Daunting Days of Winter

by Ray Gorham

  Right now Jennifer didn’t care about building codes or property rights or any of the other issues that muddied the community’s relationship with the Powells. She had Madison, helpless and hungry, who would be fighting for her life if she couldn’t get the food she needed. Jennifer knocked firmly on the door, then stepped back and waited. She heard the footsteps of a small child running to the door, then saw the handle turn and the door pull open. A little girl with long dark hair, dressed in dirty sweat pants and t-shirt, looked at her from the doorway.

  “Hi. Is your mom here?”

  The little girl nodded, bouncing her head quickly, but she didn’t move.

  Jennifer waited. “Could you get her?” she asked the motionless girl.

  “She’s sleeping,” was the reply. The girl had a runny nose, and she wiped snot on her arm, smearing it across her face where the dried remains of previous smears still clung.

  “I’m sorry, but it’s really important.”

  The girl stared at her, then turned and ran off. Jennifer stepped inside and pushed the door closed behind her. She waited nervously at the door, bouncing Madison in her arms and rocking her from side to side, trying to keep her quiet. She heard voices in a back bedroom, then someone coming towards the door.

  Allison Powell was rubbing her eyes as she came around the corner. She was dressed in an old, yellow robe that was cinched loosely around her waist, with flannel pants and wool socks. Her long, curly red hair, matched the freckles that covered both cheeks and her forehead. “Hi,” she said simply when she saw Jennifer.

  “Hi Allison,” Jennifer said, shifting nervously. “I need your help.”

  Allison stopped as soon as she noticed the baby. “What?”

  Jennifer raised Madison in her arms so that Allison could see the baby. “This is Madison Jones. Her mother died giving birth to her early this morning.” Jennifer made eye contact with Allison, her eyes pleading. “You’re the only one we know who can feed her.”

  Allison crossed her arms tightly across her chest. “What about regular milk. I’m sure you can find someone with baby bottles.”

  “We’re looking for that too, but you know that mother’s milk is better for her.”

  Allison let out a long, deep breath and looked at Jennifer with tired eyes. “Come, sit down,” she said, indicating a couch that had seen better days. Allison sat in a rocking chair that faced Jennifer, slumping back into it. “I don’t think I can do it,” she said, after an uncomfortable period of silence. “It’s hard enough with Caleb, and he’s my own.”

  “I know it’s a lot to ask, and I wouldn’t if there was anyone else who could do it, but her mother’s dead, and she’s hungry.” Madison had started to cry, and was trying to find something to suck on. “Please, couldn’t you try it for a couple of days, at least until we have a chance to figure something out?”

  “There’s no one else?”

  Jennifer shook her head. “No one that I know of. Please!

  Allison looked wearily down at the baby, then back at Jennifer. “I just don’t think I can. I’m sorry, but….”

  “You can’t say no,” Jennifer interjected. “Look at how tiny and helpless she is. Please, Allison. I’m begging you. We’ll bring you some extra wood, or food. Whatever you need.” Jennifer, exhausted from being up all night, fought to control her emotions.

  Allison closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. “Alright,” she said, finally. “I’ll do it. But I can only promise a couple of days, and I’ll need some help. Caleb and Alyssa already take up a lot of my time, and with this one, I just don’t know if I’ll have the strength to feed two.”

  Jennifer wiped away a tear of relief. “Thank you so much.” She carried the baby over to Allison and laid her in Allison’s arms. “She’s a beautiful little girl.”

  Allison loosened the belt on her robe. “She’s tiny. You forget how small they start out. Hope I don’t drowned her; Caleb has a big appetite.” She positioned Madison at her nipple, rubbing the baby’s cheek with it. Madison lurched for it, latching on without too much difficulty, and began to suck vigorously. “I sure wasn’t expecting this when Alyssa woke me up, not that we get a lot of people stopping by.” She stroked Madison’s head. “How old is she?”

