind by however, while all were staring at it and breathless awe it suddenly became hideously and alarmingly vivid and they saw it immense form in black and grey. Ross and Moor glanced at its face and they said afterwards it was like the face of a corpse, only a corpse that was nearly in the skeletal stage, the skin being drawn tightly over the bones and the mouth devoid of flesh and grinning. The impression it gave them was that it was intensely hostile. Rorck and Donovan contended themselves with peering nervously at the body only.
They did not dare look at its face. They stared at it for some moments until it began to advance towards them. Rorck finally cracked and howled, strike a light one of you. Rorck shakily clicked on a flashlight and the grim visage at once vanished.
The four friends did not stay to discuss what they had just seen. They raced for the hallway immediately and fled from the camp. A week or so later came a sort of sequel to their story. Rorck was again in the neighborhood.
Indeed the place had gripped his curiosity and he had to pass by it. When he was in the valley looking around him, a stranger suddenly came inside and hallowed him. After a quick discussion, the stranger said that the very night Rorck's party of four were in the house. He himself had also seen the creature.
Across from there he said, pointing to a tall, isolated pine on the side of the road, close to a pit with a wide, dark gaping mouth. Watch that pit closely tomorrow night between midnight and 3 AM. It is the pit that causes the lumber camp in the whole valley to be haunted. It goes right down to the bowels of the earth.
Holes like this attract and harbor a foul and dangerous species of elemental spirit. Precisely at the time he mentioned, Rorck went to the haunted encampment. The night was still, but dark, scurrying clouds hinted at possible rain. The pit made his flesh creep.
There was something so deep and menacing about its darkness. He approached it cautiously and was gazing at it apprehensively when he got a terrible shock. Rising slowly out of its depthless pits was a luminous, ghastly greyhead. The frightening thing about it was a lurid, glowing light in the depths of the fleshless eye sockets.
It was the same horrible phantom that Rorck and his friends had seen in the main house of the lumber camp. Rorck stared at it at gas and when grisly shoulders gradually arose he did not wait to see anymore, but took to his gheels. He was quite satisfied that what the stranger had told him about the pit was true. He never went to the woods again.
Some years later the supposed bottomless pit was filled in. When that was done, roads forest and its lonely roads apparently ceased to be haunted. The passage of time, continued, persisted, unremitting. Some say times a human construct that time doesn't really exist outside the realms of human thought.
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The moon was high, huge and yellowish red. Almost what hunters would call a blood moon. It was definitely time to reel in this long soaked corpse of a minnow from the near channel of the lake. It was almost too dark to still be sitting on a dock with a cigar and reel in my hand.
I stood up slowly, reeling in my line. There was no action on the bobber end of this line. The time I brought it in this china was long past living. Limp, lifeless, immobile, and glassy-eyed.
The moon shone in those diminutive, unseen eyes. That was when I heard the frothing in the bubbly. A sort of tumult in the water. Behind me.
From the live well. Illuminated by moonlight. Blood moonlight. There it was.
Slowly climbing up and out of the water. Moving like a set of spidery crabs. Fingers, drab, grey, green and bony. Gripping slowly and with uncertainty the chicken wire of the live box.
Flesh and nails peeling back, lake weeds hanging off the fingers. And now emerging from that turbulent water. Hair, weeds. Was there still taut skin drawn over that misshapen skull?
Clacking teeth and vacant eye sockets as it rose. Slowly rose. I actually felt the terror from within me start to choke off my airway. I would get off this dock if it was the last thing I did on this earth.
It was not much change in temperature. A slight atmospheric disturbance of undetermined origin is reported over Nova Scotia. Causing a low pressure area to move down rather rapidly over the northeast and states. Entering a forecast of rain accompanied by winds of light gale force.
Maximum temperature 66 to 6 minimum 48. This weather report comes to you from the government weather bureau. We take you out of the mergots meridian room in the hotel park, plasma and downtown New York where you'll be entertained by the music of rain on Raquelo and his orchestra. My pulse was pounding in my temples as I pushed through the moonlight brush.
I was used to the brambles and forns amidst the undergrowth now. I placed the machete in my right hand as I used my left to push away at the underbrush. The night air was thick yet cold. There was a cloying almost swamp-like humidity in the air as I stealthily made my way through the thickets.
My breath rolled like mist for my nostrils. No time to stand idly by. I was of a single purpose now. I must keep pushing through until I found it.
Found them. My family. My lovely wife. Children.
Gone. It'll left dead on the floor of the house or missing. Missing having left a bloody trail behind them. A trail that disappeared after less than a third of a mile.
Could I find them? Could I save them? Aw. They were gone.
I knew it in my psyche and I knew it in my heart. They could never come back and all that was left to be done was to avenge them. Make these things pay the ultimate price for what they had done. Could I do it?
