Chapter 17: Escape to Canada

Governor Sandra "Sadie" McConklin of Washington spoke softly to the uniformed officers seated in her office. The grim expression on her face and the uncomfortable looks on theirs betrayed the serious subject of their conversation.

"General, is there any possibility that you could be relieved of command by anyone outside my authority? As I understand it, this is the State of Washington National Guard, is it not?

"Governor, normally I would say no, but these are extraordinary times. The President is Commander in Chief of all the armed forces of this nation. I suppose he could use his executive powers and order my replacement. It has never happened with any state's Guard forces to my knowledge ... but... " General Mikelson shrugged his shoulders.

"Very well. I've asked the State Attorney General for his opinion, but they're still researching the question. I tend to agree with you, however. We're facing the fact that every time it comes to a shoving match between federal and state powers, the feds come out on top. So, it falls to us..." she turned to her Commander of State Police.

"Fred, I need your troopers to help us with this. I realize I'm asking a lot by sending you and your men to stand in front of armed soldiers and ask for civil order ... but maybe, just maybe ... they will respect the uniforms of the law. These are all decent young men and their officers are certainly aware of the obscenity of their orders ... correct, General Mikelson?"

"Absolutely, ma'am! Starting with myself, and going down to our newest reserve Second Lieutenant, we're all aware that we've been ordered to round up innocent citizens and herd them onto buses. We also have an idea of what waits for them at the other end.

"But Ma'am, I and my officers won't be allowed to make the decisions. The active Army command and the Department of Homeland Security agents are issuing the orders. I can be removed from command and my officers punished for willful refusal to obey orders. Whether those orders are lawful or not remains open to question, but they stand until countermanded. We would lose good officers to courts-martial and ... God knows ... what other fate, given the current situation."

"So it is actually that bad, on the military side, General?" Sadie McConklin asked.

"Probably worse, Ma'am. We're only a whisker away from the President invoking martial law. If you've not refreshed your memory concerning the provisions of martial law, now is probably not the time to do it. You'll have nightmares. In essence, as Commander in Chief in control of the Armed Forces, Stinson would become the military dictator of America. Every edict out of his mouth would be enforced by military force."

The governor bowed her head for a moment; her hands atop her desk squeezed so tightly together they went bloodlessly white. She remained lost in thought.

"General Mikelson, Commander Granger, if we can't take this bastard in a head-to-head confrontation, we'll just have to outsmart him. General ... Buzz ... if you were to obey the command directives given you from the Army, but perhaps in a thoroughly and deliberately careful and prudent fashion, might your forces move just a bit more slowly than our fleeing citizens?

"And Fred, if your men were strategically positioned in traffic control and public safety deployments, is it conceivable that those Federal detachments not familiar with the local terrain might become misdirected perhaps?"

Both men smiled and nodded.

"Yes, Ma'am! That is entirely possible!

"Dee'rah! You must warn Marie, immediately. Tell her to warn her grandparents, to get their people moving now! Federal forces have narrowed their search area and they are very close to finding her people! Can you reach her ... now?"

"I will try, Michael-mine! I think so. Oh ... this is so ... so STUPID that we do not have better communications between us! Really! I will tell my father that this prohibition of using our technology must STOP! Too many precious lives depend on us, on our help!"

"Dee'rah ... you are wasting time! Contact Marie ... and afterward I will tell you what a blessed help your father and your technology have been, already! Now go!"

The elder leader of the camped Nez Percé jerked awake. He opened his eyes to see the spirit vision of Raven Woman staring down at him.

"Get up! Cry alarm among the people! They must gather only their personal identification papers, whatever money they brought, and get dressed and make ready to flee—as quickly as possible. You must go up through the Myers Creek valley, and cross the border. Federal forces are preparing to tighten their search around you beginning at first light. Please, you must do it now. There is no time. If you are caught in the open during daylight they will encircle and trap you."

He scrambled to his feet. The old man cried out Marie's alarm, and hastened to wake a few young men to spread the message up and down the forested areas where the tents and shelters were hidden.

"Please, warn everyone to be careful with lights. Let us not be careless in our haste!"

"We must move quickly. The road is narrow in the creek valley, and that will confine us in the dust of a slow-moving convoy of vehicles. It would make it too easy for them to cut us off."

"It gives me a bad feeling," another elder warned. "It is easy for a soldier or a pilot to fire at a vehicle; it is something very different to shoot an unarmed person on foot. But if we do not use the vehicles, we will never reach the border in time.

"We will drive up the county road to the bend where the road turns east away from Myers Creek. From there it is a mile up a creek bottom wash to reach the border. We must drive another mile north from the border to the first houses, and the beginning of a rural road that will take us to Canadian Highway 3. I believe that once we are there, we will have reached safety. Until then, however ... nothing is certain!

