Switchback

by Pamela Fagan Hutchins

  Then she remembered her earlier sensation that she wasn’t alone in the woods. The cracking twig. Goldie’s nervousness. What if something had been out there? What if it got Perry? All the terrible possibilities she’d thought of earlier ran back through her mind, this time with Perry’s freckled face and crew-cut hair in the picture. She fought back tears.

  In the distance, she saw something moving. “There. What’s that?” she shouted.

  But her dad must have already seen it. He asked Reno for more speed, and the horse careened through the trees and over the rocks and slippery forest floor at a breakneck pace. Goldie reacted immediately, staying right on his heels. The hooves beat a wicked bass drum cadence. Trish’s view of the forest heaved and jerked like a film that had come off its reel. She strained to make sense of the movement she’d seen. What was it?

  Perry. It was Perry. Walking. Limping, really, toward them, and rubbing his shoulder.

  Her relief was a wave of dizziness that rocked her in her saddle.

  Her dad sat back, the lead line in one hand. Reading his body language, Reno slid to a stop. It was an amazing feat for a horse of his size in tight quarters. Patrick was off before the horse came to a stop. He reached Perry in a few running strides.

  “Are you okay?” Patrick didn’t hug Perry. Instead, he touched him, lifted his arms, and looked him over, checking him for injuries.

  Perry’s cheeks were stained with tears, but he nodded. “I’m okay. My ankle and my shoulder hurt a little.”

  “What happened?” Patrick moved a finger slowly side to side in front of Perry’s eyes and leaned closer to look at his pupils.

  “A b-b-bear scared Duke. My saddle came loose, and I fell off. Duke ran one way, and the bear ran the other. I’ve been following Duke’s tracks back to camp, but it was h-h-hard.”

  For a moment, Trish felt vindicated. There had been something in the woods. A bear. She wasn’t just a fraidycat. But now that she knew Perry was okay, Trish’s anger at him returned. “And because you left me, and went way too far, you know. Did you even get any wood?”

  “The bear scared Duke before I could get any.”

  Trish snorted.

  Patrick shook his head. “Next time, stay with your sister. And if you get separated, come straight back. You’re lucky this didn’t end worse.” He glared at Trish. “Both of you. You, missy, are older, and that makes you the responsible one.”

  Trish didn’t want to be responsible for Perry, especially not alone out in the scary woods. He was impossible. But she knew better than to argue. “Yes, sir.”

  He continued muttering under his breath, but Trish heard him, mostly. “Susanne should be here. She shouldn’t have sent me off alone with these two.” He mounted Reno, then held a hand down for Perry. Perry took it with his good arm, and Patrick hauled him up behind the saddle.

  They started the ride back to camp. As she peered behind every tree and boulder looking for the bear, a thought struck Trish. Perry and Duke hadn’t been anywhere near where she’d gathered firewood. Whatever had been out in the woods with her and Goldie, if anything, wasn’t the bear that had scared Duke. Had there been anything? She kicked Goldie until she was abreast with Reno. Trish wanted to be as close to her dad as possible. Because suddenly she was sure of it. Something had been there. She hadn’t imagined it.

  She just didn’t know what it was, and that scared her most of all.

  Chapter Twelve: Stuck

  Buffalo, Wyoming

  September 19, 1976, 3:00 p.m.

  Susanne

  Every second that passed alone in the chair in the bedroom felt like an hour to Susanne. Her raw wrists burned. Her eyes stung from lack of sleep. She had to go to the bathroom, and her stomach had started to growl. At least her tears had stopped—crying had left her nose first runny and then congested. Ferdinand had even taken a break from his frenzied noisemaking. She’d be completely redoing the laundry room when this was over, if there was any of it left after containing that wild animal for days. The house was so quiet the ticking of the clock in the kitchen sounded like blasts of dynamite.

