by Robin Lamont
A moment later, a young woman who could have been the daughter of the worker at the lambing sheds answered the door. She wasn’t wearing a traditional maid’s uniform, but her white button-down shirt and black slacks were close enough.
Jude handed her a phony EO Travel business card. “I’m afraid I don’t have an appointment, but I wondered if I might have a word with Mr. Tripp,” said Jude, putting on her most winsome smile.
The solemn young woman let her into the foyer and said she’d see if he was available. Silently she stepped across the polished wood floor and knocked on a pair of sliding doors. When they opened, Jude caught a glimpse of a cathedral ceiling and a roaring fire in a wide stone fireplace.
“He’ll be with you in a minute,” said the woman when she returned.
Left alone, Jude took stock of her surroundings. A suitcase embossed with the initials JRT sat by the front door. Hanging from the handle was an airport tag, and she made a mental note to find out what IAH stood for. She wandered into the open room across the way, pretending to admire the décor. It wasn’t easy. Part bar, part sitting area, the space was decorated with so many dead animal parts that she lost track in her quick survey: chandeliers made of antlers, an enormous elk head mounted over another fireplace, rabbit skin covers on the bar stools.
“Miss Harris,” came a voice behind her.
Jude turned to see John Tripp striding forward. “I’m afraid I only have a minute. What can I do for you?”
Tripp drew from his politician’s well of practiced charm, summoning forth a broad smile, though the tightness around his eyes revealed a much steelier core. He grasped her hand the way he had with Margaret Cunningham, as though they were old friends.
“Thank you for seeing me. I’m sure you’re busy so I’ll try to be brief,” said Jude, then glanced toward the front hall. “I wouldn’t want to make you late for your trip.”
“Not to worry. I’m just returning, actually.”
“I hope it was a successful venture,” said Jude.
“It was indeed.”
She let it go at that and launched into a short version of her cover story and her interest in his elk farm. “I spoke to your foreman who was very helpful about group accommodations. With our European contacts we’re envisioning some pretty large groups and I thought if I could personally meet you, that would lend some additional credence to my recommendations.”
He was cautiously curious, but maintained a fixed cordial expression. “Not sure how much more I can tell you. We can only accommodate a certain number of hunters at any given time.”
“Of course. That’s precisely why I was drawn to your ranch … the personalized service. You offer a unique experience in the American way of life. I’m certain you know just about everyone in the hunting world and can recommend others for any overflow. Would be a great way to bring some revenue to the area.” She could see a spark of interest and decided to skip ahead. “And if you’ll forgive me, on a personal note, I have to tell you how impressed I am at how in tune you are with your constituents. I’m talking about the debate at the town hall meeting.”
“I gather you were there?”
“Yes, and I admire your forthrightness. Our clients are from Europe, but I’m a proud American and so many people don’t understand that it’s ranchers like you who are the real guardians of these lands.”
“I’m glad that you see it that way.”
“You have to worry about an overpopulation of predators.” Pressing on, Jude said, “You would think that the state and federal governments would have an interest in managing wildlife in a way that doesn’t cause the kind of animosity we saw at the town hall.” Tripp glanced over his shoulder, then graciously began to steer her back toward the front door as Jude continued, “I mean, can’t the federal government provide some help? What about Wildlife Services?”
He eyed her keenly for a moment, then clasped her hand again. “Wish we could discuss this further, my dear. But I must get back to my guest. It’s been delightful to meet you, and I hope we can do some business together.” His smile vanished before he’d turned away, telling Jude that despite what she thought had been a passably charming performance, his mind was elsewhere – either that, or she’d hit a nerve.
Outside, the corrugated aluminum dome of the airplane hangar gleamed in the late afternoon sun, drawing Jude like a beacon. With Tripp busy, she decided to chance a look. She drew aside the heavy tarp of green plastic hung over the front and saw Tripp’s plane. No one was around, so she slid through the opening.
Light filtered through the steel trusses supporting the roof. She spotted a storage cabinet where a clipboard hung from a nail hammered into the frame. Jude examined the notations, guessing they logged flight times and fuel allocations. She tried the cabinet itself. It wasn’t locked.
Inside were shelves crammed with a variety of airplane parts: clamps, air hoses, rivets. Among them Jude noticed one particular piece of equipment. It looked like a three-pronged antenna with a hand grip. A wire ran from the antenna to a scuffed canvas bag. She lifted one of its flaps to find a black box receiver. Next to it was stuffed a leather collar with a matchbox-sized transmitter. She knew this collar. It belonged to the wolf who had taken her last breath underneath her trembling hand. Bits of hair and grime were embedded in the shearling underside.
For a moment, she thought about taking it, then reconsidered. If it went missing she’d be an immediate suspect. Instead, she took out her phone, snapped a few photos, and put the collar back. The purpose of the radio antenna and the receiver had come to her with soul-crushing clarity. They had used it to track the wolf – the very equipment designed to monitor and protect her and her pack had led the killers right to her. Of all the hunting technology Jude had seen the last few days, this seemed the cruelest.
