Chapter 8: South Dakota

One thing about riding on many western roads: they’re straight, flat, and fast. I had to keep checking my speed as I rode south from Bismarck towards Sturgis and Rapid City, South Dakota. From some test runs, I knew my Harley would easily do a hundred.

I used the Wi-Fi at a public library to send one email to Lauren, Kim, Ellen, and Crystal that included a detailed account of my encounters with Shaye the previous night, and a few nights earlier with Brite – including our encounter with Mitch and Ashley. After thinking about it I took a risk and followed Kim’s suggestion that I send a copy of the email to Anna. When I’d written about my exploits in earlier emails, Anna never said anything about the sexually explicit nature of that part of the message in her replies, so I took her silence as approval and interest in the subject.

I rode through Sturgis, South Dakota, and made the transition from the flat and slow undulating plains to a more hilly, even mountainous terrain, and from a nearly treeless part of the Dakotas to large stands of pine and spruce trees. I picked up some supplies in Rapid City and went south to the Black Hills. The weather warmed during the day, and the forecast was for good weather.

After Labor Day, most of the Black Hills’ campgrounds closed. To find a good camping site, I selected a closed campground on a beautiful lake about twenty miles west of Mount Rushmore. The state run campground had a chain across the motor vehicle entrance, but pedestrian access to the lake was allowed along a path. I rode in on the path with my Harley, found a secluded campsite beside a lake and near a hiking trail up Harney Peak. In less than an hour I had a small fire going and my tent set up.

The site inspired meditation and communing with Nature. As the long shadows of the nearby mountain peaks slanted across the terrain, I sat beside the lake and cleared my mind of all. I allowed my mental gyrations to dissipate until there were none – just wonderful emptiness of mind. My eyes were open, I stared at the rippling surface of the lake, yet I accepted nothing that would disturb my contemplation.

At dusk, I set some of Karen’s ashes free onto the quiet surface of the lake. She’d loved water and nature, so I assumed her spirit would approve of most of the locales I’d selected to leave a trace of her ashes. I’ve heard that some people receive strong messages from their dead loved ones about how to dispose of their remains. I’d received no such messages, but knowing Karen, she would have thought leaving a trace of her in each state a wonderful and fun thing to do.

I enjoyed a grilled steak for dinner along with a bottle of white wine I left to chill in the lake waters. I read a little using a flashlight in the after-dinner darkness, and then went to sleep early.

I probably had a sleep deficit accumulated from my night with Shaye and the nights with Brite. We’d chosen to make love instead of sleep. This night I slept soundly in the cool mountain air, not awakening until seven o’clock the following morning when a bird made a racket to show that it took issue with my presence. I freshened up in the lake, allowing the cool water to brace my face. I wondered whether I’d have the fortitude to swim in the cold lake after my morning run.

The campground had a posted trail map of routes to the top of Harney Peak – a mountain that topped out three thousand feet above the campground. Running in mountains can be a challenge. The down hills are as bad as the up hills. Uphill your body labors, you quads ache, and you gasp for air. Downhill your feet jam into your shoes, and you slide or skid on the uneven ground. I didn’t plan to run to the peak, only some distance past the tree line where I might have a vista across the Black Hills. I carried my small camera strapped to my waist.

I’d run the winding trail uphill for thirty or forty minutes before I passed the tree line. After that, I ran mainly on the packed scree that formed the trail. The view across the area was magnificent. On the east face I had sunlight all around me. I took a couple of dozen photographs as souvenirs of that precious morning.

I started to run again, following trail markers for an alternate trail down the mountain and back to the campground. I have an uncanny sense of direction and distance, so I felt confident I’d find my way back without difficulty. I reentered the trees, and started my plunge down the mountain. In many places on this trail, I had to stop and climb down a near vertical incline before I could start again. In one place, I started a small avalanche of rocks that made quite a racket in the quiet of the pine forest.

“HELP! HELP ME!”

Over the sounds from the cascading rocks, I heard the plaintive cry of a female, but muffled by the distance from me – sound doesn’t travel far in a heavily treed environ. I stopped and tried to determine the direction of the sounds – somewhere off to my left. I slowed and changed course, slightly to my left and off the trail.

