She found Ben unconscious and as cold as ice. His breath was barely detectable under his wet jacket. Somehow he had gotten soaked, the icy air had cooled his body to the degree that Journey was worried. As much as it wouldn’t help Ben, Journey pulled her coat off and tucked it around him. His eyelids fluttered. Ben opened his eyes when he felt hands touching him, and he expected to see the woman or one of the kids. Journey looked down at him. Ben closed his eyes.
“Ben? Ben, can you hear me?”
He nodded slowly. Do you think anything is broken? Are you in pain. He nodded again.
“Something is broken?” She waited for a response. He finally managed to shake his head.
“You’re in pain?”
He answered with barely a nod.
One of the things she never had to deal with was hypothermia, but she recognized the signs. They needed to get Ben to the fire and warm him up before his heart stopped. In an ideal situation, they would start an IV with warm saline, but that wasn’t an option.
Andy and John came back together, and Journey explained what they needed to do.
“As warm as the water is, why can’t we put him in it if we just need to warm him up?”
“It may feel warm to us because the air temperature is so cold, but it’s still far less than body temperature. We’d only be getting Ben wet again and still have to carry him, so let’s just get him to the fire.
Both men nodded, and they made a sling out of the blanket, and while Ben didn’t look comfortable in it, they started across the tree, one man carrying each side. They still didn’t know if he had broken bones or possibly a broken back. Ben had landed hard on the rocks, cushioning the woman. For all they knew, he could have internal damage, and they would only find out when it was too late.
Once they had Ben back at the fire, John sent both boys back down to camp, taking the younger children with them. John and Andy had given up their jackets to the kids. John knew Mary would soon have them clean and fed. He told them to not say anything about Ben, or Lucy would figure a way up the hill.
As soon as the four had left, John and Andy stripped Ben of his clothes completely and zipped the sleeping bag around him. Between the fire and the bag, it was all they could do. Until he woke up, they couldn’t know what his damages were. Journey had inspected his body and found nothing out of line except for the bruising on his back and upper legs. He had a couple of cuts, one on the back of his head, but Journey thought they were superficial and cleaned them and applied bandages.
With Ben taken care of as best she could, Journey went over to the woman. She was lying on the other side of the fire from Ben. Her husband massaged her back and timed her contractions.
It turned out that the woman was already a full two weeks past her expected due date, so there were no worries about having to deliver a premature baby. She had told Journey her other two pregnancies had been easy ones. Other than the fall, and being hungry, she was healthy.
By dusk, Journey sent John back down to camp on Joe. She told him to send Lucy, but be sure to say everything was okay. She also asked him to explain to Mary about their newest addition and see if she could send up blankets, maybe some diapers and something to put on the baby.
After John had left, Journey found she didn’t know what to say to Andy. What he and Ben had done was not only dangerous, but stupid too. Once John had explained everything that had happened, Journey didn’t know whether to hit him for putting himself in danger or praise him for putting others safety before his own. Realistically, she knew they couldn’t have done anything but what they did do, but it made her realize how precarious their hold on life could be.
They could have lost not only the whole family, but Andy and Ben as well.
It was long after dark, when Journey, having just checked on Janice, heard the familiar sounds of horses. The jingle of tack and creak of saddle leather told them that at least Lucy and probably one of the boys was coming to their camp.
When Andy, having heard the same noises stood and faced away from the fire did Journey realize the horse sounds were coming from the wrong direction.
She stepped up beside Andy and reached for the familiar shape of her holster. It wasn’t there. She was unarmed, and by his look of dismay, so was Andy.
There was nowhere to run and hide even if they could. She had Ben, who they couldn’t leave behind and a woman who was going to deliver a baby at any second, she would never abandon.
“Shame on me,” Andy whispered.
The woman moaned, and Journey knew it was time.
Chapter Ten
As Sam and Gina approached the area they knew to be Sam’s home, Sam reined in his horse. They had been faced with the dilemma whether to stop and pick up the other horses at Matt’s or continue on home. After listening to Gina go on about the importance of getting the chickens home, he had agreed with her, and they headed back to the hay barn. He planned on heading directly back to the McMillan place as soon as they’d dropped the chickens.
He was going to load the feed barrels, the other chickens, with the use of Gina’s handy cage and anything else they could find in the camp trailer and use the tractor to bring it back to the home farm.
They agreed they couldn’t afford to lose the horses or anything else they had scrounged up.
One of the biggest finds had been the handpump and Sam had plans to remove the unit if he could and cap the wellhead.
The fact that there were people east of them shooting had spooked him, and while he tried not to show Gina, he was worried. He didn’t understand why people would be coming to the west rather than toward Missoula or Billings.
Sitting and looking at what he was sure had to be a man-made fire, “What do you think? Go on or go around?”
“Oh hell no. We need to find out who it is and if we can, find out why they’re here.”
“You plan on turning Annie Oakley on me and arresting the varmints?”
“You can be such an ass sometimes. Do you want people camped so close to our home?”
“No I don’t, but maybe it’s better to pretend they’re not there until daylight. We can just cut down and go by the hay barn, drop your chicken’s off and go get the other horses.”
