by G. R. Carter
Jeremiah filled in the details with King’s confused look. “When the Department of Health insisted everyone eat the exact right calories and vitamins every day, they started given each person ration bars that met those requirements. Pretty much outlawed any kind of food sales outside of that. Said it was better for health and better for the environment that way.”
“Thousands—nah, probably tens of thousands of those nasty-tastin’ things are stored out at the old Dot Foods warehouse. They don’t make ‘em there anymore, but it’s still a major distribution point for St. Louis,” Bradshaw said.
“But that don’t stand for the diner?” King asked.
“Yeah, the government types still like eatin’ real food. So they grant exemptions to some of their pals to run an odd restaurant here and there. Somehow, some mob guy is related to the folks who own the diner. Managed to get them an exemption via favor. They call it a ‘supper club’ instead of a restaurant,” Jeremiah smiled. “You see some of their trucks come to town occasionally. They got those fancy cards like you got.”
“Reckon those folks at the diner would sell us what they got?” King asked hopefully. He wasn't used to striking out on this many deals in a row.
Bradshaw and Jeremiah looked at each other and smiled. “I don’t think so, Mr. King,” Jeremiah said. “Look, sir, I know you’re used to buying what you want, when you want. It just don’t work that way around here. If our folks were only interested in the money…well, they sure as heck wouldn’t be living in Mt. Sterling. Or Brown County. Or anywhere outside the hubs. Chicago, St. Louis, someplace like that.”
“Jeremiah’s right, Darwin. I think it’s time we headed back to the lodge. Maybe we better load up Mr. Casey’s body and head over to Jacksonville hospital. Either that, or we’ll have to think about burying him on the property.”
King was already thinking the same thing. If people around here weren’t interested in money, they certainly weren’t going to be persuaded by a foreigner’s charm. “Right, let’s get the fuel, then back quick as we can.”
Loading several containers of fuel took longer than King expected. Jeremiah helped until the last one was loaded in the back of Bradshaw’s truck. Sy signed off on the receipt, shook hands with several of the men around them and jumped in the truck. Sy sat with his hand on the ignition, not yet turning the key. “You want to tell me what that was all about?” he finally asked. The look on his face was one King hadn’t seen before. He wasn’t quite sure he liked it.
“Don’t know what you mean.”
“You flashin’ that card around. Tryin’ to buy up everything. What’s the point of that? Power ain’t even been out a full day,” Bradshaw said.
“Actually, mate, Mr. Tucker said most of the power had been out near on 48 hours, we just didn’t know it. Cell phones and internet stopped workin’ first. Then the landlines and electricity after that.”
“So what? Happens around here pretty often.”
“I know. Just call it a gut feelin’,” King said. “I been operatin’ off that my whole life. Served me well. I just got a bad feelin’ the power won’t be comin’ back on for a while. Just wantin’ to stock up for all our good…just in case.”
Darwin started to say something else, then stopped. Sy studied Darwin’s tanned face for a moment.
“Something’s eating at you, Darwin. I’ve never seen you like this before. You’ve always treated me with respect, never like just some backwoods hillbilly who works for you.” Darwin nodded and Sy continued. “So shoot it to me straight. Guys like you are in the know…for big stuff, I mean. Insiders get to find stuff out long before people like me. Something’s got you spooked.”
“Don’t know nothin’ for sure, Sy. It was Ben Casey who said somethin’ real strange to me recently. Talked about movin’ his family, I mean the whole lot of’em, out of Chicago. I think they were in the process…heck, might be they're all out of there now. Kept their business in the city of course, but I think the family moved out somewhere deep in the woods of Wisconsin.”
The sun was up and filling the truck cabin with the brilliant light of dawn. Sy took his cap off and ran his fingers through his short hair. He thought for a moment and then he shrugged. “Makes some sense if you can afford the private flights back and forth. Lots of crime in the cities, and no real food available to common folk, just government ration bars.”
