I ran out of woods. The hi-line climbed the mountains and disappeared higher than we could ride, forcing us to descend into the valleys. Homes and businesses began to take over the rural landscape. Highways crept back into our way and traffic whizzed past us with a growl of engines and hurricane force winds.
Highways spread out before me and barred my way across the six cement lanes with high fences and traffic so fast that I could barely see the kinds of cars they were. I couldn’t ride on the shoulder, no animals, pedestrians, bicyclers or hitchhiking were allowed. There was no way I could sneak across and if even one driver saw me, I was sure it would be reported, or uploaded onto UTube. I’d be cornered in no time with nowhere to run. There was no way I would leave Ballycor and try to make it on my own.
I wished there was a way to get out of the state of New York by staying completely in the woods. I had a map, but it only showed the major roads and none of the logging, snowmobile or state trail system. I knew of the Appalachian trail, but I also knew that there were sections of it that were completely impassable for horses. I wouldn’t risk a broken leg on Ballycor, not even if it meant I could escape by leaving him behind.
I knew that dithering on the side of the road was also dangerous, so I slid off and led Bally to the lowest part of the shoulder. Luckily, it was much lower than the road and unless someone stopped along the same stretch as me, I was invisible to traffic. Except maybe an eighteen-wheeler as they sat much higher.
The sudden rush of passing cars and trucks wasn’t a constant sound but frequent enough to make me both nervous and used to it. I walked slowly, carefully on the angled slope of grass and gravel. Careful so that I didn’t slip and twist an ankle.
My boots were showing their wear, I had no idea how old they were. They could have been waiting for decades in that trunk room although they didn’t look out of style. It wouldn’t be long before I would have to find another pair.
Highways led to towns and cities. Highways usually were where malls were built so access on and off was easier. The only obstacle I could see was finding a place to tie Ballycor where he couldn’t be seen and whether the store clerks would take one of the credit cards from me that I had borrowed from the RV. At home, no one would have cared if I had used one of Mom’s. If she had one. She didn’t have a bank account, cell phone or a credit card. Hadn’t used Social Services to make life easier for us. She was afraid that my father could find us through the system that way.
I looked down at my shoes and swallowed the lump in my throat. “Forever and always, Mom,” I whispered. I could almost hear her voice in my head telling me to be brave, think my solutions through and then, once I had decided on a plan, stick to it.
I stopped walking and looked around for something high, so I could mount. Up ahead of me was an area where the road ran off onto a shoulder and mounds of gravel, dirt and concrete forms were stacked in neat row. Probably a Depot site for local road repairs. They were always repairing the Interstates.
I walked over and climbed onto the ‘v’ shaped cement block, positioned the stallion so that I could slide over. I tried to keep my elbows from digging into his back, not that I thought he might buck me off. He stood quietly for me. Once I was seated, he turned his head around to sniff at my boot. I patted his neck and praised him.
“Okay, Ballycor,” I said with determination. “We’re going home. First, we gotta find food, a saddle for you so I can tie stuff and not have to carry it myself. A map of the terrain so we can plan a route where no one can find us.”
He bobbed his head as we rode down the shoulder of the highway faster than I could walk.
*****
Tempe knew that he couldn’t follow the boy through the woods without a horse of his own and the time off from his job, but he did have one major advantage over the rest of the crowd that was trying to find his boy. He knew how his son thought and where he was headed. He knew Cris would run to the last place he had lived with his mother even knowing that she was dead and gone. Knowing that there was no family or friends left to care for the eleven-year-old.
He pointed his truck South, calling his Great-Aunt Elmira, the woman who had raised him after his father was found murdered. She was the only one who knew that he had killed his father at the early age of twelve when he became sick of the sexual and physical abuse from the older man. He called his boss, calling in favors from all his buddies in the department. He asked for trackers and a helicopter, telling the authorities that his son had been taken against his will but had escaped and was traveling on his own through the woods. The Sheriff promised a chopper that would run a grid search through New York state into PA and toward Maryland, the area where the boy might be heading to get back home. Even as the tracker from Colorado was flying into Albany airport where Detective Matt Eachann waited to pick him up, Tempe’s people were heading north to search also.
