The River Wild

by Denis O'Neill

  ** ** **

  Two miles above Indian Gorge takeout, two of Long’s SWAT team members stood thigh deep in the river, holding fly rods, peering upstream for any glimpse of boat traffic. The third team member stood below them, not far from their tent, wearing shorts and flip-flops. His sniper’s rifle was angled against the back of the cottonwood towering beside him, out of sight from any river traffic.

  At the takeout itself, Trooper Noel sat on the back of a boat trailer parked beside the boat ramp. The van marked Bear Canyon Anglers was visible in the line of parked cars. Two other troopers wearing outdoor recreational gear sipped coffee nearby. Just upstream of the takeout, another trooper sat in a collapsible camp chair wedged into the sand at the water’s edge. He wore shorts and a fishing shirt. Binoculars were slung around his neck. On the sand beside him, the handle of his police revolver poked out of a rumpled beach towel. From his vantage, he could see a hundred yards upstream.

  ** ** **

  If they had known to look downstream toward the Gauntlet and had the ability to see through a wall of granite, they would have seen Roarke and Gail sitting on the scrap of beach at the foot of cliffs that elsewhere rose up sheer from the river. Terry sat on the edge of the raft, nervously watching Deke, who stood at the far end of the beach, peering downstream at a place where the lead edge of the River Wild seemed to just fall away.

  Gail held Roarke’s face in her hands. “We have a shot at this, honey, and I think someone’s looking out for us, but if you end up in the water, try to keep your feet angled downstream, right? … So you hit any rocks feet first. You’re not going to believe how fast the current is. Luckily, you’re a great swimmer, so that’s going to help if you get separated from the raft.”

  “What about you, Mom?”

  “Well, I’m going to try to keep the raft afloat and us in it, but you always need a Plan B in life, right?” She glanced at Deke and Terry. “These guys can’t swim, which is good if we end up in the river. Here’s the other thing. The old logging road is on this side of the river. The takeout side. So if and when, or when and if we … or you, get to the bottom of the Gauntlet—and you’ll know that because it’s really froggy and slow—get out to river right and head away from the river. You’ll hit the road at some point. Take a right, upstream, and that’ll hit the road to the takeout where there are always people.”

  “Gail!” Deke’s voice pierced the dull rumble of the river. Gail looked at Deke, who had returned to the raft and was signaling it was time to go.

  “I’m scared,” Roarke said, softly.

  Gail kissed him. “Me, too. But you know what? We’re going to get through this somehow—‘cause my gut says so—and we’re going to meet up with Dad and Maggie and oh boy, are you going to have the best story to tell your class when your teacher asks everyone what they did this summer. You’ll probably win an award.”

  Roarke blinked back tears.

  “You know what else?” Gail told him. “You’re the best kid I ever had. And I’m not even kidding. Not even close.”

  ** ** **

  Minutes later, Gail was seated at the oars of the raft—now shorn of its branch camouflage. She watched Deke tie Roarke’s feet to a D ring near the bottom of the raft. Her face tightened. “He’s got no chance if we flip, Deke.”

  “Which makes him even with me and gives you all the more incentive to keep the boat afloat, doesn’t it? Besides, Roarke told me you’ve done this before.”

  “I was twenty years younger. And I rowed every day.”

  “Let’s hope it’s just like riding a bike, then. You get us through the Gauntlet, to that road out, and I’ll let you go. How’s that? Deal?”

  Deke spotted the camp hatchet in a mesh net inadvertently packed within reach of Gail. He leaned over and retrieved the hatchet. “Don’t want to leave any sharp objects within reach of children,” and with a look, he said, “or their parents.” He slipped the hatchet into a storage net near his bow position.

  Terry climbed in beside Roarke and lowered himself into the bottom of the raft. Deke edged the bow of the raft off the beach. He looked downstream. He couldn’t see the Gauntlet, but he could hear the rumble it made. “Drivers start your engines,” he said, stepping into the bow of the raft as he pushed them gently free of shore. “Drive safely, now. We have children on board.”

