Ill Wind

by Nevada Barr

  Anna’d been carrying the orange jump kit in front of her like a shield. Now she strapped it on her back. Eroded soil made the bank soft enough she could work her way down crablike, heels and butt breaking the descent. Prickly pear sank disinterested fangs into the palm of her right hand and she swore softly. Tomorrow, without adrenaline for an anesthetic, the barbs would itch and burn.

  From above, she heard the whooping cry of the ambulance approaching and was glad of the company.

  At the bottom of the broken bank, the ground leveled out in a litter of rocks from fist- to house-size. Anna leaped from one to another, her balance made uncertain by the moving flashlight beam.

  The truck was wedged between two rocks. One beneath the front axle, the other crumpling back the hood and holding the vehicle at an angle almost on its right side. Both rear wheels and the front left tire were free of the ground. The front tire still turned slowly. The crash had been recent and Anna felt a spark of hope that she was not too late.

  “Anna!” It was Hills on her radio.

  “Down here,” she responded, flashing her light up to the road till she got an answering flash.

  “What’ve we got?” Hills asked.

  “Stand by.”

  Between her and the cab were two boulders roughly the size of Volkswagens and woven together by a tangle of oak brush. For lack of a better place, Anna shoved the flashlight down the front of her shirt, then, hands free, scrambled to the top of the first boulder and jumped the crevice to the second.

  The tilted cab was on a level with the rock, the driver’s door parallel with the top of the stone where she stood. Heat radiated from beneath the hood; the engine was still running. Anna rescued her flash and surveyed the scene. Broken and hanging in fragments, the safety glass of the side window fell in ragged sheets. Isolated pieces sparkled in the beam. From the interior came strains of country-western music. A faint green glow emanated from the dashboard lights. All else was lost in a darkness fractured by moonlight through fragmented glass.

  Anna unstrapped the jump kit. Cursing her slick-soled Wellington boots, she inched down the boulder where it sloped to within eighteen inches of the truck. Spinning gently, the pickup’s front tire, along with the broken angles of metal and stone, gave her an unsettling sense of vertigo, as if she might topple into the window as into a bottomless well.

  At the boulder’s edge she stopped, recovered her equilibrium, and peered inside. From her new vantage point, the cab and a small slice of the passenger door were visible. On the far window, where it had been forced inward, drops of ruby mixed with the glittering diamonds of glass.

  Fresh blood was startlingly red—too red for paintings or movies. Comic-book red; believable only in fantasy and real life.

  Gingerly, Anna pushed at the truck’s exposed undercarriage with a foot. It held steady. Apparently the truck was wedged firmly between the rocks. How firmly, she was about to find out.

  Getting down on her knees, she restored the flashlight to its bruising hammock between buttons and breasts and crawled her hands out onto the door. Bit by bit she transferred her weight from the rock. The truck remained stable. Emboldened, she brought one knee onto the door, catching hold of the handle to keep herself steady.

  Moonlight reflected off the white paint. Details, overwhelmed by the hard light of day, were surrealistically clear: a pencil-thin scratch beneath the side mirror, a square patch where a sticker had been inexpertly removed, fading black stenciled lettering, once showy flourishes almost obliterated by time, spelling the initials T.S.

  Tom Silva, Anna realized. It was his truck. Better a stranger; no psychological buttons pushed interfering with efficiency.

  Pulling herself up to her knees on the slanting metal, she braced butt on heels and took the flashlight from inside her shirt. Silva was crushed down on the far side of the cab, his back to her. One leg trailed behind him, wedged beneath the driver’s pedals. His left arm, the palm turned up, rested on the hump between the seats. She couldn’t see his face. “Tom,” she called clearly. “Can you hear me?” No response.

  Having wrested the King from her duty belt she made her assessment out loud, sharing it with Hills. “One individual, white male,” she began, avoiding Silva’s name lest Patsy or the girls should hear in such a manner. “About thirty-five. Unconscious, no seat belt. He’s half on the floor at the far side of the cab nearest the ground. He submarined ,” she added, taking note of where the operator’s pedals had bent and the floor mat ripped when Silva’s unrestrained body was hurled beneath the steering wheel. “His right leg’s broken. The foot caught beneath the clutch and twisted a hundred and eighty degrees from anatomical position. I can’t see his face but there’s a lot of blood on the dash and windows.”

