Wild Inferno (12 page)

Thursday, 1100 Hours

Fire Camp was taking on the look of a fully functioning tent city. The supply cache now sported a tent cover and a line roped off for overflow items too large to fit in the store. The information team had moved into an office trailer, and they had erected a big camp bulletin board, which was already covered with notes, ribbons, and good wishes for the Three-Pueblos Hot Shots. Plans had installed a satellite dish on the lawn of the ICP for the latest GlS—geographic information system—mapping data. This was the division where maps were made charting the fire's progress and the plan of attack. Plans was also where our bible—the Incident Action Plan containing the day's objectives, maps, weather reports and forecasts, safety messages, contact information, and an organization chart showing the chain of command—was created and printed twice daily, updated for each operational period. The chow tent had been upgraded with some climate control: it was lined on one side with a trailer holding a tank of water topped by a row of thundering fans that received timed squirts from misters to keep the dust down and provide a reasonably comfortable place for crews to get in out of the blazing sun and eat. And washbasins with running water offered the firefighters a chance to clean their hands as they entered the mess tent. Rows of porta-johns lined the public areas of camp. The shower trucks were now operational, complete with a big blue vinyl overflow pond-pouch to recycle the used water. The medical unit had posted signs everywhere illustrating the importance of good hygiene, hoping to fend off some of the inevitable cases of camp crud.

And now there were three refrigerated sleeper trucks with generators droning, each box lined floor-to-ceiling with compact individual sleeping units—or “cold coffins,” as we firefighters called them, since they were only big enough to lie down in. These permitted the crews to sleep and recuperate in a cool environment free of biting insects or other critters. Since the fire management team was now running both night and day operations, the night crews who could get back in from the field currently occupied the cold coffins. But the coyote crews continued to suffer the elements as they spiked out in harsh terrain on the eastern flank of the fire, without any of these modern benefits.

I caught up with Dr. Elaine Oldham in the chow tent, where she was sitting next to a fellow in green fire pants and a Forest Service T-shirt. Neither was talking; they were both hurriedly eating lunch. “I've been looking for you,” I told her, as I sat down with a plate of salad and my bottle full of iced tea.

She looked up in surprise. “You have?” she said. “Oh! Where are my manners? Jamaica, this is Frank McDaniel. He's the fire management officer for the Columbine District.” She gestured to the man seated next to her. He had a tan face with salt-and-pepper hair. His lip sported a lush, full mustache to match his locks.

I offered my hand. “So you're the FMO over there? Jamaica Wild. Liaison officer for the team.” I turned to Dr. Oldham. “I'm sorry to be so abrupt, but there's a lot happening. Elaine, the IC wants you to work with the Navajo hotshot crew. They're in Division Charlie today, and I'm supposed to take you up there to be their resource advisor. They refuse to work near any grave sites so you'll be there to make sure they're clear of any.”

“But I'm working for Rescue Command,” she said.

“I'll talk to the IC for Rescue. Roy wants you to work with the Navajo crew. And he's the boss. If you have any questions, you can talk with him. I'm just following his orders, and he said to take you up and get us both acquainted with the Navajo Hotshots.”

Frank got up and picked up his empty plate and his soda can. “Well, if anyone knows the grave sites around here, it's Elaine. I'm sorry to be abrupt myself, but I've got to go. Nice to meet you, Miss Wild,” he said.

Elaine Oldham got up, too, and began picking up her things. She spoke in a strained voice. “I have to go get my gear. Are you driving us, or do I need to see about transport? They told me I wasn't supposed to drive myself on business for the fire until some paperwork was processed.”

“Well, that's the federal government for you. I can drive. Why don't we meet at the ICP in fifteen? Will that be enough time for you?”

“Well, I have a headache, and I'm going to go to Medical and ask them for something.”

“It's probably from the smoke. That's you becoming a firefighter: dry eyes, headaches, and sore throats from so much smoke. I can meet you at Medical after I finish my salad.”

“No need for you to come there,” Dr. Oldham said. “I'll meet you at the ICP. I'll just hurry.”

Kerry was alone in the war room, listening intently to his satellite phone, when I got there. The light was off. I tapped softly on the door.

