flow. Nothing we can do there before Monday. When we get some
equipment.”
The roads were shown in red like a man had placed his right hand
palm-down on the paper. The small towns of Kalispell and Whitefish
nestled under the palm. Roads fanned out like the four fingers and the
thumb. The index finger ran up through a place called Eureka to the
Canadian border. The thumb ran out northwest through Yorke and stopped
at the old mines. That thumb was now amputated at the first knuckle.
They assume you’ll come up the road,” Johnson said. “So you won’t.
You’ll loop east to Eureka and come in through the forest.”
He ran his pencil down the thumb and across the back of the hand. Back
up the index finger and stopped it at Eureka. Fifty miles of forest
lay between Eureka and Yorke. The forest was represented on the map by
a large green stain. Deep and wide. They knew what that green stain
meant. They could see what it meant by looking around them. The area
was covered in virgin forest. It ran rampant up and down the
mountainsides. Most places the vegetation was so dense a man could
barely squeeze between the tree trunks. But the green stain to the
east of Yorke was a national forest. Owned and operated by the Forest
Service. The green stain showed a web of threads running through it.
Those threads were Forest Service tracks.
“I can get my people here in four hours,” Webster said. The hostage
rescue team. On my own initiative, if it comes to it.”
Johnson nodded.
They can walk right through the woods,” he said. “Probably drive right
through.”
Webster nodded.
“We called the Forest guys,” he said. They’re bringing us a detailed
plan.”
“Perfect,” Johnson said. “If things turn bad, you call your team in,
send them direct to Eureka, we’ll all make a little noise on the
southern flank, and they muscle in straight through from the east.”
Webster nodded again. The contingency plan was made. Until the
National Forests guy came up the short aluminum ladder into the command
post. McGrath brought him inside with Milosevic and Brogan. Webster
made the introductions and Johnson asked the questions. Straight away
the Forest guy started shaking his head.
Those tracks don’t exist,” he said. “At least, most of them don’t.”
Johnson pointed to the map.
“They’re right here,” he said.
The Forest guy shrugged. He had a thick book of topographical plans
under his arm. He opened it up to the correct page. Laid it over the
map. The scale was much larger, but it was obvious the web of threads
was a different shape.
“Mapmakers know there are tracks,” the guy said. “So they just show
them any old place.”
“OK,” Johnson said. “We’ll use your maps.”
The Forest guy shook his head.
These are wrong, too,” he said. They might have been right at some
stage, but they’re wrong now. We spent years closing off most of these
tracks. Had to stop the bear hunters getting in. Environmentalists
made us do it. We bulldozed tons of dirt into the openings of most of
the through tracks. Ripped up a lot of the others. They’ll be totally
overgrown by now.”
“OK, so which tracks are closed?” Webster asked. He had turned the
plan and was studying it.
“We don’t know,” the guy said. “We didn’t keep very accurate records.
Just sent the bulldozers out. We caught a lot of guys closing the
wrong tracks, because they were nearer, or not closing them at all,
because that was easier. The whole thing was a mess.”
“So is there any way through?” Johnson asked.
The Forest guy shrugged.
“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not. No way of knowing, except to try it.
Could take a couple of months. If you do get through, keep a record
and let us know, OK?”
Johnson stared at him.
“Let me get this straight,” he said. “You’re the damn Forest Service
and you want us to tell you where your own tracks are?”
The guy nodded.
“That’s about the size of it,” he said. “Like I told you, our records
are lousy. The way we figured it, who the hell would ever care?”