Summer's End (23 page)

She headed toward the bow of the canoe. “No way,” Nick called out. “I'm still a major league amateur. You have to do the hard stuff.”

She brushed her hair off her face. “Okay…if you're sure.”

“I'm sure.”

It wasn't far to the mainland. Ellie didn't say anything, and that was fine with him. She steered them in parallel to the shore, and at the first brush heap they were able to break off dry wood while still in the canoe.

But the second wasn't so conveniently located. “I'll get out,” she said.

She was closer to the more solid ground. It made sense for her to get out, but all of a sudden Nick shivered. There was something wrong with this brush heap.

He never had thoughts like that—instincts, he guessed
they were called—but he couldn't get rid of this one. There was something wrong. He couldn't let her go.

“No, Ellie, I'll do it.”

He tried not to move too quickly, he tried to be careful, but he didn't want to dawdle. Otherwise she'd argue with him, and he didn't know what he could say without sounding like some sort of macho jerk.

He hadn't paid any attention when the canoes were first being loaded, but once they were out on the water, he could see that his and Jack's canoe rode lowest in the water; Jack had taken the heaviest packs himself. That's what guys like Jack did, take the heaviest packs, climb the risky paths first.

Nick's first step, the one that took him out of the canoe, was fine. And his second one was okay too. So he tested his third step. The tangle of branches and brush seemed solid, but just as he was lifting his back foot, he heard the wood crack, and it wasn't just a single crack but a whole series of little firecrackers. Everything was still cracking and popping as the wood gave way. He slipped and then there was a pain, a slicing pain, followed by warmth, warmth and liquid and pain.

“Nick, Nick…what happened?”

“I don't know.” He was feeling strange. Weak. Woozy.

Ellie was fumbling with her fanny pack. She pulled out something shiny and raised it to her mouth. Three shrill blasts spat out across the water. It must have been a whistle.

She was blurring. He felt like she was getting farther away, although he knew she was coming closer. The pain in his leg was fierce.
Was this what it was like, Brian? Is this what it felt like?

The blast was shrill. It was instantly followed by two more. Then a pause. Then another three blasts. The pause made it unmistakable. This wasn't a kid playing. This was the international distress signal, coming from somewhere across the lake. A moment later Jack was in a canoe, sweeping it through the water. He knew how to paddle a canoe alone. You sit in the bow, facing the stern. His dad had told him that when he had been canoeing in Boy Scouts.

The blasts sounded again. He could hear shouts from the campsite, but he was already off, following the sound. It was coming from behind a pile of brush on the shore. He grew closer, saw the canoe. He called out. “Hello?”

“Dad?” It was Ellie.

“No, it's Jack.”

He rounded the brush heap. Nick was at the shoreline, tangled in the brush, slumped over, and Ellie was in water to her knees. “The pile gave way. He's caught on something.”

Jack pulled the canoe next to her and splashed into the water. He felt along Nick's leg. It was clear what had happened. Some idiot had dropped an open knife. It had
wedged in the brush and Nick had fallen onto it. His leg was clammy with blood.

Jack pulled off his shirt. “Okay, when I lift him, you get this underneath. Get it on top on his cut and hold it there. Really keep the pressure on.” Ellie was nodding. She understood. “You won't pass out or anything?”

She shook her head. He got his arms under Nick's knee and around his shoulders. He lifted, and Ellie slipped her hand underneath. “I've got it.”

Another canoe was coming; Jack could hear the splash of their paddles. “What happened?” It was Phoebe; Amy was with her. “What can we do?”

“Get that canoe out of the way.” He nodded toward Ellie's canoe; it was full of firewood. “Then can you get into this one and hold it steady?” Jack had already turned with Nick in his arms. Ellie was bent low, still holding her hand in place.

Phoebe swung herself in the empty canoe. The thwarts kept Jack from laying Nick in flat, so he let Phoebe cradle him in a crouch. She reached out to place her hand over Ellie's; the pressure on the wound never let up. As Ellie pulled her hand away, Phoebe gasped sharply.

“We need to get him to a hospital, don't we?” Jack asked.

Phoebe nodded.

Before they left, Ian had spent what had seemed like hours discussing with the outfitter what to do in an emergency. Jack had taken it as a typical Ian make-everyone-else-wait power move. But to give Ian credit, it was good to know that there were ranger stations equipped with radios that they could call in little airplanes whose pontoons could land on water.

Ellie was now in the bow in the canoe. The legs of her
jeans were dark and wet; a watery red trail ran down her arm. Phoebe was keeping pressure on the wound.

“What can I do?” Amy asked. She was still in the smaller canoe.

“Go back,” Phoebe said. “Tell Giles to start cutting butterfly bandages about an inch and a half long.”

