“Sickness. Isn’t that why they leave the water? He was sick of swimming with the sharks and dolphins, squid and spiny porcupine fish; sick of fighting the storms, the cold and hot currents. He would spend hours gazing at the beautiful white sand, palm trees and windblown lazy grass along the dunes. He would then go back to Mrs. Whale and say, ‘It looks wonderful. I think we could live there. We could build a house on a foundation of words in the sand. No sharks, no sword fish, no fat lazy blow fish.’ Mrs. Whale does not agree, but being a good and supportive mate she says that maybe a trial run for a time would be okay for him, but in no way would she and her babies leave the water. She’ll swim with the denizens of the deep if necessary to ensure that the little ones have plankton in abundance, and swim in the best schools. ‘You go, Mr. Whale,’ she tells him, ‘and prove the beach of white sand doesn’t wash away underneath you. Prove you have what it takes to survive and then maybe I’ll join you.’ And so, off he went.”
Karen doesn’t say anything, but looks at me as though waiting for something more.
“It’s awfully lonely on the beach,” I say.
The flight attendants begin picking up empty cups, napkins and snack wrappers. An announcement is made that we are approaching Spokane and will be landing shortly, which is followed with tray table and seat-back instructions.
“That was a short flight,” I say.
“Just the first leg for me,” she says. “Going on to Minneapolis. Where’re you heading?”
“I pick up a puddle jumper here. I’m heading for Kalispell, in Montana. The writing assignment I know nothing about.”
“Ah.” She helps Melissa put away her books, except Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham, which she refuses to give up. Karen settles again. “I’m returning to my husband after a trial separation.”
“Ah.” Her color-shifts suddenly make sense.
“Six months with my parents. I don’t know who drove who crazier.”
“I know what you mean. Do you miss him, your husband?”
She looks at me a long time. The wheels touch the runway hard, and then again, followed by a roar as the aircraft slows to taxi speed. “Does a beached whale miss the water?” she finally responds.
Karen and Melissa are not getting off. I stand and notice Melissa tugging on her mother’s arm. Karen bends forward to receive a comment in her ear. She straightens and says, “I think you’ll have to ask him yourself. You’re on a funny face basis with him after all.”
I look at the six year old–Karen confessed the child’s age–and watch her hesitate and then present me the book by Dr. Seuss. “Can you autograph my book?”
I look at Karen who only raises her eyebrows. I sit back down, accept the book, find an appropriate page and pause briefly in thought. Melissa makes a face at me. I return same and then write,
For Melissa,
One of the most beautiful young ladies I have ever had chance to meet. May your charm and funny faces never cease. If some day we should meet again, may it be over Green Eggs and Ham.
Zach Price
I return the book and put on my coat. Karen says thank you and we squeeze each other’s hand. “The beach isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, is it?” I say.
“No, it isn’t.” Her last words.
I step into the aisle and Melissa wiggles around her mom. I bend down and she presents me with a hug. I feel her arms around my neck and my heart does about a dozen flips. “Thank you,” she says in her soft voice. As quickly, she retreats to her seat and I retreat to the exit door.
Chapter 2
Three hours later the pilot of the puddle jumper cheerfully announces our pending arrival at Glacier Park International Airport. We circle the runway, a long strip of pavement in a sea of white. Elsewhere the white is only broken by buildings and parking lots full of cars.
It looks cold as we taxi to the small terminal, well below freezing I imagine. It was about forty degrees in Spokane. I am next to last to exit. I attempt to step out, but it feels as though a giant is smearing an invisible ice cube in my face. I suck up a lung full of icy air and stumble back into the only person behind me. “Holy shit!” I cough. “I’m sorry, but it’s cold out there.”
The person I back into, a man in an Eskimo parka, shakes his head, steps around me and goes down the steps. The flight attendant says, “First time in Montana, Sir?”
I nod. “How cold is it?”
“The low overnight was forty-two below, I’m told. It’s about twenty-five below right now.”
