Burning Ground

by D. A. Galloway

  Graham turned his head and looked over his shoulder at the thermal spring, listening intently for a few seconds. He cupped his hand over one ear, then switched and did the same with his other ear. The noises from the spring were not muted. It was his hearing. Once again, he was one-sided deaf! He had lost the gift of normal hearing he temporarily enjoyed while living in the previous century.

  What irony, he thought. I asked to return home, and my request was granted. Unfortunately, I’ve reverted to a world devoid of stereo—a familiar realm of shallow, unidirectional sounds.

  He was both disappointed and elated with this discovery. Complete hearing had been a short-lived blessing, and he was deeply saddened by its loss. However, being one-sided deaf was another confirmation he was indeed back in the present.

  His thoughts shifted to his present conundrum. If, as he presumed, over a month had passed since his sudden disappearance, many people would want to know about his absence. His roommate, Kevin; his coworkers; his supervisor, Jeff; and his parents would all expect an explanation. Park officials or someone from law enforcement would demand to speak with him, since they would have conducted a search after he had been reported missing.

  He couldn’t tell the truth. No one would believe him. He could imagine the rolling eyes and the deeply skeptical looks as he explained his travel back in time and his adventures with the Hayden Expedition of 1871. Heck, if someone told him such a tale, he would immediately conclude the storyteller needed psychiatric help. The only person who would believe his actual experience was Redfield.

  No. Telling what really transpired was not an option. He would have to obfuscate his audience through a series of untruths that would make an enigmatic but credible story. He decided the easiest way to keep his story straight was to modify his nineteenth-century experience in contemporary terms. One conceivable explanation for disappearing could be a story about being abducted. And in a bizarre way, he was abducted—by the spirits into another time.

  The details of his story would be critical. He would need names, descriptions, and events for those who would inevitably probe his yarn for inconsistencies.

  After concocting a potential narrative, he spent the next hour sitting on the boardwalk brainstorming likely questions he would be asked. Almost every question led to another. He struggled to make his string of falsehoods fit together to make the account plausible. Graham mentally rehearsed his fabricated story, then put himself in the shoes of wary interviewers. He tested the validity of his fictional story by evaluating whether he would believe this tale if he heard it from someone else.

  It was an exhausting exercise. He tilted his head back against the railing post and allowed the morning sun’s low-angle rays to warm his face. Crossing his arms on his chest, the wearied time traveler nodded to sleep.

  * * *

  “Mom, look at the sleeping man!” a small voice shouted from the boardwalk.

  Graham woke and rubbed his eyes. A young boy with curly blond hair covering his ears stood twenty feet away.

  “Gared, stop! Wait for us!” his mother called out from farther down the boardwalk.

  Graham stood and leaned against the railing, observing the curious boy who he guessed was seven years old. His parents jogged to catch up with their son.

  “Good morning,” Graham said in greeting when the boy’s parents arrived.

  “Hello,” the father replied, standing behind his son and placing his hands on the boy’s shoulders. The man was tall and thin with long brown hair and a beard. He was dressed in jeans and a Levi’s denim jacket. “We stopped to see these springs. We didn’t expect any visitors this early.”

  Graham glanced at his watch. It was just past seven thirty.

  “I was just resting,” Graham responded, struggling to engage in conversation.

  “Did you sleep here?” the woman asked incredulously. Blond and in her thirties, she wore a flowered halter top and bell-bottom jeans. She had a blanket draped over her shoulders, and rose-colored, frameless eyeglasses rested on her nose.

  “Yes. I’ve been traveling around the park and ended up here last night. I’m a park employee based at the Lake Hotel. I’ll be making my way there today.”

  “My name’s Mark. This is my partner, Sandy. And this is Gared,” the man said, looking down at his son.

  “I’m Graham. Pleased to meet you.”

  “Dad, can we look at the spring now?” Gared asked impatiently.