“And tell the others to take down the pup tent and put together a trail pack,” Jack added as he got into Nick's canoe. “We're going to have to go to the ranger station.”

Amy nodded and quickly pivoted in her seat so that she too was in the bow facing the stern. Jack gave her a helpful shove.

He leaned over Phoebe's shoulder to look at Nick. The boy was ashen, and if Phoebe took the pressure off, the bleeding would start up again. Jack told Ellie to start paddling.

“Do you know how far we are from a ranger station?” Phoebe asked. “Is it closer than where we launched?”

“By about an hour, and remember, there may not be anyone at the launch. We could still have to drive for another twenty minutes and then figure out who to call.”

“Are there portages?”

“Yes.”

“Then Giles shouldn't go. You and Ian will have to.”

Jack grunted. He supposed it made sense, but he certainly would rather go with Giles. They would need to go fast, and Ian would want to check the maps, think, deliberate. He would want to be in charge. He would want to tell Jack what to do.

Everything was ready for them at the campsite. A poncho was spread out, and all the first-aid supplies were lined up. The butterfly bandages were cut and ready. Joyce and Maggie were over at the kitchen packs, apparently making
sandwiches, preparing a trail pack. Ian was taking down the little pup tent. Amy had made good time across the water.

Of course she had. Pound for pound, who was the single strongest person here? It wasn't any of the men; it was Amy, beautiful, delicate-looking Amy. Even if you dropped the pound-for-pound requirement, she had more brute strength than anyone but Jack himself. And her endurance was probably better than even his. Why was he for one second even considering going with Ian?

Giles was doing the actual bandaging while Phoebe was holding the skin together. They were wearing rubber gloves from the first-aid kit, and the smell of alcohol rose from their hands. They had sterilized them even before putting on the gloves. Joyce and Maggie were still working, and the kids were sitting quietly, out of the way. Whatever else Jack might think of this family, they knew what to do in an emergency.

“I'm going to take Amy,” Jack said to Phoebe. “She and I are going to the ranger station.”

“Amy?” Phoebe glanced up, startled. “Why? What good will she be?”

“Muscle. She's stronger than Ian. Her endurance is probably better than mine. We've already paddled for six hours today, and the ranger station is another five. She's the only one with that kind of conditioning.”

“You're right about that.” Phoebe looked back over her shoulder. “Ellie, I think Amy is in Jack's tent, finding dry socks for him. Go ask her if she's willing to go to the ranger station with him.”

Ian overheard. “Wait, wait.” He set the rolled pup tent on the ground. “Let me get this straight. You can't be thinking of sending
Amy?
”

Jack wanted to hit him.

It was Phoebe who answered. “No, Ian, we aren't going to wait, not while you get this straight, not for anything. Face it, Amy's stronger and in better shape than any of the rest of us.”

“But Amy? She has no outdoor skills.”

“Jack has enough for the both of them. We need muscle. That she has. We always think of her as having sequins on her brain, but she is a professional athlete.”

Argue with that
, Jack dared him.

He couldn't; he wasn't stupid. He couldn't say that he was in better shape than Amy; he wasn't. He tightened his lips, not liking anything about this. Then he spoke. “Your boots are wet, Jack. I've got an extra pair of really good wool socks if you'd like to take them.”

Jack wasn't sure he had heard right. Ian was being decent about this. Jack supposed he needed to be gracious in return. “That would be nice.”

I don't want your stupid socks even if they are wool
.

But wool socks were great. Jack didn't own any because he could never bring himself to spend that kind of money on comfort.

Ian went off to get the socks, and Jack knelt by Nick. Nick was biting his lip, struggling not to cry out. Jack touched his arm. “Hold on, kid. You'll be fine.”

Jack did believe that. If the butterfly bandages didn't hold, Phoebe and Giles would keep pressure on the wound all night if they had to. They were that sort of people. Nick wouldn't bleed to death, but he did need to have the wound stitched and a doctor check his tendon.

Ian handed Jack the socks, and they were thick and light and soft, exactly what you wanted when your boots were wet. “Thanks,” Jack said.

“My younger sister's usually the one in the family with
all the right clothes. She and I seem to be changing places.”

When the stakes were high enough, apparently even Ian could be a good sport. It was the nickel-and-dime stuff that made him impossible.

Amy was already down by the canoes. They were taking the smaller one. They had two packs, a bulky, light one with their sweatshirts and sleeping bags, a smaller, heavier one with the tent, the food, and a few pieces of equipment. Jack changed his socks while Amy went to get an extra paddle.

It was five-thirty; their light would hold until nine. Jack glanced at the map. They could camp about an hour from the ranger station and then reach it just after dawn the next morning. It would be a long haul, but he was sure they could make it.

