by Linda Mackay
I’d lost all track of time.
I knew we were moving forward. With each step of the horses my focus point moved too. My mind changed from alert to alarmed. The men heard us. I put my left arm out like I was stiffening up.
“Jorie needs to stretch.” Mac took my cue. “Everyone walk for a few minutes.”
As we all dismounted to the right, I felt confusion in my head. The two men were startled by all of us moving off the horses away from them. I hoped I wasn’t wrong and one of the men had moved across the trail making us easy targets. I also hoped I wasn’t imagining everything. I didn’t know which was worse, being right or being wrong.
The first shot came from behind the rocks.
Mac and Frank disappeared into the trees while the rest of us held onto the frightened horses and tried to side step them into the trees. A man ran out of the trees onto the trail followed by a cow elk. The man raised his gun. Amanda let go a slingshot. It caught him in the chest, but only momentarily stopped him.
I was keeping hold of Arikira’s right flank so she didn’t step on me and felt my crampons in the saddlebag. I popped the snap and hurled the crampons at the man. They hit him on the cheek. He dropped the gun and grabbed his face, which was now oozing blood. Todd ran forward and fired his gun. I took the lariat off my saddle, threw it over the dude on the ground, and pulled it tight. Amanda fired her bear spray in his face.
“Holy shit. I meant to stun him first.” Todd dropped his pistol, pulled out the stun gun and pulled the trigger.
“Hold on!” Mac said coming out of the trees and taking the stun gun from Todd. “That would be overkill.”
“Guess I got a little excited. I meant to stun him first so it wouldn’t hurt so much when I shot him.”
“That’s some strange reasoning there, son.” Frank looked at the man on the ground. “Looks like a government spook to me.”
“I agree.” Mac said picking up the crampons. “What the hell?”
“Those would be mine.”
“I hit him first.” Amanda held up her slingshot. “Then I got him with the bear spray.”
Mac looked at the three of us and unhooked the rope from our victim. “Whose rope is this?”
“That would also be mine,” I said. “I didn’t want him to get away.”
“The dude is dead!” Mac threw the lariat at me.
“I didn’t know that.”
“Only one problem, I think you used the rope on the wrong person. You seem to have lost your prisoner.”
“That would be my fault.” Dad said from behind the trees. “Horse stepped on my foot and I dropped Blue’s reins.”
“Dad, you okay.”
“I’ll be fine. Go find Blue and Marty.”
“Frank stay with Joe,” Mac said. “The rest of you heroes follow me.”
We mounted up. I borrowed Frank’s horse and started down the trail calling Blue. We rode for almost a mile before Amanda saw Blue off the trail.
“Everyone wait here.” I said dismounting Junior. “Let me calm Blue.”
I lowered my right shoulder and walked slowly toward her. She stomped her hooves and her eyes were wide and wild. Marty was slumped forward over the saddle. She turned sideways and I saw the blood running down her stomach. “It’s okay girl, I’ll get him off you and you’ll be fine.”
I loved this old horse. Blue took my directions without complaint; she didn’t need to be told twice. I pulled out my knife and cut Marty’s restraints off. He fell from the horse taking me with him. Mac was there instantly, pulled Marty off me, and laid him on the ground.
“They hit him with the first shot?” I asked.
“They took out their biggest liability.”
Marty groaned, “Jorie?”
“Yeah, Marty.”
“My son.” His bloody hand reached for mine.
“What about your son?”
“For him.”
“Do what for him?” I ran my hand across his cheek.
“All this for him. Don’t let them take it away.”
“I won’t.”
“Jorie?”
“Marty, I’ll take care of your family. We all will.”
His eyes closed. He was gone. I looked at Mac. “What the hell was he talking about?”
“His reason.”
Chapter 22
Sit still old man.” Todd told Dad as he splinted his foot.
“I can still kick your butt with my good foot.”
“You couldn’t kick my butt with two good feet.” Todd helped Dad stand up. “How does that feel?”
“It’ll do, son.”
