by Dane Hartman
“Yup, news travels fast. Kind of embarrassing when you think about it. The cops really fucked that one up.”
There was no way of determining whether he suspected Harry of being among their number, but there was a good chance that that was what he thought. Especially since Harry cradled a shotgun in his hands.
“Yes, they did.”
“The radio news, they got only part of it. From what I hear, it was a hell of a lot worse than they’re letting on.”
‘You don’t sound displeased about it.”
“All I can say, mister, is live and let live. There’s no way the cops are going to root out those kids up there. All they’re going to do is get themselves killed. Now take me. I’m a law-abiding citizen. Ain’t no truck with the shit they’re growing up there. Never smoked no marijuana in my life.” He made marijuana sound as though it was composed of eight or nine syllables. “But they ain’t harming me. Fact is they’re helping me out, bringing lots of business into the area that there’d never be otherwise, you know? Everyone makes money. Even the cops, they make money. Hiring all these boys to go around with their investigatin’ and such.”
“Do you happen to know what happened to the force that was headed up to Lunar Mountain? I’ve been . . . well, out of touch, you might say.”
Reardon nodded but kept his eyes locked on the narrow road ahead of him. “That crew never made it to first base is what they tell me. They got one truck stuck, they get that out, then another one goes into a ditch, they got that one out. By that time they found out what was happening over on Rain, they figure the hell with it and pull back. Can’t say that I blame them.”
Neither could Harry. So it looked as though Davenport had triumphed by doing nothing at all.
“The only thing wrong with all this shit,” Reardon said as they were about to enter the precincts of Russian River, “is all this violence. People killing people, it’s just plain wrong.” He slammed his open palm on the steering wheel. He wanted Harry to know just how serious he was about this.
Harry thanked him for the lift and got out of the truck.
“You have a good day, you hear? And clean yourself up. You don’t want to go around looking like that.”
“No, you’re right there,” Harry said, closing the door behind him.
It was right then that Harry paused. He breathed deeply. He took another long breath. The smell was awfully familiar. And it was coming from the back of the truck. Even after it pulled away down Van Buren, the smell persisted.
The smell was the smell of the substance Tom had denied having truck with. The smell was marijuana.
Even on foot Harry had no trouble tracing Tom Reardon’s truck. Russian River was small enough that anything could be found if one were willing to look hard for it.
It was parked on a street not far from where Elsie lived, in the slumlike district Davenport had pointed out. There was no sun to brighten the roofs of the squat shelters in which the perpetually stoned youth of Russian River lived. In the dull light they looked just sad and derelict.
The back of the truck was still crammed with its load, but that situation was shortly to be changed. A couple of men were scrambling into the rear, about to remove the bales and transfer them to another waiting truck which, Harry noted, bore official U.S. government plates.
Now this might be a perfectly legitimate procedure. The bales of marijuana, disguised with an outer layer of hay, might be intended as state’s evidence. But Harry’s instinct, and his accumulated experience, told him otherwise. If any of this was legitimate, why was the transfer occurring here, in a neighborhood known for the sale and consumption of illegal drugs? And why was an alleged farmer like Tom Reardon, Senior, involved in it?
Harry was about to investigate further when he heard his name being called.
He wheeled about, only to find himself looking into the eyes of Ham Kelso. Ham was wearing his uniform, but he would have been well advised to invest in a suit a few sizes larger than the one he had on. The buttons were threatening to pop. So, Harry observed, were his inquisitive eyes.
“What can I do for you?” Harry asked him pleasantly enough.
“I had no idea you were still in Russian River, Callahan. I was under the impression you had left us for a more favorable climate.”
“I like the rain.” Harry started to walk away from him.
Ham came after him. Harry could hear how hard he was breathing as he sought to keep up.
Harry was proceeding toward the truck, and it was clear that that wasn’t at all to Ham’s liking. Ham wanted to articulate this but was too busy trying to catch his breath.