“I’M HERE. YELL AGAIN SO I CAN FIND YOU,” I shouted.

“Over here. I’m over here. Help. I’ve fallen. I’m hurt.”

I zeroed in on the voice, slowly approaching the nearly hidden edge of a sharp drop off. When I got to the edge, I peered over.

“Hi,” I said to the woman about twelve feet below me on a rocky ledge. Twelve more feet below her lay the rocky forest floor. “How are you hurt?”

Her head jerked upwards at the sound of my voice. “Oh, thank God, someone’s found me. I think I broke my ankle when I fell over the edge. I almost fell the rest of the way down; that’d have done me in completely. I can’t walk or stand on it, and I can’t see a way down from this ledge.” She moaned a little. “Oh, God. I’ve been here all night.”

“Let me see if I can get down to you. When did you fall?”

“Yesterday, late in the afternoon, the shadows were really long, and I didn’t see the edge up there as I rushed to get down. I’d gotten off the trail somehow, and had been trying to find my way back to it.”

“My name’s Jim. What’s yours?”

“Mils – everyone calls me Mils. It’s short for Millicent, a name I don’t particularly care for.”

Mils looked to be about forty with long brunette hair she’d pulled through the back of a baseball cap that had ‘St.L’ on it. She had a down jacket on, so I speculated she didn’t have hypothermia – the night hadn’t gotten that cold. She had a really pretty face – angular with high cheekbones. She appeared athletic from her body frame; beyond that, the coat hid her upper body. She wore tight blue jeans that proved she had good-looking legs that stretched out in front of her, although there seemed to be an unnatural cant to her right hiking boot.

I angled down the slope to one side of the ledge to see whether I could find a lateral path to get onto the ledge Mils lay on. I stayed close enough that I could carry on a conversation with her. “Where are you from?” I shouted.

“St. Louis. I came out here with two friends, but they had to go back yesterday. They took a flight from Rapid City. I kept our rental car. Dumb me! I thought I’d just see a little more of this area, so I thought I’d stay around another five days.” I’d maneuvered to where I could hear her, but couldn’t see her.

I explained my own presence on the mountain; “I was taking a morning run. Good thing you heard me and yelled.”

I rounded a large boulder with a tall Ponderosa right next to it. Mils lay thirty feet away and level with my position. I could see that there was no way I could easily get to her ledge without either climbing up to her from beneath the ledge or down to her from above. I scrambled back up the slope so I could talk more to her.

“Mils, I’m going to scale down to you. Can you roll in closer to the face of the cliff, in case I have to jump right where you’re lying.”

“OK, I can do that.” I watched her shuffle and roll her body sideways. I lay on my stomach and dropped my feet over the edge, feeling in the rocks for toe holds for each foot. As I found footing, I inched my body further over the edge until I needed handholds. They were there, but just barely. I caught a glimpse of Mils watching me with a touch of fear on her face. Gradually, I scaled down the rocks. I jumped to the ledge the last four feet, barely catching myself before I’d have gone over the next ledge and fallen uncontrollably for twelve more feet into the rocky floor of the forest.

Mils said, “That was daring. How am I ever going to get down from here? I can’t climb like that – never could even with two good legs. I need a sling.” She gestured to her right leg. I could see the boot and part of the ankle at an unnatural angle to her upper leg.

“Mils, I want to examine your leg. Is that all right?”

“Hell, yes!” She said, obviously hoping I could create a miracle cure for her.

I helped her stretch the injured leg out in front of her. I carefully unlaced and removed the hiking boot and sock, using every care not to twist or pull on her foot. Mils had pretty toes with manicured nails painted in a soft feminine pink. Despite my precautions, Mils winced in pain. I gently touched her ankle, noting it had already swollen – the body’s protection mechanism to minimize pain at the broken bone and to make you stay off it while it heals. I felt gently up and down Mils’ shinbone or tibia. She moaned in pain when I touched the fracture above her heel. As I held my left hand on the area of the fracture, I used the other hand to gently turn the heel of her foot a small way in each direction. Mils yelped in pain at a few of my moves.

