Summer of Fire (13 page)

The latch clanged as Travis pushed past into the building. “I’ll let the authorities decide.”

Clare followed him into the command center.

Gathered around the maps, at least thirty men were meeting. Fire behavior expert Ken Roberts had the floor, holding up his Texas Instruments calculator containing the program he had developed, appropriately named PREDICT.

Garrett, seated in the front row, had told Clare about the program. The three main factors used in predicting were fuels, weather and topography. It sounded simple, but fuels could be anything from grass to four hundred-year-old trees.

“Back in July,” Roberts lectured, “the thousand-hour fuels had dropped to twelve percent moisture content. I refer to the practice of using four-foot lengths of lodgepole pine that would take at least a thousand hours to dry as an index. To give you an idea of how low that moisture content is, it’s the same as kiln-dried lumber.”

Clare imagined the forest as one huge stack of kindling.

“This week the numbers have dropped to below ten percent.”

A new plastic overlay had been added to the fire map with a dashed red outline that encompassed a large area that had not yet burned. “According to our estimates,” Roberts said, “the hundred-fifty thousand acres already consumed could potentially double before the season is out.”

Clare felt as though she’d been punched. If Roberts were right, she might be another three weeks getting home to Devon.

“Okay, everybody.” Garrett held up a hand. “There’ll be a press conference in an hour. We’ll release the predictions hammered out here.”

Sergeant Travis clumped over to the maps.

Clare went to the kitchen refrigerator. She downed a sixteen-ounce bottle of cold spring water and opened another.

Garrett followed her. “What do you think of their predictions?”

“It’s frightening to think we’re going to face that much more.” She removed her hard hat, set it on the counter, and riffled her sweat-damp hair.

“It’s going to get a whole lot worse than anybody imagines. Roberts’s program is designed for surface fires, not crown fires. When you get winds like we’re having and the fire leaps up into the treetops, all bets are off.”

She gripped the plastic water bottle. Garrett had seen a lot and if he thought it was bad, she believed.

“How’s it going with the Army?” He shot a glance at Travis.

“Okay.”

“That fellow giving you a hard time?”

“What makes you think so?”

“A hunch.”

Clare smiled both at Garrett and the sight of Travis retreating from the center without speaking to anyone about the migrants. “How’d you guess?”

“You forget I’m in the minority, too.”

She drank deeply of chilled water and looked up at Garrett’s dark face. “You’re right, I do forget.”

He poured coffee and stretched to pluck a pack of Fig Newtons from a high shelf. She surmised from the way he cached his sweets that it was an honor when he offered one. She took a cookie and ate it while Garrett downed five. Scanning the room, she confirmed that he was the only black and she one of the few women present. “Speaking of minorities,” she ventured, “my family tree is supposed to trace back to the Nez Perce.”

Garrett studied her. “Most folks like you don’t acknowledge red or black ancestors.”

Clare flushed. “The local bookstores have only a few books about the Nez Perce.”

“Try the archives,” Garrett suggested. “At Park Headquarters in Mammoth.”

Steve’s hands shook as he placed a stack of yellowed papers into a manila folder.

“Right in here.” Walt Leighton’s voice sounded in the outer room as he ushered someone into the basement archives.

Steve checked his watch and found it nearly five. The time reminded him that the sun was over the yardarm.

What in God’s name was he going to do? He longed for the years when he’d been a man who appreciated a good red wine, for the time before his life had been shredded in a falling, flaming instant. Drink was impossible to kick on your own. He’d stopped hundreds of mornings, only to start again the same night. The hell of it was that if he wanted to stay in Yellowstone, he had no choice but to take the cure.

On the other hand, fire’s assault on the land he loved made him determined to stay until the crisis ended.

Steve opened a new folder and considered a reprint of Jarred Ayad’s article, “An Alternate Route for the Nez Perce through Yellowstone.” He knew the Nez Perce story well, how in the summer of 1877 Chiefs Joseph, White Bird, and Looking Glass had refused to go onto the reservation outlined by the U.S. government. After hotheaded young men of the tribe avenged several murdered Nez Perce by killing white settlers, about seven hundred people set out on a freedom flight to Canada. The Army had pursued them through Yellowstone.

“Back here we have our library of books and videotapes.” Walt’s footsteps sounded loud in the narrow aisle between floor-to-ceiling shelves. The person who followed did not walk as heavily as he. “It’s time to close, but since you drove all the way here, I can stay open a while.”

“Where would I find information about an old homestead?” The husky voice might belong to a man or a woman. “Someplace close to the Tetons around 1900?”

“Not here, I’m afraid,” Walt said. “You might ask at Grand Teton National Park, or at the Historical Society in Jackson. In the meantime, feel free to look around.”

Walt retreated toward his office while the other late visitor to the archives shuffled along on the opposite side of a shelf of geology books. A moment later, Steve looked up to find Clare Chance frowning at him, her brows startling wings. Her face had darkened from the sun since he saw her last week.

“Dr. Haywood,” she said, “you look like hell.”

Clare did think Steve looked terrible, but she immediately regretted saying it. The paper he’d been studying wavered as he laid it down. Pale stubble on his chin outlined where he’d missed a patch shaving.

“You don’t look bad yourself.” Steve smiled. Despite the puffy bags around them, his gray eyes lighted. If he stayed off the sauce, he might turn out to be a decent looking fellow, with that blond hair and solid looking build.

“Thank you,” she said.

He tilted the straight wooden chair on two legs against the basement wall. This was the first time she’d seen him in his ranger’s uniform. Above his head, afternoon light shone through the window where he’d placed his summer straw hat on the sill.

“How’s the fray?” he asked.

