by Ron Currie
Frank stared, his expression caught somewhere between terror and impotent rage.
“Your choice,” Trumbull said, still picking at his fingernail. “Make it now.”
“Okay,” Frank said. “Okay, so let’s say I do stay here with you. What do you think is going to happen?”
“War,” Trumbull said.
“War.” Frank snorted. “Seems a little … what’s the word?”
“Grandiose?” I offered.
“That’s it,” Frank said.
“Frank, there are over one hundred people in this compound,” Trumbull said, “all of whom qualify as expert marksmen. They’re well armed, dug in, motivated. When those government boys show up they’re going to see the size of the problem they’re dealing with and realize they’ll need an infantry battalion to clear us out of here. That’s a fight they’re not going to want.”
“Exactly,” said Frank.
“If it were just the guns, they’d try to figure a way to avoid that fight,” Trumbull continued. “With two hostages, they won’t have any choice but to come in sooner or later.”
“And they’ll kill all of you,” Frank said.
“No matter,” Trumbull told him. “Did you know, Frank, that as we speak there are more than half a million militiamen and sovereign citizens in this country?”
“So?”
“So that’s a very big army, by any standard,” Trumbull said. “As big, in fact, as the army of these United States. We die on CNN, and that army is suddenly mobilized.”
Frank looked at Trumbull, then to me, then back to Trumbull.
“You’re out of your goddamn mind,” he said.
• • •
Not surprisingly, Frank decided against standing with Trumbull and his men, opting instead to sit outside the compound in the air-conditioned comfort of his patrol car, flanked by half a dozen deputies, to give federal officials the impression that he was a man dedicated to the letter of the law.
And surely Frank must have thought he’d made the correct choice when, several hours later, the federal officials arrived with a scale of force I had never seen except in news footage from far-off battlefields. As this was prairie country, the compound’s main building enjoyed an unobstructed view of both the driveway and the main road that led to it. This allowed us—by which I mean Trumbull, Claire, and me, standing at the window of an upstairs room that served as Trumbull’s study—to see the entirety of the FBI convoy as it arrived: forty or so Humvees and Bradley Fighting Vehicles, a quarter-mile-long column led by two Black Hawk helicopters that shot ahead and began buzzing Trumbull’s ranch the moment they came into sight.
Diesel engines growled and roared as the convoy turned right onto the long dirt driveway. Reddish-brown plumes of dust rose from knobby tires, coalescing into a cloud thick enough to blunt the remarkable fury of the Texas sun. Nearly every Humvee was capped with a turret, from which protruded the gleaming snouts of machine guns and grenade launchers. The Bradleys, armored behemoths seething with chain guns and antitank missiles, chewed up gravel in their heavy tracks. As the vehicles drew nearer, the floor under our feet began to tremble, minutely but unmistakably, as if at the approach of some movie monster. The overall effect, as the convoy reached the terminus of the driveway and deployed around the property, was decidedly apocalyptic—and no one had yet fired a shot.
Claire’s hand found mine and clutched it. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “I am way too sober for this.”
“Perhaps if you asked them nicely,” I said, “our hosts might be willing to give you a drink.”
“I don’t see why we couldn’t,” Trumbull said, still gazing out the window. Even he sounded a bit awed.
“If these people are here to save us,” Claire asked, “why do I feel a lot more scared than I did a few minutes ago?”
“Because you’re starting to understand who the real terrorists are,” Trumbull said.
“I mean, for God’s sake,” Claire said. “It looks like Fallujah out there.”
“In fairness,” I said to Trumbull, “you did inform them that you’re in possession of an arsenal.”
Trumbull raised his eyebrows and tilted his head slightly to the side, half an assent. “Valid point,” he said. “But their response, as you see, is always to increase force twentyfold. It’s been unofficial policy since Sherman torched Atlanta.”
Below, Frank got out of his car and shook the hand of a tall man wearing a business suit and a Kevlar vest marked “FBI.”
“That’s right, Frank,” Trumbull said. “Kiss the ring, old pal.”
We watched as Frank and the agent conferred amidst the choreographed chaos of armored vehicles taking up tactical positions.
“So now what?” Claire asked.
“Now I’m hungry,” Trumbull said. He checked his wristwatch. “Anybody else hungry?”
“Um,” Claire said.
Trumbull moved toward the door. “Got a nice fatty brisket going,” he said. “Come on.”
Claire looked at me. “This is by far the strangest kidnapping I’ve ever been a part of,” she said.
“You’ve been kidnapped before?” I asked.
“It was a college thing,” she said. “Sort of consensual.”
Trumbull stopped in the doorway and looked back at us. “A good brisket takes twenty-two hours to cook. Nothing gets in the way of dinnertime when it’s finally ready.”
On our way down the stairs we were met by one of Trumbull’s men, a wide-eyed and breathless fellow whose state of distress was hardly surprising, given the circumstances.
“Guys are talkin’ about leavin’,” the man said. He bent at the waist with his hands on his knees, trying to catch his wind.
“Already?” Trumbull asked.
“You did see what’s out there, Abe?” the man said.
“Sure. What’s out there is exactly what I expected. And what you and everyone else should have expected, too.”
The man stood up straight and brushed a sweaty strand of hair away from his face. “Abe, you know I’m with you. But these other fellas. Tracy. Bob C. Ray Ray. The Childress boys.”
“All six of them?” Trumbull asked.
