Bryson City Tales (39 page)

“Hmm!” she sighed. I had no idea what emotion she was trying to express. But she continued, “Rescue One, I've also been notified by the park service that they've launched a search boat from the Almond boat dock and will be at the search site within thirty minutes. Over.”

“We'll take all the help we can get, Millie. Over.”

“Roger that. By the way, Monty, there's a one-lane dirt road just before the new bridge. At the bottom of the road, around a small cove, there's a place where you can launch the boats. That's where the officers are stationed.”

“Ten-four. Unit One out.”

“Have a safe search. Monty, you boys be careful, OK? Command out.”

I couldn't believe it. Millie's voice actually had a hint of softness in it—a touch of concern. I smiled. The old girl really did care!

As we pulled off the four-lane, the truck's emergency lights penetrated the darkness of the road leading to the lake. At the bottom, a sheriff's car, emergency lights still blazing, awaited our arrival. Deputy Rogers and the sheriff both ran up as our truck stopped.

The sheriff summarized the situation. “Monty, some fellas were drinking and fishing just below the bridge. Said their boat turned over. Two of 'em made it to shore. They say their buddy went straight to the bottom. The ambulance took 'em both to the hospital. They're near enough drowned. Don and Billy will be back here shortly.”

As our other units pulled up, Monty went into action. “Joe,” he called to one of his deputies, “I want you to take two smaller inflatables and place the marker lanterns. Then I want you to shore-search a half mile up-lake and two miles down-lake.”

He turned to look for Ray, his other deputy. “Ray, let's launch the larger inflatable for dragging, OK?”

“Dianna!” Monty recognized his wife as she drove up. She had been monitoring the radio at home, as did most of the rescue squad wives—many of whom would be coming. “Honey, can you set up the food tent for us?” She nodded and turned to begin her work. She would erect a tent in which the spouses would prepare coffee, hot chocolate, and snacks for what I imagined could become very fatigued workers.

“Walt.” Monty was walking up to me. “You ready for your initiation?”

“I guess so.”

“Then I want you in the dragging boat with me. I'll show you the ropes.”

I nodded, not at all sure what I was getting myself into.

First the small inflatables were launched, one to search each side of the lakeshore. The large inflatable was being launched as Don and Billy drove up in the ambulance. “Don!” shouted Monty, “you want to be in the dragging boat with me and the doc?”

“You bet,” bellowed Don, as he ran over. One of the guys handed him a life vest, which he put on as he stepped into the boat. Monty started the small engine, and the three of us pushed off.

“Monty,
y'all come back when the doc's tired, and we'll change off personnel, OK?” shouted Joe.

“You bet,” responded Monty. “Might not be too long. Doc's fresh at all this.”

“Doc'll do good, Monty,” exclaimed Don. “I bet he'll set a record for a newcomer.”

What were they talking about?
I wondered as the little engine kicked into gear. Within moments we were in the middle of the pitch-dark lake. The only light that could be seen came from the growing encampment on the shore, the searchlights of the two small boats examining each shore, and the lanterns they had placed about fifty yards apart on each shore. Occasionally we'd see the lights from the top of an eighteen-wheeler above the guardrails of the bridge as it thundered through the night.

“Don, show Doc how to use the grappling hook, will ya?”

“You bet!” Don shouted over the sputtering of the outboard motor. “Doc, this here's a grappling hook.” He pulled on what looked like an oversized treble hook, attached to about ten feet of chain and then a long rope. “Put on these gloves. Monty will move the boat back and forth across the lake. He'll be watching the shore, monitoring our progress with those lanterns on each side. He'll be using a precise pattern so we don't cover the same area twice.”

“Mark,” called Monty.

Don dropped the hook into the water and let the rope slide over his hands until it hit the bottom. “'Bout twenty-five feet here, Monty.”

“Walt, look here. The rope is marked with tape every five feet. You'll know then how deep you are. You just jig the hook up and down. It'll slide over most of the rocks and boulders, but if it hits something soft, it'll usually stick in. You'll feel the weight, and we can pull it up. Sometimes it'll be milk cartons or a garbage bag. It's worse when we snag a log. We're done when it's the body.”

