Summer of the Wolves (11 page)

N
ick had been kneeling at the edge of the pond, baiting hooks on two bamboo poles with bologna. When I told him about the wolves, he stopped and stared at me with his mouth hanging open.

“You’re kidding!” Nick said. “Everyone’s been spending all this time looking for them and y’all haven’t said anything?”

“Stop looking at me like that!” I said, and I grabbed one of the poles. Without my usual caution, I tossed the
bologna in the water, then watched the greasy quarter-sized rainbow that formed where the bologna sank. I’d thought it would be such a relief to tell someone, but I didn’t feel any better, the way he looked at me.

I wished I hadn’t said those things to Mama about Diana earlier tonight. I didn’t like what Mama said about Diana being on medicine and having problems and not wanting me to spend time with her. Mama didn’t even know Diana.

I threw a pebble in the pond and watched the widening circle of ripples move outward. I’d read in my science book this year that a tsunami was like a gigantic version of a pebble being thrown in a pond. Underwater earthquakes radiated energy that moved five hundred miles per hour through the water and crashed on beaches thousands of miles away.

“If we could just find them, everything would be okay.” This was exactly what Diana had said after dinner, and I hadn’t believed her, but now here I was saying it to Nick.

Nick shrugged, as if realizing this had nothing to do with him. “Maybe they’ll luck out.”

“Maybe.” I stared at the fading light reflected on the surface of the pond. “You and I could go look for ‘em,” I added.

“Yeah, right.” Nick threw his line in the water. Now he wasn’t looking at me at all.

I watched his bologna sink. “Hey, I’m serious; why couldn’t we? Maggie said they set traps around Mr. Morgan’s place. We could check and see if they came back, try to find ‘em before Mr. Morgan does.”

“It’s gonna be dark in an hour, and how are we supposed to catch them? Put a leash on them? They’re practically wild.”

“I don’t know. We could figure that out if we see them.” He faced me again, and I looked at his light brown freckles. He looked like a little kid with those freckles, young and innocent. “Please?” I asked. “I feel horrible, and I want to try to fix it. We could take the bikes, just like Diana and I did.”

A few minutes later we were bouncing on bicycles through the woods over rutted, hard-packed bridle trails. I couldn’t remember which trail I’d been on when I’d gone riding, or how we found the pen before. But since it wasn’t dark yet, the sound of the wind through the trees was soothing and not scary. The birdcalls and scurrying animals didn’t give me goose bumps. When we came to a fork in the path, I had no idea which way to go.

“What do you think?” Nick straddled his bike and peered down both ways. Now that he’d agreed to come along with me, he seemed more like his old self.

“No clue,” I said. I stopped and fished in my pocket for a ponytail holder and twisted it around my hair. “But I think we should keep going uphill.”

We picked the left fork and kept climbing the mountain until we came to trails that were so steep we had to get off and walk the bikes. Were these the same trails I’d been on with Diana a few nights ago? I couldn’t remember, but they didn’t seem familiar.

“Maybe we should leave the bikes here,” I said, leaning into the handlebars and gasping for breath. My lungs were screaming for air.

Then I looked up and saw the rock face Diana and I had climbed. The other night it had seemed like some awful evil crag. In the rosy light of sunset, it looked smaller, and it was easy to see places to put your hands and feet.

“The wolf pen is right at the top of this rock,” I said. “I bet we’re on Mr. Morgan’s property now.” A shiver ran across the back of my neck.

Nick looked at the cliff face. “Hey, at least we get to practice our rock climbing,” he said. “But if you fall, it’s adios, amigo.”

“Yeah.” I leaned the bike against a tree and stood at the foot of the rock with my hands on my hips. I remembered how cold and scared I’d been that night, my flip-flops sliding on the dark rock face, scraping my
bare toes. I was still scared, but now something new was happening. I kept going anyway.