  “Excuse us,” Mark said as the three of them squeezed past Graham on the boardwalk. They perched by the railing and marveled at the unique sounds of the thermal feature.

  Graham used this opportunity to follow the boardwalk down to the parking area. The only vehicle in the lot was a velvet-green Volkswagen Westfalia camper, which almost certainly belonged to the family he just met. In the 1970s, many visitors explored the accessible sections of the park’s 2.2 million acres with an RV or camper. It seemed a third of the vehicles on the park roads were a Winnebago, a converted van or bus, or a car pulling a polished aluminum Airstream travel trailer.

  Graham sighed. He needed to get back to the Lake Hotel. He unzipped his pack and pulled out his handcrafted Park Employee sign. After all his adventures, the cardboard placard was bent but intact.

  He trudged to the main road and held up his sign, waiting for a trusting visitor to offer him a ride. Although he still didn’t know the date, he guessed it must be outside the heavy tourist summer months, as the road was lightly traveled. A few cars passed by without slowing. Graham resigned himself to the realization it could be a while before he would secure a ride. He considered walking along the road to the lake rather than waiting for a ride near the Mud Volcano parking area, since it would take less than three hours.

  “Graham!” a man’s voice called from behind him.

  It was Mark. His family had walked back to their VW camper.

  “Do you need a ride to the Lake Hotel? We’re headed that way and could give you a lift,” he offered.

  Graham didn’t hesitate. “Thanks! That would be great!”

  He jogged to the camper and climbed in the side door. He stashed the cardboard sign in his pack and tossed it onto the floor, then slid onto a vinyl bench seat. Gared was sitting across a small table on the opposing rear-facing seat. Sandy scooted into the front passenger seat. Mark closed the double side doors and climbed in behind the wheel. He turned the key, and the air-cooled, flat-four-cylinder engine came to life with the familiar chuff-chuff-chuff sound characteristic of the VW’s engine.

  A few minutes into the ride, Gared turned to his mother in the front seat.

  “Mom, this man is dirty and smelly!” he blurted out.

  “Gared, that’s not a nice thing to say,” she quickly responded, glancing at Graham apologetically. “We will be at the lake soon.”

  Graham couldn’t blame the boy for his comment. It was an honest observation. He had ridden a mule daily, sweated profusely, slept on a raw bearskin, and covered himself in a buffalo hide. His bathing had been infrequent. He had worn the same clothes for almost five weeks and had become accustomed to his own foul body odor.

  “Could you tell me the date?” Graham asked. “I’ve been hiking around the park for quite a few weeks, and I’ve lost track of time.”

  He asked this question to partly explain his appearance and stench. But more importantly, he really wanted to know the month, day, and year.

  “It’s September 2,” Mark replied, looking in the rearview mirror at the foul-smelling hitchhiker. “And I believe it’s a Thursday.”

  “Thanks!”

  He couldn’t think of a way to ask the year without raising suspicion, but he could easily get this answer from a daily newspaper at the hotel gift shop.

  “Do you mind if we listen to the radio?” Mark asked.

  “Not at all.”

  Mark turned on the Sapphire AM radio and slowly twisted the black tuning knob to search for a station. After moving the vertical red dial on the display through
a fog of hissing and faint voices, he stopped on a station out of Billings with a reasonably strong signal. The DJ was in the middle of his introduction for the next song.

  “. . . a group of brothers from Australia. It is their biggest hit so far and has rocketed to the top of the 1971 Billboard charts. Here are the Bee Gees with ‘How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?’”

  “This song is fab!” Mark exclaimed as he cranked up the volume.

  Mark imitated Robin Gibb’s unique quavering voice in the opening verse, oblivious of his off-key singing.

  I can think of younger days when living for my life

  Was everything a man could want to do

  I could never see tomorrow

  But I was never told about the sorrow.

