Anna Pigeon Episode 2 recap: “Hide + Seek”

Tracy Spiridakos stars as park ranger Anna Pigeon in USA Network’s Anna Pigeon, based on Nevada Barr’s novel series.

Photo credit: USA Network.

---

Episode 2 of Anna Pigeon, “Hide + Seek,” picks up with Anna having made her decision: she’s staying at Glacier.

Her fellow rangers have decided this calls for a celebration, which means Anna opens her door to find them singing a welcome song and bearing huckleberry pie. She is standing there in a T-shirt, thoroughly unimpressed by the whole production, although later, talking to Molly, she admits there are signs that staying might not be entirely terrible. She has a cat now, for one thing.

Molly is more interested in what staying means for Anna than in the cat. She has sent her sister a journal and wants her to start writing down her nightmares. Anna isn't interested. Molly points out that running means Anna doesn't have to deal with people or risk becoming attached to them, and Anna doesn't seem particularly eager to hear the diagnosis.

Anna goes to see Jesse, and whatever is developing between them moves forward from his invitation to the bar in Episode 1. Jesse wants to know her as more than whatever they currently are, but the conversation is interrupted by a considerably less romantic concern: the park's popular eagle camera has gone down.

Anna heads out to deal with it and instead finds a frantic father and teenage son searching for a missing girl named Mandy. The father introduces himself as Michael White, with his son presented as Mike Jr. Mandy has been gone for more than an hour, and the situation becomes more urgent when Anna learns that she has diabetes.

The search leads to the river, where they find Mandy in the water. She's cold but conscious, and Anna checks her before returning to retrieve the stuffed lion Mandy lost in the river. Mandy is safe, but enough about the family's story bothers Anna that she keeps looking.

Jeremiah Paulson is also hanging around the park. When Anna encounters him, he says he's visiting an old friend. She reminds him that she put his friend in jail, and Paulson responds by taking a shot at Anna, describing her as a down-on-her-luck widow. Anna gives it right back to him, but his continued presence makes it clear their conflict didn't end with Episode 1.

Back at the ranger station, Anna asks for the campsite registration for Michael White. There isn't one.

Zoey checks the eagle-camera footage while Anna calls FBI agent Frederick Stanton. The identities the family gave Anna were false. Stanton identifies them as Amanda Davies, her brother Austin and their father, Jake. The entire Davies family, including their mother, Sarah, disappeared six months earlier after the children's grandmother reported them missing. Stanton also tells Anna that Jake has a criminal record that includes break-and-enters, scrap-metal theft and bar fights.

The eagle footage gives them another piece of the puzzle. Jake was near the camera carrying a crossbow, and he deliberately shot it out.

Anna and the other rangers track the family to a makeshift camp, and this isn't somebody pitching a tent for the weekend. They find children's clothes and evidence that the family has been hunting, foraging and growing food there. There is also a pharmacy receipt for passport photos and Amanda's empty insulin pen.

They also find a grave.

With Sarah still missing and Jake having lied about the family's identity, the rangers have reason to suspect she may be buried there. Anna begins the process of getting permission to excavate it while Jake, elsewhere, is trying to get insulin for Mandy. He doesn't have insurance and comes up $2 short at the pharmacy. When the pharmacist won't give him the medication, Jake takes it and runs, leaving the children behind.

Anna now has Austin and Mandy while their father is on the run. Zoey spends some time with the children and tells them that she lives in ranger housing while her family lives around the park and on the Blackfeet Reservation. When she asks where they have been living, their answer is strange but important: “Where the medicine grows.”

Anna and Stanton disagree about what Jake is going to do next. With passport photos found at the camp and the Canadian border nearby, Stanton believes he may be running. Anna thinks he's coming back for his children.

Her reasoning gets personal. Austin and Mandy remind Anna of herself and Molly, and Anna tells Stanton that when they were children, their parents went out while the sisters were watching Titanic and didn't come back for three years. Anna says Molly essentially became her mother overnight. The Davies children don't behave like children who think their father has abandoned them, she argues. They expect him to return.

Anna's own loss is still part of the episode as well. She has another disturbing dream involving Zach, exactly the sort of thing Molly has been trying to get her to write about in the journal.

Back at the station, the kids begin making bird calls. Anna eventually realizes they aren't just making noise: Jake is communicating with them. A broken window provides a distraction, and Austin and Mandy disappear.

Anna was right about Jake coming back.

The FBI expects him to head toward the border, but Anna believes he'll try to get there on foot. The children's grandmother, Lori Grant, arrives demanding to know where they are, and she isn't willing to stay behind when Anna goes looking for them.

On the drive, Lori fills in the part of the family story Anna has been missing. Sarah had cervical cancer, and Lori says she wasn't getting better when Jake took Sarah and the children away. Sarah left her mother a text saying they were going into the woods. Lori believes Jake thought he could help Sarah with plants and other natural remedies.