“What’s your problem, Ham?”
Ham stepped back, then produced his .38. “Your problem,” he managed to say.
Harry shrugged. “Why do we keep having to go through this, Ham? It’s getting to be like a bad movie.”
Ham wouldn’t respond. He motioned Harry toward him. But Harry didn’t move.
Ham had fully expected he would. He really seemed at a loss as to what he would do next.
Across the street Harry glimpsed Reardon, who was just coming out of one of the corrugated structures. Tom stared long and hard at Ham and the man he’d just given a lift to. He seemed to be trying to figure what to make of this.
“You’re a wanted man, Callahan. We’re going to extradite you back to San Francisco for wounding a federal officer.”
“You know, you disappoint me, Ham. That’s exactly what I expected you were going to say.”
From around the corner a second cop appeared. Harry was acquainted with him too. He was the other arresting officer who had taken him in. He still didn’t look too sure of himself though he had his gun directed at Harry’s head.
“Two against one,” Ham pointed out gratuitously. “The smart thing is to give yourself up.”
The unloading of Reardon’s truck was continuing unimpeded. It was evidently thought that Harry was merely an irritant who could be safely gotten out of the way—and soon.
Harry consented to drop his rifle but that was all. “I think you’re going to have to shoot me,” he said but in such a matter-of-fact way that he disconcerted Ham and made his younger colleague terribly upset.
“You don’t know what you’re saying, Callahan. You’re around the bend. Nothing would give me greater pleasure.”
But obviously Ham wasn’t prepared to take this pleasure right here and now.
“Tell me, Ham, who are you working for?”
“The sheriff’s office,” declared the younger cop confidently. “Who did you think?”
“I’m not sure. That’s why I asked. How about Howard McPheeters?”
Ham scowled. Then he stepped up to Harry, ready to handcuff him. But as soon as he attempted to do so, Harry retracted his arm, forcing Ham to lean forward. Then Harry shot out his right leg, hooking it around Ham’s and forcing the cop off balance.
Ham emitted a sound that reminded Harry of the squawk of one of those birds hunters like to pepper with shotgun blasts for sport. Stumbling, he lost hold of both handcuffs and .38.
“Shoot the fucker!” he urged his partner.
His partner rushed forward, then stopped three feet away from Harry. “Hold it!” he shouted.
Harry wasn’t listening to him. He brought the edge of his right hand down on Ham’s neck. Ham grunted and collapsed. When he groped for his gun, Harry planted his foot down on his hand, stopping him dead.
“This is your final warning!”
Harry turned to confront the second cop. “You’re going after the wrong person, kid,” was what he said.
Ham was reaching out with his other hand, hoping to recover the .38 without Harry noticing. He had it just within his grasp when Harry stamped down his left foot, causing the helpless cop to shriek with pain.
His partner remained immobilized. The gun was shaking in his hand.
Across the street the men who were in the midst of transferring the bales from Reardon’s truck to the ot
her one stopped what they were doing. It was now clear that they could not rely on the local constabulary to dispose of the threat that Harry presented to their operation.
From their slightly elevated position in the open end of the truck, Tom’s two assistants drew out handguns and simultaneously opened fire.
One bullet creased the side of Harry’s face, setting loose a flow of blood that a particularly bad nick with a razor might produce. The others were close but failed to strike him. Instantly, he flattened himself, draping himself across Ham’s prostrate form.
Ham’s partner was not so lucky. Two of the rounds meant for Harry hit him, one in the stomach, the other in his head, slightly above his left eye. In death he looked as incredulous as he had in life. And so pronounced was his paralysis that it seemed to take him forever to sink to the ground.
Seizing hold of the shotgun that had once belonged to Milandra Harry tried firing it. It jammed. He rolled over, which was something of a painful experience for Ham who knew enough not to move until the shooting stopped. Now Harry grasped hold of the .38 and tried using that. More successful.