I pulled myself up to a small shelf that had been invisible a few nights ago. I leaned close to the wall and edged my way over to a place where there was a root hanging over the rock top. I grabbed the root, wedged my toes onto a small outcropping, and with all my strength, pulled myself up and over the edge. I lay with my feet dangling, catching my breath, and glanced down at Nick, ten feet below, watching me. One of the rhinestones from my jeans fell down the rock face, sparkling as it bounced. Looking down made me light-headed, so I turned around. I shimmied onto the ground above the rock, grabbed the chain-link fence, and was finally able to stand up.

“I made it. Come on up,” I called.

Since Nick was taller, climbing was easier for him, and he was lying on his stomach beside me in just a couple of minutes. Keeping the fingers of one hand wrapped around the cage fence, I offered him my other hand. He took hold, and I pulled him up the last two feet.

“Whew!” I said once we were both standing on the ledge. We edged our way up to the gate, holding on to the fence. It squeaked as we climbed. Finally, we reached level ground.

“I can’t believe you guys did this in the dark,” said Nick. “I mean, look down there. Heart attack city, man.”

“I can’t look,” I said. I looked over to where Diana and I had slid the dead tree over the fence. Someone, probably Russell, had pulled it down and it was lying inside the pen. The gate was double-locked the same as before.

“Now what?” said Nick.

“I guess we look for the traps,” I said.

“My dad says they normally cover traps with leaves and stuff, so be careful.” Nick caught my eye, then ducked his head. “Maybe grab a stick and use it to feel the ground in front of you.”

“Good idea.” I poked around until I found a stout stick and brandished it like a cane as I crashed through the woods. Nick and I stuck together at first and then split up, winding through clusters of trees and wading through fallen leaves, vines, and underbrush. The last purple light before dusk filtered through the green veil of branches. Cool air brushed my arms. It would be dark soon.

I stopped on a high slope, looked down, and saw the lodge, sort of snuggled into the meadow. Dirt roads looked like thin red lines crisscrossing the stands of trees on the mountainside, like places where a wound had been stitched up.

I was out of breath and could feel the blood pumping next to my collarbone.

Doc had described the traps as “padded leghold traps,” which would trap an animal’s leg but not break the skin. But he said they had to be checked a lot because sometimes an animal would injure itself trying to escape, or even chew off its own foot to get free. And what would I do if I found Waya or Oginali in one of those traps? They would surely try to bite me.

The sky above the lodge was still really bright, but the woods were dimmer now. Nick headed farther away. Leaves rustled and pine needles whispered as he walked.

And then it happened. The moment my foot landed, I knew it wasn’t the ground. I tried to jerk my foot away but it was too late.

Thwack! The trap slammed shut just above my ankle.

The pain was awful. I screamed and fell backward.

“Nick!”

I sat up and tried to wedge my fingers under the steel rods clamped together over my leg. From that spot pain spread out in all directions.

Nick was crashing through the woods, and now he was beside me, kneeling. “Oh, man!”

I thought I might faint. “Get it off of me!”

“Okay, okay, give me a minute.”

He ran his hand through his hair and looked around like he might find a key or something. I started crying and turned my face toward a tree. I felt his fingers gripping and pulling, but I couldn’t look. Bolts of pain shot up to my waist. I tried to relax my muscles, and it did help a little. “Good thing there aren’t teeth. And you have on jeans. Maybe if you took off your boot and just left it in the trap.”

“Just get it off, please!” I couldn’t think about anything but the pain.

“Maybe there’s a release lever,” he said. A minute later he pressed something, the steel bars opened, and the pain went away. I writhed away from the trap, pulling my leg free, and lay on the ground, breathing hard.

“I’m scared to look at it,” I said. But I had to.

I sat up, dragged both palms across my face, and then pulled up the cuff of my jean.

It was getting dark and hard to see. I ran my hands over my ankle but felt no blood. The side of my ankle was the size of a golf ball, and my shin bone was swollen and tender to the touch.

Then, close by, a dead branch snapped. Nick and I both looked up and saw somebody’s shadow framed against the sunset.

