FINDING THE LOST, Jeanne Tody Beroza [reading tree txt] 📗

tremendous drive, more than JJ really. Once she had a scent she was totally focused on following it until she found her person. She tried to do this at a full run so Cristi wore leather gloves, hung on tight and held the little dynamo to a speed she could follow.

To stay in shape Cristi worked out and ran several times a week. Luckily she had been in track as a teenager and had never lost the habit of running cross-country. Sometimes when Blaze was dragging her over rough ground, and particularly when she was climbing rock outcroppings straight up and then running straight down, Cristi almost wished she worked with a dog that didn’t travel at high speed; a bloodhound would be good.

Once Cristi gave Blaze the gauze square to smell, she put her nose to the ground near the driver’s door, zigzagged across the hard surface of the gravel parking lot towards the center of the peninsula, and then just as she hit grass and pine needles at the lot’s edge, she took off like a bat out of hell. “She’s got it,” Cristi said and they were off. Good thing Charlie worked out regularly too or she and Blaze would be leaving him in the dust.

“You want to take a short water break when we get to the top of this ridge?” Charlie asked after a quarter mile of straight up the rocks trailing at Blaze’s cruising speed. Cristi nodded, unable to fill her lungs sufficiently to speak. “You know some dogs would have a problem finding a scent in these rocks. I’m amazed she not only finds the trail but can follow it at this speed.”

“Just the little bit of soil and pine needles is enough ground cover to hold a scent for her nose,” Cristi said pulling on Blaze’s line a little to slow her to a walk as they climbed a particularly steep spot. “I’m always impressed. It’s almost like she was made for the kind of terrain we have in the Black Hills.”

Charlie knew he was supposed to help Cristi watch Blaze as she worked. The flanker was another pair of eyes to pick up on subtle nuances of the dog’s behavior on a tough trail. In this kind of terrain, however, the most he could accomplish was to stay right at Cristi’s back. He was impressed she was athletic enough to maintain a constant speed behind Blaze.

Just as he was wondering if this straight uphill climb wasn’t tiring her out, she stumbled and fell to her hands and knees, toppling over against a large rock. Fearing she might let go of Blaze, he reached around her and grabbed the dog’s lead out of her hand. “Stop Blaze,” he commanded and pulled her to a halt as he knelt by Cristi’s side. Blaze obediently stopped and then seeing her mistress on the ground, ran back to check on her welfare.

“Are you okay?” Charlie asked as he knelt beside Cristi. Her eyes were closed. He wasn’t sure she was breathing. He was just about to lay her flat on the ground and check for breath and a pulse when she opened her eyes and turned herself around to sit on the ground with Blaze in her lap.

“Water would be good,” she said, rubbing her forehead as if it hurt. Charlie got the collapsible dish out of the pack and poured Blaze a little water. Then he got a bottle out to share with Cristi. “What happened just now?” he asked.

“I had a vision,” she murmured, still rubbing her forehead. “I hate it when that happens. You think if I was going to see this guy in my head, I could have done it in the parking lot before I was running behind Blaze over broken ground.”

“What’d you see?”

“Just his face, or I assume it’s the truck driver’s face since he’s the one I’m trailing so I have a connection to him. I just got a flash of his face, eyes closed, lying in water with greenish light playing over his skin. It looked like he was just below the surface in weeds or something that disrupted the light and also caused ripples in the water.”

“Blaze has been virtually dragging you over these ridges towards the lake’s edge. She’s got a strong trail. I’ve been down to the water on the other side of these rock ledges; the lake shore is lined with cattails right there.” Cristi nodded, her eyes unfocused as she tried to reconnect with the man.

“I can’t get him again.” She wiped the sweat off her brow with a cloth Charlie handed her. “Radio Jana and see if she’s found the passenger yet.”

“JJ’s is getting close to finding her man. Jana says she’s really pulling now, like she does at the end of a trail when she’s got a strong victim-scent. She says they’ve been tracking along the lakeshore. They’ve been slowed down because the breeze flowing down over the rocks towards the water’s edge keeps blowing the scent into the water. JJ’s been stopping often to check the water’s edge. They’re closing in on a stand of cattails.”

“All-right, let’s go then. Both of our guys must be in the water by those cattails since that’s where we’re headed, too. We don’t want them to beat us. Pack the water and catch us. Let’s go Blaze.”

The little dynamo didn’t need any encouragement. She leapt to her feet, put her nose to the ground and raced over the broken ridge of granite and then down the other side. Cristi had to either hold Blaze back going down the slope or possibly fall and break her own neck. Ok, she thought and she held tight to the line, next time a little less enthusiasm on my part.

