Gone to Ground (22 page)

That was four days ago, and the intervening hours had tested the four children to the limit. For the first two days, Alysa had insisted that they ride only in the dark. Using the map which Christina had taken from Rickards’ office Alysa managed to guide them south of Kingman, avoiding the seekers and annihilation teams. She led them to a forest road leading up into the Hulalapai Mountains, and by some means unknown to Christina managed to keep them going approximately southeast. A one day break from the monsoon activity was all they were given, and several afternoons had found the children huddled in the sleeping bags inside the tent they’d found at the ranch house as wind and rain assailed their shelter as if determined to blow it to the next state.

Now, as the afternoon sun slid slowly down from its noon zenith toward the mountains behind them, Alysa’s lead horse suddenly lifted its head and let loose with a shrill whinny, causing the other five horses to also lift their heads. The small group ground to a halt and Alysa rose in her stirrups, craning her head to try and see what had caught her mount’s attention. Faintly in the distance Christina heard an answering neigh and her heartbeat ratcheted up a notch.

“Alysa, do you see horses up there?” Christina whispered loudly.

Alysa held out a hand behind her, palm facing the rest of the children, signaling them to be quiet. Her horse, originally the most troublesome of the six, had quieted over the last four days of steady riding, but now it grew restive again at the wait. Christina envied Alysa’s easy manner in controlling the red gelding as he fidgeted in place, pawing in frustration. After a moment Alysa turned back toward the others.

“I don’t see anything yet, but its probably just ranch horses, loose in this pasture. Maybe mustangs. Go careful. If it’s wild horses, they may get our horses acting up.

“Cool, mustangs,” said Nick in tones of awe as Ryan nodded in eager agreement. Both boys intently watched the brush and the thickets of mesquite and creosote that had replaced the junipers of the Hulalapais, trying to find where the elusive herd was hiding.

“We’re coming up on a town or something,” Alysa said. “See that narrow line over there? That’s a highway or road. If the map is right, we should be just a bit above Wikieup. We can stop there for the night, if it hasn’t been destroyed, then move on tomorrow morning.”

The small group of horses moved on down the trail, weaving among boulders, joshua trees, creosote and countless other types of desert plants that Christina couldn’t identify. Signs of human habitation became more evident as they crossed several trails left burned into the land by ATV riders, careless of what they were doing to the fragile ecosystem. Several times on the ride Alysa had broken her habitual silence to educate her three citified companions about the way of the land, and one of the things that had surprised Christina the most was how fragile it actually was. It was hard to think of something that was as big and solid as the ground, as fragile and easily damaged.

According to Alysa, a trail used by an ATV or other off road vehicle only a few times could leave an impression that would be visible for years or decades to come.

“My father told me that it was getting so bad nine or ten years ago that the National Forest people wanted to ban ATVs on all but developed roads on some of the public lands, and that if the riders couldn’t follow those rules, then to ban the ATVs completely,” Alysa told them.

“What happened?” asked Nick. He and Ryan had pestered Christina’s parents a long time for ATVs after they went riding with friends one weekend. Her parents had refused on the basis of safety, but now Christina began to wonder if there were other reasons that they hadn’t mentioned.

“Some forests banned them, but the ATV riders went up in arms. It’s actually still, or I guess was still, being fought over. I suppose now that everyone is in the APZs, the argument is pointless.”

Christina thought a long time about those trails after Alysa explained how they were made. Her father had told her that there was a huge dichotomy among people in regards to things like ATVs and not all of it made sense. You had some people singing the environmental song, conserving energy and working hard to live in a way they felt was responsible to the planet. In the past decade more and more ads on TV had jumped on the green bandwagon, touting their products as environmentally friendly, whether or not they actua
lly were.

Then you had the others who lived to please themselves, using resources any way they wanted without regard to the future, or to anyone else using the same resources. These people screamed that the public lands were just that, public, and that they, as members of the public had a right to use them in any manner they saw fit. Their wants came first, and others using the public lands, whether it be for ranching or recreation, were seen as a nuisance. These people treated the land, and everything on it, including corrals and windmills as theirs to use, pollute or destroy as they wished.