“Sorry. I think what you have is a ‘green stick’ fracture of your tibia – that’s your main lower leg bone. It carries ninety percent of the load for that leg; you also have a smaller bone called a fibula that seems all right. The break may be like what a tree branch might do when it cracks but not all the way through. We’ve got to immobilize the leg before we move you, or we might do greater damage getting you back to civilization.”

“How do you immobilize me here – there’s not much around to work with and you’re in running shorts and a t-shirt?”

“I’m going to go down to my camp and get some materials and come back. We’ll immobilize your leg, get you off this ledge, and take you down the mountain. Where’s your car?”

“I have a rental car parked at Sylvan Lake. Do you know where that is?”

“No, but I can find it. Give me the keys I want to move it closer to where I’ll bring you out of the woods below. I’m on a motorcycle, so that won’t do to transport you.”

Mils studied me a second, I guess evaluating whether she could trust me with her car and whatever valuables she’d left in it. A wave of pain caught her for a few seconds. The car keys rapidly appeared, and she dropped them in my hand. She described the car to me, and where she’d put it in the parking area.

“It might be an hour or two before I get back. We’re still a way from the campground that’s the nearest to where you are; that’s where I’m camped. I’ll take my motorcycle to your car and then drive it back. Be patient. If someone else comes, ask for them to stay, and to me help get you down the mountain when I get back.”

“Bring me some food too, if you can – please. My stomach is growling; I’ve missed two meals.”

I agreed, and then studied a descent over the lower cliff, from the ledge to the rocky floor below. I scaled down that cliff face, noting the paucity of hand and toe holds. Once I got down and a few feet away, I turned and took a picture of the cliff. I didn’t have cookie crumbs to lead me back to Mils, but I could take a picture every few feet to be sure I could reverse play my journey down the mountain. Occasionally, I’d also move a few rocks into a signpost as well.

I traversed laterally through the trees back to the trail I’d been on before I heard Mils call for help. I trotted down the mountain, extrapolating what the journey would be like with the injured woman. In ten minutes, I rejoined the trail I’d started on when I left camp, and ten minutes after that I reached my camp. I’d taken about fifty pictures of my route down the mountain.

As I moved down the trail, I’d made a mental list of the things I’d need to rescue Mils. I figured my first job was to get her car and see what other resources I could find along the way. I rode my motorcycle a little further down the mountain to the parking area she’d indicated. I found her car quickly and returned to the campground with it, leaving my motorcycle locked in the same parking area. I was amazed at how isolated we were now that the season had passed. I passed one pickup truck before I could react and flag him down. I had no cell phone coverage. The few places I passed were closed.

After I had transferred the packs on my bike to Mils’ car and locked up my bike, I drove Mils car back to my campground. I stopped at the entrance and found I could easily detach the chain blocking auto access to the campground parking area. I tossed the chain in the car. After I’d parked by my camp, I checked the trunk of the car. Mils had a hard-sided suitcase. I dumped the clothing out of it, and on a picnic table near the camp I cut the sides out of the case with my knife; they’d be her splints.

From my saddlebags, I grabbed a collapsible backpack and loaded the bag with duct tape that I always carry, my knife, six energy bars, two bottles of water, the chain from the entry, and the sides of the suitcase. I grabbed her sweat pants and sweatshirt as well. I kicked a board loose from the bench seat on one side of the picnic table – a two-by-four. I took my hatchet to the piece and shortened it to what I thought would be a length Mils could use as a crutch during her descent. I added the hatchet to my backpack.

I sized up the rest of my assets, and couldn’t imagine much use for anything else. The temperatures were rising, but we were into the afternoon, so I didn’t think that any additional clothing would be needed. I set off up the mountain at a brisk pace.

I carried my camera, retracing my steps up the trail and checking my route back to Mils with pictures I’d taken earlier, some trail marks I’d left on the ground as signposts. Eventually, I got the base of the cliff.

“I’m back,” I yelled up to her.