  Jennifer thought a second. “About ten hours. Last night was kind of a blur.”

  “What happened to her mother?”

  Jennifer relayed the events of the delivery, and Allison listened as she nursed, filling Madison up without having to switch her to the other breast. “Hope Caleb doesn’t mind sharing. He’s used to a monopoly on these things,” she said as she repositioned her robe.

  “Thank you again,” Jennifer said as she took the baby back. “Is your husband here?”

  “No. It’s his day with the militia. He won’t be home ’til later. He’s sure going to be surprised. So what kind of help can I get? I was barely hanging on with two kids. Adding another is going to push me over the edge.”

  “My family will help,” Jennifer quickly offered. “In fact, I was thinking that maybe your family could move in with us at Carol’s. It would be a little crowded, but we could make it work. I need to be with my kids, and my daughter, Emma, is too young to stay here by herself, but if we’re all there together, my kids and I can help with your kids, and we have wood, a warm house, and Carol and Grace to help as well. I know it’s not perfect, but I can’t think of a better option right now.”

  “Let me talk to Curtis before I agree to anything. I don’t even know how long I can do this. Leave Madison here for now, but any help would be appreciated.”

  Jennifer stood to leave. “I’ll go talk to Gabe and some others from the council. Maybe they’ll have some ideas.”

  CHAPTER 34

  Friday, February 10th

  Northwestern Montana

  The first shot sailed over Kyle’s left shoulder, whistling by so closely he thought it might have nicked his ear. Before he could react, a second shot caught him in the chest, six inches below his left shoulder, knocking him backwards off his horse and into the snow and growth on the side of the road. Kyle blacked out momentarily before coming to in severe pain and struggling for breath. He watched as Garfield, spooked and confused, ran wildly in the direction of the shots.

  Finding that his left arm was useless, Kyle rolled onto his back and brought his right arm around. He felt a clean hole in his jacket where the bullet, the cause of such unbelievable pain, had struck.

  He’d started out early that morning after spending the night in the barn of an abandoned house near the river. He’d cooked pheasant for breakfast, filled his water containers, and headed off just after sunrise, hoping to reach his parents’ place by noon the next day, assuming Garfield held up and nothing unexpected happened. Now he unexpectedly lay on his back in the weeds, dizzy, struggling to breathe, arm numb, and unsure of why he’d been shot and by whom.

  That the snow wasn’t stained crimson with blood he owed to Frank Emory and his safety lecture, and the Kevlar vest Frank had given him. Because the vest was bulky and uncomfortable, Kyle hadn’t worn it once he’d cleared Missoula, but after being held at gunpoint by the survivalists, he’d changed his mind and begun wearing it again. Staring up at a gray sky and waiting to catch his breath, Kyle was grateful he’d changed his mind. Frank had warned him that if he were shot while wearing it the impact would hurt like hell, and it did, and that it’d probably break some ribs, but at least he’d be breathing and not bleeding out all over the ground.

  Whoever shot him was good. The flash had come from at least six hundred yards ahead, and to be so close on the first shot and nail him on the second, the shooter was practiced and comfortable with their weapon. Kyle tried to clench his left hand, but his fingers responded minimally, quivering and barely balling into a loose fist. He forced himself to let his head fall back in the snow and to relax, to focus on the trees swaying back and forth overhead in the breeze and on the branches and the birds that flew lazily by, anything to help him
think about something other than the pain.

  It seemed like an hour, but was more like just a minute or two, before he was sure he was going to live. Kyle rolled slowly onto his stomach and started to assess his situation. He edged gingerly up the bank and peered down the road. Garfield was about eighty yards away on the side of the road, still antsy and unsettled and moving further away. He scanned the direction the shots had come from, but saw nothing in the way of people or movement.

  Kyle slid back down the shoulder of the road and did a quick inventory, finding he didn’t have much more than a knife, his handgun, and a short length of rope on him. Everything else he’d brought on his journey was tied to his saddle or in the backpack secured to the horse, now eighty yards away and moving towards the shooter.

