In The Heart Of The Canyon Part 10

"Do you ever get tired of it?" asked Lena.

"Oh," said JT, "maybe there'll be a trip in October that seems to last too long. But generally, no. If I ever get to the point where I feel like I'm shuttling people back and forth, then I'll retire. I'm not there yet."

Mitch.e.l.l flipped open his guidebook, then scrutinized the cliffs. "Looks like we're coming up on Nankoweap," he said. "Are we going to stop? I'd sure love to see those granaries."

"We'll see. It's a popular place," said JT. "If there's another party there, I'd just as soon not clog up the trail."

It turned out there was, in fact, another large party at Nankoweap; from the river, JT could see a line of tiny figures inching up the steep peppered hillside to the ancient stone granaries. JT was tempted to skip the hike, but it was already past noon, and people were hungry.

"It's a hot, dry hike," he cautioned them after lunch. "If you come, bring two liters of water, and dunk your hat and s.h.i.+rt. No," he told Sam sternly. "The dog stays here."

Not everyone went; Dixie stayed with Ruth and Lloyd, and Peter opted for a nap. Of those who went, all but Mitch.e.l.l followed JT's advice and clothed themselves head to toe in wet cotton. Mitch.e.l.l wore just a T-s.h.i.+rt, a dry one at that, claiming that he really did like the heat, and a wet s.h.i.+rt would just dry out within the first few minutes anyway, and he didn't like that yo-yo feeling of being hot, then cold, then hot again. JT was too hot to argue, and Mitch.e.l.l seemed to do just fine on the half-mile hike through desert scrub and then up along the side of the cliff, until, just fifty feet from the stone cubbies, he leaned over and vomited, not just once but retching repeatedly, so that JT had to grab on to the waistband of the man's shorts to keep him from tumbling over the edge of the trail. He sent the others on ahead and made Mitch.e.l.l sit and take small sips of water, but the man's face and neck had turned deep red, and, sensing he was dangerously close to heat exhaustion, JT uncapped his own jug and poured half a liter of good drinking water over Mitch.e.l.l's head and shoulders.

"Sorry," wheezed Mitch.e.l.l.

Next time do what I tell you, JT wanted to say.

"This is amazing!" Lena called from above. "Mitch.e.l.l! Are you coming?"

"In a minute," Mitch.e.l.l replied.

In a minute my a.s.s, JT thought. "You okay?"

"Better," said Mitch.e.l.l, just before vomiting again.

Mitch.e.l.l never made it to the granaries; he couldn't seem to muster the strength to climb the last fifty feet. He didn't seem to care about it, either-a bad sign for someone who'd been so intent on getting up there an hour ago. JT knew the signs of heatstroke and didn't think Mitch.e.l.l was there yet, but he was dangerously close.

It was was hot this trip. He reminded himself that all trips in July were hot; but still, he had an elderly couple and an overweight girl and a man who refused to follow directions; and as they headed back to the boats, JT wondered just how hot it could get without these people going really strange on him. hot this trip. He reminded himself that all trips in July were hot; but still, he had an elderly couple and an overweight girl and a man who refused to follow directions; and as they headed back to the boats, JT wondered just how hot it could get without these people going really strange on him.

19.

Day Four Miles 5360 Whoa. Dude. What happened?" Peter asked Mitch.e.l.l.

Without answering, Mitch.e.l.l strode into the river and dove under.

"Mitch.e.l.l got a little overheated," said JT.

"Heatstroke?" asked Evelyn anxiously.

"No," said JT, "but it could have been. Listen up," he told the group. "In case you haven't noticed, it isn't getting any cooler down here. I want you all to drink as much as you can, and then some."

"What's heatstroke?" Sam murmured. He and the dog were lying on their sides, facing one another like spent lovers. The dog's eyes were wide open, and he was panting heavily. Every so often, Sam poured a handful of sand on one of the dog's paws, causing it to twitch.

"Heatstroke can kill you," said Mark. "You better listen to JT."

"And you gotta keep your body cool," JT said. "Jump in the river. Dunk your clothes. I don't care. If you're hot, you're stupid."

