Stony River (14 page)

Fenn said he didn’t mind having her out of the house in the evenings, but supposed he couldn’t expect her to put up with their dimwitted company when it was something he wouldn’t do himself. Besides, if there was even a one-percent chance one of them might end up as his brother-in-law, that was way too high a likelihood for him.

Sevana laughed at that. She said the last thing she wanted to do was marry a logger with a dead-end job in the heart of nowhere, even if it did look like paradise out there. “No offense,” she added quickly, realizing she had just insulted him and his livelihood.

Surprisingly, Fenn grinned. “None taken.”

“Really, I didn’t mean that.” She knew she had spoken condescendingly. “I admire anyone who puts in a hard day’s work. It’s just that the group from camp—they don’t seem to have a lot of—well,
poetry
in their souls.”

“Not unless you consider snoose-spitting and hunting stories poetry, they don’t.” Fenn was still remarkably complaisant. He himself was known to chew, but was one of the superior breed who swallowed the tobacco juice for extra buzz, making him much more esthetic to live with.

Sevana didn’t know what he told his fellow workers; she doubted it bore much similarity to her original message. Probably it had been blunt and not extremely tactful. She rather regretted handling it that way when it was over and done. She didn’t like to think that downriver was a whole campful of loggers she had snubbed, especially when they had been so friendly to her.

But whatever Fenn told them, it proved effective: no logger set foot on the place after that. So ended Sevana’s brief social whirl in the upper reaches of Stony River valley—with one notable exception. The day Joel asked her to Snowshoe Summit, she accepted the invitation immediately, without the slightest intention of turning him down.

CHAPTER 9

Sevana had passed the Spruce Creek pack-bridge several times in her excursions up the river with the loggers, and when Fenn disappeared on foot Sunday morning without telling her where he was going, she decided to investigate it. Leaving Trapper home in case Fenn wanted him later, she strapped the gun to her belt and walked the mile upstream to the sturdy structure of railroad ties spanning the river. Crossing the plank walkway to the other side, she found a fern-fringed path leading into shady woods, and a bare weathered board nailed to a tree with only the routed grooves of the letters remaining:
Stormy Pass—10 miles
.

The trail to the high country! Sevana started up it at once toward the worlds of beauty she was sure waited at its end. The hike took her on a challenging climb through squashy moss-green draws and witchy dark stands of ancient hemlock and spruce, and eventually to a landmark of sorts—an imposing, two-post signboard bearing three lines of freshly painted white script.

ATTENTION HUNTERS

HEAVY SNOWS COMMON BEYOND

THIS POINT AFTER OCTOBER 15
^TH

She stopped to take in the warning, feeling a tingle of adventure because the country behind that sign was so unaccommodating the government had been obliged to post a cautionary message. But it was also deflating. There she stood at the portal of the absolute untamed wilds, and she had not the time or resources necessary to journey further. She took a few steps past the sign so she could say she had entered that primitive territory—and then with one last reluctant look, turned her back on it.

On the bridge she stopped again, leaning over the splintery railing to watch the amber-green water slipping swiftly beneath her feet. She had walked a long distance and she was tired. The gun in its holster was heavy and cumbersome, to the point she couldn’t decide if it was worse to be mauled by a bear or be too exhausted to care. Hiking was not the best way to reach Stormy Pass, she saw that now. The only solution was to take Trapper. But could Trapper go the whole ten miles in one day? No—make that twenty, because she would have to come back, too. She didn’t think Fenn would let her keep his horse out all night! In fact, he might not let her go at all. But if he did, could she make it? It took Joel three days with the sheep, but just she alone, flying on a horse…

Startled, she looked up. Joel was walking onto the bridge, as if he had just appeared out of her thoughts. She hadn’t heard him over the noise of the water. Behind him, his dusty truck was parked in the pull-off.

“Hi, Sevana.” He came to lean on the railing beside her. “Saw you as I was driving by. What are you up to?”

“I took a hike up the trail,” she answered, still trying to account for his unexpected presence there.

“How far did you get?”

“To the hunters’ warning sign.”

“That’s a good three miles.” He sounded impressed.

“It wasn’t far enough to see the high country, though.”

“No.” He seemed to understand her disappointment. “You would have hit snow before you got there, anyway,” he pointed out, as consolation.

She had forgotten about the snow, in addition to everything else. Of course it was still snowed in, or Joel wouldn’t be here. Always, in every way, the alpine country stood out of reach! She put the subject out of her mind for the present. “Why have you left your sheep today?” she asked.

“I’m taking a quick run up to Snowshoe Summit to catch a few brook trout,” he answered, although in fact he seemed in no hurry to leave the bridge. He was looking down the channel as if enjoying the sight. “Dropping fast, isn’t it? Soon it will be clear and shallow, and you’ll know the reason it is named.”

“I’m glad I’ll get to see it at both high and low water,” she said happily. “It’s such a pretty river.”

“I’ve never found another river equal to the Stony—not here, nor up north,” he said with feeling. He turned to seek out the rivercut in the other direction. Finally, his eyes found hers. “Would you like to come up to the summit with me?”

“Oh yes!” Delighted he would ask, she followed him off the bridge. Before climbing into the truck through the door he held open for her, she unstrapped her sidearm and laid it on the seat.

“I didn’t bring my gun, so you’ll have to defend us today,” Joel kidded, but added more seriously, “I thought you gave up shooting.”

“I decided to try again. It wasn’t as bad the second time.”

When Joel was in the driver’s seat, he took the pistol out of its holster. “It’s a .44, all right,” he confirmed. “Fenn started you out with the biggest caliber there is.” As he started the engine, he looked over to offer: “Want to go back and let him know where you’re going?”

