Hanging Falls

by Margaret Mizushima

  Cole’s X-ray machine had been more affordable than the newer digital models, so he took the plates into his darkroom to develop. Placing the films into the tank full of fluid, he set the timer and went back to where Tess and Riley waited with Sassy.

  “What did you think of that?” he asked Riley.

  Riley’s eyes were bright with excitement. “That was cool. You guys did that really fast.”

  Cole exchanged a smile with Tess. “We’ve had a little bit of practice, and Sassy is a model patient. You did a good job too, keeping her quiet.”

  Petting Sassy, they chatted for a few minutes, and Cole was happy to see that Riley had adjusted her attitude toward him. Now he needed to work on Angie, a tougher nut to crack.

  The timer bell dinged. Cole went back into the darkroom to remove the film from the tank and held it up to the light to study. It looked good. Deciding that the Vaughn kids might want to see the result, he carried the X-ray with him, signaled that all was well to Tess, and reentered the exam room, where he clipped the film onto the light box.

  While Tess and Riley brought Sassy, he opened the door into the reception area and invited the family to return to the exam room. “Angie, if you want to see the X-ray, come join us.”

  Angie hesitated, and Cole tried a disarming smile as he held the door open for her. Evidently unable to resist seeing the X-ray, she moved through into the exam room without making eye contact. Sassy was back in Hannah’s care, and the girl had hunkered down beside the dog with her arms around her. Tess had removed the muzzle, and Sassy wore a smile on her face that matched Hannah’s.

  Cole enjoyed showing the kids the landmarks on the film: the white strips of dense bone and the darker images of soft tissue. He asked Ruth if the children could have suckers, and she allowed it. Even the shy boy murmured thank-you when he selected his treat.

  “I’ll contact you with the results when I get them,” Cole told Ruth as he ushered them back into the lobby to say good-bye. Then he marked the bill so that Angie could handle taking payment and went back to help Tess and Riley with cleanup.

  “That went well,” he said as he disassembled the X-ray system. “Thanks for helping, Riley.”

  “Gosh, thanks for letting me. Sassy is so sweet.”

  “She’s a beauty, isn’t she? If all goes according to plan, maybe we’ll get to see her puppies in a few months.”

  Riley’s freckled cheeks bunched as she grinned. “Sounds awesome. Who’s the dad going to be?”

  “Well … I didn’t ask.” Cole had thought of Robo, but he belonged to the Timber Creek County Sheriff’s Department. He supposed that any future breeding arrangements would be an executive decision and not just up to Mattie.

  “Maybe Hannah would let Angie and me come out to her house to see them when they’re born.”

  “Maybe.” Cole pictured the subdued girl in the old-fashioned dress and worried about how she might be received at Timber Creek High. He had an idea of something that might help but knew it wouldn’t fly if he suggested it to Angie right now. “Hannah and her family are new in town. She could probably use a friend or two before school starts. Maybe you and Angie could call her and invite her over to the house some afternoon.”

  Riley nodded, a faraway look on her face as she considered it. “Why do they dress like that?”

  Cole kept his reply neutral, hoping his kids, including Riley, would be willing to see the people beyond the clothing. “I don’t know, but I bet it’s a religious choice. You can probably talk to Hannah about that after you get to know her. She’s probably just an ordinary girl like you.”

  The muffled slam of the clinic’s front door carried through to the back room, followed by a booming male voice. It was almost noon, and Cole had thought they were done for the morning. He looked at Tess. “Were we expecting someone else?”

  “No one else on the schedule until one thirty.” Tess started for the exam room to check things out just as Angie met her at the door.

  Distaste pinched Angie’s face. “Dad, Parker Tate is here to talk to you. He doesn’t have an appointment.”

  “Thanks, Angie.” Parker was a pharmaceutical rep, new to the company that had hired him, and this was only his second visit to the clinic. “Send him into the exam room, and I’ll talk to him.”

