Chapter 11

July 9-29, 1999

Grand Canyon, Trip 5, 1999

The funeral was somber, and it was not small. While only Team 3 was off the river and able to attend the funeral, there were a lot of former Canyon Tours employees there, and many people from the other river touring companies that had their headquarters in Flagstaff.

Al was at the funeral, but he was just about gone in grief. While both Crystal and Scooter offered their condolences, both suspected that he was never totally aware of who he was talking to, and both were willing to guess that it would be a while before he pulled himself together.

One thing was a little out of the ordinary, the minister handling the service announced that Louise had requested a special piece of music to be played. A local singer who was pretty good performed it: Laura Nyro's And When I Die with the haunting lines,

Give me my freedom, for as long as I be,

All I ask of livin' is to have no chains on me.

All I ask of livin' is to have no chains on me,

And all I ask of dyin' is to go naturally

I only wanna go naturally.

And when I die, and when I'm gone,

There'll be one child born in the world to carry on.

There was a dinner following the funeral; Crystal and Scooter and the rest of the team went to it, of course, but didn't hang around long. The funeral had eaten up much of the one full day they had off before they had to get groceries and pack, but the evening was free. Normally, they would have headed to the boatmen's bar downtown, but they just couldn't manage to do it this time.

Packing went decently the next day; Michelle was there to help, along with some extra hands -- her parents, both former boatmen, and both of whom looked astonishingly young themselves -- roughly Scooter's and Crystal's ages, maybe a little older, even though they said they were in their fifties. Afterwards, Crystal, Scooter, and Michelle headed down to the Burro for a beer or two -- Michelle said it was the one place in the world where she could drink without carrying her passport along with her driver's license and still not get carded with every drink.

It was still early, and quiet; the three of them found a quiet booth in back and ordered beer. "Look," Michelle said. "I'll tell you again that I really appreciate you hanging in there with leading your crew."

"Given a choice, I'd rather not, but we weren't given a choice," Crystal said. "We'll make it work."

"We're just going to have to do what we have to do," Michelle said. "Scooter, I know you don't know me, but Crystal knows that I'd by a damn sight rather be down between the walls than sitting in the office. I know I owe enough to Al that I don't have any question about doing what I have to do."

"That's pretty much where we're at," Scooter nodded. "Actually, it ought to work out pretty well as long as things don't get too bent out of shape. My major concern is that I'm still learning the place. I mean, I can handle the raft OK; I've been rafting for years. But I think of Al pointing out places where it's not good to camp because of a flash flood danger, and that's the kind of shit I don't know. I've listened to both Al and Louise, and I'm still way behind on interpreting the Canyon's geology, history, and nature for the customers. I mean, I couldn't tell a Kaibab limestone from a Tapeats sandstone if either one of them bit me on the ass."

"Me either," Crystal nodded. "I'm trying to pick it up but I ain't a geologist."

"Jerry is pretty good with that stuff," Michelle counseled. "He went on a special Park Service trip to learn some of it. Lean on him."

"I knew that," Crystal said. "We leaned on him for that pretty hard after Phantom."

"Good, he can teach you a lot. Look, you two, I don't know if Al or Louise told you, and maybe it's not my place, but you two leading trips was going to happen pretty soon anyway. They really wanted to hold it off until we got through the summer rush so you'd have a few more trips under your belt. Neither Al or Louise would have told Jeff or me that if they didn't think you were pretty close to ready."

"Both of them told me something like that," Crystal nodded.

"Same here," Scooter added. "I feel like I can handle it, but I wouldn't mind having a few more trips before it happened."

"This is one of those deals where we have to shuffle things around and make it work, like we did for Team 2 when I left," Michelle nodded. "In a couple ways, it's a worse reach for them than it is for you."

"How's that?" Crystal asked.

"There wasn't anyone on the team who we could upgrade to full boatman, and neither Jeff nor I could come up with anyone on short notice. They have a kid with them, Stan, is a second-year swamper and not bad on the sticks, but there's no way he's ready to carry passengers, and I'm not even talking about insurance. Back before I turned eighteen, I took a raft on a couple trips a little special when we came up shorthanded. Al and Louise had me take a raft solo, no passengers -- just gear -- and the insurance company let them get away with it. So Dave and Mary and I decided that Stan could run a gear boat."

"That's shuffling it around, all right," Crystal nodded. "You have any idea if it's working?"

