By Chance, A Reunion -- A Death In The Wilderness Binds Three People

Someone once said that you keep meeting the same 200 people in your lifetime. Last week, Mary DeFelice-Bartley happened to read a story about the Seattle woman who won $1 million in the Pillsbury Bake-Off. Her name is Ellie Mathews.

Mary read the story and suddenly, simply felt overwhelmed. It was the same Ellie.

July 21, 1988:

Mary, then 35, an administrative assistant at a Seattle bank, had been engaged for three weeks to Mel Webb, then 36, a Metro bus driver. That July weekend, they had driven to Lake Chelan and taken the boat to the isolated town of Stehekin to go hiking in the Cascades.

"Mel was bouncing off the trees with ideas about where to hike, most of them involving lots of climbing straight up," Mary remembered.

That's the way Mel was, Mary knew by now. She called it his "adventuring mode." They woke up the next morning with Mel excited to go hiking up a snowfield. Mary wanted to spend the afternoon resting by a waterfall, but she knew there was no point in talking Mel out of his exploring. He went hiking by himself; she fell asleep by the waterfall.

When she woke up, she waited for Mel to return. She worried, but she also told herself this was nothing unusual. Getting back on time from a bicycle or hiking trip wasn't a high priority for Mel.

When he didn't return that night, there wasn't much that Mary could do to help in the dark. A bus from Stehekin had taken them 22 miles to their base camp; there were no other hikers around. She calmed herself by telling herself that it wasn't that cold, that he was physically strong.

The next day, the search-and-rescue helicopter spotted Mel's body. He apparently had slid down snow, tumbled onto rocks and punctured both lungs.

That same weekend, Ellie Mathews, her husband, Carl Youngmann, and another couple had been hiking in that vicinity, arriving at the base camp as Mary waited for news about Mel. Ellie, then 42, had been a software designer; she now writes short stories.

She and others overheard the rescuers talking on the radio that Mel had been killed in the accident. Mary had not yet been told.

"Ever done this before?" Ellie asked the park ranger, meaning, breaking the news to Mary that Mel had been killed. The ranger asked Ellie to be there when he took Mary aside, to in some way help the young woman get through that first shock.

If it's true that you meet the same 200 people in your lifetime, sometimes you luck out, and among those 200 are a few right ones.

Ellie and others in her party helped pack the hiking equipment that Mary and Mel had brought with them. Ellie kept Mary company as the Park Service sent a truck to take her back to Stehekin. At the lodge, where Ellie and her husband had rented a room, they made sure Mary could shower and compose herself.

Then Ellie paid her own way when a chartered plane arrived to take Mary back to Chelan. Knowing that Mary would be left to drive by herself back to Seattle, Ellie kept her company, a sympathetic listener to whatever Mary wanted to talk about.

"At the time, I was very alone from the comfort of friends and family," Mary remembered, "and Ellie came to my aid. I remember asking her how I could ever thank her enough for what she did for me. She said, simply, to pass on the gift of helping others in need."

Later, when there was a memorial service for Mel, Ellie attended. The two women kept in touch for a while, sending each other Christmas cards. Time passed and Mary married. Ellie and Carl changed residences. Christmas cards came back unopened.

They might have lost track of each other, but the vivid memory of that July weekend never left them.

Last week, Mary read about the local woman who beat out tens of thousands of other entries in the Pillsbury Bake-Off with her Salsa Couscous Chicken recipe, and won $1 million.

This past Saturday, Mary and Ellie met once again.

Mary said to Ellie, "What you did, it really kind of saved my life."

And Ellie told Mary, "Well, wouldn't you have done the same?"

Erik Lacitis' column runs Sunday, Tuesday and Friday. His phone number is 206-464-2237. His e-mail address is: elac-new@seatimes.com