CHAPTER 7

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ELENA WOULD FIND Dad herself. She would find him before the soldiers did. She had to. If he was hiding from them, maybe he needed her help.

She packed water and snacks and went to tell Mamma where she was going. Mamma was in the yard, settled into one of their cracked plastic chairs, and she was trying to appear normal even though her eyes looked sore and her hair was messy and she hadn’t put her makeup on today.

“I’m going for a bike ride.”

“You’re not going anywhere that I can’t see you.”

“But Mom!”

“Your dad’s missing. I almost lost you. I’m not letting you wander off on your own again.”

“I’ll go with her.”

Rob had just come outside, his basketball tucked under one arm. It wasn’t like him to be helpful.

“I’ll make sure she doesn’t get into any more trouble.”

“No,” Mamma said. “I want you both where I can see you.”

Elena stamped her foot but Rob, for once, remained calm.

“Mom, there are soldiers everywhere. We’re not going to go missing. We can bike over to Ken’s and see how he’s doing. And I finished the bread and milk. We can pick those up on our way home.”

“I should go see Ken myself,” Mamma said quietly.

“But someone needs to stay here in case there’s any news about Dad,” Rob said.

Mamma thought about it for way too long, looking at them and then at her watch and then back at the two of them.

“Fine,” she said. “But be back by 4, no excuses. And, Elena, I mean no excuses.”

Mamma gave Rob some money for the groceries. They got straight on their bikes and rode out together, like they were heading on a real adventure. Elena expected Rob to pedal away from her as soon as they were out of sight of the house but he didn’t.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

“As close as we can get to the mill.”

“Why?”

“Something isn’t right.”

“You know something, don’t you? Something you didn’t want to tell Mom.”

That’s why he wanted to come with her. He wanted to find out what she knew. Elena was glad, actually, to be able to discuss it with him. Mamma would freak out but not Rob.

“I overheard some soldiers talking. They said Dad was on the run.”

“Why would he be on the run?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who is he running from? The army?”

“Maybe.”

Rob went quiet. “This whole situation is weird,” he said finally. “They won’t let us anywhere near the mill.”

“But maybe we’ll see something they missed on the way. A clue.”

He didn’t have any better ideas, so they went with her plan. Biking through town was easy enough; they’d both done it a thousand times. But as they crossed the bridge and slowly wound their way up the reserve hill, the sweat piled up on Elena’s back and her hairline became sticky. Rob got a little further ahead of her with each push, while she puffed and struggled and wondered if her lungs would burn up.

Eventually the winding road levelled out and the reserve houses popped up on either side of them. Rob hung back until she’d caught up but he didn’t wait for her to catch her breath. They didn’t have a lot of time. There was no way they’d be able to make it to Ken’s. They’d just have to hope Mamma never thought to ask him about their visit.

The reserve was quiet; nobody around. But a couple of black and brown dogs followed them briefly, jogging up beside them to say hello with their tongues lolling out.

“Maybe he’s hiding out here,” Elena said.

The houses were set back from the main road, spaced further apart than the houses downtown. No fences separated the grass into square lawns; often the wild sagebrush and grasses grew right up to the steps.

Elena slowed down as they passed a derelict church with a crooked roof and faded wooden tiles. Next to the church was a small home with a neat path to the door. An old woman sat on a wooden bench, enjoying the blue sky and early autumn warmth.

Elena braked. She hopped off her bike and walked it up the path. Rob turned and pedalled back towards her. “Elena!” he half-whispered, but she ignored him. The cops on Mamma’s shows had to talk to people to find things out, and the old woman was the only person they’d seen so far.

“Hi.”

Elena introduced herself from the middle of the old woman’s yard. She looked fragile; thin and crinkly like handmade paper and she had a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She didn’t respond. Elena tried again.

“My name’s Elena. I’m looking for my dad. He went missing in the mill fire.”

The old woman focused on her.

“Have you seen him?” Elena asked.

“What does he look like?”

“Tall, kinda big.” She gestured outwardly from her ribs with her hands. “His hair is shaved but it’s brown. His name’s Curtis Reid.”

“That your brother over there?”

Elena nodded. “Yeah.”

“Helping you look?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re good kids. I got eight grandkids. They’re all grown up now. Youngest is 21. Oldest is 37. Most of ’em got kids of their own.”

“My brother is 14. I’m 10.”

“If I see your dad, I’ll tell him you’re looking for him.”

Elena turned around and saw Rob, off his bike, kicking the dirt. She couldn’t go back to him with nothing. The old lady was probably out here all the time, watching. She had to know something. She turned back.

“Did you get evacuated too?”

“No. I’m too old for all that. They knocked on the door but I pretended I wasn’t home. When they left, I came out front here and sat on my bench and watched everyone hurrying around.”