He hit neither of his assailants, but he did force them to scramble from the truck and around to the other side where they were less exposed. What had happened to Reardon was hard to say. Harry certainly did not intend to linger around to find out.
He was off and running, weaving in and out like a son of a bitch, determined to put as much distance between himself and the men who were anxious to take his life.
As far as he could see only one refuge in Russian River, maybe in the state of California, remained to him and that was exactly where he was bound: the home of Elsie Cranston.
C H A P T E R
E l e v e n
At first, Elsie had no idea who this man was, with mud-caked clothing and blood coursing down his face and eyes that suggested the presence of fever, he could have just emerged from a Grade Z horror film.
But then Elsie recognized that this was in fact Harry Callahan, and that probably what had happened was that he’d just gone and gotten himself into a little more trouble than he could handle.
“God, you look a sight.”
She guided him into the bathtub and proceeded to remove his clothes, though he assured her that this was something he could do very well himself. Actually, it wasn’t so easy since the sweat and the damp acted like glue, causing the fabric to cling to his skin.
“I thought you were dead,” she said. She stooped down and turned on the taps. Soon there was lots of steam filling the room. “When you didn’t come back with the rest of them, I thought that you hadn’t made it.”
“I made it all right.”
He was little disposed to talk.
“You know that Turk was killed.” She didn’t sound sad about this. On the other hand, she didn’t sound happy about it either. She just seemed to have resigned herself to the fact. Could be she’d anticipated it so long ago that the shock had worn off even before the first round from the 30-30 had torn through Turk’s stomach.
“Yes, I know. I was with him. He seemed to want to die.”
She raised her dark eyes to him. “He got his wish,” she said. Then she added, “They’re looking for you.”
“Who?”
“Everybody. First they went looking for your body.”
“Now they’ll come looking for whatever’s living and breathing.”
“That’s right.” She was very quiet. “You are in a lot more trouble than I’d ever have guessed.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.”
The water was as hot as it would ever be. Elsie handed Harry a couple of fresh towels. “When you want, I’ll be waiting,”
Fighting off the sleep that was ready at the first sign of surrender to claim him, Harry dressed and went downstairs. He found Elsie in the kitchen. She obviously felt more at home there than anywhere else in her rambling home.
She was not alone.
Frank Davenport was seated at the table, partaking of some of her tea. No one passed through her house without being given a sampling of her tea.
Whether he had been there all along or shown up while Harry was sloughing off the detritus of Rain Mountain in the bathtub was not immediately clear.
Davenport did not appear especially delighted to see Harry. In fact, his expression was rather sour. “You look older, Callahan.”
“I feel older. But that’s a great deal better than feeling dead.”
Davenport was not ready to argue the point. “That was one hell of a mess,” he said, referring to the abortive invasion of marijuana country.
Harry took a seat at the table. He looked over to Elsie, trying to deduce what she was thinking. But her face was impassive, betraying no emotion.
“From what I hear, you stayed well out of it. All those trucks that kept getting stuck, it’s a damn shame,” Harry said.
“What are you saying? That it was my fault Turk’s two-pronged attack was reduced to one?”
“Let me put it this way. I wouldn’t be surprised if you made sure you never made it up Lunar Mountain. Now whether you deliberately sabotaged those trucks, well, I wouldn’t know about that. But they played into your hands, those accidents. You realized the whole invasion idea was doomed from the start.”
“And you didn’t?”
“Hey, I’m not blaming you. Maybe if I were in your shoes I’d have done the same thing. Now you have Turk’s job. It looks like that’s not all of Turk’s you might be thinking of moving in on.”
He wasn’t directing his eyes at Elsie, but there could be no doubt as to his meaning. She flushed and looked away from the table. Davenport remained as glum as before and did not react.
“I want you to know something, Callahan. I am only looking after my own ass. I have no grandiose plans like Turk. I have no intention of tearing up tons of marijuana fields and handing out warrants like advertising circulars. That is not my aim in life, never has been.”
