Page 40 of At Midnight Comes the Cry
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 12
Paul met them at the landing pier at Long Lake, where they had seen the reverend off on her flight back to civilization. If it hadn’t been for the fact Flynn was out there in the wilderness with a bunch of freaking Confederacy cosplayers, Hadley would have been on the plane with her.
“So.” Paul joined them at the splintery gray picnic table. “Kicked out of Newcomb. That’s gotta be a first.”
“We were asked to leave the inn, not the town.” The chief sounded as if he were chewing on something nasty.
“And the lodge,” Hadley corrected. “She called the lodge to warn them about us, too.”
Paul sat on the table next to the chief and opened his thermos. Hadley and Van Alstyne had already gotten their coffee from the general store—apparently their money was still good in Long Lake. Although she wouldn’t count on that lasting. “So, was the warning from some resident who thinks you’re part of the militia? Or from someone involved with the militia, who knows you’re not?”
“That,” the chief tipped back the rest of his coffee, “is the fifty-thousand-dollar question.” He tossed his go-cup into a nearby trash barrel. “We’re going to need to be extra cautious hiking up there today.”
Paul snorted. “I was planning on it.Youcan at least pass for a sympathizer, maybe with Hadley here as your child bride.”
“Hey!”
“No offense. It’s just they’re going to take one look at the color of my skin and know I’m not there to sign up for the Aryan Nation.”
The chief laughed. “That’s the truth.” He eased off the table. “Okay, let’s head out. The sooner we reach that truck, the sooner we know our next step.”
The ranger took his official vehicle, while Hadley and the chief followed behind in Van Alstyne’s pickup. The way into the wilderness was painfully slow. They ran out of paved road all too soon, continuing onto something more like a trail; barely wide enough for their vehicles, rutted, rocky, and full of holes that the chief’s truck would drop into and judder out of, shaking Hadley’s spleen and turning her stomach upside down. She experimented with closing her eyes, fixing her gaze on the horizon, such as it was, and finally had to unroll the window and stick her head out like a dog.
“You need me to stop, Knox?”
“Not yet.” She couldn’t believe she was nauseous two days in a row. “I swear, I don’t get motion sickness. I didn’t even barf when I was pregnant.”
The chief looked at her, alarmed.
Despite feeling queasy, she laughed. “Unless God Himself reached down and undid my tubal ligation, I’m okay.”
“Jesus. I mean, sorry. Not meaning to be inappropriate.”
“As you keep reminding me, you’re not my boss anymore.” They lurched again and then jolted to a stop.
“Paul’s getting out. I’d better see what’s up.”
She stumbled out of the truck cab a beat behind the chief, and leaned gratefully against the non-moving, non-bouncing hood. She breathed deep, steadying herself. The air was amazing up here, cold and sweet like well water. Back home in California, people would have spent big bucks to suck it down at an oxygen bar. She laughed.
“You must be feeling better.” Paul came around the tail of his truck.
“Yeah, thanks. Why did we stop?”
“This is as far as we’re going to drive. We can still turn our rides around here, so we’re going to do that and then strike out on foot.”
She looked at where the forest was crowding in against the trail and thought,Turn around?What she said was “I thought we were going to drive to where we saw the truck?”
“We’re on a different road. We’re going to cut across to reach our target location. It’s not like Pierre to drive into trouble, but just in case, we don’t want to be trapped there as well.”
She waved at the so-called road they were completely blocking. “What if someone wants to drive past us?”
“The only vehicles allowed here belong to the Department of Environmental Conservation.” He tapped his black shoulder patch with its red lettering and green pine.
She got to wait outside while the men performed fifty-seven-point turns and got the trucks aimed downhill. The chief checked her backpack again, despite giving it a go-over before they had left Millers Kill. “Dried food, pot, a change of clothes, matches, headlamp, stove, where’s your water?” She shoved the water bottle into a side pocket. “Your sit pad and your cold-weather sleeping pad.” He cinched the straps holding it to the bottom of her pack. “Good to go.”
Van Alstyne’s pack was considerably larger, with a tent and two sleeping bags, while Paul emerged wearing a knapsack that looked just about big enough for a picnic outing. He slung a rifle over his shoulder. “Either of you carrying?”
She shook her head. The chief nodded.
