Backwater (15 page)

I shone the flashlight against the wall, looked at Jo’s gray face, half-closed lids. She looked back at me bravely as Malachi stood by her side.

“Aunt Jo, I need information. Would the rangers come to see if you’re okay?”

“They haven’t yet,” she said softly.

“Is there any way to call for help?”

Jo shook her head. “Lord, I’m sorry, Ivy.”

“It’s not your fault.”

I pushed off the gnawing fear that we were going to die.

Felt a wave of sickening panic.

Law school teaches you not to panic
, Dad used to say.
Never allow panic in your mind. Steel yourself, do whatever you must do to remain calm. Panic causes men to do foolish things. Circumstances usually point to the next appropriate action
.

Where did that come from?

The legal version of “Use fear, don’t let it use you.”

I took a deep breath of courage, faced my situation square.

Jo was in serious shape.

There was no way to call for help.

I looked madly around the broken cabin.

The Franklin stove was still pumping heat. I threw more logs inside.

“It’s going to be okay, Aunt Jo.”

She shook her head. “Cut it open,” she directed weakly.

“What?”

She pointed to her injured leg. “Need to look,” she said.

“You mean cut your long underwear?”

She nodded. I took my pocket knife, gently sliced through the material from her hip down to her knee. I shone the flashlight on her leg and stepped back at what I saw. Her hip to her knee was swollen an angry purple. Her thigh was bent where it should have been straight. Little bumps were on the skin. It looked bad.

“Tell me,” she insisted.

I told her.

“I might be bleeding internally,” she said. “Leg’s probably broken.”

I scanned the bookcase, looking for the first aid book.
Where was it? Shelf after shelf. I saw it in the far corner finally next to an old Bible. I ran to it, looked up internal bleeding. I stared at the words on the page.

Purplish swelling
.

Internal hemorrhaging
.

Get the victim to a hospital immediately. Can be fatal
.

The flames in the Franklin stove spat and sputtered with heat.

“I’m moving you closer to the heat, Jo.”

“Can’t move.”

“I know, but you need to stay warm.”

“You, too …”

“I will.” I tugged at the rope of the sled and pulled Jo gently forward. Malachi jumped in front of the sled, looked at me, but I looked away.

“Okay,” I said. “That’s better. We’ve got firewood for a month. We’ve got food. We’ve got a hole in the roof the size of a Chevy Suburban.”

“We’ve got each other,” Jo tried bravely, then sank back and closed her eyes.

“
No sleeping!
” I shouted. “
We’ve got to keep talking. If you fall asleep
…” I didn’t say
you’ll die
.

“Your father …” Jo began, “know what he said when you were born?”

“I … no …”

“Said you were the toughest kid he’d ever seen.”

“My father said that?”

“Told everyone …”

“He did?”

“Said,” Jo said with great effort, “you could chew nails you were so tough. Called you Nails.”

“Really?”

Nails Breedlove. I scrunched closer to the fire, watched it beginning to melt the snow in the room.

I layered on every piece of clothing I could find to keep me and Jo warm. The fire was helping, but the gaping hole in the roof wasn’t. The falling snow was melting in the cabin, making the floor terribly wet.

Malachi began to whine.

“No whiners,” I snarled.

Malachi whined, looked up.

“Don’t,” I said, and felt Jo’s forehead. “You’re very hot, Aunt Jo.”

“In there.” Jo pointed to the cupboard. I climbed over the mess, found Tylenol, filled a cup with water from a bucket, brought it to Jo, who gulped three pills down. The fire was almost out. I headed for the door to get more logs.

Another wolf whine, scratching paws.

A creak in the roof.

I looked up.

The huge tree lying on the cabin seemed to be slipping through. It creaked, cut through more roof.

“
No!
” I leaped to action, opened the door, pulled Jo and the sled out into the cold and across the porch, with her crying in pain.

Malachi escaped within inches as the giant tree inched its way down, crashing through the roof, the walls, and took the last of the cabin with it.

