Contingency Plan

by Lou Allin

  Andy’s grandpa had built the place with a couple of hunting buddies and a chainsaw. All of them must have passed by now. I suspected that someone from the reserve kept an eye on it for Andy. They might not know about his death.

  Gramps had said that a good cabin would outlive us all.

  The door creaked open. A musty smell met my nose. Everything looked exactly the same. About twenty by twenty with a sturdy Fisher woodstove. No cheap tin jobs for Gramps. A Canadian Tire wall calendar from a decade ago. The pump at the sink would work until the hard freeze. After that, we would get our water from the creek or later melt snow for drinking and bathing. It was nearly dark, but I felt relieved and safe. Joe would never find us. But could we make a life here?

  “Let’s start unpacking. Go get those lanterns. The kerosene cans are in the back of the Bronco. Welcome to the frontier,” I said to Jane, rubbing her shoulders. She smiled back. My little girl was a trooper.

  In minutes we had all the light we would need. Tacked to one wall was a fading color picture of Andy and me. I remembered when Gramps took it with our Polaroid. A lump in my throat brought back the moment.

  “Wow, Mom. You look so young,” Jane said when I pointed it out.

  I had hoped for a supply of wood, but I had been fooling myself. In the ten years since Gramps passed, any wood left in the shack out back would be eaten away by dry rot. No electricity. No heat. Often I’d chuckled over a book about someone living in the bush but with a complete four-piece bathroom with hot water. City people take comforts for granted. Most of them have no idea what an outhouse is.

  I was glad for the double bed. We curled up together in our sleeping bags, hoping that our body warmth would cancel out the cold of the mattress.

  The next day I drove into Fort Fraser. I found a notice advertising seasoned firewood at the Petro-Canada station and store. Using their phone, I ordered three cords.

  The woodman chugged into our drive in a huge dump truck. Six hundred bucks. The wood looked clean. It was good value.

  “Drop it over here, please. And you said you could pile it?”

  “Sure can. Fifty dollars should do it. You best stand back,” he said, picking up a wicked-looking hook and spearing the first chunk. He moved into a regular rhythm and the task was underway. Wood was cheaper here where it could be gleaned from the clear-cut timber lots after the logging.

  Two hours later I put the cash into his hand. Sitting in a tarped pile by the house was a warm winter.

  “You’re lucky, ma’am. This was the last load I had. Don’t wait so long next year.” He tipped his wool hat complete with earflaps.

  “I won’t. Thanks.” I added a tip. No tax in the underground economy.

  “There’s extra pine for the kindling,” he said with a smile. “And a chopping block too. No charge. The birch will burn all night, not like the fir down south. Lots of coals in the morning.”

  He tooted his horn and waved as he left. His friendliness warmed my heart. In the North, people went out of their way to be kind. When the climate could kill, you stuck together. Those stranded could even break into a camp. Bush code. Isolation made me feel safe. No land line, no cell phone. No cable. No TV. At the cost of our lives, we wouldn’t miss them.

  Cooking was simple and fun. Creativity carried us. Stews, soups, beans and skillet bread. The old one-pot meals seemed best. People up here weren’t used to fresh vegetables. When the temperature dipped below zero, we’d have all the freezer space we’d need in a shed. Pasta, rice and potatoes were our mainstays. The bears were long gone to their dens, and coons and foxes couldn’t penetrate the locked door. Jane had told the spider in the outhouse to leave us alone for the winter. “Estivation,” she called it. A kind of hibernation. Like we were doing.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Our first week was the roughest. Chores kept us hopping. Even split and piled, wood warms you three more ways: hauling, burning and cleaning up the ashes. The snows were beginning, and the creeks froze over. I had never imagined how long it took to melt enough snow for a pan bath. No wonder the Scandinavians loved their saunas.

  One morning, I opened the door of a small outbuilding and nearly started laughing. Tarped inside was the old Bombardier Ski-Doo snowmobile that Andy and I had used on our honeymoon. A tiny 250cc model—a baby next to today’s muscular 1000cc versions. A set of tools sat on the spider-webbed wooden counter along with two empty gas cans. Everything was filthy with dust.

