DID YOU KNOW

that in the old logging camps of the North Woods, workers tell stories about a creature called the Hidebehind? It's a forest predator said to stalk men by slipping behind the nearest tree every time they turned to look. Early accounts describe it using forest sounds to lure people off the trail with a single crack, a faint creak, or the echo of something heavy falling deeper in the timber line.

Loggers claimed the Hidebehind favored birch stands, where the pale bark made it easier for the creature to blend in. Some men reported finding fresh gouges in the trunks after hearing the sounds, as if something had been watching them from just out of sight.

The tale usually starts the same way. A lumberjack is alone in the woods, or he wanders off from the crew. He gets that feeling that something’s following. He catches movement in the corner of his eye. He hears noises behind him. But every time he whips around to look, there’s nothing there. That’s because the Hidebehind is good at it. It moves in perfect sync with its victims, always staying just out of sight. Some say it’s faster than you can turn your head.

Early accounts call it a large, powerful animal, even though nobody could ever see it clearly. What's the way it pulls off the trick? Folklore says it sucks in its stomach until it’s so slender it can hide behind the trunk of any tree. You look, and it’s gone.

What happens if it gets you:

Most stories end one of two ways. Either the lumberjack disappears completely, and all they find are his tools, or he stumbles back to camp half out of his mind, telling about how it stalked him. Some versions say it waits until a man is totally alone before it attacks. Others say it’ll shadow you for hours, even days, feeding off fear first.

It’s not pretty. Old yarns claim the Hidebehind subsists chiefly on the intestines of its victim. One modern telling even says it rips them out.

Have you ever heard of the Hidebehind before?