  “Deke,” Gail said. She leaned forward and gestured for him to come closer. There was a hardness in her eyes that was almost unnatural. She placed her lips by his ear. “Do you know what the Ma Morgan Society is?”

  “Tell me.”

  “It’s a secret society of mothers. I’m a member. There’s only one rule. Do you know what that rule is?”

  “No.”

  “If you hurt my family, I will kill you.”

  She sat back and pulled hard on the oars, jerking Deke off his feet and onto the bottom of the raft. She rowed into the center of the current before straightening out the raft’s trajectory. She turned to Roarke and pulled him against her body. “I love you,” she told him. “Buckle up. Hang on.”

  The river narrowed at the tail end of the pool as it bent river left. Forced in by the guarding pillars, the current picked up speed, moving the raft at a faster clip. Gail braced herself with her oars to stand and assess and slowly back-oar. The start of the Gauntlet rushed into view—a bristle of white water, bank to bank. Gail stared downriver, imagining her run. She flew back in time to the only time she had ever taken in this view. Adrenaline surged in her body as it had twenty years earlier. Fear was matched by gumption. Back then she had soloed the run. There was only one passenger she cared about now, and it wasn’t even her. Though if Tom was dead it would be her job alone to shepherd Roarke to a place where he was strong enough to manage all of life’s currents on his own. She sat down, empowered. She made one last course correction before the current swept them into the unbroken water and plunged the raft down a first chute.

  The raft bounced easily over the first mogul field of rapids, snaking its way across the top of the churn, the fairly even weight distribution of bow, midraft, and stern gluing the raft’s rubber bottom to the water’s surface. Deke gripped the canvas lifting straps on either side of the bow. He practically pressed himself against the bottom. The raft hit a sizable curl-back, and the nose shot up. Gail drove both oars forward to counterbalance the backward thrust and help force the nose back down. It slapped down, taking aboard a spray of water that soaked everyone. Deke allowed himself to peek over the top of the bow. For a good hundred yards, there was nothing but acres of angry, churning water. Beyond that, the river began its major horseshoe bend to the left—a stretch where centrifugal force smashed half the current against the outer cliff.

  Gail worked her oars the way a mogul skier used her poles, little plants here and there to keep the momentum forward and hold the raft to its line. It took concentration and strength. When Deke’s body angled too far in one direction, Gail shouted at him to “Center up!” A dangerous rock rose up dead ahead, causing the river to cleave around it. Gail furiously dug in with her left oar to aim her butt river right. One, two powerful strokes to get the stern off its line, then two-handed strokes to try to cut through the chop and avoid a collision. She grunted with the exertion, pressed her feet hard against the bottom of the raft for better leverage. She took two more strokes, then scrambled to swivel the bow once more directly downstream. The raft just cleared the rock, brushing against it. The current rushed them toward the bend. Like a downhill skier, Gail knew she had to take as much of an inside line as she could—not for speed but for safety. She swung the butt violently the other way, river left, to try to get her closer to the inside line that would keep the current from smashing her up against the outer wall.

  Roarke’s eyes widened with alarm as the raft hurtled toward the midway point of the Gauntlet—the hairpin turn left. Ahead, where the force of the current was forced through a narrows that halved the width of the river, the noise was deafening. Terry was ashen.
>
  “Mom!” Roarke hollered. He was afraid.

  Gail yelled at him over her shoulder: “We’re okay. Get down. Hang on!”

  All of a sudden, Gail caught a crab with her left oar. It was partly because the raft abruptly dipped down as she dug in with her oar. The water held the blade and wouldn’t let go. The force of the current pushed the raft forward and punched the oar handle out of Gail’s left hand. The raft swung crazily broadside in the chop. Gail jerked her right oar out of the water as she lunged to grab her other oar before it slipped through the oarlock and overboard. Water poured over the right gunwale as the raft tried to manage the chop sideways. Imbalanced, the raft hit the next rock broadside. Gail leaped to the upstream rail to keep it from flipping. The raft folded dangerously in the midsection then sprung loose around the rock so that they were now turned stern-first downriver. Gail fumbled to return both oars to their oarlocks. Water sloshed around her feet, further destabilizing their ride. The cliffs narrowed dangerously, speeding up the current. All she could hear was the rumble around the corner, where the Gauntlet underwent a massive churn to alter course. It would be almost impossible to survive bow first. Sideways, they were dead.

