The Maggody Militia Page 9

  “I’ll set up the communications post in town. I can hardly plug the computer into that tree, can I? I think I hear another vehicle coming across the pasture. I need to make sure it’s one of our people instead of some nosy federal agents.” He paused to study Jake’s face for a telltale flicker of guilt. “I had a communiqué from the outfit over in Oklahoma. It seems they discovered an informant in their midst, a sneaky bastard taking money from the FBI. He’d been in their cell for over two years before they uncovered him.”

  “Did they hang him by his balls?” Jake asked as he pulled the tent out of the bag and began to unroll it.

  “Something like that.”

  “Sumbitch deserved it.”

  “My sentiments exactly.” Sterling left him to struggle with the tent and returned to the pasture. The truck belonged to Red Rooster. For a moment, he assumed the passenger was Apocalypse, but as the truck got closer, he recognized Dylan Gilbert. It was unfortunate, he told himself as he crossed the gully, that the young man had not drifted elsewhere. Theirs was an enthusiastic group, but hardly as professional as the one in Colorado. Red Rooster had passed along Dylan’s remark about the compound in Idaho, too. Sterling knew the brethren there had been ruthless when they’d been under siege by the feds for nearly three weeks. Some of them had been given life sentences despite the fact they were doing nothing more than protecting their families.

  Reed cut off the engine and got out of the truck. “How’s it going, Pitts?” he said as he began to unload his camping equipment.

  “You’re supposed to call me Silver Fox.”

  “Yeah, okay,” said Reed. “How’re you doing, Judy? Where’s Jake?”

  Sterling stomped his boot in the mud. “Refer to him as Blitzer, damn it! This is not a Boy Scout Jamboree. We are here for a purpose—and it’s not to roast marshmallows and tell ghost stories. Tell your friend to get his gear, and I’ll lead you to the encampment. I myself will be staying at a motel in order to remain in communication with the network.”

  “What’s the matter, Pops?” said Dylan as he lazily emerged from the truck. “Getting too old to rough it with the rest of us?”

  “My name is Silver Fox! Can’t you morons get that through your thick skulls?”

  “Look at this, Silver Fox,” Reed said, holding out a blowgun. “Jake—I mean Blitzer—told me to check it out. It’s a helluva lot more accurate than a knife. I took down a crow at more than forty feet.”

  “Interesting,” said Sterling.

  “You bet it is. I got some paint pellets so I can show everybody how powerful it is. It didn’t cost but about thirty dollars.” He pointed at a sparrow on a limb across the gully. “Watch this.”

  He loaded a pellet into the blowgun, leveled it, and took a deep breath. A noise no louder than a mouse’s fart accompanied the release of the pellet. The sparrow continued to watch them, its head cocked.

  Pitts looked at the orange splotch on the front of his field jacket. “Good work, Red Rooster. I can see how terrified all of our feathered friends will be in the future. Now, would you put that blasted thing away and get your gear?” He looked at Dylan, who was sniggering. “You, too, if you’re planning to participate in the retreat. Otherwise, take a hike back to Colorado.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Dylan balanced a sleeping bag on one shoulder and picked up a duffel bag.

  Reed fondled the blowgun. “Hey, I’m real sorry, Sterling. I practiced all day yesterday with this baby, and I was getting to where I could hit something clear across the parking lot behind my apartment. ’Course there were some wild shots while I was learning. This old boy that lives below me liked to have gone crazy when he saw the paint on his car, but I told him next time I’d use a dart and aim for his tires if he didn’t stop squawking.”

  “Just call me Silver Fox,” Sterling said in a discouraged voice, then started back across the gully.

  “Did you do that on purpose?” asked Judy as Reed walked by.

  Reed was torn between not wanting to admit he’d made a bad shot and confessing that he’d purposely assailed their leader, which might amount to treason. “It was one of those things,” he muttered. “You aiming to sit there all night?”

  “I might.”

  Dylan joined them. “You’re too pretty to spend the next few days wallowing in the mud. Judy, right? I’m Dylan. I think I’m going to like it here more than I thought.”