I felt a shudder go down my spine.

“Doc, this is hard work. The current record for a new squad member is forty-five minutes. Want to see if you can beat that?”

“Might as well try.”

So my life as part of the Swain County Rescue Squad began, dragging the bottom of Lake Fontana looking for a recently inebriated and now likely deceased angler. I didn't know how long I could make it, but I was determined to give it the old college try.

The first ten minutes weren't too difficult—except for the times when the hook would snag. Monty would have to change the boat position, and sometimes Don would have to help me unsnag the hook. Eventually I could begin to “feel” the end of the hook. I could feel the difference between a rock and a log. After about fifteen minutes my arms were beginning to burn. At the twenty-five minute mark, my neck and upper back were aching, screaming at me to stop.

“Doc, you want someone to spell ya?” Monty or Don would call from time to time.

“I'm fine,” I'd reply—knowing full well that I was not.

I thought it peculiar that Don would call out the time in five-minute increments. “Thirty minutes, Doc. Want to keep going?” I noticed that the search boats were picking up the lanterns on each side of the lake. I remember wondering why. But I was seriously considering quitting, so that had become my overriding concern.

Only
fifteen more minutes to the county rescue squad record. For someone who's an outsider to the county, the opportunity to set a county record was too tempting to turn down. “I'm fine,” I lied once again—a white lie!

I could see another boat speeding up the river toward us, emergency lights flashing. “Looks like the National Park Service boat,” shouted Monty as they passed us and headed to shore at the encampment.

“Thirty-five minutes, Doc. You OK?”

I grunted. I could barely feel my fingers they were so numb. By now the only light we could see was at the camp—which for some reason seemed very festive, especially in light of our grim task that evening.
Maybe these boys were just too used to death,
I thought.

“Forty minutes, Doc. Only five minutes till the record. You gonna make it, boy?”

Boy.
In any other setting it might be a demeaning term. Not here.
Boy.
Don or Monty, I'm not sure which, called me
boy.
Not doc, but
boy.
Despite the blinding pain in my neck and back, shoulders and arms, I smiled.
I guess I was one of the boys!

“Forty-three minutes,” Don shouted. There were cheers from the shore. This
was
surreal. Here I was trying to locate a dead body, and the other boys were cheering me on to a new record.
They sure didn't teach me about this in medical school,
I thought.

“Forty-four minutes,” shouted Monty. The chants on the shore began, “Go, go, go . . .”

“Thirty seconds . . . twenty-nine . . . twenty-eight,” Don shouted, as the gang on the shore chimed in, “ . . . ten . . . nine . . . eight . . .”

I felt a new surge of energy. Everything in me wanted to stop when he hit zero, but I didn't want to just
set
the record, I wanted to
shatter
it so that it would never be broken again.
Not
likely,
I thought,
given how many records are broken and broken
again, but, why not try?

“Two .. . one . . . zero!” The crowd on the shore erupted. Sirens were turned on and truck horns pierced the dark, quiet night. Don and Monty were cheering and slapping me on the back.

“Doc, you did it!” yelled Don over the noise of the motor. “You can stop.”

“Stop?” I yelled. “No way! I'm going for sixty minutes!” I screamed.

The boat was silent except for the sputtering of the small engine. Don and Monty were laughing hysterically. Finally they stopped laughing long enough for Don to bellow, “Doc, there ain't no record. You can stop.”

I was stunned. “No record? What are you talking about?”

“Doc,” exclaimed Monty, “this here was just an initiation, boy. There ain't no record. You just had to prove you wanted to be part of our squad.”

“There ain't no record?” I asked. “Are you kidding me?”

They both rolled in laughter. From the shore I could hear a chorus of “Hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hooray!”

I rolled over on my back, my arms slumped at my side. The most brilliant stars illuminated the sky. My arms were numb, but my heart was happy—perhaps as happy as it had ever been. I had been hoodwinked, but hoodwinked by friends—good friends.

