Smoke Stack

by Andrew Gruse

  “Can you find out how much the widow sold the land for? Something tells me that Bertram Johnston didn’t have a heart condition and that she sold out for way less than the value of the land.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Five men met south of the town of Clyde early that morning under an increasingly cloudy sky. This meeting, sent secretly using an untraceable IP address, was highly unusual. The group agreed not to meet at all until the affairs of Clyde were finalized.

  But things changed.

  Two outsiders changed it.

  Two pick-up trucks drove through a thick-treed forest on a dark, windy road filled with puddles from the previous night’s rain. The path was nearly swallowed by long grass that spread from the center and edges onto the tire tracks. The road was always blocked with heavy chains, but this morning, in the dark, a man lowered the barrier.

  He waited in the thick undergrowth behind the ditch by the road until the trucks passed, then he re-hooked the chains, and crept back into the forest, out of sight almost immediately. Even if the figure didn’t blend into the woods, no one ever drove the country roads south of town. There was no reason to. Farmland, forest, and a deserted farmhouse and its empty barns lined the street. Desolate, alone, dark, creepy, and no people for miles. Like a ghost town.

  The meeting was quick; it had to be. In the small town of Clyde, a person’s absence would be noticed. But the oncoming storm bought them some time. Time for these men to figure out any alterations to their plan.

  The outsider, the private detective, asked too many questions and had his eye on the Clyde forest. He had already broached the barrier once. Only a lucky break stopped him from finding an opening to their lair. Then, who knows what would have happened.

  He had to be stopped.

  The truck failed. The outsiders left their motel room.

  But they couldn’t change the rest of the plan.

  Fifteen minutes after the man melted into the forest, he reappeared, checked for the rare chance of a passing auto, and unhooked the chains. A red truck drove up the winding path, turned onto the country road, and sped off. Moments behind it was a black truck. It reached the street and sped off the opposite direction.

  The camouflaged man slinked his way to the chains, re-hooked them, drug brush over the path, and once again disappeared into the forest. To the casual passerby, it looked like nothing had been disturbed in at least eight years.

  Precisely as he wanted.

  Deep inside the forest, the man stepped around a tree, looked in every direction, and lifted a hidden door in the floor of the woods. He stepped down the stairs and closed the hatch behind him and added a lock. No one would see it or find it.

  Three hundred yards away, he entered the basement of a house, a rundown empty house. He climbed a set of stairs to the main floor, checked the rooms, and looked out a dirty, broken window at the grass-covered driveway. No visitors.

  Precisely as he wanted.

  For eight years.

  He returned to the basement, hid his tracks, and disappeared into the labyrinth of tunnels and rooms beneath the surface of the earth. Not much longer. He told himself all of this would be over. He could leave this dreadful place, and Clyde would be ruined. His secrets would be buried and hidden forever. He’d be wealthy, and no one would know the wiser.

  He opened an unbalanced wooden door and looked at the bed. He smiled, entered the room, and shut the door behind him. Time to relax and please himself via the prize on the bed.

  Precisely as he wanted.

  * * * *

  Molly finished her mimosa and put down the glass. “You’ve done your research,” Molly said to Julie.

  “I get paid to know what I write about,” Julie said. “I read a lot about teachers.”

  “Since I’ve been here, the general populace has been conditioned to be not particularly pro-teacher.”

  “Why here?”

  “There’s an ongoing state budget crisis. So they pick on us. Why? Because we have a collective voice. Well, guess what? They don’t like it, so they have to get rid of that,” Molly said, the ire in her voice increasing with each sentence.

  “What happened?” This was Julie’s gift. Now, just sit back and listen.

  “Well, they had to make us the enemy. The governor effectively vilified public-school teachers. I went to the city one weekend to buy supplies for my classroom. Can you imagine that? Someone asked me why I needed all these supplies, like pencils and pens. I said I was a schoolteacher. The person scoffed at me and said, ‘with all that money you make for only working nine months, you can afford to.’” She shook her head. “I mean, pencils for the kids. It’s absolutely ridiculous,” she said. “It would be like telling firemen to buy their own hose from the local hardware store so they can put out a fire.” Molly looked disgusted. “I guess the grown-ups forgot where they got their education.”

  Julie nodded. “Probably some rich to-do private academy.”

  Molly smiled. “It started when the economy tanked a few years back. Remember? It was bad. It was bad everywhere, but places with a lot of industry got walloped. Which meant the loss of jobs. Well, any moron should realize that revenue via income and sales tax is going to plummet. Then, in a move that never ceases to amaze me, they decide to cut taxes to,” she used air quotes, “stimulate the economy. Well, now, not only do you have thousands of unemployed workers not paying taxes, corporations, and businesses are paying less. Guess what? The brilliant politicians come out and say there isn’t enough money. So, what do they go after?” She shook her head in disdain.

  “Entitlements, they now call it, because that word fires up their base. Only they include public education in entitlements, and the first thing they did was hamstring our union to take away our collective bargaining power, which makes the teachers an easy target. Of course, they needed to undermine us with a smear campaign which subtly convinced the voters not in the know that we are overpaid and only work nine months and only work from eight until three, you know, when the students are there because there is no planning or meetings, or any of the million other things us teachers do when the students aren’t in the classroom.” She shook her head. “I actually had parents of kids in my classroom tell me we got what we deserved!”