The plane came in fifteen minutes late and Eachann picked out the Colorado native easily, but not because the man wore a felt hat, carried a backpack or sported wrinkles from a deep, outdoors-man tan. Jonas Sanderson looked the part as if he had been born for it. He bore a decided resemblance to a young Clint Eastwood except that his hair was a curly dark gray even though he did not look that old. Matt knew from the bio on his website that Sanderson was in his early thirties.
Matt stepped forward and held out his hand. “Detective Mathieu Eachann,” he said. “You have any bags?”
Sanderson shook his hand and nodded. “Rifle case and one duffle bag.”
“The carousel is this way.” Matt took him down to the luggage area where they stood in line with the rest of the disembarking passengers from four other flights. They watched as the bags came through the flap on the conveyor belt and worked their way around to their position.
“You have a good flight? Any problems getting on with your weapons?” the detective asked idly.
“No. It’s packed in a locked metal case and I have a concealed carry permit for New York state.” He reached through the crowd and grabbed the long aluminum case, an old Army-green duffle and pushed both back toward Matt.
“Army?”
“M.P. Iraq, seven years,” the tracked grunted. Mat looked him over but saw no sign of a career-ending injury and knew better than to ask. Sanderson wasn’t so tactful.
“What happened to your leg? Shot?”
“Car accident. I’m on medical leave until I can pass the physical.”
“Will you pass?” he asked bluntly, his blue eyes like lasers as he took in the cane and the limping strides.
“The ER doc said I’d be paralyzed, the surgeons said I’d be a vegetable, the orthopedists said I’d never walk again without crutches,” Matt shrugged.
“So, you’re a stubborn bastard,” Sanderson said with a straight face.
Matt grinned. “Stubborn as a Missouri mule. My car is waiting.” He led the way down the concourse to the front of the airport where his SUV waited at the curb. The rookie stood at the door.
When he saw Matt, he jumped around to open the rear gate, loaded the luggage and gun case before he helped a disgruntled detective into the passenger seat. Matt smacked his hand when he tried to buckle the detective’s seat-belt.
“This is my babysitter. I have to put up with him per the Captain’s orders. Can’t come back if I don’t follow his conditions. His name is Jimmy Jacobs, but we call him Jake. Jake, Jonas Sanderson. Tracker.”
“Back to where?”
“New York City. Homicide. 81st precinct.”
“I hear Boston, not New York.”
“Not much difference between New Yawk and Bahstan,” Jake teased.
“Where am I going?”
“Upstate. To a small town called Unadilla. It’s a rural area with a great deal of state forests and wooded terrain. SAR tracked him as far as Oneonta and lost him near the Susquehanna River,” Matt informed the tracker.
“How old is the boy? Does he have any camping or woodland experience?”
“He’s eleven. Just came out of a year-long coma a few weeks ago. His name is Cris Snow. He’s camped, fished and hunted in Tennessee and Louisiana. Parts of Virginia, too.”
“With his Dad or on his own?”
“Both from what we’ve heard. The tricky part of this is the boy is the John Doe. From that fatal bus accident, a year ago. The one where he was the only survivor. His father just found out that he is alive, his father is a Deputy Sheriff from Louisiana. He’s looking for the boy, too but his only interest is the 150 million dollars in Trust from the accident settlement.”
Sanderson whistled as Jake made the circuitous detour around the new construction of the expanding airport before finally merging onto the Thruway. Setting the cruise on 85, they talked for most of the two-hour trip to Oneonta, even though the Colorado man watched the view through the windows. Matt noted that the man’s eyes were never still – like a cop he watched everything. He had a total awareness of his surroundings and his company.
Although the detective wanted to start immediately, he had Jake take the tracker to the hotel on the access road not far from the Corning plant. Jake brought the consultant’s bags in and saw to his settling in, informing the man that he would pick him up in the am. Wearily, Sanderson nodded and disappeared into the en-suite after thanking the younger man. The rookie returned to the car and drove Matt and himself to their accommodations where both ate, crashed and slept.
The night held nightmares for both older men – both dreamed of a lost child, the unhappy outcomes played predominantly for both. In Sanderson’s dreams, the boy suffered through exposure, dehydration, hypothermia, drowning, animal attacks and worse. Eachann’s added rape, abuse, fear and exploitation from Cris’ own father. Neither man knew what dreams or nightmares that the boy might have on his own.
