Smoky Mountain Mystery 01 - Out on a Limb

• Out on a Limb
  
• Chapter 1
  
• Chapter 2
  
• Chapter 3
  
• Chapter 4
  
• Chapter 5
  
• Chapter 6
  
• Chapter 7
  
• Chapter 8
  
• Chapter 9
  
• Chapter 10
  
• Chapter 11
  
• Chapter 12
  
• Chapter 13
  
• Chapter 14
  
• Chapter 15
  
• Chapter 16
  
• Chapter 17
  
• Chapter 18
  
• Chapter 19
  
• Chapter 20
  
• Chapter 21
  
• Chapter 22
  
• Chapter 23
  
• Chapter 24
  
• Chapter 25
  
• Chapter 26
  
• Chapter 27
  
• Chapter 28
  
• Chapter 29
  
• Chapter 30
  
• Chapter 31
  
• Chapter 32
  
• Chapter 33
  
• Chapter 34
  
• Chapter 35
  
• Chapter 36
  
• Chapter 37
  
• Chapter 38
  
• Chapter 39
  
• Chapter 40
  
• Chapter 41
  
• Acknowledgments
  
• About the Author
  

© 2013 Carolyn
Jourdan

This is a work of fiction.

For safety reasons, locations and routes described herein

have
been intentionally altered to preclude retracing.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means – electronic, mechanical, photographic (photocopying), recording, or otherwise – without prior permission in writing from the author.

ISBN – 13:  978-0-9885643-3-6

Layout and conversion by Cheryl Perez

Printed in the
United States of America

Cover photograph by Donna Eaton

© 2013 All rights reserved

www.donnaeatonphoto.com

Ivy Iverson knew what she was doing was extremely dangerous. She’d been warned time and again by her friends and family. They’d cautioned her about going out into the wilderness alone, and making these high ascents alone. They’d begged her to at least tell someone where she was going.

But she preferred to do things her own way.

She was going
way
out on a limb, and she loved the feeling more than anything in the world. She stood over a hundred feet high on a branch near the top of a leviathan hemlock in the
Great Smoky Mountains
National Park
.

It was sunrise and patches of white mist slowly rolled by as she reconfigured her climbing gear. She stopped to watch the surreal mist creep through the upper branches of the old-growth tree, each wisp looking like a ghostly form fleeing the rising sun. The chill of the early morning damp caused a shiver to race down her spine.

Shrugging off the cold, she clipped on a temporary safety line, hauled up the long dangling ropes she’d used to get where she was, and prepared for the next segment of her ascent. A climb this high had to be done in stages or else the rope would be too heavy for her to handle. She scanned the canopy until she saw another limb about fifty feet overhead that looked sturdy enough to bear her weight, and then braced herself against the tree trunk while she reloaded her crossbow.

When she was ready, she took a couple of deep breaths, turned around, and paced carefully backwards along the swaying limb. She moved gracefully, like an acrobat on a high wire. When she got a clear shot, she stopped and balanced herself as well as possible.

Holding the crossbow snug against her right shoulder, she fired a perfect shot. The bolt, trailing lightweight cord in its wake, soared over the limb and dropped onto the other side, falling neatly in front of her.

Ivy tied the thin cord to the end of her orange and yellow climbing rope and teased and tugged until the climbing rope had replaced it across the limb above her. This would be the final segment of the climb, so she wouldn’t need the crossbow again this morning. She used the long cord to lower it to the ground. When it touched down gently next to her backpack, she let go of the cord and it fell so it lay with the rest of her gear at the base of the tree. With the ease of long practice, she re-rigged her harness and connected it to the climbing ropes.

Then she checked the exotic knot on which her life depended. It was a Blake’s hitch, a knot commonly used by arborists to climb trees. The knot could slide upwards easily, but wouldn’t allow any downward travel unless it was held in a particular way with continuous pressure. When she was satisfied that all her gear was configured correctly, she began to climb again.

Her shoulders were unusually muscular for a woman. They’d been honed by working out six days a week and climbing trees in all her free time, so it didn’t take her long to reach her goal. Her formidable expertise in scaling trees had earned her the nickname Ivy.

