Aquifer: A Novel (12 page)

The morning mist was just beginning to rise as the first rays of sunlight peeked over the mountain ridge and began filtering down through the trees at Clayton’s Jack’s Fork River Campsite. It wouldn’t take long for the morning dew to burn off.

Tina’s Jeep pulled to a stop as she parked in a stall in the campground’s common parking area. The top of the Jeep was down, exposing its black padded roll bars. Tina stepped out of the Jeep and sauntered over to Clayton’s campsite.

Clayton and Larry were seated at a camp table with their backs toward the common parking area, reviewing various charts and data tables. They were deeply engrossed in discussing the statistical findings of their recent field work and did not hear Tina approaching. When just a few feet away, Tina changed her pace, straightened her back and assumed a very business-like demeanor.

“Good morning. Tina’s Ozark Tour Guide Service . . . at your service,” she jovially announced.

“Well!” said Larry looking up from his work and turning to see her, a little surprised. “And a very good morning to you. I was hoping you’d show up.”

Tina continued rather formally and somewhat aloof, “Unfortunately, on such short notice I couldn’t get any of the regular guides, they were all booked, sooo . . .” She tilted her head to the side and flashed Larry a wide flirtatious smile while shrugging her shoulders. “I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.”

“Then this must be my lucky day,” replied Larry.” He turned to Clayton, who was trying to conceal a smirk, and said with a broad smile and a wink, “Don’t wait up. I have a feeling I won’t be back till late.”

“Oh, but I will. We have work to do after dark,” Clayton reminded him. “Be back by dusk.”

*

Fifteen minutes later Tina and Larry had joined a group of ten tourists standing on the back porch of the red Mill House at the basin of Alley Spring. The group was clustered around a lady Park Ranger who was giving a lecture. The porch extended out over a portion of the mill pond, allowing tourists to look down at the spillway gates and to see the water turbine that powered the mill in years past.

Unlike most Ozark mills which had used water wheels, chutes and flumes to harness water-power to drive their equipment, the grist mill at Alley Spring had used a totally submerged turbine that was driven by the river that exited the spring. It also used steel rollers rather than stone grist mills to grind its various grains. The state-of-the-art system had been the most advanced technology in its day when it was originally installed in 1893.

The mill operators became quite wealthy in a short period of time because of the increased efficiency of this new technology. At the height of its production period, the turbine powered eight roller mills, allowing it to produce over ten tons of flour daily. However, the mill had not been in service since electricity was brought into the valley in the 1940s. Its only purpose now was to serve as a tourist attraction and historical preserve.

The lady Park Ranger addressed the small group of excited tourists and began a lecture about the spring’s history and its water source. “Of all the springs in Missouri, the coloration of the water in Alley Spring is the most unique. The richness of the turquoise-blue color is caused by an abundance of limestone that is dissolved in the water. The dissolved calcium refracts the sunlight, diffuses the blue spectrum and reflects it back to the surface. The pool is a funnel-shaped spring basin with a depth of only about thirty-two feet. Then the spring channel cuts back under the limestone bluff where the water comes from an underground cave that goes for many miles. Scuba divers have mapped the first mile of the cave which we have reproduced in a brochure you can get at the gift shop inside the mill house.”

While the ranger continued with her lengthy lecture, Larry opened his camera bag and removed his 35 mm single lens reflex digital camera. He then removed the telephoto lens and replaced it with his wide-angle lens. The ranger continued speaking while Larry, playing the part of the tourist, began snapping pictures of the spring basin and its surrounding area. Unnoticed by the ranger and the other tourists was the fact that Larry was actually circling around Tina and making sure that she was the focal point of every frame before he snapped the shutter.

Though the scenery behind her was truly magnificent, back-dropped by the submerged turbine with the spring’s sapphire blue, 150 feet in diameter, smooth as glass lagoon in the background, Larry was nevertheless more interested in capturing every nuance of Tina’s features as she leaned against the railing of the mill porch.

A little over half of the lagoon’s circular pool was circumscribed by a one hundred foot high, slightly concaved, horseshoe-shaped limestone bluff. At the top of the bluff, near the center of the horseshoe bend, a small waterfall trickled water over the edge. Plunging toward the base of the bluff, the tiny droplets nearly evaporated on their way down, causing a slight misting effect of gentle rainfall landing upon that end of the otherwise still lagoon.

“There are hundreds of springs in this area,” continued the Park Ranger. “Most of them receive their water from the local karst topography. However, some of the larger springs receive a portion of their water from the large underground transcontinental aquifer that brings water down from as far north as The Great Lakes and Canada. This aquifer supplies water to much of our country and it is believed that it even extends down into Mexico and South America. The aquifer connects much of our country’s water supply, from New York to Los Angeles.

“Missouri in particular is a complex system honeycombed with caves, grottos, sinkholes, springs, and rivers, many of which are fed from the aquifer. Almost one fourth of all the artesian spring water in America can be found within fifty miles of where you are standing, producing enough water to provide for all the culinary water needs of every person in America . . .”

The Park Ranger’s interesting, though admittedly dry, lecture continued as Tina led Larry down the back steps of the mill porch, away from the crowd, to the six-foot-wide dirt path that extended around the perimeter of the spring, As they approached the path Larry heard the ranger say something about the Delaware Indians becoming frightened of evil spirits and leaving the area when the spring suddenly stopped flowing and the waters were sucked back down the tunnel that fed the spring from the bottom of its basin. But then Tina’s hand brushed against his, their fingers intertwined and embraced, and he suddenly lost all interest in what the Ranger was saying. Though it was the middle of the day, the overhead arching tree branches of the dense forest kept the path cool and shady.

“Isn’t this just beautiful?” she beamed, gazing across the lagoon as they lazily strolled down the path. “I love the Ozarks.”

