Volcano Watch

CHAPTER TWO

On the way down the mountain Stobie took the lead and Eric roped the sled from behind, holding it in tension. Walter followed and I stayed close on his heels.

At the last ridge before the final descent, a sled strap came undone and we had to stop. While Stobie fussed with the litter, I went to look at the view eastward, way out in the distance.

I found what I was looking for: the mountain ranges and ridges that join to erect a giant loop around the high desert floor. The loop closes against the wall of the Sierra, embracing Mammoth Mountain and enclosing our hometown of Mammoth Lakes.

What it is, in fact, is a cleverly camouflaged volcano.

Seven hundred thousand years ago it blew the hell up, blowing so ferociously that it sank a fifteen-by-twenty mile block of the earth’s crust a mile and a quarter deep. The eruption left a hole so vast that people passing through today see desert and mountains and don’t recognize it as the bowl and rim of a volcanic caldera. Beneath the bowl, the magma chamber has been refilling. Six months ago, within the span of a day, four big quakes hit this area. With these abrupt shivers, the volcano awoke.

That was five months before Georgia disappeared. Her last five months were her best. She rose to the occasion. She’d downplayed the volcano through four mayoral terms, as it sporadically stirred. Don’t spook the tourists. She simply told us what we wanted to hear — which was that things would quiet down — and she was always right. But this time was different. This time, seismographs and tiltmeters said time to worry. To our utter amazement, Georgia called in the feds. If an eruption was coming, she was going to get us ready.

Stobie called “fixed” and I abandoned the view and rejoined the team.

I said, “About Georgia’s notes…”

“We keep that quiet,” Eric said.

I shrugged. That was a given; we don’t discuss case details with anyone not authorized. I glanced at Stobie, the only one of us not involved in criminalistics, but he was official Search, Rescue, and Recovery and I assumed they followed the same code.

Stobie held my look. “We don’t know jack about what she meant. Who says it has anything to do with anything?”

“This is what needs to be established,” Walter said.

“In the meantime,” Eric said, “we don’t need the whole town speculating.”

We resumed our descent.

Two switchbacks down, it began to snow. Snow like white cement stuck to the body bag until it looked like we were transporting a snowman. Snow woman. The wind picked up and drove wet slugs into my face. If I cried now, snow would hide the tears. I had no tears. Just cold misery and a hot poker in my gut.

I stared at the shape on the sled. What did you find, Georgia?

You mind me talking to you? I talked to my little brother Henry for years after he died. Nothing woo-woo, I don’t believe in ghosts, just in talk therapy. So explain yourself, will you? What did you just find out? And what in the name of all that is logical does no way out mean? Does it mean you couldn’t dodge the volcano issue this time? Couldn’t pat us on the head and say ‘there, there’? You just found out how serious the unrest is? You couldn’t see any way out of that predicament?

I can almost raise your voice Georgia, but, sad to say, I can’t put answers in your mouth. All I can do is read the message you left behind. I’m not talking about the notes, now. I’m talking about the bits of the earth embedded in your boot soles. I’ll track that soil and find out where you died, how you died. And why you wrote no way out.

So long, Georgia. I swear we’ll find whoever did this to you.