I had heard of such things but didn’t imagine. “Below? Below freezing or below zero?”
She laughs. “Below zero, Sir.”
“Oh, God.” My gloves are somewhere in the bowels of the plane. I have no hat and my coat is good to maybe twenty degrees. I eye the distance to the door of the building where the man who went around me disappears. I wonder if I can make it. I’m already feeling a deep chill.
“Are you going to be here long?” she asks.
“I hope not. Maybe no longer than the next flight south.” I wait a few more seconds and then take a deep, warm breath and hustle down the stairs and across the tarmac.
The terminal building feels like a blast furnace. My fingers, ears and nose I’m sure are frostbitten, and my eyes are frozen open.
“Mr. Price.” I turn to a man presenting his hand. “I’m Lance Evans. Welcome to Kalispell.”
My eyeballs did indeed freeze between the plane and the building and are now thawing out and running down my face. I sniff in whatever else is trying to escape and accept his hand. “You didn’t tell me it was this cold.”
“Cold?” he says. “We’re in a heat wave. It hit fifty-four below night before last. It’s warm now.” He laughs. “I do apologize though. I should have warned you of the Arctic cold front. Is that the best you have?”
“The best I have?”
“Your coat. Did you bring anything warmer?”
“This is it.”
“We’ll get you outfitted. Let’s get your bags.”
We move to where the bags are already coming in on a large, wheeled cart. A tall, rather husky man with a neat trimmed beard, steps up next to Lance. Lance says, “Zach, this is Randolph Spriggs. He’ll be our pilot the remainder of your trip.”
I shake Randolph’s hand. “Remainder?”
“Good to meet you, Zach. I’ll be taking you out to the compound. It’s about a thirty minute flight.”
“Ah ha,” I say.
“I’ll grab your bags, store them for you. The chopper is being warmed up now. Shouldn’t be too bad. Which ones are yours?”
I pull out a large black faux leather bag with straps. “This is it.”
He zips and buttons his parka, slips his hands into cowhide gloves, picks up my bag, as well as my over-stuffed briefcase, and walks away.
“We’ll wait in here until the bird is warm,” Lance says. “It’s been sitting for a while. We came in early and did some shopping for the compound. So, what’s Texas like this time of year?”
“Texas?”
“Yeah. That’s where you’re from, right? Dallas I believe.”
“Yeah, right. Being two days into spring, I expect it’s a tad warmer than here.”
“Frankly, this is damned cold, even for here, especially in March. We’re breaking records with this one.” He leads me to where we can see out to the helicopter. “I get the impression this is your first time in cold country.”
“It must be the word, fear, carved in the ice on my brow that gives me away.”
He laughs. “Don’t worry. It’s just a matter of dressing properly. We’ll take care of that. This weather isn’t something to fear, but you certainly must respect it. It can be a killer, Zach, if you don’t.” He stares out at the helicopter, the blades slowly turning. “At least it doesn’t come hunting for you.”
Something in the tone of those last words sends an additional shiver down my spine.
“Let’s go,” he says.
Without thinking I follow him out the door. Before I know it my lungs are being ripped open from the inside by a thousand ice needles while we strut across the endless tarmac to the helicopter. The sliding door opens just as we approach. I scramble in ahead of Lance.
It isn’t warm in the chopper; at best a few degrees less cold. I sit shivering while Randolph does what helicopter pilots do to prolong the agony of their freezing passengers. When we finally leave the ground I momentarily forget the cold.
“Is this your first helicopter ride, Zach?” Lance hollers over the noise of the craft.
“This is a Huey Bell 212. The military equivalent is the UH-1N. I’ve flown it a couple times.” That was back in the days when I had my private pilot license and a friend who was a test pilot for Bell Helicopter in Dallas. Joel let me put my hands on the controls quite a few times. He said I was a natural.
“You’re a pilot?”
“Not anymore.” I flipped a Cherokee upon landing in a strong crosswind about seven years ago. I walked away from it and flying altogether.