I looked at the collapsed, smashed cabin, the smoldering Franklin stove that had been doused with mounds of snow from the roof. The huge pine lay flat across it like a giant who’d smashed a little house made of Lincoln Logs. Jo’s pained face looked away to the swirling mass of snow. Another tree had fallen right in front of the bird hospital, not doing any damage, but blocking the entrance.

“Tell me what you want me to do!” I shouted.

“I’m … thinking.”

I stuck my face close to hers and screamed, “
You tell me what to do, Aunt Jo, and I’ll do it. I’ll do it!
”

“The chapel,” she said thickly.

I yanked the sled through the thick snow to the chapel door.

*    *    *

It was freezing in there, but at least we were protected. I found the wooden matches by the hanging lantern—took three tries to light one. The lamp beamed a shaft of light across Jo in the sled. The wooden cross cast a shadow on the far wall;
the holly that had seemed so perfect yesterday now seemed like a funeral wreath. Jo was getting worse. Her voice was slurred, she was shivering, haggard.

Get the victim to a hospital immediately. Can be fatal
.

“Keep warm,” Jo said painfully, beating her hands together.

I kept moving. We were going to freeze in here.

Jo looked at me weakly.

“Maybe we’ll get rescued,” I offered.

“They think we’re safe …”

I felt a deep, sick feeling.

I turned away, tears pouring from my eyes, half freezing as they rolled down my cheek. My brain was frozen, my feet were wet and cold. I looked back at Jo; her eyes were closing.

“
Move!
” I shouted, slapping her hands together. “
Fight!
”

“Can’t …”

“
You can!
” my voice bellowed through the chapel. “
You will fight this! Is that clear?
”

“
Sound like Dan!
”

“
Good! We could use him right now. Do you know what he always said to me? When you look something straight in the eyes, you can fight it.
”

Decide you’re going to make it.

I batted my hands together, marched in a little circle like a prisoner in solitary.

I went outside, clanged the chapel bell for help until I realized there was no one who would come.

It was up to me.

“When it clears, Aunt Jo, we’re going to the lake. You show me the quickest way across the ice to the ranger station.”

*    *    *

The storm stopped.

I looked at the trees heavy with snow.

Jo was gray, shivering.

I had put on the snowshoes and was now pulling the sled through the tall trees, walking on top of the new powder, feeling close to dead. Malachi was running ahead. Shafts of sun broke through the trees.

I was out of my mind to be trying this.

“Follow him,” Jo said.

This isn’t a Lassie movie
.

I followed the wolf anyway.

He’d get a little far ahead and would sweep back around like a sheepdog.

“Good boy,” Jo said.

What about me?

I kept pulling, blisters raw, hands frigid, snow and snot frozen on my face.

I pulled the sled.

“Stop,” Jo said. Her eyes were half closed. We looked out over the snow-covered frozen lake.

I found a big, heavy branch, threw it hard on the ice.

I stepped on the ice. It seemed solid. I jumped to make sure.

Malachi ran on the ice and headed across. “Follow him,” Jo said softly.

Fear pounded in my throat.

“Don’t think,” Jo said thickly. “Do it.”

I couldn’t seem to move. Given the choice of where to die, I’d rather pick frozen land over frozen water.

I don’t know where I’m going
.

I don’t know how to do this!

My hands were freezing, my wet feet were going numb. I wasn’t supposed to get wet or tired, Mama said. I didn’t think I could walk at all, much less pull something.

“God …” My head went down.

Malachi came up to me, whining. I looked away. He was going to wait until I was half dead and then start chomping.

I stepped onto the ice. My whole body was shaking. Malachi raced ahead and then doubled back to look at me.

I pulled the sled across the snow, felt my snowshoes slip under me.

I fell hard.

I shook the image of Jo and me drowning in frigid water from my mind.

I got up, brushed myself off, started again.

My body screamed for rest.

The temperature was dropping. I’d made it half-way across the frozen lake when I heard the sickening sound.

I froze as I felt ice move beneath my feet.