  “That must have been a fun parent-teacher conference.”

  Molly smiled. “It gets better. Shortly after the state killed the power of the teachers’ union, they said they didn’t have enough money and that our retirement fund was part of the culprit.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, you heard me right: the pension fund was the reason the state was broke.”

  Julie read about it earlier. “I wonder if the politicians cut their pay or benefits?”

  Molly burst out an incredulous laugh. “Are you kidding? It’s always someone else’s fault.” Molly said. “They really took it to us with that. You see, about when I started, we had another contract negotiation come up.” Molly paused to sip her mimosa only to realize the glass was empty and put it back down. “With that one, essentially, we teachers agreed in place of higher raises for several years to have part of that raise go to our retirement. We said our retirement is more important. They matched part of what we had allocated to the retirement fund. Not unheard of. Employers do that everywhere. So, we took the extra retirement funds.”

  “Smart thinking,” Julie said. “I would have done the same.”

  “Well, they said the fund was running out, gave us some lame excuses about too many retirees living longer and blah, blah, blah, and cut the portion that they matched in our retirement funds.”

  “Wait, what?” Julie asked. “That is deferred payment for work, right? And then they collect the funds and invest them. So the only reason it is gone is that they invested poorly, they took from it to pay the big wigs, or they stole it. Someone should be going to jail for that, right?”

  Molly sat back and nodded. “Exactly. But when you make the rules, you can change them at any time to your
benefit, right? You could say it was highway robbery, but that’s what the idiot politicians did with the gas tax that was supposed to be used exclusively to repair our roads. How was the highway into town? A disaster, wasn’t it? Anyway, with no union and no public support, what could we do? They took away what we earned and what they promised. Nothing we could do.”

  “Wow.”

  “Wow is right.” She shook her head and grabbed her empty glass. “Would you mind if I turn on the air? With the storms coming, it could get muggy,” Molly said. She walked to the thermostat, switched it to cool, and looked at Julie.

  Julie shrugged. “I don’t care,” she said.

  Molly changed the temperature and waited for the sound of the central air unit. “How about at night? Do you like the windows open or like it really cold?”

  Julie nodded. “I’m sure when I hit the pillow, it won’t matter,” Julie joked. “Zack likes the windows open.”

  “I can turn it off later.” She waited. “Well, that’s odd. It didn’t turn on.” She moved the switch on the thermostat again and lowered the temperature. Nothing. “Hold on. Maybe a circuit blew.” Molly left the room, entered the basement but was back up quickly. “That isn’t good.” She shook her head. “Damn old houses. I knew I should have replaced it last year when I had the furnace replaced.”

  “I’m fine, really,” Julie offered. “You don’t need to turn it on for me.”

  Molly smiled as she grabbed her phone and leafed through a phonebook. “I’m sorry. This will drive me crazy until I have it fixed. I’m going to call the local guy quick. Is that ok?”

  Julie nodded and listened.

  “Hi, this is Molly Lockett. My central air unit isn’t working, and I wonder if you could schedule a time to look at it for me.” She twirled the locks of her hair with her finger as she listened. “Oh, really? That would be fantastic. I’ll be here. Great.” Molly hung up. “The guy said he’d come right over.”

  CHAPTER 26

  “Midwest Development Company,” Zack said. “That’s what the guy said.”

  “You’re late. Julie already asked. The main owner is a guy named Keith Overton. Your friend Tim Weber and some guy named Marvin Solder are part owners. I think there are others, but the names are hidden. They just bought a property on State Highway 9 using an arm of the company called Tri-County Realty. A small three-hundred-acre farm. Got it pretty cheap, too. Actually got it for half what the normal rate for acreage is there. Zack, that’s the Johnston farm.”

  “Interesting.”

  “I found a yearbook online since we’ve been talking,” Michelle said. “Oh gee, here’s your pairing. The football team for Clyde. Made it to state but then got slaughtered by a big city school. Lost 63-6. Tim Weber, the pride of Clyde, went on to play at a college in North Dakota. Dick Miller was a lineman who went both ways.”

  Zack smiled. He knew Michelle meant played offense and defense. “Even back then, huh?”

  “Here’s another. Keith Overton.”

  Zack shook his head. “Birds of a feather. What about that Marvin guy? Is he in there?”

  “I’ll look, but he’s not in this yearbook.”

  * * * *

  “Where were we?”

  “The district mismanaged your retirement funds,” Julie said.

  Molly nodded. “Yeah, a bunch of goddamn hypocritical jerks. Every last one of ‘em. And now they want to expand the voucher program. Talk about a lame-brain idea! They can’t manage one system, why should we trust them with two? And we all know the endgame with that: privatize education completely so their cronies can profit.” Molly shook her head. “I hope you aren’t going to put this in your article. I’d get fired in a heartbeat.

  Julie shook her head and smiled. “I keep my sources anonymous.” She winked. “Freedom of the press.”

