Authors: Nancy Radke
I climbed down and helped him hitch the wagon. He climbed in and
sat down in the passenger seat, which had been welded behind the driver’s seat.
“Turn right out of my drive and head towards the mountains.
We’ll turn off just past a cluster of three mailboxes on the left.”
I started the tractor up and drove carefully down the lane,
remembering at the last minute to pull out wide enough to clear the wagon as it
followed. Once out on the road, I changed to second, then third. I didn’t know
if I should try to put it in fourth gear or not, since the road started to
climb up into the foothills.
“Why don’t you use horses on your calls?” I asked.
“It’s hard on them. Sometimes, in an emergency, I’d almost kill my
horse racing to save a life. I decided, as the roads got better, that I
wouldn’t worry about killing a car. Also, it doesn’t need feeding if you don’t
use it for several weeks. The tractor runs on diesel, and I have a tank by the
barn for it. The car takes gas. It had to be towed home by a team of horses
once, but that was after I got to the farmhouse in time to do emergency
surgery.”
“So they didn’t laugh.”
“Nope. What for did you come to see Sam about?”
“To pay her for doctoring Mickey.”
“That’s good news. Most people don’t bother paying. They offer
me a chicken or a pig.”
I laughed. “You can’t buy much gas with chickens.”
“No, but they sure are tasty.”
“Sam said you had a horse fall on you.”
“That wouldn’t have been too bad. It was a draft horse, and he
kicked me, and then slipped and fell on me. I was trapped between him and the
side of the stall and couldn’t get out of the way. Here’s the turnoff.” He
pointed past the mailboxes.
I shifted down to second to make the turn, then left it in
second when I looked at where we were going to travel.
The lane going back into the ranches was less than a road,
rather it was a challenge.
The water had washed down it in succeeding winters, taking away
the soil. It had never been fixed, so the road was a series of three-foot-deep
ruts and big rocks.
The tractor’s two-foot-wide back wheels and the even wider front
wheel just rode on top of the ruts, climbed the rocks, and pulled that wagon
behind it in spite of where it thought it wanted to go. My team could have made
it, but not at the speed the tractor did, and I doubted they would have been
able to pull the wagon through the ruts.
“Does Sam drive this rig?” I shouted to the doctor.
“Yes. She’s good at it. It gets even steeper up ahead. You’ll
need to put it in first gear.”
The tractor bounced and jumped as it clawed its way upward,
almost throwing us off our seats.
There was no telephone line going up the mountain that I could
see. “How did you know Sam needed the wagon?” I asked.
“Rancher sent his son down to tell me. The kid went on in for
supplies.”
“I saw him. He was just getting to the store as I left. I see
why he had pack animals.”
We got to the top of the ridge and the road both smoothed out
and leveled out. It joined a ridge road that looked well traveled.
I put the tractor into fourth and we rolled along at a good
clip.
I pointed ahead, at a small wisp of smoke rising above the
forest.
“Is that the ranch house?”
“No. It’s over to the left, in a large meadow. See. The sunlight
reflects off the windows.”
I looked at where he was pointing, and then back at the smoky
wisp. It was bigger now.
“Forest fire,” the doctor said. “Not in the treetops yet. We may
have a chance to put it out. Go faster.”
I pushed down hard on the gas and the monster responded with a
roar, clanking along the roadway.
We were getting close to the fire when we came upon a group of
twelve people carrying shovels and axes. Sam was one of them.
They separated as I drove up and stopped. Then they piled into
the wagon and hung on.
I didn’t go quite as fast, not wanting to throw them off their
feet, but I made it move.
“Stop here,” the doctor said as we reached the fire line.
Everyone jumped off and ran toward the fire, which was now
beginning to spread.
“Back up, just enough to loosen the hitch,” the doctor said.
“Take the wagon off.”
I did so, jumping down to pull the pin.
“Now, take the cable that I use to pull dead animals, and throw
it around that short log there.”
The cable had a hook on the end, and I worked it around the log
and hooked it to itself.
The doctor had climbed into the driver’s seat. He waved and
drove off, up ahead of where the fire was going.
“What’s he doing?” I shouted to Samantha, as I ran up to her and
grabbed the axe she handed to me.
“He’s going to drag a firebreak for us. I only hope he doesn’t
turn the tractor over.”
“Or get caught by the fire,” I added.
The smoke was thick and swirling, but we had no wind to speak
of. The Indians used to burn the underbrush before it got thick, and while the
woods were still wet. Nowadays the cattle kept the brush from accumulating and
feeding the fire.
The men had followed the doctor, and were cutting down trees
ahead of the fire and throwing dirt on the oncoming flames.
Samantha and I and a young boy were on one side, keeping it from
spreading sideways. One tree exploded as the fire reached the lower branches,
then the pitch-soaked and dry upper branches.
“Leave it,” Sam called. “Get the one next to it.”
They were small trees, and I chopped the next one down, fast,
then another one near it, then went back and chopped down the burning tree. Sam
and the boy used their shovel to put out the flames.
We worked well as a team, and I stayed near Sam, keeping my eye
on her, so was able to run over and beat her on the back when a falling ember
set her shirt on fire. She looked at me, puzzled.
“You were on fire,” I said.
“Oh. Thanks.” And she kept on resolutely shoveling dirt on the
flames.
Then I stepped into a hole and my leg went under a burning
stump.
“Ahhh!” I yelled, throwing myself down as I tried to get away
from it.
