The well lubricated rifle bolt softly snicked a soft-nosed hunting round into the chamber. Now, where are you? Sights tracked slowly up the rough grey corrugated bark of the ancient Hemlock-Spruce. How many days had it taken him to hike this far? Two, or was it three? It didn’t matter. That damn creature had evaded his snares and traps for weeks now. He’d seen the tracks out here in the towering dark woods of British Columbia, far from any trace of humanity. Out here where the Muskeg could swallow a house and a hundred billion trees cast a dark, pine scented pall over the land. Ground that had never seen axe, chainsaw or even a single human bootprint, punctuated by massive outcrops of lichen encrusted rock, bare since glaciers last ruled this land.

Now Henry George Balmain, graduate of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada was in the deep woods seeking his Ph.D, rifle in hand.

*

It had started with a short contract working in the university archives after he’d made double first in his Masters degree. He was a Botanist and Geologist looking for his first real job, but the economy was flat and the Oil companies weren’t hiring. So, you took work where you could. That was when he saw a small item of Victoriana, a smoky glass photographic plate, a little water damaged but still readable with care, which had crossed his desk on the way for sorting before being sent for recycling. Administration had deemed the archive of little or no academic value, so the whole collection was being trashed. The plate’s barely visible handwritten title read “A Squonk. Shot 24^th July 1891 by Sir Edmund Howell-Foxley” There was also a small sheaf of paper covered in faded handwritten notes. Henry began to read. There was little legible on the crumbling paper, but what there was read;

Modern Observations of the Northwestern Pacific Squonk 14^th November 1891 St Thomas Lake Camp, British Columbia;

Squonk is an anglicised name derived from an extinct First Nations dialect word ‘Ts’a’Qu’k, which loosely translates as “Ugly little man of the trees”

Habitat and range;

Squonks are reputed to be an arboreal species, whose habitat is mainly the Western Hemlock or Hemlock-Spruce tree, native to the Pacific coast of North America (Tsuga heterophylla). Populations were reputedly once found in the range of the Eastern and Mountain Hemlock trees. Around 1880, a time of maximum habitat loss, Squonks (to use the anglicised version of the name) were once thought to have become extinct. This species was also falsely thought to have been restricted to the Hemlock groves of western Pennsylvania. Island populations were located, according to First Nations legend, all across North America and Canada.

Squonks were originally thought only to be native to the extensive pine forests of northern Pennsylvania and Appalachian mountains, but reports of similar creatures have come in from many of the heavily forested States and Dominions all across North America.

In continental North Western America, many sightings have come from the underdeveloped regions of coastal British Columbia and the forested areas of Northern Alberta. Other reports have come from Southern Alaska all the way down the Pacific coast to Howe Sound, in the south of BC. None have ever been reported on the offshore islands such as Vancouver Island or the Queen Charlotte Islands. Whilst this particular sub species of Squonk is not thought to be migratory, despite numerous failed attempts by hunters to catch individuals, reported sightings of similar individual markings would indicate that each Squonk’s range may be as large as five thousand square miles.

Anatomy and physiology;

One reputed specimen, dissected by cryptonaturalist Sir Edmund Campbell-Jones (Ph.d Kings, Oxon) in 1887, who noted details of its somewhat bizarre physiology which may give a clue to this creatures alleged ability to dissolve into tears. He found that this creature has a series of large toroidal (Ring doughnut) bladders under its skin which give the animal great drought and fire resistance. Indeed, when frightened, the animal is said to void the contents of these interconnected skin bladders, possibly cutting its body weight by up to two thirds in a matter of seconds, thus vastly improving agility and speed. Squonks are clumsy on the ground, but once in the canopy can move remarkably quickly, easily able to outpace a running bear or cougar, which are, apart from man, its only known predator.

These skin bladders, when full and distended, also give Squonks an unevenly pneumatic aspect, like the deep folds of a Shar-Pei dog. These creatures are also prone to various fungal infections resulting in characteristic wart-like skin lesions. This lends an unpleasant aspect to the creature, even amongst its own kind, which has led to speculation that it may only mate on moonless nights.

A primarily nocturnal animal, the eyes are large and surrounded by light coloured fur, but lack either well developed eyelids or nicitating membrane for lubrication. However, Campbell-Jones reports large lacrymal ducts situated at the upper outer aspect of the eye, which constantly flood the corneas, keeping them moist.

