Nora Jane (26 page)

“Trusting the earth is trusting yourself. Trusting yourself is trusting the earth. This is our home. We were made for it and
it for us.” The girls chanted Freddy’s credo in unison, then fell into a giggling fit. The Jeep bounced along over the ruts.
The girls giggled until they were coughing.

“You have reached the apex of the silly phase,” Freddy said, in between the bumps. “You have perfected being ten years old.
I don’t want this growing up to go a day further. If you get a day older, I’ll be mad at you.” He gripped the steering wheel,
went around a boulder, and came down a steep incline onto a blacktop road that curved around and up the mountain. “Okay,”
he said. “Now we’re railroading. Now we’re whistling Dixie.”

“He hated that mobile phone,” Tammili said to her sister. “He’s been dying for it to break.”

“It’s Momma’s phone so she can call us from her school,” Lydia answered. “He’s going to have to get her another one as soon
as he gets back.”

Nieman woke with a start. He had been dreaming about the equations from the day before. They lined up in front of the newspaper
office. Gray uniformed and armed to the teeth, they barred his way to his typewriter. When he tried to reason with them, they
held up their guns. They fixed their bayonets.

“I hate dreams,” he said. He put his feet down on the floor and looked around at the mess his house was in. He lay back down
on the bed. He dialed a number and spoke to the office manager at Merry Maids. Yes, they would send someone to clean the place
while he was gone. Yes, they would tell Mr. Levin hello. Yes, they would be sure to come.

I’m out of here, Nieman decided. I’ll eat breakfast on the way. They know I’m coming. They know I wouldn’t stay away all week.
I’ll go by the deli and get bagels and smoked salmon. I’ll take the math book and do five more problems before Monday. Only
five. That’s it. I don’t have to be crazy if I don’t want to be. An obsessive can pick and choose among obsessions.

He put the suitcase back onto the unmade bed. He added a pair of hiking shorts and a sun-resistant Patagonia shirt he always
wore in Willits. He closed the suitcase and went into the bathroom and got into the shower and closed his eyes and tried to
think about the composition of water. Hydrogen, he was thinking. So much is invisible to us. We think we’re so hot with our
five senses but we know nothing, really. Ninety-nine percent of what is going on escapes us. Ninety-nine percent to the tenth
power or the thousandth power. The rest we know. We are so wonderful in our egos, dressed out in all our ignorance and bliss.
Our self-importance, our blessed hope.

Freddy went up a last long curve, cut off on a dirt road for half a mile, then stopped the Jeep at the foot of an abandoned
gold mine. “Watch your step,” he said to the girls. “There are loose stones everywhere. You have to keep an eye on the path.
It’s rough going all the way to where the trees begin.”

“It’s so nice here,” Lydia said. “I feel like no one’s been here in years. I bet we’re the only people on this mountain. Do
you think we are, Dad? Do you think anyone else is climbing it today?”

“I doubt it. Nieman and I never saw a soul when we were here. Of course, we have managed to keep our mouths shut about it,
unlike some people who have to photograph and publish every good spot they find.”

“Feel the air,” Tammili added. “It tastes like spring. I’m glad we’re here, Dad. This is a thousand times better than some
old ski resort.”

“Was a ski resort a possibility?” Freddy was trying not to grin.

“No. But some people went to them. Half the school went to Sun Valley. I don’t care. I’d lots rather be in the wilderness
with you.”

“I’m glad you approve. Look up there. Not a cloud in the sky. What a lucky day.”

“There’s a cloud formation in the west,” Tammili said. “I’ve been watching it for half an hour.” They turned in the direction
of the sea. Sure enough. On the very tip of the horizon a gray cloud was approaching. Nothing to worry about. Not a black
system. Just a very small patch of gray on the horizon.

“Gather up the packs,” Freddy said. “Let’s start climbing. The sooner we make camp the sooner we don’t have to worry about
the weather. Those trees up there have withstood a thousand years of weather. We’d be safe there in a hurricane.”

“What about a map check?” Tammili asked. She was pulling the straps of her pack onto her strong, skinny shoulders. Lydia was
beside her, looking equally determined. This will never come again, Freddy thought. This time when they are children and women
in the same skin. This innocence and power. My angels.

“Daddy. Come to.” Lydia touched his sleeve, and he turned and kissed her on the head.

