Wildside

by Steven Gould

  Rick showered quickly, put on clean clothes, and stuck his head in the kitchen door.

  “You want some eggs?” I asked.

  “I’ll grab something in town—do we need anything, while I’m there?”

  I opened the fridge. “Get some milk. And some more Diet Pepsi.” I looked at him. “Guess you aren’t going to Clara’s?”

  His smile died. “Not yet. I’ll talk to her later.”

  I started to speak, then stopped myself. After a moment I said, “Be careful. Watch security. Okay?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Of course!” He left.

  Marie shook her head and pushed the tea away from her. I sat down and took a bite of my sandwich, but it tasted dry and flat.

  “Shit,” I said.

  Marie said, “Yeah.”

  I found Clara at the stables, riding her horse, Impossible, over training jumps. They had one set of bleachers, faded and weather-beaten, and I climbed to the top seat and watched.

  She saw me when she was finished, after she’d dismounted to open the gate of the arena. There were shadows under her eyes and she looked like she wasn’t enjoying herself. I walked with her back to the barn and Impossible’s stall.

  “Rick told me about Christopher,” I said.

  She blinked and leaned into Impossible. “Oh.” Impossible nickered. He was an old quarter horse, brown with a white sock. The hairs on his face were flecked with gray.

  “Are you okay?” I kicked the side of the stall. “Shit. Of course you’re not okay. Sorry. That was stupid.”

  She smiled briefly. “I know what you meant, Charlie. I’m bearing up.”

  She tied Impossible’s halter rope in the corner and unsaddled him. “Hang this in the tack room, will you? The rack has my name on it.”

  I took the blanket and saddle, backed out of the stall, and looked down the aisle. I stuck my head back in the stall to ask her which direction. She had both arms around the horse’s neck and was crying. I backed out of the stall quietly and, with only a little backtracking, found the tack room at the far end of the barn.

  I made a lot of noise coming back into the stall. She wasn’t crying anymore and she was briskly brushing Impossible’s coat. She looked at me with reddened eyes.

  “It’s okay, Charlie. You don’t have to scuff your feet quite so much. I’m presentable.”

  “Huh?”

  “Charlie—you never scuff your feet. You walk around like a mouse. Even when you were overweight.”

  “Uh…“

  “Oh, shut your mouth. Something will fly into it. There’s another brush on the rail.”

  I picked up the brush and started working the other side of the horse. After a minute I handed a bandanna across Impossible’s back, “You have horsehair on your cheeks.” While she wiped her face I said, “I’m worried about things.”

  “Things? Who’s a thing?”

  “Okay. I’m worried about you. I’m worried about Rick. I’m worried about the project.”

  “Don’t worry about me, Charlie. I’m not telling anybody about the project. I don’t know about Rick, though.” She gave me the bandanna back.

  “Oh, Jesus, Clara. It’s not just the project. I know you don’t particularly like me, but I do care if you’re happy or not.”

  She dropped down into a crouch, looking at me from under the belly of the horse. “What makes you think I don’t like you?”

  I shrugged. “You know you wouldn’t have hung out with me unless Rick wanted to. You even complained about it.”

  She looked down at the bedding. “Um. That was before the project.” She blinked. “In my callow youth.”

  “That was three months ago.”

  “We all have to grow up sometime.”

  I bit my lip. “Do you really think I’ve lost weight?”

  She opened her eyes wider. “Don’t you weigh yourself?”

  “Uh—I’ve been busy.” I didn’t want to say that scales terrified and depressed me. “My clothes have been fitting different, but the last time I weighed myself, I was the same. I haven’t had to trim the aircraft any differently.”

  “Well, that doesn’t surprise me—you’ve turned a lot of flab into muscle. Your shirts are still the same size, but it’s because of your shoulders and chest. You need to get some different pants, though—look at the way they’re bunched up under your belt. At least put a few darts in the back.”

  Maybe I was slimmer. I glanced back at Clara. She was staring at something a million miles away and the corners of her mouth were drawn down.