Sam was there, throwing a shovelful of dirt on the fire and my
leg, then grabbing my arm and helping me pull my foot out.
“Thanks.” I had barely avoided being burned.
“Over there,” I said, pointing at another tree starting to burn.
If we could keep the fire confined to the ground, we’d be able to stop it.
Her father kept dragging the log back and forth, digging a small
ditch into the dirt each time he passed through, making the firebreak wider and
wider. The men cut down the trees next to it, and pulled them across the break.
One rancher ran toward the fire and started a line of small fires, allowing
them to burn back to the break, clearing even more combustibles as they did so.
It was getting dark, almost ten at night, when we got it under
control. I looked at Sam, her face black with soot and sweat. She was
beautiful.
Her father and another man had taken the tractor off the
mountain around an hour ago. It came clattering back up to the fire area,
pulling a small water tank behind it. The tank was on skids, and they couldn’t
bring it in real close, but it was there, and we all went and got us a drink. I
don’t know how clean it was, as it was made for cattle, but I don’t think
anyone cared. They had buckets, and we filled these with water and walked
through the burned area, pouring water on the hot spots. In some places we had
to dig up the roots that continued to smolder and put dirt and water on them.
I don’t think I’ve ever been so tired. I looked at Sam. She had
her mouth set and was still working away, but her legs were wobbly. I know
because she couldn’t get over a small log, and fell to her knees.
“Sam!” I ran over and helped her up.
“I’m okay,” she said, as I continued to hold onto her.
“Let the men finish this. They can do the mopping up.”
She looked up at me. “I should help.”
“You should quit, so that your father will quit. Both of you
need to go home and rest.”
“His leg! He was driving the tractor!” All concerned now, she
glanced around for him. We walked back to where the water tank was. It was
empty and the doctor was getting ready to make another trip back to the
farmhouse. He’d done several already, as soon as we emptied each tank.
“I’ll do that,” I told him. “I just need someone to show me
where to go. You rest that leg.”
“Take Sam. She knows.”
“Are you all right, Dad?”
“Just need to rest, Sam. It’s aching, but that’s all. You go
help Barnabas.”
She climbed in with me. I started the monster up, turned it
around and drove down the mountain to the ranch home. It was not far from where
we had picked the group up in the first place.
“How did you get here?” I asked as we clattered along.
“I drove the car.”
“Up
that
road?”
“No. There’s a long way around on the road that follows the
ridges. It’s almost fifty miles by the mountain road. That lane is a shortcut,
only used by horseback. It’s why they don’t maintain it.”
We got to the farm and found that the grandfather of the family
who lived there had been busy filling up another tank. We three pulled off the
empty one, used the cable to pull on the full one, and then pulled the empty
one over to where he could pump water into it again. So this was why we seemed
to have a constant supply of water.
“How are you doing?” I asked him.
“Better than you, looks like. I rest as I go along, as I can
easily fill this before you come back.”
I climbed up into the tractor’s cab and Sam started to come,
too.
“Why don’t you stay here with him, Sam? I’ll unhitch this and
put on the stock wagon and bring everyone back next time. You’re about to drop,
and won’t do your father any good if you get injured.”
She looked up at me. I could see her considering my words.
“They’ll need someone to stay there and watch, tonight.”
“Two of the men can do it. They can keep each other awake. You
rest here. And don’t you drive the car until you’ve had some sleep first. You
can take your father home while I bring the wagon back.”
She nodded. “Yes. You’re right. We still have to bring the cow
back.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“It looks like she has an eye infection. Either that or she’s
injured it. I want to keep her where we can watch her and take care of it. I
don’t want to have to come up this mountain road every day.”
I drove back up the mountain, no longer having trouble driving
the tractor. If Sam and her father could manage to drive it, then so could I.
I took up two more loads of water, bringing her father back the
first time and then the stock wagon back with most of the rest the second time.
They set up shifts of two men to ride up on their horses every three hours, while
they made sure the fire didn’t start up again. Going back to the fire’s
beginning, the rancher found a bottle that had been thrown into the tall grass
by the road. He also found a cigarette stub nearby, and figured it was one or
the other. It was three a.m. by the time we finished, already getting light.
We loaded the cow onto the low stock wagon. She didn’t like the
ramp, and jumped in instead.
“You’ll have to drive down the long way,” Sam told me. “The cow
won’t be able to stand up, going down the short-cut. Turn right when you reach
the main road.”
The farmer thanked us and we drove away, the car leaving me
behind in a cloud of dust.
I clanked along, headed back down the mountain, doing fine until
the motor coughed and died. With all the driving back and forth, the doctor had
used up the diesel. I turned off the key and climbed off the tractor.
Walking around it, I found a gas can, but it was empty. The
doctor must have already used it during the fire.
Picking it up, I started walking down the road. I was fairly
close to the valley floor, and got to the main road in under two hours, at
around six in the morning. I saw a horse and buggy coming, so sat down on the
can and waited.
“Hello, young feller,” the old man said as he pulled his horse
to a stop. “You look like you’ve been through the wars.”
“We had a fire up on the ridge. I ran out of gas coming back.
Could you take me to the nearest station?”
“Yes. Next time take a horse. They don’t run out of gas.”
“My horse wouldn’t have managed this trip,” I said, climbing in
beside him. “Where can I fill this?” I held up the can.
“I guess at the general store. I think Wylie keeps gas out
back.”
“It takes diesel. It’s a tractor.”