“She said Miguel can stay with us until Social Services figures out the next step, but he very well might have to go back to Mexico. She told me when she tried to explain it to Miguel in Spanish, he didn’t seem to understand. He kept telling her he had to reach Seattle. She asked us to keep a close eye on him, in case he tries to run away.”
But he didn’t try to run, not once. Whatever Miguel expected his fate to be, for the present he seemed happy. Ashley thought it was because Miguel had never seen anything like the spectacular beauty of Glacier, but Jack guessed it was more. With the Landons, Miguel was fed. He had warm clothes and a bed. He belonged. He no longer faced the world alone.
Jack knew, though, that one phone call from Ms. Lopez could change everything. Square-jawed men from the Department of Immigration and Naturalization—well, maybe they wouldn’t have square jaws, but that was the way Jack pictured them—could appear and take Miguel away, back to his life of poverty. How could he return to that harsh existence when now he knew how many good things were in the world? All Miguel wanted was to change his life, and the lives of his family in Mexico. He was braver than anyone Jack had ever met. He’d saved their lives. Would it cost the United States so much to give him a chance?
In the car, Jack felt Miguel’s elbow in his ribs as the boy eagerly pointed to the side of the road. Up ahead, white animals scampered across a mountain slope like bits of clouds. Miguel’s face lit up as he chattered a string of Spanish words before he stopped to slowly translate.
“Look—over there. See…uh….” He shook his head, unable to come up with the English word.
“Yeah, I see them!” Jack exclaimed. “Mountain goats! There’s a whole bunch of them—they look like they’re hanging straight up on the side of that mountain. How do they do that? Dad, now will you pull over so I can get a picture?” he begged.
“You bet. I’ll grab my camera, too.”
The car had barely pulled into a parking spot when the cell phone rang, loud and penetrating. Every one of them froze. Only one person would be calling them: Ms. Lopez. The phone shrilled again. Olivia hesitated just a moment before answering it. “Hello?” she said. “Oh, hello. Yes, I can hear you fine, Ms. Lopez.”
Jack felt his stomach clench. For the first time since they’d begun their tour of Glacier, Miguel’s face clouded. He looked from Olivia, to Steven, to Jack, and then to Ashley.
“Yes, we’re all fine. Miguel’s been a delight. And he’s got quite the appetite—I’ve never seen anyone that small eat so much. No, no, don’t worry about the bill. It was fun just to watch him enjoy himself.”
Jack saw Miguel’s eyes slide to the door lock on the car. The button had been pushed to Open, which meant the door wasn’t latched. As if he were clutching the neck of a violin, Miguel’s fingers wrapped around the chrome door handle.
“Yes, our Jeep will be fixed by three o’clock today. In the meantime, we’ve seen most of the park. It’s been incredible.”
Slowly, quietly, Miguel released the buckle of his seat belt with his left hand, so gently it didn’t make a sound. He was going to run, Jack knew it. If the news was bad, Miguel would bolt out of the car and take off just as he had so many times before, disappearing into the undergrowth until he could find another way to Seattle. Maybe he’d hitch a ride with another family. Or maybe he’d climb into a van with bad people like Max and Terry. Then, once more, Miguel would become a shadow. Jack couldn’t let him do it. But it didn’t seem fair to keep him prisoner. He’d come so far….
“So you’ve heard from the Immigration Service?” She shot Miguel a look, and then continued, “What did they say?”
“Uh huh. Uh huh. I can understand their problem. Yes, of course.”
Miguel’s entire body stiffened as he leaned closer to the door. Jack tensed himself to grab him, wondering if he should….
“And the teacher in Seattle, Crecensia Álvarez, what did she say?” Olivia pressed.
Jack could see the whites all the way around Miguel’s eyes as he took in a wavering breath.
“She did! Oh, Ms. Lopez, that’s marvelous. Yes, of course, I’ll let you tell him. He’ll be so happy! Miguel, I believe this call is for you!”
When she handed the phone to Miguel, Jack saw the look on his mother’s face; he raised his palm to give her, and then his sister, a high five.
“I knew they wouldn’t send him back!” Ashley exclaimed. “I just knew it!”
“Well, you were the only one. It was nip and tuck with the people at Immigration, but they finally consented.” Olivia reached over and gave Steven a quick hug before exclaiming, “It’s all set. Miguel’s mother gave permission for him to live with his teacher, and the teacher agreed. He’s going to Seattle, just like he wanted. That was a brilliant idea you kids had to get Miguel’s story to the Missoulian newspaper.”
“And then the wire services picked it up,” Steven added, “so the story went out all over the country.”
