Snaggle Tooth

by Pamela Fagan Hutchins

  She started knocking. When that didn’t yield immediate results, she pounded on the sidelight window with her palm. She shouted through the glass. “Hello in there. Is anyone home? Emergency. Help. Hello!”

  Still, no answer.

  She tried the doorknob. Everyone in Wyoming left doors unlocked. She could run in and use the phone, even if there was no one home. The owners wouldn’t mind. Wyomingites looked out for each other, like with the little cabins up in the mountains stocked with firewood and water in the winter, in case people needed them.

  The doorknob didn’t give. Of all the bad luck, the new people locked their doors. What were the odds?

  She backed away, looking for a rock or a brick. She’d have to bust out a window. Movement in her side vision caught her attention. The white truck. It was backing out. Barb was on the move again. Whatever she’d been doing in the house, she didn’t plan to wait around to kill Ronnie and Jeff.

  That was good, right? But Susanne hadn’t been able to call the police.

  And now she had to go. She couldn’t let Barb and Will get away. She ran back to the Suburban, threw it in gear, and floored it. The big vehicle bumped down the driveway, on the teetering edge of control, like Susanne herself. In her rearview mirror, Susanne saw the front door to her old house open. A woman of about her age stepped outside, a toddler clutching her leg. She waved. What had taken them so long? Susanne screamed and pounded the steering wheel. She let off the gas, tempted to turn back and make the call.

  Then Barb turned right back onto Airport Road. In seconds, Susanne knew, she would disappear into the gulch. It was possible that even if Susanne hurried, she would lose her. Would let Ronnie and Jeff down. Would never see Will again. Would only be able to tell the cops that Barb was gone.

  She accelerated after Barb, praying she was doing the right thing.

  Chapter Twenty-seven: Hurt

  Upper Little Goose Trail, Cloud Peak Wilderness, Bighorn Mountains, Wyoming

  Friday, August 12, 1977, 5:00 p.m.

  Perry

  As his group rode down the Little Goose Trail, Perry was bringing up the rear. If a starving mountain lion came after them, it would jump from the trees onto his and Duke’s backs. Everybody knew it was always the last one in a line that got eaten. But he didn’t care. He wanted to be there. He could hang back as far as he wanted, away from John. Because Perry wasn’t speaking to his friend. Not anymore. He’d tried to talk to him over and over when they were still up at the cave. He’d told him that he wasn’t mad about his tooth. He’d promised not to tell any of their friends about how things had gone. He’d even asked him about Kelsey, in a last ditch effort. John had acted like he hadn’t heard him, which was impossible since Perry had been standing right beside him the whole time.

  And it wasn’t like John wasn’t talking at all. A few times, Trish had asked John stuff, and John had answered her, like everything was normal. That really hurt Perry’s feelings. Talking to Trish and not him? He hadn’t done anything to John. John was the one who’d kicked Perry’s tooth out and busted his lip, and Perry wasn’t even mad about it. Not that he was happy about it, but he didn’t blame John. Accidents happen, and John had been scared. Perry had done dumb stuff before when he was scared. Like once when he’d been really little and was riding on his dad’s shoulders, a dog had charged at them and Perry had accidentally wet his pants. Except his pants were on his dad’s neck, so it was like he had peed on his dad. It was an accident. His dad hadn’t gotten mad.

  Perry hadn’t been mean to his dad about it like John was being to him. Why was John giving Perry the cold shoulder? That wasn’t what best friends did to each other. So, not another word. Not until John spoke to him first, anyway. Then, Perry would consider it.

  Perry pressed his fingers against his busted lip, very gently. No scab yet. Still oozy. But his gum wasn’t bleeding anymore. The bloody wad of gauze had started to stink, and every time he caught a whiff, he’d gagged. The last thing he needed to do was barf. He’d thrown it away ten minutes before. His mouth was really starting to hurt, though. He wished his dad had given him some more Tylenol for the ride down.