“What did you see?”

“Well, I saw everybody leave. One of my granddaughters gave me the evil eye as she put her kids in the car. She couldn’t see me in the darkness, but she knew I was out here and she knew I wasn’t coming.”

The old woman let out a little chuckle.

“Let me see now ... there were army trucks and a couple airplanes and I saw a few guys driving away from the mill in their vehicles.”

Elena perked up. “Did you see an old blue Ford truck? With a lot of mud on it?”

The old lady looked around, as though someone might be hiding in the grass, listening.

“I heard something about a truck like that.”

Elena’s heart jumped. “What?”

“My daughter’s husband. He’s been looking around to see what went on. He said he found a truck that had been driven off the road into the forest. He said somebody drove it in there recently, and they got as far in as they could go and then abandoned it. He looked around for a while to see if anyone needed help, but he never found nothing.”

“Where was it?”

“Not far from the mill. He figured someone was headed towards town before they took off into the forest. They went off on that side of the road.” She pointed helpfully.

“Thanks!”

Elena wheeled down the path back to Rob. She explained everything to him as quickly as she could get the words out, and they both agreed that they had to find that truck. Elena looked back as they pedalled away. The old lady remained on her bench, watching.

The road that led from the reserve to the mill wasn’t as steep as the first stretch but it wasn’t flat either. Elena was jealous of her big brother, peddling with ease, so much stronger.

“You could cycle to Stony Creek if you want to leave home,” she said.

Rob glanced back at her guiltily. “I’m not leaving. I was just angry. Mom’s so annoying sometimes.”

Elena turned to smile at him and her front tire hit a rock. She steadied herself just before she slipped over the verge.

“Watch where you’re going!” he said.

Elena thought about Mamma. “Do you think Dad wanted to leave us?”

“No,” Rob said firmly.

“Maybe he got sick of Mamma.”

Another thought came to her. Maybe he got sick of all of them. A small tear dropped from her eye, but she rubbed it away before Rob saw. She hated being called a baby.

Just beyond the reserve, pine trees littered the sagebrush until it was mostly trees, and eventually there was no more brush. They were entering the forest. “We’re getting close,” Rob shouted back to her.

The further they went, the more determined Rob seemed to get, and a couple of times she lost sight of him as he pushed ahead. Then, suddenly, he stopped.

The trees had opened up a little, as though they had once given way to a side road or an old driveway. Something had crashed through there recently. Branches were broken and leaves were flattened against the dry ground.

“He came in this way!” Elena said excitedly, already certain that the truck they were looking for was Dad’s.

“It’s here!” Rob shouted, a short distance ahead of her.

Elena burst forward. There it was, just below them, where the land sloped downwards. At first she thought it had smashed into the trees in front, but it was perfectly parked so it was hidden by the ridge. It was Dad’s truck. Old Beat-Up, he called it, on account of all the rust and dirt and dents and scratches. It was unlocked. Elena opened the driver’s door and jumped inside. The keys were still in the ignition. They jangled as she turned to see Rob hopping in from the passenger side. He opened up the glovebox. Tissues and insurance documents and an AC/DC cassette tape. Why would Dad have left the truck all the way out here?

Rob flinched as though he’d heard someone. He pressed one finger to his lips and gestured for her to duck down in the seat. She disappeared into the well below the steering wheel, waiting for the sound of soldiers’ heavy boots.

“Did you hear something?” she whispered.

He nodded.

She bobbed her head up as something shifted between the trees. A crow took off towards the open sky.

Rob said they should be careful, but Elena wasn’t interested in wasting time. They had found Dad’s vehicle. He could still be nearby. She charged into the pine forest before Rob could stop her, hurtling down the slope, skidding over needles and winding around trunks until he grabbed the back of her t-shirt. “We have to find him!” she said as she pushed Rob away.

The hill bottomed out ahead of them and opened up into a meadow where a trapper’s cabin stood. Cabins like that were common in the area around Stapleton, although there weren’t any trappers anymore. Dad said hunters and hikers sometimes slept in them if they got lost, or teenagers went there to cause trouble.

There was a little creek running along one side of the cabin. Elena saw something in the water and sprinted closer.

A large leaf flopped over bits of a rotting sluice box and followed the water downstream. Elena decided that somebody had discovered gold here a long time ago, and they were so excited they left their equipment behind. It was a good sign. Dad was here, somewhere.

A man’s voice came from the cabin; loud, then hushed, interrupted. It didn’t sound like Dad’s voice. Elena’s skin went cold. Rob looked over at her, wide-eyed. She couldn’t get back to him. There was no time.

There was a scuffling inside the cabin, men coming out, and Rob’s instinct was to run. She saw him dart back up the hill. He said later he had seen someone with a gun pointed in his direction. Elena never saw a gun.