“Don’t want to shake the boat?”
“If you want to put it like that, exactly. I tend to my job, mind my business, that’s it. One day, if I’m lucky, I’ll be given a decent assignment and move far away from here. Until then I’ll hold the fort.”
“What about McPheeters?”
“What about him? He’s a necessary evil.”
“Like Kilborn?”
“Like Kilborn. I don’t like either of them, but there’s no sense trying to buck them. The main thing I’m concerned with is ensuring peace in Russian River. Life was fairly peaceful before Turk. I want to make sure it gets that way again. And whoever I have to do business with to maintain that peace . . .” He shrugged, leaving the sentence dangling. Evidently, he didn’t feel that he had quite made himself clear. “I am not corrupt. I am not on the take, I want you to know that. I am not profiting off the marijuana or anything else.”
“I never said that you were.”
“But I could tell that was what you were thinking. You assume that because everyone else in this damn town is on the take, I must be too. I’m not. I couldn’t get to sleep at night if I was.”
“Your sins are more in the venal class rather than the mortal one is what you’re saying?”
“Possibly. So I had those trucks sabotaged, so what? What good would it have done to charge into those mountains? How many men did Turk lose? Half a dozen? More? Including himself. Everyone survived under my command.”
“I think that’s just fine. I’m not criticizing you.”
Davenport sighed. The world was hard on him. He wasn’t a saint, nor a fanatic, nor firebrand, nor prophet. He wasn’t a very good man, but there were a great many far worse than him. He just had the ill fortune to be stuck somewhere in the middle. He couldn’t necessarily be condemned for what he was doing—or wasn’t doing.
“I don’t like it,” he said. “But nobody said that I had to like it.”
“What about Elsie?” Harry asked.
Elsie rested her eyes on Davenport. She looked
as interested as Harry was in what his answer might be.
“She wants what I want. We’ve talked. We agree basically on terms. Isn’t that right, Elsie?”
“I suppose so.”
“What is that supposed to mean, that you agree on terms?”
“Peace in Russian River. An end to this politicking.”
Davenport was being more than circumspect, he was being downright evasive. Harry guessed he was saying that from here on in Elsie would no longer have to act as go-between for the local narcotics office. That meant no more Kilborns. That probably also meant no more Callahans.
This assumption was borne out a moment later when Davenport said, “That brings me to you, Callahan.”
“I had a feeling you’d get to me eventually.”
“You can see now why your presence in Russian River would not contribute to the general welfare of its population? You are something like a walking catastrophe, frankly. You’re wanted in San Francisco on charges of injuring a DEA agent. And I think you know how our local police force feels about you.”
“They’ve made it pretty clear.”
“But I am not a malicious man. I don’t want to throw you to the dogs.”
“Kind of you.”
“I’ve spoken to McPheeters about your case. If you leave town today, I guarantee you that charges against you will be dropped. You can return to San Francisco, rejoin the force, there’ll be no problem. It’ll be like nothing ever happened.”
Davenport seemed so convinced of the generosity of this offer that he could not conceive of Harry rebuffing him.
“Sounds like a fine idea, Frank.”
Davenports eyes lit up. For the first time since Harry had entered the room, he looked happy. “So you’ll accept my proposition?”
“I just would like to get a few things straight that I don’t think we’ve covered yet.”
“Sure, what is it?”
“Now, basically what is happening here is a systematic campaign to murder the growers and strip their property of the harvests and then sell them on the market.” Davenport was about to interrupt, but Harry stopped him. “Let me finish. Never mind that murders are being carried out but they also have the sanction of Howard McPheeters, who is using his office as a conduit for the marijuana. It’s very easy to account for all that weed by calling it state’s evidence. Maybe you adjust the weight periodically so no one knows just how much comes in and how much goes out. But what the hell? It’s only a little weed between friends.”