CHAPTER TWENTY
With the storm blotting out what was left of the day, darkness was falling fast. The wind had risen to a continuous moaning whistle high in the trees. The gloomy woods rang with creaks and snaps and rushes. I scrambled over the rocks and roots back to my pack. Digging through it, I pulled out the whistle. I gave three long blasts on it in each direction. My hands shook, with cold or fear or hunger, or all three.
Where to make my camp? I walked down the bank to the west, where the creek slowed and widened. Giant, gnarled tree roots had made a kind of cave in the bank. I followed the roots up. It was a huge cedar and it had been there a long time. The deciduous trees were bending crazily in the wind, but this cedar seemed like it would hold its own. I had no time to be picky. It was almost dark.
A large rock anchored the tree roots on the east corner. The creekbank would shield me from the worst of the north wind. I crouched down into it to try it out. Immediately I felt warmer, protected. I climbed the roots back up to the woods. There I was met with icy blasts of wind and rain. My flashlight was in my pack, but it wasn’t hard to find good-sized limbs to use for my shelter. The wind had strewn them across the forest floor. When I picked one up, the wind tried to rip it from my hands. It nearly knocked me over.
One by one, I dragged several large branches to the edge of the bank, then threw them over onto the shore. Then I scrambled back down to where I’d be spending the long night. No blankets, no food, no company. But I could make hot tea. That would have to be enough.
A night not fit for man nor beast. Dad used to say that when he came home from work on a blustery winter afternoon. I always thought it was funny, because he’d walked all day in it. He’d tromped up sidewalks that hadn’t been shoveled and pried open screen doors that were blocked by snow. He’d stepped carefully on ice and poked envelopes into slots and tried not to be scared of dogs snarling at the ends of their chains.
His wool toque was pulled low over my forehead and ears. I’d been instantly warmer when I put it on; it was like he’d left it for me. There was no way that was true, but it made me feel better. My fire sparked and twisted in the wind. I hoped I hadn’t built it too close to my shelter. I was comfortable enough, cross-legged on a springy bed of fir limbs, with others pulled in around me to protect me from the worst of the cold. My back was against my pack. I had my hands around the small pot of tea. I’d forgotten the tin cup, but the pot worked well enough. On my knee lay two mints, which I planned to savor once I’d finished the tea. Through the opening I’d left to watch and tend the fire, I could see a slice of the creek, lit by firelight and pitted with rain.
Where was Dad? Was he close by, close enough to see my fire? He must have dropped the hat, but when? Was it on the day he’d first set out walking? If it was, he was far off a southern course, even farther than I had been when I discovered my error today. I pushed away my next thought, barely formed: Dad was left-handed. He’d veered left. But that didn’t make sense, because he had the GPS. At least at the beginning of his walk, it should have been functioning. As long as he checked it, he should have been able to stay on course.
As long as he checked it.
The other possibility was that he’d dropped the hat on his way back, looking for the road and the truck. What were the chances we’d crossed paths? What were the chances he was at the truck right now? I felt sick to think of it. My head buzzed and I leaned farther back against my pack to steady myself. It must be hunger.
Then I remembered the ants and larvae I’d stuffed in my jacket pocket. I’d have to fire up the stove again to fry them. I fished them from my pocket and looked at them lying in my hand. Then I popped them into my mouth raw instead and quickly washed them down with a gulp of warm tea.
Where was Mom? Could she still be out in this? She had no knife, no supplies of any kind. She must have reached the road. For some reason, she wasn’t able to get back to me. But she’d said she would and I believed her. She said to wait for her. Maybe she’d fallen and hit her head on a rock.
I would not think of that. Instead, I suddenly felt Phoebe near me. The way her hand felt in mine, warm, always a bit sweaty. I felt her nestled next to me, her head on my shoulder and her happy laugh. When we used to sit on the couch together watching TV, she always dug her feet under my legs to keep them warm. Sometimes we brought the blankets off our beds and made a tent of them. Phoebe usually fell asleep in there and I had to try to pull myself out without waking her up.
I ate my mints, sucking every last crystal of sweetness from them. The gnarled piece of root I’d put on my fire had burned through. I pulled another section onto the flame, leaned back to watch it catch. The storm raged above me, a night not fit for man nor beast. I stretched my legs out to try to warm my toes without setting my boots on fire.
I don’t remember lying down. A thunderous crash woke me. I sat up. The fire smoldered. Somewhere close, a big tree had fallen, making the ground shudder. I was cold, especially my legs, which had only one layer of protection, and my feet. I found my poking stick and dragged another piece of wood onto the fire, then poked it and blew on it till it flared back to life.
Flicking on my flashlight, I swept the beam across the creek and up along the shore. It had stopped raining. I thought I saw movement down by the wide, slow part of the creek. I shone the beam in that direction, but it was hard to see. Maybe that dark bulk near the water was something. But with the wind churning everything into motion, it was hard to tell. I withdrew back into my cave and tried to warm my feet and legs.
What if it was Dad down by the creek? What if he was weak and crawling?
That was a stupid thought. That was my imagination getting carried away.
Part of me wanted to get out of the cave and run down the shore. Another part wanted to lie down, squeeze my eyes shut and pray for morning. If the shape were an animal—a bear, or a wolf—would the fire keep it away? They’re just trying to survive like I am, I reminded myself. They’ve got no reason to bother me.