He started, then held out a hand indicating I should wait. “Nobody can do that better than me, Roy,” he said. He jumped off the stool he'd been sitting on. He looked at me, then turned away, wiped his hand across his brow and through his hair, and said, “I'm fine, Roy. Hell, I've been through worse than this, you know that. I can't sit here and not do anything. Put me on Bravo. You want this fire flanked on the east side? Then let me do it. I got pulled off to do Rescue Command, but now that it's done, let me finish what I started. Okay, then. Yeah, we'll set up a spike camp down there. I'm on it.” He switched off the talk button and looked in my direction.

I turned on the light, then flipped it off again. “How much sleep have you had?”

He shrugged, then headed across the room to the coffeepot. “About as much as anyone else,” he said. “Roy wants Division Alpha to hold the heel of the fire and work along the river on the western flank to preserve habitat. He told me to take Division Bravo now that Rescue Command is pretty much over.”

“Sounded like you had to push for it.”

“A little bit. He knows I can do it, though, and the team needs me on tactical. I can't sit around and manage something that's already a done deal. We've got to get that east side contained or it's going to get in another one of those drainages like it did yesterday and shoot right up the slopes. Hey, did you hear that body you found was a homicide?”

“Yeah, I heard. Do we have an update on the Three-Pebs?”

“Not yet.” He filled a coffee cup. His hand shook as he returned the pot to the coffeemaker.

I moved carefully toward him and touched his arm. “Hey.”

He gave the slightest smile. “Hey, yourself.”

“I'm worried about you.”

I saw his eyes narrow. “Don't.”

“Let's do another stress debriefing, what do you say?”

“We already did one.”

“No, we just talked with the woman a few minutes. You barely said a word. It was all too fresh. I didn't get anything out of it. Let's schedule another one for later today. Want to?”

“I can't. I'm setting up a spike camp down east of the heel of the fire, and we'll be running night crews from there, too. I've got to get over there and get things going. Besides, I don't want to talk. If I want to talk about it, I'll let you know, okay?” His voice was as cold as the coffin-boxes in the sleeper trucks.

I pulled my hand back to my side. “Okay. I'm going to borrow your resource advisor.”

“What resource advisor?”

“Dr. Elaine Oldham. She told me she's been working for you.”

“Oh, that gal. I don't really need her right now anyway. She doesn't say much, does she?”

“Not unless she's really passionate about something.”

“Well, I'm not using her at the moment. They have resource advisors assigned to Bravo already, and we'll get more if we need them. Go ahead and put her wherever you want.”

I checked my watch. “I'm supposed to meet her here in about ten seconds.”

He set his coffee cup down on the counter and gave me a halfhearted hug. “Did you hear? The fire jumped the highway,” he said, breaking away. “They closed 160 down. Roy may need a separate team to manage the other side of the highway.”

“Yeah, I know. Roy's up the wall. He really raked me over the coals just a little while ago. I'm still sore from it.” But I thought about that and decided to forgive Roy instantly. Ultimately, the buck stopped at his door, and this incident had complexified geometrically since he took it over. And now there were even more risks, because working around high-voltage power lines requires a completely different set of techniques than just fighting a wildland fire.

Elaine stepped into the room. “Ready to go?” she asked.

I gave Kerry a smile. “Yup. My Jeep's out back.”

Elaine chatted easily on the way to Division Charlie. “Your wolf is beautiful. What's his name again?”

“Mountain.” I smiled, thinking of my beloved four-legged companion.

“I could help you take care of him while we're on this fire. I'd love to spend some time with him.”

“Thanks, but it wouldn't be as easy as you think. Wolves are not like dogs. They have no interest in pleasing you, so they're not obedient. You have to earn their respect and establish pack order, and even that is always up for challenge. They are escape artists, very willful, and often unpredictable. I had to go through some training, and then there was still a huge adjustment period while Mountain and I learned how to live together. It would just be too hard.”

“How did you come to have a wolf?”

“His mother had been shot. He was just a tiny pup. One of our wildlife rangers found him. They tried to integrate him into another pack, but the pack wouldn't accept him.”

“So you raised him from just a baby.”

“Yes, I bottle-fed him and everything. It helped establish our bond.”

“You don't seem the motherly type,” Dr. Oldham said.

