Dennis Yates - Red Mountain

The runner began to pick up speed as the slope sharpened. Robert pulled Nugget away from the stump and led her behind the trunk of a redwood tree. The thudding footfalls moved closer. He kept his hand in his pocket, gripping the gun wrapped in plastic.

Someone’s following us….

He could now hear the runner’s sharp breaths. Nugget strained to get her head around the trunk so she could see. He bent down and tapped her on the nose, to let her know not to bark.

As the runner went past, Robert shifted to the other side of the trunk. He glimpsed a young woman dressed in red sweats, and trailing behind her was a Doberman Pincher. As the dog passed, it swiveled its head in their direction and sniffed without slowing.

Robert pressed his head against the redwood and laughed. The feeling of it next to his skin was comforting. He shut his eyes and willed away the fears that crowded inside him. He’d discovered how useful the trick was back when he was still a boy, while visiting his grandfather who lived in a cabin up in the Cascade mountain range. Back then a day could feel like a whole summer—an endless series of adventures, dependent only on your willingness to get out and find them. There’d been time to discover things his friends at home would never know. Yet on that evening when he’d found himself clinging to a cedar for dear life, he would’ve traded everything he knew just to be back in town again, riding bicycles with friends and hanging out at the mall.

After a few moments Robert felt the tree trunk absorb his fears and unwanted thoughts. He visualized them being carried up the trunk into the branches high above, then into the needles, and finally out to the very tips of the needles where they escaped into the air and slipped past the threatening rain clouds.

All clear. Blue as far as one could fathom. But how long can it last?

Now that Connor was no longer afraid of spiders he’d have to teach him his trick.

He’d probably get laughed at too...

Nugget tugged on her leash. Robert could tell she was getting anxious to hunt for squirrels, even if it meant pulling him in tow. He glanced down at her, smiling for just an instant.

“Sorry Nug. I promise to do better from now on.”

****

As they walked around the reservoir, Robert looked for a safe place to hide the revolver. Next to the path was a concrete and steel bar fence protecting a reservoir roughly the size of a football field. Portland’s drinking water. On the opposite side of the path was a sharp hillside covered with ivy.

Birds bobbed out in the middle of the man-made lake where a geyser of silver water shot high into the air. When Nugget heard the quacking ducks, Robert let her put her paws up on the wall and stare at them through the spaces between the bars.

Despite a sudden cloudburst, several hardcore joggers slogged their way around. Robert walked in the same direction as the joggers and tried to avoid eye contact. All of them wore headphones, and appeared to be lost in their own worlds. He watched as the hammering rain moved across, causing thousands of miniature quakes. They stood in the doorway of a stone pump house until the shower passed. A fine mist smelling faintly of chlorine rose above the roiling surface of the reservoir. It drifted lazily over the concrete wall separating them from a steeply angled, concrete shore.

At a parking spot not far away, Robert thought he saw someone sitting in a black van watching. But when they’d made their second trip around the reservoir, the van was gone.

They stepped off the path and climbed up to a graveled parking lot. There were only a few cars left, most likely owned by the same joggers who’d been circling the reservoir with them. He noticed a small grove of trees on a hill just above the parking lot. He decided to go up there and see what he could find.

They waded up through a field of yellow grass with several old cherry trees. The dark limbs of the trees were gnarled and covered with small bumps. Robert was always amazed how such arthritic looking branches could produce such striking blossoms in the spring.

It had been below trees just like these where he’d proposed to Peggy. Tiny fragrant white and pink flowers had clung to her hair like a bridal veil. A few even got pasted to her cheeks after they’d become wet with tears. Robert had collected his share as well…

He stood below the trees and watched as one of the soaked joggers got into his car and drove away. From up here he had a good view of the reservoir and the rain-blurred city stretching beyond.

Somewhere out there is a man making preparations to kill you. A man you’ve never met…

Robert found a deep ragged hole in one of the trees. Damp, and full of cobwebs. At one time the tree had lost a limb and it had tried to heal over, until the squirrels found it to be a useful place to store their cache.

Once he was satisfied no one was watching, he shoved the plastic-wrapped gun inside. He and Nugget then climbed up through the tall grass to another trail which fed back into the woods. Maybe the gun would come in handy. He had no idea if it would. But at least it was there if he needed it…

Later, Nugget smelled a rabbit and forced him to trot along behind her.

CHAPTER 6

By the following afternoon the storm had been long forgotten. The sky was intensely blue, and hot sunlight had already baked the mud into a cracked skin. Horned toad lizards hunted for ants, while buzzards made big lazy circles in the thermals above.

Sheriff Underwood felt like crap.

He and Deputy Logan had been riding horseback since daybreak. They’d been out settling a ranching dispute ten miles to the north when word arrived that a vigilante party was seen headed for the Horn farm the afternoon before. Not that anyone in town had bothered trying to stop the three men and boy from their crazy quest to do god knows what. It was only later, when they hadn’t returned home to their beds that caused their families to become worried to the point of calling on him for help.

Something had boiled over, and Underwood hadn’t been around to simmer things back down. He suspected the timing wasn’t entirely coincidental with him being away. The men had been planning this for some time, and they’d managed to keep the festering anger to themselves.

Underwood, who’d been county Sheriff for nearly twenty years, knew all four of the party well. He’d recently spoken to the boy a week earlier about paying him to white wash the outside of the jailhouse. Having been an orphan himself at a young age, Underwood and the kid hit it off right away. Unfortunately, the kid’s uncle wasn’t what you would call an ideal role model. He wasn’t a bad character though. No, the problem with Arvin was just he didn’t enforce a whole lot of discipline under his roof. Underwood, in his own way, had tried his best to gently steer the kid whenever he could.

When they got the news, Underwood and his partner had only enough time to heat up a plate of chili and some coffee before breaking camp. Now Logan’s chili was doing a war dance on Underwood’s stomach, and riding a horse thirty miles wasn’t helping matters. He couldn’t figure out what the hell his deputy must have done to it. His guts felt as if they’d been packed with gunpowder.

Logan’s cooking had frequently been an issue between the two men, and Underwood hadn’t thought of a delicate way in which to bring it up again. For a man who’d been tempered by several hard years in the army, Logan’s only soft spot left had been an overblown pride in his culinary skills.

As they rode, Underwood released a notch on his belt, making himself feel more comfortable. He longed to stretch out on his blanket and take a nap under a tree. Better yet, he would’ve liked to have rested his head on his wife’s lap and sip lemonade.