“Of course. Get a drink of water out of the thermos we’re leaving. Then we’ll climb up to that lookout and take our bearings.”
He handed paper cups to them and they poured water from a thermos and drank it, then folded the cups and left them in the
Jeep. They hiked up half a mile to a lookout from where they could see the terrain between them and the place they were going.
“Take a reading,” Freddy said. “We’ll write the readings down, but I want you to memorize them. Paper can get lost or wet.
As long as the compass is on your wrist and you memorize the readings, you can find your way back to any base point.”

“The best thing is to look where you’re going,” Tammili said. “Anyone can look at the sun and figure out where the ocean is.”

“We won’t always be hiking in Northern California,” Freddy countered. “We’ll do the Grand Canyon soon and then Nepal.”

“Momma’s friend Brittany got pregnant in Nepal,” Lydia said. “She got pregnant with a monk. We saw pictures of the baby.”

“Well, that isn’t going to happen to either of you. I’m not going to let either of you get pregnant until you have an M.D.
or a Ph.D., for starters. I may not let you get pregnant until you’re forty. I was thinking thirty-five, now I’m thinking
forty.”

“We know. You’re going to buy a freezer so we can freeze our eggs and save them until we can hire someone to have the babies.”
They started giggling again. When Lydia and Tammili decided something was funny, they thought it was funnier and funnier the
more they laughed.

“Maps and compasses,” Freddy said. “Find out where we are. Then find out where we’re going, then chart a course.”

“Where are we going?”

“Up there. To that cliff face. Around the corner is the waterfall that is the source of Red River.” He watched as their faces
bent toward their indescribably beautiful small wrists. The perfect bones and skin of ten-year-olds, burdened with the huge
wrist compasses and watches. I could spend the day worshiping their arms, Freddy thought, or I could teach them something.
“This is the Western Cordillera,” he added. “Those are Douglas fir, as you know, and most of the others are pines, several
varieties. Are the packs too heavy?”

“They’re okay. We can stash things on the trail if we have to.”

“In twenty minutes, we’ll rest for five. All right?”

“I think I hear the waterfall,” he said. “Can you hear it?”

“Not if you’re talking,” Tammili said. “You have to be quiet to get nature to give up its secrets.”

“Stop it, Tammili. Stop teasing him.”

“Yeah, Tammili. Stop teasing me.” They walked in silence then, up almost a thousand feet before they stopped to rest. The
path was loose and slippery and the landscape to the east was barren and rough. To the west it was more dramatic. The cloud
formation they had noticed earlier was growing into a larger mass.

“A gathering storm,” Freddy said. “We’ll be glad I put the waterproofing on the tent last night.”

“I am glad,” Lydia said. “I don’t like to get wet when I’m camping.”

“Let’s go on then,” Tammili said. “That might get here sooner than we think it’s going to.”

They shouldered the packs and began to climb again. Freddy was drawing the terrain in his mind. He had planned on camping
at a site that was surrounded by watercourses. It was so steep that even if there was a deluge it would run off. Still, there
was a dry riverbed that had to be crossed to get to the site. We could make for the caves, he was thinking. There wouldn’t
be bears this high but there are always snakes. Well, hell, I should have gotten a weather report but I didn’t. That was stupid
but we’ll be safe.

“He’s worrying,” Tammili said to her sister.

“I knew he would. He thinks we’ll get wet.”

“I don’t know about all this.” Freddy stopped on the path above them and shook his head. “That cloud’s worrying me. Maybe
we should go back and camp by the Jeep. We could climb all around down there. We can go to Red River another time.”

“We’re halfway there,” Tammili said. “We can’t turn back now. We’ve got the tent. We’ll get it up and if it rains, it rains.”

“Yeah,” Lydia agreed. “We’ll ride it out.”

In the solar-powered house Nora Jane was watching the sky. She would study for a while, then go outside and watch the weather.
Finally, she started the old truck they kept for emergencies and tried to get a station on the radio. A scratchy AM station
in Fort Bragg came on but it was only playing country music. She was about to drive the truck to town when she saw dust on
the road and Nieman came driving up in his Volvo. “Thank God you came,” she said, pulling open the door as soon as he parked.
“Freddy took the girls to Red River and now it’s going to storm. I could kill him for doing that. Why does he do such stupid
things, Nieman? He didn’t get a weather report and he just goes driving off to take the girls to see a waterfall.”

“We’ll go and find them,” Nieman said. “Then we’ll kill him. How about that?”

