The Arctic Queen and Other Stories

By Burr Cook

This is a book of 6 short stories. Story 1 is an action packed spy story in which a secret experiment in Germany involving changing DNA in a human egg creates a super strong man who escapes from the laboratory and hides out in northern Canada. He meets a beautiful Native American girl by the name of Oriel who he wants to marry but there are complications. In story 2 a teen age boy (Billy) with abusive parents runs away from his tenement home in Brooklyn and hides out in a tent near the Appellation trail in Massachusetts, meets up with a tramp (Bud) and has an adventuresome summer camping out with his new friend. Story 3 is total nonsense and was written for those who enjoy wasting time. It is made up of old jokes most of which are not original. The jokes are loosely woven into a story about a mental patient who is released from a sanitarium prematurely. Number 4 is about a man who testifies against a gangster and enters the witness program. When the criminals discover where he is hiding he goes on the run hiding out with Native Americans in Northern Canada. Story 5 is about a city politician who is arrested for accepting a bribe and gets cleared by a chance twist of fate and in story 6 a young cowgirl meets a man who turns out to have some very weird characteristics. They fall in love in spite of a seemingly insurmountable difference in backgrounds.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Burr Cook
• Release date: Feb 4, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310546600

Burr Cook

Burr lives in Syracuse New York and started writing novels at age 79. He has 4 children and several grandchildren and Great grandchildren are arriving at an alarming rate. Burr is an history buff and works hard on his family's genealogy. He got through the 3rd grade with passing marks. Dropped out due to a childhood illness and made several unsuccessful attempts to restart his schooling. He has a web site at www.burrcook.com which is biographical in parts. He may be contacted through this site. Burr says "my first novel is 'Buster, a Story of a Slave' and I consider it to be my best work."

Book preview

Third Edition

Chapter 1 Hotel Whitehorse

Jason Pohl was just leaving the city of Whitehorse heading north toward Carmacks, Canada, following the Yukon River when he first saw her. She was beautiful dressed in her deerskin clothes with her long black hair flowing in the fall breeze. She turned and looked directly at him then looked away again a little too quickly he thought. What a picture he had in his mind’s eye just as if he had photographed her. He would have if she had given him time but she was gone as quickly as she had come into view.

He was driving a Dodge van which he had purchased in Vancouver. It was white with a green racing stripe and it had all of his belongings in the rear including a sleeping bag and extra clothes and various camping gear. He had paid cash for the used vehicle which appeared in good working order.

He had come through places like Prince George, Iskut and Watson Lake on his route to Whitehorse which was not his destination. The truth was that he had no destination in mind. He was running away from not toward something.

Jason knew he was not a normal human being although that is what he wanted most to be. First of all he was only 10 years old. I suspect that will require some explanation but for now let’s just accept that he is aging more than twice as fast as a normal person should. He looks to be about 25 years old and his mind is occupied with thoughts about the girl he had just seen. He made a quick decision to remain in Whitehorse at least over night. He felt safe here.

He checked into the Hotel Whitehorse and paid the bill with cash. He had no credit cards and didn’t need any, he had plenty of cash. He had robbed a bank in a small village in Germany, his country of origin.

Jason found the dining room off the hotel lobby and finding an empty table he sat and ordered a caribou steak with eggs. While he was eating his meal he saw her again. She came into the room with a very large man who looked to be older than her by at least 10 years. The girl looked to be in her early twenties. During the remainder of his dining experience she looked at him a couple times and smiled. She made sure that the man was not watching her when she eyed him briefly. She was definitely looking at him but did not want to be seen doing so. He thought this to be very mysterious.

He slowed down his eating and remained in the room until the couple left. He wondered if they were man and wife. The man didn’t look old enough to be her father. So after they left he tried to get his bill paid in time to see where they went. He managed to see them go out the front door of the hotel and walk together down the street. He rushed to the front desk and asked if the couple just leaving were guests of the hotel. The clerk answered that he shouldn’t give out information like that but when he was handed a 50 dollar bill he quickly opened the register and said yes Mr. and Mrs. Olmstead are registered guests of the establishment.

Chapter 2 Germany

In the year of 1941 Heinrich Luitpold Himmler who was Reichsführer of the Schutzstaffel (SS), began a secret experiment called ‘Project Supermen’. The purpose being to find a way to breed a super race of people built around what he called the Arian Race. To carry out his experiments he appropriated what he considered to be the best of the best in the medical field to study all possibilities. There was no limit to the amount of funds available for this project. Himmler committed suicide on 23 May 1945 after which the project would have fallen apart except that the American OSS organization found the records of the experiments through the Nuremberg Tribunal testimony. Some of the doctors were found guilty of war crimes but most of them were not directly involved in what is known as ‘the holocaust’.

For reasons unknown the OSS and later the CIA got interested in the project and employed the German doctors in order to continue the study of genetics and exploring the possibility of breeding better soldiers was the terminology they used to get funding for their covert study. Not much came of the project for some years until DNA studies became popular. By that time the original doctors had passed on and were replaced by more up to date personnel and over time genetic experiments were covertly being explored by the group.