  Jane clapped her hands. “A snowmobile. I sure miss our rides from when I was a little kid. Do you think it still works? That would really be fun.”

  Grinning, I opened the cowling. “These things run forever. I bet I can get it going.” I had done my share of the tune-ups on the older models at our shop. No fancy circuitry. Just the basics. Andy had said that I had the touch of an angel with a carburator.

  A week later, a battered Jeep bumped down the drive. A man in a handsome beaded buckskin jacket got out. His raven hair swept over his brow. His arms were folded and his dark eyes flashed disapproval. This looked like trouble.

  I left the porch, where I’d been hammering a loose board. It couldn’t be someone Joe sent. Not this soon. I forced a smile. Friend or enemy?

  “This is reserve land,” he said. “I’m presuming you didn’t break into the cabin to survive.” He tossed a look at our car.

  I extended my hand. Jane came around the corner with an armful of wood. The happy look on her face vanished as she stopped in her tracks: were we safe or not?

  “I’m Sandra Sinclair. Andy was my husband.” I struggled to remember the few words Gramps had taught me. “Hadih.” Hello.

  “I’m Pat Redwing. Daint’oh.” How are you? The tension in his voice eased.

  “Soo’…” I shook my head. “It’s been a long time. I never was much good at other languages. Flunked French.”

  “Soo’ushah is the reply. I am impressed.” Looking around, he said, “So where is the guy? It’s been years. And is this your little one? I have a daughter in high school.”

  “Andy passed a few years ago.”

  Pat lowered his head. “I didn’t know that. Sorry for your loss. We were kids together.”

  “Come on in for a coffee, Pat,” I said.

  With our boots at the door, in snowy-country tradition, we sat at the table. Jane curled up with a book of animal tracks. She had spotted a lynx print near the lake.

  As we sipped at the kitchen table, he asked, “So you were here about fifteen years ago? Nothing’s changed, as you can see.”

  “I didn’t know what to expect. I mean, Tom died not that long after Jane was born. We were so busy with the shop that the time got away from us, I guess. That’s why we never managed to come back here.”

  “I miss old Tom. We pass by the camp every now and then to see that it’s okay. In case Andy came up.” He drained the cup and gave me a nod of thanks. “But surely you’re just visiting. Can’t be that you want to spend the winter. You know how brutal it gets.”

  “Pat, I’m going to trust you with some information. I’d rather that no one knew I was here for now. At least not under my real name.”

  He gave me a curious look but said nothing.

  I brushed back my hair in a nervous gesture. “There’s a very dangerous man looking for us. He has powerful connections.”

  Pat put his hand on his heart. “I’m sorry for your troubles. No one will bother you. You have my word on that. Tom’s family is part of my own blood. Do you have everything you need? You’re gonna have to rough it big-time.”

  I laughed. “You forget that I lived in Dawson Creek. That’s a climate and a half.”

  He leaned forward over the table. “Fishing’s good. Lots of trout. In the winter we take our ice huts out too.”

  “I’m thinking of getting the old snowmobile going again. Could you keep your eye out for a used blower for the drive? For a while I can crunch the snow down, but I’ll be bogging soon enough even with four-wheel drive.”

&n
bsp; When he left, I realized that I had a friend. It was as if I had found a new planet. Joe seemed so far behind. By now he would have thrown out a dragnet in every direction. I prayed that our tracks to the North had been covered.

  Not for the first time, I wished that I could have brought Bonnie with me. But in her confused state, how could I? She was safe where she was.

  Would we ever see her again?

  * * *

  As the winter set in, I made sure that we had shovels and snow scoops. Pat arranged for a used snowblower in running order. It would make a path to the main road. That would be plowed before dawn each morning for the school buses. More than once he brought us a grouse for a special treat.

  I thought about a weapon. Pistols were out. While I knew how to handle a shotgun and a .22 rifle, how could I carry one? Getting a gun license might be tricky too. I’d have to take a handling course. Not good for a low profile.

