6 Miles With Courage

by LaCorte, Thomas

  Ryan watched the waves from the passing boat ripple towards the shore and towards a log with a yellow-bellied turtle perched atop. The ripples frightened the turtle and with a leap he splashed into the river.

  This set off a thundering explosion of churning mud and water as an alligator of at least eight feet gobbled him up for dinner.

  Ryan walked back up the slope clutching his machete. He stands by the fire watching as the alligator—like a submarine with a snaking tail—heads across the river.

  “I’ve got to swim that tomorrow?” Ryan asks himself. He sits down on his blanket and stokes-up the fire for added safety. Soon, the last rays of daylight will fade away. The moon is rising giving him the comfort of knowing that there will be some light tonight.

  As the ashes drift away so does his thoughts to home. He thinks about Brent and the movie they were supposed to watch. He thinks about the poker game and his eighteenth birthday tomorrow. He wonders how his dad is doing but he has the upmost faith that he will survive until tomorrow night. He knows that due to his dad’s previous escapades; his friends and family will not be worried until tomorrow evening. His thoughts are interrupted by the rustling of wings. Something ghosts by overhead and settles into a cypress tree within the glow of the fire.

  Ryan is straining to see what it is when his eyes meet the huge eyes of a Great Horned Owl. “Well hello Mr. Owl,” Ryan says, “I’m glad to see you and I hope you stay for the night.” Ryan takes comfort in the thought of something keeping him company.

  He did not take comfort in the thought of the alligator coming up the slope or the panther coming out of the swamp. He already had a plan of defense for the panther. If it were to pounce he would lie on his back and impale it on his machete. He had no such plan for the alligator. He was stirring the fire and mulling over such a plan when he heard it. It was a hideous cry from deep in the swamp.

  Back at the hog wire pen where the fawn was ensnared the panther lets out a cry of anger. He has lost the trail of the fawn but he has since doubled back to the wire pen and sniffs the ground for a scent.

  He finds one.

  It’s Ryan’s scent.

  He lumbers down the path that Ryan created but he is in no hurry. He will continue to track Ryan until something else comes along— that is to say if something else comes along.

  Once the panther finds Ryan’s blood he will not be deterred. He will seek out Ryan at all cost, counting him as nothing more than a wounded animal.

  Sometime between the hours of dusk and dawn he will lie in wait, and when he is ready, he will pounce!

  Chapter Fifteen

  Beep, beep, beep, the stove alarm tells Judy that the cobbler is done. She opens the stove door and sets the pan on a rack. She wipes the sweat off of her brow with a dish towel before throwing it into the clothes bin and hangs a fresh towel on the stove handle. She starts a pot of coffee as the doorbell rings.

  Judy heads towards the door, before answering it she stops by the mirror in the hallway to fix her hair and to strategically adjust her dress. Judy is a practical woman, but will use all of her attributes to achieve her goal and that is to convince Sergeant Mallory to get an early start with the search tomorrow. It should not be too hard. She can at times hold Bob Mallory in the palm of her hand.

  Sergeant Mallory asked Judy to the prom thirty two years ago, she turned him down. She went with Rob instead and it ended up in marriage. They have been happily married—with three children—ever since. Bob Mallory never has married and waits patiently, forever if necessary for Judy’s hand.

  Bob adores Judy but Rob is one of his best friends. That’s just the way love deals the cards sometimes. The three of them know and except the situation. The three of them also know that if anything should happen to Rob, Judy will marry Bob. It’s just an accepted fact and in some weird way it comforts the three of them. When Bob has to go searching for Rob his emotions run high, for he is torn between the need to find his friend alive and the want of being with the love of his life. It’s not easy being Sergeant Bob Mallory.

  “Hi Judy,” Bob said as she opens the door and motions for him to come in.

  “The cobbler is done, let me finish the coffee,” she says heading back to the kitchen. Bob closes the door and turns to hang his coat on the rack.