A voice inside her head insisted that it was time to go. But she was in the belly of the beast and itched to find out more. She moved over to the Piper Cub. On the body of the plane someone had pasted rows of decals. Decals of wolf heads. The way cowboys notched their guns and soldiers marked their helmets in a gruesome tally of their victims, here was the body count. Jude grit her teeth and examined the wing strut where the wolf had been strapped. There were traces of dried blood.
From her shoulder bag she took a pen knife and a small notepad. She tore off a piece of paper and began to scrape some of the blood onto it. Hard to know if the blood belonged to the same or another wolf, but Lisbet and her colleague might have a way of finding a match. God, the fight for animals felt like such a Herculean task. At that moment an oppressive weariness overcame Jude, so much so that when she heard a sound at the hangar’s entrance and saw a man’s figure appear in the opening, she almost lifted her hands in surrender.
“Hoo-ee, if it ain’t my cowgirl,” said Cash, but his tone was not friendly.
Jude casually slipped the pen knife into her back pocket and palmed the folded paper, her heart racing.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“Oh, hi.” She hoped her voice remained steady. “I came by earlier to talk about my travel company with Mr. Tripp. And I remembered he had a plane–”
“How’d you know that?”
“Abby at the Café told me. Don’t you remember? She said that you and your friend should take me up sometime. Well, I didn’t want to say at the time, but I’m terrified of flying, every time I have to go abroad, oh my God …” Jude was verbally scrambling, sounding to her own ears like what she was – a guilty, inept burglar. “And I just thought that if I actually could see a plane up close, which I’ve never done, it might help me get over my fears.”
“Kinda like picking up a rattlesnake if you’re scared of snakes, hunh?” Cash didn’t sound convinced.
“A little like that, I guess,” laughed Jude lightly. “Only I hope this plane doesn’t bite.”
“It don’t, but Roland
Pike will, he finds you sneakin’ in here.”
Recovering, Jude sauntered in his direction. “Hey, I saw you at the town hall last night. I waved, but I guess you didn’t see me.”
“I saw you all right.” Cash grinned, and she returned it, hoping his attraction would trump suspicion. “You still up for a guided tour?”
“Absolutely.”
“Great,” he nodded. “How ’bout day after tomorrow?”
“Sure, that’ll work.”
“Done,” said Cash as though they’d just completed a business deal. “I’ll pick you up at the Aspen House. Nine o’clock sharp.”
An icy finger of fear traced itself down Jude’s back; she couldn’t interpret the way he was looking at her. How did he know she was staying at the Aspen House? How much did he suspect? Was he merely playing along, just as she was, hoping to learn what she was up to? She lifted her chin in acknowledgement and walked out of the hangar, leaving Cash staring at her back. The wind had quickened and she thrust her hands deep into her pockets, tightening her shoulders against the cold, but more important to protect the blood sample. She had the sensation that at any moment he would lasso her with a rope from behind and drag her to the ground. What in hell had she gotten herself into?
“Judy!” Cash called out after her.
She turned. This was it. He hadn’t believed a word she said.
“Dress warm, ya hear?”
Chapter 15
Working undercover, Jude thought, was like walking a high wire. At the slightest misstep you windmill your arms into the air, looking to grab something solid to stop the fall. But there is only nothingness around you. Nothing familiar, nothing comforting, nothing but pretense, thin and fragile as a wren’s egg.
This morning, the further she got from Stanton, the more she could feel sensation coming back into her fingers, as though her very hands had been asleep. She could feel herself re-aligning, Judy Harris mutating back into Jude Brannock. She could ask for soy milk with her coffee again. Granted, no one in Idaho had it, but at least she could ask. And that made her feel more … real. Even Finn, in the back seat of the Subaru seemed to relax in a way he hadn’t for days.
Her phone began to chirp, and when she saw who was trying to reach her, she eased onto the side of the road and picked up.
“Walt Kincaid,” stated the gruff male voice.
“Thank you for calling me back,” said Jude. Before they left the coffee shop, Lisbet had given her Kincaid’s number, thinking he could answer some of her questions about Wildlife Services. But she’d warned Jude that Kincaid didn’t talk to just anybody. “You spoke to Lisbet?”
“She vouches for you. So you’re in Stanton, Idaho, is that right?”
“Yes, and Lisbet suggested I call you because I’m seeing some weird stuff go down with Wildlife Services.”
He chortled at the other end of the line, a hoarse, smoker’s laugh. “Is that so?”
“She said you used to work with Wildlife Services in Montana,” prompted Jude. “Why did you leave?”
“Principles.”
“Uh … can you be a little more specific?”
“I got sick and tired of killing animals for no reason,” he replied. “How much do you know about the agency?”
Jude told him about seeing the aerial gunning on public lands and the use of a private rancher’s plane.
“Well, then you’re seeing them in action,” said Kincaid. “They may be leasing Tripp’s plane because something happened to one of their own. The agency has had a lot of accidents, crashes because they’re flying too low or the gunner shoots the damn plane up. But aerial gunning is only the tip of the iceberg.”