  Kyle continued to work his left arm, clenching his fingers and flexing at the elbow. It was still numb, but feeling and movement were slowly returning, to the extent that his arm no longer felt like a dead appendage hanging uselessly from his shoulder. Taking his pistol from the ankle holster, he ejected the magazine and counted the bullets. He’d used it that morning to scare off a coyote, firing a couple of warning shots before the young animal dashed off into the bushes. That left him with eight rounds to work with. He plugged the magazine back in the gun, released the safety, and began to plan.

  Since he had fallen between the road and the river, Kyle needed to get across to the forested hillside where the trees would provide cover. He ducked low and backtracked, working in the direction he’d come from to a curve in the road that would shield him from view. Once he was sure he was out of sight, he dashed across the road to the protection of the trees.

  The forest was thick with pine trees, but only a thin undergrowth of patchy scrubs and nameless ferns covered the forest floor, enabling Kyle to move freely through the trees, though his vision was limited. Kyle knew that with only a handgun he was at a disadvantage, so he ran uphill to try and at least get on higher ground than whoever had shot him and improve the odds somewhat.

  Once he felt he was high enough, Kyle turned north and hurried along the mountainside, running as fast as he dared while trying to minimize noise. Because the forest was densely treed, he’d lost sight of the roadway, forcing him to guess at his location relative to his horse and the shooter. The further he went, the more uncertain he became, until he eventually slowed his pace, stopping every few seconds to listen. His mind raced. What if, he thought, the shooter was doing the same thing – circling up high and trying to come in behind him?

  A branch snapped up ahead, and Kyle froze in his tracks, holding his breath for a long time, even as his lungs screamed for air. He waited, eyes and ears straining for any hint of movement. After a long, silent moment of nothing, Kyle slowly let out his breath and stepped closer to a tree, watching and waiting. His thoughts flashed back to Colorado, when the tattooed man had trapped him on the side of the road. The same tensions and emotions flooded over him. Kill or be killed. Lose and die forgotten. Or win, and all you get is the chance to do it all again the next day. He hated what life had become.

  Kyle cautiously resumed his advance, moving more carefully now, wary of any sound or movement. He descended at an angle, a thirty-degree drop from his highpoint, towards the general area of where the shooter might be. Proceeding from tree to tree, and using the skills he’d been taught in the Deer Creek Militia as a counter offensive to an assault from the tree line, although with only one man and one pistol, the strategy was greatly modified. Reach the cover of a tree, drop down, wait, peer out quickly for signs of threat, count three, peer quickly from the other side, wait, then carefully move around the tree, exposing yourself slowly as you looked more thoroughly for the enemy. If everything was clear, then select the next place of cover, check for obstacles, and make the move.

  If done correctly and efficiently, you could move to a new cover spot every thirty-five to forty seconds, depending on how far away the next place you selected for cover was. Of course that was in training, with no threat of return fire. Kyle’s current pace was noticeably slower.

  Kyle had been moving forward in this fashion for ten minutes when he caught a glimpse of the road far below through a break in the trees. He paused where he was, studying the forest and what he could see of the road, watching for any sign of someone tracking him or movement in the opposite direction. Reassured he was alone, he proceeded onward, adjusting his course to drop more directly towards the road.

  Nervous, he moved forward, selecting the thickest trees for cover, each time having to force himself from their protective shelter and into the open, risking his life with every move. He’d dropped down to about fifty yards above the highway when he heard Garfield snort some distance back. It gave him a feel for where he was, but also strained his nerves further, knowing he was between his horse and the shooter, and that it wouldn’t be far, or long, before the situation was resolved, one way or another.

  Kyle leaned back against the tree and uttered a short prayer, something he found himself doing more often, then slowly crept towards a fallen tree ten yards below that he’d selected as his next point of concealment. He reached it and dropped down, breathing hard. The trunk of the tree was large, more than three feet in diameter at the base where he was hiding. The root cluster had torn out of the ground and stood over six feet in the air, the tree having had the misfortune of growing in a rocky patch of ground that had forced the roots out and not down.