  “What do you want, Clara?”

  “I want Rick!” She stood abruptly and I could hear her sniffing. I handed my bandanna back and she took it. I heard her blow her nose heavily. “Sorry,” she said. She walked to Impossible’s head and started to hand me back my bandanna. “Uh, I’ll wash it, first.” She tucked it in her back pocket, then took Impossible’s bridle off. After a minute, she said, “You meant, what do I want that I can have?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I don’t know.” She led me out of the stall and closed it, absentmindedly stroking Impossible’s neck over the gate before she turned away. She dropped the bridle off in the tack room and we walked outside into the hot August sun. “We’re quite a pair, aren’t we, Charlie?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Unrequited, incorporated. Me with Rick. You with Marie.”

  I swallowed. “I wasn’t aware it was that obvious.”

  She laughed. “You walk quiet, but your face—well your face stomps around like an elephant. Besides—I live with Marie, after all. It’s not like we don’t talk.”

  My ears turned red. “Oh.”

  She hugged me suddenly. “It’s okay. And I do like you, Charlie. You’re okay. More than okay. And if I ever thought different, you can be sure it was stupidity on my part.”

  It was my turn to blink away tears.

  We had good weather the next two weeks, and were able to start a new depot on high plains of New Mexico near the Colorado and Oklahoma borders. There was a small town in that location on the tame side, so we named the base after it—Moses. We were very close to our destination, now, a short hop to the northwest from the new base, but risks were about to increase exponentially.

  Since Marie or I were Pilot-In-Command on every flight, Clara didn’t have to fly with Rick, which she preferred. They were talking, but Clara kept him at arm’s length—strictly project business—unless he was willing to return to their old relationship. Marie was still mad at Rick for hurting Clara, so she flew with Clara while I flew with Rick.

  A couple of nights a week, Rick slept away from the ranch. I didn’t have to ask if he spent the time at Clara’s.

  Marie’s disposition improved greatly when she was able to visit Joey on weekends. He’d been shaken and clung to her like a drowning man. I had mixed feelings. I’d been hoping they’d break up, that I’d have my chance, but it was good to see her smile again.

  Clara spent all her spare time at the stables, with Impossible.

  I purchased oxygen sets for the Maule. The next series of flights would clear ten thousand feet—God help us—over the Rocky Mountains. We spent a day doing test flights over Wildside Base, flying clear up to the Maule’s operational ceiling of twenty thousand feet, to test engine performance and the oxygen rigs. I hoped to keep below fifteen thousand feet over the actual mountains—the danger from icing would be bad enough as it was.

  Rick and I took the first foray into the mountains. Our destination was only forty-five minutes flying time from the base at Moses, but we played it safe, a simple high-altitude flyover of Cripple Creek, Colorado, videotapes running. Rick took three rolls of 35-mm stills, as well. The weather was clear and the mission went as planned.

  We were running out of time, though. There was snow on most of the peaks and glaciers in some of the high valleys. If we didn’t finish in the next month, we were stuck until next spring.

  All our flyovers were two-day trips.
Spend the day getting into Moses, then refuel and stay the night. Wake up rested for the mountain flight, turn around after the flyover, and head straight back. If the flyover was short and the winds were right, we didn’t need to refuel until Wildside Base. If we were in danger of running into our reserves, we’d stop at Scurry or Comanche to refuel.

  At Cripple Creek, our potential landing sites were few. The best one looked like it would take substantial ground prep and I didn’t know about parachuting in at that altitude. There were also a few flattish spots above the timberline, but they were spotted with snow. However, a glacier valley five miles downstream had a tilted meadow that looked flat enough. If we landed going uphill, it would compensate for the higher than normal ground speed necessary at that altitude.

  Twice, Rick and I were caught by weather and had to return to Comanche after running into advancing weather. Once, Marie and Clara were socked in at Moses for two nights. Rick spent the time in Bryan and I lived by the shortwave, camped in the tower, dashing back to the house for food and drink, then returning to eat by the radio.