There were somber faces all around as they stood in line to refill their water bottles. Peter held the jug, and as he poured for people, he whispered to Amy that JT had spiked the water, and this was just a ruse to get them all drunk this afternoon so he didn't have to cook them dinner tonight. Peter didn't like it when things got too serious. Of course, he didn't like it when people like Mitch.e.l.l thought they knew more than the guides, who'd only been down the river like four hundred times between the three of them. And he didn't like it when people couldn't apologize for their errors in judgment. He thought a well-timed apology from Mitch.e.l.l would have done a lot to lessen the tension on the beach. But Mitch.e.l.l didn't want to talk to anybody.

Peter wasn't one to gossip, but he wasn't one to keep 100 percent of his thoughts to himself, either. And that afternoon in the paddle boat, he let it slip that he hoped Mitch.e.l.l would chill out. "No pun intended," he added.

"Did you hear he's writing a book?" Jill said.

"About what?" asked Evelyn.

"Us," said Peter. "Ha ha! Just kidding," he told Mark, who looked alarmed.

Susan said, "He told me this trip was a big disappointment to him because he wasn't able to do it in a wooden dory."

"What's so great about wooden dories?" said Peter.

"It's more like Powell," said Evelyn.

"And who's this Powell dude again?"

There were groans all around. But n.o.body explained.

"My problem is that he's setting a bad example," said Jill. "I'm trying to get the boys to do what the guides say, and then Mitch.e.l.l does exactly the opposite. Like not wearing a wet s.h.i.+rt for the hike."

"I wonder what he's writing about," said Amy. "Every time I look, he's writing in one of those notebooks."

"Or taking pictures," said Susan, a comment that elicited more groans, and threats to throw the camera in the river.

"Come on, people," said Abo. "The guy simply misjudged the heat today."

"No, he did not!" Jill exclaimed. "He really truly thought he knew better. He did the same thing on the hike this morning! We get to the stream, and JT tells him to keep his boots on, says you can protect your boots or you can protect your feet, and what does Mitch.e.l.l do? He takes them off! 'They're two-hundred-dollar boots,' he tells JT."

"Be glad you're not Lena," Peter said.

"I would never let myself be bossed around like that," Amy declared.

"Good for you, honey," said Susan.

"Easy forward," said Abo, and they stroked with the current.

"Who was the worst pa.s.senger you ever had?" Peter asked.

Abo chuckled.

"Come on," said Peter.

"Fine," said Abo. "Are you ready for a long story? Because this is a really long story. But its a good story. This guy he had a bunch of Boy Scouts, and you know how you all got an equipment list before the trip? Well, he told his Boy Scouts it was all bunk, temperatures wouldn't drop below one hundred so forget the polypro, forget the fleece, forget the rain gear even. Then they get down here, and its monsoon season."

"When's that?" asked Evelyn.

"Late July Every day it rains. Every day these boys get wet. Every day we're looking at eight hypothermic Eagle Scouts. We guides, we're pulling out every piece of clothing we have, just to keep these kids dry. Then we come up on Bedrock, where there's this YOOGE rock that splits the river, and you have to stay to the right because if you go left you're dead, and who knows what happened, but one of the boats misses the cut and they postage-stamp right up against the rock and these four kids disappear into the water. So! Now we have four boys with hypothermia, and when we get everyone ash.o.r.e, we tell the boys to strip down and get into sleeping bags together. At which point the scout leader goes totally apoplectic, accuses us of trying to turn his boys into f.a.gs-his word, my apologies-and when we get the sleeping bags out anyway, he takes them all and dumps them in the river so they're soaking wet and no good whatsoever."

"What happened to the kids?" asked Jill.

"This is what's so rich. They all warm up! On their own! So the scout leader is now completely convinced that he's Mr. Outward Bound and we're John Wayne Gacy. I thought the trip would never end."

"Wow," said Peter.

"Yeah wow," said Abo. wow," said Abo.

"I guess Mitch.e.l.l isn't so bad," said Peter.

"Mitch.e.l.l's nothing," Abo declared. "So I want you guys to be nice to him."

"Did you hear that?" Peter told Jill and Susan. "Be nice to Mitch.e.l.l."

"We're very nice," they said in unison.

Peter couldn't argue with the two women, but he also knew the difference between G.o.d-nice and smiley-nice. G.o.d-nice was how you acted when a new kid came to school, and his mother shamed him for crying, and so you invited him to play kickball during recess. Smiley-nice was how you acted when your mother made you play with the hairdressers kids while she got her hair done.