  Molly nodded. “Until the bastards take that away because they can’t handle negative press. I swear. Anyway, to be fair, there is the other side. Look, I am not going to sit here and try to tell you the union was perfect. You know as well as I that when things were good, and revenue streams seemed like they never were going to dry that they bullied their way into deals that looking back were bad for the people paying the bills for schools. The teachers’ union won probably way more than it should have. However, contracts are contracts and had the state negotiated in good faith, I know for a fact that we could have come to an agreement that wouldn’t have screwed us so badly while still helping out the idiots in the state capital.”

  Julie smiled. “It seems some only support helping those who already have the means to help themselves.”

  Molly laughed. “Who knew wanting to teach others was so contentious?”

  Julie spoke. “Doesn’t bode well for the future, does it?” She thought about raising kids and if she would want her children in private or public schools.

  Molly agreed. “No, but it’s worth fighting for. Education can’t be just for those who can afford it. For Clyde though, simply put, the money isn’t coming our way. Whatever kind of system they use to decide who gets what heavily favors the big city schools. Rural schools like Clyde and Hobby are screwed. Throw in declining enrollments because there is nothing here, and it is a recipe for the extinction of the small town rural school.”

  “But for Clyde and Hobby, there is a possible solution,” Julie said. “Ag Cen.”

  Molly smiled with approval. “Give that lady a blue ribbon. You got it.”

  “The state is pushing Clyde and Hobby to merge, correct?” Julie asked.

  “They are, and it makes sense. Some teachers would get a pink slip, but it would make for a stronger financial situation for the schools. The only problem is that Clyde and Hobby hate each other.”

  Julie nodded. “They are competing for Ag-Cen.”

  “Yes, they are. And each town thinks that Ag-Cen will build in their town and thus that town’s school would remain open. The other, well,” Molly shrugged, “I guess old towns are known for antique stores, huh?”

  “Has Ag-Cen promised anything?”

  Molly nodded. “They promise to add about three hundred jobs initially, which is about two-hundred and fifty more than either town has workers for. All told they think their operation will add double that year-round. On top of that, they want to spend a hundred million or so on improving the infrastructure in and around the town. The school leaders envision Ag-Cen dumping money into a new gymnasium and all kinds of things. So, yeah, as you can imagine, the city officials and school districts are drooling over being selected.”

  “When is the selection supposed to happen?”

  “This fall. They want to announce early fall and start building right away and be operational by the time the next harvest is ready.”

  “And Clyde’s school just burned down.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Molly said. “There hasn’t been a meaningful improvement done since I’ve been here.”

  “Has there been any problems with the school before like electrical issues, the fire alarm not working, for example, anything that would give us reason to believe that it burned down because it was simply old and falling apart?”

  Molly laughed. “We all wondered when the day would happen. I figured someone’s space heater or mini-fridge would short something out and start a fire. I mean, I don’t think we ever went more than three days without blowing a circuit. Or we wondered when the boiler would explode.” She laughed more and rolled her eyes. “My God, that school was so old. The windows were almost literally falling out of the building. Plaster fell off the walls daily. The place was a disaster waiting to happen.”

  Julie listened. What she heard lent itself not to arson but to the neglect of an old school that the elders decided was once good enough for them so therefore good enough for today’s students. She was familiar with that battle back home. “Was it ever talked about?” Julie asked. “The disrepair and age of the buildings?”

  “All the time. But what do you expect in the current situa
tion of almost every school everywhere?” Molly picked up her empty glass again. “Money for repairs is the next thing the district eliminates. It isn’t by design; I mean, they only get so much per year, and it keeps getting less, but books cost more, supplies cost more, heating oil costs more, insurance costs more, every kid needs an iPad nowadays, that isn’t cheap nor is the infrastructure the school needs to keep up with technology. It adds up, but the money doesn’t. So what are school districts supposed to do? Like I said, public schools have been vilified.”

  “You don’t read that in the paper, huh?”

  “No, you don’t,” Molly said. “And you won’t. The place was a death trap. I am just grateful as hell that Zack showed up to save my life.” Molly looked at her empty glass. “Screw the mimosa. It’s going to rain all day, and it’s time for my family’s vineyard wine.”

  Molly disappeared into her basement again but reappeared a moment later with two bottles of wine in her hand. They heard a knock on the door. Molly put down the bottles, went to the door.

  “Hi, Miss Lockett,” said a shorter, skinny man with thin brown hair. He wore blue work pants, and a blue work shirt with thin vertical white stripes and a patch on one side saying Marvin, and the other side saying Solder Electrical. Julie paid little attention to him other than how he was diminutive and had a stringy body.

  “Hi, Marvin,” she said. “The unit is just around the side of the house.”

  “Ok, I’ll get right on it.” He smiled and went back outside to his van to get tools. Molly returned to the Merlot. She filled two glasses and handed one to Julie.

  Julie took the glass and set it down. “You know him?”

  Molly nodded. “Marvin? Everyone in town knows him. He volunteers at school and seems to really like the kids.” She fake shivered. “He’s a little creepy if you ask me, but he’s the only guy in town who knows how to fix everything electrical, including central air units.”