Poverty Hill
Copyright© 2026 by Asa Strong
Chapter 7
It was snowin’ pretty hard as Lisa and I listened to the sound of the car on the fire trail fade. This weren’t no place to get snowed in and I turned to Lisa.
“We gotta get out of here. It looks like we’re in for a blizzard and I’d just as soon be home than out here.”
Lisa nodded her head, and then asked, “Before the shooting started, you asked if I had an evidence bag. What’d you need it for?”
Shit, I’d forgotten all about the spent shell casing.
“I found a shell casing where the shooter was positioned at. Give me one of them bags and I’ll grab it real quick. You see if’n you can get these horses back out into the meadow and we’ll get out of here.”
“Sounds good to me,” she responded, handing me a small plastic evidence bag.
I retraced my steps back to where I’d found the shooters depression, and using a small twig, I inserted it into the casing and dropped it in the bag. I put the bag in my shirt pocket and hightailed it out of the willows.
By the time I reached where Lisa had the horses in the meadow, there must have been almost an inch of snow on the ground. It’d only been coming down for about fifteen minutes. If this rate continued, it could be a real problem.
Once in the saddle, I turned to Lisa, “Let’s take a quick look at that guy I nailed. He might have something on him that will help.”
Lisa swiveled her head around, “You killed someone?”
“Ayup, ‘twas that guy with the automatic rifle, he’s over by that stand of pines.” I said pointing to where I’d shot the guy.
When I reached the shooters location, he was laying on his back. I’d hit him square in the middle of the head, right above the bridge of his nose. The back part of his head was gone and you could see the spray of brains and gore spread out behind him. That hunnert grain 243 mag sure did a job on him.
Lisa took one look and upchucked. At least she had enough sense to lean off to the side and didn’t mess herself or the horse.
There was an M-16 laying off to his left and was quickly gettin’ covered in snow. I checked his shirt and pants pockets, comin’ up empty. Who ever this guy was, he was a pro. He didn’t have any identification at all on his person.
I didn’t want to leave the automatic weapon. So, I walked back to the packhorse and untied a small tarp I usually used for a ground cloth if’n I were sleepin’ out in the open.
After carefully wrappin’ the weapon in the tarp I tied it to the pack.
“OK,” I said to Lisa, who was finally gettin’ herself under control, “Let’s make tracks.”
When we reached where I’d parked my truck, we found out what all the shootin’ we heard was all about. All the tires on both of the vehicles tires were shot out.
“Them son’s a bitches!” I exclaimed when we reached my truck.
It didn’t take long afore Lisa figured out we was in trouble. “What do we do now Amos?”
I had finished walkin’ around my truck and was doing the same with her Bronco. Hopin’ that between the two, maybe we could at least get one movin’. No such luck, they were all ruined.
I answered her question. “What we do now is get our asses out of this valley and find a place to hole up until this shit stops.”
Lisa looked scared, so I tried to calm her down a bit.
“Look, this ain’t as bad as it looks. We got ourselves four or five days of food, Legs is carryin’ a small tent and there’s two sleeping bags. The next few hours might be uncomfortable, but we’ll make it just fine.”
“You’re not tellin’ me that just to make me feel better, are you?”
I shook my head, “Nope, you gotta remember, I was raised out here. Like I said, it ain’t gonna be a picnic, but we’ll make it just fine.”
She nodded her head and we remounted. We pro’lly should have picked up some of the spent shell casings that littered the ground around the vehicles. But I didn’t wanna take the time. We needed to find cover and find it fast.
The wind had picked up and the snow was staring to drift as we left the vehicles. The wind was comin’ from the northwest, so that meant I needed to find someplace on the southeast side of a mountain to break the wind.
There was a good-sized hill, maybe four or five miles to the north of us, and I headed in that direction.
The wind was blowin’ the snow so hard it was difficult to tell which way I was a goin. It was only by keeping track of the faint shadow cast by the tall grass that I could keep my bearin’s.
It took us a couple hours to reach the base of the hill and another twenty minutes to work our way out of the wind.
I finally spotted a small draw when the wind let up a bit and headed towards it. It cut into the hill for about fifty yards and ended in a small stand of spruce trees. Once we entered the draw, the wind let up considerably.
With Lisa’s help, we made a quick camp and put up the tent under the branches of a huge spruce tree. While Lisa packed away our gear in the tent I unsaddled the horses. There weren’t much need to hobble them. In this snow, they wouldn’t go far. I gave each of ‘em a good feed of oats, a rubdown and then headed back towards the tent. By this time, I was getting’ pretty wet and my boots were soaked through.
When I got to the tent, I found Lisa had things pretty much under control. Hell, the gal even had enough sense to take off her wet boots.
“It looks like we’re in for a good blizzard.” I said, enterin’ the tent.
She looked up at me from where she was workin’ in the corner, “How long you think it will last?”
“Hard to tell, could be a couple of days—although, that’d be rare this early in the year.”
I sat down and took off my boots, my feet were gettin’ cold, and I didn’t need a case of frostbite.
Lisa finally quit fussin’ in the corner of the tent and asked, “So, what do we do now?”
I looked up, “I don’t know ‘bout you, but I’m gonna get out of these wet clothes.”
With a surprised look on her face, she asked, “You mean you’re going to get undressed in here?”
“Ayup, sure as hell ain’t gonna do it outside. You know, it’s gonna be a bit cozy here til this storm blows over. Yah better get used to it.”
Once I got my boots and socks off I rummaged though the pack until I found my extra clothes. Lisa turned her back while I skinned out a my wet duds and didn’t say a word.
Once done, I asked her, “you better get out of them wet duds or you’ll catch yourself pneumonia.”
She turned around, “And I guess you’re going to watch every minute too?”
I grinned, “ayup, it’s the prerogative of the owner of the tent.”
Lisa squinched up her face, turned around, and started undressin’. When she got down to her bra and panties, she realized that she’d have to crawl into the corner and find her dry clothes. I found it to be an interestin’ sight to view. Damn that woman had a nice ass on her.
Once she had herself dressed she turned around. Clearly, she was embarrassed.
“Well, did you get a good show?”
I laughed, “That I did lady.”
“Hummph, I don’t believe you sat there and watched. You could have turned your head.”
“Ayup, I could’ve.”
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