She and Blaze reached the large stand of cattails coming at it down a steep granite slope, just as JJ dragged Jana along the last fifty feet of lakeshore towards the water weeds. The dogs converged within ten feet of each other. JJ walked back and forth along the lake’s edge, biting at the water, jumping in a foot and then immediately out again. Blaze walked into the water up to her belly and began searching among the cattails. “Ya think they might be in there?” Jana asked with a big smile on her face.

“Dogs think so, we gonna have to get wet to find these guys?” Cristi said. “Hey, Charlie, you got waders with you? I don’t really want to walk in there. Mike got any waders, Jana?”

Mike began tossing pebbles into the cattails. After the fourth one plunked with a splash, two men erupted straight into the air spraying water over both dogs. They would have gotten Jana and Cristi wet too if they hadn’t quickly backpedaled away from the lake’s edge. The men were outfitted in wetsuits and full scuba gear. “That water’s cold,” one of them said after wading through the cattails to reach the rocky shore. “You think it would have warmed up by late July.”

“Stockade Lake is never warm,” Cristi said. “I don’t know how kids can swim in it but some of them do. The beach over there always has a crowd in the summer.” They all turned and looked across the lake at the small sand beach with its group of fifteen to twenty people, sunning on the sand or playing in the water.

“Better for fishing,” Mike said as he handed both divers a towel he’d carried in his pack just for that purpose.

“Yeah, some of those fishies were nibbling at me,” Cristi’s victim said. “It made it hard to be still and not make waves. I wanted to reach out and grab a few.”

“Thanks for coming guys,” Jana told the two men, both members of a dive team that practiced and stood ready to assist when needed at Angostura lake, a much bigger body of water southwest of Hot Springs that boasted 36 miles of sandy beach, four campgrounds, year round fishing and tons of boating opportunities for tourists and locals alike.

“No problem,” one of the men said reaching down to scratch JJ and Blaze. “Your little pooches are pretty amazing. “We’ll have to remember to call you next time we have someone lost in our area.”

“That was pretty cool, Mike” Jana said as the two teams walked back towards their vehicles, the dogs now loose and running ahead of them, playing along the shore in the water. “I’ve worked dogs along water before but have never had volunteers to hide submerged for me.”

‘Yeah, thanks for setting that up Mike,” Cristi said. “I had no clue my guy was going to be in the water until right at the end. That was fun.”

“Hey, you guys want to get together for a beer later?” Charlie asked his fellow searchers as they loaded gear into Jana and Cristi’s vehicles.

“Maybe Friday night,” Jana said. “Dave doesn’t get home till late these days. I know he loves working in Deadwood but the drive is killing him, what with all the summer tourist traffic clogging the roads.”

“Yeah, I could get Mattie to come out too after she’s off at the hospital,” Mike said. “Friday night would be good. How about dinner and drinks, say at seven? We could come down your way this time Jana and meet at the Hitchrail Bar and Restaurant in Pringle. That’d be half way for Cristi too since she has to come up from Hot Springs.”

Cristi felt her skin warm when Charlie ran his hand gently down her upper arm and then laid it on top of her hand now holding Blaze on a short lead. “See you later kiddo,” he said. “Lunch time’s over, got to get back to work.” He climbed into the red Custer State Park pickup and drove off with a wave.

She could feel Jana’s eyes on her and looked over to catch her friend’s smile. She and Charlie had just lately become an item. Married and divorced she hadn’t planned on getting married ever again, and maybe she still wouldn’t, but she was enjoying her budding relationship with this interesting, caring and gentle man. Jana walked over as Mike drove away.

Wrapping her arms around her friend Janna said, “I’m glad you and Charlie have found each other. You make a good team and deserve to be happy. So, did you get a reading on your guy while you were trailing or was Blaze working alone this time?”

“I did connect with him, just a flash, nothing prolonged but I could see he was alive and in the water.”

“Good, keep yourself open when you get a vision. I know it’s uncomfortable and a little scary for you but your ability might really come in handy some day.”

“I know,” she answered. “I wish I could practice so I can control what I see. Today, if we were only going on the clue that he was in the water, he could have been in any lake or creek in the area. It might have taken us forever to zero in on his location and then he might have died.”

“It’s never that simple or that hard,” Jana said. “We always know something about a lost person. We know the area where he was last seen, or where his car was left, or at least we might know he was in Custer State Park versus at the Bismark Lake Recreation Area. That would narrow our search area a little. Every tip or clue helps us. We