Christina remembered her father laughing when he explained this schism to her. Sometimes, he said, you even had a split in the same person. He called these people “environmental schizophrenics.” These were the people who used the compact florescent bulbs in their lights. Who always bought from the organic aisle in the grocery store. Who recycled all their paper, glass and aluminum, then spent the weekends ripping up the land with noisy ATVs or were careless when filling the tanks of their boats and figured that the gas and oil spilled into the waterways wouldn’t matter. He even included those people who planted green lawns or installed flowing waterfalls in desert towns like Las Vegas and Phoenix.

The trail continued downward until it finally broke out of the thick scrub into an area of lower growth plants. Before Christina lay a two lane road leading into a cluster of houses, announcing the presence of the town of Wikieup. Alysa’s horse pealed fourth with another ear splitting whinny, which was quickly answered. Everyone’s head snapped in the direction from which the sound emanated. Before them, on the far side of the road were several more horses, only these ones weren’t wild as Alysa had thought. These horses carried pack saddles and wore halters, and on the lead horse was a man, looking at them with surprise equal to their’s, the sun glinting off the deep red of his hair as he raised his hand to shade his eyes from the early afternoon sun.

A man that Christina knew.     

25

“You have
got
to be kidding!” Maggie stared in horror at the small black cow laying approximately twenty feet in front of her.

“Is she having the calf, Mom?” asked Mark as he stood beside Maggie, holding Lindy’s hand as they watched the cow’s sides heave and a pair of large white hooves bulge out from beneath her tail, only to disappear back inside when the contraction eased up. “O’Reilly said he was afraid she was too little and couldn’t calve on her own.”

“She darned well better be having that calf on her own,” said Maggie, “cause her obstetrician happens to be MIA and I have no intention of acting as a substitute.”

O’Reilly had been gone nearly four days, and Maggie was becoming worried. He’d said that he might be gone for up to a week or a week and a half, but Maggie had held onto an irrational conviction that he’d show up much sooner. Every day that she didn’t hear his horses’ hoofs echoing through the canyon her anxiety increased, as well as her annoyance with herself.

The thing that frustrated her the most was that, for the life of her, she couldn’t decide whether her anxiety was for him, personally, or whether it was the fear that if he’d been captured, she, Mark and Lindy would soon be discovered. The not knowing was driving her mad, and now she was faced with this cow on top if it all.  “What’s an obsta... and obstita... that thing you said, what is it?” Mark asked. He looked from the cow up to Maggie while Lindy pulled at his hand, trying to reach the prostrate bovine.

“An obstetrician is a doctor who delivers babies.”

“Baby calves?”

“No, baby humans. A vet delivers calves. Actually cows deliver calves, unless they’re like Miss Emily here who can’t seem to manage it on her own. Then she needs a vet to help out.”

“Cow, cow, cow. What wrong cow?” Lindy fought to get free of Mark and reach Emily, the name that Mark had given the small cow when Maggie first brought it to Hideaway.

“We don’t have a vet. O’Reilly said he might have to help her have the calf. He’s not a vet, but he said he could 
pull
the calf?”

“I’m seeing a bit of a problem with that plan at the moment, kiddo.”

“What?”

Maggie looked in exasperation at Mark as he watched the cow straining in front of him. “The problem is that O’Reilly isn’t here. I am here. You are here. Lindy is here and Jack and Gypsy are here. None of us who are here, with the possible exception of Emily, have any
idea
how to deliver a calf. The one human we know who does have an idea of how to deliver a calf is conspicuous by his absence.”

“Okay, okay... Geez. How hard can it be? Just grab on and pull, right? You can do it.”

“If it were that easy, it would be hard to justify how expensive it is to get into vet school. For one thing, I’m not sure how much Emily is going to want me messing around with her rear end. From what I remember of child birth, it’s not a time when you want well-meaning but inept help and advice.” Maggie studied the groaning cow in front of her. Two feet. That had to be good, since you would think two would need to come through at once. Big feet, at least to her eyes. That might be bad since the calf attached to them would probably be big as well, and Emily was a small cow.