Don pulled in the hook, and Monty gunned the boat back to shore. The celebration had begun. A new member of the squad had been initiated. The friendly pharmacist John Mattox had come up in the NPS boat with his son, Ranger John Mattox. Don and Billy, Deputy Rogers, the sheriff—they were all there, cheering and slapping me on the back.

An older woman approached, bringing me a mug of steaming hot chocolate. I could barely hold it in my frozen and fatigued hands. “Dr. Larimore, my name's Millie. Good to meet you—and congratulations.” She actually smiled at me. She bent over and whispered, “My husband works at Cope Chevrolet. Let me know when you decide to get a new car, ya hear?” I smiled back.

As I sat down, Dianna Clampitt walked over. “Walt, from now on Barb will be invited to these initiations. Welcome to the Swain County Rescue Squad, and welcome to our community.”

I remember sitting around with the men and women late into the evening. I remember the laughter. But most of all I remember the intensely satisfying feeling of belonging and of being accepted.

The next morning at 6:00 A.M. the clock radio went off and Gary Ayers's voice boomed, “The Swain County Rescue Squad was called to the site of a reported drowning last night near the new
T. A. Sandlin Bridge. Turns out the call was a hoax, according to the Swain Command Center . . .”

“Walt, turn that thing off before it wakes up the kids!” exclaimed my sleepy spouse. My mind told my hand to reach over and turn off the radio, but my arms couldn't move—they were too stiff and sore. Barb had to crawl over me to turn off the radio. Before she could click it off, Gary Ayers continued, “Chief Monty Clampitt reported that Dr. Walt Larimore, officially the newest member of the rescue squad, participated in the rescue mission . . .” She clicked it off.

“Barb, don't you want to hear what happened last night?” I asked excitedly.

“Later,” she whispered as she rolled back to sleep.

I couldn't move. But I smiled.

chapter thirty-two

HOME AT LAST

L
abor Day weekend was over. Kate was heading toward her fourth birthday and Scott his first. Barb and I were approaching our ninth wedding anniversary. Our marriage and our children were a joy. I was so happy to be a daddy and to be so in love with my best friend.

Our new office building was under construction. The contractor was predicting occupancy in just a few weeks. Rick and I had hired our new staff members, and they were already at work beside us at Swain Surgical Associates, learning the ropes. Dean Tuttle, wife of my football buddy Preston, was going to be our office manager. Beth, the daughter of Bryson City police chief Carl Arvey, was going to be my nurse, and Rick had hired Patty Hughes from a practice in Sylva to be his nurse. Diana Owle was also going to work in our front office. These four women knew everyone in town, and we felt
so
blessed that they wanted to work with us.

I had completed a wilderness medicine certification course and was doing more and more consulting work with the Nantahala Outdoor Center, the National Park Service, and the Swain County Rescue Squad. I was planning to begin kayaking lessons in the fall and couldn't wait to get out on some of the county's rivers—both for boating and fishing. Rick and I had also been invited to become assistant professors and to teach the family medicine residents in Asheville, which we gladly did once or twice a month.

We were seeing increasing numbers of maternity patients and delivering more babies each month. The Shulers were pregnant with their first and had chosen us to attend the birth. Greg's dad was doing worse medically, and I would make a home visit to see him weekly. Rick was seeing Katherine fairly frequently, and her summer at the Fryemont Inn had gone very well. This budding romance in the professional community was being followed closely in the various town gossip circles. Rick was leading bird-watching hikes for both the Fryemont and Hemlock Inns.

The man charged with first-degree murder in Bryson City had been convicted and sentenced to death. However, Fred Moody appealed the case, and the verdict was overturned—to one of second-degree murder. The appropriate prison sentence—with the possibility of parole in the distant future—was not appealed by the district attorney, who decided not to run for the state senate. Barb and I remained Republicans, while Rick registered as a Democrat. We would care for members of both parties on each side of the aisle of our new building.

The Larimore's root cellar was packed with canned vegetables, fruits, honey, jams, jellies, and a variety of canned meats. We had enough food for two winters. And I had also gone ahead and purchased a lifetime North Carolina fishing license.