King shook his head. “It was more than that, mate. Ben was telling me to make sure my ranch was secure. Get a plan for anyone I really cared about…figure out a way to get them out of the city and onto the ranch if something bad happened.”
“But he didn’t say what that bad thing was?”
“Naw, he was pretty secretive about it. That was part of our trip out here. He said there was no one snoopin’ in these parts,” King pointed up and around,” to hear what he was gonna tell me.”
“You figure JR knows?”
King shrugged. “More than me, I hope.”
The high-pitched whine of off tires on pavement rattled the quiet of the morning. Right down the middle of Main Street, four tan-colored behemoths sped past the service station.
“Those are Army transports,” Sy said. “We used to get National Guard out here a few years back. They’d practice some kind of maneuvers.”
“That’s good news, then!” Darwin said with a smile. “Maybe it’s the National Guard again, come to help get the power on.”
Sy didn’t look convinced. He watched the last of the trucks turn down Route 99.
“Wonder why they didn’t stop here? Figure this would be as good a place as any to set up a command center of some kind,” Darwin said. His smile was fading.
“The Dot Foods warehouse is that way. So is the prison. Those are probably the two highest-value things we got around here.”
“You said that’s where the next month’s ration bars are stored for all the St. Louis and Metro East area?”
Sy nodded. “We don’t have to eat ’em around here, cause we grow our own stuff mostly. Not enough votes here to get us a steady supply of government food, even if we wanted it.”
“I’ve never tasted one myself.”
“Yeah, rich folks don’t have to play by the same rules as the rest.” Sy didn’t mean it as an insult. Darwin didn’t care if it was one.
“Anyway, there’s several million of those no-taste turds sittin’ in that warehouse…oh man, if they can’t get that food to all those people in the city…”
Darwin whistled through his teeth. “Wouldn’t want to be there, no way. Hungry, thirsty, in the dark…” He didn’t have to complete the thought. They both had pictures of a hellish landscape in their mind. “Sorta like that prison, only with millions of desperate folks instead of thousands.”
“Probably what those Army boys are gonna do. Get as many rat bars as they can and truck ‘em down there to the city. Better them than me. But we got our own problems.”
Sy started the truck up, put it in gear, and pulled back on to the road.
“Something strike ya, Sy?” King asked.
”I know someone who’ll know someone… heck, they know everything. We'll just have to be careful what we say.”
King didn't ask any more questions, trusting the younger man and resigned to the trip. They traveled west down Main Street, cruising the quiet streets of Mt. Sterling like Bradshaw had thousands of times before. There were a few people walking the sidewalks, no more or less than usual. Cars sat motionless in the parking lots; that wasn’t so unusual, either. The stoplight at the intersection of Capitol and Main wasn't lit, but there were stop signs each direction, and no one ever really bothered to completely stop anyway.
Sy turned the truck onto Capitol Street and parked diagonal in front of a building that still said FIRST NATIONAL BANK in stone on the facade. No one remembered exactly how long ago First National Bank had vacated the building, but every local knew what was located inside its brick walls now.
Sy and King jumped out of the old Chevy,
waving at a few people on the sidewalk coming out of a glass doorway across the street. The paint on the building's metal siding was faded and the brick facade starting to crack. It had been rebuilt as the Brown County Human Services building back in the early part of the century, when the last federal grant dollars were still spent in rural areas. Every bureaucrat in the county had gotten an office there, along with the newly combined police and fire department. Everyone thought of it as state-of-the-art at the time, but as with most facilities built in that era, it wasn’t destined to stand the test of time.
Sy pointed over to the building and said, “We'll stop in there later. See if Sheriff Moore's gonna check in.”
As King agreed, Sy walked to the old bank's heavy wood door and turned to him. “Welcome to the Brown Boar,” he said with a smile. “You're about to be the first out of towner… ” He stopped and laughed. “I guess you'll be the first foreigner to ever purposely set foot in this place. The owners don't even like the locals, and they sure as heck don't like outsiders. Best just let me do the talking.”