Although noisy, the ride is smoother than I remember. The view is better than from a commercial airliner where I usually have to battle with the wing. From my seat I know I’m looking south. I can identify the northern end of Flathead Lake, an expansive area of white fading away into the distance, bordered by trees and multimillion-dollar homes. It quickly passes from my sight as we continue west, deeper into the Flathead National Forest.
Chapter 3
“The tiger oozes through the forest, quiet as the mud, invisible as the wind.”
—Spell of the Tiger
The memory of my helicopter days soon fades as the penetrating cold snaps me back to my wondering what the hell I’m doing here. The frigid landscape is unending and evidence of human habitants becomes harder and harder to find until suddenly there is nothing but trees and more trees, snow and more snow. I have a terrible vision of being dropped into some nineteenth century community where there is no electricity, where people live in huts made of thin logs, tree limbs and animal furs.
I lean toward Lance. “Are there Grizzlies around here?”
“Huh?” Lance yells over the noise of the helicopter.
“Is this Grizzly country?”
Apparently he notices a new level of fear on my face. He laughs. “Don’t worry. I’ve only seen them a couple times in the last year.”
I look down expecting to spot huge bear tracks in the snow, finding instead an unblemished snow-packed road running alongside the helicopter. Randolph is flying us just above the tree tops. We pass over a spot where the road is broken by a fence that is topped with several rows of barbed wire. The road passes through a double gated, high security entry complex, and continues on and up, higher into the mountains. We leave the road for a few seconds and then the trees open onto an expansive array of buildings. I breathe a sigh of relief. No hand-skinned logs glued together with clay and mud; no buffalo and grizzly fur siding; real, warm buildings with, hopefully, electricity.
I note several dome topped buildings stretching into the distance just before the landscape ceases moving around me and the noise and vibrations die away. Lance opens the door and I step onto the roof of a building, into the frigid. I see a door behind which I’m sure exists air nearer to my comfort zone. Lance heads in that direction and I stay close on his heels. I glance back as we enter the building. Randolph has my bags.
“Zach.” Lance is already standing inside an elevator. “This way. Randolph will ensure your bags get to your apartment. Meanwhile we have a meeting to attend, which starts in just a few minutes.”
I rush inside. He pushes the button with a four on it and we descend one floor and get off.
“You are about to learn what Sans Sanssabre is all about.”
The corridor is plush, about fifty feet long with several closed doors on each side. It terminates at a set of double glass doors through which I can see what I consider, now that I’m warm again, a white and green landscape wonderland. If I hadn’t just been out there I’d have the desire to go play in it. Now I’m quite content to only look.
Lance opens the door and I step into a boardroom. A wet bar sits to my left overlooking several overstuffed sofas and chairs. A huge oval table sits to my right with a high-back leather chair at every position. At the far end two men and a woman appear to be deeply involved in a poster size sheet of paper spread before them. The woman looks up, smiles, and comes to her feet.
“Lance! About time. Thought maybe the weather held you up somewhere.”
Lance pulls off his parka and looks at his watch. “Actually, I think we’re right on time.” He takes my thin coat. “I’d like you to meet Zach Price. He has graciously agreed to provide his services as our photojournalist. Zach, this is Aileen Bravelli. She’ll be able to give you all the history, which by the way goes back several hundred thousand years.”
Ms. Bravelli looks first at me and then at Lance. “I thought we weren’t. . .”
“It was decided in the meeting you missed,” he says quickly. “I’m sorry. I meant to inform you.”
Her mouth goes set; her eyes narrow and turn dark and then dart toward one of the two gentlemen she was with when I walked in. She returns her eyes to me. “Nice to meet you, Mister Price.” She doesn’t offer her hand, but I feel the intenseness of her aura. She is feeling betrayed.
“Zach,” Lance continues, pulling me toward the two gentlemen who have also come to their feet, “I’d like you to meet the Chief Executive Officer and founder of Sans Sanssabre, Victor Vandermill, and our Chief Financial Officer, Henri Cassell. Gentlemen, this is Zechariah Price.”
