“But when we were talking about common ground, I thought I could trust everyone,” Ginger said. “Things seemed to make so much sense. Now, as we deal with this one, I’m seeing belligerence. My feeling of trust is slipping away.”
“That’s because . . .” Dave blurted, before seeing Jack’s hand cutting him off.
“Give me a second,” Jack said. “That took nerve to offer that kind of honesty.” He turned to the woman. “Understood. What can we do to help?”
“I’m not pretending . . . I mean . . . Oh, just give me a chance to finish my thoughts before somebody trashes ’em.”
“I promise, I’ll do what I can to give you that.” He turned to the young environmentalist. “Do you?”
Sheepishly, he nodded.
Jack looked around the table at the others, waiting for nods of agreement. He turned to the young man. “Do you have something to say?”
“I’ll wait. Let’s hear her first.”
—·—
Jack drove back to the park, his mind on the meeting. The tough problems. The last issues, always the hard ones.
Beginning to wind down, the flow of adrenaline stopped, soon would come numbness, then being mentally fried.
He turned the white, green-striped pickup marked Park Ranger onto the scenic road into the park. After driving miles of an oft-beaten path, he turned right, onto a side-canyon road that ended behind headquarters.
He pulled to a stop, looked back, gently pushed the accelerator, and backed the pickup into a parking space.
The back door of the building burst open. Johnny Reger darted out and jogged toward the pickup, a thin stack of papers in hand. He came around to the driver’s side.
Jack rolled down the window.
“Boss, we’ve got weird stuff going on. You’re gonna freak.”
“Tell me.”
“That burning pickup that started the fire . . . you won’t believe it.”
“Just tell me, Johnny.”
“No license plates, no vehicle identification number. The plates were removed, the VIN was ground off. And Luiz thinks it’s an old government pickup. Looks like it had markings like ours, but melted off. The park doesn’t have one that old, and probably hasn’t had anything that model year for over a decade, maybe longer.”
“That’s odd. Who’d want to burn an old government pickup?”
“Luiz is still investigating, treating it as a crime scene. All he’s found is a set of tracks out on the desert, made back to the road, and a spot where they were probably hiding when we arrived to put out the fire.”
Jack sensed irritation. “What’s wrong?”
“The pickup’s got everyone spooked, as if folks are gonna start torching off their Caddys just for fun of it.”
“Does Luiz think there’s reason to believe this is the beginning of something?”
“Maybe someone playing some sort of weird game but we don’t know what that game is.”
“Why are you so excited?”
“Cause I’m pissed. The superintendent ordered me down here to update the plan for the fire. Torching that rare plant didn’t help, but after I did the update he said he wouldn’t sign till you’ve looked at it.”
“Me?” Jack let out a sigh. “That’s your job now.”
“I know. I told him you’d say that, but he said you’d be back soon. He wants you to look at it.”
“Let me see your plan.”
Johnny handed over the papers.
Jack flipped past the cover page of signatures—all there except the superintendent’s—and past pages of narrative, stopping at a map. He studied the topography.
Jack rubbed his eyes and tried to get his brain to click back into gear. “Fire behavior?”
“Projections are in the back. They look good.”
Jack thumbed through the back of the proposal.
“You good with it?”
Jack gave him a confused look.
“I need you to say that it’s a good plan, that you still support it.”
“Oh, yeah. Let’s go to my office. I’ll run some numbers.”
“Why?”
“See what I come up with for fire behavior and spread.”
Johnny’s brow furrowed. “You don’t trust mine?”
“I do, but that’s not the point. Joe wants you to have me look at it. If you want to give him what he wants, I should run the numbers. It’s a thing called credibility.”
Johnny pulled off his cap and scratched his head. “You saying I’m not credible?”
“No. With me, you’re very credible. With Joe, I have no idea. But I need you seen as credible. You need to go in there, show Joe you took him seriously, that we came up with similar results.”
Johnny frowned and stepped out of the way. Jack rubbed his eyes and climbed out of the pickup. Johnny followed him up the stairs and down the hall to his office.
Pouring over maps, Jack quickly determined fuel types and calculated slopes. “Weather forecast,” he said. Johnny sorted through the papers and extracted it. Jack picked it apart, finding hours that would give the most extreme fire behavior. He opened the forecasting software, input values for fuel, weather and topography, and let the model give him outputs.
Johnny peered over his shoulder at the monitor. “Your numbers are more extreme than mine.” He glanced between the screen and numbers in his own projection. “I see the difference. Fine fuels. Why’d you use that number for one hour fuels?”
“I dropped fine fuel moisture a couple of points to give worst case.”
“Makes sense, but your outputs, do they torpedo us?”
“Don’t think so. Spread and intensity look manageable.”
Johnny stood up and let out sigh. “So, supportive?”
“You’re banking on the fire moving north and west. The bigger it gets, the more trouble you’ll have catching it, if you need to. Could give you trouble if it whips around the line.”
“It’s already hit the canyon rim to the northeast.”
“Do it,” Jack said. He signed on a margin of the cover page.
Johnny rushed the door. “Let’s go see Joe.” He stopped. “You coming?”
“Nope, it’s your fire.”
Chapter 10
Late spring in Piedras Coloradas National Park. Days growing longer, warmth and seasonal rains bringing green to the meadows. Buds, then leaves to the trees and shrubs, and now, flowers making their appearance.
Jack Chastain knelt at the wildflowers at his feet—desert