The Shack (6 page)

Mack surfaced, yelled at Kate to swim to shore, gulped what air he could and went under a second time. By his third dive and knowing time was running out, Mack realized that he could either keep trying to free Josh from the vest or flip the canoe. Since Josh, in his panic, was not letting anyone near him, Mack chose the latter. Whether it was God and angels or God and adrenaline, he would never know for sure, but on only his second attempt he succeeded in rolling the canoe over, freeing Josh from his tether.

The jacket, finally able to do what it was designed for, now kept the boy’s face up above water. Mack surfaced behind Josh, who now was limp and unconscious, blood oozing from a gash on his head where the canoe had banged him as Mack had righted it. He immediately began mouth to mouth on his son as best he could, while others, who had heard the commotion, arrived to pull him and the canoe with the attached vest toward the shallows.

Oblivious to the shouts around him as people barked instructions and questions, Mack focused on his task, his own panic building inside his chest. Just as his feet touched solid ground, Josh began to cough and throw up water and breakfast. A huge cheer erupted from everyone gathered, but Mack couldn’t care less. Overwhelmed with relief and the adrenaline rush of a narrow escape, he began to cry, and then suddenly Kate was sobbing with her arms around his neck, and everyone was laughing and crying and hugging.

Somehow they all made it to shore. Among those who had been drawn to the scene by the panic and noise were Jesse Madison and Emil Ducette. Through the mayhem of cheers and relief, Mack could hear Emil’s voice, like the repetitious chant of a rosary, whispering again and again, “I am so sorry . . . I am so sorry . . . I am so sorry.” It was his canoe. It could have been his children. Mack found him, wrapped his arms around the younger man, and emphasized strongly in his ear, “Stop it! This wasn’t your fault and everyone’s okay.” Emil began to sob, emotions suddenly freed from behind a dam of pent-up guilt and fear.

A potential crisis had been averted. Or so Mack thought.

4

T
HE
G
REAT
S
ADNESS

Sadness is a wall between two gardens.

—Kahlil Gibran

M
ack stood on the shore, doubled over and still trying to catch his breath. It took a few minutes before he even thought about Missy. Remembering that she had been coloring in her book at the table, he walked up the bank to where he could see the campsite, but there was no sign of her. His pace quickened as he hurried to the tent trailer, calling her name as calmly as he could manage. No response. She was not there. Even though his heart skipped a beat, he rationalized that in the confusion someone had seen to her, probably Sarah Madison or Vicki Ducette, or one of the older kids.

Not wanting to appear overanxious or panicky, he found and soberly informed his two new friends that he couldn’t find Missy and asked if they would each check with their families. Both quickly headed off to their respective campsites. Jesse returned first to announce that Sarah had not seen Missy at all that morning. He and Mack then headed for the Ducette site, but before they reached it Emil came hurrying toward them, a look of apprehension written clearly on his face.

“No one has seen Missy today, and we don’t know where Amber is either. Maybe they’re together?” There was a hint of dread in Emil’s question.

“I’m sure that’s it,” said Mack, trying to reassure himself and Emil at the same time. “Where do you think they might be?”

“Why don’t we check the bathrooms and showers,” suggested Jesse.

“Good idea,” said Mack. “I’ll check the one nearest our site, the one my kids use. Why don’t you and Emil check the one between your sites?”

They nodded and Mack headed at a slow trot toward the closest showers, noticing for the first time that he was barefoot and shirtless. “What a sight I must be,” he thought, and probably would have chuckled if his mind wasn’t so focused on Missy.

Arriving at the restrooms, he asked a teenager emerging from the women’s section if she had seen a little girl in a red dress inside, or maybe two girls. She told him that she hadn’t noticed, but would look again. In less than a minute she was back shaking her head.

“Thank you anyway,” said Mack, and headed around the back of the building where the showers were located. As he rounded the corner he began calling loudly for Missy. Mack could hear water running but no one responded. Wondering if Missy might be in one of the showers, he began pounding on each until he got a response. He succeeded only in severely scaring a poor elderly lady, when his door banging accidentally opened her shower stall. She shrieked, and Mack, with profuse apologies, quickly shut the door and hurried on to the next one.