Jill and Susan, he was sure, were being smiley-nice.

As for other matters of group dynamics, Peter was also 100 percent certain that Dixie was sleeping with Abo. He knew this because when they were unloading the boats yesterday, he overheard Abo asking Dixie if she knew what a hernia looked like, and Dixie bent and inspected a very white part of Abo's groin-felt it, even, with her own two fingers. And this afternoon, after they set up camp and Peter went down to Dixie's boat to retrieve one of his beers, there was Abo lounging in the well of Dixie's boat with his feet up in her lap so she could clean his toenails with her pocketknife.

They had to be sleeping together.

Peter took his beer back to his own campsite; he popped it open and savored that first cold, fizzy swallow. Their camp tonight was at the base of yet another rapid, on a small beach walled off by chunky gray slabs rising straight up out of the water. Not a lot of room here, and he'd spent some extra time helping Abo set up the groover tonight; as a result, he'd had to settle for a small uneven patch of sand close to the kitchen area, a site that lacked any privacy-Evelyn as usual having claimed the nicest spot. But Peter resolved to make the best of things tonight-he did, after all, have a full beer in his hand and two more allotted for the evening.

Nothing like cold beer in hundred-degree heat.

Upriver, Jill was trying to convince the boys to wash. They were having none of it, though, and huddled on the sand, hugging their knees. Peter knew he should go down to the river right now with his own bathing kit, horse around, splash the boys, get everybody laughing. He didn't really like kids, but Jill wore such a pinched, irritated look that he felt sorry for her.

And he was all set to gather up his towel and wash kit, when out of the corner of his eye, he saw Amy toiling across the sand in his direction. She was wearing her oversized Jamba Juice T-s.h.i.+rt and carrying her own wash kit, and when she got close, he could see beads of perspiration above her lip, right where a mustache would have been.

"Hey," he said, squinting up at her.

"Hey," she sighed.

"I was just going to go wash."

Amy collapsed on her knees in the sand.

"You don't look so good," he said.

Finally she opened her eyes and breathed in deeply.

"Oh my G.o.d," she said. "I've just never been so hot in my entire life."

"Want some of my beer?"

And to his surprise, she took the can and drained what was left.

"Whoa," he said. "Does your mother know you drink like that?"

"I'm almost eighteen," she said, letting out a froggy burp. "When my mother was eighteen, it was legal."

Peter had a thought. He knew it was against the law, but down here in the canyon, the law didn't seem to apply. And based on what he'd seen in Susan, he didn't think she'd mind.

"Don't go away," he said, and he went down to Dixie's boat and gave the guides a goofy wave and got another two beers and came back and opened one and gave the other to Amy.

"Where's your mother, anyway?" he asked.

"Reading. Not Not bugging the s.h.i.+t out of me, for once." bugging the s.h.i.+t out of me, for once."

"I can't read down here," Peter said, opening his second beer, which didn't really count as his second, as Amy had drunk most of his first.

"Abo reads at night," Amy said. "Have you seen him? He lies on his sleeping pad with his headlamp and reads before going to bed."

Peter felt scolded.

"I'm supposed to be reading The Satanic Verses The Satanic Verses for my lit cla.s.s next year," Amy went on. "I'm having a hard time with it, though." for my lit cla.s.s next year," Amy went on. "I'm having a hard time with it, though."

Now Peter was unable to stifle his surprise. "I brought that book too!"

"Are you reading it?"

"No," he confessed. "Its at the bottom of my bag."

"It's just so dense, and I want to like it because I know he's a good writer, but-" Amy bent forward, as though inspecting her toes, and what might have thrilled him in Dixie, repulsed him in Amy.

"I should have brought Tom Robbins," he began, but Amy seemed to have gone into another world, taking shallow hiccupy breaths. He thought she might be crying. Then he saw a little line of drool fall from her mouth to the sand. He suddenly regretted missing his chance to go bathe with the boys.

He cleared his throat. Some people, he'd heard, were allergic to alcohol. "Hey. Amy."

She didn't reply. Peter looked around to see if anybody was watching them. He wanted someone to come over, and he didn't want someone to come over.

Then Amy lifted her head and took a deep breath. She sensed the drool and hastily wiped her mouth.

Peter nudged her. "What was that all about?"

"Nothing."

"f.u.c.k it's nothing."

"It's a stomachache. It's nothing."