  Sandy raised her arms above her head and gently swayed to the melody. She joined Mark singing the chorus as the voices of the Gibb brothers filled the VW with their distinctive three-part tight harmony.

  And, how can you mend a broken heart?

  How can you stop the rain from falling down?

  How can you stop the sun from shining?

  What makes the world go round?

  How can you mend this broken man?

  How can a loser ever win?

  Please help me mend my broken heart and let me live again.

  Graham tried to block out the remainder of the melancholy song. The lyrics were too personal, too relevant, and too painful. He had traveled back to 1971. But it was a bittersweet return. Last night (and a century ago), he chose to leave the only woman he had ever loved.

  Before he initiated his vision quest and ventured through the time portal, he never could have imagined the emotional toll this journey would take. If he had not met the beautiful Crow woman and fallen in love, he wouldn’t have a broken heart that needed mending. But he was never told about the sorrow.

  A tear trickled down his cheek as he closed his eyes and imagined Makawee lying next to him under the buffalo hide.

  “Mister, are you okay?” Gared asked over the blaring radio and his parents’ accompanying vocals.

  “What? Oh, yes. I’m fine,” Graham lied, wiping his cheek with his coat sleeve. “I’m just tired and looking forward to getting back home.”

  Fifteen minutes later, the VW camper pulled into the parking lot of the Lake Hotel. Graham thanked the family for the ride and trudged across the road to the rustic housing units. He walked to the end of the building until he came to room 21, but he couldn’t recall if he had taken a room key with him. Putting down his pack, he searched the main compartment, then remembered he had placed the key in a zippered side pocket.

  Graham ascended the stairs, inserted the key in the lock, and turned the knob. When he pushed the sticky wooden door inward, he was surprised to see Kevin asleep. He had expected the fishing guide to be on the lake, especially since it was a partly cloudy day with little wind. He padded slowly across the wooden plank floor toward his bed, but a creaking board awakened his roommate.

  Kevin opened his eyes and raised his head, then sat bolt upright in bed when he recognized the visitor.

  “Graham?!”

  “Hello, Kevin. Long time, no see.”

  Kevin leaped from bed and hugged his long-lost roommate.

  “What the hell! Where have you been? What happened? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. I’m fine,” Graham assured his friend. “I have a bit of a story to tell.” He placed his pack on his bed and sat down beside it.

  “I’ll bet you do! So many people wondered what happened to you. They had a team hunting you for weeks before calling off the search. It was like you disappeared without a trace!”

  “Yeah. I imagined they would be looking for me.”

  “Have you spoken to anyone since you returned?”

  “Not yet. You’re the first person who knows I’m back and safe. But I need to talk to Jeff and the park officials to explain what happened. And I want to call my family.”

  “Sure. Sure. Let’s go. I’ll take you wherever you want,” he said while pulling on a pair of jeans and slipping a sweatshirt over his head.

  “Wait a minute. I know this sounds crazy, but first I gotta take a shower and change my clothes. I haven’t had a bath in . . . well, I can’t remember when.”

  “Definitely. You look and smell like shit,” Kevin observed with a broad grin. “I’ll go with you to the washhouse. I want to shave and brush my teeth.”

  Graham opened the top drawer of his dresser and was surprised to find all his socks and underwear scattered. He quickly pulled open the other drawers and discovered the same thing. He always folded his clothes when he put them away. Someone had obviously been searching through his belongings.

  “Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you. Some guys with an official-looking badge showed up three days after you were reported missing and searched our room. They didn’t say much, but it was clear they were looking for clues related to your disappearance.”

  Graham nodded his head without turning around. He was glad Kevin explained the condition of the drawers before he mistakenly accused his roommate of rummaging through his personal things.

  “As a matter of fact,” Kevin continued, “I was a prime suspect for quite a while.”

  Graham spun around. “You? A suspect? Why?”

