“Probably at the first one that’ll have us!” he grinned.
Darlene went alone to meet Thelma. She heard the dogs before she saw them, and was surprised to see that they were side by side, rather than in pairs in a line.
“I use fan traces. More likely to get tangled but more fun for the dogs. Less competition among them too. Most racers prefer the other way. They think fighting to be top dog makes them work harder.”
Thelma situated Darlene on the sled, then off they went with a “whoosh” of runners on the snow. The dogs whimpered with excitement, then settled into a steady run. Every now and then they’d yip out of pure joy, but mostly they were quiet as they ran. Thelma ran along behind the sled, standing on it now and then, mainly when they came to curves. She stood on the back bar and lean to help turn the sled.
After several miles they stopped on a rise of land where they could look out over the ocean. There were no trees on this swampy end of the Island, and they could see in all directions. The sky seemed very close and low; a blueish-gray hue of puffy clouds condensed against each other. It wasn’t snowing but you could almost see moisture in the air. Darlene felt the sting of the damp air on her cheeks and wondered if they were as red as Thelma’s.
“Wow, you must be in great shape to keep up with the dogs for so many miles!” Darlene was impressed.
“Years of doing it!” She said lightly. “Besides, then I can eat more! I can eat 6 hamburgers and burn it all off! You should see how much the DOGS eat!!! When they‘re racing they need more than 5,000 calories a day, and almost as much during training! ”
Darlene laughed. “Maybe I should take up mushing! I like to eat!”
Thelma smiled at her, then said, “You can stand over here, and I’ll turn the sled around and we’ll head back. It’s going to be dark before we get there.”
And it was. But the dogs didn’t hesitate. They ran on in the gathering gloom and then in the dark. Even with the heavy robe around her Darlene was getting cold by the time they got back to the village. Carl was waiting nearby with Hendrik, and he stood up and walked over as the sled pulled up.
“Sorry you missed out on a ride!” Thelma said, as she waited for Darlene to climb off the sled. “See you bright and early tomorrow. I have a rental truck, and I’ll load the dogs around 6:00. We’ll be ready to roll by 6:30. See you then!” With a sharp command to the dogs they whisked out of sight.
During the afternoon repairs had been made to the ship. Everyone except Carl and Darlene spent the night on the ship, which expected to sail after daybreak. They said their good-byes on the pier, and Darlene got misty-eyed hugging Igor. They invited him and the others to visit if they made it to Montana some day.
It was still dark when they stood in the cold snow the next morning, watching Thelma finish securing the dogs in the truck. They slid onto the front seat with her and began the drive to St. Johns, 30 miles away. The land was mostly flat and the small rolling hills were barely perceptible. Scrubby bushes and tall grass was the only vegetation, and it poked out of the snow. Once they left the village they didn’t pass another house or building until they turned onto the main highway a few miles from St. Johns.
The truck pulled into the airstrip and parked by a metal hangar with a sign on the door that said “Main Terminal”. They laughed over this as they got out of the truck. A man with a scarf wrapped around his head and neck hurried over from where he’d been sitting in a car with the engine idling.
“I checked everything over yesterday for you. She’s all fueled up and ready. I’ll go start her up and get her warm while you load,” he said.
“Thanks, Grandpa!” Thelma said, then introduced him to Carl and Darlene. “Grandpa grew up here, and he came back after Grandma died a few years ago!”
“Ayup, it’ll always be home!” he said with a crinkly smile. “But at least thanks to her being a musher and coming for the races, I get to see my granddaughter every year!”
“Aw, Grandpa, you know I’d come see you anyway!” she said with a twinkle in her eye. ‘It’d give me an excuse to fly somewhere!” she added mischievously.
“You’re a pilot? I thought you had someone who flew YOU and the dogs!” Darlene exclaimed.
“I’m too independent for that! Nope, I do my own flying!” she was leading dogs to the plane as she talked.
“She went down once. Spent 3 weeks in the back country nursing a broken leg and assorted injuries. She was starting to hike out when we found her,” said the older man. “Took a buncha years off my life. But she knows how to survive out there. Good thing for everyone to know.”
The plane had two seats at the controls and two jump seats behind those. The rest of the fuselage was cargo space, which was mainly taken up by the dogs. Plastic crates of dog food and supplies lined each side.
Darlene offered to take the jump seat, knowing it would be more uncomfortable for Carl than it would be for her. They buckled in and the plane taxied out the runway. Once in the air Thelma circled back over the airstrip, where her Grandpa stood waving. She opened the window and dropped something out. Her timing must have been practiced because it landed almost at his feet.
“Pipe tobacco and mints. He won’t let me give it to him, so we’ve got this tradition that I do this when I leave.” she grinned.
“We’ll have to fuel up in Quebec. There’s a little shop nearby if you want to buy any snacks or anything. I don’t use the international airport. I use one of the smaller airports on the edge of the city. It’s about an hour and a half away.” She stretched her arms and shoulders, one at a time, always watching the dials and gauges, and glancing out the window.