  After hours of rocking and struggling, she’d figured out the reason the chair wouldn’t tip. The man—Kemecke?—had used excess rope to secure it to Patrick’s gun safe before he’d looped it around her body and feet and tied her arms behind her back. The damn rope must be a mile long. And thick. She needed something to saw through it. But even if she’d had use of her hands, she didn’t have on jewelry or hairpins, she had nothing in her pockets or on her shoes, and there were no pieces to the chair that she could break off. As for summoning help, she could scream like mad if someone knocked, but she couldn’t make a phone call or even break out the window.

  She was stuck. Would she survive until Wednesday when Patrick and the kids got home? It was Sunday morning. She had no idea how long a person could go without water. And pretty soon she’d stink, because there was no way she could go without relieving herself for four days. Who was she kidding? She already smelled bad, from fear and sweat. She’d hold out from wetting herself as long as she could, though, for her own sake.

  Occupying her mind would be important, or she’d go crazy. She wasn’t used to idleness. She always stayed busy, and if she had down time, she played solitaire or read a book. She was never alone with her thoughts, and she found she didn’t like it. Her mind wandered all over the place. To the man who’d left her here. Why had he chosen their house? How had he gotten here? Where was he going? If he was Kemecke—and a merciless killer—why hadn’t he hurt her? And would he be back? She second-guessed her decision to stay home from the hunting trip. How she wished she was with her family. How a horse sounded better than this chair. That she’d love to have a gun in her hands right now and might never go without one again after this. To where her husband and kids were at this moment, and why they hadn’t been at Hunter Corral.

  Most especially, she thought about that. Her terror when the man had been in the house had kept her worry about them to a dull roar. Alone in the permanently dark room, it consumed her. She kept picturing horrible things. Their truck and trailer at the bottom of a ravine, with them inside, like the trucker with the nails in his knees. One of the kids bucked off and paralyzed. Patrick gored by an angry elk. One after another, the improbable tricks of her mind tortured her. These things weren’t going to happen. She was thinking crazy. But they could have had a wreck anywhere between the house and the campground. Or gotten lost. Been hijacked. She knew the most likely scenario was that Patrick had changed his mind about where to camp. So why couldn’t she get her mind to accept it?

  Because improbable doesn’t mean impossible. Just look at what had happened to her.

  To calm herself, she decided to sing. As a child, her mother had sung Susanne and her sister to sleep with hymns. Susanne read to her own kids, since she didn’t like her singing voice. Patrick didn’t want to sacrifice his rare Sunday mornings off for church, so she only went when he was at the hospital, although she made the kids go to all the children’s and youth’s programs. She missed the music and the community. The comfort.

  That was what she needed. Comfort.

  The words to her mother’s favorite hymn came to her easily, and with no one to hear whether she was off-key, she sang at a full voice.

  “O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds Thy hands have made. I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder. Thy power throughout the universe displayed. Then sings my soul, my savior God to Thee, how great Thou art, how great Thou art.”

  Her voice cracked. She cleared her throat and tried again. This time the words came out smoother, and by the time she’d made it through the song one full time, she felt more centered. No one would ever invite her to join a choir, but being on key wasn’t what was important. She started from the beginning, now imagining her mother holding her hand and singing with her.

  Halfway through the first verse, Ferdinand’s barks exploded beneath her feet. She jerked and he
r voice caught, but she kept going. Seconds later, though, someone knocked on the door.

  Kemecke. But no, he had a key. He’d just let himself in. This was a potential rescuer.

  “In here. Help. Help. Help me,” she shouted. Then, “Shut up, Ferdie.”

  The dog was so loud, she couldn’t compete with him. If anyone was answering her, she couldn’t hear it. The tears started again. This was her chance, and the stupid dog was ruining it.

  But then Ferdinand shut up, and she heard something else. A female voice. In the house. Murmuring “Wassamatta, boy?”

  “Up here,” she yelled. “Help me. Help!”

  The woman’s voice quieted. Susanne strained to hear. Ferdinand whined, and then his toenails scrambled on the linoleum below her, the sound they made when he was winding up his big body to run. Within seconds, his paws were pounding up the stairs. She could picture him, his body nearly as long as the first landing, winding into the turn and covering the second set of steps in a single bound, galloping down the hall to her door, where he bayed like a coonhound. Footsteps followed him, slower, more cautious. They stilled at her door as well.