  “I was the last person to see you,” he said with a shrug. “I had dropped you off at the Mud Volcano, and you were never seen again. They thought I . . . did something to you and hid your body. After searching our room, they took the Fairlane. I’m sure they were trying to find evidence I committed a crime—you know, testing for traces of blood or whatever. They returned my car after a few days and never questioned me again. But I gotta tell you, it wasn’t pleasant for a while.”

  “I’m sorry you had to go through all that.”

  “Hey, I’m just glad you’re back. Now go get a shower. You smell disgusting, and you’re stinkin’ up the room!” he said, laughing.

  “Okay. Then I’d like some food. I’m so hungry I could eat a horse!”

  Graham cringed at his own words. Given his recent experience living in the last century, the cliché he repeated aloud sounded repulsive.

  “Great! After your shower, we’ll go to the employee cafeteria. I want to hear all about what happened!”

  The two friends went through the line at the cafeteria. Kevin got a bagel and a cup of coffee. Graham piled his plate with scrambled eggs and ladled oatmeal into a large bowl. He put two cartons of milk and a glass of orange juice on his tray before checking out at the end of the line. When they sat down at a table near the windows, Kevin commented on the size of his roommate’s breakfast.

  “You really weren’t kidding when you said you could eat a horse. When was the last time you had a good meal?”

  “I don’t remember,” he answered candidly. Actually, it wasn’t that he was famished, but rather he had missed certain foods. It had been many weeks since he had eaten something other than meat, potatoes, or biscuits.

  Kevin noticed Graham looked thinner since his ordeal. He waited patiently for his friend to empty the bowl of oatmeal and clean most of his plate before prompting him to tell his story.

  Graham drank both cartons of milk before launching into his tale. He saw this as a trial run of his ability to spin a complete lie while sounding believable. It also gave him a chance to respond to questions and check the plausibility of his answers with someone who was less discerning than park officials or law enforcement.

  He kept his story minimal, adding details only when Kevin asked questions. When he was finished, Graham leaned back in his chair. He sipped on the orange juice, savoring the tangy citrus drink while assessing his friend’s reaction.

  “Wow! That’s an amazing story! You’re lucky to have made it back here alive!”

  “Yes. I know,” Graham answered sincerely. Indeed, he had close calls with death in the past month, but he planned to share those life-threatening events with only one person. Redfield would hear what r
eally happened. Everyone else he spoke to in 1971 would get his best effort at prevarication.

  “I’m going to call my parents,” Graham said as he stood. “Then I need to go to the marina and speak with Jeff.”

  “Of course. I’ll go get my car and wait for you in the parking lot.”

  “By the way, I was surprised to see you in the room when I arrived. It’s a nice day for fishing.”

  “We’re wrapping up for the season. I’m working second shift today helping to prep some of the boats for winter. There aren’t many people seeking to charter a boat now that we’re out of the busy tourist season. My last day is next week.”

  Graham nodded and headed to the lobby, where a telephone booth occupied one corner. He opened the folding glass doors and slid onto the small wooden seat. After pausing to gather his thoughts, he picked up the receiver and used his index finger to dial zero.

  “AT&T Directory Assistance. May I help you?”

  “Yes. I would like to place a collect call . . .”

  * * *

  Kevin was reading a newspaper when Graham opened the door to the Fairlane and slid into the front seat.

  “Well, how did it go?”

  “They were very happy to hear my voice,” Graham replied with a smile.

  “I’ll bet they were!”

  “I told them my story. They wanted to catch a flight to see me right away, but I persuaded them to stay. I assured them I was okay, and explained I needed to speak with the park authorities. I promised to call them again tomorrow night and give them an update.”

  Ten minutes later, Kevin eased the Fairlane into the parking lot at Bridge Bay Marina. The young men climbed out of the car and headed to Jeff Martindale’s office situated by the gangway. Kevin rapped on the metal door but didn’t wait on a response before pushing it inward. The marina director was sitting behind his small desk, reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. He was reviewing a work schedule.