It smelled of wet dog in the plane, but Darlene didn’t really mind. She admired how the dogs had flopped down and stayed put after Thelma loaded them. Each were hooked with a short piece of chain to a metal clip welded to the floor, and Darlene guessed it was a safety restraint.
They landed in Quebec and stretched their legs as they got out. Carl and Darlene walked to the shop to have something to do, and to move around. The prices seemed outlandish until they realized it was priced for Canadian money. They took a few bags of chips and bottles of pop to the register.
“Do you take American money?” Carl asked.
The surly woman sitting on a stool behind the counter looked up from her magazine. “Canadian money IS American money. This is ALL America. Do you mean those ugly green things called money in the UNITED STATES?”
Carl and Darlene were taken back by her attitude. Canadians, in their experience, had always been pleasant people. Oh well, there’s always got to be an exception, they figured. Taking the high road, Carl smiled at her.
“Yes, ma’am, that’s what I mean. Do you take money from the United States? We have not had a chance to exchange for Canadian currency,” he looked at her brightly like an obedient school boy. Darlene almost chuckled.
“Hmph.” The woman reached for their things, added them on the register, then looked at them expectantly. “$28.47.”
“WHAT???” Carl gasped. “For 3 bags of chips and 3 bottles of pop?”
“Take it or leave it,” she shrugged. “When the panic started we were ordered to double prices.”
Carl latched on to that phrase ‘When the panic started’ and asked, “What do you mean, when the panic started?”
She rolled her eyes in annoyance. “Hello! Where have you been, under a rock? After Europe went nuts, people all over the world started buying up all the food and stuff they could. The government put limits on purchases and ordered prices doubled, to slow it down. Of course, they also said they would be taking the extra money as a special tax to fight inflation. Go figure.
“It’s worse down in the states. Business owners are howling and some refuse to comply. The military is in a lot of the cities, supposedly to keep the peace, but some say they’re acting as enforcers.”
Carl stared at her. He pulled out his wallet almost absently, dropped $30 on the counter, and reached for the pop.
Darlene took the chips and they left the shop reeling in shock.
“What’s the matter?” Thelma asked in alarm when she saw them. The man who had pumped the fuel was watching them out of the corner of their eye.
“Um, nothing, I just forgot about the Canadian exchange. We hadn’t expected to need Canadian money. It’s okay, they took our US dollars,” Carl tried to look more relaxed. When the plane was back in the air they related the story to Thelma and told her what they learned.
She was quiet for a moment, then said, “I didn’t show it back there, but I was angry. The price of fuel is twice what it was when I came through two weeks ago on the way to St. Johns. The attendant was rather threatening when I questioned it. I just want to get home.”
“Do you have family in Winnipeg? Parents? Husband? Kids?” Darlene asked.
“There’s my Mom, and I have a little boy. He’s two. His Dad died hopping a freight train to go look for work in the city. We didn’t even have enough money for him to drive. I started racing my dogs locally, determined to win and raise some money. I got lucky. The dogs had belonged to my husband and they’re top quality.”
“Mom got laid off from the store where she worked, and now she watches my son. We grow a garden and have chickens. We trade eggs to a neighboring rancher for grain to feed the chickens. Money is better now, since I’ve won some big races and…” she stopped for a minute. “And some bigger wagers!”
They laughed, and she went on. “We have enough money to be comfortable now, but we’ll never forget those years of nothing. We stock up on extra and plan ahead as much as we can. I will never look at my little boy and tell him we have nothing for dinner. Not ever!”
“You’re a prepper!” Darlene said. “That’s what we’re called, people who prepare against hard times or emergencies. We do it too. It started because we live so far from town that it was impractical to run to the store when we ran out of something. Then Carl resigned his job on the coast and it took a couple years to find steady work in Montana. Things were really lean. If it weren’t for what we had stored and what we were able to grow, along with hunting and fishing, we would have starved.”
“Things are better for us now, though. Carl has a steady seasonal job. We do okay,” she added.
They were quiet for a while, and Darlene drifted off to sleep. Eventually Carl nudged her. “Honey! We’re going to land soon.”
Darlene immediately flashed back to waking on the plane as it was about to land in London and she sat up with a start and gave a cry. Realizing where she was, she sank back in the seat, then told Carl what happened. He reached back and held her hand and mouthed ‘I love you’.
Thelma was a skilled pilot and brought the plane down gracefully. They taxied to a stop at the end of a row of square buildings. A truck was parked there, along with a woman and a boy. Thelma leaped out of the plane and ran to them. Carl and Darlene watched them embrace, then she brought them over to meet them.
“Oh my!” said Thelma’s mother after she got a brief report of their situation. “You’ve been through so much!”
“And miles to go before we sleep,” quipped Carl, quoting a line from a famous poem by Robert Frost.
They were invited to come home with Thelma and her family while they figured out the next step of their journey. They lived on a two-acre farm about a 45 minute drive from the airport. It was surrounded by miles of grain fields. A tiny creek bubbled along one side of the house, and Darlene was surprised it wasn’t frozen. She commented on it.