  Gail sunk back into her seat, yanked her left oar onboard and grabbed the right oar two-handed to dig into the current and swing them around. She grunted and swore. She got red in the face. She rose up in a crouch and pushed for all she was worth. Her thighs screamed at her. Reluctantly, the bow edged downstream. When she had them aligned north and south, Gail slid the other oar back into action. She still had to get them closer to the inside line to survive the plunge. She aimed her butt river left and inched the raft closer to the cliff. The current swept them into the turn, ready or not. The river seemed to stampede itself toward the outer wall. There were whitecaps the size of ocean waves between her and the far cliff. Where the current collided with the wall, there was deadly chaos. The raft was practically shaking from all the torque on it. The river wanted to hurl it against its outer cliff, dooming it. Gail pulled two-oared in short, powerful, choppy strokes, all the time keeping her butt river left to hug the inner wall. Her arms throbbed with fatigue, felt like rubber. She persisted out of fear.

  What Deke saw next made him piss in his pants. Literally. As they swung around the pivot point of the inner cliff and started to straighten out, the bottom of the river fell out. This was the legendary Niagara Falls of the Gauntlet, more commonly known to guides and river dogs as “the drowning field.” The noise was deafening. Deke glanced back at Gail. What she saw in his face—for the first time—was a terror brought on by a complete loss of control. Behind her, Terry puked partly from fear, partly because he had swallowed so much water. Roarke reached forward and wrapped his arms around Gail’s waist. The lip of the waterfall raced at them. For a moment, when she looked straight ahead, all Gail could see was air and sky.

  The waterfall stretched from bank to bank; there was no intermediate trail down. The final obstacle, if you survived the plunge, was the Sphinx—a monolith right in the middle of the river that cleaved the boiling current left and right, leading to deeper, smoother water downriver and safe harbor. If you hit the Sphinx, the hydraulics guaranteed you were dead. It was as treacherous and merciless as the desert icon for which it was named.

  Gail centered herself and made a final adjustment so that the raft could take the falls properly aligned—north and south. The river fell away, and they were suddenly airborne. Only the underside of the stern of the raft maintained contact with the river. Gail leaned back like a bronc buster to keep the raft from nosediving and flipping forward when it hit. She angled the oars back as well, ready to engage the river on contact and with a mighty back-paddle help counter the raft’s forward momentum. Terry and Deke were screaming, but the roar of the river buried their voices. The bow pierced the water first like a pelican dive-bombing for fish. There was enough weight in the back half of the raft to allow the rubber nose of the Avon to pop up moments later, gouging water. A curtain of water poured over the sides, and for a moment the raft seemed to stick in place, held by powerful up-current. Gail knew she had to break out or be swamped. She shipped her left oar and grabbed the right two-handed. She rose up like a gondolier and back-oared two-handed. She had to generate enough speed to break out of the eddy. The waterfall poured down upon her and Roarke and Terry. Deke clung to the bow. Gail got the boat spinning, slowly at first, then faster and faster with each stroke, finally generating enough speed to break free. The raft caught in the downstream surge once more and rushed ahead, toward the Sphinx. Gail sunk back into her seat and returned the shipped oar to action. She back-paddled with the remaining strength she had to slow their speed and give her a chance of maneuvering the raft left or right. Her strength was ebbing. She had to make her play, or they’d be carried into the Sphinx. She jammed her left oar into the current and back-paddled with her right. She shouted and grunted and pleaded and growled. Suddenly, the stern swung river left, giving her just enough of a purchase on the current to make her move out of the suicidal current that targeted the Sphinx. She sunk back into her seat and rowed, pretending she was back on the Charles River for the last gasp to and through the Longfellow Bridge. She pulled until the Sphinx loomed almost overhead, then she stabbed her left oar into the water to swing the bow downstream.

