“Let’s go, soldier.” Carter passed the light to someone else and followed the captain. They ran, tapping other soldiers on the shoulders, until there were a half dozen of them sprinting for the bridge. Susan splashed along the pavement after them, still clutching Archie’s coat, like it was a part of him, like if she held it tightly enough she might be able to will him out of the water.

The center of the bridge was up. It had been up since that morning, when the city had ordered it raised indefinitely so that it wouldn’t short out and get stuck in the down position. It would be hard to get to him from there. If Archie didn’t get to the side, he’d wash right under the bridge and there’d be no way to get him. North of the Steel Bridge the river widened and the park gave way to condos and the port.

Susan chased the soldiers as they dashed down the promenade and onto the bridge’s concrete pedestrian walkway. They ran to the drop-off, where the rest of the bridge had been lifted, and climbed over the safety gate. Carter knelt down on the edge of the walkway. “All you have to do is hold on to my ankles, and when I have them, pull us up,” he said to the others, as if it were that simple.

Susan strained to see Archie and the kid fighting the current in the light. They were close. Maybe thirty feet away, maybe fifty. “They’re almost here,” she said.

Carter handed her a black flashlight off his belt. “Turn this on and hold it so he can see us.”

She would be his light, so he knew they were there, so he’d come to them.

Suddenly calm with purpose, Susan tied Archie’s coat around her waist, turned the flashlight on, and lay flat on the wet bridge so she could get as close to Carter as possible. Then she hooked her feet through the safety gate, extended the flashlight off the end of the walkway, and pointed it south. She turned the flashlight on and off, hoping to catch Archie’s attention. Unlike most of Portland’s other bridges, the Steel Bridge was not festooned with lights. It was an old girl: functional, practical. Just streetlights on the upper-deck roadway, and a few lights along the length of the bottom deck.

See me, Susan willed Archie. See me.

She could feel the weight of Archie’s gun in his coat, like a fist. The wet concrete and metal was cold but Susan pressed the side of her face into it, trying to get her arm even lower. She could feel tears hot on her cheeks, or rain, or both.

“He’s coming this way,” she heard someone say from above.

“Lower me,” Carter said.