“Thanks, Pop.” Todd reached in his pocket and pulled out a pill. “Take this, you’re gonna need it riding.”
“Give me some whiskey to wash it down with.”
“No way, that pill is powerful enough.”
“Snot-nosed kids don’t know anything.” Dad mumbled sitting back down.
Todd jogged over to Amanda and I who were keeping watch while Frank and Mac made a quick circuit to see if they could find the other guy. Mac had wounded him, but he took off in the excitement of the elk running through the woods. They’d followed a blood trail till it ended. Mac assumed the guy covered his bleeding wound long enough to confuse them at the direction he took. Soon as we returned, I changed out of my bloody clothes. I wanted to throw the clothes away, but with only two pair of pants I couldn’t afford to abandon them until we reached home. I rinsed the blood out in Atlantic Creek sending a part of Marty on a final journey through the land he loved and onto the Atlantic Ocean.
“Are we really going to leave Marty?” Todd asked.
“We buried him best we could with the small camp shovel,” I said. “Transporting him out will only attract animals.”
“Ending up dinner for a griz isn’t on my bucket list,” Amanda said. “What’s your deal anyway, Todd?”
“Seems his family would prefer it.”
“It's the code of Mt. Everest.” Amanda threw a pebble at him. “You leave them where they die.”
“Todd, we also covered him with rocks and logs. If his family wants to retrieve the body they can. But Mac believes the guys who shot him will be back to retrieve the body as part of their cover-up.”
“If something doesn’t dig him up first.”
“If you want, put him on your horse and take him back to Hawk’s Rest. But, I’d cross your fingers no one at the patrol cabin finishes you off,” Amanda said.
Finishes him off? Amanda was starting to sound like Mac.
“Mac and I took his personal possessions to send to the family.” I had no clue why this was eating at Todd, but the whole bunch was one step from going Loony Tunes. “What’s the verdict on Dad’s foot?”
“Pretty sure he has a few broken bones on the top of his foot.”
“Mac’s decided we’re taking the Buffalo Fork River Trail instead of Enos Lake. We can drop Dad at Turpin Meadow Ranch or take him on to Blackrock Station and he can be flown out from there.” I opened a bag of fruit snacks. “I’ll be glad to get home and eat real fruit.”
“I’m not stopping at Turpin,” Dad said. “We’re not alerting anyone we don’t need to.”
“Then Blackrock it is.”
The horses’ heads perked up as Mac and Frank approached. “Incoming!” Frank said so no one reacted with a stun gun or slingshot.
“No one out there,” Mac said. “He’ll need to regroup and hopefully he heard me say we were going to Enos Lake.”
“What are we doing with the dude Todd killed?” Amanda said.
“Leave him where we dragged him. He isn’t carrying any identification, and I’m not going to be undertaker for these assholes. And we don’t have any extra rope left to hang the bodies in the trees.”
“I don’t think the Park Service will be happy we’re leaving a trail of bodies for the animals.” Amanda scrunched her nose and tightened her bandana against the marauding mosquitos. “Wow! That’s a sentence I never thought I’d s
ay.”
“More important we get out of here with our information.” Mac put his duster on which no longer looked liked he just walked out of the Outdoor Store.
“I imagine the bodies will be removed before the animals arrive,” Frank said. “I think we need to get out of here.”
“Screw the Park Service.” The thunder popped overhead and Todd snapped up his rain duster. “I look forward to telling them so to their face.”
“Good luck getting a permit or a paycheck if you do,” I said.“ This all sucks. I’m with Frank, let’s get out of here.”
“Bring ‘em on.” Todd waved his stun gun in the air.
Everyone quickly mounted up and ignored Todd. I was now riding Arikira solo, which should make every sore muscle and joint in my body much happier. Mac and Frank helped Dad on Alfalfa and we moved out. The terrain allowed us to ride at a reasonable pace. Frank wanted to camp at the Buffalo Fork River so Dad could soak his foot in the cold water.