Was my anguish, rage, and razor-sharp machete enough to put an end to this butchery? I wasn't sure yet of the full scope of their strength. What they could do to a human even after being cut, being shot, being set alight. At this point I had a declarative mind to consider it.
There's only one task in front of me now. Only one thing to do. I didn't care if I made it out alive. I could see through the clearing ahead fireflies creating a small light show above the damp musk egg.
I could see moonlight set the clearing aglow. That ancient decrepit and moss-covered shack. The one deputy Addison mentioned finding over the police band shortwave before that too went dead. One last push through the underbrush and I'd reach the clearing.
A more savvy man would have planned his attack with greater care, more finesse. There's nothing left for me now. I knelt forward in the thickets, listening to that portable shooing, grunting. There was a pale crimson light coming from under the drawn shades.
The half-closed front door. I tried to guess their number based on the disgusting sounds floating around me as I crouched. Did it matter? No.
I realized too late the folly of getting my revenge as a solitary man in the dark holding a farm tool. I did not care. Farm tool. Yes, but a keenly sharp and lengthy farm tool.
One I would use with no remorse. If this was going to happen, I'd best move forward. Get my legs suddenly, felt as though cemented to the ground. I was filled with sadness and rage.
I must have my revenge, yes. And now the last wave of fear had come over me, hearing the sounds from inside the shack. I must go and go now. The faces of my loved ones filled my vision as I took a firm grasp on the mache.
It was time to move. And now I do not never lose a favor. The ever-popular starter, Raymond Ricallor in the book. We'll be back in a moment after a few words from our sponsors.
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So how does this new medium-bodied offering live up to its majestic moniker? So you like the flavor, it's not too rich. Does it still have the caffeine zip you're looking for in the early hours of the morning? Hahaha!
Oh, we agree. And yet you say this is a coffee that you've been known to enjoy throughout the day, cup after cup without overdoing it? Well, I guess there's no arguing with that, Bjorn. Yet another satisfied voice from the heart of cabin country.
Boy, those Red Wind Blackbirds really know their stuff when it comes to medium-roasts. Save your own. You said it's fun. And I couldn't agree more with our Red Wing friends on the popularity of this roast.
What a coffee. Here, here. Let me top your mug, Bjorn. Don't mind if I do.
Mitz coffees. The brew of the flute with the Great Northwest. Now, real adventures of the CCOA, the cabin country outdoors agents, featuring Officer Torquey Torgerson on his tireless efforts to maintain law and order in the unpredictable wilds of cabin country. Tonight's episode.
But around the Chain of Lakes area, the fall of an warm and the trees late to turn. And now we were getting to the seasonal blast of evening and early morning cold that no ever could offer. Cold sun and the steaming layer of frost in the early morning. Massive walls of lead and clouds swallowing the moon and the stars at night.
The wind now had a bite to it. And then a day of 50s or 60s. Uncertain weather to be sure. Many a critter was now considering the subtler points of hibernating.
Maybe not yet, but soon. I was savoring my second mug of coffee and looking over the reports on my desk. Applications for some new boat houses on lakes near Emily. Concerns over deer eating the landscaping at some real estate developments near lower colinard.
A year rounder off Loon Lake worrying about how to keep a hungry and persistent bald eagle away from her Vichon freeze. Maybe a third mug of Joe would redirect my thinking. The phone rang. I reached for the receiver.
I was glad to talk to someone rather than read these reports. Officer Torqueyson, outdoors agents. What can I help you with? Officer, this is Harry Coakinson.
I run Sweet Peas Bakery on 25 and calling with something of a concern. So that would make you a sweet pea right Harry? Yeah, that's right, Officer. I've heard them all.
So if you compare me with the comedy, I'm calling you with the problem other than my moniker. Go ahead, Coakinson. What's eating you? Officer Torque.
Is it Tor Gerson? Yeah, that's right. But you can call me Torqueys. Everybody else does.
I'm used to it. Well, Torqueyson is making me a little strange. I've been running this bakery for years and I've never seen anything like what I'm seeing lately after hours. I always finish my shift by bagging up the day old bakery goods people are real interested in two day old donuts and pastries.
Then bring them out to the dumpster. Then I mop up the floors and while they dry, I go back to the office and count the till pretty standard small business fare. Well, lately I've been saying a little bit later and doing some new product research for the next day. Anyway, while I'm on the desktop checking out new recipes, I'm hearing all kinds of banging around the dumpster.
I stay open until 11 o'clock just to make ends meet. Okay, Harry, so you've investigated the noise? Well, I'm no coward, but I'm no dunderhead either. It's just me here after nine and so it gets much darker earlier now.