  His cover was excellent, the tree providing a thick wall of wood and branches to conceal him along with a decent view of the road below. He even caught a glimpse of Garfield, who was now grazing calmly and alone on the side of the river. Kyle knelt down and scanned the area again, peering over the trunk, studying the road, and watching for anyone moving along it. With the fallen tree providing such great cover, Kyle decided he would wait things out. If nothing happened before dark, he’d retrieve his horse and make a quick dash out of there, and if something happened before then, well, he’d just play that out as it happened.

  He waited twenty minutes, with every sense on edge and ready to react, but there was nothing. He was about to find somewhere to relieve himself, a need he’d had since arriving at the tree, when he heard the snap of a branch, a sound too loud to be natural.

  Kyle shrank back against his cover, his brain filtering out the sounds of wind and water and birds, listening for any additional signs that would indicate a person – a cough, a sneeze, footsteps, voices, anything that would let him know whether to relax or attack. He gripped his gun in both hands, ready, but not anxious to shoot, especially when there was a good chance he could be shot in the exchange.

  Hearing nothing, Kyle silently shifted, turning his body so he could look through a gap in the roots of the tree. Moving his head slowly to the side, he peered through a two-inch opening in the direction he expected the shooter to come from and where the noise had originated.

  He choked off a gasp as two figures, bundled in hats and heavy coats, with rifles in hand, moved stealthily through the trees no more than fifteen yards away and heading towards him. His heart skipped, and it was all he could do to keep from jumping up and running, so strong was his urge to escape. He stayed motionless, not wanting his movement to draw their attention.

  Kyle was confident he hadn’t been seen, as their attention was focused towards the road and away from where he was, and they would likely have been more evasive had they known he was there. Suddenly, one of the figures motioned towards the fallen tree, and they began moving towards him. Kyle drew his head back slowly, his thoughts racing, trying to decide what to do. He could hear their footsteps, careful and methodical and cautious, drawing closer.

  One handgun against two rifles was bad odds, even with the element of surprise. Kyle extended his legs, gripped the gun a little tighter, placed a shaking finger on the trigger, and rolled against the fallen tree, tucking under it as much as he could while trying to silence his breathing.

  Dirt crunched and twigs po
pped, sending shockwaves through Kyle’s body as the footsteps drew nearer.

  “See anything?” The voice was low and wary.

  Kyle placed them no more than five feet away, just the other side of the tree he hid behind. He listened for a reply that didn’t come, the question likely just eliciting a shake of the head.

  “Keep watching. I need to take a leak,” the voice instructed.

  Kyle lay still, too scared to blink, cold sweat running down his back. He heard the sound of a zipper, then splashing only a couple of feet from his head. They were using the other side of his cover as a toilet. If this had been paintball, they’d have had a good laugh about it later. But the reality was, at least one of them would likely be dead before lunchtime.

  He waited, not daring to move, as the splashing became intermittent, then stopped. Pine needles crunched as the man stepped away. Kyle lay still, trying to determine how quick and silent he could be getting to his feet. However fast it was, he was sure it wouldn’t be faster than they could turn and pull a trigger.

  There was a different voice, softer, feminine. “You think he’s dead?”

  “Pretty sure. You aimed too high, but my shot hit him in the chest. I saw him go down. If I hit the heart, he was done almost immediately. If I missed the heart, then he’s had plenty of time to bleed out. We’re good.”

  There was a pause in the conversation, then a question from the woman. “Should we just take the horse and be done, or do we have to make sure he’s dead?”

  “I know you hate it, but you always confirm your kill. That’s why we’re taking our time and going this route. The body can take some pretty serious damage before shutting down. We don’t want an unexpected bullet coming between us, do we? Let’s just do this. Stay close, and keep your head up.”