  “I checked in with the airfield, Rob’s truck is still there,” his voice rises in the direction of the kitchen. “The man on the phone said that the truck was locked but he hears what sounds like cellphones in the glove box, making noises.” He continues to stand by the front door.

  “Come into the kitchen Bob,” Judy says finishing up the coffee.

  Bob walks slowly through the hall and into the kitchen. Judy is running hot water and leans into the steam. With her back to the hall she hears his footsteps as he enters the kitchen. She turns her head to one side, pausing for a moment, and then apprehensively turns full around. Bob gets a little weak in the knees and reaches for the back of a chair. The loveliness of her steamy silhouette is just too much for him, he has to sit down. She turns back to face the sink.

  She hates toying with Bob’s emotions knowing how much he adores her. She shouldn’t have to do anything as daring for a while. That image will be burned into his mind for at least five years. She smiles and shakes her head ever so slightly. “Men,” she says to herself before turning around to face Bob.

  “So the truck is at the airfield and the cellphones are in the glove box, well that explains why he hasn’t called,” Judy said as she made her way from the sink to the table. She takes a seat across from Bob who is regaining his composer. She places her hand on his hand and gives it a squeeze and a little shake as if to say, “It’s OK Bob, I know what you’re thinking, now get over it.” She takes her hand back.

  “That—that’s right Judy,” he takes a deep breath and exhales. Then he continues, “If we look at what we do know, it should help us figure out a game plan for tomorrow. We know he is not in the air, but there are plenty of grass airstrips and fields north of the Oklawaha River where they may have put down for the night.”

  With Bobs attention fully on Rob now, Judy gets up from the table, prepares two cobbler plates and heads over to the coffee pot as it sounds the alarm that it has finished. She pours two cups and puts one sugar and heavy cream in both cups. She knows how Bob likes his coffee. She sets both the coffee and the cobbler on the table and sits down across from Bob.

  “Go on,” she says, as they both begin to sip their coffee and start in on the cobbler.

  “The way I figure it, we need to pin down the location of the job site that Rob is scouting.” He pauses for a bite of cobbler.

  “Did you get to look around in his office for anything helpful?” Bob asked.

  “No I haven’t, with Brent calling and the restaurant calling to see if we were coming I have been busy.” Judy said, “As soon as we finish our cobbler let’s take our coffee to Rob’s office. I’m sure we can find something telling us where he was heading.”

  They both quickly finish the cobbler and put their plates in the sink. Taking their coffee cups they head down the hall towards Rob’s office. Judy is in the lead with Bob in-tow. It’s a peculiar site as Judy is a head taller than Bob. They stop at a set of well-crafted double-doors. Judy pulls a key out of her dress pocket as Bob admires the woodwork.

  “I haven’t seen the inside of Rob’s office,” Bob says, “I bet it’s nice.”

  “His clients seem to like it. This is his private entrance. He usually brings clients in from the outside.” Judy says swinging open a door and turning on a light. The light reveals a large octagon room, four walls and four doors, with an atrium in the middle. Bob is very impressed.

  “Wow, what is this place?”

  “It’s a display room. A room for Rob to display old surveying instruments from the past, and a place to display some of nature’s creatures that Rob has to deal with.”

  In the center of the room is a free standing octagon atrium. It is the mai
n attraction. It is ten feet across with spot lights and landscape timbers around the base. The base is knee high, and then starts the mounded “island-of-life” as Rob likes to call it. Up above is a skylight for the horticulture planted throughout the island. “Let me see, the switch to turn on the spot lights is over here somewhere, Oh yes here it is.” Judy said as she flipped the switch lighting up the atrium and all of its life.

  “Wow!” Bob said loudly, jerking his body back and slightly spilling his coffee, “that’s a rattlesnake!” It was knee high directly in front of him in the atrium.

  “It’s stuffed Bob.” Judy said with a laugh. Still chuckling she set her coffee cup down on one of the glass display cases and taking Bob’s cup from him, set it down also. He didn’t argue.