The commotion near the dumpster, it's like someone's trying to be discreet to get my meaning. I'm not on the edge of town, so I doubt I've got bears. While I'm looking out the window at the trash area, what I've seen twice now is let me scratching my head. Maybe I should call up a paranormal investigator.
Where are you going with this, Harry? What is it you've seen? Tori, I'm not sure what I've been seeing. I swear it's like the old stories about the bear man or the wind to go.
Have I lost you yet? No. No. The thing appears to be bear-like, yet bipedal.
It's big, broad, short, and thick neck with a huge bear-like head. Climb in and out of that dumpster with all the bags I dumped in it. Did I mention it's big and the eyes, Tori, you almost glow. But for a large mammal, the thing has an almost unnatural grace.
That's nimble I'd call it. Strangely quiet for a beast of that size. Well, I got to ask, did you approach it, Cokinson? I would hope you had the sense to stay in the shop.
Yeah, I'll be straight with you. I wasn't going out there. Coward? No, but I'm no down either.
I don't know what that was, but it was bigger than me. Light on its giant feet and hungry. No sir, I stayed put. So if you had to call this creature something, what would you refer to it as?
I need something for the report. Once this is a live agency action, we have to have something to go on. Now I'm going to sound like a nut. So be it.
Tori, I'd say this looks like the closest thing I've ever seen. That might need the description of a Bigfoot. But I've got to be accurate here. Hit on that thing.
Like pictures I've seen of a brown or Kodiak bear. I'd say it looks more like a bear-human hybrid. We don't have brown bears around here, Tori. No, we don't.
But we have our black bears in various color phases, various stages of growth. This could be a lighter-faced black bear that's grown to a normally large size. Wimer temperatures readily available for food. Who knows?
Again, I worry about my local reputation, Tori. Have you heard of the wind to go? I have, Harry. If you don't mind me saying so, the stuff of folktales, mythology.
I'm not going to head in that direction with this case. Well, you know, best. I'll tell you that thing was big, quiet, and spry. I got it was quick out of that dumpster and other than the sound of the metal cover being opened, I would have known it was out there.
I'm reluctant to call it a wind to go or a wear bear, Tori. It could have even smelled like a wild beast for a fall. The third time I saw it, I was ready to go after it. I had my 12-gauge loaded with deer slugs, and I was planning to let fly.
I got to the alley door of the bakery, and I couldn't believe my nose. Wow, what a stench. I forgot all about the gun and slammed the door shut. It took off with a bag and its teeth leaning forward and loping away on its hind feet.
I know what you're thinking. Bad luck to dumpster. I tell you, it's beyond that now, Tori. I believe this thing to be dangerous.
I want to be able to park behind my business to walk the alley after dark without fear. The sight of this thing has me questioning my thinking. Now, what the heck is it? How does it keep getting away?
That joke on YouTube has become a real thing. Now, Tori, I need your help in ending this folk tale. I asked Harry Cokonson what time this activity seemed to happen at. He said it was intermittent.
Happened three or four times now. Always late at night. He was at the point where he was upset and wanted answers. He was ready to try to end this with a heavy-gauge firearm if he had to.
This is where cabin country agents step in. Let's keep things. People and critters. Safe.
I told Cokonson I'd be by with a thermos full of hot coffee. Bear night binoculars. My service revolver and an open mind. I'd sit and watch the alley and his dumpster.
We'd get to the bottom of this. Ah, yes. The chill of post-Halloween evenings in the north. Frost setting it.
Senior breath in the cab before the truck warms up. The darkness. Gabbin' country darkness seems to settle in like a heavy blanket. Not like in the cities when I visit my cousin Terrible Tim.
There's always action in the cities. It never stops. No, the north lakes country gets quiet. Deep and dark.
Night vision binoculars. Check. Loaded side arm. Check.
Radio is working in the heat zone. Check. Full thermos of hot coffee. Never.
Any doubt about that. No, it was time. Bring the agency truck through the back alley behind Sweet Peas Bakery and into a parking cut on several businesses away. Back the truck in so I could still see Harry's dumpster.
Cut the parking lights. Headlights are off before I go down the alley. Cut the engine. Crack the windows so I don't fog over.
And I watch that dumpster. Maybe fill my coffee mug off the thermos. Never take my eyes off the bakery's dumpster though. Keep the radio on low in case I get called.
Key in the ignition. Time begins to crawl a bit. I'm giving Coakinsons dumpster my full attention. But I guess I'm beginning to wonder just how far-fetched this story is.
Like in Thropes in the Channel Lakes area? Wherebears in general? Come on. About one hour's gone by.
Curious sounds from the rear of the truck. Barely perceptible. Or was there. My coffee mug is empty and I catch myself actually nodding sleepily towards the steering wheel.
