ARIEL, Wash. — Music thumps. Boots stomp. Smoke swirls.

It rises like a dry mist from red-glowing cigarettes. It ebbs around an elk’s skull, five-point antlers still attached, and a muzzle loader hanging on the wall.

A potbellied stove washes its warmth over strutting men, women and children. A skinned-out bobcat dangles from the ceiling. A two-man chain saw with a 12-horsepower engine roosts on a canopy over the bar. A sign says: “This Business is Supported by Timber Dollars.”

Tab tops pop. Bartenders slide Budweiser and Rainier and Miller and Coors across the varnished bar top, 3,120 cans and bottles in all. On a wall nearby, these people have tacked up $40. The money is waiting for D.B. Cooper. If he ever shows up, they would like to buy him a drink.

All of this is in his honor. F

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