Whilst few reputable images exist of Squonks, observed individuals are known to be covered with a heavily ridged mottled grey pelt ideal for camouflage whilst clinging to the trunk of its native tree habitat. Once immobile, these animals are almost impossible to spot from ground level. Adults range in size from two to three feet long from flat fronted porcine snout to stubby tail, with long spindly arms and legs which are often each long as two thirds of the animal’s entire body length.

After reading, Henry searched the internet for references to these strange creatures. All he could find was a humorous treatise called ‘The Fearsome Creatures of the Forest and some Beasts of Deserts and Mountains’ (1910) By a William T. Cox. A similar book by Jorge Luis Borges entitled ‘Book of Fictional Beings’ (1969) also appeared, along with a 1976 song by supergroup Genesis from 1976, but little else. Despite this dearth of information, Henry was hooked. He slid the damaged glass plate into a spare envelope and added the notes, slipping the small package into his briefcase. No one would miss the material as it had been scheduled for waste disposal anyway. So he told himself it wasn’t really stealing.

As he drove home, he reflected that despite all the camp-fire tale rhetoric, he now had exciting evidence that a whole new species existed. He drummed the steering wheel distractedly. If he went to the head of department with what he presently had, he might lose his job, such as it was. Heads of department tended to get set in their ways and more than unsympathetic to wild-eyed boat rockers. So a specimen was needed. Alive or dead, it didn’t matter. Physical evidence could sway even the most intransigent academic stick in the mud.

The trouble was that expeditions cost money, which was in perilously short supply, although he did have enough money to go camping in the target area this summer. Perhaps he could borrow a quadcopter drone with a camera from the Geology department. Maybe borrow Dad’s old rifle too, although the old man would be very surprised, Henry had always been so anti-gun.

*

Several months later Henry stepped out of a float plane onto a waterlogged jetty at the edge of a remote Canadian lake. Even under his modern ultra-grip soled hiking boots the rain-damp wood felt slick. With him he brought a large backpack full of lightweight clothing and a hundred rounds of ammunition, his father’s old Remington 30-06 lever action rifle, a holdall containing a tent and another full of dried food and supplies and a large box containing a quadcopter drone and cameras. The pilot also left two five gallon containers of gasoline before revving his engine and scooting up the lake for take off, leaving Henry standing alone.

All around the high walls of conifers towered as though they knew what they were doing. This was not some expanse of woodland encompassing a few dozen hectares, but the dark blueish green of the deep, deep pine and spruce woods. Mile after timeless mile, over hills and valleys, only permitting bedrock to poke through the gloomy pine needled canopy occasionally like small holes in a threadbare sock.

When it comes to looming, the trees of Canada’s pacific north west, specifically those of British Columbia, are Olympic gold medal loomers. For the evergreen overlords of this land, looming is not so much what they do as what they are. The coniferous indigenes have had many thousands of years practice and can keep it up for centuries to come.

Two hundred metres up a gentle slope from the waterlogged jetty was a log built hunter’s cabin. Nothing much, just a two room shack with log burning stove and a couple of kerosene lamps. There was a well stocked log pile, a bed and two chairs, dry kindling, a fire striker and cupboards full of canned goods, some of which, when Henry checked, were actually within their sell by dates. And after a few minutes thought he added several cans of soup and chilli to the larder. This was how the system worked up here in the back country. You always brought more than you needed and left the surplus at one of these hunter’s cabins, just in case someone got stranded up here for a month or three, which was not unheard of.

While he was doing this, the float plane upon which he had arrived, a rotary engined relic from the 1960’s, roared off the lakes surface leaving him quite alone. As the single engined aircraft droned off into the distance, Henry busied himself moving the gasoline and his equipment up to the cabin.

On the far shore of the lake, one of the local black bears heaved upright to stand on hind legs, sniffing the new scent before moving on. New man-thing? It moved on, knowing that particular smell always brought danger.

From the nearby treetop of a forty metre tall western hemlock-spruce, large curious eyes observed the newcomer whilst the ugly little mouth underneath munched on a richly resinous pine cone. A broad, pig-like snout twitched above wart-speckled mouth and nervous finger-claws dug deeply into the bark. Half a mile away, a Cougar sniffed deeply and changed direction. Mule deer felt the changes and glanced nervously around.

