From where he was, he told himself, he should be able to glimpse the lights in the town of Lone Pine, but, try as he might, he could not see so much as a single light. He tried to make out some familiar patterns in the stars, but there were no stars— either the sky was overcast or the forest cover was too thick to see through.
Christ, he thought, crouched against the ground, here he was, lost in a woods not more than a mile from a town—a small town, of course, but still a town.
He could, of course, spend the night here until morning light, but the air was already chilly and before morning, it would get much colder. He could start a fire, he told himself, and then realized that he had no matches. He didn’t smoke, so never carried matches. And the approaching cold, he told himself, was not the sole consideration. Somehow, as quickly as possible, he had to find a phone. Kathy would be furious. He’d have to explain to her what had held him up.
He remembered one adage for a lost man—travel downhill. Traveling downhill, one would come to water and by following water, soon or late, people would be found. If he traveled downhill, he’d come to the river. By following along its bank, he’d come to the road. Or he could try to cross the river, which might put him in striking distance of Lone Pine. Although that had small attraction, for he did not know the river and having to cross it could be dangerous. He could run afoul of deep or rapid water.
Or, perhaps, he could find the contraption in which he had been caged. If he could find it, then by turning to his left, he would find the road that led to the bridge. But even so, he could not cross the river, for the bridge was out. Or the contraption might still be sprawled across the river; he had thought he felt it move, but he could not be certain that it had.
He couldn’t be too far away from it, he thought. He had been thrown from it and he could not have been too distant from it when he’d crashed into the tree. The structure in which he had been caged, he felt certain, could be no more than thirty feet away.
He started out or tried to start out. He got nowhere. He collided with trees, he became entangled in undergrowth, he tripped over fallen logs. There was no possibility of covering more than a few feet at a time; it was impossible to travel in a straight line. He became confused; he had no idea where he was.
Worn out with his effort, he crouched against a tree trunk, with the drooping branches almost on top of him, almost brushing the ground. God, he thought, it seemed impossible a man could get so thoroughly lost, even in the dark.
After a short rest, he got up and went on, floundering blindly. At times, he asked himself why he just didn’t give up, hunker down for the night, waiting for the dawn. But he could never persuade himself. Each new effort that he made might be the lucky one. He might find the alien structure or the road or something else that would tell him where he was.
What he found was a path. He hadn’t been expecting to find a path, but it was better than nothing and he decided to stick with it. The path, or trail, would surely lead him somewhere if he could only follow it.
He had not seen the path. He had found it by stumbling on it, tripping on something and falling flat upon his face upon it. It was fairly free of obstructions and he made it out by patting the ground with his hands, tracing out the narrow, hard-packed pathway. Trees and underbrush crowded close on either side of it.
There was only one way to follow it—on his hands and knees, feeling with his hands to keep himself upon it. So, thoroughly lost, not knowing where he was or where he might be going, he inched his way down the trail on his hands and knees.
6. LONE PINE
Frank Norton spoke into the phone, “I don’t know where they are, Johnny. They just haven’t showed. You said six o’clock and I’ve been waiting for them here. It might be the traffic jam.”
Garrison’s voice rasped at him, “What the hell, Frank? Since when have you developed traffic jams up there?”
“Worse than the opening day of fishing season,” said Norton. “Everyone’s trying to reach here. Traffic is backed up on all the roads leading into town. The state patrol is trying to close us off, but they’re having a hard time doing it. As soon as radio and television began flashing bulletins
“It’s too late now to get pictures of the thing that fell,” said Garrison. “You say it moved?”
“Quite some time ago,” said Norton. “It moved across the bridge and up the road into the forest area. It’s dark now. There’s no chance to take any pictures. But I did take some before it moved
“You took pictures!” yelled Garrison. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me that before?”
“Johnny, they aren’t much. Not the kind of pictures you’d take with the press cameras you have down there. Just a small ordinary tourist camera. I got two rolls of film, but I can’t be sure there is anything worth looking at.”
“Look, Frank, is there any way you can get those two rolls to us? Would you be willing to sell them?”
“Sell them? They’re yours if you want them, Johnny. I’d like some copies of them, that’s all.”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Garrison. “Those films are worth money. A lot of money. If you’ll let us have them, I’ll get you, from this end, all that the traffic will bear. Is there any way you can get them to us? Anyone who would drive them down? I don’t want you to bring them yourself. I would like you to stay right there until Kathy and Chet show up.”
“There’s a kid here who works part time at a gas station. He has a motorcycle. He’d get them to you the fastest, if he doesn’t kill himself getting there.”
“Can you trust him?”
“Absolutely,” Norton said. “I give him work now and then, a few odd jobs every now and then. He’s a friend of mine.’~
“Tell him there’s a hundred in it for him if he gets them here before midnight. We’ll hold up part of the press run to get the pictures in tomorrow morning’s paper.
“I think the kid’s at the station right now. I’ll get in touch with him. He can find someone else, or I can find someone else, to man the pumps for him. Hell, I’ll handle them myself if I have to.
“Are there any other newsmen in town? Any of the TV crews show up as yet?”
“I don’t think so. TV crews I’d see. I suppose Duluth will be sending someone, but if they got here, they’d probably look me up. So far, there’s been no one. The highway patrol has the roads sealed off fairly well. Not too many people have actually gotten into town. Some of them left their ears at the roadblocks and are walking in. The roads are clogged with ears. That way, a motorcycle is better than a car to get out of town. This kid I told you of will take to ditches, go across country if he has to.”
“You’ll do it, then.”
“Almost immediately. If I can’t get the kid, I’ll get someone else. One thing, Johnny. How’s the country taking it?”
“It’s too soon to know,” said Garrison. “I have a man out talking to people in the street. Going into bars, standing at theater entrances, catching people wherever he can, asking what they think of it. A man-in-the-street reaction story. Why do you ask?”
“I had a call from Washington. Army chief of staff, he told me. Said his name, but I don’t remember it. A general, I do remember that.”
“There’s been no reaction so far from Washington,” said Garrison. “They need time to get their feet under them. You still think it may be something from the stars?”
“It moved,” said Norton. “It moved across the river and went a ways into the forest. It could mean it was alive, or at least a very sophisticated machine, or a machine operated by intelligence. People up here have no doubt. So far as they are concerned, it’s a visitor from space. You should see it, Johnny. If you saw it, you might believe it, too.”
The door to the office came open and a woman came in; following her was a man loaded with camera equipment.
“Just a minute,” said Norton. “I think your people are here. They just came in the door.”