A Montana Man. Jackie Merritt

      Two

      John Mann of the Montana Highway Patrol introduced himself to Clint and Tommy Barrow, who rose from their chairs and shook hands with the officer. They were all tall men, and their eyes were almost on the same level. Officer Mann probably outweighed the Barrows, as Clint and his son were both lean and lanky, very much alike in appearance with dark hair and blue eyes.

      Mann moved a chair from another part of the waiting room to sit closer to the Barrows. They were in the intensive care unit of Missoula General Hospital, where Sierra had been brought by a flight-for-life helicopter.

      Officer Mann, big and burly as he was, spoke in a surprisingly soft voice. “Any news on the woman’s condition?” he asked.

      “Nothing conclusive. We’ve talked to a couple of doctors and several nurses. They’re running tests,” Clint said in a voice choppy from strain. As concerned as he was about the woman in room 217, he was more worried about his son. Tommy’s face was pasty and gray. It could have been Tommy who had crashed at the bottom of that ravine, and Clint couldn’t get that image out of his mind. The thought of losing his son in a car accident had Clint half sick to his stomach.

      “Then she’s regained consciousness?” John asked,looking from father to son.

      “If she has, we haven’t been told about it.” Clint noticed John’s close scrutiny of Tommy, and shifted in his chair so his shoulder touched his son’s.

      Officer Mann registered the protective gesture and cleared his throat. “It was a serious accident and will have to be investigated.”

      “Yes, I know,” Clint said. The stern lines of his handsome face became even more rigid. If Tommy hadn’t gone out of his way to pick up Eric for school, would there have been an accident? Clint knew that same question was haunting Tommy. The boys were the best of friends. Clint remembered his and Tommy’s conversation before the boy had driven off in his red pickup that morning.

      “You’re running late, Tom.”

      “I told Eric I’d pick him up. Remember, Dad, Barrows don’t go back on their word.”

      “Figured you did,” Mann said quietly. “Well, let’s get started.” He produced a small note pad and a pen from an inside pocket of his jacket and flipped it open to a specific page. “Thomas Lee Barrow and Eric Roger Schulze,” he read and glanced up. “Names correct?”

      Both Clint and Tommy said yes.

      “Okay, Tommy—are you called Tommy or Tom?”

      “Either one is okay,” Tommy said. He was looking down, and Clint could tell he was scared.

      “Tell me what happened, Tom,” Officer Mann.

      “I already told Sheriff Logan,” Tommy said. “He’s the one who came when Eric called for help.”

      “I know you did, but I wasn’t there and I’d like to hear it for myself.”

      Tommy drew a deep, slightly unsteady breath. “We were afraid of being late for school because of finals, and took the shortcut over Cougar Pass.”

      “You and Eric.”

      “Yes. I was driving. I came around that hairpin curve—you know the one—and there was one of those minivans smack-dab in the middle of the road. I hit the brakes and so did she, and we—we collided.”

      “You hit an icy spot.”

      “Frost It was only melted where the sun, uh, shone on the road.”

      “Did you see that the driver was a woman?”

      “Didn’t have time to see anything. I was trying to straighten out my truck.”

      “Understandable.”

      “The van went off the road.” Tommy swallowed hard. “I got the truck stopped, and Eric and I ran to the edge of the ravine. It was still going down, rolling end over end. We saw the woman fly out through the driver’s door and land on the rocks. The van landed upside down about a foot from the river. We hurried down the grade as fast as we could. Eric thought she was dead, but I found a strong pulse and realized she was just knocked out. I told Eric to get back to the truck and go for help. He was about to leave when he spotted the fire. The woman was too close to the wreck, and I started thinking about, uh, maybe it would explode, you know? Eric didn’t want to move her, but I knew we had to.”

      Tommy raised stricken eyes to look at Officer Mann. “We had to move her—she would have died in the explosions if we hadn’t—but what if we hurt her more?”

      “Tom, you did the right thing,” Mann said. “She’s alive and she wouldn’t be if you’d left her where she was. Okay, I have a few questions. Did she come to at all and say anything?”

      “No.”

      “Did you happen to notice the license plate on the van?”

      Tommy frowned. “I don’t remember one.”

      “Then again, you might have been too occupied with other things to notice.”

      “That’s true. It’s just that the van’s back end was toward us, but I can’t remember a plate.”

      “It might have been thrown off during the tumble.”

      Tommy nodded. “That’s possible, I guess.”

      “Where is this leading?” Clint asked.

      “Have you seen the wreckage?” Officer Mann inquired.

      “No.”

      “Well, there isn’t any, other than a widespread ground cover of tiny pieces of fabric and metal and other unidentifiable debris.” Mann sat back in his chair. “We don’t know who she is. If Tommy had seen a license plate, we’d at least know in which state she lives.”

      “Lots of stuff fell in the river,” Tommy said.

      “Yes, but the river’s running high and wild in that canyon from spring runoff. Everything’s probably miles downstream by now.”

      “You’re concerned about her identity,” Clint said. “Won’t that question be cleared up when she comes to?”

      Officer Mann put away his notebook and pen. “I’m sure it will.” He got to his feet and looked at Tommy. “That should do it for now. If any other questions come up that I think you might be able to answer, I’ll contact you.”

      Tommy nodded. “Yes, sir.”

      Clint sensed Tommy’s relief after the officer had gone. Neither Clint nor his son had ever been involved in anything that required police intervention, and Clint knew his son well enough to also know that that aspect of the accident made him nervous.

      He put his hand on Tommy’s shoulder. “Relax, son, Officer Mann is merely doing his job.”

      Tommy didn’t answer, just kept staring across the room as though his father hadn’t said a word.

      Clint drew his hand back. He loved his son more than life