I shake my head. Clear my thoughts. I'm not feeling glad to be in the dumpster. I haven't missed anything right?
I'm looking now through the windshield. No way. I believe I'm watching in a tunnel meteor shower. One after another flashing across the sky and disappearing.
How great is this? It's been a while since I've been lucky enough to witness something that's amazing. And suddenly the North Country's night sky seems more majestic. More all encompassing.
This is unreal and so crystal clear in the cold night air. Wow. And then the clang of metal on metal. Now I saw something.
A big hairy shake lumbering into the open dumpster. Is the darkness playing tricks on me? Things bigger than me by a long shot. I believe on this one I'll stay in the truck and get pursued that way.
I guess I wasn't taking this seriously enough to bring the tranquilizer gun or maybe it just slipped my mind. And I can't let Kat Martinez catch me to that. Whatever Torgy, focus. Be where your feet are.
I flip the switch on the searchlight and aim it at the dumpster. I swear to the listeners that the dumpster actually begins to shake. The giant shape with an enormous neck and head comes up over the edge of that dumpster. I keep the light, trained on the shape.
Again, when I say it's big I feel I'm doing the listener at this service. I'm moving to descriptive phase wearing my agent's head. It had an upper torso and a grizzled head more like a Kodiak bear than a black bear. Big, powerful.
I kid you not. The eyes seemed to glow red. Another shake of the head and silent prayer for clarity. Nope, those eyes seemed to glow with traces of red.
It made a lot of guttural noises and then much to my surprise this creature seemed to vault out of the dumpster like a gymnast. I kept the light trained on it as it landed on four giant paws. A large black trash bag on the ground next to it. Thing rose up on two legs and threw its hand back with a roar.
I believe I shook my head again and tried to clear my thoughts. And suddenly there was a wall of smoke. I couldn't see anything. The searchlight didn't cut through the smoke.
This was like something out of a campfire bull session. Spooky stories to scare the younger ones. I became an outdoors agent again and gritted my teeth. I loosened the retention strap on my holster and turned the key in the ignition.
I'd give chase by a gag. I'd give me this lift. The engine coughed and was as sluggish as I'd ever heard it. Then it stalled.
I turned it again and pumped the gas. Let's go, I yelled. I sputtered. Some weak idling.
Another stall. And on the next turn of the key, strong smell of gasoline. No firing at all. Are you kidding me?
I now realized I was yelling at a truck by myself in a darkened alley at midnight. Oh well. As the smoke cleared, it was quite clear that whatever it rated the dumpster was gone. From the smell of rotten eggs in the air, it was also clear that the supernatural smoke cover was the result of some smoke bombs.
The kind of you buy at a fireworks stand. I took a short walk around the dumpster and found the hollowed out cases of two smoke bombs. Into the scorch marks they left on the asphalt. I was, however, still smelling a distinctly strong wild animal smell on the dumpster.
This was getting interesting. I popped the boat of the truck. Everything was in order, but I'd clearly flooded the engine. I walked around the truck with my flashlight.
Aha. What was that sticking out of the exhaust pipe? That was a good-sized and possible ribbon-winning example of a Minnesota red potato. I had heard something while I was watching that meteor shower.
Something, I'm more likely some one, had stuck a spud in my tailpipe to forestall my pursuit. There was less and less of the paranormal about this event as I continued to investigate. Other than the smell of wildlife, this was starting to look like one elaborate setup. Once the spark plugs had dried a bit, I got the truck back on the road.
I brought the potato into the agency along with the empty smoke bomb cases. Torgi, this is quite a production. What did Coquincin say was in the dumpster? Two-day old donuts, Captain.
Seems like a lot of work for free-sale donuts, Torgi. We're seeing this one through. You get back out there tonight and take the Trank Gun with you. We'll get this guy.
Wear bare my foot. You got it, Captain. And Torgi? Captain.
Put a screen over your tailpipe on. The truck had recovered after a short stint in the mechanics bay at the agency. New plugs and a fresh fuel filter. They also installed a metal mesh guard over the tailpipe.
No more foreign objects being stuffed up the exhaust. I made it a point to drop in on Harry Coquincin during business hours the next day. Smoke bombs in a spud in the tailpipe, huh? I figured someone was messing with me.
Good thing I didn't let fly with my 12th gauge. Today old Bismarck's aren't worth a prison route. You said it, Harry. If you leave us up to the agency, we'll solve this caper.
I'm coming back tonight and every night until we can put an end to these shenanigans. Thanks, Torgi. It's good to know you agents have my back. It's not even that big a deal, but it's just the obnoxiousness of it.
You know what? I wanted to stop, and I want the safety of a Hooligan free alley again. Now it's all declares. Next, it might be vandalism or theft.