Rain of Fire (31 page)

Alicia entered the Resource Center at eight-thirty to find a wide-eyed Iniki Kuni behind the reception desk. Black bellbottoms and a matching cropped top looked out of place against the scientists’ Park Service uniforms and Alicia’s own jeans and flannel shirt. Before she could ask for news of Wyatt, Iniki thrust a trembling sheet of paper at her.

We are leaving Nez Perce Peak this morning due to high heat flow and the danger of poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas. Examples of dead wildlife have been found along a previously unmapped active fault that is a conduit for rising magma. Our seismic readings indicate that the park will undoubtedly experience more and stronger earthquakes, without warning and at any time. There is also a definite possibility of a volcanic eruption with Nez Perce Peak as its focus
.

Along with Wyatt, Kyle Stone and a Nick Darden were listed as senders.

“More earthquakes,” Iniki wailed. “A volcano! Do we need to get out of here?”

Alicia studied the message again, this time trying to focus on something other than the fact that Wyatt was coming out of the field, which was fine with her since he wouldn’t be spending nights around Kyle Stone anymore. On the second reading, the words ‘poisonous gas’ and ‘dead wildlife’ stuck out.

“More and stronger earthquakes. Without warning,” Janet Bolido said to Radford Bullis. “What warning does an earthquake ever give?”

She slapped the printed email onto her cluttered desk. Somewhere in those piles of paper was the approval she was ready to sign for the Wonderland advertising campaign.

Radford shifted his broad body in the straight-backed wooden guest chair.

“What does their gibberish mean?” Janet crossed her arms. “A
definite
followed by
possibility
of a volcanic eruption? What am I supposed to do with this?”

Radford tented his fingers and studied them. “You get what the mountain gives you, Ms. Bolido.”

Janet whacked the offending paper and her French manicured fingernail poked a hole in it. The Chief Scientist was another of those Ph.D.s, a dime a dozen around here. Doctor this and that.

Her office door opened without a knock and Chief Ranger Joseph Kuni’s tall form filled the frame.

“Joseph, I need a head’s up opinion instead of the wishy-washy crap the scientists are shoveling.” She passed him the email. “Before he mounted this expedition, Wyatt Ellison told me geologists couldn’t make this kind of prediction!”

Kuni glanced at the chair beside Radford’s and stayed on his feet. He read, his brow creasing by the time he was done. “This doesn’t look wishy-washy to me. Looks like something changed Ellison’s mind.”

Radford’s chair squealed against the floor as he got up. “At the very least, we need to issue a press release.”

Her gaze located the Wonderland campaign papers.

“I agree,” Kuni said. “The season is winding down, but maybe we should consider closing the concessions in the center of the park early.”

“No,” Janet argued. “You remember … some guy predicted a big earthquake in Missouri on a certain day?”

“Iben Browning, New Madrid Fault Zone, December 3, 1990,” Radford said.

“Scared a lot of folks and nothing happened,” she remembered.

“We’ve learned a lot since 1990,” Radford countered.

Kuni nodded.

Seconds ticked past while Janet considered. Before coming to Yellowstone, she’d known scientists carried more weight here than in an urban park setting.

She stood. “I didn’t sign on to be a disaster manager, but go ahead and draft the release.” Then, thinking better of giving away too much control, “I’ll look it over before it goes out.”

When Radford and Kuni were gone, she sat staring for a long time. A lot was riding on her ability to increase revenue at Yellowstone, most notably her rise to the top of the ladder at Interior. She’d never get a Cabinet post, those were political appointees, but she could be the one feeding the Secretary his or her cues.

Craving a jolt of caffeine, Janet pushed back her chair. She could ask somebody to bring coffee, but she decided to walk over for Kuni’s daughter’s gourmet selection. While she was there, she could look over Radford’s shoulder as he composed the release.

When she shoved open the door of the Administration Building, the
Billings Live Eye
van was parked in front of the Resource Center. On the front porch, Iniki Kuni’s hands fluttered as she talked to a reporter.

Wondering what the media folks wanted with a secretary, Janet decided to evade an interview and turned back toward her office.

At her desk, she sipped the bitter brew that passed for coffee in the Administration Building and flipped through snail mail with her eyes and ears pealed for the new email signal. Half a dozen false alarms later, the draft from Radford came through.

The purpose of this press release is to alert the public and employees of the National Park Service to the recent earthquake activity in Yellowstone. Historically, the most persistent earthquake swarms have been on the west side of the Park. This is where the 1959 Hebgen Lake Earthquake and landslide killed thirty people
.

1959 sounded sufficiently long ago, if not far enough away.

Other swarms occurred in 1985 and 1986, as well as 1999. This fall’s most recent two-week series culminated in the September 26
^th
magnitude 6.1 event. Following the quake, there has been an unusual lack of aftershock activity. The Utah Institute of Seismology, the USGS, and the Park Service will continue to monitor the situation
.