  “That looks like a water moccasin over there.” Bob said pointing into the atrium.

  “It is,” Judy went on, “and that’s a Bobcat. Rob had to kill it. It attacked him.” She said. “Way up there in those vines is a large hornet nest,” Judy pointed to a basketball-size lump of gray paper.

  “My God, how did he ever get to that nest without getting stung?”

  “He said he smoked them out on a cold day.”

  Bob shuddered at the thought and turned away from the atrium to inspect one of the glass cases that lined the walls.

  There were four glass cases in all, and four doors in all (counting the door that they entered from.) The room was laid out like a stop sign. The top, bottom, left, and right sides are doors, and the other four angular sides are walls with glass display cases of various artifacts pertaining to land surveying.

  “What is Rob doing with all these old surveying instruments?” Bob said referring to a glass case full of brass compasses, transits, and measuring chains.

  “He is a collector as well.” Judy said as she turned a light on inside the case, lighting up all the shiny brass within. She saw a sparkle in Bob’s eyes as he moved to the next case. Judy followed and lit up that one as well.

  “Old bottles, that’s very nice.” Bob said as he admired the many colors of the old glass. There were shades of purple, brown and green. Some were black and many were clear. Judy moved ahead while he was looking intently at the bottles. Then she lit up the third case.

  “What are those?” Bob said, referring to the brass disks, pipes and broken concrete monuments. There also was a wooden post on top of the glass case in a box being readied to be shipped.

  “Those are destroyed and displaced boundary stones or survey markers.” Judy said.

  “And the wooden post?”

  “That’s a very old survey marker. Rob is shipping it off to the Smithsonian.” Judy said, “Do you want to head over to his office now?”

  “What’s in the last case?”

  “Oh, let me light it up for you,” Judy turned the light on inside the case, “It has a bunch of old maps and deeds, and old field notes.” She said.

  After he admired the maps for a while he gathered the coffee cups and taking a look around he said, “This is quite some place Rob has here Judy. It really gives you a feel for what Rob does for a living.”

  “Yes it does, and when a client starts to haggle with Rob about a price for a survey. Rob likes to bring them out here to show them what he has to deal with in performing their survey. They always come away with a new level of respect.” Judy said proudly. They finished their coffee and left their cups on the last display case.

  “Well let’s head over to his office then, shall we.” Bob said. He too had a new level of respect for how Rob makes a living.

  Judy led them through a set of double doors and into Rob’s office. She turned on a light. The room was chock-full of maps and plans scattered about.

  “I don’t know where to start looking.” She said.

  “Well, didn’t you say that the last job he did was on the Oklawaha River?” Bob asked as he dug around inside a pile of aerial photographs.

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Well than look for a photo or plan with a river on it, we can start from there. Rob told me that he was going to be north of the last job he finished.” Bob said.

  “Wait a minute. Did he not meet with his new client recently?” He asked.

  “Yes he did, yesterday as a matter of fact.”

  “Does he have a conference room?”

  “Why yes, right across the hall.”

  “Take me over there.” Bob said, and without a word she turned out the light and with Bob in-tow they headed across the hall to the conference room.

  Judy switched the light on. Bob was greeted by the sight of a conference table with a large aerial photo on it.

  “We may have something here,” Bob said as he pulled the aerial over to him for a closer look. At the bottom of the photo was the Oklawaha River, but farther to the north near the top of the photo, was a large boxed out area outlined in red pencil. In the margin was written the words “area to be scouted.”

  “Judy, I believe we found where they were heading,” he said. Without looking at her he studied the photo intently. Judy moved up behind Bob and peered over his shoulder.

  “This boxed out area is about fifteen miles north of the river. It is five miles long by ten miles wide so we are looking at a 50 square mile area. Notice that there are several grass airstrips near the property.” Bob said as he let out a sigh of relief, “I bet they’re camping at one of these airfields right now as we speak.” His voice ended with certainty.