Six shower stalls and no Missy. He checked the men’s toilet stalls and showers, trying not to think about why he would even bother looking there. She was nowhere and he jogged back toward Emil’s, unable to pray anything except, “Oh God, help me find her . . . Oh God, please help me find her.”

When she saw him, Vicki rushed to meet him. She had been trying not to cry but couldn’t help it as they embraced. Suddenly Mack desperately wanted Nan to be there. She would know what to do, at least what the right thing was. He felt so lost.

“Sarah has Josh and Kate back at your campsite, so don’t worry about them,” Vicki told him between sobs.

“Oh God,” Mack thought, having totally forgotten about his other two. “What kind of a father am I?” Although he was relieved that Sarah had them, he now wished even more that Nan were here.

Just then, Emil and Jesse burst into camp, Emil appearing relieved and Jesse looking as tense as a wound-up spring.

“We found her,” exclaimed Emil, his face lighting up, then turning somber as he realized what he had implied. “I mean, we found Amber. She just came back from taking a shower at this other place that still had hot water. She said she told her mom, but Vicki probably didn’t hear her . . . “ His voice trailed off.

“But we didn’t find Missy,” Jesse added quickly, answering the most important question. “Amber hasn’t seen her today either.”

Emil, all business now, took charge. “Mack, we need to contact the campground authorities immediately, and get the word out to find Missy. Maybe in the ruckus and excitement she got scared and confused and just wandered away and got lost, or maybe she was trying to find us and took a wrong turn. Do you have a picture of her? Maybe there’s a copy machine at the office and we could make a few copies and save some time?”

“Yeah, I have a snapshot of her in my wallet.” He reached for his back pocket and for a second panicked, as he found nothing there. The thought flashed through his mind of his wallet sitting at the bottom of Wallowa Lake, and then he remembered that it was still in his van after yesterday’s trip up the tram.

The three headed back to Mack’s site. Jesse ran ahead to let Sarah know that Amber was safe, but that Missy’s whereabouts were still unknown. Arriving at camp, Mack hugged and encouraged Josh and Kate as best he could, trying to appear calm for their sakes. Changing out of his wet clothes, he threw on a T-shirt and jeans, some clean dry socks, and a pair of running shoes. Sarah promised that she and Vicki would keep his older two with them, and whispered that she was praying for him and Missy. Mack gave her a quick hug and thanked her, and after kissing his children joined the other two men as together they jogged toward the campground office.

Word of the water rescue had reached the little two-room camp headquarters ahead of them, and everyone there was in high spirits. This changed quickly as the three took turns explaining Missy’s disappearance. Fortunately the office had a photocopier, and Mack enlarged half a dozen pictures of Missy, handing them around.

The Wallowa Lake campground has 215 sites divided into five loops and three group areas. The young assistant manager, Jeremy Bellamy, volunteered to help canvass, so they divided the camp into four areas and each headed out armed with a map, Missy’s picture, and an office walkie-talkie. One assistant with a walkie-talkie also went back to Mack’s site to report in if Missy turned up there.

It was slow, methodical work, much too slow for Mack, but he knew that this was the most logical way to find her if . . . if she was still on the campgrounds. As he walked between tents and trailers, he was praying and promising. He knew in his heart that promising things to God was rather dumb and irrational, but he couldn’t help it. He was desperate to get Missy back, and surely God knew where she was.

Many campers were either not at their sites or in the final stages of packing up to head home. No one he asked had seen Missy or anyone looking like her. Periodically the search parties checked in with the office to get an update on the progress, if any, that each was making. Nothing at all, until almost two in the afternoon.

Mack was finishing his section when the call came in on the walkie-talkies. Jeremy, who had taken the area nearest the entrance thought he had something. Emil instructed them to put a mark on their maps showing where each had left off, and then he gave them the site number where Jeremy had called from. Mack was the last to arrive, and he walked in on an intense conversation involving Emil, Jeremy, and a third young man that Mack did not recognize.