Oblivious to the disturbances rippling out from his arrival, Henry continued his chores. The cabin would make a nice base while he assembled the drone and made ready for expeditions out into the greater forest. He filled the cabin’s generator tank and tried the manual starter. After a few tries and skinned knuckles, the little Honda engine coughed into life and Henry had power. He laid a fire in the stove, which after a few attempts began to burn. Someone in the distant past, when they’d first built this small refuge, had drilled a well under the building, which allowed him to manually pump water without having to go outdoors. Even if the first few gallons were brown. After much pumping, the flow soon cleared and he managed to fill a large tinware pot, which he left to boil on the now-heating stove. Once boiled and cooled, he’d drop in some purification tablets. Dad had brought his youngest son up in the great outdoors and such necessary chores were hard-wired into young Henry’s subconscious.

For the next few days he settled in, assembling and testing the drone, ensuring he had three sets of spare batteries, flying them cautiously up to tree top height and using the high definition camera to scan the area. He found several curious bears, who blinked lazily at the buzzing quadcopter as they raided wild bee hives for honey or munched at skunk cabbage growing around the lakes swampier edges. Just over four hundred metres away on other side of the side on the lake, a cougar languidly lodged in the fork of an ancient Maple flattened ears and bared savage teeth at the drone’s buzzing annoyance.

For three more days he practised learning to fly the drone around the lakes and hills until on the third day, the drone was filming on final approach when one of the nearby treetops rustled violently, as though something had moved quickly up the trunk. Henry diverted the drone to investigate. He caught a blurry glimpse of greyish brown fur moving out of drone view around the trunk and his heart leapt. Was it? Could it really be? Or was it just a squirrel?

Pausing the drone, he zoomed back and lifted ten metres to see a series of tree tops whip back and forth as something moved very quickly from tree to tree. Henry wanted to follow, but the drone was at less than fifteen percent battery and needed to be brought in.

Quickly swapping in a new set of fully charged batteries he sent the drone back to where he’d made the first sighting. There were some small claw marks in the bark and it looked like someone had emptied a several buckets of water down the trunk but Henry was elated. A possible Squonk sighting? Checking the video, he managed to isolate a few muddy images of something that was neither bear, ape nor cougar moving quickly out of camera shot.

He enhanced the image and stared slack jawed. There it was. The resemblance to the old image was incredible. Taking an enhanced printout from a waterproof pocket he scrutinised them side by side. No question about it, the profile of the beasts head was unmistakeable, even if it did look considerably skinnier than he’d thought.

Had he really just confirmed a brand new species? A whole new genus even? Fantasies of naming this novel creature spun through his head all that evening. Lacrimacorpus Dissolvens Balmainii perhaps? Henry went to sleep with a smile on his face.

The following morning that smile disappeared with the arrival of four ebullient fortysomething Americans on a much larger floatplane. They brought beer, rifles, fishing gear and a collapsible boat with a loud outboard motor. Henry’s heart sank. They would drive his prize even further away. He could always leave with the scant video evidence he had, but it simply wasn’t enough and the Americans were too bent on having noisy fun. Of course they tried to cheer him up by regaling each other with tall campfire tales about their various other expeditions, offering him beer and steaks, but Henry, in a self-absorbed academic gloom, simply couldn’t get into the spirit.

“I got a good story.” On their last evening, Todd, a dentist from Nebraska looking every inch the frontiersman with his six day beard and well-used heavy wool plaid shirt. “It’s about a strange creature from Pennsylvania called a Squonk.” The rest of the Americans leaned forward, taking in Todd’s tall tale with amused scepticism. Henry internally braced himself, but said nothing. The Squonk was real. He had camera footage. Not very good, but good enough.

“Now the Squonk is probably the homeliest animal in the world, and knows it.” Todd began. “Used to live most anywheres in the forests across the US and Canada. Geological history shows beyond dispute that, as these areas gradually changed from swampy, lake-dotted country to high forest the Squonk was forced to leave it’s original watery habitat. Not being too bright neither, Squonks constantly ranged around the shrinking marshes in search of food. In the end they took to the trees.” He added. “Then people came to the high forests and the Squonks, once plentiful, began their long decline. It’s from these old legends that the White man first heard of this weird creature that dissolves into tears when captured.”

“Dissolves into tears?” scoffed Nils, a lawyer from the same Nebraskan town as Todd. He had stayed clean shaven and his outdoor clothing was more modern. “Seriously?”

“Okay Todd. You win.” laughed Zak, oldest of the four, he playfully threw a bait fish at Todd, who batted it away.

“Yeah, some guy called J P Wentling caught one back in nineteen something.” Todd said mock-earnestly. “Put it into a burlap sack and all he found when he got home was tears.”

