By noon the following day, the clan had caught and cleaned enough fish to fill the wooden barrel. They had caught an assortment of fish, some were trout, some were pan fish, but most of the fish were suckers from the deep pool just south of the Mountain House. As they worked together to carry the fish up to the house, Britney worked in the kitchen to insure she had carefully checked and washed each fish. Then she carried them into the mineshaft and layered them into the barrel with salt. When the barrel was full, she fit the wooden top in place and placed a large rock on the lid. By the end of the day, she had filled the second barrel with fish. After she sat a rock on that barrel, she sat down on a wooden bench and rested for a moment. As she sat, Jenna walked up behind her and said, “I see you have some more fish in the kitchen. I will cook some of them up for supper since both barrels are full.” Britney started to stand up to help her, but Jenna put her hand on her shoulder and said, “You have done enough today. You rest until bedtime. I will prepare the evening meal and the others can help me clean up the kitchen. Jenna leaned down and kissed Britney on the cheek. Then she asked, “Are you all right, Britney?” Britney giggled and said, “Yes, I am okay. I am just very tired. This child has drained all of my energy.”
Jenna walked out to the kitchen, cut a piece of goat cheese and poured a small glass of goats’ milk. Then she walked back into the mineshaft and handed the snack to Britney. She sat down on the bench beside Britney and said, “I suspect the child growing in your belly might be getting hungry. Please eat this cheese and drink the milk. It will give you an energy boost until I can get supper on the table.”
When Jenna returned to the kitchen, Randy handed her a child to care for and said, “You girls have worked hard today. Robert and I will deal with the evening meal. Kathy, Bonnie and Britney are in the mineshaft. You can join them there if you want, but get out of the kitchen.” Jenna kissed her husband on the lips and then snuggled their child into her arms as she headed off to the mine to join the others.
Rodney walked into the kitchen where the other men were preparing the evening meal. He took a large drinking glass down from a cupboard and sat it on the kitchen table. Then he poured about two inches of water in the glass. He sat down on the bench alongside of the table and sat staring at the glass of water. Randy turned to him and said, “Okay. You have spiked my interest; I cannot stand the suspense any longer. Please tell me why you are staring at a glass of water.”
Rodney pointed to the water and said, “Just watch the water in the glass of a moment or two. You will soon discover that the water moves inside the glass. There are tiny vibrations moving through the earth. I fear we are about to have an earthquake.” Randy ran full speed into the mineshaft and told the girls to move out into the living room of the Mountain House and do it immediately. When they all gathered around, he explained what Rodney had discovered.
Britney turned on her tiny transistor radio and tried to find some news. They soon discovered that the epicenter of the shaking was hundreds of miles away. The scientists around the world were carefully watching the movement under the Yellowstone National Park. The ground was rumbling so hard that the movement was discernable all the way to New York City. As the clan all began to calm their emotions, they decided to remain out of the mineshaft for a few hours until they were certain the ground around them was stable.
While Randy and Robert worked in the kitchen, Rodney returned to the barn for another load of hickory wood to stoke the smokehouse one last time before they settled indoors for the night. As he picked up some wood and began stacking it into his arms, a flash from the woodpile surprised him. Then he felt the pain in his arm. He dropped the wood he had picked up and looked down at his arm. He could see two holes in his arm and then realized he had been snake bit. The snake slithered along the edge of the woodpile and Rodney quickly cut off its head with a shovel. He picked up the snake and rolled the snake’s head into a coffee can. Then he headed for the house. He knew that if the snake was a Water Moccasin, his life was in jeopardy. When he got to the porch, he dropped the snake and carried the coffee can into the house with him.
Rodney walked up to Randy and said, “I was just bitten by a snake. I think it is a Water Moccasin. Randy sat him down at the kitchen table and then tipped the snake’s head out of the can onto the table. Randy yelled for Jenna and the girls to join them. When Jenna arrived, she looked at the snake and said, “I think it is just a Watersnake, not a Water Moccasin. Let me get my book and we will check.” She returned a few moments later and found the pages where the author discussed the look alike snakes and how to identify them. Jenna wanted to see the snake and Rodney told her he had left the snake on the porch. When Jenna returned, she said, “The snake that bit you is just a Watersnake. It does not have vertical eye pupils, which tells me it is a Watersnake, not a Water Moccasin. This snake also does not have heat-sensing pits on its face as a Water Moccasin would.”
Randy patted Rodney on the shoulder and said, “I will cook up the snake for supper.” Rodney laughed and said, “I will help you. I have not had roasted snake since my military survival training days.” Jenna said, “I will get rid of this head. I hate snakes.”
Bonnie finished stoking the fire under the smokehouse for the night before returning to the house to help prepare supper. Jenna asked Bonnie where the guys had all disappeared. She said, “They are out skinning the snake and drowning their male egos in testosterone.” Once Jenna explained that Rodney would not die from the snakebite, the guys reverted from frightened little boys, directly into their strong Army Ranger mentality. I suspect we will have to finish preparing the evening meal.” Bonnie said, “I am glad that Rodney had the wherewithal to kill the snake so Jenna could identify it. We would have spent a long night worrying if one of our clan would die during the night.”