When she reached the limit of her rope there were no big limbs nearby to stand or sit on, so she remained seated in her harness, swinging. She took in the view while she got her breath back. She was in the higher elevations of the
Smokies
at over 5,000 feet, plus the 150 more she’d just climbed, amid an incredibly lush and diverse forest that was an International Biosphere Reserve.

She was off-trail in a remote area of the park that could be identified only by
GPS
coordinates. But this was typical for her. Most of the really big trees were hard to get to, or they would never have escaped the greedy saws of loggers in the early 1900’s.

The climbing made her hot, so she unzipped her jacket and took off her helmet. She ran a hand through her sweaty sun-streaked blond hair,
then
clipped the helmet to her harness while she enjoyed her surroundings. Her shoulder muscles were burning from exertion and her hands chafed inside her gloves.

She was in paradise. Her vantage point was atop a thick blanket of clouds that totally concealed the undulations of the blue-green ridges below her. The only part of the
Appalachians
she could see were the tips of the tallest peaks. They looked like islands rising above a turbulent white sea.

The sunrise was casting a pink, gold, and orange glow onto the ever-present, ever-changing, clouds and fog that gave the
Smoky
Mountains
their name. It was a perfect time of year to be in the park. When the cloud cover burned off she’d be able to enjoy one of the early fall days when the mountainside reflected three seasons simultaneously: lush green of summer at the lowest elevations, gaudy fall color in the middle, and austere bare branches of winter on the mountaintops.

It was almost too beautiful to bear. The peace of the vast forested wilderness was complete. The only sounds were made by birds and leaves rustling in the breeze.

Now that she’d stopped exerting herself, she became aware of the pervasive dampness and the places her harness was cutting into her legs. The best way to ease the pain and restore circulation was to carefully rotate her body until she was hanging upside-down with her feet pointed toward the sky. A couple of minutes like that were all she needed and all her heart could tolerate, but it really helped refresh her.

 As she upended herself several birds burst into flight as though startled by something nearby. Ivy squinted, wondering if a bear might be making its way along the forest floor. A bear was the only creature in the
Smokies
that could present a serious threat to a person in a tree.

It was rare for a bear to eat meat. They preferred a vegetable diet, but they were called
opportunistic eaters
. In certain circumstances they could turn predatory to other animals and even humans.

She’d seen the jumbled piles of bare, crushed bone fragments left from a bear kill and the bear scat with bits of bone in it. She thought of them as
bear bones
even though they were anything but that.

Peering down through the layers of branches, she caught sight of something large lumbering in her direction. The critter, whatever it was, raised up on its hind legs, and she caught her breath.

It wasn’t a bear, it was a man.

Someone stood below her with his head tilted back, staring straight toward her as she swung upside-down in her harness. That was odd. Ivy hadn’t told anyone where she was going this morning. But now, someone was staring at her from behind a ski mask and it wasn’t really cold enough to warrant one.

Blood was rushing to her head and her heart was pounding from being upside-down. She suddenly felt nauseous.

“Hello?” she called out, hoping for a friendly reply.

The mysterious hiker remained silent and turned his attention to something he was holding. Whoever he was, his intentions were not benign, for Ivy realized with a shiver that he was holding her crossbow. Then he lifted it and aimed it squarely at her.

Phoebe McFarland exhaled and watched the plume of her breath fade slowly in the cold morning air. She stood alone on a ridge in the pre-dawn darkness, facing a landscape that was corrugated like a washboard. At this early hour the twilight panorama was the color of tarnished silver and pencil lead.

The
Smokies
always looked so peaceful. But Phoebe knew it was dangerous to underestimate what you were looking at. Beauty could be used as bait for something unpleasant, while treasures were often concealed behind the plainest of façades. Some people figured this out early, others stayed foolish about it their whole lives.

She had a hard day to get through and didn’t know how she was going to make it. Sean’s funeral was at
noon
. His sudden death three days ago had been a hard blow to Phoebe. She wasn’t yet used to the idea that he was gone.

Phoebe had never married. Sean was the latest in a long string of boyfriends that stretched back nearly forty years. He would be the last, Phoebe thought. This clinched it. No more men, even good ones like Sean.