“Tears? In a sack? Jeez Todd, you are so full of it.” Guffawed Tony, a thin, balding man who ran a modest construction company. “Squonks, huh!”

“They exist.” The words escaped Henry’s mouth before he could stop them. “I’ve seen one.”

“What?” and “No way!” chorused around the camp fire.

“Before you arrived I was test flying my camera drone and I managed to catch a snapshot.” Henry produced his tablet computer and showed the few images he’d got to the Americans.

Each of them stared at the small but distinct video loop apart from Tony who commented “Kinda blurry ain’t it?”

“Jeez Tony. Whaddaya want? Technicolour and surround sound?” Todd said sarcastically. He turned to Henry, whose eyes now burned with a quiet messianic zeal. “You got anything else?”

Just a water damaged picture and some old hunters notes from the eighteen nineties.� Henry replied quickly. Those are why I’m here. But the drone footage I just showed you is from just last week. Squonks are real.”

“I’m not convinced.” Tony said after a short silence. “Good story though, even if you are Canadian. Hey, I’m turning in. You guys please yourselves. We’re due to fly home in the morning and that’s my floatplane out there on the water. Unless of course you guys want to go off chasing Skunks and moonbeams.” He chuckled.

“Squonks.” Henry corrected.

“Yeah. Whatever. We fly out at ten. Get your kit ready.” Tony pushed his angular frame upright and made off toward his tent. The others followed, apart from Todd. Henry felt foolish for exposing himself to such easy ridicule.

Todd stared into the camp fire reflectively. Then he looked up at the crestfallen Henry, features sharp in the flickering orange glow. “You sure about this?” He gestured at Henry’s tablet computer.

“Sure.” Henry confirmed.

“So when are you going to make it public?” Todd added.

“I need more footage. Better still a live specimen.”

“What do you need?”

“What does any scientific enterprise need?” Henry replied morosely.

“You talking about money?”

“Yes.”

“How much?”

“For the right supplies and two graduate assistants? Half a million would do it.” Henry said gloomily, expecting Todd to fall off his log laughing.

Instead Todd stared into the fire again for a few moments. Then he looked up at Henry. “What would five million get you?”

“Ultra high definition cameras, infra red, a proper technical crew plus professional guides, permits and a proper base camp with security.” Henry said after a moment, not thinking for a moment that Todd was serious. “For that money we could cover a rough circular area about a hundred and thirty kilometres across. In the deep woods, at least fifty kilometres away from any human habitation or activity.”

“What’s that in miles?”

“About eighty.”

Todd gave a long low whistle. “How many Squonks in a circle that big?”

“One. Maybe. Maybe none. No one knows.”

“One? In five thousand square miles?” Todd gave Henry a sidelong look. “That’s a whole lot of nothing to cover.”

“You know where I saw this one?” Henry pointed at the tablet.

“Where?”

“Up there. In that tree.” Henry pointed into the fire-shadowed gloom behind the cabin.

“Wow!” Todd said turning to look and forcing himself to whisper. “Really?”

“Read the GPS data.” Henry handed over the tablet.

There was a pause. “So it was just a hundred metres from the cabin?” Todd said quietly. “Woah.” He drew a deep breath. “You know. When I said five million dollars, that’s US dollars by the way. I wasn’t kidding.”

Wheels were spinning in Henry’s head Over six and a half million Canadian dollars?

“Of course we’d make it all back and then some. Lecture tours, speaking engagements, presentations, books, maybe even TV or a movie deal. You’d be famous, my foundation would get a massive tax loss, amortised and repaid over five to ten years.” Todd said.

Henry was shocked. “You’d help me just to cheat on your taxes?”

What Henry had forgotten is that a fundamental difference between most Canadians and most Americans is while many Canadians have an almost pathetic faith in government, many Americans do not. Canadians therefore, when asked for extra taxes, trustingly give up their hard earned funds without thinking, whilst Americans tend to ask pointed questions which many politicians find oh so inconvenient, such as “Whatcha gonna do with it?” and will use any legal or quasi-legal means to retain what they see as rightfully theirs. Which is why the US tax code runs to over a thousand pages.

“It’s not cheating!” Todd snapped and stared at him in disbelief before adding. “But if that’s your attitude, I’ll leave you to be sanctimonious in peace!” He firmly handed Henry’s tablet back. “Goddamn Canadians!” He snarled and stomped off to his tent, leaving Henry open mouthed.

