The Blue Bottle Club (37 page)

PASSAGE TO THE TUNDRA

November 28, 1994

Y
ou want to go
where?"
Ron Willard, station manager of WLOS, kept his voice low, but his face was beginning to turn a bright shade of crimson.

"Take it easy, Ron," Brendan urged. "You'll block your arteries."

"I'll have a full-blown coronary if Chedway gets word that I authorized a trip to—where is it? Alaska?"

"Minnesota." Brendan tried to maintain a semblance of calm. Marcus Chedway, owner of the station, was a notorious tightwad. True, when he had purchased the station it was deeply in debt and now operated in the black, but everybody complained about his penny-pinching.

"Have you forgotten that this is a
local
station?" Ron shook his head. "Not this. No way."

"That's your final word?"

"Final. Absolutely. Kaput." He raised his head and glared at her. "I warned you not to run over budget on this story. Have you seen your expense account totals lately?" When Brendan didn't answer, he went on. "I didn't think so."

"But honest, Ron, this is going to be a wonderful story. It's got a great local angle, and—"

"I'm sure." He didn't sound sure, and Brendan winced inwardly.

"Ron, please—"

He held up a forefinger and shook it in her face. "Nope. Don't try that abandoned-puppy look on me, either. It won't work. I've known you too long."

"All right." Brendan sighed. He was right, and she knew it. Chedway would have both their heads if he found out the station was paying for her to traipse off to Minnesota on a story that might or might not pay for itself in the long run. But she had to go. As hard as she might try to still the voices in her head, she kept hearing echoes that urged her on:
Take the risk. Trust. Don't give your future to the past. Live without regret.

Brendan wasn't sure what kind of future she was seeking, but she was absolutely certain what she
didn't
want that future to be: a never-ending loop of sameness, reporting meaningless stories that faded into oblivion as soon as the camera panned away. Although the thought left her distinctly uncomfortable, she found herself identifying with Ellie James Tucker, longing for her life to count for something, to have some significance beyond herself. She couldn't be a social worker, or a teacher; she did not, in fact, have any clear picture of what form that significance might take. But something deep inside her—in her heart, in her soul—she had responded to Catherine Star's advice to Ellie:
Change happens one life at a time.

Suddenly Brendan realized that Ron was staring at her, waiting for something. "What?" she snapped.

"I was just wondering if you were going to stand here in my office day-dreaming all day."

"Sorry, Ron. I was just thinking." In a flash of insight, Brendan knew what she had to do. "I've got some vacation time coming, haven't I?"

Ron nodded apprehensively. "Yes, but—"

"Then I want to take it. Now. Today."

"What part of
no
don't you understand, Brendan? As of this moment your expense account on this story is closed."

"I'll take care of the expenses myself. Just approve the vacation. Three days, maybe four. I'll be back before you know it."

"You can't just go flitting off to the tundra on a moment's notice. Didn't you watch the weather channel this morning? The whole Midwest got a snow dump—about a hundred feet, I think—over the Thanksgiving weekend."

"Did you ever hear of snowplows? Unlike our nearsighted city fathers, Minnesota is prepared for that kind of weather. I'll survive."

Ron sighed and waved a hand. "I give up. Go. Make your trek into the arctic wilds. But don't call me if you get snowbound until the spring thaw." Brendan grinned at him and made for the door, then stopped and turned. "Oh, one more thing."

"What now?"

"I'll take a Handycam with me, if you don't mind. I might need it."

"Sure. Whatever." Ron shook his head. "Check it out from the supply guys—and don't drop it in a snowbank."

"It's already in my car." At the sight of Ron's upraised eyebrows, Brendan shrugged. "I knew you'd give in, one way or another."

"Get out of here. And be careful."

"If Chedway notices my absence, tell him I'm on vacation."

"Right," Ron said. "Just a little igloo holiday. R and R in a dogsled."

November 29, 1994

By the time Brendan got to the rental car counter at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, she had begun to wonder if Ron might have been right about the foolishness of this trip. Her fifty-minute layover in Cincinnati had stretched into three hours, and now, at dusk in the Twin Cities, it was snowing again, blowing icy pellets into her face as she listened to the Avis manager's instructions for the third time.

"Take 494 west to 169," he repeated, pointing at the map. "Puts you right into Mankato."

"Is 169 a main highway?"

"Trunk highway," he said. Brendan didn't know what that meant, but didn't ask for fear of looking stupid. "'Bout as main as you get, going that way."

Brendan squinted at the yellow lines on the map and felt a knot of apprehension form in her throat. She had driven in snow plenty of times, but in North Carolina she had her 4Runner, and she generally knew where she was going. This little compact she had rented didn't even have snow tires, much less the security of four-wheel drive.

"You sure I'll be all right in this car?"

"Plow's been through. Should be pretty clear." He peered into her face. "Not from around here, are you?"

Brendan grimaced. "North Carolina. How'd you guess?"

"Accent." He opened the door for her and smiled. "Not much of a snow, really. Usually get a big clipper this time of year. Take it easy, now."

"I will." She started the car and buckled her seat belt. "Thanks."

"You betcha. No problem."