  “Hey!” Reed said, thumping Dylan on the back with the blow gun. “You’d better watch that kind of thing. Jake’s liable not to like it, and he’s one mean fucker when he’s riled up. He did six weeks in the county jail for biting off a biker’s ear in a brawl.”

  Judy winked at Dylan, then went back to studying the dusty dashboard. The two men crossed the gully and disappeared into the woods. After a while, Jake emerged and came back to the truck, his eyes hard.

  “Thought you was coming to the camp,” he said.

  “You thought wrong. If Sterling can stay in a motel in town, then I can, too. He can bring me out here to do the cooking and washing up, but there’s no reason why I should spend the next three nights in a smelly sleeping bag on the rocks. If you don’t like it, I’ll find a way to get myself to Emmett in time to baby-sit tomorrow. Take it or leave it, Jake.”

  “You planning to sleep alone?”

  “Heavens, no. I was planning to ask Silver Fox to crawl into bed with me. He may still have a little life in his old pecker. Or maybe that new fellow named Dylan. I could tell from looking at him that he’s a real stud. After all, he’s got be a good twenty years younger than you.”

  “Damn it,” Jake said, making a fist but keeping it at his side, “you got no call to talk like that. I ’spose you can stay in town as long as Sterling keeps an eye on you. I want you to promise to stay in your motel room and not go wandering around town. From what I’ve heard, there are some mighty peculiar folks in Maggody.”

  Judy decided not to comment about grown men who snuck around the woods with green and brown makeup on their faces and guns that fired paint pellets. Boy, that’d stop the foreign troops in their tracks. They’d be laughing so hard they could be rounded up effortlessly and deposited in makeshift stockades.

  “I promise to stay in the motel room,” she said.

  “Make sure that you do.” Jake stared at her, then gathered the rest of his gear and headed for the gully.

  “This is more like it,” Jim Bob said as he opened a beer and settled his muddy shoes on the crate that served as a coffee table in the trailer. “Hey, Larry Joe, if you’re gonna fix yourself a bologna sandwich, make one for me. I skipped breakfast on account of not wanting to disturb Mrs. Jim Bob when I left the house.”

  “What’d she say when you told her we was going hunting?” asked Larry Joe. “Joyce was mad like she always is, but she said she’d cover for me if the principal at the high school calls to check up on me. It isn’t like those little bastards in my shop classes aren’t cutting school to go huntin,’ too. There were so few of them yesterday that I sent them to the library.”

  “To do what?”

  “Hell, I don’t know. Study or something.” Larry Joe opened a cooler and dug around for the package of bologna. “So what’d she say?”

  “Some critter must have died in the outhouse,” said Roy Stiver, zipping up his fly as he came into the trailer. “It stinks to high heavens.”

  Jim Bob slapped his brow. “And us without a can of pine-scented air freshener! I knew we’d forget something essential. Put mustard on my sandwich, Larry Joe—unless we forgot that, too. Cut off the crust while you’re at it, and put on the tea kettle.”

  Roy sat down at the kitchen table and shuffled a deck of cards. “I was just making an observation, for chrissake. You want to play poker or sit there like a boil on a preacher’s ass?”

  “Deal the cards,” Jim Bob said, smugly congratulating himself for changing the subject. Mrs. Jim Bob would have figured out by the middle of the morning where he’d gone, but there wasn’t anyth
ing she could do about it until he got home. That scene was something he didn’t want to think about and spoil his weekend, not when they had plenty of beer, whiskey, bologna, and cards.

  “I think we forgot the mustard,” Larry Joe said with a sigh.

  Instead of going straight back to Maggody, I went to Farberville to report in person to Harve and find out if he’d heard anything from the FBI about the prints. The sheriff’s department, which housed the county jail as well as offices, a weight room, and more showers than to be found in all of Maggody, was a complete contrast to my two-room, shabby PD. It always depressed me.

  LaBelle glanced up at me over the top of her sequined bifocals, sniffed, and resumed talking on the telephone. From what I could tell, the conversation concerned a young relative with head lice. LaBelle’s not a Buchanon, but she should be.

  “I need to speak to Harve,” I said.