I frowned, then reminded myself what Momma Anna had said about me being angry all the time. I looked across the cab of my Jeep at her. “Well, how about you? Are you the motherly type?”

She gave a big sigh. “Not especially.”

“No children, then?”

“I didn't say that,” she said. “I have a daughter.”

“That's nice.”

“Not really. She was born with Down syndrome. She's been institutionalized since birth.”

“Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't know…”

“Twenty-two years,” she continued, “twenty-two years she hasn't been able to see at all or hear very well. She can barely dress herself. She doesn't speak well—it's hard to understand her, but you should hear her laugh. In spite of everything, she has this big, loud, incredibly contagious laugh. Her heart is not very strong…” Elaine bit her lip and took off her sunglasses. As she wiped them on her T-shirt, I saw moisture glisten in her eyes.

“That must be so hard,” I said. “I can't even imagine.”

She shook her head. “It's just that”—she paused a moment—“there's nothing I can do for her, nothing at all.” Her voice quavered. “I'm sorry,” she sniffed. “I didn't mean…”

“No.” I reached out my hand and touched her arm. “It's all right. I understand.”

“I don't see how you can,” she said, and then she withdrew into silence.

Thursday, 1200 Hours

Since Highway 160 was closed, we had to work our way through heavy traffic on State Highway 151, which was no doubt the way the locals were getting around the fire. For them, it meant traveling down south, through the Southern Ute Reservation to Ignacio, and then turning back north toward Bayfield. All in all, it probably doubled the time, yet that was considerably less than the tourists had to travel. In order for them to get from Pagosa Springs to Durango, it meant a trip south to New Mexico and a long drive across some badlands from Chama to Farmington, then back north to Colorado. Half a day's drive at least, instead of an hour. The temperature had escalated steadily throughout the day and was now at 113 degrees. The asphalt road shimmered like a river with heat waves, and the stop-and-go traffic made the time in the Jeep feel like we were locked in a sauna.

I noticed Elaine licking her lips and offered her some lip balm. “That's a sign that you're getting dehydrated,” I said. “That could also be the reason you have a headache. Better reach back and get one of those bottles of water out of the back and drink it down. While you're at it, get a couple extra, would you?”

I pulled the front of my yellow Nomex shirt away from my chest. The smell of smoke mixed with sweat rose to my nostrils. Elaine started to roll up the cuffs of the new-looking yellow shirt she was wearing. “No, don't,” I said. “They won't let you come on the fire lines if you're not wearing full PPE.”

“Not wearing what?”

“Personal protective equipment. It's your entire uniform, from top to bottom. You need to have your sleeves down. When we get there, you'll have to put on your helmet and fire shelter and gloves.”

She nodded but didn't speak. She rolled her sleeves back to her wrists and fastened the cuffs.

“Hey, can I ask you something?” I said as I cracked open the cap on a bottle of water. “You said you helped excavate sites around Chimney Rock some years ago?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Well, I just wondered if you were familiar with the sites in Division Bravo. There are literally dozens of them on the map.”

“Yes, I'm familiar with them. Why?”

“What kind of sites are those where we had the burnover yesterday?”

She blew out a breath and shook her head back and forth rapidly. “They're just ancient settlements, nothing big, really. Little pueblos, or family group residences, mostly Pueblo I and II. Nothing special. Not like on top of Chimney Rock, where you have the huge Great House and those large kivas, the perfectly aligned walls.”

“And the sites in the black—the burned-over area. They've mostly all been excavated, right? I mean, most of them have site numbers, so…”

“Yes, they were excavated a long time ago.”

“So, I would imagine…” I had to be careful not to reveal any details about the crime scene. “Well, no one like a pothunter or something like that would expect to…”

She turned to me and wrinkled her brow. “What?”

“Find artifacts to steal?”

She snorted. “I can't imagine anyone would think that would be the best place around here for that. In the first place, those were poor farmers in that area, not the rich priests and VIPs who lived up on top in the big, fancy Great House. And besides, everyone loves the more refined Chacoan artifacts, and those folks along the river and on the slopes above it weren't Chacoan.”

“Really?”

“No. We believe that they were here before the Chacoans arrived. They lived in pit houses, which don't last for centuries the way Chacoan architecture does. Those ruins are heaps of rubble that can hardly be put back together. And besides, those sites have been sifted with fine sieves.

