Deadfall Read Free Page A

river water, Frank joined the other two on the top of the far bank.

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    "Let's not waste time," Joe said. 'The fire's bigger. And I still don't see Stan!"
    As the three of them ran toward the blazing mill, they heard a siren approaching. A moment later they spotted a fire truck through the trees. Men in everyday clothes and yellow helmets were hanging on to the sides of the truck. They looked as though they'd dropped whatever they were doing to come to fight the fire.
    As the teenagers neared the mill, the parking lot came into view. "Stan's truck is gone," Frank said, relieved. "He must have left before the explosion. But wouldn't he have heard it?"
    "No time to worry about that now," Joe pointed out. "This is a volunteer fire department—just the local townspeople. They could probably use our help."
    "There're more volunteers coming," Callie said, pointing down the road. "In a little town like this, everybody has to pitch in." Behind the fire truck were several cars with flashing red lights stuck on to their dashboards. The drivers and passengers were staring, awestruck, at the growing blaze.
    As they jogged toward the parking lot to meet the fire truck, Frank could hear the siren wailing in Crosscut, far down the mountain. At the same time another siren sounded and Frank spotted a police car racing up the mountain from the opposite direction. He wondered whether it would be the Sheriff Ferris that Stan had mentioned at the general store.

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    The volunteer fire fighters had piled off the truck and were unwinding the enormous fire hose and heading toward the blaze with it. Frank approached one of the men, who was already sweating under his yellow helmet. **Anything we can do to help?" he shouted over the noise of the sheriffs siren.
    ''Sure. Line up and help move the hose," the man commanded. 'Tell the others to do the same. We think somebody might still be in there."
    Callie's face went pale in spite of the incredible heat from the blaze.
    Frank put an arm around her. "Remember," he cautioned, "Stan's truck is gone. There's no reason to think it's him."
    Before Callie could respond another car pulled up beside the trio and a man and woman in jeans and T-shirts leapt out. "How can we help?" the woman demanded, her eyes switching from Frank to the enormous, frightening blaze.
    "Help with the hose," Frank told her. "We'll need all the volunteers we can get."
    By now the fire had spread throughout the mill. Two warehouses and one of the huge piles of lumber that lay at the edge of the property were also burning. More cars and trucks had arrived from town. The instant they stopped in the parking lot, loggers and other locals leapt out to help.
    The sheriff was kept busy giving orders to the volunteers, Frank noticed as he fought to hold

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    on to the bucking hose. The loggers were so organized, he had a feeling they'd been through all this before.
    'They found someone!" Callie shouted just then. ''Look! They're bringing him out now!"
    The volunteers surged forward as three men emerged from the flaming mill carrying a blanket-covered body. Frank heard another siren over the noise of the crowd and swiveled around to see an ambulance arriving.
    Almost instantly a pair of paramedics worked their way through the crowd with a stretcher and a portable oxygen tank. Frank strained to see who the victim was, but smoke and the crowd blocked his view. He knew Callie was even more anxious than he was.
    Fifteen minutes later the paramedics passed through the crowd on their way back to their ambulance, this time carrying the body of a huge man, now completely covered with the blanket.
    "It's Buster!" Frank heard everyone murmur as the stretcher passed by them. "Buster Owens! Burned in his own mill!"
    "Oh, no." Frank turned to Callie. Her face revealed a mixture of horror at Owens's death and relief that it wasn't her uncle. Suddenly she began to cry. Frank put an arm around her.
    "He must have died from