Joy’s friend Russ set their search area in the most likely spot the missing kids may be, since he knew Joy was fearless and would skim close to the treetops. They’d been flying over the thickening canopy for an hour and were so close Brian thought he could almost identify the species of the trees. He recognized sugar maples mixed in with white pine and every once in a while they passed over a several hundred acre patch of paper birch that tend to spring up in the wake of a forest fire throughout most of the Adirondacks. Joy mentioned having helped put a fire out several years earlier. Even though he fought it, Brian couldn’t help the anxious feeling he got in the pit of his stomach at the idea of her flying this close to raging flames. She didn’t want his caring and protection, he sternly reminded himself, so why did he still long to give it? Brian put the thought away and concentrated on the terrain below. As she took them higher toward the peak of the mountain, sugar maple and white pine gave way to balsam firs.