Sanderson was up early, ready and waiting for them when they arrived. Both were bleary-eyed and grumpy. He informed them that he had already eaten and was eager to start tracking the boy. Eachann grumped that he did nothing without his first, second and third cup of coffee. Jake took them to the nearest coffee place, a Dunkin Donuts situated in a gas station/convenience store. So, it was past ten by the time Matt brought him to the last place that he was sure that the boy had been.
E
achann leaned on his cane and watched as both the FBI, PD and SAR people tracked the kid’s trail from the cave entrance to the entrance of the State Forest system. The agents all wore FBI jackets and boots, the Search and Rescue people attired in sensible duck pants, waterproof boots and layered shirts, vests and coats. There were four with a dog apiece, no two alike.
Two handlers were women, one holding the twenty-foot lead on a bloodhound. The other woman had a yellow lab and the two men followed dogs that looked like Shepherd mixes.
All had alerted on the cave and then taken their handlers on a cross-country trip through the South Hill State Forest. At two hours in, the dogs found the first campsite to which the detective’s rookie had driven them in a newly rented Jeep with four-wheel drive and mud tires. Eachann had not complained over the bumpy ride but Jacobs knew it from the pained expressions on the detective’s face.
He stood near the Jeep and listened to the Search and Rescue team of the two women.
“Neat campsite. He follows the LEAVE NO TRACE mantra and if Petey hadn’t alerted, I’d not have guessed that he’d stopped and camped here.”
She looked at Eachann and not the FBI agents, her green eyes soft, her curly brown hair brushed back from her plain face. She wore no ring on her finger, no man had found her attractive enough to wed and her dog was love enough for her needs. All that Eachann saw in seconds as she stared at him.
“How do you know he stopped here?” he asked, curious.
“He knows the woods. There are ashes under the dirt and the dirt is not the same as what’s under the leaf litter. He made a fire, kept it small and put it completely out so it couldn’t start a forest fire. I found where he went to the bathroom and buried it. Along with rabbit fur and bones. So, he’s hunted and camped before. How old did you say he is?”
“Eleven. Rabbit?”
“He made snares here. See? The rub marks on the branches? Probably used his shoelaces. He caught at least two, there are two pelts buried with the bones.” She looked down the trail. “He’s following the park road.”
“Where does that go?”
“Nearest town is Unadilla but it’s a small village. A stranger, especially a young boy on his own would stand out and be noticed.”
One of the local Troopers came over to talk to Eachann, they had been introduced earlier at the school. His name was Hawkins, Strider Hawkins and he was a tall, rawboned man with gray hair and gray eyes that didn’t miss anything. He talked to the NYPD detective and not the agents. He spoke so that no one but the dog’s handler and Matt could overhear him.
“Had a report from Unadilla this morning. The clerk at the Speedway mini-mart said he had a kid with messy reddish brown/blonde hair and bright blue eyes in the store. He was looking at the message board, reading the rides wanted. Should have been in school and the kid rabbited when the clerk confronted him on it. Said he thought the boy was a runaway. Oh, and he talked funny.”
“Funny? How?” Matt asked. “Like an accent? A drawl?” He imitated the soft Cajun accent.
“He said like that guy on NCIS/ New Orleans,” the trooper said.
“How do I get there? Before the fabulously incompetent?”
The bloodhound’s handler laughed, and she looked almost pretty.
“Follow the seasonal road to the four corners and then turn left onto the pavement. Follow that into town. The Speedway is on your right at the first light. We already sent a cruiser out but haven’t spotted him.”
“He’s probably hiding somewhere or with someone.” He looked at the woman. “Are you going to go with me to the…Speedway and start from there or follow the Feebs?”
She nodded. Called her dog and followed the detective to the Jeep where the dog jumped in happily, drool hanging from his flews. Matt warned him not to shake that stuff at him and the dog gave him a happy smile.
“Jimmy, take me to Unadilla, please,” he told the driver. They slipped away without informing the FBI agents or the other SAR handlers.
The same clerk was manning the counter and his eyes grew wide as he took in the uniformed policeman, detective with a cane and a gun, the SAR and her huge dog. He was only too eager to tell them the story of the boy looking for a ride to Disney World and the direction in which he had fled.
Jimmy followed the hound as he put his nose to the ground, trotting down the street past the light, the old manufacturing plant that had closed, across the railroad tracks, the abandoned warehouse and to an unpaved parking lot with barns, buildings and trucks hooked to large trailers. The place smelled of cattle and horses, both the driver and Matt’s noses twitched at the pungent odor.