  She covered the mouthpiece. “He’s busy. You’ll have to make an appointment for sometime next week.”

  “I’ve just come from a murder scene, and I need to speak to Harve. I cannot wait until next week, or even until you stop offering nit-picking advice to your sister or whoever it is.”

  “Then go on back to his office,” she said with a flip of her hand. “Don’t blame me if he bites your head off, though. I warned you.”

  Harve was seated at his desk, gazing dully at a stack of folders. An ashtray contained a veritable mountain of burned matches, and flakes of gray ash decorated most of the nearby surfaces. The potted plant on his desk appeared discouraged, if not yet dead.

  “What’d you find?” he asked.

  “Not much.” I took out my notebook and flipped it open. “The victim’s name was Katherine Avenued, twenty-one, lived alone in an apartment on Thurber Street. Her parents moved to Tucson several years ago. She waited tables at a Mexican restaurant and started taking classes at the business college in August. Her only friend seemed to have been Heidi Coben, the homeowner’s daughter. Katherine didn’t mention anything out of the ordinary when Heidi last talked to her on Monday. We pulled up a lot of prints, but you know as well as I that if these perps are pros, they wear gloves.”

  “What else did the Coben women say?”

  I tried not to wince as he pulled a splintery cigar butt out of his shirt pocket and reached for a box of matches. “Mrs. Coben received a hefty divorce settlement and could afford nice things. Besides the stuff you already knew about, she’s missing a computer, a fax machine, a cordless telephone, a bunch of silver pieces, a pair of antique dueling pistols, a camcorder, and a jewelry box that deserved a spot in Fort Knox. There may be more after she does a thorough search.”

  Harve fired up the cigar, eyed the overflowing ashtray, and dropped the match on the floor. “They had all that expensive stuff, lived in the middle of nowhere, and didn’t have a burglar alarm?”

  “Heidi said that Katherine set it off by accident when she first moved in. After that, she refused to turn it on because she was afraid she’d do it again. I guess she figured her presence was enough, but she parked her car in the garage and more than likely turned off the lights when she went to bed.”

  “Damn,” Harve drawled, the cigar bobbling. “Did you ask the women all those questions about who could have known they were away?”

  “Not a single concurrence,” I said as I closed the notebook. “The burglars obviously weren’t watching the house, or they would have been aware of Katherine’s presence. They weren’t worried about the alarm, either.”

  “Any of the other houses have alarms?”

  “No, all the victims have in common is that they chose to live in rural areas. One couple retired here from Chicago, another from someplace in California. One husband’s a history professor, one a minister, one a consulting architect. Elsie gets by on Social Security and what I imagine is a modest savings account.” I slapped the notebook on his desk. “This is driving me nuts, Harve!”

  “You and me both—and you’re not up for reelection.”

  I glowered at him for a moment, wondering what he’d do if I yanked off my badge and stomped out of his office. Probably not much, since my paycheck came from the town council. I calmed myself down and said, “I may as well go by Sterling Pitts’s office and try one last time to talk him into rescheduling his so-called maneuvers. You have the address handy?”

  He looked it up in the telephone directory, told me how to find it, and was back to staring at the folders when I left. LaBelle ignored me as I went through the reception area, no doubt disappointed that my head was still firmly attached to my neck. She did not instruct me to have a good day.

  The Tri-County Patriots’ Insurance office was housed in a shabby little building on an unfamiliar street. On one side was a warehouse, and on the other a dry cleaning establishment. There were no vehicles in the parking lot, but through the window I spotted a young woman seated at a desk.

  I went inside and said, “Is Mr. Pitts here?”

  “Oh, no,” she said, popping her gum earnestly. “He won’t be back until Tuesday morning. Is there something I can do for you?”

  “I guess not,” I said. “Did he tell you where he was going?”

  “He didn’t tell me, but I heard him on the phone with his wife, and he said something about a seminar in Kansas City. Do you need to file a claim or something? I can give you the forms.”

  “I just wanted to speak to Pitts,” I said, then went back to my car and headed for Maggody, where I suspected I’d find him.