  “Well that’s it then,” Judy said, “they’re most likely just fine,” and after slapping her palms onto the desktop—she gave Bob a big hug. It made him feel uncomfortable, but it was instinctive. Awkwardly parting from their embrace—Judy turns out the light—Bob takes the aerial as they head out of the conference room.

  Crossing through the atrium, Judy gathers up the coffee cups and arriving back at the kitchen—with Bob standing by the table—she rinses them.

  “The man at the airfield said that Rob did not file a flight plan, but this aerial is just as good, I think anyway.” Bob was saying as Judy continued at the sink, “I will head up to the grass airstrips in the morning where I expect to find them camping. If they are not there then I will call the bird in.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” Judy said as she put the clean coffee cups into the strainer, “and if I should hear from them I will call you right away Bob.” She said as she came up to his side at the kitchen table and said, “I suppose we should both get some rest now. It’s going to be a long day.”

  “Err-ah, yes of course,” Bob stumbled for words as he got the hint it was time to leave. They walked to the door without saying a word. Bob took his coat from the rack as Judy opened the door wide. He slung his coat over his arm and with the aerial photo in hand, stepped out of the door. After negotiating the slight downward step he turned to face Judy.

  “Judy, if it turns out that—”

  “What Bob, if it turns out like what?” She said cutting him off.

  “Na—nothing Judy, well alright then,” he said turning, “goodnight Mrs. Sykes.”

  Judy watches him walk away. She smiles as she thinks, thirty two years, and he still has not given up.

  “Men!” she said, closing the door.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ryan is not sure what made the cry in the swamp, but he takes comfort in seeing his machete lying next to him. Stirring the fire gives him pleasant thoughts and lets him forget about the alligator and the panther. The sun has set leaving just a slight brush of magenta in the western sky. The rising moon casts an eerie glow and sparkles across the open waters of the Oklawaha River. The frogs call for mates with a ceaseless noise. The day has slipped away.

  Who-who, who-who, said the Great Horned Owl as the ashes float by a little too close for comfort. Ryan looks up at the beautiful bird and then remembers the camera.

  “I wonder,” Ryan said as he picked up the camera turning it on. He thumbs through the images which appear to be pictures of his dad’s projec
ts. Ryan would hate to erase something important of his father’s. He eliminates twelve blurry pictures. Now he can take twelve pictures of his own. He captures a snapshot of the owl in the firelight. He was zooming and cropping the image on the display screen when he heard the distance shrill of a whistle. He was thinking that it must be a far-off train when he heard it again. Only this time it seemed closer, setting the camera down he stood up.

  He was gazing off in the direction of the sound when he heard it a third time. It captured his full attention. Ryan strained his eyes in the pale moonlight toward the twinkling river bend to the west.

  The bend made a sharp turn to the left and the river disappeared behind a towering stand of cypress trees. Only the tops were illuminated by the moon. It is beyond these treetops that he first saw it. There was a towering gush of black smoke rising up from the river in a frightful manner.

  “What could that be?” Ryan said with a puzzled look.

  Then came an unexpected loud shrill of a whistle sending shivers up Ryan’s spine. It was somehow connected to the monstrous cloud but he had no idea what was about to emerge from around the river bend. Any second it would appear.

  He stood frozen with fear as a mechanical pounding and thumping noise began to build and the light of a burning fire lit up the river bend. Whatever was coming around the bend was smoking and on fire. It was whistling and making god-awful noises.

  Around the bend and floating across the top of the water came a fire breathing dragon! Well that’s what Ryan first thought anyway. When the whistle blew he saw the white steam telling him it was a steam boat.

  “Wow! Will you look at that?” Ryan said, “I wonder if that’s the one Mom and Dad took on the dinner cruise for their anniversary?”

  It was closing fast on Ryan’s camp and the details of this replica were astonishing. The black smoke was from a genuine coal burning steam generating boiler. The loud noise came from the piston driven and rear centered paddle wheel. The fires burning above the wheel house and on the sides were pine logs in iron baskets used to light-up the river. No level of detail was spared.