They sat the water glass on the fireplace hearth where they could see it. They could not feel the little tremors that were shaking the mountains but the occasional jiggling water in the glass reminded them of that reality. The news channel was reporting that the caldera at Yellowstone was very unstable, but it did not appear that it would explode anytime soon, yet the scientists were only guessing what the volcano would eventually do.
Just as Jenna locked the door and put the three wooden bars across it, she heard the sound of an animal outside. She looked out the window and then began to yell for help. There was a black bear trying to get into the smokehouse. Jenna quickly loaded her rifle as the guys all ran towards the door. Randy yelled at her to wait for everyone to get the guns loaded before she opened the door. When they were ready, Britney opened the door and watched as the three men and Jenna stepped out onto the porch and opened fire on the bear. They knew that just frightening the bear away would not work out to their advantage. The bear would simple return once they went to bed. Killing it was the only option. Once the bear stilled on the ground from its wounds, they all walked out to inspect the smokehouse for damage. The bear had sprung and clawed the door, but it was still secure. They returned to the cabin to get dressed and light a few lanterns. They would gut and skin the bear tonight and then hang it in the barn for the night.
When the task was complete, they returned to the house and began washing up. Once they settled into bed for the night, they soon realized that no one could sleep. They finally all got up, made a pot of coffee and headed into the mine to work. They would try to sleep later in the day. Randy placed baby Timothy into a small wagon they used to transport firewood and covered him with a blanket. The boy could sleep through anything, even the hammering and sawing of lumber to build more shelving.
As they worked, they soon realized that even if they did have a small earthquake, the mine would be the safest place around. The walls were solid rock and six-inch square timbers resting in pockets cut into the rock walls supported the ceiling. The chance of the mine collapsing was relatively small. They decided to begin tearing apart the bunk style beds they had built in the loft and move them down into the mine. Once th
ey moved their beds into the mine, they would be much safer and would need to burn much less wood for heating and cooking.
As they began assembling the shelving, Bonnie discovered that a small rock in the wall, about the size of a breadbox, was loose. She wiggled it around and dug around it with a screwdriver. Soon, she had the rock free and pulled it free from the wall. The rock weighed about twenty pounds, but she managed to sit it down on the kitchen table. Then she shined a lantern into the hole and realized that the hole in the rock wall was two feet deep. In the back was a deerskin leather bag. Bonnie reached in and pulled the bag out where she could inspect it. The clan gathered around her and then watched as she untied the leather drawstring and opened the bag. When she looked inside, those around her heard her take a deep breath and then her voice trembled as she said, “Gold. Gold nuggets and rice size gold.” She stood up and walked over to the kitchen table. Jenna laid a cookie sheet on the table and Bonnie poured the contents of the bag into the pan. When she poured out the gold, she realized that there was enough gold in the pan to fill a half pint size canning jar.
After they had weighed the gold and returned it to the leather bag, they placed it back into the hole in the wall and replaced the stone. Then they packed dirt around the rock in an attempt to make the wall look as if it had not been disturbed.
As they sat at the kitchen table and sipped coffee, they realized that they could see a beam of sunlight shining in around where the stovepipe exited the mineshaft’s east wall. They had not taken the time to seal around the pipe, but they would have to do that in the near future.
The clan discussed their need to gather more drinking water. Randy said, “A few days ago I was thinking about how to get water from the river up to the cabin and realized that we would need a pump to accomplish that task. In the winter, the pump and water lines would freeze and become useless. Then I remembered that there is a small flowing well up above the cabin that presently runs down to the river below us. The water from that flowing well is what forms the marsh area upriver from us where we often set our traps. I would like us to consider how to pipe that running water down into the mineshaft to fill a water tank and then allow the overflow to return to the marsh area as it presently does.”
They all sat and discussed how they could run pipes to the mineshaft without them freezing in the winter, and how they could hide them from people hiking or hunting in the forest above the cabin. Randy said, “I would like to drive a well point into the side of the mountain at the west end to see if we can create our own well. If there is a flowing well a hundred yards from the mineshaft, maybe we can tap into that water from inside the mine. Then we could return the overflow back down the mountain. I know that the well drillers who put in the well for this farm only went down thirty feet to hit good water. That well is located up on the knoll above the cabin and is at least ten feet above the ceiling of this mineshaft. I suspect we could drive a pipe down a few feet and use a hand pump to pull water from the ground.”
As they talked, Robert said, “I have all of the materials we would need for two wells and a lot of replacement parts. They are up on a shelf in my storage building at the farm. We could make a trip down there and bring back what we need to attempt creating a well. Having fresh water within the mineshaft would be a lifesaver this winter. It would save a lot of firewood if we did not have to melt snow all winter.”