  In the minute the climb and assessment had taken, the rubies had pooled into a puddle of crimson. As she spoke it spread, a bright beautiful stream dripping from dash to windshield. “Bring the Stokes, backboard, oxygen, and jaws of life. I’m off radio now, I’m going to try and get to him.” She heard the ubiquitous “ten-four” as she doffed her gunbelt and tossed it back onto the boulder. The radio she kept, using its heavy leather case to knock the remaining glass from the window frame.

  “Sorry about that,” she muttered as fragments rained down on Silva’s back, caught shining in his hair.

  One hand on either side of the window, she lowered her legs into the cab until she straddled the body of the man inside. Her left foot was on top of the passenger door above the shattered glass. Her right foot she wedged in the angle made by the windshield and the dash inches from where Silva’s head rested.

  Hanging on tightly to the outside door handle lest her precarious perch give way, she stretched down and switched off the ignition. Blessedly, the tinny sounds of country pop were silenced and the bizarre party feeling quenched. A click of the headlight button turned on the interior light and she freed up the hand she used to hold the flashlight.

  Edging down till her knees rested along the upper edge of the passenger door, she slipped two fingers between Silva’s jaw and shoulder, seeking by touch his carotid artery. Blood, warm and slippery, reminded her she’d forgotten to put on rubber gloves. Rangers with emergency response duties were required to be given hepatitis B vaccinations, but at a hundred and fifty bucks for each ranger, Hills couldn’t bring himself to comply. AIDS, there was no shot for.

  “You better be clean, Tom,” Anna said as she pressed down. No pulse. Holding on to the rearview mirror for support, she crouched lower and repositioned her fingers in the hollow of Silva’s neck beside his trachea.

  “Bingo,” she breathed as she felt the faint and thrilling thread of life. Given the mechanism of injury—a headlong flight off a cliff—and the absence of a seat belt, there was a good chance Silva had suffered damage to his spine and she was loath to move him without at least a short backboard. “Hills,” she barked into the radio. “Where are you guys?”

  “Just starting down.”

  “Jesus,” she whispered. Since she’d dropped into the truck it seemed as if half an hour must have passed but she knew in reality it had been minutes. “It’s bad,” she said. “Bring a short spineboard. He’s all crunched down on the passenger side and the truck’s tipped. We’ll have to haul him straight up through the driver’s door.”

  Hills undoubtedly responded but Anna’d quit listening. Silva had made a sound. She crouched as low as she could, the man’s dark head between her knees. Cupping his chin in her left hand, she supported his head and neck in the position she’d found it. “Tom, Tom, it’s Anna.”

  A gurgle, half felt through her fingers, half heard, came from the injured man. Liquid trickled over her fingers where they curled around his chin. “Hang in there, Tom, help’s here. Stay with me. We’ll get you out.”

  “No,” came out with more blood. “Killed Pats.”

  The adrenaline rush in Anna turned to cold horror. With her free hand she fumbled the radio from where it rested on the drunken tilt
of the dash and held it to her mouth. Her right leg had begun to shake uncontrollably. “Hills, send somebody to check on Patsy Silva.”

  He asked something but Anna’d dropped her radio. The fragile beat of life beneath her fingers had stopped. “Fuck.”

  Silva was wearing a denim jacket, the collar turned up. Grasping collar and shoulder seams in her fists, she pulled the dead weight upward, straightening her legs to take some of the strain off her back. Silva’s head fell against her forearm. In the uncompromising light of the dome she could see the gash in his forehead. White bone gleamed through the torn flesh.

  Grunting with the effort, she pulled him chest high and wedged her right knee under his rump. Locking him in her arms, she looked up at the driver’s window a couple of inches above her head. Impossibly far. Silva was a slight man, not more than one hundred and thirty-five or forty pounds, but she doubted she could push that much weight over her head.

  “Come on, Tom, don’t wimp out on me, damn you, come on,” she murmured in his ear. Blood dropped onto her neck. “On three, ready, Tom. Jesus!” Anna coiled the strength she had into her legs and back. “One, two, three!” With all the power she could muster she pushed Tom up toward the night sky. Her back creaked in protest and she felt the muscles burn and grow watery in her shoulders.