  Chapter 7

  I drove past the old Wockermann place, but I didn’t see any vehicles in the driveway or indication anyone was in the house. I considered stopping at Estelle’s to ask if she’d noticed any activity, but a UPS truck blocked her driveway. Not wanting to be subjected to a private viewing of the latest batch of fingernail polish, I headed for Ruby Bee’s.

  She scowled as I took a stool. “I don’t suppose it occurred to you to inform me before you took off this morning, did it? After all, I’m only your mother.”

  “Sorry,” I said humbly, in that I’d missed lunch and it was well past suppertime. “The sheriff asked me to investigate a crime over in Mayfly. I just now got back to town, and I sure could use a grilled cheese sandwich and a glass of milk.”

  “I was so worried about you that I got a bad case of heartburn. I had to suffer through happy hour before I could slip away to my unit to take some medicine.” She paused so I could appreciate the immensity of my misdemeanor, then said, “General Pitts and a woman named Judy Milliford checked in about an hour ago. They took separate rooms, so I don’t guess he’s up to any hanky-panky. I put her between me and Kayleen, and him in the building across the parking lot.”

  I was not impressed with this minor concession to virtue; the locals refer to the Flamingo Motel as the Stork Club—and not because they’re ornithologically challenged. “Have you seen any of the others in this group?”

  “I reckon they’re camping on Kayleen’s property. She’s back in town, by the way. She stopped by to tell me, in case I was worried about her having car trouble on that narrow highway from Malthus. I think that’s real considerate of her. Don’t you think so?”

  “Oh, yes,” I said, still hoping for some supper. “About that sandwich and—”

  “Ruby Bee!” shrieked Estelle from the doorway. “I don’t know what I’m gonna do! I couldn’t believe my eyes!”

  I spun around, nearly toppling off the stool. “Was your house burglarized?”

  “This is a sight worse than that. Get your coat and come with me, Ruby Bee. You got to help me figure out what to do!”

  “Does this have anything to do with the militia?” I asked. “Did somebody fire a gun or launch a grenade in your direction?”

  This finally got her attention. “No, missy, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of them. My inheritance from Uncle Tooly was delivered half an hour ago. The polite young man helped me get the crate into the living room and even pried the top off. Well, I liked to
have died when these big ugly birds hissed at me, and the delivery man bolted out the door to his truck and was almost at the stop sign before I got out to the porch.”

  “What are they?” demanded Ruby Bee.

  “How should I know? Are you coming or not? I can’t leave them in the living room. I got two appointments tomorrow, and I can’t see Eileen having her hair trimmed while she’s being hissed at.”

  “It’s Friday night, Estelle, and I usually get a decent crowd. I can’t afford to close the bar just because you’ve got hissy birds in your living room.”

  I grinned at Ruby Bee. “Don’t worry about that. I’ll hold down the fort while you go to Estelle’s house, as long as you don’t mind if I make myself a sandwich.”

  Estelle acknowledged my generous gesture with a nod, then said, “So are you coming or not, Ruby Bee? If you were having some terrible crisis, I’d like to think I’d drop everything and come galloping to your rescue. Remember when you ran out of gas at the flea market and I drove all the way out there, even though it meant canceling an appointment? I seem to recollect it was a good twenty miles each way. And what about the time I went with you to Noow Yark City so you wouldn’t—”

  “If you’ll stop jabbering, I’ll get my coat,” Ruby Bee said in a wintry voice, clearly not pleased at having certain incidents dredged up. “It seems to me you might should call that lawyer and ask him what you’re supposed to do with the birds. He’s the one who sent them, after all.”

  “His office is closed by now. I can call him Monday, but I’ve got to do something right this minute!”

  I waited until they were out the door, then went into the kitchen. I was hunting for the mayo when I heard a voice call, “Hello? Are you open?”

  My stomach whimpered as I dutifully returned to the barroom. The voice belonged to a guy approximately my age. He had agreeable features, short brown hair, and a surprised expression as he stared at my badge. To my dismay, he was wearing a camouflage jacket, but he could be nothing more exotic than a hunter stalking a beer instead of a deer. Or so I told myself.