Bear Adventure

by Anthony McGowan

  And then he thought that it might have been the spirit bear that had attacked Ben’s hiking group. And that perhaps it had returned to finish the job.

  And he knew something else: that bears could be incredibly persistent and single-minded. The wolf pack would not hunt them through the day, and by the next night the wolves would have found something else to occupy their quick minds. But the bear … if its mind was set on human flesh …

  His thoughts were interrupted by Amazon shouting up ahead.

  ‘At last,’ she said, ‘I can actually see what’s in front of me. Hello morning!’

  And now Frazer saw that she was right. The sun had not yet risen above the horizon, but the sky was light, and they were, for the time being, safe.

  Frazer cycled next to Amazon – there was just enough room for both bikes on the trail.

  The trees were solid above them, but they could still sense that the skies were growing greyer. And then they heard a deep rumbling sound.

  ‘Thunder …?’ said Amazon, although it didn’t sound quite like that.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Frazer, listening intently. ‘I think it might be a –’

  ‘Hellycopter!’ yelled Ben excitedly.

  They all strained to try to see through the canopy. They even tried yelling. But they knew it was futile.

  ‘They’ll never see us,’ said Frazer.

  ‘Who do you think it is?’ said Amazon.

  ‘One of the search teams. Quick, let’s try to get out of the trees so we can signal to them.’

  They raced on down the trail, desperately searching for a break in the canopy. But soon the sound was gone and the trees were as thick as ever.

  ‘You sure it really was a helicopter?’ panted Amazon.

  ‘I don’t know,’ groaned Frazer. ‘Could have been thunder after all. Maybe it was just wishful thinking. Your mind can play tricks when you’re in the wilderness. Anyway, I think we all need a rest.’

  They had been pedalling for an hour and even Frazer’s steely thighs were aching.

  ‘I wanna go pee-pee,’ added Ben. ‘And I’m hungry.’

  ‘OK, little guy,’ said Frazer, ‘time for a comfort break.’

  They pulled over and sat on the ground, exhausted. Amazon took Goldilocks out of the pack and fed her a handful of trail mix as she looked anxiously back down the path.

  ‘Have we put enough distance between us and the wolves?’

  ‘If it was still night, I’d say no. But the dawn means we’re pretty safe, I reckon. They’ll be going back to the den. Some of them at least …’

  ‘Some …? Oh, you mean because of the fight. You still think it was a bear?’

  Frazer nodded. He didn’t think that there was any sense in scaring her about the big white beast he had seen. Besides, with a bit of luck, they would make it back to the Tracker camp later that day.

  But still he thought that it was perhaps the time to ask Ben about his ordeal.

  He made some space next to him on the ground and beckoned the boy over.

  ‘Hey, Ben. I was kinda wondering if you remembered anything about the night you got split up from your mom and dad. Cos you know you’re a big star, don’t you?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Yep, a big star. You’ve been on the TV and the radio and all over the internet.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘My friend Suzie Jo is gonna be so jealous. She wants to be on the TV more than anything.’

  ‘So you want to tell me what you remember?’

  ‘Well, we were walking all day and I was tired. My mommy and daddy had an argument about me. My mommy said they never shoulda brought me because I was too young, and my daddy said it was good, and that I’d grow up fast. And then we camped. We had sausages to eat. I told my daddy I wanted to share a tent with my friend Pete and his mommy, and they said I could, probably so they could argue some more. And I went to sleep real fast because I was all walked-out, and then I woke up and everyone was screaming.

  ‘Pete’s mommy went outside and then Pete went out too. I was looking for my other shoe when the tent all exploded and then the monster was there, like a giant Goldilocks, but more fiercer and not as cute. And then someone fired a gun and there was more yelling and I don’t know how, but I was running and running and running and I ran forever because I didn’t want to get eat by the bear. And then I climbed up high in a tree, because I’m the best at climbing in my school, and I waited for my mommy and daddy to come, but they didn’t. Then I fell asleep in the tree.