  Eyes squeezed shut, she tried to force him beyond her strength, but the soft weight of him was slipping from her.

  Then, miraculously, he went, his body light as air. Anna’s eyes sprang open and the air exploded from her lungs. Her hands fell away and still Silva rose like Christ on Easter. As his feet drew level with her face, Anna heard voices. For an instant, Drew’s face was visible in the glare of someone’s light. He held Silva by the shirtfront, supporting him with one arm.

  “Get him flat,” Anna shouted. With shaking arms, she tried to lever herself out of the cab. Drew grabbed her wrists, lifted her clear of the truck, and set her on the rock near Tom. “Get me an airway,” Anna said. “He had breath and pulse not a minute ago.”

  Crawling, she positioned herself over Silva’s chest, placed two fingers on his carotid and her ear an inch from his mouth. “Damn.”

  “Nothing?” Drew asked.

  “Nothing. Airway,” she snapped. Behind her she could hear Hills pawing through the jump kit. She tilted Silva’s jaw, pinched his nose, and blew two slow breaths into his lungs. “Compressions, Drew.”

  The big man leaned over Silva and, elbows locked, depressed the man’s chest for five counts, forcing blood through the now quiet heart and into the dying organs. Anna breathed for Silva. Five more compressions and another breath.

  Sour vomit from Silva’s stomach filled Anna’s mouth and she spat it out, refusing to let her own bile rise in its wake. “Airway,” she barked as Drew compressed the chest.

  A curved plastic oropharyngeal airway was pressed into her palm and she took a second to work the plastic into Silva’s throat to keep his airway patent.

  Drew compressed and Anna performed rescue breathing while the backboard was moved into place. The time for delicacy was past. Emergency personnel often referred to the Golden Hour, those first sixty minutes in which quick transport to a medical facility can still save a life. Time for Silva was running out, if, indeed, not already gone.

  Unceremoniously, Silva was slid onto the board and strapped in the Stokes. Paul Summers took one end, Hills the other and lifted. Anna breathed, Drew compressed.

  “Can’t do it,” Paul cried, shame and anger hot in his voice. The downward pressure of the compressions were too strong for him to support.

  “Switch,” Anna called.

  Drew moved to the head of the Stokes and Paul took over compressions. “Breathe,” she said, and blew into Silva’s lungs.

  “And one, and two . . .” Paul counted off as they crabbed awkwardly along the two boulders.

  “Stop,” Drew ordered when they reached the edge of the second rock. Anna and Paul stepped back. Drew set the litter down, Hills knelt still holding his end. The helitack foreman jumped from the rock then took up the Stokes again.

  Hills scrambled down and they moved with startling speed over the river of boulders. Paul and Anna ran after. The big men, the littler, the moonlight, the rocking and rocky passage, gave the scene a jerky, keystone-cops look and Anna felt inappropriate laughter pushing up in her throat.

  It came out in gasps as they reached the foot of the steep incline.

  “Now,” Drew said.

  Anna felt for pulse, listened for breathing. Nothing. Again she gave two slow rescue breaths, then Paul began compressions. Bones broke—Silva’s ribs—another rescue breath, five compressions.

  Jimmy appeared from somewhere with ropes. Stanton’s voice behind Anna said, “Can I spell you?” Anna blew oxygen into Silva’s lungs, then shook her head. Five more compressions, more ribs snapping.

  “Stop,” Drew commanded.

  Gratefully, Anna stepped back and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. The Stokes was roped up. Jimmy and Stanton had regained the top of the dirt slope and on a three count began to haul Silva upward.

  CPR couldn’t be interrupted for more than a minute. Without bothering to catch her breath, Anna began to claw her way up the incline. On the other side of the Stokes, she could see Paul bounding up the hill and envied him his youth.

  The Stokes bumped to a halt on the cliff top. Anna was there waiting. “Now,” Drew ordered. No breath, no pulse: Anna blew into the lungs. Paul did compressions. Bile spewed up, the acid burning Anna’s lips. She spit it out and heard gagging. For a second she thought it was Silva breathing on his own, but it was Stanton.