  When they were within an hour of home, I turned the tower back over to Rick, showered, and slept for ten hours.

  Despite perfectly clear skies, we didn’t fly the next day.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “WE’VE LOST THE TUNNEL.”

  Joey was released from the treatment center on a Friday and went to his first AA meeting that night. “Actually, it’s not my first. We had them every day in the center. I even ran some—it’s part of the program. Gotta work the program—keep my support systems intact.” He grinned but it wasn’t the old Joey. This was someone who was both less and more sure of himself.

  The old Joey presented a confident face to the world—very aggressive. I’d long known that it was a mask, a pretense that covered someone who was very unsure of himself. This new Joey was very tenuous and overtly insecure—haunted, almost—but you found under this something stronger, a desperate determination to win an inner fight.

  We had a dinner for him on Saturday, early, before the AA meeting in downtown Bryan.

  “Thank God they’ve got nonsmoking meetings. In the center it was so bad that I thought if alcoholism doesn’t get me, lung cancer probably will.”

  He didn’t want to fly, yet. The overnight missions would keep him away from AA meetings and, for the time being, he wanted to go every night. So he volunteered to do all the base maintenance and to take shifts on the tower.

  “All right with me if you want to mow all the strips. Great, in fact,” I said. “You can do some of the wildlife video, too. But you still need to get a couple of hours in every week, to get your reflexes back in shape and keep them there. Right?”

  He nodded slowly. “I guess. I’ll want a check pilot the first time or two.”

  “Just say the word. I have a feeling that Marie would be more than happy to ‘check you out.’”

  “Already did,” Marie said, “last night. And he’s performing beautifully.” Then she had the grace to blush slightly, but Joey turned bright red.

  I laughed and was surprised when it didn’t hurt. Not too much, anyway.

  Rick and I were returning from a low-level photo recon of our proposed Cripple Creek landing site. We’d been battling headwinds all the way back so we landed at Scurry for fuel.

  After tanking up, I got on the shortwave to Wildside Base. Clara had the tower and answered immediately.

  “Weather’s clear here. How’s it there, Charlie?”

  “We got some scattered cumulus and the headwinds have been crummy, but we’re okay. Should be in about four. What’s going on there?”

  “Joey and Marie just went to get the tractor. She’s going to mow the Wildside strip while Joey rides shotgun, so it should be nice and smooth when you—”

  She stopped transmitting.

  “Sorry, Clara, you took your hand off the mike key. What was that?”

  No answer. I checked the radio carefully. Power, antennas, frequency setting, digital self-diagnostics. Ten minutes went by with no further communication.

  “What do you think happened?” The worry on Rick’s face matched the feeling churning my guts.

  I took a deep breath. “Either they’re transmitting and we’re unable to receive them, or they’re not transmitting. If they’re not transmitting, it’s because they have technical problems or they have other problems.”

  “Other problems? What do you mean, other problems?”

  In my head I pictured federal agents swarming over the hangar and tower, Joey, Marie, and Clara standing handcuffed, under guard. “Maybe Joey fell off the tractor and broke his arm. Maybe there was a power outage. Who knows? Let’s get going—we know the weather is clear there and if we get above five thousand feet, we should be able to check the AM beacon.”

  “Right.”

  He tried to rush the preflight and I irritated him by being twice as careful. Still, ten minutes later we were in the air and wasting fuel by flying five knots below rated top speed instead of our optimum cruise speed. Still, with headwind, this only took our actual ground speed up to normal cruise. We took a bearing on the solar-powered AM beacon at Comanche, then switched over to 216, the AM beacon at Wildside Base. Nothing. When we reached five thousand feet there was still nothing.

  “The oxygen sets are over half-full,” I said, and kept climbing. We pushed it all the way to twenty thousand feet and there was still no trace of the Wildside Base beacon—Morse W.