“Hey!” Nick shouted.

I heard myself scream.

“I figured it was you kids that done this.” It was Mr. Morgan’s raspy voice.

I thought my heart would jump right out of my throat.

“Hey, we’re not doing anything.” Nick’s voice was shaking, higher than usual, and he stood up. “We just wanted to see if we could find the wolves. We didn’t hurt anybody.”

“We’re just trying to get your wolves back.” I heard a brave-sounding voice and was amazed to realize it was my very own.

“Shut up!” Mr. Morgan snapped. “If I’d talked to my father like that he’d have knocked me cold.”

“Please, Mr. Morgan. I promise you, we’re trying to get your wolves back.”

“Ever occur to you that you might be trespassin’?”

What would he do to us? Mr. Morgan’s hair looked wild and uncombed and there was a sweetish smell coming from him that I remembered from a man downtown who asked Mama for money once. Mama said he was drunk.

“We didn’t mean to trespass,” I said in a small voice.

“No back talk! I’m takin’ you to my cabin. Now move!”

Mr. Morgan gestured for us to walk ahead of him toward his cabin. I stayed close to Nick, and he held
my arm as I limped along. My mouth had gone completely dry and my knees were nearly buckling under me. I knew there was dirt everywhere on me. Suddenly I desperately wanted a shower. We headed real slowly toward the dark cabin in the woods. All we heard was our own breath and Mr. Morgan’s boots crashing in the underbrush behind us.

I whispered prayers to myself.
Dear God, please help me be brave again
.

Just barely turning my head, I sneaked a look toward the lodge. It looked so sweet, like a doll house or something, with its green roof, gray-white smoke curling from the chimneys, and golden squares of light shining from the dining room windows. The sloping pasture, dotted with yellow flowers and salt licks, darkened as the sun dropped lower. The scene was so peaceful. I wiped both cheeks with my sleeve.

I imagined Mr. Morgan’s hand touching my shoulder. My skin crawled at the thought of it.

Then I saw Doc’s green truck, like one of those matchbox toys, kicking up a red swirl of dust as it climbed a nearby hill. From this distance the dirt road looked like an orange strand of yarn. Russell was riding in the truck bed, leaning over something. Was that one of the wolves?

I drew in my breath and glanced away, so that Mr. Morgan wouldn’t see. But it was too late.

“What’re you looking at?” Morgan stopped and squinted across the chasm down at the truck climbing the hill. “Is that one of my wolves?”

I
jumped out when Doc pulled his truck into a lot beside a converted barn. A weathered wooden sign outside said
MOUNTAIN MIST COMPANION HOSPITAL.
Doc lowered the truck gate and tossed his keys to Maggie, who ran to unlock the door.

Russell, kneeling in the truck bed, slid the stretcher toward Doc.

“Easy,” said Doc. “As easy as you can.”

Waya looked dead. A lot of the fur on her stomach was dark and wet with blood.

Together, Russell and Doc carried Waya into the hospital while Maggie held open the door. I followed behind, feeling guilty and useless.

Inside was a small waiting room with old wooden chairs and a linoleum floor. A counter divided the room. Behind it was a wall of files and a bookcase crammed with thick textbooks and dusty diplomas propped on top. On the counter was a ceramic statue of a smiling golden retriever standing up on his hind legs, wearing a white coat and stethoscope, and holding a large syringe. The caption said, “Paybacks are hell.”

“Keep going straight back to the OR,” Doc instructed Russell.

Maggie turned on the lights in Doc’s operating room, and on Doc’s orders, lay towels on the metal operating table in the center of the room. Doc and Russell lifted Waya onto the table.

“Grab that IV stand over there, please, Diana,” Doc said. He lathered his hands and arms over a deep sink.

This was the first time anyone had said anything to me since I’d told Russell about letting the wolves go. I got the feeling that if they could have thrown me out of the moving truck they would have. As quickly as I could, I pulled a metal stand on wheels over next to the operating table.