  Angie disappeared, and Cole hurried to place the last piece of his X-ray system into its case and close the lid. He went into the exam room as Parker was entering through the other door, holding it open and speaking to Angie over his shoulder. “Okay, darlin’. I find it hard to believe you don’t have a boyfriend, a pretty girl like you. But it gives a poor old boy like me lots of hope.”

  Cole’s hackles rose, and he studied the man with a sharp eye. Teasing teenage girls was harmless in most cases, and he was used to hearing it from the older men who were dads themselves. But Parker looked like he was in his early twenties, probably only six or seven years older than Angie, and he had the edgy features of a fox on the prowl.

  Call it father’s intuition or purely gut instinct, but whatever it was, Cole’s previous tolerance of the sales rep soured to instant dislike. “What brings you here today, Parker?”

  Parker turned his cobalt-blue eyes toward Cole, shifting his expression from a leer to a smile, though not fast enough for Cole to miss it. He must have read Cole’s disapproval, because he instantly sobered and adopted a deferential attitude just shy of genuine. “Thanks for seeing me, Doc. I was driving through town and thought I’d stop by. I’ve got some samples to give you, and I thought I’d see if you need to order anything.”

  Cole crossed his arms over his chest. “All right, we have about five minutes.”

  Parker displayed evenly spaced white teeth in what looked like a practiced grin, placed his briefcase on the exam table, unsnapped the latches, and opened the lid. The kid wore his hair styled and gelled into a sweep on top that Cole guessed had him standing at the mirror often to make sure it stayed in place. Some might think him handsome, but Cole thought he looked like trouble.

  Parker took several boxes from his case and lined them up on the table. “I brought you some new heartworm pills you might want to try and a chewable vitamin that smells like dog candy.”

  Cole scanned the labels on the boxes, deciding that both products looked like something he could dispense, but he didn’t feel like placing an order today. “These are the samples?”

  “Sure are. I can give you a discount on an order of twenty boxes or more.”

  “Thanks for these. I’ll take a look at my inventory and get back to you if I need anything more.”

  “Hey, that’s fine, but I can get you discounts if you order directly from me,” Parker said, removing a business card from inside his case and offering it.

  Cole took the card, going toward the door as a sign that the meeting was over. Parker caught his drift and snapped up the case to follow, which might have put him back in Cole’s good graces if he’d walked through the lobby and exited like a good lad. Instead, he paused to take one last shot at Angie.

  Parker flashed his phony grin. “Hey, gorgeous, remind the doc here to call me when he needs to order supplies, and I’ll bring you something nice the next time I come to visit.”

  Seated at her desk, Angie straightened and stared at her computer screen, her cheeks flushed. One look at his daughter’s body language told Cole she wasn’t having it, but she seemed embarrassed by the attention and unable to come up with a reply.

  “Make sure you call first for an appointment, Parker,” Cole said, wanting to prevent him from showing up at a time when Angie and Tess were at the clinic alone. “I’m not always here, and it’ll save you a wasted trip.”

  Parker gave him a salute. “Will do, Doc. I hear you’ve been keeping pretty busy these days.”

  Puzzled by what he meant, Cole raised a brow.

  “I heard you’ve got a new girlfriend you’ve been running around with.” Parker smirked as if sharing a joke, one that Cole didn’t think funny.<
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  The grapevine in Timber Creek is going to be the death of me yet, Cole thought, as Angie’s scowl told him she didn’t consider the joke funny either. He glared at Parker and opened the outside door to show him out. “Don’t always believe what you hear when you gossip.”

  But Parker wouldn’t leave it alone, and evidently thought they could bond if he exercised his sense of humor. “Now, nobody’s blaming you, Doc. Fall is just around the corner, and you’re gonna need someone to warm your bed when the snow starts to fly.”

  These were not the type of comments his daughter needed to hear, especially now, and Cole’s irritation toward the guy spilled over to the boiling point. He grasped Parker by the arm and marched him through the door, closing it firmly behind them. “Listen, bud. That’s my daughter in there, and I want to make it clear that I don’t like you insinuating things in front of her or toward her.”

