Schroeder was on the news. I couldn’t watch it because it brought too many flashbacks. Schroeder told them in no uncertain terms that they would not get an interview with me no matter what. I think it’s because Schroeder is worried about how much I might say but he also knows my aversion to television reporters.”
“You know you’re just digging yourself in deeper and deeper.”
We were headed up the first little valley, still following Peter and Ally’s tracks but only enough to verify their passage. I was more interested in what had happened to Alisondra after she left Peter and headed back. I was hiking at a good steady pace because I knew time was ticking away. The trail wasn’t exactly a valley, but more of an area where two hills met and resulted in a little wash. When it rained the wash would turn into a small creek but now, even with the snow on the mountains quickly melting, the wash was dry.
“If you really want to find out, drop back a bit and talk to Strict.”
“I couldn’t do that. Everybody within range would listen in.”
“You can go to another frequency, but really, I’m telling you you’re probably the only one who doesn’t know. Maybe Peter will feel better about me carrying this rifle. Or maybe he’ll worry more. Oh hell.” I stopped, turned around and confronted Landon with the truth. “Okay, here’s how it was, I went to Del Sol Elementary School to talk to a third grade class about my job, how to prevent getting lost, you know the drill. I hear shots. There’s a gunman walking through the school taking pot shots at people. I was the only one armed. I had to shoot him…Landon I had to. Everybody else was locked in classrooms or running down the hall in fear. There were two gunmen and I killed one and wounded the other. He’s the one we’ve got to catch. But I can’t fit all the pieces together. And I can’t put it down. I just relive it and think about it and try and piece it together but I can’t make sense of it. I try but I don’t have enough pieces yet. Now let me hike before I get all tied up in knots and become useless.” I kicked a rock, turned around and trudged off down the trail. Landon stood still letting this new information sink in. He knew to give me some distance. He followed silently but I knew what was coming and I didn’t want to hear it. I stopped to clear the tears from my eyes. No use trudging off if I couldn’t see, I’d only lose the trail. Even if I was just verifying their tracks I still needed to see them.
“And this teacher thinks the gunmen were after her? An ‘activist’? That’s an odd word.”
“She was trying to think of a word her foreign friend would understand. That’s just what she came up with.”
“Activists have an agenda. An issue they address. What’s this guy against?”
“That’s just it, Landon, I don’t know.” But I was thankful he wasn’t trying to justify my actions like I had been expecting him to. “I keep thinking, though, that if she knows he’s an activist, maybe she knows who he is. And if she does, why would she protect him? It seems like she’d be running to the police and reporting him but that hasn’t happened.”
“You said there were two gunmen. Maybe she’s afraid of a radical militant organization.”
“This is Joshua Hills. What kind of organizations do we have here?”
I climbed up a few rocks and located Ally’s footprints on the other side. I was glad hikers preferred following sandy washes. It made my job a lot easier. I expected it to get tougher at the saddle.
“Cassidy, you know it had to be done, right?” Oh boy, here it comes. Instantly my walls went up.
“My head knows. It’s the rest of me I’m having trouble with. Just because something has to be done doesn’t make it right.”
“Look at the alternatives. I know it goes against your principles to shoot someone. If you hadn’t shot him then what would have happened? You couldn’t fight the guy, you’d have been beaten until he shot you or you shot him. You couldn’t wait for help. Help could have been too long coming.” My pace picked up as the thoughts flailed around in my head.
“I don’t want to hear it. I’ve heard it several times a day since this happened. I go over and over it but I still can’t justify it to my heart. I just need to forgive myself and maybe that will be come sooner if we can just get this guy who got away and I can make sense of the whole situation. Now find a different subject to talk about.”
“Cookies. Did you bring any cookies?” he asked.
“Depends, did you bring anything to trade?”
“You’re kidding.”
“Victor brings cinnamon rolls.”
Of course Victor had never actually offered me a cinnamon roll. He just unknowingly taunted me with them. Landon’s face fell.
“Oh, all right, I only brought a few, because I expected this to be a short search, but I’ll split them with you.”
“Chocolate chip? With nuts?”
“Chocolate chip, no nuts.”
“This is Mickey Mouse tracking,” he said looking at the ground. “Even I could do this.”
“We’ll have our work cut out for us after we reach the saddle. It’ll be more woodland tracking and it’ll only be one person. I’m not even really tracking at this point. Just trying to get to the saddle in time to leave us some real tracking time. She shouldn’t be far from the saddle though. We can’t be two miles from the campground. She should have been able to find her way back from the saddle. It seems impossible to get lost on a hike like this. Judging from the hints in the meadow she probably got distracted and followed her curiosity away from the campground instead of returning.”
The day was warm and pleasant. We watched ahead for trees and shady spots then eyed the saddle ahead and kept walking. As we neared the saddle I paid closer attention to the tracks. A mountain pass could be a broad area and one tree could be hard to spot so I followed the tracks. When we stood before the corkscrewed tree Landon and I glanced at each other. My look said, okay, now the real work begins. His look said, didn’t you say you had cookies? I rolled my eyes then took off my pack and fished around inside until I found a Ziploc bag of cookies. I handed him four. Then I took out trail mix to snack on while tracking. I put on my pack, shifted it around, fastened the hip belt, and shouldered the rifle. The rifle was packing surprisingly well. As I put it back on I realized I hadn’t noticed taking it off. It fit me and moved with me as though I had always owned it.
Now it was time for some real tracking. We had to find Alisondra today. I was determined. Examining the tracks around the corkscrewed tree, I located Peter’s tracks standing next to it, then discovered Alisondra’s tracks several yards away where she had stood to take the picture. I followed her footsteps carefully as she hiked with Peter over the saddle. They stopped and talked once about halfway down the hill, their footprints milling about casually. She followed him to the bottom of the hill before turning back. However, when she returned to camp she did not want to climb to the top of the saddle again so she circled the hill hoping to see some new sights and find her way back to Elk Meadows from the other side. If she thought the hill would lead back around to the first little valley she was mistaken. It didn’t lead her that way at all. At first she just hiked along with a spring in her step, seemingly enjoying the day. When the hill began curving in an obviously