Janet smiled. No layman would take the time to finish reading this, much less find anything alarming about it.

Scientists in the field from the above agencies have reported reactivation of dormant faults, along with seepage of poisonous gas. It is their opinion that further earthquake activity will take place, along with the potential for a volcanic eruption in the vicinity of Nez Perce Peak. All park visitors and employees should educate themselves as to the emergency preparedness precautions in the attached file
.

The list included storing water and food, inspecting for hazards like unsecured bookcases. She glanced up at six wide shelves of books towering behind her desk.

“Bullshit,” she muttered. There was no way to predict earthquakes or volcanoes with any kind of precision. There were plenty of examples of people crying wolf; she’d seen some of the TV shows about false alarms in different parts of the world.

It would take only a year or so to see results from the Wonderland Campaign. Once it was rolling and she could take some credit, she’d angle for the next promotion back in Washington. All she needed was a little luck.

With a few clicks of her keyboard and mouse, Janet deleted the paragraph with the warning, along with the emergency-precautions attachment.

She hit the send button.

Alicia prowled the aisle of the Pic and Sav Shopping Center in Gardiner. Wyatt was a meat-and-potatoes man, so she’d already picked up some bakers. Now she frowned at the steaks.

“Hey, Kelley,” she called to the gray-haired mom of the family operation. “All your meat out?”

Kelley’s age-spotted hand selected another golden apple from a box and added it to the pyramid she was building.

“Skinny New York strips aren’t what I want for Wyatt’s first night home,” Alicia said. She planned to wait for him at his house, clean sheets on the bed, the salad ready to toss, steaks seasoned to grill. When he came in, tired and dirty from the trail, she’d draw a hot bath and pour him a drink. “No rib-eyes hidden out?”

Kelley smiled. “You might try up at the Firehole Inn. Edith bought all my rib-eye and filet, but she might sell you some.”

“At a premium,” Alicia grumbled.

She started to maneuver and found a traffic jam blocking the aisle. A baby started to squall as her mother’s cart knocked cans off a piled up display. Above the cash registers, helium balloons began a gentle sway.

Alicia went still.

An elderly man in coveralls came into the store, looked with dismay at the empty cart bay, and stumped down the aisle to grab and balance three large jugs of water.

Kelley put down the apple and wiped her hands on her apron. “What’s up, Harry? Didn’t know there was a drought.”

“Earthquakes coming. Gotta lay in emergency supplies in case we lose power or the water mains break.”

Kelley raised an eyebrow. “You can’t tell when an earthquake’s coming.” She stopped and mused, “Unless … did Brock Hobart make another prediction?”

“No, siree.” Harry set the jugs on the floor beside the checkout. “These are mine,” he told the pregnant woman in line.

Alicia glanced up at the corner TV tuned to
Billings Live Eye
. At this midmorning hour, they would normally be broadcasting some network talk extravaganza. Instead, the local anchor was speaking over a banner, “Breaking News in Yellowstone National Park.”

“Kelley!” Alicia called. “Turn up the TV.”

“That’s what I saw,” said Harry, as Kelley ran to her glass-fronted customer-service office and pointed a remote at the television.

“… Startling news from Yellowstone this morning,” said the spectacled Clark Kent type anchor. “In the wake of the 6.1 magnitude earthquake here, scientists have warned of,” he consulted a paper, “more and stronger earthquakes and a volcanic eruption at Nez Perce Peak.”

Alicia watched the expressions of the people in the store. Those who had already heard the news redoubled their determination to lay in supplies. The others wore a shocked look that gradually shifted to a mental assessment of the contents of their shopping carts.

The anchor went on, “After Carol Leeds, our roving reporter in the field, filmed an interview with Ms. Iniki Kuni of the Yellowstone Resource Center, the Park Service issued an official release.” He smiled. “I won’t read it to you in its entirety, but it does conclude with mention of September 26’s magnitude 6.1 event.” He consulted his copy again. “I quote, ‘Following the quake, there has been an unusual lack of aftershock activity. The Utah Institute of Seismology, the USGS, and the Park Service will continue to monitor the situation’.”

Though the official version was less ominous, no one in the store put anything back.

K
yle, Wyatt, and Nick rode down the canyon from Nez Perce Peak. They’d skirted the area of poison gas where the deer had died and avoided the fault line in case of new seeps. Nobody had much to say.

She wondered if the others were as jumpy.

Probably not. Steady Wyatt wasn’t above admitting to fear, but she had faith he’d never give in to it. Her view ahead was of his brimmed hat and the back of his jacket, as well as Thunder’s broad flanks and flicking tail.

Nick, bringing up the rear atop docile Gray, no doubt thought leaving the mountain cramped his style. She wasn’t happy about abandoning their fieldwork, either. Hollis Delbert was going to be livid that they’d left all the equipment that wasn’t part of a permanent station.