PRECIPICE
Authors: Leland Davis
Contents
This book is a work of fiction.
Names, places, characters, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 Leland Davis
ISBN-13: 978-0-9827379-3-4
No portion of this book may be duplicated or copied using any means—mechanical or digital—without the express written permission of the author.
PRECIPICE
Leland Davis
1
First weekend of October
THE SOUND OF gravel crunching under five pairs of feet was strangely loud in the fog-muted morning. The river rumbled an ominous bass undertone, its warm waters rushing from the summer-warmed lake and churning mist into the cool fall air that rose to mingle with the ghostly tree branches above. Chip Wilson quietly carried his compact eight-foot-long plastic kayak and two bladed paddle, following four solid men who carried a large, thirteen-foot-long rubber raft above their heads with effortless grace. The puffs of their breath billowed in front of them, visible for only a moment before blending with the fog. The parking lot—full only yesterday with weekend hordes of fun-seeking rafters and kayakers—was almost empty now, with only a few hardy professional kayakers and river gypsies left behind, camped at the far end of the lot. Few of them were moving at this early Monday hour. As the men with the raft veered onto a road leading down toward the river, their footsteps were quieted by a mat of fallen green and yellow leaves knocked from branches by the winds of Tropical Storm Katia, which had raged up from the Gulf Coast and across this remote southern corner of the Allegheny Plateau only a day before.
As they reached the river, Chip noted that the rocks where raft trips usually began were hidden under the swirling brown water, and that the river gauge was reading a full four feet higher than usual from the tropical rains. The flow was above eight thousand cubic feet—or two hundred fifty
tons
of water—flowing by each second, well over the weight of a locomotive engine. The force of the water would be equivalent to an entire freight train passing every thirty seconds. Chip knew that compared to the river’s might, a kayak, raft, or person would be little more than an insignificant speck carried along by the flood. It was going to be a wild day.
The four men silently put the raft down on the side of the river, pulled paddles from the boat, and jumped aboard. Chip sat in his kayak and pulled his neoprene spraydeck over the boat’s opening to seal it. The waterproof fabric cover fit like a tight girdle around his waist and sealed over the cockpit of his kayak, keeping all water out of the boat. If he were to capsize, this would allow him to perform an Eskimo roll to flip the boat back upright—a skill he was likely to need today.
He rechecked the tightness of the straps on his life jacket to make sure they were secure and then picked up his paddle. He was more nervous than he had ever been and was trying not to show it. It was the first time he had kayaked anything this difficult since the accident. It was surreal to be here without Daniel’s steady presence. Chip paused and glanced to the side where his best friend should be, looking for the burning light of indomitable enthusiasm that had lanced out of those bright blue eyes like twin beams of pure motivation. If that light could be snuffed out by a river, it could happen to anyone. Chip took a deep breath and focused on making sure that it didn’t happen to him today.
The other four men dug their blades in with tremendous strength and propelled their raft toward the center of the swollen river. Accustomed to the easy jocularity of river folk who try to lighten the mood or distract themselves from the seriousness of such a venture with jokes, the eerie silence of these four men was a bit unsettling to Chip. He slid into the water and gave chase, digging in strong, vertical paddle strokes with first his right blade and then his left, feeling the power of the swollen river ripple up the paddle to his arms and shoulders and send him shooting out into the middle of the flow.
The rafters churned the water with their paddles in silence, quickly working their way through the first quarter-mile of warm-up before the bigger rapids began. The riverbed narrowed and crushed the water into eight-foot-tall exploding waves and then rushed over the lip of a rapid into a frothing mass of white. Chip could hear the leader of the men in the raft, Harris, deliberately calling out commands to his crew over the roar of the water, sounding more like a veteran guide than someone who had only been doing this kind of rafting for four days. The raft darted precisely through the foam, the unwieldy craft looking like a surgical instrument under the direction and power of the four world-class athletes. Chip ducked his head as the waves crashed over his tiny craft, leaning his weight forward to drive him through to the end of the rapid, and continued to chase after the black island of rubber which moved inexorably ahead on the swell. He was supposed to be their safety-support kayaker today, but he was more worried about keeping up than having to rescue these guys.
With most rivers around the country having low water flow in the fall, West Virginia’s Gauley River was a perfect choice for this excursion. In September and October, water was released through the dam from Friday through Monday on six weekends, lowering the level in Summersville Lake to make room for winter rainwater, preventing floods downstream. This practice dumped a torrent of water into one of the best stretches of riverbed in the world, creating a famous paddling destination as adventurers flocked from across the globe to challenge the rapids. However, when rare tropical rains pumped the water up to three times the normal flow like today, few were willing to tackle it.