King nodded his understanding and they stepped inside. Lynyrd Skynyrd's “Simple Man” was blaring out of an ancient jukebox. Dim ground-level lights mixed with neon from beer signs and gambling machines, revealing every animal imaginable stuffed and staring at everyone as they walked in. Smaller critters were displayed in various poses on a ledge ten feet up above the bar. Trophy bucks were mounted on the opposite wall, some wearing Santa hats and sunglasses. At the very end, above the back hallway leading to the bathrooms and the back door exit, was the most enormous wild boar head King had ever laid eyes on. He was mesmerized by the tusks, the coarse black hair, the eyes that looked like they'd still have their revenge on whoever had bested him.
“Remarkable,” King said to himself.
“Get ya somethin', sweetie?” a waitress asked King. He was still standing in the middle of the aisle, a full row of men perched on barstools to the right, bellied up and staring at him, a row of four-seat square tables to his left. He’d been all over the world and most bar atmospheres were the same; unfriendly to outsiders at first until you’d passed a test. Usually that first test could be passed by buying everyone a round. He was about to call it out, then remembered his credit card probably wouldn't work. Fortunately he still had his small roll of American cash he always carried for tipping at the airport and restaurants.
He cleared his throat and gave his best American accent. “I'll have whatever you got on tap.”
She looked at him for a moment, sizing him up. “Yeah, sure. Be right back.”
Sy had already left him behind, talking to a tall skinny man smoking a cigarette behind the bar. The use of tobacco had been illegal inside buildings for years, but no one seemed to mind it here. In fact, about one in three of the customers had something burning, though not all of it smelled like tobacco.
King tried to look at everything that wasn't human, desperate not to make eye contact with anyone. The waitress finally brought his beer back, a small mug with barely any head on it. He raised the short mug in a toast to her, which she nodded back.
Being Darwin King, he couldn't help but strike up a conversation. The waitress’s disinterested attitude was too big a challenge not to attempt to overcome. “You know,” he said, still trying to hold his American lilt, “Where I'm from the boar is a symbol. Mean, tough, they'll run you through if you're not careful. I took a boar's head as my company logo just to remember that. The natives used it as a totem. Like to capture evil spirits.”
She shrugged and said, “One of the Kaplan boys poached it over in Missouri.”
“Poached?” King said. “That's right terrible. That's the sorta stuff ruins it for the rest of us.”
Again she shrugged. “Whatever. Listen, mister. I'm kinda workin' this whole area by myself. You wanna order some food, or just the beer?”
He was losing the battle with this one, so he lifted the class to his mouth to keep from saying something he might regret. As he took the sip she said, “That'll be twenty dollars, hon.”
King tried not to choke on the beer or the price. He sat the mug down, reached into his pocket for his money clip, and carefully pulled just a single twenty-dollar bill out. “You can keep the change, love,” he said with a big smile, full Aussie accent on display.
She just rolled her eyes and walked off, laughing at two burly men in seed corn caps who looked her up and down her as she walked by them.
He had enjoyed about half his beer before Sy finally came over to where he sat. “Time to go,” he said.
“Can't I finish my beer?” King asked with a smile. The grin faded with Sy's dour look. He took one big gulp, slammed the mug down, and followed Sy out the door.
Sy didn't stop on the sidewalk, didn't wave at anyone, just walked straight to his truck and jumped in. King let him sit quietly until he was ready to talk. “Probably nothin', Darwin,” he said. “That bar is owned by a member of the Kaplan family. This is the legit side of their business. Plus they do some farmin' also.” He sighed. “But their main business is cookin' Syn.
“Syn?” Darwin asked. “You mean drugs? They’re drug dealers?”
“Not just dealers. They actually make the stuff. Got a regular factory churning the stuff out like an assembly line.”
“Why don’t the cops shut it down? If you know about it, the cops hafta know too.”