  The raft straightened out just as the current washed it up against the flank of the Sphinx. The right side rode up slightly against the rock, but the force of the current pushed the nose downriver and into the final chute that emptied into the still water that marked the end of the Gauntlet. The raft slipped through the final, accelerated current and over a last turbulence before being squirted into the head of the long, deep, green pool below.

  Gail released the oars and collapsed from the exertion into the six inches of water in the bottom of the raft. She lay still, panting, like an Olympic cross-country skier at the end of a final sprint. The rumble of the waterfalls receded. After a moment, Deke’s eyes peered up over the bow. At the back of the raft, Roarke and Terry pulled themselves up onto the inflated gunwales. They looked like survivors of a tornado, lifting the cover of a root cellar to see what remained of their world.

  29

  The river below the Sphinx was as peaceful and tranquil as it was wild above. The cliffs faded away to rolling hills. The river straightened and deepened. There were any number of overhanging cottonwoods, some of which sported thick ropes knotted at the bottom for kids to unleash summertime cannonballs and belly flops.

  Deke was studying the soaked river map.

  “About a mile to the logging road,” Gail told him. “Leave us here. You’ll be off the river soon. We’ll walk out.”

  Deke refolded the map. “There’s been a change of plans.”

  Gail froze. “There’s no one coming after us, Deke. No one’s on the river down here but us.”

  “It’s not who’s coming after you that worries me. The problem is, once you get out, the folks who have been chasing us will know they still need to chase us. But if you’re not there to tell them, and they find the raft overturned and they find your body and Roarke’s—drowned—they’re going to have to believe we didn’t make it either … the Gauntlet being the Gauntlet.” He smiled. “What was she thinking taking a child down the Gauntlet? Dead and irresponsible!” He shrugged.

  “We don’t need to do any more killing, Deke,” Terry said.

  “How about some raping first? That’s what you want, lover-boy, isn’t it? But first some bungi-bungi. I told you you could do what you wanted once she got us through the Gauntlet.”

  “You told me we had a deal,” Gail said, her voice raw with anger and betrayal. “I did what I said I’d do—I got you down this beautiful and wild river alive … now keep your end of the fucking bargain!”

  “You know what hurts me most?” Deke replied, oozing a sincerity that had comingled with sarcasm for so long as to become indecipherable. “More than me giving you my word, then not living up to it? T
o think of you being the calf that makes it through the winter and dies in the spring. A farmer’s nightmare. I know because my daddy was a farmer. At least he was until he beat me with a belt one day, as he did almost every day, and I put a pitch fork through his neck that night after he passed out on the kitchen floor. I know he would have felt the same.”

  Gail stopped slow-paddling and shipped the oars. It was all she knew to do to buy more time. She turned to Roarke and touched his wet hair. She had no words, no strength. He was crying even though he was attempting to put on a brave face for his mother. The raft glided beneath an overhanging tree. Gail looked up to where the branch thickened in an unnatural way. She looked down, then she looked up again. Tom angled his face into view. He had pressed his body to the limb in almost perfect camouflage. He put a “shush” finger to his lips, then silently retreated behind the limb to blend in once more as the raft drifted past.

  Gail sat straight up. Her heart sang. Her body surged with adrenaline. Her mind raced, even though there was only one topic on the agenda: how to convene a meeting of the Ma Morgan Society.

  ** ** **

  A bare-chested Tom hobbled downriver, propelled by a mix of desperation and adrenaline. His cut foot was wrapped with strips torn from his shirt. His exposed back was a massive, open, scabbed sore. His hair was a tangle. His one-time threat to Gail that the wilderness might bring out his inner beast had come true.

  His destination was close by, where a giant cottonwood had sunk its roots on the riverbank and lived for a hundred years or more. A limb from the tree angled out over the river. One kid’s rope was knotted around the far end of the limb, some twenty feet over the water. The rope was drawn back and held in the crotch of a sapling. A second rope, affixed by Tom to the limb a couple yards closer to shore, was tied to a tree stump the size of a beer keg. The stump rested atop a rock nestled between giant roots.