In the morning the hunter’s float plane roared off the lake surface, heading southbound. None of the four Americans spoke to Henry before they left.

Feeling wretched, Henry put a pack together the following day and left most of his gear at the cabin, using it as a base camp. Every few days, sometimes a week or more, he would return to find another visitor had passed by, leaving their own contribution to the stores, but never touching his labelled equipment. As August came to a close, he used his satellite phone to access his email. There were no job offers, so he elected to try and over winter at the cabin.

North country BC is noted for brutal winters, but Henry had the foresight to cut enough firewood and thanks to several successful hunting forays, had supplies to spare. However, when he emerged, full bearded and blinking into the light of a spring morning to rapidly melting snow, he found two First Nations hunters staring at him.

“You been here all Winter?” The taller of the two gave Henry a high cheekboned look of disbelief.

“Er..” Henry’s vocal chords creaked into life. “Er, yeah.”

“Why?” The smaller of the two, lever action rifle cradled in his arms, gave Henry an amused look. He exchanged a rapid fire series of fluid syllables with his friend, who burst out laughing.

“I’m looking for Squonk.” Henry said. The laughter suddenly ceased. The shorter of the hunters scowled. The taller hunter spoke in a placatory tone to his friend but the scowl on the smaller man’s rounded face did not fade.

“My friend doesn’t like people bringing up old legends. He says it makes the spirits angry.” The taller hunter explained. “He says it’s bad medicine. Especially for white men.”

“Is it? Oh I’m very sorry, I didn’t know.” Henry blushed furiously at the implied lapse in etiquette, which when it comes to interactions between urban Canadians and Canadian First Nations, can be quite the social minefield.

“No problem.” shrugged the tall hunter. “Got any liquor?”

“Um, no. I don’t drink.” Henry replied.

“Okay.” shrugged the tall man again. “Have a good day.” He shook his head at the older man who grunted and they walked off toward the treeline in an unhurried amble. As they reached the treeline the tall man put his head back and gave a bark of laughter that could be heard all around the lake. The older man glanced back toward the cabin for a moment, then they disappeared into the trees.

Henry felt crushed. Not only had he spent an entire solitary Winter in the Canadian wilderness, the batteries he’d brought with him had died, condensation had infiltrated his tablet and caused it to fail. Now total strangers were laughing at him. That and the generator was out of gasoline. It was time to go home, find a job and get on with the rest of his life. He was sure he’d seen something, he didn’t know what, but he wasn’t going to fund any further efforts with some Americans tax dodge. Not that anyone from Canadian academe would support him. Going against established thinking was one of the many ways to academic commit career suicide. Still, he had a fund of anecdotes to help ease his way back into the social whirl, which would help him find a job. The Squonk would have to remain a mystery. He would seek his Ph.D in a less obscure field.

*

Later that afternoon, in a remote log built trading post and bar, the two hunters walked in and sat down at the counter with a thirtyish woman wearing too many tribal tattoos, her companion in Levi’s and leather waistcoat and right at the end, a short skinny figure in massively baggy leisure pants, worn dark grey hoodie, the cowl pulled up around broad, porcine features. “Guns and knives on the bar please. Empty the chamber and keep your ammo in your pockets. Button ’em up too.” Said the gruff barman. “Then your first drink is free.” The grizzled old man put a pint glass of cold pale amber liquid in front of hunters when they complied. “Up here for the Elk?”

“Sort of.”

“Well mister sort of, I hope you got the right tags on your hunting licence. Fish and game are pretty hot up here. Get caught with an unlicensed kill on your hood and you lose everything.”

“I know.” The tall man took his First Nations hunting ID out of his top pocket.

“Not much bear in these parts. Try another twenty kays north.” commented the barman.

“Thanks. You see that white guy at the old lake cabin? He looks like hell. Spent all winter up there.” said the tall hunter. Everyone snorted with derisive laughter. “Says he’s looking for Squonk.” There was an even more raucous burst of laughter from everyone but the little guy at the end of the bar, who picked up a resinous pine cone with impossibly long fingers from a basket on the three inch thick counter, putting it into his wide lipless mouth.

“That’s kind of dumb.” said the barman. “Everyone knows you don’t get Squonk this side of the coastal range. Leastways not this time of year. Ain’t that right Charlie?” He asked the little man in the hoodie.

“Yeah.” chuckled the Squonk softly, picking up another pine cone to chew.

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