“I’m still here, although I should warn you, I had to pee, and it didn’t go well. I tried to pull my pants down, but it was too painful. I ... well ... err ... I’m drying off, but ... well, I’m just warning you I’m not pretty right now.”

I laughed loud enough for her to hear me. She yelled down to me, “Hey, no fair, laughing at the infirm and injured.”

I left the rough-hewn crutch at the bottom of the cliff, and scaled up to her with the backpack. Mils blushed over her predicament. I could see the puddle of urine near her. I knelt beside her, and dumped my kit out on the ground. “This might hurt a little; I have to put a splint on your leg.”

“How do you know so much about this stuff – tibias, fibulas, and first aid?”

“I was in the Army years ago – Special Ops. Had to learn all this stuff so I could backup the medics from my unit. On some missions we went on, I had to be the medic.”

“Oh,” Mils said. After thinking about it for a minute, she asked, “What was your specialty if it wasn’t being a medic?”

I shot her a sideways glance, “Oh, blowing things up, assassinations, overthrowing unfriendly governments, saving the world, rescuing hostages, and if I tell you more, I’d have to shoot you.” Mils looked horrified. I laughed. She made a face at me and stuck her tongue out at me. At least, she’d kept her sense of humor. If she knew how close to the truth my statement had been, she might not have thought our conversation so humorous.

I carefully and tightly wrapped the sweatpants and sweatshirt around her leg and anchored them with duct tape. I elicited a couple of yelps from her as I straightened the leg. I hated to do that part, but I knew I had to. I took the panels I’d cut from the sides of her suitcase, and made a long box with no ends for her leg from the stiff material.

Mils watched me. She observed, “Hey, I have a suitcase with sides just like that ... Oh, shit.” I looked at her and nodded, confirming her guess about the demise of her suitcase.

Before she could comment further, I said, “Sorry, I couldn’t find any other suitable material for a splint on such short notice. I’ll buy you a new one.”

With more duct tape I wrapped the splints around her leg until I’d made the lower leg completely immobile. As I worked, Mils wolfed down the six energy bars and water I’d brought her.

After checking my handiwork, I said, “Now, to get you down off this ledge. How much do you weigh?”

“About a hundred and thirty.” I hoped I could support that weight as I lowered her.

I pulled the chain out of my backpack. I put one end of the long chain around her body and under her arms, tying a bowline knot in front of her to lock her into her metal sling. I told her how I wanted her to hang on, and how I’d lower her, and specifically how I wanted her to keep all weight off the injured leg, even if she had to fall the opposite way.

I found a place I could brace one foot in a crevice in the ledge as I slowly fed the chain out to lower Mils to the ground. I helped her shuttle over to the edge of the ledge, grabbed the chain, wrapped it around my waist, and established my foothold. Mils faced me as she went over the edge, her bad leg going first. I held tight, the free chain passing behind me. I remembered a tough drill sergeant yelling instructions at our platoon as we learned about belaying and anchoring with one of our buddies dangling in midair.

Mils used her arms and good leg to hold herself away from the face of the ledge as I slowly fed out the chain. Inch by inch, I lowered her, trying to estimate the distance to the ground. I asked Mils to start to tell me ‘how much further.’

Finally, I heard, “I’m down and standing on my good leg. I’m braced against the cliff face.” Mils shouted up just as I would run out of chain. “What now?”

“Don’t move; I’m coming down.”

I dropped the chain over the edge, being sure I didn’t clobber her with the excess, and then I scaled down the cliff face for the last time. I brought all my rescue materials, and even the wrappers from the energy bars: carry in; carry out.

I explained to Mils that I would try to carry her piggyback and see if she could handle that position. With some effort I got her onto my back so I could support her weight. We didn’t get twenty feet before she pleaded with me to let her down. The lateral pressure on her leg and the bouncing as I walked produced too much pain for her. We had to use an alternate method of getting her down.

I set her down, and Mils steadied herself against a tree while standing on one foot. I retrieved the crutch I had made and handed it to her. I could see the steely look in her eyes as she estimated how far she could go with the piece of lumber under her arm.

