by Sharon Dunn
“I wish I could trust more easily,” Nathan said. His thoughts turned to his brother. Daniel’s past history of gambling meant he was a bad financial risk as a business partner. It just seemed easier to sell the mountain property than to go through the heartache and humiliation of losing it to pay off debt if his brother returned to his old habits. Still, there was a part of him that wanted to believe that his brother had changed after his last time in rehab.
Merci stared at the ground as she walked. “Taking people at face value just means I get burned a lot.”
“I guess,” Nathan said, his voice becoming distant. His issue with Daniel wouldn’t matter at all if they didn’t get off this mountain alive.
The sky over them darkened to a deeper gray. Nathan watched the path in front of them. A dark lump lay in clearing up ahead. He put his hand up to stop her.
“What is it?” she whispered.
Now he could discern what the lump was. “Fresh kill. Stay here.” He moved in quickly. The fawn was still warm. Maybe their voices had frightened the predator away. In any case, he’d be back quick enough. He pulled his pocketknife out and cut from the back flank where the muscle was exposed. He packed snow around the meat and placed it in the kangaroo pocket of his ski jacket.
Merci had stepped closer. She let out a sad cry when she saw the dead fawn. He paced toward her and grabbed her hand. “Come on, we got to go.”
“Why?”
“Because whatever killed this has got to be close by, and they aren’t going to be very happy that we stole some of their dinner.”
He broke out into a trot and she followed. “I thought the bears were asleep this time of year.”
“The wolves and the bobcats aren’t,” he said picking up the pace.
By now they were moving at a run, slowed down only by the drifts of deep snow. He pushed hard for at least an hour. When they stopped, the sky was black.
“We can build a fire here, cook this meat and melt some snow to drink. Look around for some dry wood.” A tall order considering the amount of snow that had fallen. “Sometimes branches that are covered by other deadfall aren’t too bad.”
She hesitated, moving only a few feet away from him. “Do you think whatever killed that fawn is still out there?”
Nathan looked around as he cleared a dry spot under a tree for the fire. “We would have heard or seen the wolves by now.” She was afraid, but he couldn’t lie to her about the level of danger. “Bobcats are quieter. Sometimes they stalk their prey for miles.”
“Have we become the prey?” Her voice faltered when she asked the question.
“Tell you what, why don’t we just look for that wood together.” They foraged for about twenty minutes. Dead branches on standing trees proved to be the best source of fuel. Nathan gathered twigs for kindling.
As he struck a match, he said, “We’ve got to keep it small and let it burn out quickly so they don’t find us.”
Nathan filled the tin can with snow and positioned it close to the flames. As the fire began to die, he placed the meat on a makeshift grill he’d fashioned from willow sticks.
They passed the can of melted water back and forth. Nathan jabbed at the meat with a sharpened willow stick. He cut it in half. “It’s kind of black, but it will fill the hole in your belly.”
“Bon appétit.” Her cheerfulness sounded forced. After she had taken several bites, she said, “This tastes better than a lot of restaurant food I’ve had.”
“That’s just because you’re starving,” he said.
“This is pretty gourmet,” she joked. “Maybe you should think about getting your own cooking show.”
“Or at least write a cookbook.” He played along, grateful for any humorous relief they could find. Merci’s
ability to find something positive or funny in the worst situation never ceased to amaze him.
She laughed. A branch broke somewhere in the forest. Her head shot up as she swallowed her laughter.
Nathan spoke in a low, solemn voice. “Maybe we should think about covering this fire up and getting out of here.” It didn’t matter if it was the bobcat or the thieves. They needed to move pronto.
As they piled snow on the fledging fire, he listened to the forest for more signs that they weren’t alone, but didn’t hear anything. By the time they got moving, the sky was pitch black with only a few twinkling stars. The flashlight had been in the backpacks. Any torch they could have fastened from the fire wouldn’t have lasted long without fuel to keep it burning.
Darkness slowed their pace.
Merci came up beside him. “How much farther do we have to go?”
He didn’t see any familiar landmarks in the darkness. “Let’s just keep going.” He hadn’t lost confidence that they would get to the ski hill. They were headed in the right direction. Their escape from the thieves had been a little erratic, and they’d gotten off course. He just couldn’t be sure how far away they were.
Night chill set in as the temperature dropped. The knife wound started to hurt again, sending radiating pain down his arm.
Merci stopped and leaned against a tree. She looked up at the sky. “I wonder what time it is?”
“Seven…or eight o’clock.” The temperature had dropped, too. Spending the night out here was out of the question. If they stopped to sleep, they would freeze.
“Hey, what’s that?” She pointed up at the sky back toward where they had come from.
He tilted his head, studying each twinkling star and then noticed that one of the stars was moving. He stared in stunned amazement. “It’s a helicopter.”
Merci clapped her hands together. “That’s good news. That’s means they are looking for us.”
His deputy friend, Travis Miller, must have become concerned when he didn’t show up at the station. Maybe his brother, Daniel, had even said something. Nathan shook his head. “The problem is they are looking over by the cabin. I don’t know if they will extend the search to this side of the mountain.”