“What is this place?” Eachann asked, a city boy.
“Chambers Auction House. Sells tack, horses, cows, sheep, pigs, rabbits, chickens. You know, livestock.”
Matt held out his hand. “I’m from the city. The closest I’ve come to a cow is in the steak package. I’m Mathieu Eachann. Detective out of NYPD on sick leave. This is Jimmy Jacobs, driver and a boot.”
“Boot?”
“New recruit just out of the academy. He gets to cart me around.”
“I’m Jane Franklin. This is Petey, a bloodhound.” She rubbed his head and shook Eachann’s hand. He smiled when the dog offered his paw and shook that, too.
“Nice to meet you both,” he said.
“Ditto,” said the young cop and he patted the dog on the head. Petey stuck his head out the window and howled, so Jane opened the door for him. The bloodhound leaped out and into the barn, sniffed around the pens and made a bee-line for the actual auction floor where the four of them made an impression on the audience. A heavyset older man with gray hair and light blue eyes walked up to the only uniformed officer and spoke to the cop.
“Can I help you? Are you here about the theft?”
“Mr. Chambers, this is Detective Eachann and Patrolman Jacobs. We’re searching for an endangered child. My dog led us here,” she explained as Matt held out his badge.
“New York City. This kid ran away from New York all the way up here?” the old man was surprised. “Nobody here has seen any kid hanging around. Boy or girl?”
“He’s an eleven-year-old boy,” Matt supplied.
“I can ask around but everybody’s out looking for a stray horse.”
“Stray horse?”
“A stud brought in for the auction on Friday but when we ran him through the sale ring, it turned out to be a big gelding, not a stud. We’re one horse short. I ain’t never lost a customer’s animal in 40 years nor had one stolen,” the old man complained.
“You mind if my dog tries to track through here?” Jane asked. She looked at Matt. “Does this kid know horses? Could he have ridden away?”
Chambers protested. “The owners said this horse is a killer, he was going to the killer buyers because it hurt too many people. No one could ride it.”
They watched as Jane gave the dog a long lead and he dragged her out the back of the barn up a small hill and into the scrub brush that ringed the beginnings of thick woods.
She found the spot where an animal had been tethered; there were horse droppings and dug up ground with hoof-prints. Petey ranged in a circle and sat down where Jane patted him and gave him pieces of dried out hot dogs.
“The scent of the boy stops here,” she said. “More than likely, he’s on this horse. Petey can’t pick up his scent over the horse if he’s not on the ground.”
“Can he follow the horse’s scent? We can track the hoof marks, right?” Matt questioned.
“He’s trained to follow a scent from a person’s clothes, shoes, personal items. Not horses. And unless the horse is shod, we can’t see the hoof-prints on pavement,” she offered. “I could track through the dirt, but I’m not as skilled as a tracker.”
“And he’s smart enough to stay in the woods, not on the roads where he’d be seen. How far could he go in the woods?”
Jane looked at him with grim amusement. “The Appalachian Trail runs from Canada to Florida. Some sections aren’t passable for horses and some go high enough that exposure is a constant danger if you aren’t well equipped. Seasoned hikers still disappear. Does an eleven-year-old have a chance of making it? Not in my opinion. Does he have any relatives he might be running to?”
“His mother died in a bus accident. His father is up here looking for him, too. But the father isn’t a suitable caregiver,” Matt said cautiously.
“Bus accident?” Jane’s face lit up as she processed the facts. “We’re looking for ‘John Doe’?”
“Cris Snow. That’s his real name. His father is Tempe Neige, Deputy Sheriff from Louisiana.”
“Neige. That means snow in French. So, what’s his story?”
“The boy and his mother were running away from Neige when the accident happened. She was killed along with everyone else. We know she had a ticket to Oneonta, but we can’t find any relatives up there. The boy was the only survivor, but he was in a coma, couldn’t tell us his name and she used a fake one to buy the tickets. He only woke up a few days ago and told no one his name. The father found him through a DNA match he put out in CODIS. We think he wants the boy just for the Trust fund.”
“One hundred and fifty million would tempt the Pope,” she agreed. “How did you get involved?”
“I moonlight for my brother-in-law, one of the lawyers hired by the boy’s father,” Matt shrugged. “I’m on disability until my leg heals.”