  Mind over matter, his dad would have told him if he were there. But he wasn’t there. He’d left them. And he hadn’t even bothered to act like he was considering Perry’s offer to help rescue the plane crash survivors. He’d just sent Perry away like he was some little boy. I’m no little boy. He was thirteen and a half, nearly a man, and he’d proven himself, hadn’t he? When his mom and his sister would have burned up in Coach Lamkin’s wrecked truck, who had saved them, with no help from anyone?

  He had.

  He straightened his shoulders and ducked away from a tree branch. This trail was a harder ride than Solitude had been from Park Reservoir. The branches were lower, and the path was lots more narrow. He glanced to his left, past the steep drop into a valley, out over a row of low rocky summits along a ridgeline. They looked like ant hills to him. Lots and lots of giant anthills, with no ants. Like some giant anteater had come along and slurped them all up. Bing, bang, boom, no more ants. It was a glum thought. And a glum ride with no talking or singing. He even would have liked to hear his dad singing his dumb songs right now. “Thank God I’m a Country Boy.” Or maybe “Rhinestone Cowboy.” Instead, it was just the thwap, thwap, thwap of wetness falling from the sky.

  “Everyone okay back there?” George called.

  Natch, John wasn’t going to answer George, so Perry did. “Yeah. Good.”

  “Is the pace all right for you?”

  Perry wanted to say it was slower than Christmas, but he knew George was holding back for John’s sake. It didn’t make sense to Perry, though. When they’d gone on rides in town, John had been fine. He’d trotted, loped, even flat out galloped some. But he’d pretty much turned into a big, fat chicken on the mountain.

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” Perry said.

  Although at this pace they would probably still be riding down this trail after dark. Let’s see how much John likes that. Perry wondered if this trip would be the end of their friendship. It would be the last time Perry would invite him up into the mountains, that was for sure. But he hoped they’d still practice ball together. Go to movies. Order an extra-large double cheese, double pepperoni pizza together and eat the whole thing. His eyes started burning, so he forced himself to run through plays in his mind instead.

  Half an hour later, John started whispering something to Trish. Perry had been feeling calmer and less mad. He knew all the wide receiver routes cold, plus the special team trick plays the coaches loved to use him on. But the whispering set him off again. His blood boiled. Was this how it was going to be? If so, John could just be best friends with Trish for all Perry cared.

  She shouted up the line. “George?”

  Like a chain reaction, all the horses stopped as George pulled his up. “Yes, ma’am?”

  “We need a bathroom break.”

  We. Ha. More like John.

  George’s mount backed up and tossed his head. “Okay. Here’s as good as any place, I guess. I’ll hold the horses.”

  Perry stopped Duke beside a big pile of fallen trees that someone had pushed off the trail. The forest service probably. His dad said when he got old enough, he could volunteer to help them clear trails in the spring, because every year more trees fell, during the winter especially. He thought that sounded more like something his dad would like him to do than what Perry would like to do himself. When he was old enough to get a real job, he was going to apply at the A&W so he could have all the root beer floats he wanted.

  He slid off his horse. His legs were like jelly, and it took a second for him to get right with the ground. He walked Duke to George, who had also dismounted, and handed him the reins. Trish brought Goldie and Plug over, too.

  George juggled the four sets of reins. “Probably best if you hurry. Junior is looking at Plug kind of nippy. Anytime there’s a mare around, geldings lose their fool minds.” He smiled at the
horse. “Typical fella.”

  Perry thought about John and Kelsey. And now John and Trish. “Yeah. Typical.” He gave John a slant-eye glare.

  But John had already disappeared into the trees back up the hill a ways. Trish went off in the other direction. She picked a spot across the trail from George, up an incline and behind some rocks. Perry followed the trail about ten yards further than her. He wanted to be as far away as possible from his fair-weather friend. Normally, they would have gone into the woods together, had a contest to see which of them could pee the farthest, maybe snuck up on Trish and pretended to be bears. But no. Not today. Today Perry might as well have come by himself.

  Grumbling, he climbed up the slope in the same direction as Trish, through the stubby, skinny trees, and across pine needles slippery and wet under his cowboy boots, until he found a big enough rock to give him some cover. It was a cool one, covered on one side in green moss and lichen in a bunch of different colors.