“Now, I need all three of you to lift her up so I can
get this compression bandage around that wound to stop the bleeding.”

“On three,” said Maggie. “One, two, three.” We raised Waya up. My arms shook, but I didn’t let Waya’s hind section drop. Doc tightly wrapped a bandage around her abdomen.

“Okay, lay her down now. I don’t know if I can reach any of my assistants this time of night. You folks might have to help me do surgery,” Doc said.

A spot on the bandage started to turn pink.

“Let’s get a muzzle on her. She’ll bite if she’s scared. Diana, there’s one in the bottom drawer over there.”

I found the leather muzzle. I hoped Doc wouldn’t ask me to put it on Waya.

Doc took the muzzle from me and slid it over Waya’s jaws, then buckled it behind her head, all the while talking to her. Waya moaned softly.

“We need blankets,” Doc added. “Check the closet in the hall.”

I ran down the hallway, opening doors until I found the linen closet. I bundled several blankets in my arms and rushed them back.

Maggie and Russell gently spread them over Waya.

“Maggie, you and Russell hold her while I get the IV going,” Doc instructed. And then he began shaving the fur from the top of Waya’s front leg.

My eyes burned, and my throat caught so I couldn’t breathe for a moment. I stroked Waya’s ears and pulled my hand back when I felt the heat of Russell’s eyes.

Doc hung a bag of clear liquid on the IV stand, swabbed brown, sharp-smelling iodine on the bare patch on Waya’s leg, and used what looked like a long needle to start the IV.

“I’m letting the fluids run in full blast,” he said.

Now he examined Waya, shining a penlight in her eyes. Lightly pressing on the bandage, which had stained a deep red. He lifted the skin of her snout, revealing her sharp teeth, and then pressed on her gums with the ball of his thumb. “Don’t like her color,” he said.

“She gonna make it, Doc?” Russell whispered.

“Too soon to tell.” Doc clicked off the penlight. “She looks like she’s in shock. I want to get at least one bag of fluids in her before I try to get that bullet out.”

“Please save her,” I said, practically choking.

“You know what?” Russell said. He finally looked at me, the pupils of his eyes huge with anger. “She could die. And it would be—”

“Russell!” Maggie cut him off. “Shhh! What we need to do right now is help Waya.”

Doc was making calls to see if he could get some assistance. I heard a dog barking back in the kennel area. Its voice sounded hoarse and lonely.

“Nobody’s home.” Doc left messages for both of his assistants and hung up. He yanked the rubber band from his gray-blonde ponytail, shook his hair out. Pulled it back again, tighter this time. “As soon as I can get this bolus into her, I’m going to need some help with surgery.”

“How long?” Maggie asked.

“It’ll take about fifteen minutes for the fluid to run, and then the surgery itself will take about two hours.”

Maggie looked at her watch. “I can’t! I’ve got desk duty at the lodge tonight. I already took one day off this week.” Maggie patted Russell’s shoulder. “You’re gonna have to help Doc do this, Russell.”

Russell nodded.

I swallowed and looked only at Doc. “I’ll help,” I said.

Doc nodded. Five minutes later, Maggie left in the truck. I didn’t dare try to talk to Russell. It was pretty clear he wanted nothing to do with me. It was as though all we’d talked about that first night, all we’d shared today had never happened. We sat in silence watching the level in the bag of fluid drop and the stains on Waya’s bandage grow.

Suddenly a truck screeched to a halt outside.

“Did Maggie forget something?” Doc came back from prepping for surgery. He wore a green gown and rubber gloves.

The front door slammed and someone shouted, “Doc! I know you’re in there!”

I glanced at Russell, who sat bolt upright.

“My dad!”

Just then Stephanie and Nick showed up at the end of the hall. Their faces looked white. Stephanie was limping. Joe Morgan stepped around the corner behind them. “Go on,” he said, pushing them forward. “Look who I found by my wolf pen.”