  Susanne’s heart hammered. Someone had let her dog out. That was a good thing. But now that they were near, she was scared again. Could it be the man? But Ferdinand would have ripped him up. This had to be someone Ferdinand trusted.

  She gathered her courage. “Hello? Is someone out there? Please help me.”

  The bedroom door started easing open, slower than the passage of a dark Wyoming winter day. Then a blue-jeans-clad figure poked a head inside.

  Her neighbor. Ronnie.

  Chapter Thirteen: Trudge

  Walker Prairie, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming

  September 19, 1976, 3:30 p.m.

  Trish

  A fly circled Goldie’s head, making darting attempts to land in the corner of her eye. The horse shook her head and snorted. The headshaking knocked Goldie off course a little, and then her whole body shuddered. Trish shifted her back on the trail, then turned. A horsefly had landed on Goldie’s rump. Trish shooed it with the end of her reins. It flew off for half a second then was back to continue its torment. The one buzzing Goldie’s head had never left. Too many flies. Goldie hated flies more than any horse Trish had known, which was a lot, since they were the bane of a horse’s existence. The trail they were riding was steep and narrow, too. If Goldie got any more upset, she could fling them both down the incline.

  That would suck.

  A lot of today sucked. She was riding last in line, for one. Her dad was afraid of Perry getting separated from the group. Again. Neither she nor Goldie were very happy about it. Goldie had nipped Duke’s slowpoke butt a time or three, but it didn’t speed him up. They’d been riding for an hour, supposedly searching for the perfect hunting spot. She thought they’d found it that morning. It had been good enough for a nap anyway, while her dad and Perry stared through binoculars into nothing, seeing nothing and shooting at nothing. She’d been looking forward to another nap after their picnic lunch, but no, Dad made them pack up.

  “I think I see elk over there.” Patrick had pointed all the way across the high prairie to a higher elevation, miles north of them.

  “That’s, like, a long way,” she’d said.

  “Not for an elk.”

  “I’m not an elk.”

  He hadn’t replied.

  Now the ride back to camp in the dark was going to take forever, which she’d mentioned to him, but had he listened to her? No. If her mom had come, no way would they still be riding out into the great beyond. God, I miss Mom. How weird is that?

  There had been fewer flies at the morning spot, too.

  When they got to his perfect spot, wherever it was—if it even existed—she’d have to walk again. Her boots were pinching her feet, and they’d had to hike into their last spot. She’d be rich if she had a dime for every time her dad reminded them to be as quiet as an Indian. Every time he did his dorky fox walk, she was just glad no one else was around to see him. Worst of all, her hair was gross and dirty. She would have washed it yesterday morning before they left, but her mom hadn’t woken her up. What if Brandon came and saw her like this? She’d left him a note pinned underneath a rock between their campsite and the trail, in case he showed up today while they were hunting. It would be awesome to see him, but ew, her hair.

  At least she had the small joy of remembering that she hadn’t boiled the drinking water that her dad was chugging. She smiled, thinking about what he always told her mom about people at work. “If I want something done right, I guess I just have to do it myself.” Yep, she thought, I guess you do.

  Her dad reined Reno off-trail and down a bank to a broad creek. The big horse didn’t hesitate, just plunged in up to his knees. Great. Reno was a giant. At least six hands taller than Goldie. She’d be swimming. Duke plodded in next. He split the difference in height between the two horses. Perry’s head was lolling over. How could he sleep in a saddle on a moving horse in this terrain? Her ass would be on the ground if she fell asleep on Goldie. Perry jerked awake when the cold water splashed on him, and he reacted by sawing at Duke’s mouth. The horse ignored him. He might be a puffer, and apparently he didn’t like bears, but he was super patient with her brother.

  Goldie huffed and pawed at the water’s edge.

