After a night with little sleep, Carlyle pulled on a wool hat and gloves and stepped off the front porch of the lodge. It had been snowing since dawn. A storm sweeping in from the west pushed dense gray clouds across the mountains. A half-hour ago, the snow had turned to sleet—a tough, slashing deluge that covered every tree with a thick coating of frost.
As he crossed the yard toward the gear shed, he saw Eric Munck on top of the bus, smacking ice from the rafts with a baseball bat. “Watch yourself up there,” Carlyle said.
Munck stopped swinging the bat and turned around. “Listen. Since working for Marshall, I’ve cracked an elbow, broken a foot, and fractured an eye socket. All that for seventy-five bucks a day. You think he gives a shit what happens to me?”
Munck had been working the occasional weekend as a guide for the past four years. Carlyle had no idea where he lived or what he did when he wasn’t pushing boats down the Hudson. Someone said he’d once been an ironworker. The guy certainly looked like he’d been lifting something heavy. He was five-ten, maybe two hundred five pounds, with a torso shaped by bratwurst and lager. He had two scars on his left cheek, both earned in bar fights. Betts called him a train wreck, the only person on this crew Betts went out of his way to avoid.
Munck went to work with the bat on another raft. Ice crystals filled the brittle, white air and fell to the ground. “Seen Marshall this morning?” Carlyle said.
“Just turn around. He’s right behind you.”
Marshall, clipboard in hand, walked toward them. He looked up at Munck. “Are we all set to go?”
“Have you seen the thermometer?” Munck said.
“I’ve got eyes. You don’t expect me to cancel now, do you?”
The air temperature was 38, the water 34 - two degrees north of a slushie. Carlyle knew that any time those two figures together added up to less than a hundred, Marshall was putting people in harm’s way.
The town released water from the big lake west of here ten weeks a year. If Marshall were lucky, he would have a hundred days a year to make a living. If he didn’t run boats through the gorge in April, when people were still skiing in the mountains, he would lose his business.
“You sure you want to go through with this trip?” Carlyle said. Neither man wanted to discuss what had happened to Sanders on Saturday. They’d talked themselves out, going over and over the way he’d drowned and wondering if they could have saved him.
“I’ve got forty-six people standing around the lodge,” Marshall said. “We’ve given them wetsuits, helmets, boots, rain jackets, wool socks, and gloves. You really expect me to march in there and say ‘sorry, I changed my mind, my guides screwed up five days ago and I don’t think I can keep you safe today?’”
“The state’s watching every move you make.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I got a call from Karen Raines.”
“Who the hell is she?”
“Head of Region Six for DEC. She said she’ll let you continue to run trips only if I supervise your operation for the rest of the season.”
“No fucking way. This is my business. I’m in charge here.”
“You want me to tell her that, just say so.”
“All right, what’s her bottom line?”
“I make sure nothing goes wrong today. You prove there’ll be no more mistakes, and I go back to my classroom life.”
Marshall looked up at Munck. “Don’t you have something to do in the gear shed?” Munck got off the bus and walked away.
Marshall turned and faced Carlyle. “What do you need me to do?”
“Tell me everything about your plans for the day.”
“Nash, my best guide, is running sweep. He’ll have the first-aid kit, two seventy-five-foot ropes, and the tag line. You okay with that?”
“Did you check everyone’s gear?”
“You ever remember us leaving anything behind?” Guides, who liked to believe they were just as good as Navy Seals, carried all the fancy gear they could lay their hands on: multi-colored prussic loops, heavy-duty climber’s webbing, flares, signal mirrors, rescue hooks and pulleys, and carabineers in assorted sizes.
Carlyle thought some of this stuff was nothing more than lucky charms—talismans to ward off danger— but guides, who defended their craft with tenacity, insisted every piece of equipment was vital.
“Did you inspect your boats?” Carlyle said.
“This morning at seven. I guarantee you, none of them have defects.”
“Who’s on the crew today?”
“Hernandez, Nash, Betts, Chris Blake, and Munck.”
“You ever have problems with any of them?”
“Are you crazy? You think I’d put someone out there who’d make me go through a repeat of last week?”
“What about Blake? I’ve heard he’s pretty raw.”
“It’s only his second season, but he’s done nine trips already and he hasn’t made a single mistake on any of them.”
“Maybe you should think about having a veteran out there with him.”
“You really want me to walk up to Blake and tell him to take a hike? Or maybe you’re willing to do it.”
“Okay, it’s on your shoulders.” Carlyle looked down at the list in his hand. “What about your boat order?”
“I lead my guys through the gorge. An experienced person usually follows me, but I’m letting Blake run second today.”
“You’re not serious.”
“He deserves a chance to show his stuff.”
“Really? Fifty people watched one of your employees drown five days ago. No one will give you a break this time if you make another tragic error.”
“I’ll tell Blake to stay right behind me. You ride with Nash. The two of you can watch every step he takes if you’re so worried about him.”
“I had to pull Sanders’s body out of the Hudson, remember? Don’t make me go through that again.”
“When we get back, you can tell Raines I’ve been a bad boy,” Marshall said. “If she wants to punish me,