Larry stopped walking, turned, and looked straight into her eyes. “I never knew such beauty existed,” he replied.

Both of them seemed a little uncomfortable at his boldness. Tina looked away and they awkwardly continued walking again, though it was obvious that Tina had enjoyed Larry’s comment.

When they reached the midpoint of the perimeter trail, near the center of the horseshoe bluff which majestically rose from the water’s edge, they stopped momentarily to gaze back across the millpond. Its glassy smooth surface formed a giant, semi-translucent, turquoise-blue reflecting mirror. Not far to their right and thirty-two feet under water, the spring basin was fed by water gushing from the submerged cave tunnel exiting from the base of the bluff.

“Look!” said Tina, pointing to a small furry creature swimming across the millpond. It was headed right at them and wasn’t more than fifty feet from the water’s edge.

“He’s a cute little varmint,” Larry commented.

“He’s not a varmint,” she corrected. “He’s a muskrat. There’s lots of ‘em around here.”

Larry continued to watch the muskrat swim toward them, but Tina’s gaze was momentarily distracted by a hawk. When the muskrat was within twenty feet of the bank it dove for the bottom. The ripples caused by its dive distorted his visibility, but Larry was sure he saw something large and dark dart out from the mouth of the underwater cave tunnel, grab the muskrat, and then immediately retreat to the recesses of the cave opening.

“Did you see that?” he asked.

“See what?”

“Uh, nothing,” he replied, realizing how foolish his question would appear since there are no underwater predators in the Ozarks large enough to take down a muskrat. After all, it had all happened so fast and the swirling motions of the water made him unsure of what he had seen. “I guess the ripples in the water were just playing tricks on my eyes.”

“You talk like you’ve never been in the mountains before. Where are you from?” she asked, grabbing his hand and leading him toward the remainder of the perimeter path.

“I’ve lived all my life in New York City, the Bronx actually, except for my schooling in St. Louis . . . even though I was a Boy Scout as a kid, I’ve never really spent much time in the
great outdoors
. . . but I love the ocean. I spend as much time there as I can.”

“What do you mean?” she laughingly asked.

“I love whales. I spent much of my free time back home watching them and recording their songs. I have quite a tape and CD collection of whale songs, mainly humpbacks.”

They climbed a series of stone steps chiseled out of the limestone bluff wall on the far side of the bluff as they continued their walk around the spring's lagoon.

“That’s wonderful! I’d like to hear them sometime. But, how did you ever get into frog studies? You don’t seem the herpetologist type,” she laughingly prodded.

“Wow, I’m impressed,” Larry chuckled. “You actually know what the word means. And no! I don’t intend to devote my life to the study of frogs.”

“Then how’d you get hooked up with Dr. Clayton for the summer?”

“Well it’s kind of a long story. I want to be a medical doctor, a neurologist to be specific. My favorite aunt died of a brain tumor. I was very close to her. I watched her suffer as the debilitating effects of the tumor spread throughout her body.” Larry gazed across the lagoon momentarily as his thoughts reflected upon that experience and his emotions rose in his throat. Gaining his composure, he continued. “So, I want to learn more about how to help people with that condition. After I got into med school I began studying some of the latest research and learned that some species of Amazon frogs secrete a substance that helps to either eliminate or reduce the size of certain types of brain tumors.”

“Sounds really . . .
technical
,” she said while wrinkling her nose and drawing the corners of her mouth into an innocent, disarming smile that revealed a genuine interest in what he was saying.

“Well I guess it is, but if I can extract and chemically identify this substance, then isolate it, and finally synthesize it, we could help a lot of people. Then Dr. Mclninch, one of my medical school committee members, told me about this summer internship that opened up with Dr. Clayton and his research with frogs, and I jumped at the chance.”

Tina laughed, “No pun intended I’m sure.”

Larry chuckled and smiled a wide jovial smile as he slowed his gait. “So here I am – a boy from the Bronx learning about the Ozark backwoods.” Larry stopped, turned to face Tina and stared directly into her eyes as his jovial smile faded and he became rather serious, “. . . and I’m finding that there is a lot of unexpected beauty down here.”

Tina blushed and changed the subject. “I think it’s time to continue your Ozark tour.”

=/\=

C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN

Barber Shop

The makeup of the barbershop discussion group changed from day to day and from hour to hour within a day. Some of its participants showed up more frequently than others, and certainly more frequently than their need for a haircut. Bill Jackson was one of the most ardent participants. He usually made an appearance at least twice a week, for an hour or two, just to talk and to rub shoulders with other men in the town.

This Saturday morning’s discussion started out as usual with the various weather prognosticators forecasting daily conditions for the coming week. The topic however, quickly changed to a discussion of the “meteorite” crash of two nights earlier.

“I tell ya the military's up there doin’ some kinda secret research,” Bill emphatically stated.

“Noooo, they're not! It says right here in the paper that an asteroid hit beyond Blue Spring and a military unit from Ft. Leonard Wood is doing cleanup work,” stated another man who was reading the
Current Wave
newspaper. “It says right here that they’ll be there most of the summer cleanin’ things up.”

“Yeah, I hear they got the entire area cordoned off. Ya can’t get within a mile of the place,” another man added.

“Come on!” interjected Bill. “Surely ya don't believe that the army’s up there just doing cleanup work from some asteroid that strayed off course! There certainly wouldn’t be anything secret about that. Look, I spent time in the army. I know what they do. If it was something that simple then why won’t they let us up there?” he asked rhetorically.

“They said the asteroid is radioactive. They gotta neutralize it to make it safe,” explained Zeek.

“For cryin’ out loud Zeek – asteroids aren't radioactive. I tell ya, they're up to somethin’,” exclaimed Bill.