Emil quickly brought Mack up to speed, introducing him to Virgil Thomas, a city boy from California, who had been camping all summer in the area with some buddies. Virgil and his friends had crashed after partying late into the night, and he had been the only one up who saw an old military-green truck, heading out the entrance and down the road toward Joseph.

“About what time was that?” Mack asked.

“Like I told him,” Virgil said, pointing his thumb at Jeremy, “it was before noon. I’m not sure how much before noon though. I was kinda hung over, and we really haven’t been paying much attention to clocks since we got here.”

Pushing the picture of Missy in front of the young man, Mack asked sharply, “Do you think you saw
her?”

“When the other fellow first showed me that picture, she didn’t look familiar,” Virgil answered, looking again at the photo. “But then, when he said that she was wearing a bright red dress, I remembered that the little girl in the green truck was wearin’ red and she was either laughing or bellerin’, I couldn’t really tell. And then it looked like the guy slapped her or pushed her down, but I suppose he could’a been just playin’ too.”

Mack felt paralyzed. The information was overwhelming to him, but unfortunately it was the only thing they had heard that made any sense. It explained why they had found no trace of Missy. But everything in him didn’t want it to be true. He turned and started to run toward the office, but he was halted by Emil’s voice.

“Mack, stop! We’ve already radioed the office and contacted the sheriff in Joseph. They’re sending someone here right away, and are putting out an APB on the truck.”

As he finished speaking, as if on cue, two patrol cars pulled into the campgrounds. The first headed directly for the office, while the other turned into the section where they all stood waiting. Mack waved the officer down and hurried to meet him as he emerged from his vehicle. A young man who looked to be in his late twenties introduced himself as Officer Dalton, and began taking their statements.

The next hours saw a massive escalation in response to Missy’s disappearance. An All Points Bulletin was sent out as far west as Portland, east to Boise, Idaho, and north to Spokane, Washington. Police officers in Joseph set up a roadblock on the Imnaha Highway, which led out of Joseph and deeper into the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area. If the child stealer had taken Missy up the Imnaha—only one of many directions he could have gone—the police figured they could get pertinent information by questioning those coming out. Their resources were limited and rangers in the area were also contacted to be on the lookout.

The Phillips’ campsite was cordoned off as a crime scene and everyone in the vicinity was questioned. Virgil offered as much detail as he could about the truck and its occupants, and the resulting description was flashed out to all relevant agencies.

The FBI field offices in Portland, Seattle, and Denver were put on notice. Nan had been called and was on her way, being driven by her best friend, Maryanne. Even tracking dogs were brought in, but Missy’s trail ended in the nearby parking lot, increasing the likelihood that Virgil’s story was accurate.

After forensic specialists had combed through his campsite, Officer Dalton asked Mack to reenter the area and carefully look to see if anything was out of place or different than he remembered. Although already exhausted by the emotions of the day, Mack was desperate to do anything to help and deliberately focused his mind to try and remember whatever he could about the morning. Cautiously, so as not to disturb anything, he retraced his steps. What he would give for a do-over; a chance to have this day start from the beginning. Even if he burned his fingers and dropped the pancake batter all over again, if only he could take it back.

Again he turned back to his assigned task, but nothing seemed to be different than what he remembered. Nothing had changed. He came to the table where Missy had been busy. The book was open to the page she had been coloring, a half-finished picture of the Multnomah Indian princess. The crayons were also there, although Missy’s favorite color, red, was missing. He began to look around on the ground to see where it might have fallen.

“If you’re looking for the red crayon, we found it over there, by the tree,” said Dalton, pointing toward the parking lot. “She probably dropped it when she was struggling with . . .” His voice trailed off.

“How can you tell she was struggling?” Mack demanded.

The officer hesitated, but then spoke, almost reluctantly. “We found one of her shoes near there, in the bushes where it was probably kicked off. You weren’t here at the time, so we asked your son to identify it.”

The image of his daughter fighting off some perverted monster was like a fist to the stomach. Almost succumbing to the sudden blackness that threatened to smother him, Mack leaned on the table to keep from passing out or throwing up. It was then that he noticed a ladybug pin sticking in the coloring book. He snapped to awareness as if someone had opened smelling salts under his nose.