Gina sighed, she was too tired to argue, but she wanted to know who the people at the fire were. “Tell you what, you stay and hold the horses and I’ll creep a little closer and see who it is. I won’t interact, just observe them for a few minutes.”
“Jesus Gina, you hold them, and I’ll go see. Besides, if they’re locals, you wouldn’t know them anyhow and I probably would.”
Sam was only gone for a few minutes when he came jogging back. “It’s Journey and some other people. You won’t believe this, but it looked like she just delivered a baby,” he said in disbelief.
Gina groaned, “Leave it to her. Sometimes I think that woman goes out of her way to complicate my life.”
“Make that all of our lives. Let’s go find out.”
Before they got too close, Sam hollered, “Hello the camp. He saw two people standing and facing them as if their silent approach had not been quite as silent as he’d thought.
Sam thought the silhouette of the tall, thin body, wearing the cowboy hat, who waved to come on in, had to be Andy. John was as tall, but much thicker in girth. They rode up to the camp and climbed down.
Gina looked at the woman curled up by the fire and the man sitting beside her. He held a blanket-wrapped bundle in his arms.
Across the campfire, she saw someone wrapped up in a sleeping bag. Eyebrows raised, she looked at Journey.
“Ben. He had an accident today.”
“Why is he up here and not at camp?”
Andy spoke up, “We had to rescue our neighbors, and we don’t have a way to get him back to camp yet. We thought we’d wait until daylight.”
Sam walked closer to the man and woman on the ground, “I know you. You’re across the freeway,” Sam looked a little puzzled, “or at least you were. How the h
ell did you manage to survive that…I thought the lava ran through…well shit. I’m not sure what I’m trying to say here. He reached down and shook the man’s hand. “Mike? Mike Barber? Is that right?”
The man nodded, “This is my wife, Janice. And this,” he held the bundle up, “is our newest family member thanks to your friend Journey. She doesn’t have a name yet, but we’re working on it. Our other two kids are at your camp with Mary.”
“She made quite and entrance.” Journey agreed. She walked up and hugged Gina, “I’m so glad you’re back safe. Lucy has been having a hissy fit. I guess she thought you guys would be home this morning.”
“We didn’t say when we’d be home and as soon as I drop these chickens at the camp we’re going back and get the other horses and some things we salvaged from Matt’s.”
“Chickens?” Journey laughed, “Oh my God. We were talking about finding the chickens from Matt’s just this morning. Where are they? Where are you going to put them?”
Gina pointed to the covered cage hanging off the side of her saddle. “Sam says we can put them in the hay barn in the bathroom for right now until we can build something for them at camp.”
Journey looked at Andy, “You better tell them.”
Sam and Gina looked at Andy. “You guys really need to talk to John, but a quick version is, he wants to move our camp to the hay barn. He said it would provide better accommodations for all of us.”
Sam nodded, “I wondered about going there. It’s actually a great idea. Easier to keep warm and we have feed there for the animals. I thought about using hay bales and the tent to wall off more of the structure. Maybe eventually finding enough timber to wall it all in.”
Gina cleared her throat, “That’s all fine and dandy, but we still need to get back and pick up the other horses.”
Sam looked east and saw the lighter sky along the top of the mountains. “She’s right, but what you guys need to know is that people are heading this way and if the gunshots we heard indicate anything, it’s that they aren’t friendly.”
Gina carried the chicken cage over and set it close to the fire. She had draped the shelter half over it to keep the night air off them, and Sam had said if it was dark they wouldn’t make a fuss. He was right because Gina hadn’t heard anything out of them the whole ride and she peeked under the cover to make sure they were still alive. When she set it down they had spread out some, both roosters still wore the socks on their head, but she could still feel their eyes glaring at her. She dropped the nylon back over the cage.
“Nasty little buggers.” She rubbed her hand where the blood still continued to leak whenever she touched it, which was every time her coat cuff rubbed on it.
Journey noticed Gina wipe her hand on her jeans, “Let me see that. What did you do?” she asked looking at the long scratches.
“Macho man over there let me catch the rooster and didn’t tell me he came equipped with razorblade toenails.”
“Aw geez. Let me at least disinfect it and cover it for you. We don’t need an infection right now.”
Gina nodded at Ben, “Is he going to be alright?”
Journey nodded as she cleaned the worst of the scratch, “He will be. He’s going to be pretty sore for a while, but mostly I think he was suffering from hypothermia.”
“How?”
“It’s a long story, and I still can’t believe today even happened. You guys go and do what you’ve got to do and come back to the hay barn. I’m pretty sure we’ll all be moving there today. Tonight you can tell us everything that happened to you, and Mike can tell their story.”
“What makes you think anything happened to us. We went and caught some chickens.”
Journey stopped and faced her friend, “Don’t think I’m stupid Gina. I recognize that look in your eyes. Something happened to put it there.”
“Aw, you don’t know what you’re talking about. But we do need to go. If you can find the makings for one, you might want to rig up a travois to get Ben down to the hay shed.”
“Great minds do think alike. Andy and I were just talking about it before you two rode in out of the dark.”
