by Newman, AJ
Tom wondered. “Can we see Dead Indian Road or any of Ashland from up here?”
Granny B processed the question. “Yes, but only small parts of Dead Indian Road. Remember, it’s at the bottom of a small canyon running down from the mountains. You can’t see to the bottom to see cars or people in most places. Ashland is a different matter. A lot of it can be seen from several of the hills above the cabin.”
Tom thought, Now, where do I find a powerful telescope?
*
Chapter 13
Granny B’s land – Granny B’s cabin in the hills below the cave.
The canyon was only a quarter-mile across at its widest point. The southwest side was steep, while the northeast side had a gentle slope down to the bottom. A stream wandered down from the mountains above. The fast flowing water had been slowed down over the years by vast landslides of rock and gravel from above, creating numerous small pools, which helped form small but gorgeous waterfalls.
The area around Granny B’s rustic cabin was the only level area in the entire canyon. Thousands of years ago, an enormous landslide had filled the gorge's bottom, creating a level spot a quarter-mile wide by about the same distance long. Two French trappers had found the canyon first and built a lean-to against a steep southeast cliff. They hadn’t found enough beaver in the small pools to make it worth staying in the area. However, while drunk at the trading post, one of them had mentioned the hills' lovely valley. A broke settler had heard the men and had taken his family into the mountains to hide from his many creditors. His family had built the cabin that now belonged to Granny B.
The cabin started as a sizeable one-room home back in the late 1800s. Another two bedrooms and a kitchen were added before the turn of the century. The kitchen was beside but separate from the main house with a dogtrot in between. The giant kettle, pots, and pans still graced the area around the massive stone fireplace. The floor was made from stone, and there were waist-high walls with one opening facing the small spring in the front of the home. The back of the cabin hugged the hillside and looked like it was part of the rocky face.
Rick started to walk up to the front door, but Tom shouted, “No! Stop! Only go to the cabin from along the rock face. You won’t leave footprints.”
Kate gazed at the door leaning inward and the shutter lying on the ground. “I hope the cave is in better shape.”
They walked onto the floor of the dogtrot, and Granny B was happy. “No one’s been here. There are the ashes I cooked with still in the fireplace, and look at the pine straw by the entrance to the cabin. No one has disturbed it. We can stay here if needed.”
Tom observed the wind had been blowing away from Ashland and up into the hills. “Does the wind always blow that direction?”
Granny B chuckled. “No, just wait a minute, and it’ll change direction. The wind swirls up this small canyon and dissipates the smoke. You’d have to have a huge fire for a column of smoke to be detected from Ashland. A small cook fire would never be noticed.”
Tom conceded that point. “We can cook here and avoid smoking up the cave. Is there anything of use in the cabin? If there’s not much going on here, let’s go to the cave.”
Granny B said, “There’s a hidden cellar stocked with older survival food. It should still be good.”
Tom thought, How can there be a cellar in this rock? He decided to ask his grandmother in private. He also questioned why she didn’t want to go into the cabin.
Granny B’s land – The cave
They only traveled a short distance back up the draw until Granny B stopped. “Look around and see if you can find the mouth of the cave.”
They stared at everything within a hundred feet and found nothing. Tom pointed at a thick stand of trees. “It’s in that copse of trees.”
Granny B responded. “What the heck is a copse?”
“A bunch of trees.”
“Son, how in tarnation did you know it was there?”
Tom exclaimed, “It had to be there because it has the best cover to hide an opening.”
“Well, smarty pants, it’s not there. It’s over here,” she said, and then rode her horse up into the trees and rocks and disappeared. A few seconds later, she waved at them. “Come on in. Be careful. The footing is bad for the horses.”
Tom asked Jackie and Kate to go in first with him and Rick following. “Turn your flashlights on before going into the cave.”
Tom was last to enter and found there was enough light without his flashlight.
The cave entrance was high enough to walk the horses inside but not high enough to ride. The tunnel went in about ten paces and bent to the left with a slight downhill slope. Tom guessed he was about fifty feet into the hillside when the cave opened up to a large chamber. Granny B had lit a Coleman lantern, which gave off ample light to explore the roughly twenty feet wide by thirty-five feet long room with a fifteen-foot-high ceiling.
Jackie slowly turned as she looked around the cave and noticed the markings and soot on the ceiling. “Some old Indians probably lived in this very spot.”
She gasped. “Cave paintings!”
Tom walked over to her. “More like charcoal stick figures. That animal could be a bear or a beaver.”
Jackie snarled. “Then why is the beaver taller than the man with the spear?”
“Good question,” Tom said and then motioned to Granny. “I think you said there were several chambers this large or larger. Let’s see the whole cave. Hey, where are the supplies?”
Kate chuckled, “Before we go, how do we feed the horses in here, and how do we get rid of their poop?”
Granny B urged them to take the tour first and then get into the detail. Kate pressed. “I just wondered about how to keep the smell down a bit.”
“Hold your horses, and you’ll find out how we can live here if needed.” Granny B laughed when she turned around and saw Kate holding the horses’ reins.