As much as we all wanted to get home, we weren’t going to push the horses any harder. Two days riding over twenty miles on mountainous trails was hard on everyone. We were still two days from home and couldn’t afford to ask more of them. Tomorrow we’d ride to Blackrock Ranger Station where Mac could call his friend. We’d also pack up the samples we collected and send them. Courier companies serviced the station regularly, so requesting a package pick-up was not unusual.
Lightning cracked to my left hitting a dead lodgepole pine. The hair on my arms stood on end and the electricity in the air made me shiver. “To close. We need to hunker down.”
“Fire!” Amanda jumped off Blue and ran toward the burning underbrush. “Don’t care if the park wants natural caused fires left to burn. I’m not being chased and killed by a forest fire after all we’ve been through.”
The flames spread quickly. This was not a fire that was going to burn itself out quickly. Everyone except Dad dismounted and worked to stop the blaze.
Mac was stomping on embers that were jumping from the main fire. “Frank, get Joe to safety.” Lightning and thunder popped all around us in a constant battle with each other. Rain started and fell so hard that even in the cover of trees we had no respite.
“At least the Rain Gods are helping us.” Todd said leaning into my good ear so I’d hear him over the noise.
Todd was using his emergency shovel to stir the dirt and put out the ground fire. Luckily for us the blaze started at ground level or we wouldn’t be able to stop its spread through the canopy. I grabbed the other shovel out of the pack and joined Todd.
With the fire contained, we moved to the rocks where Dad was sitting and watched to be sure the last of the flames didn’t jump our fire line. The worst of the storm moved north but a steady rain was going to hang around for a while.
“Can’t wait this out.” Frank helped Dad stand as the rest of us gathered the horses and mounted up.
It was going to be a long afternoon.
The constant rain slowed us, not allowing us to make the river before night. Dad was doing his best to ride with the broken foot. It was obvious the pain wasn’t going to allow him to sit a horse much longer. Frank found a good stopping point near a seasonal stream where Dad could soak his foot. We needed to get him to a hospital soon, but he was still refusing to be helivaced out at Turpin Meadows. By the time we arrived he may not have a choice.
Camp was set up and Mac allowed us to have a roaring fire. Todd was planning a gourmet dinner, mountain style. I was wet and cold and reached for the whiskey. Science may say booze doesn’t actually warm you up, but science is of no interest to a cold cowboy.
“Thank goodness we’ll be home soon as we’re about out of medicine.” Frank took a swig from the bottle.
“I’ll bet we can top off at Blackrock for the right price,” Todd said. “At least the rain and wind ran off the mosquitos.”
“It can rain all the way home, cause I’m freaking sick of them.” I scratched my cheek.
“Stop that!” Amanda swatted my hand. “You’re going to have a face full of sores if you don’t quit scratching.”
Mac finished unsaddling the horses and covered the tack with a tarp. “I think that elk took one look at Jorie’s calamine covered face and was so scared by the weird creature that she bolted.”
“My face isn’t that bad!”
“Don’t look in a mirror.” Todd fed extra wood on the fire to keep it going in the rain. “You could scare a buzzard off a shit wagon.”
I stuck my tongue out at him. I may be a genius but that has nothing to do with my maturity level.
“What the hell are you doing?” With arms held wide open, Mac was staring at Amanda.
“I’m redoing my make-up. I wasn’t wearing waterproof.”
“We’re not going to a party.”
“Doesn’t mean a girl can’t look pretty.”
“Hey Special Forces,” I laughed. “You’re not going to win this one.”
Mac walked away toward the stream where Dad was soaking his foot. “You people are freaking crazy!”
I found it hard to disagree with him.
“You’d think by now, he’d be accustom to the Princess.” Todd was making spaghetti with freeze-dried buffalo ground meat. I could already smell the amazing spices rising from the pot as he stirred. The rain should keep away interested bears and mountain lions. I was so hungry I was willing to fight them for my dinner.
“I’m not looking for edible mushrooms to add to the sauce,” Amanda said. “This rain is making me crazy.”
“We’ll be fine without them,” Todd said.
“I was looking forward to fresh mushrooms,” Frank said.