  When he’d unzipped his pants, he called out to his sister. “Trish, can you hear me?” He kept his voice low, so that John couldn’t.

  “What?” She sounded irritated, which was normal for her.

  “What’s the matter with you?”

  “You wouldn’t understand.”

  He rolled his eyes. Her love life. It had to be. It always was. It sure wouldn’t be about something important, like what was wrong with John, whether their dad was okay, or whether the people in the plane were all right. Okay, he hadn’t been thinking about his dad or the crash survivors either, but he had an excuse. He was injured. John had weirded out on him. And did Trish even think to ask Perry how he was doing? Nope. With her, it was all Trish, all the time. Well, Trish and her boyfriends. She was so dopey. And now John had gone dopey, too. Again, the image of John mooning over Kelsey popped into his mind. He shook it away and refocused his ire on his crabby sister. The funny thing about her was that she thought no one knew about her secret boyfriend, but Perry did. He’d heard her on the phone, all lovey-dovey with Ben Jones, of all people. The guy who’d helped his dad and uncle kidnap her. Their parents would go ballistic if they found out.

  But had Perry ratted her out? Had he even given her a hard time? No and no.

  Pardon me if I’m not in the mood for this nonsense. “What, you mean about Ben?”

  Her voice was low but screechy. “What do you know about Ben?”

  He admired the waterfall he was creating against the rock. It pooled in a depression, then overflowed and cascaded into the pine needles below. “Oh, come on, Trish, my bedroom is next to yours.”

  She was dead silent for a few seconds. Her voice was nicer when she spoke. Go figure. “You haven’t told, have you?”

  The waterfall slowed to a trickle, then drops, then only a wet patch against the lichen. “Nope. So, you owe me.”

  “Fine.” He could picture her arms crossed over her chest.

  He zipped his pants, grinning. “My choice when and what.”

  “I said fine.”

  Perry imagined all the ways he could call in his favor. Trish had a driver’s license and a truck now. He could make her take him to drag Main Street next Saturday night. Or he could have her do his chores for him when they got home. He could even save it for some time when he needed her to cover for him or—better—take the blame for something he’d done. He sure could have used it when he’d gotten nailed for pulling the fire alarm at school last spring. He grinned. He should ask John. John was really good at coming up with crazy stuff.

  But, no, he couldn’t, because he wasn’t speaking to John.

  He said, “What’s the matter with John, anyway?”

  “How would I know?”

  “He’s acting like he’s mad at me. He won’t say a word to me.”

  Trish sighed. “He’s embarrassed, numb nuts.”

  Perry mulled that over. It was possible, but not a very good excuse, since he was talking to Trish. “That’s no—"

  His words were interrupted by the sound of hoofbeats on the trail. Loud, fast, and a little out of control.

  Then they stopped. Perry frowned.

  “Well, well, if it isn’t Mr. Nichols. How’s that appendicitis?” The voice was male, accented, and mean. Really mean. Perry recognized that voice—the man George had left up in the mountains. The one looking for the three guys. And he had those two other muscle men with him. Not good. “You musta thought we were pretty stupid, Mr. Nichols.”

  Perry wanted to whisper to Trish to stay down, but he knew she would. Trish was smart. And she’d been around bad guys before. But John! John was all the way up the trail, far from Perry and Trish, and he was not himself. Perry might be mad at him, but John had been his friend a long time.

  Perry squeezed his eyes shut tight. Maybe the men would just ride on.

  Chapter Twenty-eight: Discover

  Highland Park, Cloud Peak Wilderness, Bighorn Mountains, Wyoming

  Friday, August 12, 1977, 5:00 p.m.

  Patrick

  Patrick led Reno and The Lunker toward the ring of peaks behind Highland Park, following Eddie. Patrick had never had any training or experience in tracking, unless you counted one desperate night the year before when he’d been searching for Trish between Walker Prairie and Dome Mountain. He’d been successful, but lucky. Now, Eddie was creeping low to the ground with his face to the earth, occasionally stooping to sniff like a bloodhound. To Patrick’s surprise, Eddie moved swiftly, traversing bogs, skirting ponds and rocks, and, ultimately, forty-five minutes later, bee-lining off to the far side of the park and up into a fringe of stunted trees.