“Go on.”
“Well, start with the fact that Wildlife Services killed almost four million animals last year.”
“I’m sorry,” said Jude. “How many did you say?”
“About four million.”
“How is that possible?” she asked incredulously.
“Most of ’em are birds. But they exterminate a lot of mammals … any kind you can think of: black bears, raccoons, badgers, fox, beavers, coyotes. A lot of coyotes. They probably shoot, trap and poison over 200 coyotes every day.”
Jude’s mind was reeling, trying to process what Kincaid was telling her.
“They like to say that they mostly disperse animals,” he went on. “But that doesn’t apply to predators – wolves and bears and such. Those … they kill … just about all of them.”
“Is there some kind of documentation for all this?” asked Jude haltingly.
“Well, they put out a report every year. But like I said, Wildlife Services is an iceberg. What you see is only the tip – most of it’s below the surface. For instance, the extermination of four million a year is what they admit to,” said Kincaid. “I worked as a trapper for them, and for every target animal I caught, there were two trapped by accident. That’s pretty run-of-the-mill. Happens all the time.”
Her voice cracking with outrage, Jude exclaimed, “Why aren’t those reported? Two-to-one is not an accident, it’s recklessness … it’s ... crazy!”
“That’s why I left. The agency will hire anybody who can set a trap and keep their mouth shut. These guys catch a whole lot of animals they’re not supposed to – anything that’s attracted to the bait. The animals don’t know any better. Fishers, bobcats, deer, rabbits, mountain lions, you name it. I’ve seen federally protected species like golden eagles caught in the traps. But Wildlife Services only reports within their own agency, so it’s covered up.”
“And no one calls out their incompetence?”
“Not many people know what all is going on. These boys like to stay under the radar.”
“They must be answerable to Congress for funding,” insisted Jude.
“The folks in Washington aren’t that bright. Last year there was a reporter in California that wrote up a big expose on Wildlife Services, and for a while it looked as though the politicians might take notice. But then the head of the APHIS grabs the mic and says, ‘don’t listen to what you hear about Wildlife Services because it’s not true.’ He actually stated that the agency’s unintentional lethal take – that’s the animals killed by accident – is one-tenth of one percent.” Kincaid let out a guffaw. “I mean, come on! Even if the traps had signs on ’em that said ‘coyotes only’ and all the animals could read, you’d get way more than that. The traps are baited, for Christ sake. Hundreds of animals are attracted to the bait. Like I said, Congress ain’t too bright.”
“Or they don’t want to hear.”
“There’s a couple of senators that are listening and I’ll talk with anyone who’s interested, but I keep a low profile now. Ever since I talked to that reporter they’ve been puttin’ the squeeze on me. I got audited for the first time in my life, and even though I’ve got a lot of experience, I’m not having much luck getting a job.”
“Do you think Wildlife Services is behind it?”
“Dunno. Could be I’m having a string of bad luck.”
* * *
She pulled into the parking lot of the Hampton Inn at the Boise Airport, put Finn on a leash, and found Gordon in the conference room.
“I couldn’t leave him in the car,” said Jude, as Finn galloped across the carpeting to Gordon.
Reaching down to scratch the big dog on his hindquarters, Gordon said, “Of course not. If anyone complains, we’ll tell them he’s a service dog and keeps your anxiety disorder under control.”
“That wouldn’t be far from the truth,” said Jude with a wry smile. What she had learned about Wildlife Services in the past twenty-four hours burned like acid in her gut and she was eager to get Gordon on board. “Thanks for coming. Hope this isn’t too much out of your way.”
Gordon shrugged. “Slightly. I have to be in Wisconsin this afternoon.”
�
��What’s going on there?”
“The University in Madison has resumed their maternal deprivation studies on infant monkeys.”
Jude let out an involuntary moan. “No, they’re doing it again?”
The studies, purportedly conducted to shed light on human attachment disorders, dated back fifty years. Infant monkeys were taken from their mothers and exposed to conditions that created intense fear. After tests were conducted on their blood and spinal fluid, they were killed to study their brains. Many psychologists had since condemned the studies as cruel and irrelevant, but it hadn’t seemed to stop a few scientists from seeking a half a million dollars in grant money from the National Institute of Mental Health to continue the experiments.
“They’re doing it again,” Gordon affirmed ruefully. “And this time, they’re not euthanizing the babies when they’re done, they’re sending them to Tulane for more testing. But let’s get to the task at hand. I’m on a tight schedule.”
“I do appreciate you coming. I really needed to see you in person.” She took a deep breath. “Colin had nothing to do with Eberhardt.”
“How do you know? Because he told you he didn’t do it?”
“Yes, I believe him. Why are you skeptical?” Jude asked, taken aback. “You know that violence is not the ALF way.”
“Colin is very strong-minded, and I’ve seen him get angry. Craig Eberhardt might have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Well, that’s not what happened.”