The adventurers climbed until they came to a dry riverbed that had to be crossed to gain the top. It was thirty feet wide
and abruptly steep at the place where it could be crossed. The bed was a jumble of boulders rounded off by centuries of water.
Some were as tall as a man. Others were the size of a man’s head or foot or hand. Among the dark rounded boulders were sharper
ones of a lighter color. “The sharplooking pieces are granite,” Freddy was saying. “It’s rare in the coastal ranges. God knows
where it was formed or what journeys it took to get here. Hang on to the large boulders and take your time. We are lucky it’s
dry. Nieman and I have crossed it when it’s running, but I wouldn’t let you.” He led the girls halfway across the bed, then
let them go in front of him, Tammili, then Lydia. They were surefooted and careful and he watched them negotiate the boulders
with more than his usual pride. When they were across he started after them. A broken piece of granite caught his eye. He
leaned over to pick it up. He stepped on a piece of moss and his foot slipped and kept on slipping. He stepped out wildly
with his other foot to stop it. He kept on falling. He twisted his right ankle between two boulders and landed on his left
elbow and shattered the humerus at the epicondyle.

“Don’t come back here,” he called. “Stay where you are. I’ll crawl to you.”

“Don’t listen to him,” Tammili said. She dropped her pack on the ground and climbed back over the boulders to where he lay
gasping with pain. “Cut the pack strap,” he said. “Use the big blade on your knife. Cut it off my shoulder if you can.”

“What time did they leave?” Nieman asked. He had called the weather station and gotten a report and put in a preliminary request
for information on distress flares in the area.

“They left about six-thirty this morning. Maybe they’re on their way back. Freddy can see this front as well as we can. He
wouldn’t go up the mountain with a storm coming. All they have is that damned little tent. It barely sleeps three.”

“They could go to the caves. I’m going to try to call him on the mobile phone. If they’re driving, he’ll answer.” Nieman tried
raising Freddy on the mobile phone, then called the telephone company and had them try. “Nothing. They can’t get a thing.
We are probably crazy to worry. What could go wrong? The girls are better campers than I am. They’re not children.”

“Tammili only weighs eighty pounds. I want to call the park rangers.”

“Then call them. We’ll tell them to be on the alert for flares from that area. I know he has flares with him. He loves flares.
He always has them. Then we’ll get in the Volvo and go look for them. I guess it will go down that road. Maybe we better take
the truck.”

“We have to make a stretcher and carry him to the trees,” Tammili was saying. Freddy was slowly moving his body but he wasn’t
making much progress. He couldn’t stand on his left ankle and he couldn’t use his right arm and he could barely breathe for
the pain. There were pain pills in the kit but he wouldn’t take them. “At least I can think,” he kept saying. “I can stand
it and I can think. We have to get a shelter set up before the rain hits. I want you to go on over there and wait for me.
I can make it. I’ll get there.” Then he went blank and the girls were standing over him.

“Let’s go over to that stand of trees and tie down the supplies and get the tent cover and drag him on it,” Tammili said.
“If you start crying I’ll smack you. What do you think we went to all those camps for? This is the emergency they trained
us for. Come on. Help me drag his pack to the trees. Then we’ll come back and get him. Nothing’s going to happen to him. We
can leave him for a minute.”

They pulled Freddy’s pack to the stand of pine trees where they had left their own. They tied the straps around a sapling
and then found the tent cover and went back for him. The sky was very dark now but they did not notice it because they were
ten years old and could live in the present.

They laid the tent cover down beside their father and tried to wake him. “You have to wake up and help us,” Tammili was saying.
“You have to roll over on the cover so we can drag it up the trail. Come on, Dad.It’s going to rain. You’ll get washed down
the river. Come on. Move over here if you can.” Freddy came to consciousness. He rolled over onto the tent cover with his
left shoulder and tried to find a comfortable position. “Clear the rocks off the path,” Lydia said. “Come on, Tammili. Let’s
clear the path.” They began to throw the rocks to the side. Working steadily they managed to clear a way from the riverbed
to the trees. Freddy lay on the cover with the pain coming and going like waves on the sea. He rocked in the pain. He let
the pain take him. There was no way to escape it. Nora Jane will call for help, he was thinking. I know her. This is where
her worrying will come in handy. The truck runs. She will drive it into town and call for help. The rain was beginning. He
felt it on his face. Then the pain won and he didn’t feel anything.