Countdown [antikvár]

CHAPTER ONEBitter wind from Crazy Peak tugged at the sagebrush as fourteen-year-old Elliot Schroeder coaxed his big buckskin horse back toward the ranch. He rode easily as if his short frame had grown from the saddle. Across his lap, he held a kicking newborn calf. The morning wind gusted. Elliot pulled an old gunnysack from his saddlebag and wrapped it around the bloody calf like a blanket. He clapped his frozen gloves against his pants to warm his hands and threaded his way down the rocky slope. The calfs mother followed, bawling her concern. The calf kept struggling."Knock it offl" Elliot scolded, squinting into the driving snow. "You'd be dead if I hadn't found you."He was right, too. Early snows could freeze a calf to death before its mother licked it dry. Elliot knew he was lucky to find the calf. He had been daydreaming, watching the snowflakes swirl past him like stars past a spaceship blasting through space. Only the mother cow's