Light Snow Falling, Dave Robinson [different ereaders .txt] 📗

Ben Darnell down at the FBO, his plane was in excellent condition. He has a teenage girl with him, Alex McKenna, who is visiting with Cappy and Bess for a few days and was just riding along. The logging camp is located here,” Lieutenant Scott pointed to a dot on the map. “As far as we know, he flew straight there and was on his way straight home. All kinds of things are possible, but we don’t conjecture. There are lots of lakes where he could have set down. Anyone have any questions at this point?”
After a momentary silence someone spoke up from the back of the room, “What kind of shape was his emergency kit in?”
Lieutenant Scott immediately deferred the question to Ben Darnell.
Ben stood to his feet, “He was a stickler for safety,” he began “He didn’t cut corners when it came to safety or survival. Cappy kept his emergency kit up-to-date and was always buying something to put in it.”
“Any other questions?” Scott asked.
“Flight assignments?” Trooper Gates prompted.
For the next fifteen minutes each pilot was assigned two observers and a search area. Gates was to fly directly to and from the logging camp. It would take them longer than it had taken Cappy because they were flying much lower and a whole lot slower.
“According to the National Weather Service,” Lieutenant Scott drew their attention once more, “We can expect this snow to continue until around 10 AM this morning. After that we should get a short window of clear weather. Then the forecast calls for more snow and overcast. The weather just isn’t working with us, folks.”

Alex Makenna woke up all snug and warm down inside her sleeping bag. She pulled the bag down and poked her head out. Her breath clouded the air and her nose was instantly cold. She retreated back inside her sleeping bag for a few minutes until she heard Cappy trying to turn over.
Poking her head out again she asked, “How’re you feeling this morning?”
Alex took a look at Cappy. Both of his eyes were black and blue, like he’d been in a fight and lost. There was swelling and bruising on his forehead, but he wasn’t bleeding.
“Mmmm,” he groaned quietly. “About the same as yesterday, only worse. But at least I did get some sleep last night. How about you?”
“Actually slept pretty good,” she reported, “Could have been worse without this tent or sleeping bags.”
“I try to buy good stuff,” he said. “Can’t see scrimping when it comes to survival gear, your life may depend on it, you know.”
Alex chuckled at the comment. It seems as though their lives were depending on Cappy’s survival gear.
“How much snow have we got out there?” Cappy asked.
Alex slid open the zipper and pushed the tent flap aside. “Oh my gosh, about a foot, it looks like,” Alex exclaimed
“We need to get a fire going so we can get warm, dried out and maybe boil some water for tea. We’ve still got that smoked fish, and I know there’s food in the survival kit. At least for a few days we’re not going to get hungry,” he said with a positive note in his voice.
Alex pulled the zipper down on her sleeping bag and grabbed her jeans. She slid into them. They were still damp and nearly frozen from yesterday. She pulled on the sweat socks she had found and then laced up her hiking boots. She pulled on the extra sweatshirt then her heavy coat.
“Here’s what we need to do,” Cappy tried not to sound bossy. There’s a folding shovel in the emergency kit, use it to shovel out an area to build a fire. Somewhere in the emergency kit are some fire starting pellets I made.”
“You made?” Alex said.
“Yep,” Cappy replied, “take an egg carton, and stuff the egg compartments full of dryer lint. Melt some candle wax and pour it over the whole thing. When you cut them apart, you have a really effective fire starter. You’ll see.”
Alex shook her head in amazement, “I should introduce you to my Papa Dave sometime, you two would get along great.”
Alex stood up as much as she could and stepped outside. The snow was still falling, but not as heavy as last night. The flakes were smaller, but it seemed colder to her. She walked over to the emergency kit and found the folding shovel. In just a few minutes she had a nice fire pit dug in the snow. Grateful that she had covered the firewood with a tarp, she dug it out from under the tarp and made a little pile of wood.
The fire starter pellets were in a plastic baggie along with a funny looking tool, some cotton balls and a jar of Vaseline. “I’ll have to ask Cappy about those later,” she said to herself. There were several books of matches and some boxes of kitchen matches. Alex chose one of the boxes of kitchen matches.
Placing the egg-carton fire starter under the pile of kindling, she touched a match to it. It flamed up immediately and burned brightly. The twigs began snapping and crackling and Alex added more firewood. Her family burned wood at home, so she knew how to build a fire. Before long a respectable fire was bringing warmth and cheer to the wilderness campsite.
“Give me a hand here, will you Alex,” Cappy called out.
Alex went back in the tent and helped Cappy outside, then to his feet.
“Can you see anything yet?” she asked.
Cappy rubbed his eyes and blinked them several times, “I can see some light, maybe a little better than yesterday, but still can’t make out details.”
“And the ankle,” Alex said?
“It’s hard to tell,” Cappy said, “After while maybe we can re-wrap it and see what it looks like. Hurts like everything, though.”
“Come on over here,” she said, “I cleaned off a spot by the fire for you and you can sit on the emergency box.”
“We need to get a pot of water boiling so we can make some tea,” Cappy said. “There should be a pot, or maybe even a coffee pot in this box.” He stood on one foot while Alex dug inside.
She found the coffee pot and a cooking pot as well. “I’ll go get some water,” she said.
“Where’s that smoked fish?” Cappy said. “I could use a piece of that right now.”
Alex handed him a piece of the fish. “We’ve still got some brownies, too, don’t forget,” she reminded him.
“I’m not sure it’s a good idea to get drinking water out of the lake,” Cappy suggested. “Have you seen a creek that runs into the lake anywhere?”
“There’s a creek over that way,” she pointed. Then remembering that Cappy couldn’t see where she was pointing, she said, “Off to the south, I think it is. Looks like a hundred yards or so.”
“Maybe you should go over there and get your water. Drinking out of the lake is probably ok, but I’d feel better if we got our water from a spring or at least a creek that’s running with glacier water,” Cappy warned.
“I’ll go check it out,” Alex said.
After getting Cappy settled and adding some pieces of wood to the fire, Alex looked for a way to get to the creek. She started down to the lake shore, but then saw a trail taking off in the direction of the creek. It looked like a game trail, like the elk or deer might use back in Oregon. Alex wondered if there were elk or deer around here. She’d gone hunting with her Daddy several times and he’d shown her lots of wildlife. Alex wished he were here with her now. Her eyes welled up and she wiped them dry.
For several minutes, Alex crunched along on the snow; the game trail led her almost in a straight line toward the creek. Then it went up a bank and toward a flat open spot. Coming out into the clearing, Alex stopped and stared. She could not believe her eyes!


