The Widow - Carla Neggers [9]
“Why not?” Sean asked.
“Swimming uses up your body’s heat faster. You want to conserve heat.”
Ian frowned. “Why?”
“So you don’t get hypothermia. That’s when your body temperature drops. At first you get blue lips and start shivering. But it gets worse—you get confused, you slur your words, your muscles get weak. You end up in a world of hurt.”
“Oh, right.” Sean nodded knowledgeably. “Mom told us. She says people don’t dress right on a hike, and they end up dying of the cold. Even in summer.”
“And in water, your body loses heat even faster. Try to keep as much of your body out of water as you can. If you can reach an overturned boat, hang on to it. If you can’t, keep your head out of water and stay as still as possible. Tread water if you’re in a life vest, get into the ‘heat escape lessening position’ or H.E.L.P.—you cross your arms high up on your chest and draw your legs up toward your groin. Huddle with other people in the water.”
“Have you ever been stuck in cold water?” Sean asked.
“No.”
“Have you ever rescued anyone who had hypo—” Ian frowned. “What is it?”
“Hypothermia. Yes. I’ve rescued lots of people with hypothermia.”
And he’d recovered bodies of people who’d died of it, too.
Both boys’ color had improved, and they’d stopped shivering. Owen knew they’d warm up fast, but he probably shouldn’t have let them stay out in the chilly Maine water that long. Their father, though, wouldn’t care—Doyle had grown up on Mt. Desert Island and had a healthy respect for the elements, but he wasn’t afraid of them. And he wouldn’t want his boys to be afraid.
Sean and Ian pulled on sweatshirts and sweatpants but balked at wearing shoes because of the sand stuck between their toes. They ran ahead of Owen up to the parking lot and his truck. He wrapped the extra stuff in the blanket—untouched chocolate bars and water, sunscreen, bug spray, shoes, extra towels—and followed the boys. He could still feel the adrenaline that had sustained him through the past two weeks of nonstop work. It’d be a while before he could relax.
This had been a long year of disasters. He knew he needed to rest.
He tossed the blanket in the back of his truck. He had a full range of emergency supplies and equipment there. If anything had happened down on the beach, he’d have been prepared.
He liked being back on Mt. Desert. A third of the island’s 82,000 acres formed the bulk of Acadia National Park, protecting its glacial landscape of pink granite mountains, finger-shaped ponds, evergreen forests and rockbound coast. Owen was a part-time resident, often away for long stretches, but he knew a part of his soul would always remain there.
The boys had fallen asleep by the time Owen reached the private drive off Route 3 where his great-grandfather, a visionary and an eccentric, had built a stunning “cottage” in 1919 that burned in the great fires of 1947. The mammoth conflagration consumed thousands of acres and hundreds of summer mansions, its path still marked by younger deciduous forests. After the fire, Owen’s grandparents built a smaller house on the ledge behind the original site, above the Atlantic. Now it was eccentric Ellis Cooper’s summer home. But when his family sold their Mt. Desert property after Doe’s death, Owen had talked his grandmother into saving a chunk of waterfront for him. It was where he’d built his own Maine place, working on it on and off over the past ten years.
He turned down the narrow gravel road that led to his house and, up the headland, the Browning house. Will Browning had often helped Owen work on his house. When he was home, Chris would pitch in. He’d lost his parents to the sea as a toddler, and his grandfather, a solitary man, had raised him.
Originally, the Browning house had been a guest cottage, but Owen’s great-grandfather