They hobbled the horses and took off following Granny B, who’d lit another lantern. There were several openings on both ends of the cave, but only two large enough for a person to walk upright. A couple of them were only large enough for a large dog to run into. The opening wasn’t large enough for horses, but Tom never had to duck, and it only narrowed to three feet once. The floors were much flatter than Tom expected. “Why are the floors flat when the rest of the tunnel is an elongated oval?”
Granny B guessed at the answer. “My guess is water washed the dirt into the cave.”
Kate wondered why the old lady chose this tunnel. “Why this tunnel? There was one the other end of the cavern that was almost as large.”
“Because this one goes where I want to go, and the other only goes to where we store the hay, firewood, and Coleman fuel. Do not. I repeat, do not go in there before I show you the way. It’s dangerous.”
Tom tapped her on the shoulder. “How so?”
“Stop with the dad-burned questions and take the tour!”
Tom chuckled, “She’s getting a bit testy.”
“I heard that, and I’ll test your sorry butt when we get done with the tour. There are several pitfalls and traps in this labyrinth of tunnels. So shut your pie hole and learn from this testy old woman.”
Kate started to speak, but Tom gave her a dirty look, and she held her comment. Granny B abruptly stopped. “Look! The tunnel splits off into two sections. We’ll take the left one and live. We’ll die if we take the other because it has a sheer drop-off. The crack in the floor is at least six feet across. We never tried to cross it, just too dangerous. Follow me.”
Tom spoke. “I feel like we’re going down the hillside. Does water ever gush through the cave? Could we be in danger if there’s a rainstorm?”
“Not along this route. The tunnel that leads to the hay storage has another tunnel that runs past an opening with a year-round spring. I’ve seen it almost overflow into that tunnel, and if it did, the water would flow down through these tunnels. Oh, the water is mountain spring clear and fresh
.”
“Here we go! Look ahead.”
The tunnel had exploded into a colossal cavern forty feet across by sixty feet long. The ceiling was over thirty feet above them. Granny B turned the lantern off, and dancing in front of them were several shafts of light with dust particles shimmering in the beams.
“We’re close to the surface!” Tom shouted and listened to his voice, echoing off the walls. “We could build a cabin above one of the holes and have a place to escape to when in danger,” Tom announced.
Granny B walked ahead to the far left side of the expansive room and lit the Coleman lantern. She motioned for them to join her. “Look down that way. Do you see the pile of wood, burned wood, broken pots, and other material? That’s what washed down from above us. Now, look at this wall. Yes, it’s a doorway to the outside. Follow me.”
She led the way through the rocky tunnel a short way. Along the way were roughhewn shelves stocked with food, water, and supplies. Tom’s eyes opened wide, and he felt his heart racing with expectation. Granny B stopped on a landing at the top of a short flight of stairs. “This is it.”
She fiddled with a hidden latch, and what appeared to be a rock wall silently opened to reveal the inside of the cabin. “Take a look but don’t step in yet. There are a few booby traps. Take turns and look.”
One by one, they each looked into the cabin by the light of the lantern in Granny B’s hand. Tom looked to the right and saw a small rustic kitchen with a small table and only three handmade three-legged stools. The fireplace was small but did have iron hooks with a large kettle hanging, waiting for the cook to throw a rabbit into the pot. The two windows had no frames; instead, they’re were held in place by log chinking. The glass was ancient and had run downward, as glass tends to do over time. The bed on the left side of the cabin had a trundle bed for a child. There was a door on each side of the bed leading to the other two added rooms. The entrance to the dogtrot was on the right side of the dry sink. Dust covered the floor and furniture. He saw no evidence anyone had been in the cabin for years.
Granny B waited until everyone had taken their turn. “I know you have a ton of questions. The original builder found the cave’s entrance and built the cabin over it back in the 1840s. This is the second cabin. The first was burned during an Indian attack. The family just went down in the cave and let the cabin burn after moving as many of their possessions as possible. The cabin was handed down in the same family until my dad purchased the land. I found the opening to the cave during a storm. Air rushed in from around the log wall that hid the opening back then. We replaced it with a door that sealed and couldn’t be found.”
Tom asked, “Did you ever stay here?”
“Yes, but Jonas hated being away from the ranch. Getting him to stay more than a couple of days was like pulling an impacted tooth.”
Tom had always thought his grandpa Jonas had been a gentle and respectful person. “That doesn’t sound like Grandpa.”
“I love your grandpa more than my own life, but he started out as the kind of man who thought the woman’s place was in the kitchen and bedroom. It took thirty years to round off the rough edges. He was worth the trouble, though.”
During the ride back, Granny B picked up several different kinds of plants for their supper. Tom grimaced to Kate and then whispered, “Yuck.”
On the way back, Granny B explained the waste disposal situation. Horse dung and human waste were pitched into the pit. Five-gallon buckets became the toilets and were emptied often. Granny B gave them a thorough tour of the cave and placed glow in the dark signs that warned of danger, marking the pit and other hazards.
Jackie asked, “Why did you wait until now to put those up?”
A wicked grin spread across Granny B’s face. “Unwanted intruders quickly meet their fate without the signs.”