I stared at Stephanie, who saw Waya lying on the surgical table and covered her mouth with her hand.

Mr. Morgan saw, too, and his face flushed. “What have you done to her?”

“Someone shot her, Joe,” said Doc carefully. “I’m getting ready to remove the bullet so I can try to save her.”

“You got no right to do this without my permission.”

“Dad!” Russell jumped up. “You can’t just let her die!”

“It ain’t my fault she’s shot. These here kids admitted to letting my wolves go.”

“You have to let Doc save her life,” I said.

“Yeah? And who’s gonna pay for it? You?”

Russell’s voice was monotone when he spoke. “If you let her die, Dad, I’ll never forgive you. Not ever. Not for the rest of my life.”

“You ain’t never gonna forgive me anyway, so what’s the difference?” Mr. Morgan whispered.

There was a horrible silence, and the air closed so tightly around us I could hardly breathe. Stephanie drew in her breath, and I looked over at her. We both knew Russell and his dad weren’t talking about Waya now.

And I suddenly realized how Russell’s mom had died. Russell’s dad had been driving the car. Stephanie’s face showed recognition, too.

“Hey,” Doc said. “I’m not even—”

“I’ll pay for it,” I interrupted. “I’ve saved two hundred dollars. And if it’s more I’ll send my allowance every week. Whatever it costs. This was my fault. Not Stephanie’s or Nick’s.”

Mr. Morgan glanced at me. The whites around his small brown eyes were tinged with red. He rubbed his cheeks, then shrugged and said, “Go ‘head.” He seemed much smaller now. He stared at Stephanie and Nick and then turned to leave.

“I’ll see they get back to the lodge later,” Doc said, and then returned to the operating room.

Stephanie and Nick clearly looked relieved.

Mr. Morgan looked at Russell, and after a long minute, he heaved a sigh and shuffled down the hall. A moment later the door slammed and his truck started.

I looked at Russell. His face was wet. He turned away from me.

Doc called us from the surgery room. “Russell! Diana, her color is coming back. Time to work.”

We hurried in as Doc turned on the anesthesia machine and held a mask over Waya’s muzzled snout. After a few minutes, he took the muzzle off. Her jaw hung open limply.

“Put your hands under her body and help me roll her over onto her chest.”

Russell and I rolled Waya up on her chest. Stephanie and Nick stood in the doorway and watched.

“I need one of you to open her jaw while I pass a tube into her windpipe. Just spread her jaws wide open.”

Russell didn’t hesitate. He hooked his fingers over the ends of her teeth and opened her mouth wide, revealing her grayish-pink tongue lolling between yellow fangs.

“Good work.” Doc pulled her tongue forward, then slid a clear plastic tube down her windpipe. He hooked the tube to the anesthesia machine.

We helped Doc roll her again, onto her back this time. The green line on the blipping monitor told us Waya’s heart was beating, but she seemed totally lifeless. Doc clipped the fur on her abdomen and around the bullet wound and swabbed the whole area with iodine.

He tossed surgical masks to Russell and me. “Put
these on,” he said. He soaped his hands up to the elbows and put on a green surgical cap, mask, and plastic gloves.

With shaking hands, I tied on the mask.

I looked at Russell. Above his mask, the whites of his eyes showed all the way around.

Doc unrolled a couple of surgical packs on a tray, pulled up a stool, and selected a scalpel. Then he cut a long incision right down the middle of Waya’s belly.

Dark blood oozed out. I glanced at Russell. His eyes looked scared above the green of his mask.

Doc inserted a metal retractor into the abdomen to hold the incision apart and suctioned out some blood.

Doc examined Waya’s abdomen. “Looks like the bullet destroyed part of the spleen,” he said. “I’ve got a spurter in here. I need one of you to wash your hands and throw on a pair of surgical gloves.”

“I will,” said Russell. He washed his hands and then got a pair of rubber gloves from the same box Doc used. They snapped as he pulled them on.