Brendan eased out of the snow-packed parking lot, testing her brakes. The back end skidded a little, but by the time she got off the airport road onto 494, the road seemed clear and fairly dry. Still, she kept to the right lane, taking it slow while eighteen-wheelers whizzed past her at a dizzying pace.

When she reached the turnoff to 169, however, conditions worsened. She nearly missed the turn because the road sign was packed with snow and discovered almost immediately that 169 wasn't nearly as well-traveled—or as well-plowed—as the interstate loop around Minneapolis. For over an hour she gripped the wheel in a white-knuckled panic as snow clogged the wipers and piled up on the hood of the car. Darkness had closed in, and she could see only a foot or two beyond her headlights.

Then, out of the woods to her right, a shadowy form dashed onto the highway. Brendan gasped and hit the brakes as a deer—a big buck with a huge rack of antlers—leaped across the road, crashed one shoulder into her fender, and went sliding off on the other side. She had no time to see what happened to the animal. The little compact skidded on a patch of ice and made two complete revolutions before thudding to a stop with both right tires in the ditch.

For a minute or two, Brendan simply sat there, shaking. Her heart pounded painfully in her chest, and her hands, still gripping the wheel, trembled uncontrollably. When the initial shock wore off, she made a quick inventory. No broken bones, no lacerations. Just a throbbing ache across her shoulders from muscle tension and the beginnings of a migraine.

She got out of the car and picked her way to the edge of the highway. The compact leaned precariously into the ditch, and both the front and rear wheels were lodged in a snowdrift up to the axles. If she had been in her 4Runner, she probably could have driven out, but without four-wheel drive, there was no hope.

Brendan looked around and made a quick assessment of her situation. She could see no lights anywhere—-just the eerie blue glow of snow across the fields, interrupted by dark patches of woods.

Unexpected tears rose up to blind her, and she suddenly felt overwhelmed with loneliness. She wasn't accustomed to such a vast, open landscape unbroken by the familiar mountains of the Blue Ridge. It made her feel small and insignificant and totally isolated.

What was she supposed to do now? She had no way of getting the car out of the ditch, and the highway was completely deserted. There was no place within sight where she could walk to for help, and she could freeze to death before anyone found her. She needed a phone.

Of course! How stupid could she be? She never went anywhere without her cell phone!

Shivering, Brendan dashed back to the car, slid in behind the wheel, and cranked the engine to get some heat. When warm air began to course through the vents, she removed her gloves and fumbled in her big leather bag. Her hand closed over the phone, and she breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn't exactly sure where she was, but she did know the highway number, and a few miles back she had passed an enormous billboard bearing a huge Jolly Green Giant and the words, "Welcome to Le Sueur"—enough information, surely, to get help coming in the right direction. She flipped open the phone, dialed 911, pressed SEND, and waited.

Nothing happened.

Brendan jerked the cell phone away from her ear and peered at the display. The dim green message read: LOW BAT.

Murphy's Law,
Brendan thought grimly.
If anything can go wrong, it will.

Well, there was nothing to do but wait. Wait and hope . . . and maybe even pray

Brendan awoke to a pounding in her head. She peered groggily through the windshield, trying to get her bearings. She felt strangely disconnected from her body, as if she had been drugged. She was chilled to the bone, and her stomach lurched uneasily.

The pounding continued.

After what seemed like an eternity, Brendan realized that the pounding was coming not from her head, but from
beside
her head. Then she became aware of lights behind her and a voice shouting and turned to see a dark form the size of a bear beating on the window with a huge fist.

She rolled down the window and found herself face-to-face with a burly man in a brown hunting cap, with flaps pulled down over his ears.

"Trouble?" he asked, as if a car in the ditch might be there by choice.

"I—I—yes," Brendan stammered.

"Stuck here long?"

"I—I don't know."

The massive hand opened the car door and took Brendan by the elbow. "Get on up in the cab where it's warm," the man said, pointing behind him. "We'll tow her out."

Numbly, Brendan followed him back to an enormous green tractor with an enclosed cab and the words "John Deere" painted on the side. With some difficulty she clambered up into the cab.

A young boy, not more than fifteen, sat behind the wheel. The man looked up at her from the ground. "You okay?"

"I think so."

"Name's Sven Hanson," the man said. "That's my boy, Lars."

Lars nodded and pulled at the brim of his baseball cap but said nothing.

"Hand down that chain."

Lars reached behind the seat, then leaned over Brendan and dropped a thick length of chain with S hooks on both ends at his father's feet.

"Pull her up in front."

The tractor roared to life, and Brendan held on while Lars steered the lumbering machine to the side of the road in front of her disabled rental car. Within minutes, the car was out of the ditch with all four tires on the icy pavement.

"Thanks," she said when Sven returned. "What do I owe you?" She started to get out of the tractor, but he shook his head.

"Lars, go steer. We got to pull her in."

Lars jumped down and went to the car while Sven took his place at the tractor controls. "Not from around here, are you?" he asked as he ground the gears and started off.

"No," Brendan sighed. "Why?"

"Car's outta gas. Ran it to keep warm, did you?"

"It was better than freezing to death."

"Maybe. Dying by gas isn't much better." He turned toward her in the dim light. "Tailpipe was clogged full of snow. Carbon monoxide."

Brendan stared at him. No wonder she felt drugged and sick to her stomach. "You mean—?"