Both men extend their hands and I feel their strength and confidence, but I read nothing. “Wonderful to have you on board,” Vandermill says. “We expect a best seller out of this and it will all be yours. All we ask is accurate recording. Can you do that for us Zach? I assume Zach is what you prefer.”
“Zach is perfect. I’ll certainly try my best. May I ask, Sir, what Sans Sanssabre does out here in the wilderness?”
Mister Vandermill looks at Lance. “You haven’t told him anything yet?”
“Very little. I thought it would be better for everyone to meet him first, make sure that we are all still in agreement as to his presence. If all looks well, we can then brief him.”
Vandermill nods. “Sounds reasonable.” He turns to Ms. Bravelli. “Where are Wolf and Thomas?”
“In the gardens I assume.” Her tone is far from happy. She walks around to Vandermill and whispers, “Let’s talk a minute.”
They step over near the panoramic window.
Henri Cassell moves in front of me. “So, Mister Price, what have you written lately? What kind of credits do you come with? What is your most recent work?”
This is the part I dislike. What do I say? I’ve a couple short stories placed in literary magazines no one has ever heard of? A how-to piece on hunter safety was accepted by The Northwest Hunter; however, they folded the month before the issue was scheduled to publish. Of course there are the journalism stories, with by-lines, for the Seattle Times; one about an old woman who turned on a purse snatcher and nearly beat him to death, only to be charged with assault and battery; or the one about the two kids who decided to make it their school project to begin a recycling center in their neighborhood. Real captivating reading. I fall back on my aging standby, the one thing I’m proud of. “I did a piece for National Geographic on aging farmers in the Midwest.”
“Ah, yes. Of course. Nice piece of work. Great photography.”
I feel my internals shudder. “You’ve read it?”
“Certainly. I’m surprised that’s what you prefer to put on your brag plate when I ask what is your most recent work. That was what, five. . . six years ago?”
My internals stop shuddering and flop like a fat woman reaching the end of her exercise routine. “Six.” I try to make it sound as if it’s a positive point on my resume.
“What have you been
doing in the last six. . .?”
Lance intercedes. “Henri. No need giving Zach the first degree. Six years or six weeks makes little difference. The quality of his work is good.”
“Not arguing with the quality, Lance. There just isn’t much of it.”
“True, but after his assignment with us he’ll have plenty more.”
I want to throw in my two cents and defend myself, but I realize I have hardly a penny.
Henri continues with his first degree. “Do you have any experience with animals? Large, wild animals? Extinct animals?”
I used a buffalo in one of the few short stories I managed to place. I don’t figure that would count. “No.”
“How much time have you spent in this kind of climate, ass-deep in snow and two more feet in the forecast?”
“I’m afraid, Mister Cassell, that I have no experience at all in the snow, being from Texas. But of course, you know that. I have a strong suspicion that you never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to.” I also feel an intense dislike emanating from him.
He doesn’t deny my suspicion. “If it appears to you I don’t approve of you being here, then you’re correct. We already document everything. We are a research facility. What good would it all be if we didn’t document every step of the way?”
Lance breaks in again. “The decision has already been made, Henri, so let’s move forward. I don’t think Mister Price appreciates being picked on when he has nothing to do with why he is here other than he was offered the job.”
“I agree, Henri.” Victor Vandermill places his hand on my shoulder. “Why don’t you get settled, Zach, and I’ll meet up with you in about an hour or so. Lance and I will give you the tour. Right now, Aileen will show you to your apartment. I’m sure after the flight you would like to shower and clean up. She’ll also get you fitted with cold weather gear when you’re ready.”
Although I did notice the flat-top haircut sported by Victor when I came in, I only now see how perfectly vertical the silver-gray hair is. Squared away, immediately comes to mind. Squared away in dress, squared away in mind, squared away in business. He turns away and I have another curious vision. Place a bolt on each side of his neck and I could call him Frankenstein’s monster.
Sabre-Toothed Cat Trilogy Page 2