Under the moan of the wind, I thought I heard something else—a cry. It sent chills up my spine. An owl or a coyote? I leaned out into the wind and listened. As the wind relented to gather itself, the air rang with a blood-curdling scream that sounded like something being tortured. I jumped in fear and dropped my flashlight, watched it roll into the fire before I could catch it.
I grabbed my poking stick and tried to fish the flashlight out. Sparks flew up in the night as I fumbled for it. Some landed on the boughs inside my shelter. The flashlight rolled deeper into the nest of flames. I could barely see it.
Be careful now. My stick pushed some red-hot coals aside. I tried to roll the flashlight toward me, without flicking hot embers onto myself or my highly flammable bed of fir boughs. That was a bad idea, I thought. Roll it to the side.
The crazed scream came again, close by. I felt the tears rising. With a strong flick of my wrist, the flashlight finally bounced out of the fire, landed on a rock and rolled away into the mud of the shore. It was safe now. I would let it cool. I should get it before morning, before the dew or more rain came. I wanted light, but even more I wanted not to set foot out of the safety of my cave.
My ears strained for sounds of movement, something creeping nearer or another scream, but anything I might have heard was drowned out by the blood pounding in my ears. I leaned out again. I couldn’t see far—an orange glow of firelight reflected on the water, the gloom of shoreline.
It was not human, I told myself. There was no way it was human. It was animal, some animal I’d never heard before.
Suddenly, I was struck with the powerful sense that I’d made a big mistake in leaving the safety of the truck. Stay put; that’s the rule when you’re lost. Stay put. I should have stayed put. I could be wrapped in warm sleeping bags right now, inside our trusty old Mazda, safe from the storm—a windshield and steel between me and whatever those noises were.
I couldn’t possibly sleep. I lay half on my backpack staring at the fire. Once in a while I sat up, pulled another branch onto the flames. Then I lay back with my ears alert, my heartbeat roaring. Finally, I couldn’t stand the listening and waiting to hear that scream again, so I tore corners of paper off my map, wadded them up and stuffed them in my ears. All I could hear now was my own blood rushing furiously.
I drew closer to the fire and checked my watch by its light. It was only 12:30 a.m. I couldn’t believe it. I still had at least another six hours shivering in this cave, waiting for the morning light. I was too scared and too cold to sleep. I’d drift toward it and then jerk awake in the middle of strange dreams.
I dreamt a giant dragonfly hovered above the road by the truck. It lowered a basket of food—donuts, hot chocolate, french fries. It was so close, I could smell it, that deep-fried, sugary smell. But I couldn’t reach it. In another dream, I chased the fox, which had Phoebe’s face and Phoebe’s happy laugh. But I couldn’t catch her.
By 3 a.m., I’d burnt up most of my stockpile of firewood and I realized I would have to leave my cave to find more or I’d freeze. I might not freeze to death, but my temperature could drop enough that I’d get hypothermia and it would be hard to recover from that, out here, alone, in the dark, far away from help of any kind.
I stuck my head out and looked up and down the shore. I couldn’t see much. In a stargazing book, I read that we lose a lot of our night vision just staring into a campfire. It takes about half an hour to get it back. I climbed out of the chill of the cave into the biting cold of the open air. I picked up my flashlight, dried it on my jacket and turned it on. Nothing. I gave it a shake and tried it again. Still nothing.
I closed my eyes and stood listening. The wind buffeted against my back, whistling like ghosts through the trees above. But I thought it was not quite as strong as it had been. The storm was dying out, passing over these woods, moving south. When I opened my eyes, I could see better. The debris of torn trees limbs littered the shore. Some of them might be dry and burnable.
Picking my way carefully over the rocks, my eyes gradually adjusting to the dark, I saw that the shape I’d seen moving by the water earlier was gone. That convinced me that it had been an animal. But strangely, out in the open I felt less afraid than I had been huddling in my cave with my ears plugged. It’s better to face things, I thought. Better to be standing on my own two feet than crouching and waiting for something to pounce. Sometimes hiding from something makes it seem scarier.
I remembered a field day at my school two years ago. Carly and I had just bought hotdogs for fifty cents each. We were about to eat them when four older boys walked up to us. One said, “Give me that.” We took off running and they chased us. We scooted under the bleachers on the edge of the field. But when they saw us, Carly, who is just as small as me, stepped out and stood in front of them. I tried to pull her back and caught her by the sock. She kicked her foot away from me.
“If you want us to lend you some money, why don’t you just say so?” she said.
The boys were as surprised as I was. They looked at each other with their mouths kind of hanging open, all their scariness suddenly gone. Carly was right, I saw. They just wanted to be able to buy hotdogs for themselves.
She dug in her pocket and pulled out the change she had left.
“What do you have, Francie?”
I stood up slowly, cautiously. When I was standing, the boys didn’t seem so big anymore.
“Fifty cents,” I said.
“Hand it over then,” Carly said. “You owe us a dollar seventy-five.” She handed it to one of them.
They were still gruff as they took the change and walked away, but one boy turned and said “Thanks” and his voice was soft.
There are hungry people living in our small town, hungry people who even go to our school. Mom told me that. It never really sank in before, how it would feel to be hungry and smell those hotdogs and not have enough money to buy one. I had never known what it was to be really hungry. Until now.
I found some branches that seemed brittle enough to burn and carried them back to my cave. Then I built up the fire and sat waiting for morning to come.