  “It’s okay, girl.” Trish stroked her neck. “This will get rid of those dumb flies.” For a little while, anyway.

  Goldie stepped into the water like it might be infested with grizzlies. Trish’s feet went under, and water started seeping in. A few steps later, Goldie slipped. Horses have four feet, so normally their balance is pretty good. If things get dicey, they leave three on the ground. But this time, Goldie was in trouble. Frigid water rose up Trish’s thigh on one side as Goldie went sideways into the water. Really frigid. Like, breathtakingly cold. Trish grabbed the saddle horn. Suddenly, Goldie was floating, then her front legs were thrashing. Swimming. Goldie was swimming. Trish had never ridden a swimming horse before. Goldie worked hard, but with every foot she gained crossing, she lost another downstream. Trish’s heart raced. There were rapids and huge rocks downstream.

  “Easy, easy,” she said, but her voice had a squeak to it that she knew wasn’t reassuring. She tried again. “You’ve got this, Goldie.”

  From the opposite bank, her dad looked back as Duke clambered out and shook like a dog. They seemed so far upstream from Goldie and her. Her dad must have thought so, too, because he whirled Reno and rode him hard back into the water. He untied a lasso, and when they were close enough, slung it to Trish.

  “Put her head through the loop. Reno and I can haul her out.”

  Before Trish could do it, Goldie planted her feet and hoisted herself higher in the water. Trish could feel the animal quaking beneath her, and Goldie wasted no more time in the water, now that she had her footing. She scrambled so fast for the bank that Trish worried she would break a leg. They slipped, slid, and lurched across the rocks. When Goldie reached the short sandy shore, she jumped up the two-foot embankment. There, she huffed and puffed like a steam engine. Behind them, Reno snorted. Patrick led Perry and Duke up a gentler exit from the streambed.

  “Good job, kiddo,” Patrick said.

  Trish glared at him. “I’m not a kiddo. And Goldie is not a draft horse like yours.”

  “I didn’t know it would be so deep. But you did it. And you both learned something.”

  “Yeah. To stay on the trail on the way back.”

  Patrick smiled. “You were never in any danger. The Indians rode their horses across rivers deeper than that all the time.”

  Trish was sick of hearing what the Indians did. “I’m not an Apache.” Her dad had written a term paper on the Apache when he was in college at the University of Texas, and he never got tired of talking about it.

  “True. And if you were an Indian around here, you wouldn’t have been Apache either. They lived in the Southwest. You’d be Sioux or Crow, most
likely.”

  “Don’t tell me you wrote a paper about them, too.”

  “No. But I definitely need to read up on them more.”

  Perry said, “Your ride across was super bad, Trish.”

  Trish put her torso and head across Goldie’s neck and hugged her lightly. The horse was still quivering. “I’m sorry, girl.”

  “Now, isn’t this better than being in school this week?” Her dad actually looked like he was having the time of his life.

  “Tell me when the fun part starts.” She clucked to Goldie and let her trot off some of the adrenaline.

  She spotted a trail ahead and merged onto it, then let her dad and Perry pass again. Notwithstanding the sheer terror of the creek-crossing, this trip was a snore. Now she’d get to stare at Duke’s butt for another few miles. How exciting.

  If Brandon didn’t come, how was she going to survive two more whole days of this? The only thing worse would be if they actually got an elk. Besides being gross and sad, they were miles and miles from the truck. That’s why they’d brought an extra horse even though her mom hadn’t come. One of the horses would have the job of carrying the carcass out for half a day before they hauled it down the mountain to be processed. And then? Elk steaks. Elk burgers. Elk sausage. Elk jerky. Chicken-fried elk cubes. Her dad would be in heaven. If Patrick could make them drink elk milkshakes, he would. Every last scrap of meat would be used, no matter how sick they got of it.

  She really hoped they didn’t get an elk.

  Which of course is when her dad raised his hand and closed his fist, their agreed speechless signal if he saw big game.

  Chapter Fourteen: Freeze

  Walker Prairie, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming

  September 19, 1976, 5:00 p.m.