Miles passed, and the rapids increased in size and frequency as the sandstone canyon walls rose taller and taller from a forest painted with the first multihued stain of fall. Despite having worked here for six seasons, Chip barely recognized the familiar riverbed under the concealment of the flood. Where rocks usually poked up through the surface, giant explosions of whitewater lurked instead. Where crowds of rafters and vacationing kayakers usually cavorted, there was nobody else on the water except the two boats in their group, struggling against the growing might of the river.
Before long they pulled over to the side, taking advantage of an eddy where the water calmed behind an obstruction such as a large boulder or curving river bank—allowing for a break from its frenzied descent and a chance to catch their breath before a more formidable challenge. Below waited one of the largest rapids, Pillow Rock, where the entire force of the river careened through a hundred yards of whitewater before blasting into a giant boulder which stuck out from the left riverbank, obstructing most of the channel with an explosion of water large enough to toss a raft full of people into the air and out of the boat. At this flow, that result was almost a foregone conclusion—and the men in the raft steeled themselves for the dunking. Chip followed as the raft lumbered back into the middle of the river, lining up for the headlong charge toward the aqueous monstrosity. More nimble in his kayak, Chip aimed for the rightmost edge of the rock, watching as the raft in front of him was abruptly lifted ten feet above his head, tilted to the right, and sprung into the air to be tossed upside-down into the froth, sending all four men sprawling into the swirling chaos below.
Chip ducked his head and dug in hard with his paddle, driving smoothly through the heart of the maelstrom, grateful that on this fourth and final day with these guys he was in his kayak and not swimming for his life with the rest. Not that he was too worried about them. On two of the three previous days, he had been in the raft with them, showing the four men how to read the whitewater to choose a path, use the correct paddle strokes, and move with maximum speed down the river. As part of their training he’d been required to flip the raft every day—and had been disconcerted at first when they swam back to the boat and righted it quicker than he could despite his being one of the best guides on the river. In his early years of guiding, his adventurous nature combined with his lack of skills had caused him to capsize many times in a variety of places. Some of the older guides were so amused by watching his antics that they had played on his name and taken to calling him “The Flip Wilson Show” when he wrecked. He had no idea what they were talking about, but the nickname “Flip” had stuck with him in the rafting community to this day. These guys simply were not supposed to beat “Flip” back to the raft. Chip watched one of the men clamber onto the upturned boat, hook the grip of his paddle into a drain hole and lean back, pulling on the paddle to right the raft as he toppled into the water again. Then all four men quickly scrambled back aboard. Their name stood for “Sea, Air, and Land,” but Chip thought they should work “River” in there somewhere for these guys. He dug his paddle blades in and gave chase as the raft moved off down river again. Only twenty more miles of madness to go today…
*
A week earlier, Chip had been putting away gear in the raft barn after guiding his usual Monday river trip when he was approached by a thin, mostly grey man who looked to be in his late fifties. The man’s face was a bit pinched as if he did more thinking than smiling, and his dark, sharp eyes glinted an intense counterpoint to the nondescript yet elegant grey suit he wore. The incongruity of being approached by someone wearing a suit in the rustic environment of a rural West Virginia raft outpost was momentarily startling to Chip; in fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he had seen someone wearing one.
“Charles Wilson?” the man asked. Chip nodded and tossed a rafting helmet he had just picked up into the bin.
“Richard Sutherland,” the man offered, extending his hand in an urbane yet businesslike manner. Chip cautiously shook the man’s hand, somewhat wary of where this encounter was going. The only reason he could think of for being approached by a suit at a raft outpost was that he’d done something wrong, but he hadn’t raised much hell last night or trashed any rafting guests so badly that they’d gotten hurt on the river lately.
“They tell me you’re one of the best guide trainers around here,” the man went on.
Chip blinked at the unexpected compliment. “Well, I love rafting, and I’ve been guiding a long time,” he said slowly, with characteristic confidence and modesty.
“I hear it goes a bit beyond that. I’m looking for someone for a special job next weekend, and your name has come up with almost everyone I’ve asked.”
Chip was instantly curious as to what questions this gentleman had been asking, and why his coworkers were giving his name to a suit. Work was work, though, and this guy looked like he could pay.
“I’ve probably got to work at least Saturday and Sunday next weekend, but you can put in a request for me to be your guide. I do high adventure trips, if that’s what you’re looking for.” ‘High adventure’ trips were for customers who wanted to go in smaller groups and smaller rafts taking more daring routes through the rapids. Basically, they were for people who wanted to make sure they crashed for an extra thrill. Most companies didn’t offer them any more due to liability concerns. Chip worked for this company because they still did.
The corners of Sutherland’s mouth turned up a bit in amusement, in what Chip figured was as close to a smile as this guy got. “It’ll definitely be high adventure. It’ll also be a bit of guide training. I spoke with your manager, and he doesn’t feel this is a trip that should be run through the raft company. He did say you can have the weekend off if you’d like the job.”