One
May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view.
—Edward Abbey, environmental activist
Ranger Scout Johnson was the kind of person who loved allowing room for error. Leaving ten minutes early to beat traffic. Double-checking weather before a hike. Carrying an extra water bottle. Never letting her gas tank dip below half. Keeping a spare key hidden outside her cabin. She tried to anticipate any and all “just in case” possibilities. Butthiswas something she could not have anticipated.
She stood on the rocky shore of Baker Island, arms crossed as she watched the skiff wobble its way back to the tourist boat—without her. She let out a long sigh. Any second now, Frankie would realize he’d left her behind. Surely, he’d notice.
Patience, Scout reminded herself. Frankie Franklin was barely eighteen. Chief Ranger Tim Rivers had called it a great privilege when he’d asked her to supervise him over the summer. Frankie was the son of the deputy director of the National Park Service, and apparently, he’d had a little bit of trouble fitting into his father’s shoes. “I’ve been at this job long enough,”the chief told her, “to know a true parkie. If anyone can turn Frankie around, it’s you.” That vote of confidence filled her sails. She promised herself that Frankie Franklin would be the pride of the National Park Service.
One week later, she was just about ready to throw in the towel.
It didn’t take long for Scout to understand why Frankie’d already been “relieved of duty” from his other youth program opportunities. The Youth Conservation Corps had lasted three days with him. The Summit Stewards ... only two. Frankie considered his seasonal work for the NPS as his summer break.
Scout squinted, wonderingwhatin the world Frankie was doing out there. Here it was low tide, calm seas, yet the skiff was zigzagging so badly it looked like he was playing connect the dots with the waves. She winced. One of the tourists had suffered from seasickness on the boat ride from Bar Harbor. The lady had been doing better once she walked around on Baker Island, but this skiff ride would get her stomach churning again.
If Scout was being honest, her doubts about Frankie’s capabilities had started the first day he’d accompanied her on the Baker Island NPS tour. She’d wrapped up her carefully memorized script about the lighthouse and capped it off with a joke: “Now, I know y’all don’t need me to say this, but it’s regulation, so here goes: Don’t lick the lighthouse. The paint’s got lead in it.”
Normally, that got a chuckle out of the tourists. After all, who would ever do such a thing? But minutes later, there was Frankie, tongue out, just inches from the lighthouse wall. A girl on the tour had dared him, he’d told Scout. A pretty girl, of course.
Today might be the worst of the Frankie days. Just thirty minutes ago, Scout had left the group to do what Frankie hadn’t done. She’d told him to close up the whale oil house near thelighthouse after the last person left, but halfway down the trail, she had a nagging feeling that he hadn’t followed through. A couple of adorable teenage girls, Frankie’s kryptonite, had been on the tour.
So she told him she’d be right back, in plenty of time for the last skiff trip. She had backtracked up the path, and sure enough, the door was banging open in the wind. Originally built to store the whale oil needed to keep the lighthouse burning—and positioned at a safe distance to prevent fires—the old brick oil house had since been transformed into a miniature museum of the island. A tiny treasure trove.
Scout stepped inside to check the window. Wide open. She sighed, frustration prickling at her. This was exactly how those priceless old photographs of Baker Island’s history could be ruined. Storms had been rolling through nearly every day this June, bringing wind and rain that could seep in and destroy them. Did Frankie think of that?No sir.
She had exhaled a sigh of exasperation as she pressed the window sash down. Her knee bumped against the wall and a brick shifted.
Strange.
She knelt down and jiggled the brick that had moved. To her surprise, it came loose in her hand, revealing a weathered brown envelope wrapped with a string. Her first thought was that she would need to submit a request form to maintenance to repair a loose brick. Her second thought was wondering what might be inside that brown envelope that was worth hiding.
Curiosity won over. Carefully, she brushed off the dust, untied the string, and opened it up. She found some papers, fragile but intact, and unfolded them. A yellowed newspaper clipping fell to the ground. She picked it up and read the headline.
Tragedy at Sea: USS North Atlantic Wrecked Off Maine Coast—Dozens Feared Lost
Then her gaze slid to a handwritten note on the top of the clipping.
I did it.
Her pulse quickened. Her eyes went back and forth between the headline on the newspaper and the ... what could it be? A confession, that’s what. It sent a chill from head to toe, and she folded up the papers and tucked them back into the brown envelope, tying it hastily with the string. This was the property of the National Park Service, and she shouldn’t be reading it.
But someone should know about it.
She stuffed the envelope into her jacket and zipped it up, then ran down the path to the beach.
And that’s where she was now, waiting for Frankie Franklin to notice her absence. She squinted again and saw the skiff was tied to the tourist boat as the last group loaded onto it.
Scout waved and waved, but no one waved back. She tried her walkie-talkie, but there was no response, which meant Frankie had his turned off. More than likely, he’d never turned it on. He said he didn’t like it. Too much static.
Surely, the tourist boat skipper would realize she had gone missing. Surely, he had the good sense to do a head count before leaving for Bar Harbor. Frankie certainly wouldn’t. She had to remind herself that it was a privilege to be given the responsibility to shape the character of Frankie, the deputy director’s son. It came with the honor of serving the NPS. And Acadia truly was worth it.
Sometimes Scout could hardly believe she was here. This park had always been her goal. Four years patching together seasonal ranger work—summers in one park, winters in another—she’d been working her way sideways, climbing the ladder one park at a time. Landing a permanent status position at a heavilytrafficked park like Yellowstone or Yosemite or Acadia was the NPS equivalent of winning the lottery. Each year, Scout had applied to openings in Acadia. So far, her postings had been Petrified Forest in Arizona. Voyageurs in Minnesota. Badlands in South Dakota. Each one special in its own way, but under-the-radar national parks. That’s how things rolled in the NPS.
Then, this year: Acadia National Park. Interpretive ranger. Permanent status. A dream come true! When the email came through, she stared at it for a solid minute, convinced it was sent to her in error. Interps were the most competitive, most sought-after jobs in the NPS. Someone, somewhere, must’ve said a prayer for her—though definitely not her mother. Mother’s prayers were laser-focused on getting her back to Atlanta to meet a Southern boy and “settle down.”
No thank you, ma’am.