  “Shit. You’re in control, Rick. Get us down to ten thousand feet and head for Comanche.” With the Wildside beacon out, we would have to navigate in by dead reckoning. I pulled the chart out and began taking bearings on the Comanche, Scurry, and Royce City beacons. Over the next hour I calculated our wind drift. By the time we passed over Comanche I was able to say, “Steer one-oh-six magnetic. When we’re one-eight-five off of the Royce City beacon, we’ll be on the Brazos River and we follow it south to base.”

  “You want control back?”

  I shook my head. “Nope.” I started scanning through the frequencies, looking for anything. I’d swing back to the Wildside tower frequency every few minutes and try to raise Clara, but there was still nothing.

  I kept my growing unease from Rick. Giving him control kept him busy, kept him from worrying too much. What did I do, though?

  We hit the Brazos on schedule. Ten minutes later I heard Clara’s voice on radio. “Come in Maule one seven baker. This is Wildside Base transmitting on a handheld radio, do you read?”

  “Roger that, Clara. We read you. We’re ten minutes upriver. What’s wrong? Is the power out?”

  There was a burst of static and I thought we’d lost her again, when she said, “Well, you could say that. We’ve definitely lost power.”

  “What else, Clara? What else is wrong? Over.”

  “We’ve lost the tunnel.”

  Things looked normal enough as we landed. Marie, Joey, and Clara stood outside the hangar as we pulled up. Clara held the handheld radio while Joey and Marie stood by, armed. Clara’s lips were tight, Marie was looking at Joey, worried, and Joey was scanning the perimeter, but the corners of his mouth were pulled down and he seemed on the edge of tears.

  We shut down the Maule and joined them.

  The lights were off in the hangar. One of the doors was opened two feet and the dark within was cut by a path stretching diagonally across the floor. Each of us had a flashlight on our harnesses. I took mine out and stepped inside. The others followed.

  “Shut the doors,” I said.

  “What about the Maule?”

  “Leave it for now.”

  Rick pushed the door shut and it was dark, then splotches of light lit the floor and walls as we turned the flashlights on.

  The door was still there, and the tunnel itself. The tractor was parked in the tunnel and I had to squeeze around it. Beyond it, I found half the rotary hay mower.

  Half.

  It was still attached to the tractor. O
ne side of it had plowed into the wall of the tunnel and was about six inches into the dirt wall, but the rear of it was gone, a straight edge of fused metal, like it had been cut with a very fine cutting torch. Beyond it, the tunnel continued for another eight feet or so, but ended in a rough rock and dirt surface.

  “When it happened,” Joey’s voice said, “it was like a huge electrical spark and the edge of the metal glowed in the dark for several minutes.” His voice was quavering. “I’m sorry, Charlie. I should’ve been more careful.”

  Marie’s voice came from behind the tractor. “It wasn’t Joey’s fault. We were necking. I should’ve left him alone while he was driving. I stuck my tongue in his ear and he swerved. That’s when the tractor hit the wall.”

  Rick started to squeeze past the tractor and I said, “Hold it. Let’s get the tractor out of here—maybe turn it around and shine the headlights down here.”

  They backed up and I climbed up into the driver’s seat. The tractor started right up and I backed it, first, until the attachment was away from the wall. Dirt and pebbles slid down to the tunnel floor. I pointed my flashlight at the gash in the wall and something dimly metallic reflected the light back.

  “Watch your eyes,” I said, and turned on the headlights. The four of them turned their heads and retreated up the tunnel. The fumes from the tractor stank in the confined space. I turned it quickly, in the hangar, and disconnected what was left of the mowing attachment as quickly as I could before turning the headlights back down the tunnel and turning off the ignition. I left the headlights on, though.

  Rick asked, “Are you sure you want to do that? It’s not like we can jump-start it with your truck if we run the battery down.”

  “Worse comes to worst,” I replied, “we’ll just use one of the batteries from the Maule to start it. Now let’s see what we’ve got here.”

  I walked down the tunnel, the others close behind. Tall thin shadows preceded us, thrown by the tractor’s headlights.