* * *
Merci felt hope slip away like air out of a deflating balloon. Nathan hadn’t said anything, but something in the way he talked indicated that they were off track in getting to the ski hill. And now the searchers weren’t even looking in the right place.
“I’m surprised they are out looking this late at night. They probably had a lot to deal with closer to town because of the storm,” said Nathan.
The tone in Nathan’s voice sounded pessimistic. Had he given up hope?
“There must be some way we can signal them.” She couldn’t hide her desperation. They had to try something. This might be their only chance for rescue.
“A big X made out of logs in an open area is the standard distress signal, but they would only see that in daylight.”
“And we will be at the ski hill by then, right?”
Nathan didn’t answer. He turned and trudged forward through the snow. Merci scrambled to find some morsel of optimism. The night chill had grown worse, and she could feel the cold getting under her skin. The moonlight only allowed her to see a few feet in front of her.
After a while Nathan craned his neck and then said, “I don’t know how soon they’ll decide to look for us on this side of the mountain. Days, maybe.”
Merci scrambled to keep up with Nathan as he increased his pace. When she looked behind her, she could no longer see the flashing lights of the helicopter. Had it landed or headed back to town? “If they do come this way, we can build a fire. They can see that at night.”
“A town the size of Clampett has limited resources, and they are probably overextended already with all the problems the storm caused.” Nathan’s voice filled with despair.
“You must know someone in town. They would report you missing…they would put pressure on the authorities. I know my aunt Celeste is probably frantic by now. She’s probably called everyone but the president.”
“My brother…maybe,” Nathan said.
“Your brother lives in Clamp
ett. That’s something.”
He stopped. “Merci, you have to stop. You’re grasping at straws. No one is coming for us. We have to get ourselves out of here and…” He placed his hands on his hips and turned from side to side. “And right now, I don’t know if I can do that.”
“I’m not grasping at straws, Nathan. I know a little bit about survival. I know the thing that will kill us faster than not having food or shelter is losing hope. We can’t give up, Nathan.”
Nathan took a step back. He hesitated in answering as though he were stunned by the forcefulness of her speech. “I guess I owe you an apology. I let doubt creep in. That’ll kill us faster than a bobcat or a snowstorm.”
Aware that she had taken Nathan aback, she softened her tone. “I’m not Pollyanna. I know we’ll die out here if we don’t find some shelter soon. It looks bleak right now, but that is what faith is about. Like it says in Hebrews, faith is holding on to hope even if everything around you says otherwise.”
She couldn’t read Nathan’s expression in the darkness. He spoke in a quiet voice. “I guess you’re right.” He turned and studied the landscape. “I guess we better keep walking toward what we can’t see.”
As they walked, her mind went through a catalogue of possibilities for how they could get back on track. “I don’t suppose there would be any lights on at the resort?”
He replied. “I don’t think so.”
The sound of their feet pressing into the snow was the only thing she could hear for what seemed like an hour. The wind picked up, and the chill intensified. Her eyes watered. Unable to see much else, she focused on watching Nathan’s back as he walked several feet in front of her. The darkness held a foreboding she didn’t want to think about.
Nathan stopped abruptly. “The chairlift, we should be able to see the chairlift in the moonlight.”
His voice broke the rhythm of their footfall in such a dramatic way that it startled her. “What?”
He spoke over his shoulder. “It’s not a big resort. There is one chair lift and two ski runs. But if we can get to a clear open spot, we might be able to see the chairlift ’cause it’s up high.”
So that was what he had been doing this whole time, trying to come up with a way to find the resort.
“Glad to see you haven’t lost hope.” Her voice held a note of teasing.
“Guess I needed to hear about how important hope is,” he said.
As the trees thinned, she studied the night sky hoping to see some signs of the wires and chairs. No clouds covered the twinkling stars or the half moon.
Merci shivered, and she could feel herself nodding off as they walked. She swayed to one side. It had been almost a full day since she had slept back at the cabin.
“Whoa, you okay?” Nathan grabbed her coat at the elbow.
Her limbs felt as if they were made of lead. “I’m getting really tired. Can’t we just stop for a moment?”
“It’s better if we keep moving.”
“I know, but if I could just rest for twenty minutes.” She was having a hard time keeping her eyes open.
Nathan nodded. “I’ll stay awake. If both of us fall asleep, we could freeze to death.” He led her to a large tree.
She sat down and scooted close to his uninjured side. “Now after all that fuss, I hope I can fall asleep.” He wrapped his arms around her, and she rested against his flannel shirt where he had unzipped his coat. She fell asleep to the sound of his heart beating in her ear….
She awoke when Nathan shook her. “Merci, wake up.” His voice sounded frantic.
She was still foggy headed. “What is it?”
“It’s the helicopter. I saw the lights. It’s coming back this way.”
ELEVEN
Nathan burst to his feet and raced uphill. He could hear Merci’s footsteps as she followed behind him. It had just been a momentary flash. Two distinctive blinking lights against the night sky and then they were gone.
They ran nearly to the top of hill. His legs ached from the effort of treading through deep snow. They both stopped, doubled over from the exertion.