“Have a spleen,” Doc said, holding up a purplish-red organ shaped like a big tongue. “Hold it while I tie off the vessels.”

Because Doc was so sure and calm about what he was doing, I felt calm, too. I looked at the spleen with curiosity and fascination.

Doc placed Waya’s spleen in Russell’s outstretched hand and began tying knots around the vessels attached to it. Suddenly Russell swayed.

“Oops,” said Doc. “You’re looking green around the gills, buddy.”

I glanced at Russell’s face, which had gone pale. He dropped the spleen back inside Waya.

“Russell!” barked Doc. “Diana, walk him out into the hall!”

I grabbed Russell’s arms. His weight was starting to sink onto me when I got him into the hallway. I felt strangely detached as I watched Nick and Stephanie help him slide down the wall.

“Get back in here, Diana, I need you!”

I ran back.

“Quick, I’ve got a gusher; wash up and get on a pair of gloves!”

I somehow managed to wash my hands and get the gloves on, but it was like I was outside my body, dimly aware of what I was doing. Then I was standing above Waya, my palms opened, and Doc gave me Waya’s spleen. I watched a pulsing blood vessel attached to the spleen as it pumped blood into the open belly.

Doc quickly clipped a pair of scissors around the bleeder, only it had serrated teeth like a steak knife and clasped instead of cut. “Got it,” he said. “Now I need another pair of hands.”

“Steph!” I yelled. “Doc needs you!”

Stephanie limped up behind me.

“Grab that hemostat!” Doc yelled. “Those angled scissors!”

Her eyes went wide, but she limped over to the operating table and held the hemostat in both hands.

“Just like that. Don’t move until I say so.” Doc used surgical thread to tie knots around the blood vessels leading to the spleen. “I’m tying off the blood vessels so I can remove the spleen and stop the bleeding,” he said. My shoulders were beginning to cramp from holding my hands so still. A spot between my eyes itched, but I dared not move. Stephanie was gripping the hemostat with both hands and blowing upward at stray hairs in the corners of her eyes.

“One spleen,” said Doc, taking the spleen from me.

“She doesn’t need it?” I asked, letting my shoulders relax.

“She can live without it.” Doc examined the injured organ. “Well, good news and bad news. The good news is the hemorrhaging has stopped. The bad news is I can’t find the bullet. It’s still somewhere inside.”

“Oh, no,” I said, feeling panic rising again.

Doc placed the damaged spleen on a tray and gently, patiently searched inside Waya for what seemed like an endless period of time. My chest started to hurt. I
realized I’d been holding my breath. I let it out slowly, watching Waya’s heartbeat on the monitor.

“If I can’t find it, we’ll have to take an X-ray,” whispered Doc under his breath. More seconds ticked by, then he sharply inhaled. “Got it!” Doc held up a mangled gold pellet. “Hey, it’s scrunched. It was underneath the kidney, right up against her aorta. She is one lucky wolf. Waya, you put a hurting on this bullet, didn’t you, girl?”

I stared at the squashed bullet. I could not believe that such a small thing had done such horrible damage to Waya’s insides.

“We can close,” said Doc. His voice sounded almost happy. “It’s still very much touch and go, but you’ve done a good job, Diana. You, too, Stephanie.”

I breathed while Doc sutured the bullet hole and incision and then bandaged Waya, and Stephanie and I followed his instructions to get a cage ready. He turned off the gas machine and removed the tube from the wolf’s windpipe. Waya started to whimper.

I passed Russell and Nick in the hall, my arms full of clean towels. Russell stood up, looking embarrassed. “Is she gonna live?” he asked.

His voice had lost some of its harsh tone, and I felt my chest loosen a tiny bit more. “Doc says it’s touch and go,” I said. “Do you want to go back in?”

“Nah,” Russell said. “Not right now.”

But Nick went into the operating room and helped carry Waya to the recovery room. He gently laid her on the folded towels. Doc attached her IV bag to the metal door of the cage. He stood looking at Waya through the kennel walls.