Randy said, “I am still not ready to sleep, if you are all okay, we could make the trip for the well parts now. Then we might be tired after that and could get a little sleep.” The girls looked at each other. Jenna said, “I am going to bed now. I also think Britney needs to get some down time in bed. How about if we girls sleep now and then we will work while you guys get some sleep when you return?” Once they had all agreed upon the plan, they guys headed out with the pickup trucks to retrieve the well components.
Two hours later, the guys returned and began carrying the heavy pipes and pumps into the mineshaft. Once everything was inside, they sat down with the girls to discuss the latest news they had heard in the city. There were two ham radio operators living in the city that were keeping the owner of the local radio station informed about world events. The guys had listened to the radio broadcast while filling up the gas cans at the gas station. The radio was reporting that ash and gases were spewing from the volcano at Yellowstone National Park. They said that one radio operator that lived over one hundred miles away could now see the top of the ash plumb. They went on to explain that the lava dome forming on the side of the Mount St. Helens volcano was once again growing in size, most likely from lava movement deep within the earth. Then Robert explained that they had tuned the truck radio to the same local radio station on the way home and heard that there had been six large earthquakes along the Chilean coastline and two tsunamis had destroyed many of the fishing fleets that anchored in the shallow harbors along the Pacific coastline. The once extinct Krakatoa (Krakatau) volcano was once again spewing ash and causing continuous rumblings below the ocean floor. Kathy said, “I learned in college that the Krakatoa Island destroyed itself in the 1883 eruption. I did not think we would ever have another Krakatoa.” Randy said, “The original volcano did in fact annihilate the island, but a new volcano is now forming over the fissure in the earth where Krakatoa once existed. The scientists have named the new volcano, Anak Krakatoa – child of Krakatoa.”
The girls cooked the guys some food while they began planning where to insert the one and a half inch diameter drill point into the ground. The floor of the mineshaft was mostly rock, but one crack in the north wall constantly seeped a tiny trickle of water. There was not much water there, but it did indicate that water was present. They used a large hammer and a chisel to split off a section of the rock alongside the crack where the water was seeping. Once they removed a six-inch chunk of rock, they discovered that they had found an area of hard packed clay. They used a smaller chuck of old water pipe and drove it into the clay with the largest hammer they could find. The hammer was very heavy and they struggled to move the pipe any distance into the damp clay.
As the men stood resting, they saw a tiny trickle of water begin to flow out of the three quarter inch water pipe they had hammered into the wall. Randy retrieved a large pail and sat it under the pipe. As they watched, the pail slowly began to fill with water. They realized that over time, the tiny flow of water would provide them with ample amounts of water. Later in the day, they decided to drill a one-inch diameter hole into the clay with the large hammer drill they had moved from Roberts’s farm to the Mountain House. They removed the small pipe they had hammered a short distance into the clay, then started their generator and ran a power cord into the mineshaft. When they were ready to drill, the three men and Kathy gripped the large drill and worked the drill bit two feet into the clay. After they drilled the hole, they began pounding the well point into the hole. When they had the pipe it in as far as it would go, they put an empty bucket under the end of the pipe and watched to see how much water would flow. The well point had a built in screen, so the water that came out was free of particulates.
An hour later, they had collected half a quart of water. It was not much, but if it remained constant, they could easily supply the clan with fresh water. They mixed up some concrete mix and patched the wall to keep the clay from washing out of the hole.
The guys had worked all night and most of the next day. They had been up for over thirty-six hours with no more than a short nap after lunch. As the sun sat and the smell of rain moved across the mountains, they decided to get some much-needed sleep. The girls had disassembled the bunk beds in the loft and had begun moving them into the mine. They had selected an area back near the cold storage area for the sleeping area. They had hung two large tarps across the mineshaft to separate the sleeping area from the food storage area and the main living quarters. The girls had assembled James and Britney’s bunks in the mine, but Randy, Jenna and Thomas’s bunks were not complete. They made up their beds on the
floor of the loft and settled in for the night. As they all drifted off to sleep, a strong storm blew across the mountain and the bright lightning flashing in the south facing windows of the Mountain House lit the interior as bright as day. Kathy moved to her husband’s bunk and snuggled up close as the storm intensified.
As daylight began to provide some light in the house, they all slowly got up and moved into the mine to begin preparing breakfast. As Kathy sat at the table sipping her first cup of coffee, a still very sleepy Timothy came shuffling out of the sleeping area and out to the table. He crawled up beside Kathy and wanted eggs. Bonnie giggled over his words as she broke two hens’ eggs into a pan and scrambled them the way he liked them. When she sat a plate in front of him and poured him some goats’ milk, he began talking. He was all excited about the bear they had killed a couple days ago and wanted to know if he could have the bearskin on the floor beside his bed. Kathy explained to him that they had not tanned the hide yet, but she was certain that he could have it when it was ready. Kathy asked if he had heard the thunder last night. He said he was sleeping not listening. As the girls laughed over his words, Jenna walked out and poured herself some coffee. When she sat down beside her boy, she asked if he was still hungry. He said he was full and headed off to the wake up his father.
Universal Mass Page 10