It was cracking.

My body shook in great gales of tears.

We were finished.

I stood as still as I could.

Malachi barked incessantly.

I was too afraid to silence him.

I remembered reading a book about people dying on Mt. Everest. How the cold swept through them making them confused and weak, how their fingers went numb one by one and then couldn’t move.

I didn’t move.

Tried to muster strength, wisdom. Three generations of Breedlove women had been tough-fisted pioneers, managing alone in the wilderness.

“
Help!
” I screamed, throwing back my head. “
Help!
”

I knew there was no one to hear.

My throat was parched and dry from no water, my head was stinging in pain from fear and cold.

I screamed until I couldn’t scream anymore.

I was going to die too young in the middle of a frozen mountain lake on New Year’s Day.

“Save it,” Jo whispered, trying to look brave, but her bravado didn’t fool me. We were as stuck as any two human beings had ever been.

Malachi sat up, cocked his head, listened.

Another part of the ice cracked.

Malachi looked to the shore, whined.

A huge wind blew stinging ice crystals in my eyes. I couldn’t see.

“
Breedlove
,” a voice shouted from far away, “
what are you doing?
”

I jolted to attention, wiped my eyes clear, looked madly across the expanse of snow and trees.

Mountain Mama was standing on the shore.

She was the most beautiful sight I’d ever seen, even though she was snow–encrusted and very irritated.

“
I’m trying to survive!
” I shouted.

“
I’ve been looking everywhere for you! I told you I’d be back to pick you up!
”

“
Gee, I’m sorry, when the cabin was crushed by a mammoth tree, there wasn’t much to keep us there!
”

I was beginning to sense the loss of feeling in my fingers and toes.

“
What’s your situation?
” she demanded.

I thought rescuers were supposed to be compassionate.

“
The ice is cracking!
” I shouted.

“
Everywhere?
”

If it was cracking everywhere I wouldn’t be here. “
Just some places, and Josephine’s leg is hurt bad!
”

Jo raised a brave hand.

“
Let’s think about our options!
” Mama cried.

I looked out at the snowy expanse of lake. “
We have options?
”

“
You’re alive, aren’t you?
”

“
So far!
”

“
Then you’ve got options!
”

Mountain Mama walked back and forth along the shore, thinking about my options.

“
How’s the ice behind you?
”

That was easy. “
Cracked!
”

“
How ’bout in front of you?
”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out. I was about to put my foot down when Malachi started barking crazily. I knew not to put my foot down there.

Then, like lightning, Malachi leaped to the far left of where I was about to put my foot, and moved nimbly across the ice, which didn’t seem to crack.

He seemed to look back at me to follow.

Now another voice carried like an amplifier across the lake.

“
Ivy!
”

I looked up.

Jack was waving wildly from the shore!

My heart flipped.

I couldn’t believe it!

He started to put his foot on the ice.

“
Jack, no! It’s not hard enough! You’ll fall through!
”

My voice, I shuddered. It didn’t even sound like me.

“
I think the wolf knows where the ice is thin!
” Jack shouted.

Jack was truly wonderful, but he did get a D in Search and Rescue. I looked to Mountain Mama.

“
It’s possible!
” she shouted.

“
He knows!
” Jack hollered. “
Wolves have great sensitivity! They’ve been known to lead people across dangerous ice!
”

I looked to Malachi, who jumped back to me without the ice cracking once.

“Good boy,” I said to him, and actually patted his head.

I shouted to Jack. “
Won’t it be too heavy with the sled?
”

Jack yelled back that the sled spread the weight out over much more of the ice. “
Get on your hands and knees to pull it, Ivy! That will spread your weight out, too!
”

Mountain Mama shouted that the whole thing was risky.

Jo sighed with pain. “Don’t know … how much more I’ve got.”

She began to shiver violently and her speech was slurred. She tried taking her jacket off. She was losing it.

“Jo, you can’t! You’re hurt!”

Malachi moved toward Jo, nuzzled her face, which seemed to quiet her down.