  There, Eddie dropped cross-legged in the wet grass, hurt arm cradled in the other. Patrick was ten yards behind him, having stopped the horses to drink from a pond. He took a swig of water from his canteen then handed it to Eddie. It was nearly empty, although he had one more in a saddle bag. They needed more water for the other men. One of them would have to find a fresh-running stream and purify some more, after they located the plane.

  “I need a rest, man. We’re close,” Eddie said, screwing the top back on the canteen and handing it to Patrick.

  “I thought you didn’t remember where it was.”

  “I don’t, precisely, man, but I have a general feel. I know I’ve followed my trail back. Where I couldn’t find my prints, I could smell fuel. I got some on me in the crash.”

  Patrick sniffed and detected a faint kerosene scent. The man was right. He’d been splashed with aviation fuel. It had been pounded by precipitation and was dissipating quickly in the open air, so he hadn’t noticed it before.

  “The indentations from my feet were pretty good in a few places, despite the storm. And I know when I left the plane that I came across some rocks, through some trees, and ended up here with a pond in front of me. This is the place.”

  Patrick rubbed his chin. “How high up in the rocks is it, do you think?”

  “I was pretty delirious. I’m not sure. But it felt like a long way.”

  “I can’t believe you survived.”

  Eddie looked off across the park. “Me either, man. The climb down those rocks or the crash.”

  “What do you remember about it?”

  “The pilot was trying to put the plane down in the park. So, we were gliding low. It was just too cloudy for him to see anything. Then this horn noise went off before we crashed.”

  The stall warning, letting pilots know to push the nose of the plane down before speed reduces anymore or risk falling from the sky like a rock. Patrick pictured flying past this area with Trish a few days before. He imagined what it would have been like to fly blind over the mountains with the warning horn going off, knowing he’d lost lift and was going down at the base of Black Tooth Mountain. He shuddered.

  “What are you saying, man?”

  “Huh?”

  “Your lips were moving like you were talking, but I couldn’t hear you.”

  “Oh. Talking to myself. I flew past here on my way to Dubois on Th
ursday with my daughter. I was just thinking about what a crash like that would have been like.”

  Eddie frowned. “Yesterday?”

  This time Patrick felt his lips move as he pieced together the timeline. Had it only been the day before? So much had happened that the intervening twenty-four hours felt like a week. “I guess so.”

  “Dubois?”

  “Yes. I met your sister there, actually.”

  This time Eddie paled. “Constance was at the airport in Dubois yesterday?”

  “To pick up an x-ray machine the Buffalo hospital donated to the clinic in Fort Washakie.” Patrick looked hard at Eddie. “What’s wrong?”

  “I, uh, I just haven’t talked to her in a while. She’s always with Dann. Getting ready for their wedding.”

  Part of Patrick wanted to wrap up the conversation, but the larger part of him was on high alert, his sensors nearly humming with the weird vibe Eddie was giving off. “She told me about that. Actually, we had some excitement there. There was a guy in the middle of the runway, dead as a doornail. I nearly hit him on my landing. A cousin of Elvin’s, Constance thought.”

  Eddie crawled to his feet, eyes averted from Patrick’s. “That’s a bummer.”

  Patrick’s ears started ringing. Eddie hadn’t even asked who it was. A cousin of Elvin’s might be a friend of Eddie’s. And hadn’t Constance thought it was possible that Jimmy Beartusk worked with Elvin and Eddie? Either Eddie wasn’t curious, or he already knew the man was dead. That was possible, since Beartusk had reservation connections, and news traveled like wildfire there. But not to even remark on it? Very odd.

  Before he could push the issue, Eddie said, “Let’s get moving. The sooner we get there, the sooner I can get some real rest.” So, does he expect that I’ll do all the work of rescuing his friends by myself? Eddie turned and pointed through some trees. “Broken branches. I came this way. But it’s going to be tough going from here for the horses.”