  Parker pulled his arm free, and the way he flexed it told Cole he might have squeezed a little harder than he’d meant to. “Hey, man. You don’t have to go ballistic. I was just fooling around.”

  Cole backed off, trying to cool down. “Maybe so, but your way of kidding is inappropriate, especially when you should be paying attention to business. Take some words of advice, or you’ll lose this job before you even get started.”

  That must have struck a nerve. The kid tried to look chastened. “Sorry about that, sir. Would you like for me to apologize to your daughter?”

  Parker seemed smart enough to realize that customer complaints could put a fork in his career path, but Cole wasn’t impressed by his remorse. “Just go. And it’s best if we do business by phone in the future.”

  As he watched the guy drive away, Cole drew a breath and wondered if he’d overreacted. This cold war with Angie had him on edge, and he guessed he needed to meet the problem head on. No more waiting.

  But first, he’d better go back inside and see what kind of damage control he needed to do now, or if it could wait until he found the right time to sit down and work things out with his daughter.

  THREE

  Mattie squatted beside the lake, using her cell phone to snap photos of the body snagged within the pine boughs. Robo huddled near. He was less agitated now that Glenna had tied Moose to a tree and made him stop his baying.

  Glenna came up behind her and spoke loudly enough to be heard over the roar of Hanging Falls. “How do you propose we do this?”

  “Do you have any rope in your pack?”

  “Nope. No straps, no nothing.”

  Mattie thought of the dogs’ leashes when she heard the word straps. “Can you swim?”

  “Not well.”

  Mattie wasn’t exactly a strong swimmer either, and the thought of entering the swift current just yards away from the crashing falls scared her.

  “That water comes off the snowfield, and it’s barely above freezing,” Glenna said. “It’ll take your breath away. We need water rescue personnel in wet suits.”

  Mattie took her last photo and stood. “That we do. But it’ll take hours before they can get here, and if the body breaks loose from this tree, no telling where it will end up.”

  Glenna nodded agreement as she stared at the corpse. Mattie studied it too, but since only the upper back could be seen from her vantage point, she couldn’t determine its gender. Pink slashes marred its white skin, blurry under the water. Pine boughs shielded its lower half.

  “Cold water preserves a body,” Glenna mused. “As long as the water level stays the same, this pine tree isn’t going anywhere.”

  At least five feet of trunk and a bit of root system anchored the fallen pine to the bank, even though its narrowing top stretched about twenty feet into the water. Clouds hung heavy and gray, threatening rain.

  “I don’t think we can count on the water not rising,” Mattie said. “There’s another storm brewing.”

  A loud crack came from the falls. A dead tree bobbed up at the base and spun so that its heavy end swung their way, and the strong current pushed it like a battering ram toward the pine that held the body. It smashed into it, making it shudder. Robo leapt to his feet, barking and dancing nervously at the edge of the water.

  Mattie sucked in a breath as she watched the body disappear out of sight beneath the pine, and only when it bobbed back up again did she exhale. “Okay, that does it. We have to get this body onto the bank.”

  She scanned the area, searching for deadfall beneath the grove of lodgepole pine. “What if we make a pole that we can lay beside the pine tree?”

  Glenna nodded as Mattie shared the rest of her plan. “I think we can make it work.”

  Mattie hurried to her pack and grabbed the Leatherman tool that Cole had given her. She rarely went into the high country without it, and when she was on duty she carried it in her utility belt. Together they hurried into the trees beside Moose, who barked when they passed.

  With Robo running out in front, they found a dead pine with a narrow trunk and dragged it down to the lake. Most of the limbs had been stripped already, and Mattie set to work whacking off those that were left. Soon she made a pole that was light enough for Glenna to handle by herself.

  In the meantime, Glenna had calmed Moose enough for him to be taken off leash. He obeyed her command to lie down and stay while she tied his leash to Robo’s to make a long strap.

