Way of the Wolf (5 page)

‘You cut its head off? Just like that?’ Tikaani was incredulous as Beck described his encounter with the deadly bushmaster.

Beck grinned. ‘And ate it later.’

Tikaani whistled, impressed.

They found a cranberry bush bearing small, tart fruit. The berries exploded on the tongue in a burst of sourness, but they were still edible.

The boys went back to the plane with a box full of one variety of mushroom and two kinds of berries. Tikaani was looking a little more cheerful.

By now it was early afternoon. They had been on the ground for several hours. There was still no sound of rescue – no faint, distant drone of an aeroplane or helicopter on a search pattern.

Beck’s thoughts turned reluctantly to long-term plans. ‘We need to unpack the plane,’ he said.

And so Tikaani stood on the fuselage while Beck passed him the bags up from inside, and then chucked them onto the ground.

‘Hey, I should get a job as a baggage handler!’

When everything was unloaded, Beck opened up the first bag. As he had expected, it was mostly clothes. Good. They had all packed several changes of gear – and that meant there was plenty to spare.

He picked up a shirt and thrust the knife into the cotton fabric. It split apart with a satisfying tearing sound. Beck began to methodically reduce the shirt to shreds.

‘Say what . . . ?’ Tikaani demanded.

Al had been watching without comment, leaning back on his elbows. He hadn’t needed Beck to explain his actions. ‘Beck is taking precautions,’ he explained, ‘just in case the rescuers don’t get here in time.’

‘They won’t,’ said Beck. ‘And you know it.’ He carried on cutting.

‘Beck,’ Al said, and Beck heard something very like pleading in his voice. ‘You know the procedure. If there’s a crash, you stay with the wreck. You don’t go wandering off. They’re much more likely to see the plane than to see you, so you stay with it.’

‘Yes, and usually you’d be right, but’ – Beck nodded back at the plane – ‘our plane’s going to be practically invisible from the air. It’s half covered already.’

Tikaani was looking from one to the other, utterly baffled. ‘Did I miss half the conversation? Cutting up a few shirts will help us how?’ he asked.

Beck smiled. ‘I’m going to make rope. You always need rope in the wilderness.’

‘Rope?’

‘Sure. You plait and twist this all together, and you get some good, strong—’

‘But . . . rope? Why do we need that?’

‘Haven’t you guessed?’ Al asked him. ‘Beck doesn’t think they’re going to come for us – and that means he’ll have to go and get help. And unfortunately I’m not sure I can stop him.’

‘We’ll give it a few more hours,’ Beck said, just in case Tikaani thought he was going to disappear into the wilderness there and then. ‘See what happens in the morning.’

Tikaani looked at Beck with eyes that were comically round. And again, he darted his eyes over to the mountains – the biggest obstacle to any plan that involved walking.

‘You really don’t think they’re coming?’

‘Forty miles off course,’ Beck reminded him. ‘And practically no one has any idea we’ve even taken off yet. No, I think the only way they’ll come looking for us is . . . if one of us goes and tells them to.’

By slashing up shirts and the plane’s seat covers, Beck was able to make two good lengths of rope. They held together even when he and Tikaani pulled the two ends in opposite directions with all their strength. Then he checked the contents of the bags again for the clothes they were going to need.

‘Hey, no problem there,’ Tikaani said proudly. He indicated the coat he had been wearing since they got out of the plane. It was a thick, padded parka with a fur-lined hood. ‘My aunt gave me this and I can stay warm in a blizzard in it.’

Beck took one look. ‘Sorry, but . . . no.’

Tikaani’s face fell. ‘No? But it’s warm!’

‘It’s too warm,’ Beck told him. ‘We’re going to have to cross the mountains. That thing will weigh you down, and it’ll be freezing, and you’ll sweat, and the sweat won’t be able to evaporate through that, and it will freeze and chill you. Water conducts heat away from the body much more quickly than air. No, you need lots of thin layers, so that you can add them or take them off as necessary, and the air can get at you and dry the sweat before you know it’s there. Don’t worry, I’ll show you how.’

Tikaani looked ruefully at his parka, holding his arms out, then let them drop to his side. ‘Sorry, Auntie . . .’ he murmured.

‘We’re going to need walking sticks,’ Beck said. ‘Could you look around for a couple? They need to be straight, and strong, and not too heavy.’

‘Walking sticks? You know, I have legs!’ Tikaani pointed out.

‘Sure, and they carry all your weight. A stick just takes a little of the weight off but it helps you add miles to your journey.’

Tikaani pursed his lips thoughtfully. ‘My grandfather always used a stick. I thought he was just geriatric . . .’

Meanwhile Beck had thought of something else he could be doing. While Tikaani wandered off into the trees, he climbed back into the plane for the last time. He squeezed himself into the foot space by the rudder pedals, next to the pilot’s shrouded form, and started to attack the wiring behind the control panel with the knife.

‘Well, it’s definitely not going anywhere now,’ Tikaani said dolefully. He had returned with two likely candidates for walking sticks, and found Beck with a bundle of the plane’s wiring in his hands.