Using 21st century technology the project eventually got around to altering the DNA in a fertilized human egg outside of the body and implanting it in a host. That is how Jason Pohl came to exist. He was a product of a very complex experiment with a human egg. He grew up in the laboratory and was never allowed to leave. He was found to have the strength 4 times that of the world record weight lifters. While he was growing up he was not plagued with any childhood diseases that normal children get. Once he accidentally suffered severe burns caused by a laboratory accident. At least it was classified as an accident. Jason was not sure but the result was that he recovered fully within 3 days of the incident; A recovery that should have taken months. The project however, was not a total success story. There was a problem. Jason seemed to be aging at an accelerated rate. At age 10 he appeared to be in his 20s. And the biggest problem of all came when Jason escaped. He was never supposed to leave the laboratory. He was treated well with the finest foods and exercise equipment and a large park where he could run and jump at will. But one day he somehow jumped over the 20 foot fence that surrounded the park and escaped.

The last the CIA heard of him for a while happened several days after he escaped when he entered a small branch bank in a German village and made off with all of the cash. It just happened that it was a peak time for the bank and they had about a half million dollars on hand all of which Jason put into a large suit case and left after making a complete wreck of the building knocking down partitions and removing doors. Before he got away he was shot in the shoulder by a bank guard who swore that the wound should have stopped him but instead the gun was taken from the guard and Jason left without hurting anyone.

The scientists did not need to worry about Jason’s ability to survive in the outside world. He had watched TV and read many books. In fact by age 10 he was very well educated. Once when a doctor had asked him what he could get for him on the outside Jason said he would like a woman to sleep with. The doctor had considered providing him with one. They were not sure what kind of results a pregnancy would bring. Some of the experimenters were in favor of finding out. There were many arguments over the issue. But now he was outside fending for himself. And in the great north woods of Canada he had found the perfect mate.

Chapter 3 Adventure

Jason awoke at sunrise and climbed out of bed in his room at the Whitehorse Hotel. He dressed quickly and practically ran down the stairs to the lobby where he asked the desk clerk if the Olmsteads had come down to breakfast yet. The clerk replied they left about an hour ago and said that they were driving to Carmacks today. They were the first folks to eat breakfast in the hotel. I told them that they would not find the road to Carmacks lined with diners.

Thank you, Jason said as he handed the man a tip. He had pulled a bill from his pocket without looking at the denomination. He had no idea what he would do if he met the Olmsteads again. He didn’t have it in him to harm anyone intentionally. And the girl of his dreams was married to another man. So he entered the dining room and ordered a large breakfast and after eating it he ordered another. The waitress was shocked at the amount he ate even though he was a large man each breakfast was man sized. The waitress flirted with him a little giving him a big smile and a wink but Jason could think of only one woman today.

After paying his bill he went back to his room and packed then he checked out and said goodbye to the Hotel Whitehorse. His van was still parked at the curb outside so he found an open gas station, filled up the tank and pointed the hood ornament toward Carmacks to the north. The country side was pretty with fall colors as he followed the Yukon River thinking about his adventure so far.

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Before leaving Germany he had to take some chances. The first thing that he needed was an identity. In the laboratory he had no name. He was known as John Doe. He concluded that the police were not looking for him for that very reason, he had no name. However the CIA would be searching franticly.

He traveled by train to Frankfort, about 100 miles from the lab and even further from where he did the robbery. He walked the streets for a couple of days getting familiar with the city before he started making some inquiries. He had locked his suitcases in the rail station after filling his pockets with money. The first person he talked to looked like a bum in the park. He asked how a person could go about purchasing a passport. The bum said do you mean a forgery?

Yes, but it’s not for me, I am just curious.

So the man said, Tell your friend to go to the bar at the Hotel Holder and if the bar tender is Frank, you can ask him. So he gave the man a tip and walked on. He had decided that his name would be Jason.

He entered the bar and ordered a soft drink. It was early and the place was empty except for Frank, the bar tender. Sure enough Frank could find a man who did excellent work, for a price, which Jason paid promptly. He found the forger and by the next afternoon he had become Jason Pohl complete with a German passport and driver’s license even though he had never driven.

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So Jason had to come out of his day dreaming when he just missed colliding with an oncoming car. He had been driving for an hour so he pulled over to the side of the road and stopped at a beautiful spot with a panoramic view of the Yukon River where he watched a steam boat chugging against the current.

As he sat on a guard rail looking into the river water he can think of only one thing, Mrs. Olmstead. Why does she have to be married? The first women he has ever seen that he could really love. He could feel it with his entire being. Did he come all this way just to be disappointed? It has been a tough trip.

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He had returned to the forger one more time; this time to ask a question and perhaps for some help. He knew the man would not notify the authorities no matter what he told him. So he popped the big question. Suppose a man had a big suit case full of cash money in Euros and he wants to travel out of the country. His luggage will be searched by customs. What can I tell this friend to do?"

Did you pay me with part of that cash?

Yes I did.

Well it’s not marked in any way and the serial numbers are random. I can be of service once again but it will cost 10 percent of the money however much it is.

Jason asked How can it be done?

"My name is Mark by the way and I named you so I know you are Jason. We would go to a banker that I know very well. He