“Where…was… it?” Merci scanned the sky.
Nathan pointed. “He might have dipped back behind that peak over there.”
“It doesn’t matter. The point is they are here on this side of the mountain. They are looking for us.”
“There has to be a way for us to get the pilot’s attention.” He tugged on her sleeve then they made their way up the rest of the hill.
“I see it.” Merci jumped up and down, her voice filled with excitement. “Over there, he’s coming back this way.”
Nathan waited for his breathing to even out. “Quick, find wood for a fire. They might still see us.”
Merci disappeared into the darkness of the forest.
Nathan kneeled down and frantically cleared away snow in an effort to create a dry spot. Merci returned a moment later with an armful of dried branches of various sizes.
“We need something for kindling,” Nathan said.
“I can go find some little twigs,” Merci said.
Nathan looked up. The flashing lights were distant but appeared to be moving toward them. They had to make this work. “No time, we’ve got to get this started right away and build it as fast as we can. Find what you can close by, anything that might burn.”
He slit open his coat and pulled out a handful of down. He gathered some of the thinner twigs Merci had brought. His hand was shaking as he struck the match. He leaned in and blew gently on the embers. A golden edge rimmed some of the kindling. He held his breath. The ember burned out, and the down feathers curled in on themselves.
Again, he glanced up to get a bearing on where the helicopter was. It was still moving this way. He stuffed more kindling into the triangular structure he had made with the wood and pulled another match out of the box.
Merci came and sat down beside him. “We need something that catches fire fast.”
Nathan nodded. “Yeah, paper or something.”
Merci searched her pockets and retrieved several receipts. She bunched them up into a ball. “This will work.”
The clacking of the helicopter engine and the whir of the blades broke through the darkness.
Nathan struck the match and an orange flame sparked to life. “It has to work.”
His bare hands were cold and stiff from exposure. He struggled to hold the match steady.
“Give me a box of matches, too, it’ll go faster.” She held out her hand.
He caught that look in her eyes, that desperation. He felt it, too. Everything depended on getting this fire going.
He handed her one of the boxes of matches.
She struck the match and pushed it toward the kindling. The small flames burned the paper and ate up the twigs around it. Careful not to quench the fledgling flames, they added more twigs and then the bigger pieces of wood.
The noise of the helicopter had grown louder and the lights brighter. Merci placed a larger log on the crackling fire.
The mechanical hum of the helicopter seemed to engulf the forest as it drew near. Merci jumped up and waved her arms. “We’re here. We’re here.”
The helicopter spun around and wobbled, but drew nearer. Nathan waved his arms and yelled, as well, when the helicopter got lower to the ground. Hope burst through him like a flower opening to the sun. They’d been spotted.
The helicopter listed to one side. Was the pilot having trouble or was something wrong mechanically? The helicopter created its own whirlpool of wind as it drew closer and lower to the ground.
Merci wrapped her arm through Nathan’s. “We’re going home.”
The helicopter hovered above them at a diagonal. A moment before he heard the gunfire, Nathan recognized one of the thieves as he leaned out of the open doors of the chopper.
Merci released an odd gulping sound that told him she had registered the threat, as well.
“Run.” He draped a protective arm over Merci as they dove for the
trees.
The pistol shot went wild, but was followed by three more as the chopper stalked them. They were a hundred yards from the trees. Three more shots were fired. Two of them stirred up snow around their feet. The noise of the helicopter engine surrounded them.
The forest loomed thirty yards in front of them. When he looked behind him, the helicopter was slanted even more to one side and losing altitude. They reached the edge of the forest as the helicopter soft-crashed into the snow. At least the thieves wouldn’t be chasing them with the chopper anymore.
Again they ran through forest, slamming against the branches and debris when it was too dark to see. Nathan led Merci through the darkness until they had gone a long time without hearing any signs that their pursuers were close.
Their pace slowed as they struggled to catch their breath. His hands had grown cold. In their haste to escape, they’d left their gloves back by the fire.
“What was that about?”
“They must have hijacked the search helicopter. Either they tossed the pilot out and were manning it themselves or the pilot was injured and couldn’t keep it in the air.” Whether he was killed right away or later, chances were the pilot wouldn’t make it. Hawthorne had said he didn’t want anyone to connect him to all of this. Everything he had done revealed he was serious about that threat.
“There might be a radio in the helicopter.” Merci shoved her bare hands in her pockets.
“I thought of that. It’s just too dangerous to go back now. They might be waiting for us to do that. And what if they disabled the radio?”
“You mean because they want to make sure we don’t get off this mountain.” Merci’s voice wavered.
He wanted to reassure her, but they needed to be cautious. “Maybe in the morning we can circle back around and see if the radio works.”
She slammed her back against a tree and let out a huff of air. “You mean if we make it until morning.”
“That’s not what I meant.” He could hear the frustration in her voice as he walked toward her. “What did you say about hope?”
“All of this has been too much,” she sputtered. “I didn’t think I would ever say this, but I don’t see how we are going to get out of here alive. Now we don’t even have gloves.”