*
Chapter 14
Granny B’s land – The cave
The cold fried Spam, crackers, and apples were filling, but Tom liked a hot meal for breakfast and supper. The cave was cold, and they hadn’t brought their sleeping bags, which made for a miserable night. They’d slept on top of crates and bags of rice and beans to avoid contact with the rock below. To say the least, it wasn’t very comfortable.
Tom stretched to work the kinks out. “If we’re staying here another night, I’m fetching my sleeping bag and a blow-up bed. Last night was pure torture.”
Rick had asked Jackie to massage his aching back. “What’s the plan? My back didn’t like those MRE boxes.”
Tom yawned again and finished stretching. “I say we start a second camp here for as long as it takes to run off or kill the rest of the rustlers. We need to get this place ready to be a bugout location, so let’s kill two birds with one stone.”
“Sounds good to me. I was getting a bit bored at the ranch.” Kate said.
Granny B smiled and then said, “Tom’s right. The rustlers have based their operations over here, so we need a camp over here. Remember, I brought you over to show you my secondary bugout place. Let’s get it up to the task. We need sleeping, eating, and sanitation covered.”
Tom said, “Real food! Granny B, I appreciate your survival knowledge, but real food is so much better.”
“Son, we have many more supplies put away than the average person, but even our supplies will eventually run out. I’m just trying to push the run-out time as far forward as possible, so we’ll have crops plus our livestock in good shape to meet our needs.”
“Ya got me there. Twig, leaves, and bugs it is.”
“Tom, even I don’t do bugs. Bugs are a last resort. Think of the twigs and leaves as a good food extender like Hamburger Helper.”
“I don’t like that either, but I get what you’re saying. I’ll shut up and support your efforts,” Tom said.
Jackie surprised the others. “Tom, do you trust Bill now?”
Everyone’s eyes were fixed on Tom. The cavern was silent until Tom spoke. “I think so, but I don’t know. I trusted Betty, and we all know what happened there. I want to trust him.”
Rick nodded. “Same way here. I only trust my life with the people with us now. I think we can trust the others, but until we put them to the test, who knows?”
Tom saw the confusion and doubt on their faces. “We can’t solve the trust issue any time soon, so we’ll keep the cabin and cave a secret and just let the others know we’re setting up a short term camp over this way.”
Kate ran her fingers through her hair. “Bill won’t be happy because he’s tired of being cooped up at the ranch. We don’t want him here, but maybe we can trust him to go on missions with Jack or James to satisfy him?”
Tom nodded. Then he turned to Rick. “I want Jackie and you to stay behind with Granny B while Kate and I go back for supplies. I agree with Kate, and we’ll find him a windmill to tilt away at until we can figure out if he’s trustworthy. We’re gathering our things and leaving. I’ll bring some pack horses on the way back to bring a decent load.”
Tom and Kate rode off about an hour later on their way back to the ranch. Granny B watched them ride away. “There’s not much we can do here until they get back with the supplies this evening. I’m searching for edible plants and would like you two to scout the area south of here. Stay low key and try not to leave any tracks. I’d go on foot and not get too far away. If you see anything to eat, bring it back. No shooting!”
Granny B saw Jackie’s head lowered and noticed Rick had turned away from her. “I want to apologize. I just caught myself treating you as children. Jackie, you need to tell me when that happens.”
Jackie smiled. “Granny B, you’ve been my momma and mentor so long I just couldn’t do that.”
“Learn to. I don’t want the love between us to sour because I’m a bossy old broad.”
Jackie hugged the woman who’d taken her and Tom in and had become their mother. “I’ll always love and respect you.”
***
Granny B’s land – Granny B’s cabin i
n the hills below the cave.
The shallow canyon around the cabin held a diversity of plant and animal life. Deer, rabbit, and opossum tracks littered the soil. The plant life varied from the hearty plants that could survive in arid conditions to the ones that grew around and in the Rogue River. Several thirty-foot tall Scouler willow trees grew on the flat areas next to the hillside and were in stark contrast to the pines. Pacific black willows crowded around the largest lake in this small paradise in the hills. This diversity was due to the stream that meandered down the middle of the canyon. The rest of the area was almost a high desert with little water. Scrub evergreens and hearty plants clung to the hills in patchy clumps, hoping for a bit of groundwater that sometimes flowed down the rocky hills.
It didn’t take long for Granny B’s bag to overflow with edible plants. She had a separate bag hanging over her shoulder that contained the poisonous plants she intended to use to train the others. She was pleased that she’d found such a variety of edible and non-edible plants. She’d planned to cook a tasty supper, but had been so successful she now had plenty of examples for a class on foraging.
Jackie and Rick were scouting the area north of Granny B and found something that astounded Rick. Rick walked along the narrow stream when he stopped to fill his canteen from the cold mountain water. He retrieved his Sawyer Mini and filled his canteen with the now filtered water while Jackie skipped flat rocks on the water. She wanted a flat stone, so she dug down in the stream and dislodged a handful of water-worn smooth stones. She selected a flat one and flipped it to the water. It skipped four times, but Jackie only focused on the shiny particles on her hand.