“But there are ruins up in Cabezón Canyon that have never been excavated. They're out of the public eye and completely unsupervised.
That
would be the place to find artifacts.”

At Highway 160, we reached a checkpoint. The Forest Service employee warned us of heavy smoke and accepted the bottle of water I offered. Engines lined the shoulders of the highway, and flames licked up the trees on both sides of the road. Crews doused the grasses along the edges of the asphalt with water while others worked in the low flames pulling away limbs and hacking at brush. I veered down a dirt and gravel road that bordered Devil's Creek, then turned into the tribal youth camp. Before crossing the creek, in a dense fog of smoke, I saw a notice advising that it was Southern Ute land—like the sign I'd seen the day before when I went to look for Grampa Ned.

We drove across the bridge and back into some heavy stands of timber. Several cabins nestled in the woods beyond the creek, back against the clifflike slope leading up to Chimney Rock. Near these, I spotted the distinctive, box-shaped green buggies used to transport the elite Type 1 crews known as hotshots to their assignments. A few of the Navajo Hotshots were burning out brush and using saws to remove low branches and cut through the ladder fuels—growths of oak brush that caught flames from the grass and torched, launching the fire's height up several feet so it could easily climb up to the bottom limbs of the trees and from there into the crowns.

The rest of the firefighters were working in two squads putting in fire lines, one on either side of Camp Honor. Elaine and I watched the group nearest us for a few minutes. They worked in a row, spaced several feet apart with their low-slung packs on their rumps in the air and their heads and shoulders down. The six-man squad moved like a precision machine. Three hotshots with Pulaskis worked at the fore, using the sharp ax on the tool to cut through roots, and the short blade of the hoe on the other side of the head to scrape through thick duff as they walked steadily forward in rhythm with their tool strokes. Behind these three came a trio of shovels, the men cutting and scraping what was left down to mineral soil. One of the shovel-men yelled, “Bump up!” and all the firefighters ahead of him moved ahead a space to new ground, leaving the work they had left for the men behind them in the line. Together, they dispatched a tangled, overgrown swath of scrub into a wide, bare path sufficient to serve as a sidewalk in only minutes. It was so efficient, so clean, and so quick that I wanted to applaud.

“What did that guy say?” Elaine asked.

“Bump up. It means move ahead. He's running out of work where he is, or he's about to overtake the guy in front of him. Everyone ahead of him moves up a stretch and leaves the work for those guys behind, so nobody's standing around.”

“But why
bump?
”

“That may be a firefighter's favorite word. We use it all the time. We bumped you over here from Rescue Command. People bump out to take a leak. When you finish marking the sites here, you'll probably bump back to Fire Camp. It can even be used to encompass the entire crew. They might bump over to Division Zulu after they get these lines in. Or they can even bump out to go to another fire when this one is contained.”

I spied the crew's superintendent, and while Elaine unloaded her gear from the back of the Jeep, I strapped on my own pack and gloves, pulled my bandana up around my nose, slipped the goggles down off my helmet and over my eyes, and walked through low flaming grass—tongues of yellow fire licking at my boots—to go talk with him.

When I got there, I lowered my bandana. “I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to talk with you this morning. I understand that you will require some space to do ceremony?”

“Yes, we'd like to have—”

Before he could finish, my sat phone rang. “I'm sorry,” I said. “Just a moment.”

The BIA representative was on the line. He wanted to meet me at the Pagosa Ranger District in a half hour.

I turned back to the Navajo sup. “All right, let's give this another try, and I do apologize. A lot is going on. You were saying?”

“We want—”

Again, the sat phone rang. “I don't believe this,” I said. “Just a second, I'm so sorry.”

This time it was the governor's office advising me that they had someone on the way to the area, and not to speak of evacuation to the Native Americans up top.

Once more, I turned to the hotshot team leader. “I apologize again. So you need some space—”

And for a third time, the sat phone rang, interrupting us. “Fire liaison, Jamaica Wild,” I said, holding up a finger and smiling at the hotshot.

“Jamaica,” Roy snapped, “get back to the ICP quick as you can. We need you to accompany the FBI back out to the crime scene. And I got an update on the Three-Pueblos Hot Shots.”

Bump!