  Jane, aka Denise, was now in school. The process was smooth. I stood tall and sounded confident when I enrolled her. Families relocated. Records were lost in fires. Every week we went into the little branch library to check out more books and use the Internet.

  I cautioned Jane. “I know it’s hard, but you’re not to send any emails to your friends. You understand why.”

  “Duh, of course, Mom. I took my Facebook page down before we left. Twitter too. Is it always going to be this way?”

  “Sweetie, I know this is hard. We talked about it before we left. You can make new friends as long as you don’t use your real name.” Her story was that we’d lived in Vancouver before I lost my job. I was now a writer working from home. Who wasn’t writing a novel these days? Meanwhile, I had us signed up for health cards so that we would get medical care at the local clinic. God bless Canada.

  The money was holding out well. We had no rent and no utility bills. Only our food, gas and occasional propane. The ax and hatchet took care of heating needs. Jane had put herself in charge of the wood. She had an eagle eye for splitting. Grandpa Tom’s genes. Still, I prayed that she never had an accident. The North could be unforgiving. Not evil and indifferent. That was one difference between Joe and the mountain lion. The beast killed to survive, whereas the man killed for sport.

  One day in early December, at the small supermarket, I picked up a copy of the Vancouver Sun. I felt like screaming for joy. Joe was under investigation. They weren’t sure if it was going to go to trial. He had the best Toronto lawyer that money could buy. The man had gained notoriety for plea bargaining for the wife of a serial killer. Everyone knew that the woman was as guilty as her husband. Now she was free after having only served a few years.

  As for Joe’s case, the words misunderstanding and exaggeration suggested that dementia had played a role. He was blaming his victims. His estate had been built on lies and abuse of the vulnerable. Cleverly, he avoided the richest prey with interested heirs. Ten or twenty thousand at a time satisfied him.

  I stuffed the paper into a trash can.

  Now I could breathe for a while.

  CHAPTER NINE

  When the serious snow arrived in January, I had the snowmobile all geared up. Twenty years old, but the engine ran like a Swiss watch.

  First, an oil change. Then a new spark plug. The belt was threadbare, so I got a gently used one at the dealer in town. I also duct-taped the ripped leatherette seat. Bombardier had built Canada on these babies. If the car industry had been as efficient, no one would have needed a new model.

  Under that clear blue sky that defines the wilderness, Jane and I explored our new home. The established trails were enough for us. Breaking our own might have bogged us in soft snow. We’d putt along on Holy Cross Lake, then follow the connection into a chain of smaller lakes. Fluffy coats began to cover the conifers. Rabbits’ fur had turned to white. I wished for the same camouflage.

  “Be careful around where creeks enter and where lakes join,” I told Jane. “When the water is running underneath, the ice gets thin. You can’t tell until it’s too late.”

  “That’s what Dad always told me,” she said. “You don’t know what’s below the surface.”

  We had bought used snowmobile suits with flotation and helmets. Every year in BC a dozen people drowned riding snowmobiles. Sometimes they crashed. More often they went down riding too soon or too late on the lakes. Men, for the most part. It was in their nature to take risks.

  Sometimes we stopped for lunch and ate sandwiches and dried fruit. I’d make a small fire from spruce twigs and we’d boil water in a tiny billy can for tea or hot chocolate. Nothing tasted as good as a hot drink outdoors. When the temperature sank to forty below, it kept us inside a few days at a time. Too cold for even the school bus. But those low temperatures also meant we didn’t get the 10 meters of snow like Revelstoke down south. Fine with me.

  “Do you think we’re safe?” Jane would ask at the dinner table.

  “Safe as we can be, honey,” I’d answer. After a while, she seemed to relax in her new life.

  But I’d seen that look in Joe’s eyes. There was a reason Scout had been dumped. Joe had made a mistake when he thought an active young border collie would stay alone without barking. Admitting that he had been wrong was impossible. When Joe invested, he got his money’s worth…or else. I tried not to imagine the fury when he found us gone. The cold resolve as the weeks and months passed. The idea paralyzed me. We had to be sharp and alert.