“Then you can look for them,” Amanda said packing away her make-up.
Todd held his hand up in a stop motion. “Not allowed after the cowboy scoots incident of 2010.”
“Do not let Frank near mushrooms! I was on that cattle drive and the only movement for two days had nothing to do with cattle and everything to do with finding an available tree to squat behind. We were lucky to only have diarrhea,” I said. People die from eating the wrong mushrooms. With everything Cowboy Frank knew about this country, finding edible plants didn’t make the list. He could survive being lost in a blizzard, attacks by bears, and breaking through ice into the river in the spring. But if he lost all the food he was carrying, he’d be dead in a day. Even Frank had his Achilles Heel.
“Bring me tomato paste, Princess.”
“Don’t call me Princess. And get it yourself.”
“You’re standing right next to the pack.”
Amanda walked away from the pack. “No I’m not.”
“You’re right, you aren’t a Princess…you’re a bitch.”
“You didn’t say please.”
“Please, bitch, get the tomato paste.”
“Enough! You two give me a headache.” I got the tomato paste out of the pack and handed it to Todd. “When we get home, I’m sending Amanda back to town. You both need a timeout.”
“Don’t do it boss,” Todd said. “We only get to hang out half the year.”
“We’ll be good.”
“Not possible.”
“Maybe not, but we really love each other.” Amanda hugged Todd who was squatted stirring the sauce. They fell over, taking the sauce with them. They both laughed. My dinner was on the ground and they’re laughing.
“Hey, that better not be dinner,” Frank said.
“Don’t worry, I hadn’t added the meat yet.” Todd picked the pot up. “I can make more sauce.”
Frank walked by me. “Gonna need a vacation from them when we get home.”
“I need more than a vacation.”
“I got a solution.” Frank winked at me. “I’ll put them to work rebuilding fence. Let ‘em work out that energy.”
“Thanks, Frank.” He always knows when I’m about to push them both off a cliff. “How about putting Grampa Nus in charge of watching them.”
“Nice touch, girl,
nice touch.”
“Someone mention Gramps and work in the same sentence?” Dad asked as Mac helped him to a spot under the tarp we’d hung between trees to keep the rain off us.
“Supervisory role only,” I said.
Dad looked at Mac. “Someone is being punished.”
“I don’t understand. Old guy seems fine to me.” Every eye in camp turned toward Mac. “What?”
I took pity on Special Forces. “Gramps has spent his whole life avoiding real work. The only thing worse than trying to get him to work is letting him supervise someone else’s.”
Amanda crawled under the tarp with Dad. “I saw him throw a cowpie at a cowboy who was fixing the roof of his cabin. Said guy was working too slow and making too much noise. He actually made him hammer quieter.”
“Lucky for that dude, Gramps didn’t have the aim, since he certainly had the distance,” Todd said.
Frank tied off another tarp to give us more room. “He was lucky one of my best wranglers didn’t quit, or old man would’ve found himself in a cowpie.”
Thunder rumbled from the south. “Another damn storm coming. I’d say hour or two tops. Better get that spaghetti ready fast Todd,” Dad said.
“I plan to be nice and warm in my sleeping bag before the next deluge.” Amanda said chewing a fingernail.
“Need a mani…” Todd never got the rest of his sentence out. The ground moved under us without warning. Wave after wave the ground rolled. Two of the tents collapsed. The horses were desperate to find open ground, but we were too heavily forested for them to find solace. Chimayo was leaning against two trees like she was trying to figure out how to wrap her front legs around the tree to hold on. The other horses spread their legs wide and held on for the ride.
The ground stopped rolling and finished her tirade with a huge thud that bounced me off the ground and then dropped my butt back to earth. Somewhere the land had deformed, one side dropping at least several inches as the opposite side rose several. “That was a big aftershock.”
“Assuming it came from the site of the original quake it was probably somewhere in the ballpark of 6.3,” Dad said.
“Bet there’s a nice scarp for us to find later this summer.” Todd said holding the pot with the sauce and smiling. “I didn’t spill a drop.”