“Yeah, well you might want to move him as soon as you can. Those people we heard earlier, are probably coming this way and from the firepower we heard so you don’t want to be sitting out here in the open. You tell John to get secure, and we’ll be back as soon as we can. Should only take a couple of hours to make the round-trip.”
Journey nodded, “I guess we better make two and get a couple of horses up here. I can’t expect Janice to walk right now. I think she’s still in shock, but we’ll talk when you get back.”
Gina nodded and went to climb on Mack. Sam joined her, and they rode off back to Matt’s ranch. The sun, or what would pass for it that day, was just rising above the horizon when the barn came into sight. The weak sunshine did little to warm the air, and the temperature continued to plummet.
Once there, they didn’t waste any time. Sam pumped two of the five-gallon buckets full to water the horses and set to work, removing the pump handle. He thought they could use the pump assembly on the well at the hayshed. He didn’t know for sure, but it would guarantee them having another water source and a way to access it, should they ever need it.
Gina gave the horses water, removed the hobbles from Bess and tied her to a post. With both pack horses tacked she began to fill the panniers. From under the bottom cupboard, Gina pulled out a stack of folded burlap sacks. She set them aside, they would be the last to be packed and only if there was room. Right then she couldn’t think what they could be repurposed for, but she bet someone would have ideas.
All of the hiking gear went into one side of the pack saddle as well as the brushes, spare bits of bridles and halters. Gina left nothing out. When the room was empty, Gina did one last check and grabbed the stack of bags. Gina lifted the lantern off the hook it hung from, and was about to blow the lantern out when she realized they could use the hook too. In with the grooming equipment, Gina found the hoof pick she remembered putting in and used it to remove the hook from the ceiling cross beam.
She would get Sam to carry the dynamite to the well house. It made her nervous just thinking about it.
The whole time she was gathering, Gina could hear the chickens above her head in the loft, but without her cage, Gina couldn’t see any way to take the chickens with them. If Sam were right, which she didn’t doubt him, the chickens would be gone if they ever returned.
She was standing in the shed row between the stalls listening to them when Sam came in. He cocked his head and nodded, “You want to try and catch them?”
Gina laughed and rolled her eyes, “Then what? Are you going to let them ride your horse?”
Sam reached for the burlap sacks she had trapped under her arm. “Nope, I’m going to put them in one of these.”
“Oh! I never thought of doing that. I was thinking of using them if we have to go find grain some day.”
“Well, I guess they can do double duty then. Today they will carry chickens.”
Her voice low so she wouldn’t scare off the chickens, Gina asked, “Are these going to be a wild as the other ones?”
Sam followed her up the ladder to the loft, “Those weren’t wild. You probably scared the crap out of them. I‘m sure they weren’t expecting hands to grab hold of their legs in the dark. Let's see where these ladies are before we scare them off too.”
Rays of light shone through the cracks between the boards giving them enough light to see. Sam found two hens sitting on nests in the middle of the haystack. A couple more sat on the rafters above their heads. Sam reached down and wrapped his hands around one of the hens, and she didn’t so much as let out a squawk. Gina held the bag out to him, and he deposited her inside. Looking into the hen’s nest, she saw that she had at least a dozen eggs under her and thought about taking them too.
Sam picked the other hen off her nest and held her out. She had eggs too. Gina started to open another sack an
d held it out.
“Put her in the same one.” She opened the first sack, and he deposited the hen.
“Sam, should we take the eggs too?”
He shook his head, “They’re probably no good.”
“I didn’t mean for eating. What about if they hatch and have no mother?”
“They won’t hatch. Look around, there’s no rooster.”
“Oh,” Gina laughed. “I never even thought about that.”
Sam had to climb up on the hay, but he removed five more hens. With the two from the nests, they now had seven. Gina had put three hens in one bag and four in the other. Sam used a piece of twine to tie the tops closed and then tied the two ends together.
“We can hang them over one of the saddles or off a saddle horn.”
“You don’t think they’ll smother in there?”
“Quit worrying, they’ll be fine.”
By the time they’d loaded up and mounted, there was nothing but hay left behind. Barn tools had been the last to go on, tied in the gully between the panniers.
“What about the camp trailer and the tractor?”
“I’ll see if Andy or John will come back over this afternoon. We can use both of them.”
“Why not take them now? Can’t you pull the trailer with the tractor like you did with the horse trailers?”
“We could, but that would leave you with three extra horses to take back.”
“Sam! Tie them head to tail, and I’ll be okay. It’s not like you’re going to go off and leave us behind.”
It took another half hour for Sam to hook up. He poured one of the five-gallon cans of diesel into the tractor and declared them ready to go.
“The feed barrels? Weren’t you going to put them inside that thing?” Gina asked pointing at the trailer.
“Nope. Tomorrow or the day after, someone can pull the flat trailer back and get them. They won’t fit through the door anyhow.”
Sam was right, the barrels were fifty-gallon drums, and the doorway was too narrow to fit them through. Maybe when they got them, they would bring the dynamite too. Gina knew Sam hated to leave it behind, and so did she. She hoped they were not leaving ammunition behind that could later be used against them.
Beyond the New Horizon (Book 2): Desperate Times Page 13