That gives Anna more context for Mandy's comment about living “where the medicine grows.” Anna had found goldenseal near the family's camp, one of the plants Jake had been using while Sarah was ill. The episode presents this as part of Jake's attempt to care for Sarah; there is not scientific evidence supporting goldenseal as a cancer treatment.

Anna tells Lori that she believes Sarah died in the park.

Jake, Austin and Mandy are meanwhile making their way through the woods. The children don't want to leave their mother behind, while Jake insists they have to stay together because they're a family. Anna catches up with them and Jake fires a crossbow bolt in her direction. She realizes he has no bolts left and orders him to surrender.

Before she can complete the arrest, Lori arrives with a gun.

Jake insists he didn't kill Sarah. His account is that conventional treatment wasn't saving her and Sarah did not want to die in a hospital; she wanted to spend the end of her life somewhere beautiful. Lori makes clear that her anger isn't only about Sarah's death. Jake took her daughter away, and Lori never had the chance to say goodbye.

Anna manages to get Lori to lower the gun, but Jake still doesn't want to surrender his children. Austin finally forces the issue. Mandy doesn't have her insulin, and the children need more than their father can provide while they're running through the wilderness. Jake gives in, and Anna arrests him.

Afterward, Austin talks about the life the family built in the park, hunting, fishing, foraging and living largely off the land. When he asks what will happen to his mother, Anna tells him Sarah will be laid to rest near their home.

The eagle-camera story has been running alongside the family case throughout the episode. One of the adult eagles disappeared after the camera was shot, prompting worried callers to bombard the ranger station and eventually inspiring a betting pool over whether the father eagle will return.

Anna goes back to Jesse's bar after the case and gives him a small mouse, calling back to their earlier conversation about the eagle bringing its mate one. She also borrows Paulson's insult and warns Jesse that she's a down-on-her-luck widow whose touch doesn't exactly improve things.

Jesse accepts the mouse.

Paulson, meanwhile, has turned his attention to land near the park. He learns that a man and his wife own 10 acres and offers $600,000 cash for it. When the owner says he isn't interested in selling, Paulson makes the nature of his interest considerably clearer: he can pay for the property, or he can get it for free. Whatever Paulson is doing around Glacier now clearly includes an interest in acquiring land.

Anna eventually replaces the damaged eagle camera. The feed returns, everyone watches, and the missing father eagle comes back.

Two episodes in, Anna Pigeon is starting to look like a case-of-the-week series with longer stories running underneath it. Sheila Drury's murder has been solved and we've moved on to the Davies family, while Anna's grief, Molly, Jesse, Stanton and especially Paulson continue from one episode to the next.

And yes, the question I had after Episode 1 is getting harder to ignore: are we really going to have a major crime in this park every week? We're two episodes in and we've already had a murdered ranger, a poaching operation and now an entire family living under false names in the wilderness, complete with a grave, a crossbow and an armed grandmother. Glacier is beautiful, but Anna's workload is getting ridiculous.

Anna heads out to deal with it and instead finds a frantic father and teenage son searching for a missing girl named Mandy. The father introduces himself as Michael White, with his son presented as Mike Jr. Mandy has been gone for more than an hour, and the situation becomes more urgent when Anna learns that she has diabetes.

The search leads to the river, where they find Mandy in the water. She's cold but conscious, and Anna checks her before returning to retrieve the stuffed lion Mandy lost in the river. Mandy is safe, but enough about the family's story bothers Anna that she keeps looking.

Jeremiah Paulson is also hanging around the park. When Anna encounters him, he says he's visiting an old friend. She reminds him that she put his friend in jail, and Paulson responds by taking a shot at Anna, describing her as a down-on-her-luck widow. Anna gives it right back to him, but his continued presence makes it clear their conflict didn't end with Episode 1.

Back at the ranger station, Anna asks for the campsite registration for Michael White. There isn't one.

Zoey checks the eagle-camera footage while Anna calls FBI agent Frederick Stanton. The identities the family gave Anna were false. Stanton identifies them as Amanda Davies, her brother Austin and their father, Jake. The entire Davies family, including their mother, Sarah, disappeared six months earlier after the children's grandmother reported them missing. Stanton also tells Anna that Jake has a criminal record that includes break-and-enters, scrap-metal theft and bar fights.

The eagle footage gives them another piece of the puzzle. Jake was near the camera carrying a crossbow, and he deliberately shot it out.

Anna and the other rangers track the family to a makeshift camp, and this isn't somebody pitching a tent for the weekend. They find children's clothes and evidence that the family has been hunting, foraging and growing food there. There is also a pharmacy receipt for passport photos and Amanda's empty insulin pen.

They also find a grave.

