DRAUMRS - Dreamweavers Among Us

22 - Pay the Piper

With the good night's sleep and fine weather, the canoeists were in much better spirits and anxious to get on the river once again. The continental river flowed north with relentless energy. Draining a huge watershed, the Missinaibi River moved vast amounts of water down from tributaries across the Canadian Shield out to James Bay. If it was aware of its passengers, it's motivation was only to move them along with minimum delay. Just getting on the river and letting it carry them north and out of the isolating wilderness was such a relief.

The shoreline was now broken by the occasional man-made clearing and hunt shack, visible up against the forest wall. The evidence of humans meant that they were below the last of the impassible white water. Durable boats with strong outboards could now churn up-river against the current to deliver hunters and trappers to these camps. The green curtain that had enveloped them was slowly easing open. Some of their anxiety was also retreating as open space filled more of the horizon.

When they started in the late morning, they were a full day's paddle south of the Moose River railway crossing, where they could take out the canoes and flag down the twice daily Polar Express train to carry them and their equipment back to Cochrane. They had planned to ride the train north and stay a night in Moosonee, but had used up that day in delays on the river. They had no desire to spend another night far away from home, if they could avoid it.

They all agreed that they would now catch the southbound train to take them to the van parked in Cochrane. Once there, they could choose to use the pre-booked rooms at the Comfort Inn or just get into the van and drive all night home. One more good night's sleep and they would be up for either. Just being around other people was going to be a huge comfort all on its own.

Just one more night on the river. Lester kept repeating the thought. He was certain that a similar thought, or wish, was in everyone's head, although no-one voiced it. Everyone was superstitious of ruining the good luck of the last 12 hours. Lester wished he could forget his dream and the red-haired temptress, but his personal finale and the exhorted promise stayed at the top of his mind. She was just part of his dream. It meant nothing. But, how had he injured himself?

Lester did feel refreshed nevertheless. Wendy and he had cleared out the tent and snuck in a very nice make-out session, with her doing most of the work while he just laid back and smiled. Seeing her smiling too, farmer tanned with tank-top lines that she would hate later and really enjoying herself, had almost cleared his mind of the night terrors. They had even napped a little more with the tent rustling in a light breeze and had no dreams at all. He still had no explanation, but wanted desperately to rationalize it all away. He had said nothing more to the others about the crazy car ride, the redhead or their near deaths in the black water. It was just a dream.

They set their last camp on a sand beach on the west side of the lake-wide river. Still carrying summer rains, it was now deep enough to give the impression of less current. They were approaching the wide delta section of the Moose River which would eventually simply open to James Bay. Only the occasional branch floating by at twice walking speed gave away the river's continued power. Paddling with that current, with no more rapids or portages to worry about, they had covered more than 60 kilometers and had only half that to go, when they finally made camp. It was 8:30 in the evening, but at this latitude they were still in mid-afternoon sun.

"Lean-to again?" Geoff asked, as he pulled the empty canoes up onto the flat and grassy bank. They had started a fire immediately and the girls were organizing a feast of everything left in the food pack. For many days, they hadn't felt like eating so now had the benefit of several unused freeze-dried meals to eat all at once. By home standards, it was the kind of stuff you leave on your plate. Up here, it was gourmet gastronome. They even had one box of wine left. It promised to be a nice evening.