Crimson Highway by David Wickenhauser (i can read with my eyes shut txt) 📕

With Buck taken care of, Hugh and Jenny walked out of the barn toward the house. Like she had done before, Martha saw them from the top of the steps, then flew down them to give Hugh, and then Jenny, a big hug.

“Holy cow, Ma. I’ve only been gone a couple of days.”

“I know, Hugh, but I’m just so glad to see you. And, I can see that you have left your ghosts up there on that ridge somewhere. Isn’t that right?”

“Yeah, the forest has worked its magic again. I feel much, much better than when I left here three mornings ago,” Hugh replied to her.

“Well, come on in. I’m sure you could use a good, home-cooked ranch breakfast.”

Hugh started salivating at the thought. After rabbit, jerky, oatmeal and trail mix, and canned chili for the past couple of days, a full-course ranch breakfast sounded extremely inviting. “If it’s not too much trouble.”

“Posh! Get in here,” his mother remonstrated.

Hugh sat down at the large kitchen table, and was very impressed as he saw how knowingly Jenny worked her way around the kitchen preparing his breakfast for him.

Just as he was starting to say something to compliment Jenny, he was interrupted by a screech.

“Hughey!” they all heard, as Mary came bounding down the stairs. She threw her arms around Hugh, and hugged his neck while he sat in his chair.

“Say, Bro. How did it go?” she asked Hugh.

“Pretty uneventful,” Hugh replied, to her downcast expression. Mary loved hearing adventure stories. “But, I had a visitor to my camp site last night.”

“Really? Who?” Martha jumped into the conversation.

“Not who. What. Old Grouch paid me a visit,” he told them.

“Wow! I thought that ol’ griz was long gone,” Mary said.

“No. It definitely was him. Huge track, and a missing small toe,” Hugh said.

“Well, I’ll be darn,” Mary said.

“Does someone want to clue me in?” Jenny asked, looking from Martha to Mary to Hugh.

“I will,” Hugh said, winking at his mom.

Then, he turned to Jenny with a serious expression on his face. “Well, you see, quite a few years ago, there was a big increase in encounters in this part of Idaho between tourists and grizzly bears.”

Jenny nodded for Hugh to go on.

“So the Idaho Fish and Game went on this huge public relations campaign to alert forest visitors to the problem, and what to do about it. They had determined that the best way to avoid a grizzly bear confrontation was for people to wear little bells out in the forest, and to carry pepper spray in case they came upon a bear.”

“What does this have to do with Old Grouch?” Jenny asked.

“I’m getting to that,” Hugh replied. “Old Grouch is a local legend. He’s just about the biggest, most-ferocious grizzly bear anybody can ever remember being in these parts. And, his track is very distinctive because of his missing small toe.”

Jenny was getting impatient for Hugh to get to the point of the story.

“Well, shortly after the fish and game directive about bells and pepper spray came out, we began to notice something interesting. Everywhere we went up there in the forest, wherever we found Old Grouch’s tracks, we’d spot something unusual in his droppings.”

“What? What?” Jenny insisted.

“Besides the usual berry seeds, and bits of bone and fur, we began seeing a lot of little bells. And, are you ready for this? It smelled like pepper.”

 Martha and Mary couldn’t contain themselves any longer, and broke out in riotous laughter. Hugh finally gave in, and started laughing himself.

Jenny’s face turned from serious to surprised as she realized that she had just been told a joke. She slapped Hugh playfully on the shoulder. “Oh, Hugh. I can’t believe you did that to me,” she said, and began laughing herself.

“Jenny, can you serve the standup comedian his breakfast, please,” Martha asked. “Maybe if we can keep his mouth full with pancakes we won’t have to hear any more tall tales.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

After breakfast, Hugh and Jenny walked out to his truck so he could get a close look at the damage to the fender. He needed to decide whether he should go the insurance route to get it fixed, or whether he should just eat the cost, and pick up a new fender at the nearest Freightliner dealership. It would depend on the extent of the damage compared to his insurance deductible.

Once he had examined the damage, and had decided it was not that extensive, he turned to Jenny, who was standing nearby. “We need to talk pretty soon. I’m ready to hear about what had happened during that last hijacking. But first, I wanted to ask you if you still had that cell phone your uncle had given you.”

Jenny had to think for a few minutes, running through her mind the events of the last couple of days before they had arrived at this ranch.

“I don’t have it. But I think I know where it is,” she said, walking over to the driver’s side of the truck.

She reached over and grasped the handle like she had seen her uncle do. She swung the door down, and pointed for Hugh to look inside.

What Jenny had opened up was the little door to the air compressor water purge valves. There were three cables in there that the truck driver would have to pull on in order to purge water out of the three air compressor tanks that were used to operate the braking and other systems that needed compressed air.

Hugh looked inside, and saw Jenny’s cell phone. He reached in, and picked it up.

“What on earth is that doing in there?” Hugh asked.

Jenny merely shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. My uncle put it there.”

Hugh tried to power up the cell