With Sarah still missing and Jake having lied about the family's identity, the rangers have reason to suspect she may be buried there. Anna begins the process of getting permission to excavate it while Jake, elsewhere, is trying to get insulin for Mandy. He doesn't have insurance and comes up $2 short at the pharmacy. When the pharmacist won't give him the medication, Jake takes it and runs, leaving the children behind.

Anna now has Austin and Mandy while their father is on the run. Zoey spends some time with the children and tells them that she lives in ranger housing while her family lives around the park and on the Blackfeet Reservation. When she asks where they have been living, their answer is strange but important: “Where the medicine grows.”

Anna and Stanton disagree about what Jake is going to do next. With passport photos found at the camp and the Canadian border nearby, Stanton believes he may be running. Anna thinks he's coming back for his children.

Her reasoning gets personal. Austin and Mandy remind Anna of herself and Molly, and Anna tells Stanton that when they were children, their parents went out while the sisters were watching Titanic and didn't come back for three years. Anna says Molly essentially became her mother overnight. The Davies children don't behave like children who think their father has abandoned them, she argues. They expect him to return.

Anna's own loss is still part of the episode as well. She has another disturbing dream involving Zach, exactly the sort of thing Molly has been trying to get her to write about in the journal.

Back at the station, the kids begin making bird calls. Anna eventually realizes they aren't just making noise: Jake is communicating with them. A broken window provides a distraction, and Austin and Mandy disappear.

Anna was right about Jake coming back.

The FBI expects him to head toward the border, but Anna believes he'll try to get there on foot. The children's grandmother, Lori Grant, arrives demanding to know where they are, and she isn't willing to stay behind when Anna goes looking for them.

On the drive, Lori fills in the part of the family story Anna has been missing. Sarah had cervical cancer, and Lori says she wasn't getting better when Jake took Sarah and the children away. Sarah left her mother a text saying they were going into the woods. Lori believes Jake thought he could help Sarah with plants and other natural remedies.

That gives Anna more context for Mandy's comment about living “where the medicine grows.” Anna had found goldenseal near the family's camp, one of the plants Jake had been using while Sarah was ill. The episode presents this as part of Jake's attempt to care for Sarah; there is not scientific evidence supporting goldenseal as a cancer treatment.

Anna tells Lori that she believes Sarah died in the park.

Jake, Austin and Mandy are meanwhile making their way through the woods. The children don't want to leave their mother behind, while Jake insists they have to stay together because they're a family. Anna catches up with them and Jake fires a crossbow bolt in her direction. She realizes he has no bolts left and orders him to surrender.

Before she can complete the arrest, Lori arrives with a gun.

Jake insists he didn't kill Sarah. His account is that conventional treatment wasn't saving her and Sarah did not want to die in a hospital; she wanted to spend the end of her life somewhere beautiful. Lori makes clear that her anger isn't only about Sarah's death. Jake took her daughter away, and Lori never had the chance to say goodbye.

Anna manages to get Lori to lower the gun, but Jake still doesn't want to surrender his children. Austin finally forces the issue. Mandy doesn't have her insulin, and the children need more than their father can provide while they're running through the wilderness. Jake gives in, and Anna arrests him.

Afterward, Austin talks about the life the family built in the park, hunting, fishing, foraging and living largely off the land. When he asks what will happen to his mother, Anna tells him Sarah will be laid to rest near their home.

The eagle-camera story has been running alongside the family case throughout the episode. One of the adult eagles disappeared after the camera was shot, prompting worried callers to bombard the ranger station and eventually inspiring a betting pool over whether the father eagle will return.

Anna goes back to Jesse's bar after the case and gives him a small mouse, calling back to their earlier conversation about the eagle bringing its mate one. She also borrows Paulson's insult and warns Jesse that she's a down-on-her-luck widow whose touch doesn't exactly improve things.

Jesse accepts the mouse.

Paulson, meanwhile, has turned his attention to land near the park. He learns that a man and his wife own 10 acres and offers $600,000 cash for it. When the owner says he isn't interested in selling, Paulson makes the nature of his interest considerably clearer: he can pay for the property, or he can get it for free. Whatever Paulson is doing around Glacier now clearly includes an interest in acquiring land.

Anna eventually replaces the damaged eagle camera. The feed returns, everyone watches, and the missing father eagle comes back.

Two episodes in, Anna Pigeon is starting to look like a case-of-the-week series with longer stories running underneath it. Sheila Drury's murder has been solved and we've moved on to the Davies family, while Anna's grief, Molly, Jesse, Stanton and especially Paulson continue from one episode to the next.

And yes, the question I had after Episode 1 is getting harder to ignore: are we really going to have a major crime in this park every week? We're two episodes in and we've already had a murdered ranger, a poaching operation and now an entire family living under false names in the wilderness, complete with a grave, a crossbow and an armed grandmother. Glacier is beautiful, but Anna's workload is getting ridiculous.

---