Up
and out of the makeshift shelter long before the others with the return of
daylight, Bud did a quick assessment of the area, snow still falling, though not
as heavily as before, and all around ominous signs as to the stability of the
newly burdened snowpack. The stuff sunk
under him as he walked, lower layers settling with a hollow, sickening whump whenever he stepped too far from
one of the trees, and after a few such incidents he stuck carefully to the more
heavily timbered areas, few as they were up so high.
Everyone,
so far as he could tell, had made it through the night without too much damage,
though he had little doubt there would be some frostbitten fingers and toes
amongst the men. Shirley, after taking
inventory, was even more sure of the thing Bud had only supposed. Two of the men had fairly serious finger
damage, and though it did not appear anyone was likely to lose toes, the
situation was sure to worsen should they have to spend another night out there
with minimal shelter, no dry socks and only a couple of granola bars left
between them.
Water
they did have, but only because of the efforts of Shirley and one of the other
agents, a first-year recruit from Montana, who had stayed up a good portion of
the night tending one of only two water vessels that had not been left down at
the bottom of the slide area when the storm set in—a stainless steel bottle
belonging to Bud—and passing its slightly warmed contents around in turns as
they painstakingly converted dry, high-altitude snow to water over the little
fire. Bud had to admit a grudging
respect for the man and his persistence, even after their little disagreement that
past day which had ended up with Shirley pointing a pistol at his face… This was a man who would go places, a natural
leader. Which places—a grim chuckle from
Bud—and exactly how quickly, and on what sort of trajectory, were yet to be
determined.
It
was clear to Bud, and to Shirley, joining him beneath his chosen shelter-tree
and watching a somber grey light creep across slopes of flat, unbroken white,
that they needed to go down. Any tracks
they might have hoped to follow, any further evidence they may have been hoping
to collect on the fugitive party’s backtrail—it was all gone beneath the snow,
as they might well end up themselves, if prompt action was not taken.
The
difficulty came in deciding exactly what sort of action to take. Bud, though he did not say so at first,
waiting instead to see what Shirley’s plan would be, was all for taking the
straightest safe line down the mountain—if such could be found—and waking out
to the nearest spot where either choppers or snow machines could come and haul
them down the rest of the way. Chopper evacuation
from anywhere near their current elevation was out of the question, unless they
were to wait until the weather broke a bit, and neither he nor Shirley believed
they had that much time. Not all of
them, anyway. Not the men already
suffering frostbitten fingers, and with toes heading in the same direction.
Shirley
shared Bud’s concerns, was intelligent enough, though far less experienced in
the mountains, to see that they were all heading for disaster if they tried to
stick out for another night up on that high slope, but he had other priorities in
addition to the welfare and safe return of the men in his charge. Shirley was thinking of the evidence, of the
numerous samples they risked losing irretrievably should they fail to stop back
by their base camp before evacuating. When
he expressed to Kilgore his desire to make a pass by base camp before heading
down, the tracker remained silent for a long moment, mentally debating his best
course of action. The return to base
camp—any return, by any possible route—that day meant to place themselves at
serious risk of getting caught in an avalanche or two, which, he could not
deny, might well prove just the opportunity he had been looking for. Lead them into a trap. Return alone.
Or, just as likely, not at all, not being the most experienced winter mountaineer,
himself. Hadn’t even been skiing since
sometime in his 20s, and knew he might easily misjudge the danger, miss the
signs and go down with them. He opted,
then, to try and keep everyone alive, at least for the moment. Which meant challenging Shirley on his desire
to return to base camp.
“Awful
open in that direction, you know. Pretty
good chance for slides. Best if we head
straight down from here, follow this spur of timber and hope it leads us down
into a lower basin where things aren’t so steep, open, unstable…”
“Not
happening. No way I’m leaving all that
evidence there to be drifted under by the wind, swept away by another slide or
even tampered with by Asmundson and his lot, if by some chance they’re still up
here. We’ve got to recover it. Should only
take a few hours, and then we can head down the way you’re describing. Or some better way, if we see one between now
and then.”
Bud
shrugged. “Go if you got to, but how
about I stay here with most of the men?
Cut down on disturbance to the slopes you got to cross, maybe reduce the
chances of a slide, and leave somebody uninjured to come dig you out when the mountain
lets go.”
“You
know what I think about breaking up the group.
We’ll stay together. Now I know
you kept us alive through the night, Kilgore, you and your mountain man skill,
but I have to wonder what else you’ve been doing with those skills. Where you’ve been, and with whom. You’re on my radar, tracker, and no whiteout
is going to change that. We’re going
together, and you’ll travel in the center of the group. I’ll lead this time.”
A
blank stare from Bud, who had plenty of responses he would have liked to use,
but decided it best to remain silent at the moment, seeing as several others
had emerged from the shelter and were watching them. Later.
The time would come. For now… “Surely, Shirley. Middle of the group it is. Better get them men moving, if you don’t want
them to sit there and freeze their toes off now that the fire’s gone out and no
one else is collecting sticks to keep it going.”
“No
one’s going to freeze. Half an hour out
to base camp, then straight down the mountain.
We didn’t get that much
snow. I know how you operate,
overestimating the dangers, trying to manipulate this operation. Not falling for it, tracker. The game is up. Now you’re going to wait right here while I
go pry the men out of that shelter for the day.
Bud
waited, considering, hacking idly at the nearby snow with a spruce stick,
digging, inspecting, weighing the odds…
No comments:
Post a Comment