Page 42 of Christmas Secrets

“How do the bees live in winter? I knew Darro had hives, but I’ve never seen one before. Living in the suburbs of Inverness, ye miss out on all this.” She waved one hand about.

“Except fer checking to make sure they have enough honey to eat through the winter, ye just let them be,” Ben replied. “Dad used to have a few beehives but fer some reason he got stung a lot, so he just gets our honey from Darro.”

Dorothy giggled. “Didn’t they like his pheromones?”

“Maybe too much. After a few climbed down the back of his pants he finally quit trying.”

Dorothy’s musical laugh rang out. “I can just see that, yer dad dancing around. Why didn’t he wear those beekeeper suits to keep the bees off?”

Ben loved her laugh; it always made him feel good to know she was happy.

“Always said he didn’t need them.”

“Ha!” She glanced back at him again, a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “I want to get to Neamh first. Let’s race. Is it clear enough that I can just run right past yer dad?”

“Aye, if ye stay to the...”

The rest of his words were lost when Dottie suddenly gunned the snowmobile and it leaped to the left with an amazing burst of speed and power. “Woot!” Dottie exclaimed as they whipped past a startled Angus who suddenly looked very concerned.

Ben grabbed both her elbows and yelled into her ear over the high thrum of the engine. “Dottie, no! “Veer right...hit the brakes...ye’ll be on ice!”

To her credit, Dottie did immediately try to brake and swerve right, but she was going too fast the make a sharp turn and Ben knew they weren’t going to miss the loch. The Polaris was incredibly fast. When the snowmobile went into a sideways slide, he grabbed Dottie around the waist and pulled them both off the skidding machine to land in the deep snow and roll a few feet. They both sat up and watched as the Polaris kept sliding until it slowly came to a spinning stop about thirty feet out, and then they heard the cracks in the ice. They were almost like pistol shots as they rang out in the clear air.

Angus pulled to a stop and leaped off his Artic Cat. “Are ye all right, Ben? Either one of ye hurt?”

Ben was breathing hard, his arms still around Dottie as she lay panting back against him. “Are ye all right, Dottie?” he echoed his father’s distress as he turned her in his arms to inspect her. Except for a few scratches that were bleeding on one side of her face, she looked okay.

“I think so,” Dottie sniffed, the tears forming in her eyes. Her hands were shaking as she took off her glove and wiped her face. Another loud crack drew her attention back to the Polaris and she tried to jump up. “My snowmobile,” she wailed.

Another loud crack and they watched helplessly as one back runner of the Polaris dipped down. Dottie started toward it but Ben caught her arm and pulled her back. “Are ye crazy? The ice is thinner in the middle and ye’ll be pulled under.”

“He’s right, Dottie,” Angus said gravely. “But we can try to save it.” He turned around and dug into the big bin attached to the Artic Cat and pulled out a coil of rope. “Stand back.”

Ben, Poppy, and Dottie all moved away to give Angus room. “Poppy, call Darro and tell him to bring some ropes out on snowmobiles immediately. And maybe send a truck. Even if we manage to get this thing out of the water, it may not be drivable.”

The other back runner suddenly began a very slow dip and the Polaris weaved back and forth like a drunk trying to sit on a small stump. Dottie screamed.

Angus walked out about six more feet and whirled the large loop around his head and sent it spinning towards the Polaris. It landed neatly around both handle bars and he yanked it tight. Then he suddenly dug his feet in and yelled. “Help me, Ben, she’s tryin’ to go under.”

Ben rushed to his dad’s side and grabbed the rope below Angus’s fingers and they both pulled.

“I can help, Dottie yelled and started forward, but Poppy grabbed her arm as Ben yelled. “Nay, Dottie! We don’t need more weight out here; we are already on ice. Ye and Poppy both need to stay back.”

“I don’t think we can pull her out, lad, the ice is splittin’ more and soon her belly will be in the water,” Angus said, his breath puffing from the exertion of holding the machine out of the sucking water.

“Mayhap we can hold it until help gets here,” Ben replied heavily, glancing towards Neamh. He could see the small figures of snowmobiles with their riders heading out from behind Neamh’s barns. His upper lip was beading up with sweat in spite of the cold. Every time they tried to pull, the runners wouldn’t come up and he had to assume there was heavy ice weighing them down. They must have slipped beneath it when they went in.

Angus nodded. “We can try, but we both know if our feet start slidin’, we’ll be pulled in with it if we don’t let go.”

“I know, Dad. I just want to save it if we can, fer Dottie’s sake.”

“We’ll try, lad, that’s all we can do. Just hold her stable fer now.”

“Isn’t there anything we can do?” Dottie yelled, wringing her hands. “What about tying the rope to the Artic Cat?”

Angus looked over his shoulder. “I only have the one rope, but even if we could, there’s no way one of us could let go long enough to tie it. It’s takin’ everythin’ we’ve got just to keep it above water,” he shot back at her.

“Why isn’t it coming out, honey?” Poppy asked Angus.

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