  The agent pushed ahead, trying to keep the oakbrush from scraping the rescuers away from their patient. Branches scratched Anna’s face and hands but she was aware of them only peripherally, she didn’t feel the sting or cut.

  Finally they broke free of the brush. In minutes the Stokes was loaded into the ambulance. “Jimmy drives. Me, Drew, Paul, here in back. You guys see if you can figure out what happened.” Hills slammed the door on the last of his words and the ambulance drove off, leaving Anna and Frederick standing in the middle of the road.

  Darkness and stillness returned. The moon, temporarily eclipsed by the ambulance lights, reasserted its dominion. Shadows softened. Night creatures began timid explorations. Anna noticed she was cold and her back hurt like the dickens.

  Pressing her hands into the small of her sacrum, she stretched in an attempt to ease it. “I’ve lost my strength of ten men,” she said to Stanton.

  The FBI agent was looking at her oddly and pawing at the side of his mouth. Moonlight gave his face a ghoulish cast. Primitive fear of the dark pricked Anna’s sensitized nerves.

  “What?” she demanded. “What is it?”

  “You’ve... um... got something . . .” Tentatively he reached toward her but pulled back short of actually touching her. “It’s... ah... vomit.”

  Anna wiped her mouth. Sour-smelling chunks came off in her hand. “I hate CPR. They’re dead. If they don’t sit up and take notice in the first sixty seconds, they’re going to stay dead. But we’ve got to pound and poke and blow just like it made sense. Got a hankie?”

  Stanton fished an enormous white handkerchief from his hip pocket and handed it to her. She scrubbed her mouth and cheeks, then pocketed it out of deference to his hypersensitive gag reflex.

  “So, what happened?” Stanton turned and looked down the hill. Oakbrush and serviceberry had closed ranks, creating a wall impervious to the moonlight. Beyond, down the sharp slope, the pickup’s carcass showed as a paler boulder in the boulder field.

  “Drunk, I would guess. The cab reeked of alcohol, among other things.” Anna, too, stared down the slope. The excitement over, fatigue weighed heavily and the thought of climbing back down the hill wasn’t pleasant.

  “Got a flashlight?” Stanton asked.

  “It’s down there. You?”

  “Not me. Got a spare in your car?”

 
“Of course. Doesn’t work though.” The dark grew darker. Prickly pear spines lodged in Anna’s hand were making themselves felt.

  “The blind leading the blind?” Stanton asked.

  “I’ll go first.”

  “Good. Snakes and things, you know.”

  “First person just wakes them up and makes them mad. They always bite the second person. That’s a proven statistic.”

  “Where’d you read it?” Stanton demanded as he hurried after her into the arms of the oakbrush.

  “U.S. News and World Report.” Anna gave him the standard comeback of the 1968 Mercy High School debate team.

  Without lights, music, and Silva, the wreck looked old, all life gone, metal bleached like bones. Anna appreciated its peacefulness. Lowering herself back down into the cab, she felt a kinship with Tom. It had less to do with ghosts than with the now all-pervasive odor of alcohol.

  “Here but for the grace of God” crossed her mind like a prayer as she remembered the night she’d lost to booze and self-pity.

  By the dome light, she retrieved her flashlight from where it had fallen down next to the door and passed it up to Agent Stanton.

  Searching the cab was a job for a contortionist. Anna squatted over the broken passenger window and poked through the debris that had been shaken from under the seat and floor mats. A pack of Marlboros, two cigarettes remaining that would go unsmoked; five empty cans of Budweiser and one full, still cold to the touch; a McDonald’s bag, the contents so old they no longer smelled; bits of paper, maps, and registration from the glove box; a pencil with a chewed eraser and broken lead; and a golf ball completed the inventory. But for the golf ball, it was more or less what she had expected to find. Silva didn’t strike her as a golf sort of guy. A bowling ball or squirrel rifle would have been more in keeping with the image she had of him.

  Hoisting herself out of the cab, she sat on the door with her feet still inside. The effort cost her a wrenching pain in her lower back, muscles protesting the lifting of one hundred and forty pounds.