  After Mattie carried the pole to the lake’s edge, she sat and stripped off her shoulder holster, hiking boots, and socks. She’d worn lightweight hiking pants and a short-sleeved khaki work shirt, and she decided to leave her clothing on to protect her from the pine’s bark and branches. A cool breeze wafted downhill from the snowfields and made her shiver. She could only imagine how cold the lake water was, and she planned to stay out of it for the most part.

  “Ready?” she asked Glenna.

  The game warden frowned. “I’m ready when you are.”

  Mattie picked up one end of the pole. “Let’s see if we can position this at the edge of the pine without disturbing anything.”

  Mattie slid the tip of the pole into the lake, upstream near the edge of the fallen pine. She kept an eye on the body and the bobbing tree trunk as she and Glenna guided the pole into place. It felt more stable than she’d even hoped for.

  Taking up the newly created strap, Mattie moved to the broad trunk of the pine. “I’ll see how this works,” she said, placing one bare foot on it. “Hold steady.”

  Rough bark and brittle twigs poked her bare feet as she climbed onto the tree trunk and crouched. She rose slowly, finding her balance before edging down toward the water. Heel to toe, as if she were taking a sobriety test, she stepped onto the floating pine. The icy surge lapped at her feet, numbing them in an instant. A wave of dizziness rocked her as the swirling flow caught her eyes. She refocused on the trunk, gripping it with toes she could no longer feel.

  The pine bucked and swayed but held her weight with a minimum of sagging. Inch by inch, she crept until she could sense the white body beside her. Like a gymnast on a balance beam, she bent her knees and knelt.

  The body bobbed two feet from her, but her perch was too precarious for her to lean far enough forward to accomplish what she wanted.

  Careful to avoid the jagged broken ends of branches, Mattie placed her palms on the rough bark and lowered her legs into the rushing water, gasping as the icy liquid swept up to her waist. She couldn’t bear this frigid temperature for long.

  The swell rocked the body outward and then sucked it back toward her so that it bumped her thigh, making her shudder. With a buckle of the two-leash strap in one hand and a handle in the other, she leaned over the sickly white torso, straining to keep her head above water while she reached downward to embrace the corpse.

  They dipped and swayed in a macabre dance. Her fingers numb, Mattie felt a dull sensation of slick rigid flesh, like a frozen wet fish. At least the cold water had preserved the body enough that she was spared the odor of decomp. She turned her head, her cheek kissing the water as
she closed her eyes and clamped shut her chattering teeth. Her chest now beneath the surface, it was all she could do to breathe. She focused on taking short breaths, panting through her nose while keeping her lips tightly closed.

  Her arms encircled the torso, and she fumbled to put the buckle of the strap through the handle at the other end, her hands so numb she had to feel her way by pressure cues alone. She didn’t dare rise out of the water without securing the strap, because she’d never be able to force herself to hug this corpse again.

  After a few seconds of blind groping, she sensed that she’d threaded what felt like an eye of a needle and tugged gently on the strap to test her assumption. She was rewarded with resistance that told her she’d succeeded. Forcing her frozen fingers to hang on, she rose to sit, clumsy as she reeled in the strap to draw the circle tightly around the body’s torso.

  Now, the pole. Leaning forward, she did her best to wrap the strap several times around the pole that lay along the other side of the body. The pole’s narrow diameter allowed her to accomplish it without having to dunk herself in the icy water. Mattie focused on the task doggedly until she’d tied a square knot. Then she struggled to make her frigid fingers clip the buckle onto the second leash handle to reinforce the security of the knot.

  By this time, Mattie was shivering hard and having trouble keeping her balance on the tree trunk. A glance told her that Glenna stood by holding her end of the pole. “Okay,” Mattie shouted above the noise of the falls. “See if you can pull him in.”

  Glenna took a few slow steps backward, and the strap tightened between pole and corpse. For a moment, it looked like the corpse would break free of the pine boughs and follow, but then it hung up and wouldn’t budge.

  “Just a minute,” Mattie shouted. She raised her foot, placed it against the body’s shoulder, and gently pushed it out and away.