“But,” Ashley interrupted, as Miguel chattered away in Spanish over the cell phone, “how’s he going to get to Seattle? We can’t just stick him on a bus, not after all he’s done for Jack and me.”
Olivia grinned at her children. “You think we were just going to dump him? No way! Your father and I already decided that if things worked out—”
“Right,” Steven finished. “We’re gonna drive him there, all the way to the front door of his new home. We figured we owe him that much.”
Miguel was still chatting happily in Spanish to Ms. Lopez—in his own language, that boy was quite a talker. Jack shook his head, hardly daring to believe the good news. Miguel was safe now. He would have the life he wanted, and the Landons were a part of getting him where he wanted to be.
Every single person in the car seemed to glow with a patina of happiness that a lens couldn’t capture, but it was there, just the same.
A truly perfect picture.
AFTERWORD
Glacier National Park has a special place in many visitors’ hearts because it is home to grizzly bears. Certainly, a hike in the park would not be the same for me if it were not grizzly country. The presence of bears sharpens my senses and makes me pay attention to small things I might otherwise overlook. Of course, I always yell “hey bear” when I’m hiking to let the bears know I’m coming so I don’t surprise one. To check if a bear has passed my way recently, I like to search for tracks in muddy sections of the trail. I’m always on the lookout for bear droppings because they tell me what the bears are eating. I’ve developed an eye for trees that bears like to rub their backs on. The bark is sometimes worn smooth and covered with hair from years of bear rubbing. In my studies, I use the hair to identify individual bears with DNA fingerprinting methods.
In The Hunted, Ashley is afraid to be in Glacier National Park after reading a book about two women who were killed by grizzly bears there in 1967. And who can blame her? There aren’t too many things more frightening to imagine. But the bears involved in those attacks had lost their natural desire to avoid people because they had been fed human food. Over the past 30 years, we have learned a lot about how to retain the natural feeding behavior and shyness of bears by keeping our food and garbage away from them.
Unfortunately, many people believe all bears are blood-thirsty killers. Nothing could be further from the truth. As much as 90 percent of the diet of Glacier’s bears consists of leaves, berries, and roots. Grizzlies spend a lot of time grazing on grass just like cows! Many of the animals they eat, such as ants and moths, are small. Bears do everything they can to steer clear of people. By using their keen ears and amazing sense of smell, they detect our presence and usually quietly slip away before we even know they’re there. But you could encounter a bear at close range if it is windy or a rushing mountain stream drowns out your noise. When this happens, the bear is just as frightened as you are! In an instant, the grizzly must decide whether it is safe to run away or whether it must stay and defend itself. It almost always decides to leave.
> As powerful and frightening as grizzly bears can be, their fate rests in our hands. Through habitat destruction and hunting, humans are capable of exterminating grizzlies. In fact, the population south of Canada almost became extinct earlier this century. Grizzlies survive here now only because we have decided to share some of our land with them. In a few national parks and wilderness areas grizzly bears continue to impart the aura of untamed nature that these places were created to preserve.
As an ecologist, I have been privileged to study the fascinating lives of grizzly bears and black bears in Glacier and Yellowstone National Parks since 1977. Each year is etched in my memory by my connection with these remarkable animals—1977: crawling into my first bear den to try it on for size (it was unoccupied at the time!); 1979: visiting a high mountain forest in April and finding six-foot-deep holes in the snow where bears had dug down to raid squirrel caches of pine nuts; 1983: watching from a ridge as a grizzly and black bears ate huckleberries on a slope turned crimson and gold with the arrival of fall; 1990: taking a spring bike ride up Going-to-the-Sun Road and spying a grizzly bear and her two cubs sliding on a distant snowfield. I hope all of you someday will have the opportunity to experience the magic of grizzly country.
Kate Kendall
Leader, Greater Glacier Bear DNA Project
Glacier National Park
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
An award-winning mystery writer and an award-winning science writer—who are also mother and daughter—are working together on Mysteries in Our National Parks!
ALANE (LANIE) FERGUSON’S first mystery, Show Me the Evidence, won the Edgar Award, given by the Mystery Writers of America.
GLORIA SKURZYNSKI’S Almost the Real Thing won the American Institute of Physics Science Writing Award.
Lanie lives in Elizabeth, Colorado. Gloria lives in Boise, Idaho. To work together on a novel, they connect by phone, fax, and e-mail and “often forget which one of us wrote a particular line.”
Gloria’s e-mail: [email protected]
Her Web site: www.gloriabooks.com
Lanie’s e-mail: [email protected]
Her Web site: www.alaneferguson.com
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