Sy shook his head. “The Feds are all paid off by the Kaplan’s big-city customers. They sell all their Syn to some gang out of Springfield who distributes all over. Our local cops wouldn’t be able to make any charges stick. Plus the Kaplans got twice the people and heavier weapons.”
King knew immediately why Sy had come here for information. People in the Kaplans’ line of work would have a network of informants in every level of local government. If they didn't know what was going on, no one would. “Why would they tell you anything?” King asked suspiciously.
“Cause they know of all the people in the world, I ain't ever going to compete with them for their business. Got neither experience nor interest. Plus, I played ball with two of the Kaplan boys in high school,” he said. At King's questioning look he said, “If you ain't ever played small-town football, you wouldn't understand.”
“I reckon not, less you count Footie,” he smiled mischievously. The joke was lost on Sy, so Darwin continued. “So what's got ya spooked, mate?”
“Mikey—that's Mike Kaplan—said the prison's been stockin' up on all sorts of goods. Syn, too. Said they took a triple shipment just this week, and got a lot more ordered for later. Then those Army trucks comin' in and out of the Dot Foods warehouses; he said that's been going on for a week or so, too. Haulin' the stuff up to Jacksonville, what he hears. Not St. Louis like they're supposed to.”
“You figure Ben was onto something? That's why he was talkin' all crazy?” King asked.
Sy shrugged and fired up the engine. “Since Ben can't tell us, let's see if JR knows more than he's lettin’ on,” he half-spoke, half-yelled over the throaty V8 engine. “He’s still going be out of his head grieving about his dad. But if you’re right—I mean, about something really bad happening—we’ve got find out what he knows.”
Western Illinois Correctional Center
The Third Day
“Holy Mother, you stink, Red,” Angel Trevino said while holding his nose. Morton knew the diesel smell from his hands and clothes made the room rank. He hadn’t had time to change since he’d been back. More importantly, he wasn’t the least bit concerned about the comfort of any of the sharks seated around the prison’s conference room table.
He also wasn't in the mood to put up with the head of the Asesinato Uno gang family. “That smell is keepin’ your happy ass in the light instead of the dark, amigo,” he replied, emphasizing the last word sarcastically.
Trevino laughed from his fat belly. “Just the lights, though, Red. That's all you keepin' turned on. You need to get my TV workin' again, man. That'd make my boys happy. No p
orn makes them start thinkin' 'bout doin' nasty things to your Eels.” The level of familiarity between guards and inmates would have surprised most outsiders. But these men had spent more time together than they had with their own families.
“You two been doin’ this dance for years,” Cha Cha Dawley said with a disgusted wave. “Shoulda gotta room and had it out long time ago.” Cha Cha’s scarred hands and arms told the story of a survivor who’d fought his way to leadership of the prison's Code 11 Syndicate chapter before Morton got promoted, back when the state of Illinois still ran this prison and dozens of others. He’d been convicted of triple homicide before he’d started killing people inside the walls. His body count was just a couple tallies short of Trevino’s.
Morton didn’t answer him. He didn’t have to. None of the Eels truly trusted any inmate. Morton had that drilled into him when he first started. He made sure to the repeat the lesson with every new hire since then. Besides wages and benefits, the union was focused on the safety of its members. At least the local leadership was.
Captain Peter Lewis walked in with two Eels in full tactical gear followed by three more inmates. Along with the two Eels already here and Morton, that at least kept the odds in the correction officers' favor. Between the suits and physical condition—all five inmates present were fat and past their prime—it would be a short struggle if it came to that. Still, old snakes still held venom.
Lewis plopped down at the table next to Morton and the Eels took up their positions in a casual stance, fully charged batons at hand.
Lewis began to read one of the papers he had brought in, then stopped and looked at Morton with a wrinkled nose. “Good Lord, Red.”
The inmates laughed as Morton held up his hand. “Don’t start.”
Lewis nodded and smiled. “Okay, sorry I’m late…”
A bald inmate interrupted him. “You should finish off your warden friend a little quicker. I can help with that if you like.”