"I had Dave call in from Phantom, just on general principles," Michelle smiled. "It was working so far. It's a little hard on Stan; he doesn't get anyone to relieve him, but he's a big, strong kid. Look, you two, I don't anticipate any problems, but I'd appreciate a call from Phantom just in case Al gets to wondering how things are going."

"Sure, can do," Crystal nodded. "We really don't have a bad crew, Jerry wants to be a cowboy a little, but I asked him to keep it down and he did. We're just green, all of us."

"You'll do OK," Michelle said. "Jeff or I wouldn't let you do this if we thought Al and Louise didn't think you were about ready. We'd have cancelled it otherwise."

"Thanks, Michelle," Crystal nodded. "Now let me give you a vote of confidence. I know you'd rather be on the river, but if someone has to be in the office, you're the best one to do it. I'm going to feel a lot more comfortable with you there than I would with anyone else, even Jeff."

"Thanks, Crystal," the young-looking blonde nodded. "I'm hoping I can get back out on the river pretty soon. Maybe with the funeral over, Al will snap out of it some."

The final loading went well the next day -- the crew had worked together long enough since the beginning of the season that they were starting to get it down to a science. Michelle offered to ride out to Lee's with them to help with the rigging, and neither Crystal nor Scooter were about to turn her down. Crystal knew that Al or Louise saw every trip off, and Michelle took over the tradition without comment.

Up at Lee's Ferry, the rigging also went smoothly; as always, Jimmie stayed behind to keep an eye on the rafts while the crew, Jeff, and now Michelle went up to Marble Canyon for the going-away dinner and crew meeting.

It would have been a little surprising to reflect on it, but there was no question that Michelle was running things. Although she looked like a high school kid being taken on a trip as a swamper tryout, everyone in the company knew her personally or by reputation, and despite her appearance she was treated with a lot of respect. "Just a word of advice, which you can take or leave," she said at the meeting. "I'd suggest that you don't let on to the customers about Louise or Al, or if you do, be real casual about it. Remember that your customers are there to have a good time and to see the Canyon, so try to not let your being down affect them."

"Good advice, Michelle," Crystal agreed. "In fact, I'll put it this way. Tomorrow morning is our time to be bummed out wishing that Al and Louise were both with us. But when the customer bus gets in, the bum-out ends. What both Al and Louise would want us to do is keep the customers happy, and by God that's what we're going to do."

That didn't keep either Crystal or Scooter from feeling down in the dumps while they were in the last minutes of waiting for the customer bus to come in. As had become almost traditional, Scooter sat on the bow of one of the rafts, smoking a cigar, both of them thinking about who wasn't here this morning. Not much was said; they both mostly looked out at the water, up the road for the customer bus, and didn't voice what was on their minds.

All of a sudden, Crystal commented, "Scooter, I think Louise knew down in her gut that something was wrong. Maybe she didn't believe it in her head, but I think she knew it in her heart."

"What makes you think that?"

"That last trip she led was a lot different than the trips I was on with her last fall," Crystal said. "I don't know how to say it; she seemed more reflective, more philosophical, more into memories of the old days." She let out another sigh. "I wonder if she knew in her heart that it was going to be the last time."

Scooter took a long pull at her cigar, and let the smoke drift upriver. "I don't know," she said finally. "I do know that when we got off the river she told me that she thought she'd blazed a pretty good trail for you and me to follow."

"Then I guess it's up to us to follow it," Crystal shook her head. "She said the same sort of thing to me once. You know, maybe it's just me putting things together in my mind and making something out of it, but I almost feel as if there's something eerie going on."

"How do you mean?"

"Oh, lots of things," Crystal shrugged. "I took that first trip down here with her last fall, and I just fell in love with this place. I mean, it almost felt like home. I've told a number of people that I can't get over the feeling that everything I've done has been to prepare me for this place. It's like this is where I'm supposed to be."

"I've heard you say that," Scooter nodded. "I understand, because I've got a pretty good dose of it myself. I could no more go back to NOC than I could work in that place where Andrea and Debby go sometimes, the Redlite or something."

"Yeah," Crystal nodded, "But it goes deeper than that. Louise was a teacher who gave it up to stay in the Canyon. I'm a Michigan certified PE teacher, although I've never worked at it. Or, Louise taking my mom on her trip down the Canyon before I was born, and then taking me on my first trip, introducing us both to this place." She let out a sigh. "And, for God's sakes, my name: Crystal Louise."

"So, your mom was impressed; you told me that."