Claire pulled Nell away from the gathering throng of cameras and reporters. It was obvious that this new group didn’t know who Nell was. Not yet. The bob-haired reporter from the morning, Bailey something, was not with this crew.
A third reporter elbowed past them and jogged to Mike, asking, “What are the feelings of the searchers? Are you any closer to finding the missing man?”
Contempt on his face, Mike picked up Joe’s boat and angled away, leaving the path open for Nell and Claire to escape. He caught Nell’s eyes and jerked his head at Claire’s car, a clear order to get inside. Turning to the water, he shouted, “Elton! Let’s get the boats loaded up. Daylight’s wasting.”
Walking backward, Nell saw the first reporter pivot in front of Mike, blocking his way. “Can you tell us what’s going on, out on the water?” the guy asked. “Have you seen any evidence of the missing boater?”
Mike rounded on the hapless reporters and fixed them all with a furious glare. “We’re busting our humps, is what’s going on out on the river. Why don’t you get your lazy asses out there and help the hikers instead of getting in the way and asking damn-fool questions?” The reporters seemed to skitter into a group, as if seeking safety in numbers from the irate man.
Elton stepped in and softly said, “Maybe I can help?” The reporters ganged up around him and threw questions at him fast and furiously while Mike and the other searchers and onlookers loaded up the boats. Still walking backward, Nell watched as Mike loaded Joe’s boat with the others and tied it down with twine in a complicated naval knot. She wanted the boat with her. But she knew Mike would take care of it.
Nell slid into the passenger seat, and Claire started the little red car, pulling out while they were still buckling their seat belts. Silent, they drove from the takeout. Claire shot her a glance once the car reached the secondary road and said, “You’re still mad at me for getting that reporter to come by this morning, aren’t you?”
Nell sighed and rubbed the bruised spot on her temple. It wasn’t as painful as it had been, the headache kept at bay by constant use of Tylenol and ibuprofen. “Not mad, Claire. It’s just that I’ve seen reporters on a bad SAR. I know how they get. They’ll give me until tomorrow before the innuendos turn into bald accusations.” She laid her head against the molded headrest.
“They’re gonna accuse you of killing Joe and dumping him in the river. That what you’re saying?”
Nell laughed, the tone desolate. “Yeah, Mama. That’s what I’m saying.”
As if Nell’s use of the word Mama had been a shock to her, Claire fell silent and concentrated on driving. If Nell’d had the energy, she’d have worried about the look of concentration on her mother’s face. It always presaged trouble ahead or guilt for something already done.
The radio squelched all afternoon, comments and orders and reports passed up and down the river. The hikers were in constant communication with the kayakers, checking around each boulder, inspecting downed trees with limbs in water and roots on land. In the current, the most experienced rescue volunteers checked out eddies that looked wrong. Eddies that might have been caused by a body in the water.
Mike and his paddlers stabilized the Ranger raft with ropes attached to trees onshore, securing it over the zigzag current at the base of the Long Pool. Held in place, they dragged the bottom with a grappling hook, trying to snag whatever was down there, affecting the current. Nell, sitting in the RV, was so tense her stomach was in knots, a hot pain just below her breastbone. The thought of food still made her sick to the stomach and she turned down the offer of a bowl of soup from her mother and hot dogs from the rescue squad’s family members who kept the hospitality wagon open and running.
By 6:00 p.m., the searchers had checked every rock and bit of shoreline upstream of the Long Pool and around it. Every strainer had been pulled from the river. Every eddy that looked wrong had been dredged. All were caused by trees or rocks that had shifted. Not by a body. They had methodically searched every possible location for Joe. And for his body.
The shorelines farther downstream, in the deepest part of the canyon, would take another twelve hours or more to search as thoroughly. The call came over the radio to head in. It was impossible to make it back upstream. Most of the kayakers had brought overnight gear, but it wasn’t with them on the river where they could camp overnight; they had to make it to the takeout or the next support site at the O & W Bridge by sunset, get carted back to their gear and set up camp before total dark. They had less than two hours.
Nell waited for the searchers at the put-in of the confluence of Clear Creek and the New River, sitting in the passenger chair of the RV cab, which Mike had brought in before he hit the water again. She watched the activity between the cracks of the closed RV curtains, kneading her fingers in anxiety.
The put-in here, midway down the gorge, was a rough, unsophisticated version of the Burnt Mill Bridge put-in. It sported a bumpy, one-lane road that curled midway down from the plateau at the top, to the footpath that led the rest of the way down to the river. The so-called camping area was a gravel loop of the road. No picnic tables. No Port-a-Potties. Nothing but a ring of trees and several fire pits. The walk to the river was a steep, winding, downhill path on loose gravel, sandstone rock and trail-hard dirt.
The press vans came and went, but only one or two reporters and cameramen took the long walk down to the water for footage. The auxiliary rescue squad showed up about six and parked their van on the highest ground at the top of the circle. One woman lit a camp stove and started coffee. Another began to open buckets of donated Kentucky Fried Chicken. Together they set out coolers full of drinks and heated all the fixin’s. The smell of chicken laced the air like a greasy but delicious perfume.
The hikers dribbled in by twos and threes, rubbing aching calves and stretching, some trekking to the river to soak tired feet in the cold water and take sponge baths. Others grabbed a chicken leg and took off for home, eating while driving away. From here, the sun was a brilliant globe dropping below the western hills, throwing long shadows across the campsite.
There was a gold glow to the evening air when the kayakers roared up in Mike’s big SUV, the boats bouncing behind on his trailer. At the sight, the chief auxiliary lady rang a big bell and started dishing up food. Nell watched from the cab, unmoving.
“You should go eat with the searchers,” Claire said at her shoulder. Her mother had been appearing there often, not touching, not saying much, just being there. Outside, more cars and trucks pulled up as searchers returned to the nearest support site for dinner.
“Nah,” Nell said, leaning toward the curtain cracks. “I’m fine.”
“You should go eat with the searchers,” Claire said, an unaccustomed resolve in her voice. “Not for you. For them.”
Nell looked at her mother. Claire wasn’t usually the “buck up and smile” kind of woman, but Nell knew she was right, and by the glint in her eyes, she wasn’t taking no for an answer. Fingers like steel, she tugged Nell to her feet and pushed her out the RV door toward the rescue food van. “Go. Tell them you appreciate all the work and the food and the help. Sit with them. Eat with them. It’s only right.”
Nell tucked her hands into her jeans pockets and stopped in a shadow, watching. There were no showers at the put-in. No running water. For toilets, the hikers and boaters made do with shovels and trips into the forest, and since everyone stank of sweat and river, who cared? The smells of body odor and chicken and coffee filled the evening air. In the center of the circle, someone lit a bonfire of deadwood from the nearby woods, and the sting of smoke and kerosene added to the miasma. Someone else brought out a keg of beer to massed whoops and cheers and applause. The air chilled quickly now that the sun was down, and Nell wished she had pulled on a sweatshirt or sweater. A cool breeze played with the unprotected skin of her neck and face. An owl called, seven notes of rhythmic