“Ready?” he asked Amy.

“Ready,” she answered.

The person in bow sets pace, and Amy set a swift one. If it had been anyone else, Jack would have said something about the need to pace themselves, but Amy had to know her strength. She must know more about her body than anyone he had met. So he kept quiet. They shot through the water, their paddles digging deep, then lifting and circling through the air in perfect unison. Drops of water danced off the end of the paddles, arcs of ripples splaying out on either side of the canoe. They didn't speak as their muscles warmed and loosened.

Amy pulled off her sweatshirt. She was wearing her black bathing suit, the one that was cut surprisingly high in front, almost to her collarbone, but then swooped low in the back.

Jack had never seen anything like Amy's back. He had
noticed it the first time he had seen her in a bathing suit. Her muscles were lightly, even delicately defined, curving across her back in graceful arcs, but they were so well developed that it was almost as if she didn't have shoulder blades.

They sped through the portages. Amy could carry both packs at once, the bulky one on her back, the smaller one on her chest while Jack carried the canoe. At the end of each portage, he stepped to the water's edge, hoisted the canoe off his shoulders, and flipped it into the water. It landed with a splash and a little aluminum echo. Amy unloaded her packs directly into the canoe, took up her paddle, and was ready to go.

They traveled on, making excellent time. The rhythm of Amy's strokes was nearly perfect, never wavering, never intensifying. He felt completely in tune with her, with his body, with hers. The hours passed. Their shadows on the water lengthened as the sun fell. They approached the spot where he had planned to camp; they paddled beyond it.

It was as if time had disappeared. There was no past, no future, just the moment and the tightening and lengthening of muscle, the movement of arms and back. The task, the moment, was all that mattered, not the goal, not the reason, just the doing, the now. This was what Jack lived for, moments like this. The tool in your hand, whether a hammer, a drill, or a canoe and paddle, became a part of you, an extension of yourself, and every motion sang with the harmony of you and your task and your tools.

And to be out here, away from phones, beepers, and clients, answerable to no one but himself and his partner, it was—

Was it how his dad had felt? He had commanded a
fast-attack submarine, and most of his missions had been covert. Jack used to bug him for details, and his father would give him only vague answers. Jack now supposed that the missions involved things like slipping into a Soviet port to photograph its fleet, the kind of thing that you couldn't have your kid bragging about on the playground.

When the boat was on these missions, it would be alone, out of even radio contact for days. Its C.O. would be answerable to no one for anything except the safety of his men and the result of his mission.

Maybe that's what his father had liked about his career, not the deskwork or the ranks and saluting, but being out on a submarine, deep underwater, the one place you didn't have the admirals breathing down your neck every instant. And all that caution, that insistence on doing everything right, on never using duct tape for anything, maybe that was one of the ways you kept the admirals off your back.

Did you hate authority as much as I do, Dad?

Jack suddenly and with complete certainty knew the answer. Yes, his father had hated authority, had hated it maybe even more than Jack did.

Mom occasionally mentioned how his dad had been one of the few enlisted men at the Naval Academy, a tough coal miner's kid with a few years' service under his belt. The other midshipmen would have been suburban college boys.

That couldn't have been easy.

But you don't get ahead in the military by rebelling. All his career John T. Wells, Sr., had played the game and followed the rules.

Then what had happened? They went and made him
an admiral, stuck him behind a desk so that he was breathing down the necks of the guys who were having all the fun.

I couldn't have choked it back that long
. Jack knew that about himself.

But he wasn't a tough coal miner's kid. He was an admiral's son. It was probably a whole lot easier to take risks and make changes when you had a little privilege in your background.

Jack shifted uneasily in the cold aluminum canoe seat. He didn't like to think of himself as being privileged, but he had been. And it wasn't fair to his dad to pretend otherwise, not when the guy had struggled for so long.

The sky had darkened, and they were traveling by the moon, its pale golden light marking a highway across the black water. They were only fifteen minutes from the ranger station, but there was another portage, rocky and steep.

“I hate to stop when we're so close,” Jack said, “but it's too hard to carry a canoe in the dark.”

“We have a flashlight.” Amy looked back over her shoulder as she spoke. Before he could shake his head, she went on. “My sense of balance is good, and I'm very used to falling. I know how. Let me carry the canoe.”

Jack paused. Let her carry the canoe? He always took the hardest jobs, he always carried the heaviest load even among other men, and Amy was a woman.

Okay, Dad, what would you have done? You didn't have girls on your boats
.

His father would have done what was best for his crew and the boat. Amy's sense of balance had to be better than Jack's, and she was plenty strong. Her sex was irrelevant. She should carry the canoe.