  ‘When I woke up, it was daytime and I stayed up in the tree yelling as loud as I could, but they didn’t come. And I waited nearly all day because I was frightened to go down in case the bear was there, but my mommy still didn’t come so I climbed down and then I walked a long time until I saw a light and I thought it was my mommy and daddy, but it wasn’t – it was just you.’

  There was a little pause after that, finally filled by Frazer saying, ‘I think you are definitely the bravest boy in Canada, and I think you will be so famous when we get home that everyone in the whole of North America will have heard about you and there’ll be photographers outside your school, and you’ll get invited on to talk shows, and they might even make a movie about you.’

  ‘I hope so. That’ll teach Suzie Jo a lesson for being so snooty. And I’m hungry. Can I have some food now?’

  ‘Well, I guess it is breakfast time,’ smiled Frazer.

  And so together they ate the very last of the trail food. It wasn’t enough to satisfy any of them, so Frazer and Amazon gave most to the bear and the boy.

  ‘Right,’ said Frazer, ‘from now on we live off the land. Luckily we’re here when there’s plenty to forage. Berries. Mushrooms, er … Did I already mention the berries?’

  ‘I can eat berries for a day or two,’ replied Amazon, ‘but I’m not so sure about these two little guys.’

  ‘My mommy always gives me ice cream with blueberries,’ said Ben wistfully.

  Amazon again remembered how hungry the little boy must be.

  ‘I promise you you’ll be eating berries and ice cream by this time tomorrow,’ she said and gave him a hug.

  ‘My bear wants some too or she’ll be jealous,’ said the boy.

  ‘OK. Two scoops each, no more.’

  ‘Three!’

  ‘You drive a hard bargain. But three it is.’ Amazon turned to Frazer. ‘I’m right, aren’t I? I mean, we’ll get back today?’

  ‘We should do,’ he replied, without the easy optimism Amazon was both hoping for and half expecting. ‘If we can find the route. The trouble is that we’ve come a long way in the wrong direction, and it can be easy to get yourself lost in the woods. We need to get to higher ground so I can see where we are and plot the way back. You ready to head out?’

  Amazon nodded. She put the protesting little bear in the backpack and hoisted it on to her shoulders. Frazer remembered how surprisingly heavy the cub was.

  ‘You sure you’re OK?’ he asked.

  She smiled. ‘I’ll still be going when you’re begging for mercy.’

  They both laughed then, the slow-gathering but ultimately near hysterical laughter of those who have endured terrible events.

  ‘What’s funny?’ asked Ben a couple of times, his blue eyes wide with astonishment.

  ‘You are, monkey-face,’ said Frazer and ruffled his hair.

  And then he looked at Amazon again, and saw that the laughter and the jokes had hidden a deeper sadness.

  ‘You’re thinking about your mom and dad, aren’t you?’ he said.

  ‘Always.’

  ‘We’ll keep looking for signs on the way back. And then,’ he added, his affectionate gaze taking in Ben and Goldilocks, ‘when we’ve got the kids settled, we’ll be back out here, and we’ll find them. We really will.’

  Amazon nodded, but had to turn away to hide the glistening of her eyes.

  ‘Come on, then,’ said Frazer. ‘That way look
s like up to me.’

  And once again they set off to look for higher ground.

  And then things got both easier and much tougher. It was fully light by now, which not only made it possible to see where they were going, but also banished the terrors of the night. Amazon found it hard to believe that they had been attacked by a pack of wolves. Weren’t wolves the stuff of nightmares and not reality?

  But the relative ease ended when Frazer, through a break in the solid canopy of pines, saw a hill looming up away to one side of the trail.

  ‘Right, guys, we’ve got a choice. I’m going to climb up there to find out exactly where we are, and which way we have to head back to civilization. I’m hoping that either I’ll be able to see the way back to our old camp or, with a bit of luck, I might just catch a glimpse of a road or a ranger station or something like that. Hey, I might even see that helicopter again. But we don’t all need to go up. If you want, you can stay here and wait for me. That’ll certainly be quicker than us all climbing up there.’