Chapter Seven

“The Discovery”


At 9:30 AM, the pilots and observers made their way down to the seaplane base. All of the planes flying in today’s search were equipped with floats. A couple had amphibious floats which enabled them to land on either water or land. Trooper Gates had two fellow troopers riding with him, Captain Dan Michaels had flown in from Seward and Trooper Andy Peerman who was on his day off and had volunteered for the search.
Lieutenant Landon Scott would be staying back at the barracks. His job was to monitor the radios and coordinate the search effort.
The snow had nearly stopped and the cloud formation was breaking up. Off to the north and west, there were patches of blue sky. “Let’s load up,” Brogan Gates said to his companions.
Gates’ assigned airplane was a Cessna 206. It was a single-engine, six passenger airplane. Gates liked it because it was stable, powerful and reliable. It would carry heavy loads and land in tight spots. When winter came, the floats were exchanged for skis.
Captain Michaels climbed in the front right, and Andy Peerman slid into the left seat behind Trooper Gates. Brogan had performed his pre-flight checks earlier and with a quick re-check of the fuel tanks, he lit the fires. The 300 horsepower engine started with little effort and eagerly revved up. Pulling back on the throttle, Brogan nodded to the attendant who released the rope tying the float to the dock. Giving the float a shove with his foot, the attendant stepped back as the Cessna eased out into the taxiway.
Other planes were taking their place in line as Ben Darnell acted as an air traffic controller from his office at the FBO.
Trooper Gates patiently waited his turn behind one of the Civil Air Patrol planes as they each waited for the one ahead to be airborne. Finally it was Brogan’s turn and he eased the throttle ahead. The Cessna moved smoothly forward and turned into the wind. Brogan continued to push the throttle forward and the bird gathered speed. Up ‘on the step’ and then water was dripping off the floats and they were airborne. Brogan banked toward the Rude River, several miles up Orca Inlet toward Nelson Bay.
“We’ll try to stay under the overcast,” Brogan announced to his passengers, “unless the visibility drops and it’s no longer safe.” Both men nodded in acknowledgement. “Then we’ll climb up on top of the weather and fly home.”

Alex Makenna could not believe her eyes. There before her in the clearing stood a cabin! She blinked and shook her head to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. Alex glanced around to see if anyone else was there. Convinced that she wasn’t hallucinating, she moved closer. Her feet made a crunch, crunch, crunch sound on the crisp, frozen snow. Finally she was standing at the front door. Alex half expected someone to burst out of the door and yell “Boo!” or some other bizarre thing. There was a small window to the side of