I collected the chain, got the backpack organized again, and then went to Mils’ side to help her shuffle back to the trail. As I got my arm around her, Mils looked up at me and then kissed me. I kissed back, and with my arm around her the kiss turned into more of an embrace than a support aid. After a couple more kisses, I insisted that we start back to camp. Any romantic notions had to wait until later. She said, “That’s for being my hero ... and I don’t give those out very often.”

Mils alternated between using the wooden crutch and having me help support her as she hobbled down the mountain trail on one leg. Getting down was more of an ordeal for her than either she or I had first estimated. We stopped for a break every fifty feet or so. It was slow going.

Time seemed to race by. I figured I’d found Mils about nine in the morning. It was noon when I parked her car at my campsite. Two o’clock had passed, and our progress was slow. I tried to gage how long it might take at our current rate of progress to get to my camp. I started to worry about darkness even though it was only early afternoon.

I had a better idea about her transport. I told her, “I want to change how we’re going down the mountain. We’re too slow, and I’m worried you’ll plant that bad leg to compensate. Sit here, I have to make something.”

I found several tall thin saplings. In minutes, I’d cut them down with my hatchet and stripped the branches. I made notches here and there on the longer ones, and cut the shorter saplings into still shorter sections to use as cross pieces. With the aid of more duct tape, I quickly fashioned a travois with a crude seat and backrest where Mils could recline slightly with her bad leg elevated as I dragged her down the mountain trail. Mils watched my fast assembly of the sled with a look of awe.

I helped Mils onto the seat of the travois, and picked up the two long poles where they narrowed together, one on either side of me under my arms. I started to pull; this would work. There were only a few places where the travois wouldn’t fit between trees or rocks as we went down the trail, or where the gradient necessitated that I carry her. At those places, I’d help Mils across or around the barrier, bring the travois across, and then we’d start again.

We got to my camp about four o’clock.

“Feed me. Feed us,” Mils implored as I got her temporarily seated at the picnic table with her leg elevated, and she saw a duffle bag with my food provisions in it. I made sure she wanted to wait for medical treatment, and then prepared some scrambled eggs and hardtack for the two of us. She gulped down the meager camp food like a starving person.

After our makeshift meal, I got Mils into the backseat of her rental car with her bad leg supported, and then I closed up my camp, putting all my gear into her car. As we left the campground, I even replaced the chain across the gateposts.

When we got in range, I used my iPhone for information and directions to the Rapid City Regional Hospital. I parked by the emergency room door, and seconds later delivered Mils into the hands of two nurses who took her inside in a wheelchair. I parked the car and came back to the ER to see whether I could help.

One nurse in the ER said to me, “Did you do the immobilization of her leg?”

I nodded, waiting for criticism.

She said, “That’s the finest job I’ve ever seen of preparing a broken leg for transport. Our EMTs don’t do any better than that with all the crap they carry in their ambulance. When I tell you that you did a good job, take that as a high compliment.” She gave me a warm smile and walked away.

I sat beside Mils holding her hand while an osteopathic doctor worked over her leg. Several x-rays hung from a light box on one wall. In each of them, we could see the fracture running nearly all the way through the tibia. Mils had been given a strong pain killer and barely blinked as the doctor manipulated her leg and foot into position to help heal the break, and to prepare her for a short cast running from just below her knee to the toes of her foot. After his handiwork, her toes stuck out the front of the lower cast and displayed her pretty toes.

The ER doctor gave her a talk about using the leg, resting for a few days before she traveled, bathing without getting the cast wet, and the effects of the sedatives he’d given her. He also gave her a vial of pills – painkillers – to tide her over until she could get home to St. Louis at the end of the week. The hospital also gave Mils a pair of crutches to use while her leg healed.

As I wheeled Mils past the nurses’ station on the way to curbside, the digital time on the clock registered eight o’clock. I parked Mils with one of the nurses and went to get the car. We got her into the front seat, and I started to drive to her hotel. As we left the hospital grounds, I asked, “You want any dinner?” I felt hungry and needed to get something more substantial inside me besides the breakfast I’d made for the two of us.