“Spring-fed. Starts just across the road, and stays warm enough not to freeze until it gets well below zero. One of the best features of the place!” Thelma grinned.
When they got into the house and dropped their packs on chairs at the kitchen table, Darlene asked if they could use the phone to call home. She offered to pay for the call.
“Oh, they’re not letting calls into the states unless they’re official government calls! Even the internet isn’t accessible to the states,” Thelma said regretfully.
Darlene and Carl exchanged an alarmed look, but said nothing.
After a huge dinner of chicken and dumplings, followed by huge slices of cherry pie, they spread maps on the table. A knock sounded on the door, and Thelma left, returning with a grizzled rancher who looked to be around 60. He strolled over to the table and joined in looking at the map. Carl moved his daypack off the chair next to him so the man could sit at the table. As he did, the pirate’s pistol fell out of the unzipped pack. The rancher’s eyes bugged.
“Where did you get THAT?” he asked in wonder, reaching down to pick it up. He cradled it gently and looked it over. “Oh my lord! It’s an Australian Brevet, probably 34 caliber! They’re from around the mid-1800s and quite rare!”
Carl told the story of the pirates and how he came to have the gun. The rancher just kept saying “wow”. Then he asked how much Carl wanted for it.
Carl wasn’t a collector of antique guns, although he did have a small collection of useful guns at home, for hunting and protection. This, however, was an awesome souvenir of their adventure. He hesitated.
“Money isn’t the problem. We need to get home,” he finally said.
“Okay. I’ll trade you a truck for it. I’ve got a 2007 Dodge Dakota. It’s yours,” he offered.
Carl pondered it. He looked at Darlene, who sat quietly, trusting his decision. She was tired and worn, and had been brave through the ordeal. They didn’t need another truck, at least once they got home, but it would get them there. He sighed.
“It’s a deal,” he said quietly. Darlene reached under the table and squeezed his hand. The rancher seemed to know how hard it was for him to make the deal. He said he’d make sure both fuel tanks were full, and send along a can of extra fuel.
“That’ll give you a reach of 500 miles. Oughta get you darn near in sight of your place!” he said.
Carl and Darlene wanted to leave right away, eager to get home before much else happened. Thelma tried to talk them into staying, and even gave her neighbor a hard time for stealing her company away, but they were adamant. They said their good-byes to Thelma, her mother, and the little boy, then got in the truck with the rancher and headed over to his place nearby. He pulled the Dakota out of a shed and drove it over by a fuel tank. When the tanks were full he filled a 5-gallon can and put it in the back of the truck.
He handed the keys to Carl, who pulled the pistol out of his pack and handed it to the rancher. They shook hands and thanked him, then put their daypacks on the backseat of the roomy truck cab.
The rancher had advised them to stay in Canada as long as they could. From what he’d been hearing, it was safer up there. But Carl and Darlene were eager to be on U.S. soil.
They headed south out on Hwy. 75, straight toward the US border 100 miles away. It was an uneventful drive and they reached the border as the sun was setting. They had their passports, so didn’t expect any trouble as they crossed from Manitoba into North Dakota.
How wrong they were! The rancher had signed the truck title and given it to them, which is all Manitoba required, but when the border patrol tried to call the man, no one answered and their story couldn’t be verified. They were confined in a small room while the authorities searched the truck and continued to try and reach the rancher. No one was sure what to do with them. They called bigger offices, all the way to Washington DC.
Darlene and Carl asked if they were allowed a phone call, and they were refused. Finally someone told them they were to be transported to Great Falls for further questioning. Carl’s first impulse was to throw a fit and refuse, but he figured it would just make things worse. He and Darlene allowed themselves to be put into a secured car. Two men in uniforms climbed into the front and they drove away from the border station.
Heading down the Interstate highway Carl was surprised at the lack of traffic. Other vehicles were on the road, but they were few and far between. They had just traveled down a long slope and were about to start up another when
there was a loud “POP” and the car swerved.
The officials up front yelled and pulled their guns, then the driver said “Flat tire.” They pulled to the roadside and got out of the car. Sure enough, the front tire was flat on the driver’s side. One of the officials bent to look at it. He straightened up abruptly and called the other man over. They bent over the tire, which had at least half a dozen nails stuck in it, then stood up and looked around.
A mob of people rose up from below the bank and ran at them. The officials pulled their guns and fired a couple of shots, but the mob reached them and pulled their arms back, removing the guns. The mens’ pockets were searched and wallets taken. While some of them held the officials, the rest turned to the car. They opened the door and saw Carl and Darlene. They were pulled out of the car and part of the mob wanted to search them and take their valuables, but some of the mob said no, they were victims of the beast too, and should be let go.
Before the mob changed their minds, Carl and Darlene ran up the road and angled off into a field. They went over the top of a hill and out of sight, then changed direction a few times to throw off any followers. The ground was windswept, with snow in hollows and the lee side of hills, but mostly bare. It was easy to travel without leaving tracks on the frozen ground, at least to throw off those with a mob mentality. A real tracker could have followed them.
Prepper Fiction Collection: Four Books in One Page 21