“Were you shot?”
“Car accident.” He did not elaborate that he was running on foot after a kidnap victim abducted in her own car when he was side-swiped by the kidnapper’s accomplice. He survived the impact but fractured both legs, several ribs, collapsed both lungs and suffered a major concussion. But not before he took out the tires with a spike strip. That was nearly eight months ago, and he still needed a cane to walk. His orthopedic doctor’s diagnosis was that he was lucky to be alive and would have a serious permanent disability, but Matt was stubborn if not realistic. The doctor had also predicted that he would not walk again.
The State Trooper’s cruiser pulled into the lot. The driver exited and came over to the group where they stood, discussing the route the boy must have taken. Eachann recognized Hawkins from the school cluster-fuck.
“Dispatch said you reported a theft?” Eachann made a comment on the trooper’s availability. “Troop C barracks are just a few miles down 7,” he shrugged. “You think the theft and the kid are connected?”
“You don’t hang horse rustlers, right?” Eachann asked with a straight face. Hawkins came back, equally serious.
“Only in Arizona and New Mexico. What’s missing?”
Chambers answered. “Six -year-old stud horse. Thoroughbred. Dark bay with no white and over 16 hands. He’s an outlaw, owners were running him through to the killer market.”
“You know how I feel about the meat buyers, Chambers,” Hawkins said. “I’ll put out a BOLO on both. So far, no one’s seen a loose horse or a kid, or a kid on a horse. Don’t worry, he’ll turn up soon. How long can a kid keep hidden on a horse?”
Jane said, “if he stays on the Long Trail system, he could go from here to Canada or to Florida.”
The state cop stared at her. “We’ve got helicopters out looking and you guys on the ground.”
“Petey can’t follow a horse’s trail.”
“He has to surface for food, water. The horse has to eat.”
“You think you can tell one horse from another out grazing in the field?” she asked snidely. “If he’s smart and so far, he’s been one step ahead of us all, he’ll turn the horse loose to graze in a fenced field at night.”
“How far could he go in a day’s ride?” Eachann asked.
Jane shrugged. “The cavalry used to do a hundred miles a day. With full gear and packs.”
“So, how do we find him?” Hawkins asked. “I have some of my other troopers out looking for him. One of them, Trooper Delaney saw the kid just before he went into the Mini-mart but by the time he turned around, he was gone.”
“He’ll probably start stealing food and camping gear. Food to supplement what he catches. And I’d call a tracker, someone who knows how to find a lost hiker in the woods, someone who can read sign.”
“You know somebody like that?” Eachann asked.
“Yeah. His name is Jonas Sanderson. He lives in Big Shoe, Colorado. He has a website, WildWoodsTreks@ BigShoe.com.”
Jimmy wrote it down on the small notebook he carried in his uniform pocket. He went to the Jeep, forgetting that it was a civilian vehicle and not equipped with computer and radio. He asked if he could use the trooper’s car and was met with a nod.
The computer picked up the site and all of them crowded around the front seat, reading the packages offered by Sanderson. He did day trips and all the way to two week long back-country survivalist treks that challenged the physically fit. Their eyes rounded at the fees and the disclaimers. Eachann read the list of suggested camping gear and the day treks had a surprising listed with the main difference between the short and long trips being mostly the amount of food required.
“Wow. There’s like 4000 calories a day,” he said.
“That’s because you’re not walking in the park on flat ground nor in temperate 75-degree weather.” Jane said. “You’re climbing up to 13,000 feet where there’s snow even in June. You’d be surprised how much food you’d need to survive.”
Jimmy asked, “you want me to contact him, boss?”
Eachann nodded. “Ask him if he’s available for consultation to the NYPD. Contact Detective Eachann at the 81st Precinct.” He gave the cell phone number to the cop with his badge number. Jacobs typed it into the contact area and waited to see if there was any reply.
Jane said, “unless you have anything else, Detective, I need to get Petey back home with the rest of the guys.”
“No. Thank you, Jane and Petey,” he said simply, and Jimmy offered to bring her home. They piled into the Jeep and Jimmy drove back to the staging area where the police and other dog handlers were waiting with glum faces. They reported that they had lost the scent long before the town limits. Eachann and Jimmy left her and her bloodhound in the back of the state cop’s SUV. He pretended that he did not see her slip Jimmy a card with her cell phone.