  He pointed up the steep slopes of the hill. It was a little lower than Mount Humboldt, but then there had just been the two of them and their bikes; now they had passengers.

  Amazon looked at Ben and Goldilocks. They were looking right back at her, hope and trust in the eyes of the boy, curiosity and hunger in the eyes of the bear.

  ‘I think it’s best if we all stick together,’ she said. ‘The truth is that you’re better than me in these woods – and yes, it’s pretty hard for me to admit that you’re better at anything than I am. But, if something happens, I want it to happen when you’re there.’

  Frazer nodded, acknowledging the compliment. And the common sense.

  ‘But don’t get cocky,’ Amazon continued. ‘I can still kick your ass, as you Americans so vulgarly put it.’

  ‘Amazon Hunt, you are a piece of work,’ laughed Frazer. ‘When this is all over, we’ll put that to the test.’

  ‘Bring it on.’

  The lower part of the hill remained thickly wooded, and there was no way that they could cycle. They pushed their bikes through the trees, with Goldilocks still riding in Amazon’s backpack, and Ben sitting on Frazer’s saddle, his arms stretched forward to grip the handlebars.

  The forest was still eerily quiet. They heard the drumming of a woodpecker and the screech of some bird of prey – a goshawk, thought Amazon – as it streaked through the branches above them, but they saw nothing.

  After half an hour, they broke through the treeline and saw that they had climbed a fair way.

  Frazer surveyed the rocky slope ahead.

  ‘Hate to break this to you, Ben, but you’re going to have to walk from now on. Have you climbed a mountain before?’

  ‘Sure, lots of mountains. And I once climbed up on to the garage roof to get my ball back.’

  They climbed on. The ground was solid rock from this point – not the loose shale and boulders that they had encountered on their ascent of Humboldt. Their eyes and ears strained for any sight or sound of the returning helicopter, but soon the toughness of the climb made it difficult to think of anything except each hard step.

  The going became so tough that it was obvious to Frazer after another hundred metres that, whatever Amazon thought, they couldn’t all make it. Ben was brave and determined, but his little legs weren’t made for this sort of terrain. He kept falling over, and soon his knees were scraped raw. Frazer gave him a piggyback, but there was no way he could get to the top with that kind of burden.

  Things were tough for Amazon as well. She was carrying a now rather agitated bear on her back as well as pushing her bike up the slope.

  ‘Guys,’ Frazer announced, including Ben and Goldilocks in his gaze, ‘I think it’s time I went on alone. You can stay here and look after the bikes. I can get up to the top and have a look around in half an hour. If we all struggle on, it’s gonna take at least two.’

  Amazon saw the sense in this. She also saw a flaw.

  ‘I think you should be the one to stay with Ben and Goldilocks,’ she said. ‘If anything turns up, you’ll be much more able to defend them with that spear of yours.’

  ‘Hey, it’s my spear now!’ protested Ben. ‘You gave it to me fair and square. If you take it back, I’m gonna tell everyone that you’re a big cheater.’

  ‘Chill out, Ben, the spear’s all yours. Any bad old bear comes along and I’ll teach it some karate.’

  Frazer performed a couple of fancy kicks and chops, which made Ben giggle.

  It also showed to Amazon that she had won the argument. She shrugged off the bear-pack with enormous relief, and handed it over to Frazer. ‘OK,’ she said, ‘I’m tired of being mummy bear – your turn to play daddy.’

  Frazer was looking thoughtful. ‘Something just occurred to me, Zonnie. Dad went the wrong way to look for Ben and the big bad bear, but the other hunters – the ones out in the woods looking to kill any spirit bear that comes along – well, they might not be that far away. You should keep an eye out for them too. If we tell them that we’ve got Ben safe then they’ll call off the hunt. Not to mention help us get out of here.’

  ‘But are they the kind of people who would give up on the chance to shoot things just because there’s no need?’ replied Amazon.

  Frazer shrugged. ‘Fair point. But keep your eyes peeled anyway. And look after these –’ He handed Amazon his beautiful binoculars.