She was shivering; her wet sweater and jeans chilling her skin as she lay against the slippery rocks of the creek bed. Water crept into her sneakers and turned her toes clammy. The more the cold rattled her, the more tempted she was to look up. She couldn’t hear anything. She sensed the men were still there, but she couldn’t be sure.

Slowly, she lifted her head to peer through the clumps of grass that lined the edge of the creek. There was the cabin and two men standing out front. They were looking away from her, talking to each other. She couldn’t see their faces, but they weren’t dressed like army men. They looked like back-country guys, much like a lot of the men in Stapleton. They were wearing camouflage and baseball caps and one of them was tall and stocky and the other one was tall and thin. They could have been hunters, except they weren’t carrying rifles.

The skinny man turned and surveyed the hill. Then they started off in the other direction; deeper into the forest and away from the cabin. In a few more paces they’d disappear. She had to make a decision; to go on and see if they led her to Dad or run back to Rob.

She scrambled along the creek keeping her body low, ready to drop down if the men looked behind them. The big one stopped and the skinny one stood beside him. She got close enough to hear them exchange a few words.

“What if they don’t find it?” the skinny one asked.

“... just a backup. There’s enough for them to find.”

The stocky guy took something out of his pocket. He was wearing gloves, she noticed, which was odd for a warm September day. It was a scrap of something, maybe material. He put it into the creek. Elena wished she could see what it was, but the men diverged from the stream and she had to leave the creek and creep through the trees to keep up with them.

Elena followed the men until the forest was broken by a narrow dirt road. The skinny one put something to his ear and she could hear the crackle of a radio. Elena waited patiently, curled into the coarse branches of a sprawling juniper, trying to control her shivering.

A few minutes later, she heard a vehicle approaching. It wasn’t like the military trucks she’d seen outside the school. It was just an old banger and it barely stopped long enough for the two men to jump in. After a U-turn it headed her way with its nose pushing into the forest. She saw the driver. It was Frank.

Elena found Rob hiding in the trees near Dad’s truck. She almost screamed when he popped out in front of her but she could tell he didn’t mean to make her jump. He didn’t ask where she’d been, or what she’d seen. He grabbed her arm and dragged her back to their bikes.

The way home was quicker. They flew down the hill and over the bridge and Elena pedalled hard to keep up with Rob.

At the house, Elena was red-faced and breathless. Her clothes had dried a bit, but Mamma still wanted to know why she was wet and what happened to the groceries. Rob sat Mamma down in the living room and started to explain but he got it all wrong.

“What were you thinking?” Mamma snapped at him when he admitted where they went. Her mouth opened and her eyes watered when he told her about the truck. “Are you sure it was our truck?” she said. Both kids nodded. The two of them agreed on everything until Rob mentioned what happened once they reached the trapper’s cabin.

“We heard voices coming from the cabin. We didn’t know who they were so we came straight back.”

Elena shot a glance at him, “No ...”

“... that’s what happened.”

He didn’t want to tell Mamma the truth. Sometimes he had a good reason for it but not this time. He just didn’t want Mamma to know what a coward he was.

Elena piped up again. “No. Two men came out of the cabin and Rob ran off ...”

“I didn’t! She’s lying ...”

“Let her finish.”

Rob let out a massive sigh but Elena kept going.

“I hid in the creek and followed them.” She spoke quickly as she explained the rest, keen to deprive Rob of an opportunity to interrupt.

Rob rolled his eyes. Elena glared at him. “He just doesn’t want to admit he was too scared to come with me.”

Rob tried to object, but Mamma shushed them both by raising her hand.

“Enough fighting!” She turned to Elena. “Did you see who they were?”

“I didn’t know the two men but I saw the driver. It was Frank.”

Rob threw up his hands, “Mom, she’s obviously making this up!”

Mamma stared at him. “How would you know?”

“Okay, but ...”

“So she did go off without you?”

Rob realized too late that Mamma had caught him in his own lie. She was good at that.

“I didn’t run off. One of them had a gun!”

Mamma gasped. “Who had a gun?”

“No they didn’t!”

“They did!”

Mamma hushed them. “Tell me the truth, Elena. You won’t be in trouble.”

“I just told you the truth.”

Mamma got up and went into the kitchen and stared out of the window for a while. Elena heard her pick up the phone, her voice cracking.

“Ken? The kids found something.”

Ken arrived about 20 minutes later. He barely looked at Elena when he came in the door, but she saw the dark circles under his eyes. The thin hair he usually tied back was hanging loose and greasy around his shoulders. His breath reeked, and Elena could tell Mamma had noticed too, although she didn’t say anything. Mamma led him into the kitchen and they had a hushed discussion that Elena only caught pieces of: “Rob said they had guns ... wouldn’t the police want to talk to them ... I’m worried about the kids.”