  With more free time, I caught up on the island news at the library’s computer link. I noted an obituary for Bonnie. We should have been there to say goodbye. Taking a chance, from a pay phone I called her next-door neighbor, Sharon.

  “Sandra, my god, where have you been?”

  “I can’t explain. It’s been impossible to call. What happened to Bonnie? I just read—”

  “She’s gone to glory, honey. It happened so suddenly. One morning I went over and she was cold in bed. They think her heart just stopped. Or a stroke. She didn’t suffer. What a mercy.”

  “If I could have been there…” A sob died in my throat. The times we’d talked in her cozy cottage returned to me. Bonnie laughing and teasing. Her common sense about raising Jane. Her warm embrace with a little squeeze at the end. I knew that she wished us well and happy. That was all that counted now.

  “Bonnie loved you. She’s in a better place now and understands. Like we all will someday.” Sharon told me that everything was under control.

  “I can’t thank you enough.” The woman had taken care of the simple cremation and cleaned out the rented house. The ten thousand dollars left belonged to her. She’d earned it.

  “Bonnie and I were…close. It was hard to see her fail so quickly. But it happens. Her sense of time was a problem. A day, a week, a month. She lived in the moment.”

  “Did you see Joe visit her?” I asked. Bonnie would have mentioned him.

  “You mean that fellow in the fancy suv? It’s odd, but he was there last week, the day before she passed. She could still take care of herself, but she was losing it upstairs. She told me how he had brought her a lovely fruit basket and a box of chocolates.”

  “What else did she say about me?” I held my breath until my lungs hurt. Joe visiting her could mean big trouble.

  “She said that she missed you and hoped you’d come back soon. That last night when I went in to see how she was before bed, she was muttering about some cabin. Bonnie was pretty confused by that time.”

  An icicle of fear in my rib cage chilled me more than the worst blizzard. Talking about a cabin. Somehow Bonnie had remembered Gramps and his hunting from when she had been a child.

  It was time to go. If I planned it right, we could leave in a week. Maybe three days. How long would it take for him to locate the camp and get up here?

  With all the resources in the world? Was I kidding myself ?

  He might already be on his way.

  I stopped blowing the drive after that. We rode in and out from the main road on the snowmobile. The ha
rder the access for him, the better.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The next day was Friday, the Ides of March. Jane had been reading Julius Caesar for her English lesson. The Roman general had gone to the forum against all advice and taken umpteen stab wounds.

  I felt the same pain when I saw Joe’s 1-LGL-EGL suv parked in front of the Yamaha shop as I walked by. Their sign said: Snowmobile Sales and Rentals.

  I forced myself to calm down by taking deep breaths. My heart was rattling in my chest. Time slowed to a trickle. An old lady on a walker crossed the street. I heard each crunch of the frame. Lift, down, lift, down.

  My stomach twisted.

  I didn’t see Joe. The rentals were kept behind the store. With shaking hands, I put up my parka hood and walked to the car.

  He didn’t know my Bronco, but so what? In this tiny town, newcomers stuck out, especially women alone. How could I have told everyone to watch out for him? I had some pride, stupid though that sounded. If he asked enough people…

  It had barely been a week since Bonnie died. Joe had moved quickly. He once had told me that he’d driven for thirty-six hours to Mexico to reach a client when planes were grounded. Taking amphetamines, of course. I ducked and eased into the Bronco, pulling away slowly. The last thing I needed was to attract attention.

  I picked Jane up at school instead of letting the bus bring her home. “Joe’s here,” I said as she loaded her books into the car.

  I might as well have slapped her across the face. No panic, though. My daughter had been rock solid from the time she’d learned to walk and talk. Jane allowed herself a deep breath, then straightened up like a soldier. “What are we going to do, Mom?”

  She had brought her gear to town for a sleepover with a girlfriend. I thanked all the gods for the miraculous timing. “I’ll take you to Karen’s. Stay there until you hear from me. That should be Saturday morning.”

  “But…if I don’t…”

  “You will, baby.”