  Amazon nodded, hung the binoculars round her neck and began climbing.

  ‘You be careful,’ called out Frazer after her.

  She turned back to wave, and saw him below, struggling like a dad in the mall to keep control of two unruly kids. She turned back to the hilltop and walked on, smiling.

  It wasn’t half an hour. It took Amazon a gruelling hour to reach the top. It was one of those very annoying big hills (or small mountains) that is made up of a series of ridges, each one looking convincingly like it might be the last. She never really had to do any proper climbing, but she often had to scramble on hands and knees to get up the trickier sections.

  What made it all rather worse was that, for the first time since they’d flown into the mountains, it began to rain. And with the rain the temperature fell. Climbing on dry rocks can be fun: climbing on wet rocks never, ever is. Amazon began to regret that she hadn’t brought proper climbing boots, or at least some stout walking shoes, rather than just her trainers. And she was cold.

  She looked at her hands. They were filthy. She had planned to wash in the beaver pond that morning, but being attacked by wolves can drive little issues like personal hygiene out of your mind.

  She kept checking behind her, but the same system of ridges that obscured the summit also soon took Frazer and the others beyond her sight. She hoped they’d all be OK in the rain. She’d grown very fond of the little boy and the little bear in the short time they’d been together.

  The next ridge was the toughest so far. It was steep and wet, and the cold had grown more intense. Winter was coming, she sensed. Up here there was a constant nagging wind that cut through her clothing. Her TRACKS expedition outfit was waterproof and windproof, but Amazon really wished she had a couple more layers to keep her warm.

  The last few metres to the top of the ridge were horrendous. It now suddenly did feel a little like real mountain climbing, as she hauled herself up, needing to find both hand- and footholds. She looked quickly back again, and was delighted to see, for the first time in ages, the distant figures of Frazer, Ben and Goldilocks. They were playing a game of tag down there. She thought about shouting and waving, but she needed both her hands to avoid a nasty fall.

  She finally scrambled to the top of the ridge, and looked to see how difficult the next one would be.

  And what she saw made her sigh.

  There was nothing. Or, rather, there was everything. She was at the top. The wide world fell away in every direction. From up here Amazon could see the endless forests of pine and fir. She could see dozens of lakes, and countless streams and r
ivers. She could see the flatter land beyond the range of the coastal mountains. And there, behind her, perhaps some nine or ten miles away, was the grey magnificence of Mount Humboldt. She carefully took her bearings. It was due west.

  Perfect.

  No complications, nothing to forget or muddle up. Amazon saw that, if they followed one of the streams that flowed not far from where Frazer and the others had stopped, they would be taken almost straight back to that mountain. And once there it would be easy to pick up the trail back to camp and the reassuring presence of Uncle Hal. It was a long road back, and a tough one, but knowing that they were going the right way was in itself a huge boost: nothing saps the energy like the fear that you’ve taken a wrong turning and all your efforts are futile.

  She’d almost forgotten the binoculars hanging round her neck. She hadn’t needed them to work out the way back, but now she used them to scour the land for any sign of life – whether it be the hunters skulking out there to kill, or, as she dreamed, her parents. She could imagine them sitting together round a fire, arm in arm, thinking of her just as she was dreaming of them.

  But it was impossible. The world was so huge. There were so many thousands of square miles of wilderness. The binoculars were actually worse than just looking with her own two eyes – they took her in too close. It would take years to check out the full view like this. She let them fall back around her neck. She had a last look at the view, taking in all its magnificence and grandeur under the glowering grey skies.

  OK, enough grandeur, Amazon told herself. It was going to be a long journey back to the camp, and she had no intention of spending another night with the wolves for company. She began the awkward journey back down the hillside.

  And then she stopped.

  Something had registered with her subconscious mind. What was it? She had already clambered down a couple of tricky metres. She glanced back at the summit, thought about ignoring the little mind-worm in her head and carrying on back to the others, groaned and climbed again those nasty, knuckle-grazing metres.