“Do we announce our presence?” Trev asked as they followed his set of tracks towards the tent.
His cousin hesitated. “I’d say let’s just leave the stuff and go, but they could follow our tracks if they were really curious. Let’s have a little conversation and make sure they know their best bet is to get out of the mountains before winter traps them in.”
The camp remained eerily still as they approached, but now Trev could hear conversations in all the tents, and even a bit of talking back and forth between tents. When Lewis called a greeting the talking died down at once, and a moment later a shivering man wrapped in a blanket stumbled out of a tent, holding a walking stick defensively.
Lewis helped Trev shrug out of the frame and drop the firewood to the ground. “We’re going to light a fire and get some venison cooking, okay?”
The man opened his mouth as if fumbling for a response. “What?”
“We’ve got canned food that you’ll have an easier time preparing, but better to save that for the road.” His cousin began kicking a space clear of snow while Trev got the smallest sticks and bits of bark he could find out for kindling.
It was starting to dawn on the man, and he looked at the backpack and firewood with desperate hope. “Those are for us?”
A few other men were ducking out of tents, with women and a few children crowding the doors staring out with wide eyes. Most had light jackets, sweaters, or blankets, with only a few real winter coats to be seen. Trev thought Lewis looked slightly uncomfortable at suddenly finding themselves outnumbered, but none of the men seemed unfriendly. Actually they all looked cold and weak, and the most common expressions on those unshaven faces was shock.
“As much as we could spare,” Lewis confirmed. “It should help get you to Fairview, if you hurry before another storm hits.”
As his cousin continued working on the fire Trev unloaded the backpack, handing out the food, coats, deerskin, fire starters, and axe. It felt a bit strange to be giving a potential weapon to a perfect stranger, and as if realizing it the man quickly set it down beside a tent.
Within ten minutes they had a good fire going and venison steaks skewered on sticks cooking over the flames. As they worked the refugees explained their situation, which was nothing surprising to Trev. They’d come down from American Fork, sent to Huntington by FETF. But when they arrived they were dismayed to find that along with the few hundred people the Task Force had sent there were already over a thousand other refugees there, and the town didn’t have much to spare. After a bit of discussion they’d decided to try their luck going over the mountains into Sanpete, which was reputedly greener and had more available food.
The residents of Huntington had warned the sixteen people that they’d have to hurry to get over the Manti-La Sal range before getting snowed in, and there’d been refugees coming along Highway 31 from Sanpete that refuted the rumors of bounties to the west of the mountains, but with no other available options they’d decided to go and hope they’d find a solution.
It was a miracle none of them had died when the storms hit, forcing them to huddle together for warmth in the inadequate tents and hope for some relief. As the refugees were quick to express, with fervent gratitude, that relief had come in the form of Trev and Lewis and their offerings.
Once the venison was cooking Trev and Lewis bid the group farewell and left them gathered around the fire warming themselves by the flames and salivating over the roasting meat. Together they trudged back the way they’d come with just the empty backpack, since Trev had left the simple carrying frame behind for the refugees to use.
“It feels good to give them some hope,” Trev said. “Even if it’s just a few people, to do something for them besides having to sit and watch. It feels good.”
His cousin grunted in reply. He didn’t seem to feel the warm glow of charity Trev had felt, maybe contemplating the grim winter the group had ahead of them. The help they’d given might be enough to get them out of the mountains, with any luck, but what then?
“I hope these are the last refugees we see this winter,” Lewis finally said. “The next group might not be alive by the time we get to them.”
And Matt accused Trev of being a downer. Still, in spite of his cousin’s grumbling Lewis had given them his deerskin. That was a personal touch that spoke volumes about his true feelings, and hinted that in spite of his cousin’s fatalistic words he was genuinely concerned about the welfare of those refugees.
“Maybe the little nudge we gave them today is enough to get them on the road to survival,” Trev suggested. “Maybe we saved some lives today.”
“I hope so. But I hope even more that if they do get to Fairview they don’t tell anyone about us.” Lewis started across the stones. “Still, as the voice of pragmatism I say we do our best to cover our tracks back to the hideout, and watch from the cliffs until they’re out of sight. We should also start patrolling again. Once the snows get higher they’ll be a better defense, but we should never let down our guard.”
Trev couldn’t help but think it would be pretty despicable to try to rob someone who’d just helped you, but personal experience had shown there were despicable people out there so he didn’t argue. Once they were across the river they did their best to hide the trail leading up to the gap in the cliffs, and above the gap they settled down to watch the camp down below, where people were passing around cooked venison as they huddled by the fire.
His dad had been gone for 5 days, now.
Rationally Matt knew it was too soon to start really worrying, that if it had taken Trev a week to make the same trip the first time it might take his dad nearly as long, and he had to go there and back pulling first an empty and then a loaded wagon on unfamiliar back roads. For all he knew he shouldn’t expect to see him back for at least two weeks, and there was no reason to start worrying until then.
Really worrying, that is; only seeing his dad coming back safe and sound would calm the constant tension in his gut.
He didn’t have much time to dwell on that, though, since most of those days had been spent searching for food, from morning until evening. Ferris had come again yesterday to look for more hidden stashes and his soldiers spent an hour poking around the entire yard with shovels. Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, they had no extra food from what they’d gathered for the administrator to confiscate. Matt had even gone so far as to beg Ferris to let them go through the ration line before his family starved.
Ferris had been unsympathetic. He’d even threatened to take Henrietta and deprive them of their daily egg, out of spite Matt guessed. And once he’d satisfied himself that there was no other food he’d started questioning where Matt’s dad was, and Matt did his best to deflect the question by replying that he was out foraging for food, and the rest of them would be too if Ferris hadn’t come around for another “inspection”. That seemed to satisfy the weaselly man, barely, and he’d left them alone.
Once his dad left the situation was dire enough that in spite of his protests his mom and Sam had to go out searching for food as well. They went together, both with bear spray and Sam also carrying his bat, although it was hard to view the petite woman as particularly imposing even with the weapon. Still, he hoped it would be enough to deter potential threats, and they’d agreed to stay to safer areas while Matt searched outside of town, out along Jack Dawson’s lands in fact.
Speaking of the old man Henrietta had layed consistently, just like he’d promised. They’d used the daily egg and whatever herbs they could find to make a soup each day to share among the three of them, and while it wasn’t enough it was something.