“No, he’s not home. He doesn’t care what I do, anyway,” she added, meaning to sound as if it she didn’t mind.

Joel drove up-canyon, following the river’s crooked course at the base of the mountains. “Truth is,” he remarked after a time, “I’ve been wondering how you were getting along with Fenn. Seems to me he’d rather keep to himself—the impression I’ve gotten.”

“You’re right.” She didn’t try to deny it. “He’d rather I hadn’t come; he said as much himself. I thought—I mean, I was looking forward to staying with him, but he’s grown up so hard and distant, he’s more like a stranger than a brother.”

“Why do you think that is?”

“I don’t know.” Part of her mind was registering the way the water caught the light in different refractions on the calm and rough stretches, the wide and the restricted passages—some views so priceless she wanted to beg Joel to stop, stop! so she could enjoy them. But he was waiting for a reply, so she tried to concentrate on one. “He wasn’t like that growing up. He’s always been quiet, but he was considerate. I think part of why he changed had to do with the military school he was forced to attend. He hated it in the worst way; it was completely against his grain.”

“The strict rules, the authority?”

“Yes. He’s too much of his own thinker to have someone else telling him what to do,” she said loyally. “But our father wouldn’t let him switch schools. Fenn tried everything to get expelled, and I heard he got into some kind of trouble. But instead of kicking him out, they threatened to make him take the year over, so he straightened up and graduated. Then he refused the military career Bryce had lined up for him, and came straight out here.”

The road had started the climb out of the canyon. Below them, the river was turning away into the heart of a complex set of ranges. Joel drove with his right hand loosely on the steering wheel, finding no demand in the steep, rock-studded road. “Sevana,” he ventured, “I’m sure it must be hard to find your own brother so cold. But at least you know it’s not you in particular he resents.”

“What do you mean?” He had her attention.

“It’s not just you—it’s his way with everybody. Maybe you can get through to him while you’re here. You have a better chance than anyone, living with him as you are.”

She nodded, but was not convinced. She hoped he was right—but thought if he’d seen the extent of Fenn’s hardness she had, he might have less cause for optimism.

As they neared the summit, the air blowing in the windows was noticeably colder, and the stunted trees a different variety—slender, conical spires with sharply pointed tops. They were alpine firs, Joel told her, when she commented how picturesque they were, like Christmas trees. They did look ornamental, but in reality their compact shape was the key to their survival: the short, down-sloping branches could support a heavy load of snow without breaking. He considered them the signature tree of the high country—along with the whitebark pines, which grew at even greater altitudes, up near timberline.

“What do
they
look like?” she asked, since it was seeming unlikely she would ever be at timberline to see them in person.

“Like trees twisted and tormented by the cruelest of elements,” was his surprising answer. “Trees made so strong by their struggle to dig into the rocky soil and brace against the strong winds, that even after they die, they stand solid year after year, as gnarled gray skeletons.” He stopped on the roadside. “Here’s the top.”

He retrieved his fishing pole from the back while Sevana hid Fenn’s gun under the seat. She didn’t see the creek, but followed Joel unquestioningly into the forest.

Suddenly the trees ended, and they were standing on the edge of an open meadow filled with purple-blue flowers that stretched level a good half-mile or better toward wooded hills and snowy peaks beyond. The radiant color—like the merging of violet and indigo between the bands of a rainbow—was unbroken, except for a few isolated alpine firs and one boulder that sat alone, as if out of place, near the heart of the glade.

“Oh, how beautiful!” Sevana spoke in a hushed voice, as if not to disturb the idyllic scene.

“It’s mountain camas.” Joel was not unaware of the effect his surprise had on her. It had been his intention all along to check out the bloom, but hadn’t told her so he could see her face when she witnessed it a first time. “It’s always a guess each year as to when it will flower, depending on snowmelt—but we’ve hit it right at its peak. See, almost every bud is open.”

“It’s like something someone might wish for, but never expect to find.” Sevana was wholly enraptured. “Oh Joel, I want to live right here in the middle of all these flowers!”

“It’d be a great cabin site,” he concurred. “Trouble is, it only blooms like this a couple of weeks out of the year.”

Somehow, it made Sevana feel better to know the flowers would not last. Otherwise, how could she bear to stay away, knowing what she was missing each day up at the summit? But while she there, while she could, she wanted to involve herself in the beauty some way—embrace it and make it her own; so that when Joel said, “Let’s go out to that rock,” she stepped forward enthusiastically.

They waded through the crowded flowers, the air faintly sweet with their incense. Close up, each petal was royal purple on one side and sky-blue on the other, accounting for the rich color that from a distance was neither all purple nor all blue. Nearing the boulder, Sevana saw that it lay next to a creek hidden before by the flowers—just one more discovery in a place fast unfolding as a fantasy, a storybook tale, or someone’s midnight dream. “Snowshoe Creek,” said Joel. While he strung up his pole on the bank, Sevana stepped onto the rock for a better look.

From that slight vantage, she could see more of the creek as it glided with scarcely a ripple through the blue-gilded meadow in meandering, hairpin turns. The water was deep for its narrow width, but still so clear that every streak of glittery sand was visible on its dark-silt bottom. And scattered on the glassy surface, like flowers strewn across a bridal path, fragile blue petals were being silently borne away. “I wish I’d brought my sketchbook!” she exclaimed. She thought remorsefully of the expensive camera she had glibly donated to the school’s white-elephant party, because she had never learned how to operate its complicated meters and lenses—or even change the film.

“How about fishing it instead?” Joel asked. “Ever fished before?”

“No, I’ll just watch you.”

Joel flipped his line forward and landed it expertly in the middle of a pool. He reeled in. And Sevana saw the silvery image of a fish dart through the water and strike at the fly before it scuttled away.