‘It’s stronger than rope,’ Beck said logically. ‘You never know. What did you get? Hey, good choice!’ he added when Tikaani held the sticks up for inspection.

Tikaani had chosen two branches, long and thin, but not so thin that they would bend under pressure. They only needed a bit of work with the Bowie knife – cutting off leaves, shaving down knots in the wood – to be suitable. Beck saw his words take root inside the other boy and lift his spirits a bit.

‘So, what’s your plan, Beck?’

Al asked the question while Beck and Tikaani fixed up a basic meal from the plane’s meagre stores. It was dinner time, though this far north there was still plenty of light. The meal finished off all the food they had brought with them. From now on all three of them would be living off the wilderness.

Beck unfolded the map again and took out the GPS. He frowned at the little bar on the screen that showed the battery status. It was low, and the nearest recharge socket would be in Anakat, where they were heading. He would have to use the device sparingly and, crucially, keep the batteries as warm as possible to help the power last.

The last time he had relied on one of these things, he remembered with a blush, he had managed to drop it into the sea, stranding him and his friends on a raft off the coast of Colombia with no clear idea of where they were heading. At least he wouldn’t be doing that this time.

He found their position on the map again. This time he found a pen and a piece of paper and wrote down the GPS coordinates – but he also made an effort to memorize them – you never knew what might happen. If the little gadget’s power didn’t last, he was going to have to have them ready to pass on when they reached Anakat. He turned off the GPS and took out the batteries, wondering where he could put them for warmth – next to his skin would be best, but they had to be secure . . . There was nothing else for it: he stuffed them down his underpants and then turned to the map which the other two were studying.

‘I noticed this earlier,’ he said, tapping the map in three different places. ‘Us. Anakat. Mountains. But see . . .’

Beck leaned very close and the others craned their heads nearer. There was a small gap in the mountains – a tiny white thread on the paper.

‘There’s a very narrow pass. If we can get through that, it’ll save us climbing hundreds of extra metres. And now it’s spring – well, it should be clear of snow. We can do this.’

‘“We”,’ Al repeated thoughtfully. ‘I still don’t like that word. In fact I don’t much like the word “you” either. Beck, we should all stay together. It will be hard but they will come for us eventually, and you know enough to keep us all alive—’

‘No,’ Beck said bluntly, ‘I know enough to keep Tikaani and me alive. I’m not a doctor and that’s what you need. You’re too pale and I can hear your breathing rattle. It’s not just a cut in your leg – you’re worse than you’re letting on. You need help. Look at me, Uncle Al. Look me in the eye and tell me I’m wrong.’

Al looked him in the eye, but that was all. He had never told Beck a lie in his life and he couldn’t start now. They both knew Beck was right.

Beck remembered what he had thought, in the plane, about a prepared human surviving in the wilderness. He hadn’t been wrong. But the wilderness was unforgiving to the sick and the old. Animals that were sick or old didn’t die quietly in bed, or plugged into life support, surrounded by grieving relatives. They died quickly because they were weak and something killed them.

‘And,’ he added reluctantly, ‘Tikaani comes with me.’

He had thought about this a lot. He looked Al in the eye again and, after a pause, his uncle nodded slightly. Beck knew Al had come to the same conclusion. If just Beck went for help, and Al and Tikaani stayed, and Al died . . . Tikaani probably wouldn’t last five minutes on his own.

‘Hey, yeah!’ Tikaani said. He looked from one to the other. Beck could see the uncertainty on his face; he knew how brave his friend was being. Tikaani understood what the Alaskan tundra was like. Freezing winds. Snow and ice up in the mountains. Quite possibly bears and other hazards.

‘I mean,’ Tikaani added, as if to reassure himself, ‘I can help. Can’t I?’

‘Sure you can,’ Beck agreed, with a smile. Tikaani’s smile back was brave and flattered.

‘When will you leave?’ Al asked.

‘First light.’

‘Then give it an hour. If they’re looking for us, they’ll start at first light too. Wait an extra hour. If there’s still no sign . . .’

He didn’t need to finish the sentence.

‘An hour after first light,’ Beck agreed. ‘Then we go.’

In fact they gave it an hour and a half. First light this far north was very early indeed. By five o’clock it was as bright as mid-morning back home. And, try as they might, they still couldn’t see or hear a thing that wasn’t natural. In other words, no rescuers.

Beck and Tikaani spent the extra time gathering wood for Al. The older man could move about a little, but the more time he spent resting the more chance he had of recovering. The fire burned brightly just outside his little shelter and the spare timber was piled within easy reach. At the back of the lean-to Beck had left the two water bottles he had filled at the stream – now carefully topped up – spare clothes, and all the food they had gathered so far. The boys would gather more food for themselves as they walked, and fill their plastic bottles at streams and rivers. Lastly, Beck left a red flare from the plane so that Al could set it off to alert rescuers if he heard search planes overhead.

The shelter was makeshift in the extreme, but it would keep Al out of the wind, and as warm and dry as possible. It should certainly keep him alive for the three days that Beck estimated it would take them to reach Anakat – if, that is, whatever was damaged inside Al didn’t decide to rupture so that he bled to death. Beck consciously didn’t think about that because there was nothing he could do about it.