Maggie took a tentative step toward the animal. Then another, and another. The cow looked around toward her and shook her head, flinging cow snot through the air, but didn’t try to get up. Another few steps and Maggie was at Emily’s rear end, looking down at the wet, sticky mess. Another contraction wracked the heifer and the feet jutted out. Gritting her teeth, Maggie reached down and grabbed them before the contraction ended and they could be drawn back inside, grimacing at the slimy feeling.

The strength required to keep the calf’s feet from disappearing back inside the cow surprised Maggie. She wrapped her hands around the legs above the hooves. The slime covering the limbs made getting a good grip nearly impossible, and her hands quickly began to ache with the effort. When she attempted to pull, she felt as though she was tugging on something permanently attached to the cow, not a presumably removable calf. Emily, deciding that she wasn’t interested after all in having a novice midwife, chose that moment to lunge to her feet, pulling the calf’s legs from Maggie’s hands, whereupon they swiftly vanished back into the nether regions of the cow.

Emily lumbered off several yards before stopping. She pawed the ground, arched her back and emitted a strangled bellow as another contraction took control of her body. The large feet appeared once again, but seemed to make no more progress than before. When the contraction released its hold, they once again slipped back inside.

What do we do now?
Maggie thought, as she stood watching Emily, hands liberally coated with slime hanging limply at her sides. She had to do something. She couldn’t just let the cow die this way. She briefly considered going inside to get O’Reilly’s gun. A swift bullet - assuming she could bring herself to pull the trigger - had to be better than this lingering agony. A look over her shoulder at Mark and Lindy, standing watching her with eyes full of trust put an end to that plan, however. She was going to have to deliver that calf, one way or another.

Closing her own eyes and taking a deep breath, Maggie reached a decision.

“Okay, guys,” she said, turning back toward the children. “Mark, I need you to help me get Emily into those pens behind the barn. We’ll run her up the alley then into that chute at the end. That way we’ll be able to hold her still while I try and get the calf out.” Maggie’s stomach clenched at the thought of what would be coming.

“Then I want you to go back to the house, take Lindy with you, and look through that bunch of old books and magazines that were here when we came.”

“Gotcha. What am I looking for?” Mark answered promptly.

“I think I saw some books about raising cattle. Maybe in one of those books, or in a magazine, there will be information on how to deliver a calf that doesn’t want to be delivered. It looks like we’re about to get a crash course in bovine midwifery.”

Mark nodded avidly, obviously ready to turn and head out on his mission. “Okay, Mom. I look for an article or book and bring it back here. Anything else?

“I don’t know. In all those old movies where the woman is having a baby they say to bring hot water, soap and towels or sheets. That ought to work for a cow as well, I guess.”

“Got it.” Mark turned and started to run toward the house.

“Hey!”

Mark stopped and turned back toward his mother, a questioning look on his face.

“You’ve got to help me get Emily in the chute first.”

“Oh, that’s right. Sorry.” Mark turned back with a sheepish look on his face, towing Lindy behind him. “What should I do with Lindy?”

“Lord, I don’t know. Uh... I know, put her in the big box stall in the barn with Gypsy and Jack. She won’t be happy, but she should be safe for the few minutes it takes us to get Emily rounded up.”

As it turned out, Emily wasn’t overly excited about going into the pens and the few minutes turned into over twenty of hard work. By the time the heifer was safely ensconced in the interconnecting labyrinth of pens and alleys  Maggie and Mark were both out of breath and sweating profusely and Maggie was seriously beginning to reconsider getting the gun, while at the same time wishing that she’d had that much energy when she’d delivered Mark.

From the barn Lindy was shrieking her discontent at her temporary imprisonment joined in a discordant harmony by howls and sharp barks from Gypsy and Jack, who apparently felt that they could do a better job of rounding up cattle than the humans could.

Maggie stood, hunched over, hands on her knees as she panted,  the sweat dripping off her nose.

“Okay, Mark... now... get Lindy and go... to the house and find me a book.”

Mark nodded and turned, heading for the barn where he liberated the toddler and the dogs, then headed for the house, urging Lindy to move faster.

As her heartbeat and respiration gradually returned to normal, Maggie stood up and watched the small black cow as she went through another contraction.

“I guess this is it, girl.” She took a deep breath and stepped through the gate and began pushing the heifer through the alleyway to the chute.