"There is another thing. No firearms! Absolutely no weapons are to be carried with us. We must go unarmed. To carry firearms into our host country would be a grievous insult to them, and a most serious breach of their laws. No firearms may be taken across the border! Leave them behind in your tents. Leave every firearm behind!"

He turned to two of his peers: "We must appoint a checkpoint of sorts, to check everyone's vehicle. Everyone must obey the firearm prohibition. No weapon must slip past. I cannot be too insistent about this. If we show any firearms as we go, or if we attempt to cross the border while carrying them, then all is lost! We will give our pursuers reason to fire upon us. Many would die. Do this thing. I must go now to find more helpers; we will hasten the people."

They trusted that once they made it across into the safe haven of Canada, the pursuing American forces would respect the border and stop. One could hope.

From the time of their warning until the last vehicle was loaded and ready to go, more than an hour had elapsed. Roughly an hour remained until false dawn. Sunrise would begin at a little past 0530. The people had assembled quickly, but there were one hundred thirty-two men, women, and children. Time was needed to assemble the drivers and issue instructions:

"We must drive in the dark. Our eyes must become accustomed to it. The lead vehicle will shine a red-lens flashlight down at the road beside the driver's door to follow the road edge when necessary. He will drive slowly, no more than fifteen miles an hour. This is absolutely necessary so those behind may follow safely, and not risk collision. Under no circumstances must you use your headlights or touch your brake pedal! We do not have time to disable the brake lights on all these vehicles, so you must not use the brakes. Stay in low gear, keep two vehicle lengths between you and the dark shape of the vehicle ahead, and depend on your lower gears to slow you when needed.

"Need I tell anyone what a beacon it would be for a searcher if all the headlights or brake lights of a caravan of twenty-seven vehicles shone in the pre-dawn darkness? Another thing: if the brake lights of the vehicle ahead of you flared brightly in your face, you would be blinded. You could crash. Please, my brothers. We must go very slowly and carefully to get most quickly to safety.

The caravan wound like a black snake in the night, illuminated only by the brilliant carpet of stars overhead. Starlight, once one's eyes become fully accustomed to the dark, was surprisingly helpful in the crystal clarity of the mountain air. The lead vehicle set a very slow but steady pace. Seldom did a dim red beam shine down on the road's edge for guidance. No foot came near a brake pedal; all the drivers skillfully avoided over-running the vehicle in front of them.

They came to the sharp east-turning curve. It had taken them precious time to reach this point. The dim glow of false dawn was visible in the east. The vehicles stopped in a tight line. The driver of the lead vehicle turned to his friend beside him.

"Jackson, if you would walk ahead with your light ... the red night lens. Hold it down and shade the top of it with your free hand so it cannot be seen from above. Walk slowly and check our path. If you see something doubtful, call back to me. While you scan ahead, I'll run down the line and remind everyone who has it to engage their low-range four-wheel drive. Those who don't will have to pull out of line and leave their vehicle. They will have to ride in the backs of the pickups. I'll be sure everyone has a ride before I come back.

Aaron Elkstalker jogged down the line of vehicles, stopping at each one. Of the twenty-seven, only nine had to be pulled out of line and abandoned. There was ample room for their occupants under canopy covers among the pickup trucks.

"Okay, Jackson," Aaron called out to his friend, "we're all set behind me. How does it look ahead?"

"About like you'd expect for a creek wash. Stretches of smooth sand and gravel, cut through with ditches and small side gullies. We can make it okay, from what I was able to see, but it will be very slow going."

"That's a good thing. But I'm looking to the east and I see a bad thing. It's getting light. Too much light. If those Federals get choppers in the sky too soon, we could be in big trouble. How's your medicine these days, Jackson? Strong?" Aaron joked.

Jackson snorted. "About like yours, my friend. I wouldn't match my 'medicine' against a pair of deuces at the VFW Friday night poker game ... I'd lose!"

"Yeah. Start walking. Don't get too far ahead so I can't see you, and we'll go." He leaned his head out the window, whistled to the rig behind him, and started to move forward.

A caterpillar has an elastic body. It must, or it might pull itself in half while forging ahead on all those legs. Observe one, some time. The head is moving well before the tail gets the message. When the head decides to stop, the middle gets scrunched up before the tail gets the message and stops.

The caravan could pull ahead at a good walking pace on the sandy gravel bars of the flood plain. But everyone was forced to bunch up and wait when a lead vehicle slowed, nosed cautiously down into an eroded ditch or gully dug by flood waters, and crawled up the other side. Speeding across these obstacles was not an option. Excessive bouncing would bring an oil pan or differential housing crashing down on a rock. When a leading vehicle pulled clear, a following vehicle could advance and crawl through.

The caterpillar effect was frustrating to a line of eighteen vehicles and their race against the dawning sun. Eventually, the dawn brightened and Jackson called out to Aaron to get back in the rig. He could see well enough in the first pale light to pick out his own path.