Once Mamma and Ken reached an agreement, it was Ken who came to speak to them while Mamma hung back, hugging herself nervously. His voice was slow and his hands shook.

“I called the cops before I came over. They said they’re looking into it. They told us to stay away because they don’t want any evidence disturbed.”

“Did you tell them about the men who put something in the creek?”

Ken looked at the floor as though he hadn’t heard. Elena was about to ask again but Rob interjected.

“Are they going to talk to Elena and me?”

Ken coughed. “They might, but I gave them a good account of what you saw, so hopefully that will be enough for now.”

“What about Frank? Are they going to talk to Frank?” Elena asked.

“I’m sure they will,” Ken said.

He left quickly and didn’t hug them. Maybe he knew how bad he smelled. Ken wasn’t himself and Elena wondered why he was so different around them.

As soon as Ken left, Elena began working on Mamma. If they couldn’t go back to Dad’s truck, they at least needed to speak to Frank. Maybe he could explain the whole thing so they wouldn’t have to sit around and wait for the cops. Maybe he knew what happened to Dad.

Mamma pretended the whole thing was a bad idea, but Elena sensed she wanted to be persuaded. She wanted to know what had happened to Dad just as badly as they did. And though she’d hate to admit it, Frank was the kind of guy who knew things, especially things other people weren’t supposed to know.

“Elena’s just making up stories again, Mom.” Mamma didn’t even look at Rob so he went to his room and slammed the door.

“Elena, if we go to the Inn, you can’t get your hopes up, alright? Frank might not have anything to tell us.”

Elena shot out of her chair and dashed to the front door. Before they left, she stuffed the little jade turtle Frank gave her into her pocket for luck.

As they approached the Inn, Elena scoured the parked vehicles on Main Street for any sign of the truck she’d seen Frank driving. Whatever those other men were doing she wanted to believe Frank was on their side.

Mamma said they should go in through the reception area because kids weren’t allowed in the bar. The foyer was a mess. An old armchair sagged next to a table cluttered with leaflets. Flyers and newspaper clippings pinned to the walls fluttered in the draft from the door closing behind them. No one was around. Elena rushed ahead and slammed her hand down on the little bell so hard that Mamma flinched.

Nothing, for a minute or so. Then they heard creaking floorboards and the bar door opened. Frank was calm and casual as always. Elena’s mouth burst open as he neared.

“I saw you this afternoon.”

Frank’s brow crinkled. “I don’t think so, kid. I’ve been here all day.”

“No, you were on a back road near the mill and you were driving a truck and you picked up two men.”

Frank’s frown deepened and he shook his head, miming puzzlement.

“But I saw you! You were wearing a green t-shirt just like that one!”

“I got a few green shirts. Your mom probably doesn’t wanna hear this, but I’ve been wearing this one for the last couple days!”

Frank put his nose to his armpit and pulled a face like it was all a big joke. It wasn’t funny. None of it was funny. Dad was missing. She thought again that maybe the curse was real. It was like a bad dream. People were flat-out lying.

“But I saw you!” she said again, exasperated. He had to tell the truth. They needed to know what happened to Dad.

“I don’t know what else to tell you, kid. Maybe I got a look-alike.”

“If you can think of anything at all that could help us, Frank ...”

Mamma tried, but he shook his head. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

Mamma took Elena’s arm and tried to lead her away gently, but Elena shook her off. She pulled the turtle out of her pocket and slammed it down on the reception desk. She rolled the turtle on its back so he could see the “MADE IN CHINA” imprint.

“I don’t want it anymore. You lie about everything!”

Mamma apologized to him. “Elena’s very tired,” she said. “We’ve been through a lot in the last couple of days.” Elena scowled as Mamma led her out. She turned around as they left and caught a glimpse of him through the crack of the closing door. He had collapsed into the old armchair and buried his head in his hands.

The Inn was a big part of Stapleton. It was one of those buildings people referred to when they were giving directions to out-of-towners. It was where people went for “Ribz Nite” and “Wingz Nite” and to watch the game.

The Inn had always been at the core of the town, and at the heart of the Inn was Frank’s family. Elena imagined they all had the same quirky smile, and every time they smiled, things that were there a moment ago vanished, and new things appeared. They could create anything or make anything disappear with their stories and their smiles. Like the murdered brothers and the men Frank picked up in the forest.

Maybe Frank had some kind of power over Stapleton. He was always busy doing something that Elena didn’t quite understand. Did he want her dad to disappear, or was he trying to help bring him home? If she could understand that, the mystery surrounding the mill explosion might start to make sense.