“Almost a hundred-fifty thousand acres.” Because misery loved company, she went on, “The fire experts are predicting twice that.”

Steve’s dry-looking lips pursed into a whistle.

Clare looked at the stack of journals and books on the desk before him. “History?”

“The Nez Perce War of 1877.”

She’d been a jock in school rather than a scholar, but she’d listened when her family’s tribe was mentioned. That was her history, her blood that had made that trek. “My family has some Nez Perce in it.”

“Walt’s the historian.” Steve gestured toward the front room. “But I’ve been searching the records about the Nez Perce. I’d be happy to share what I know.”

Two hours later, she sat enthralled by the images he painted. If her great-grandfather had ridden with the Nez Perce on their freedom flight, he would have been seven years old. Mentally, she compared her callused hands to the tough planes of flesh that even a child must have wielded in those days. Superb horsemen and proud, even the young people had assisted in driving the herd.

“Those were difficult times.” Steve showed her a book with black and white photos of tribal leaders and groups on the reservation. Was one of those barefoot boys her great-grandfather William Cordon Sutton? Even with his fine English name, society must have viewed him as tainted by his half-breed mother’s blood.

Steve pushed the papers away. “I’m starving.” He looked at her as if deciding. “Let me buy over at the hotel restaurant.” Casual, not like asking for a date.

He stood and extended a hand. Golden hairs flecked its back and his square-nailed fingers looked sturdy.

Clare slid her hand into his. As a scientist, he didn’t bear the calluses that she did and she hoped he didn’t notice. A tremor in his fingers reminded her once more of the splendid waste he was making of his life.

Her temptation to continue their conversation passed when he said, “A cold one would do about now.”

“Thanks.” She moved toward the door. “But I believe I’ll get on the road.”

CHAPTER NINE

August 4

In her cabin at Old Faithful, Clare lay in bed with the same trepidation she felt each night, fearing dreams of death awaited. It was past one and she had to be up at the usual four-thirty. After driving back from Mammoth, she should be asleep, but it was difficult. Some nights, she read until late, and others, she walked. Last Friday she’d been able to read under the spotlight of a full moon.

Escaping into a book was one kind of therapy, but after a while, she forced herself to put it aside. On her walks, she absorbed the peaceful surroundings and wondered where her life was going. In many ways, she was reminded of when she used to walk to school and weave elaborate fantasies of what she was going to be when she grew up.

At five, she had wanted to win Olympic gold, already interested in swimming and other sports. At ten, the goal was to be a famous heart surgeon like the men in South Africa and Houston who saved lives. When she’d passed the fire station and had her face washed by Cinders their Dalmatian, she had never imagined ending up in a place like that.

But her summer nights’ dreams dredged forgotten memories of stopping in at the station and sampling stews concocted by a kindly older fireman who reminded her of Frank. Of becoming a sort of Bellaire Fire Department mascot and riding a ladder unit in the Fourth of July Parade. Of hearing the alarm and seeing the men—no women then—pile on their equipment and drive away to the blended wail of sirens. She had watched them until they were out of sight.

This evening at Old Faithful, Clare had made the two-mile round trip to the Morning Glory Pool through a gray landscape lit by stars. On the way back, she’d had a private viewing of Castle Geyser’s pale foaming rush against the darker sky. For the first time in years, she’d thought about having someone to walk with her.

In the early days of their marriage, when Houston’s summer heat gave way to sultry evening, she and Jay used to take strolls. Cicadas sawed their sharp song and water bugs skated on Buffalo Bayou’s low water. At first, Jay carried Devon in a pack against his chest and later he pushed the stroller. As their daughter grew, she’d run free, taking fifty steps to one of her parents’, flitting to investigate a rose or chase a lightning bug.

Devon had been the first to drop out of their walks, pleading homework, but Clare suspected TV. Then Clare moved from P.E. teacher to basketball coach with evening games and practices. As their lives diverged, those ritual strolls had slipped away almost without her notice.

Come to think, on nights when Jay was home, he’d carried on alone. Looking back, she wondered if he’d been meeting Elyssa Hendron or some other woman years before she suspected.

Over a week, and she hadn’t heard from Deering. Another man who’d dropped in for a brief test drive and evidently decided to purchase another model. Normally, that didn’t bother her, but with him, she’d felt a spark. On the other hand, maybe he was busy flying for another charter service. Women were allowed to take the initiative nowadays, too. Someday when she was at West Yellowstone, she could go to the airport and see about getting a message to him.

It was a shame about Steve Haywood. Where Deering was bold and cocky, Steve had a kind of vulnerability that made her want to put a smile into his eyes.

Steve opened his eyes to darkness. As the familiar shadows of his bedroom furniture seemed to harden before his eyes, he clung to wisps of dream.

When all else disappeared, the ghost of a sweet face remained. Not Susan, but Clare, who’d looked earnest and caring when he’d opened his eyes beside Yellowstone Lake. He focused on her, nut brown from the sun, tousled short hair falling over her forehead. He’d really wanted to have dinner with her, but what could he expect after the wonderful impression he’d made thus far?

Rolling over, he realized that he wasn’t going to be able to get back to sleep. Even in darkness, he envisioned the picture of Susan on the bedside table.

What would she think if she knew he dreamed of another woman?

His bare feet found summer’s grit on the hardwood hall floor as he headed for the kitchen without turning on a light. There the window revealed a streetlamp’s bluish glow between the rows of park housing and storage buildings. The clock on the fifties-vintage stove ticked, its hands pointing to three-forty.

Susan lay beneath the earth, dust to dust. Her lithe body, her spirited hands that coaxed music from everything, including, and most especially, him--that was but a memory.