“All six of them,” the man confirmed.
“I knew his brothers were useless, but I thought Al would stay the course,” Trumbull said. He crossed his arms over his chest and thought a moment. “Let them go,” he said finally. “Anyone who doesn’t have the stomach for this is dead weight anyway.”
“So we’re just going to watch them walk out the front door?”
“What else can we do?” Trumbull asked.
The man considered, stared at Trumbull for a second, and shrugged.
“Tell whoever wants to leave that they’re free to go,” Trumbull said. “Tell the rest that I’m having a bite, then we’ll discuss the plan one more time.”
“You’ve got a plan?”
Trumbull put a hand on the man’s shoulder and spoke to him as a father to a son. “Listen to me. Nothing has changed,” he said. “This is exactly what we wanted. So take a breath.”
The man set his jaw. “Okay,” he said.
“Good. G’on now.”
The man turned and began descending the stairs two at a time.
“Oh, and Gus,” Trumbull said.
“Yeah?”
“No one talks to them,” Trumbull said. “The phones are going to ring off the hook, and they’ll get the loudspeaker out presently. But no one talks. No matter what.”
21
THE DETAILS OF THE PLAN
I want to be perfectly forthright with you,” Trumbull said over plates of brisket and potato salad. “Because I think of you as guests, not hostages.”
“You mentioned that earlier,” I said. “Quite gracious, considering.”
“Guests,” Claire said, “can come and go as they please.”
The compound’s dining room, a dark and dusty affair, sat in the center of the main building and was, as a consequence, windowless. D
ecorations consisted of taxidermy of varying quality—elk heads mounted on walls and over doorways, prairie dogs perched on shelves, a coyote, one front paw cocked, next to the doorway to the kitchen. The light fixture, hanging above the oak table at which we sat, was constructed from red deer antlers, their gnarled spread resembling the root system of a tree.
Outside, the concussive slap of helicopter rotors waxed and waned, waxed and waned.
“This is exquisite,” I said through a mouthful of beef.
Trumbull smiled and leaned back in his chair. “Come to Jesus,” he said. “Prepped, cooked, and sliced by yours truly. My granddaddy’s rub recipe.” He turned to Claire. “Sure you don’t want any? You have no idea what you’re missing.”
Claire eyeballed Trumbull wearily. “I’m fine, thanks,” she said.
“Suit yourself.” Trumbull cut through a piece of beef with one swipe of his knife, a pearl-handled bowie he’d produced from the weathered sheath on his hip. “Want to know an interesting fact about brisket?” he asked me.
“I always want to know facts,” I told him.
“Brisket is a very tough cut of meat,” Trumbull said. “Basically it’s a steer’s pectoral muscle. Gets a lot of work over the course of its life. So anything you can do to minimize the toughness is critical. Especially if you cook in competitions, which both my daddy and granddaddy did.”
Trumbull popped a piece of meat into his mouth, closed his eyes, and chewed exultantly. The helicopters buzzed and buzzed.
After a moment Trumbull swallowed and opened his eyes again. “My granddaddy was a wildcatter,” he said, “so he spent a lot of time outdoors with herds. One day he was eating lunch and watching a bunch of steer, and it dawned on him: they almost always lie down on their right sides. Which means every time they get up, their right leg has to work a little bit harder to get them standing. The way he figured it, that meant the right brisket would usually be tougher than the left. From that day on, he never cooked a right brisket again.”
“Fascinating stuff,” Claire said.
“Was he correct?” I asked.
Trumbull thrust his fork in my direction. “Excellent question,” he said, “and there’s two ways to answer it. The first is to tell you that over the next eighteen years my granddaddy won the Lone Star State Finals four times, and never placed lower than sixth. We’re talking a couple hundred of the best brisket cooks in Texas.”
“Anecdotal,” I said, “but still pretty impressive.”
“And that leads to the second answer, if empirical evidence is what you’re after: the next time you come across a herd, have a look for yourself. I guarantee all but a few will be lying on their right sides.”
“It seems doubtful,” Claire said, “that we’re ever going to have a chance to observe cows at rest again.”
Trumbull looked over at her. “You want a beer?” he asked. “I’m gonna get myself one.”
“I told you I was fine,” Claire said, her tone flat as fettuccine.
Trumbull rose and went into the kitchen.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you turn down a drink,” I said to Claire.
She was staring up at the macabre spectacle of the deer antler chandelier, and responded without looking at me. “As my mother liked to say,” she said, “miracles never cease.”
Trumbull returned with a Corona almost completely obscured in his massive fist. “When this is over you will have a chance to observe bovine behavior again,” he said as he took his seat. “You will have a chance to eat Thai takeout and go to the movies and do the twist and anything else you like.”
“None of that’s going to happen,” Claire said. “Here’s what is going to happen: we are going to die some serious Old Testament deaths. And that will be that.”
Trumbull forked brisket into his mouth. “Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not.”
“I saw what’s out there,” Claire said, “and I see that you are out of your mind.”
“‘Conviction is worthless,’” Trumbull said, “‘unless converted into conduct.’”
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Thomas Carlyle,” Trumbull said. “A man, like me, of Highland Scot stock.”
“‘I would never die for my beliefs, because they might be wrong,’” Claire said. “That’s Bertrand motherfucking Russell.”
Trumbull squinted at her across the table, his expression taut and dangerous. Then his face opened up, and he chuckled. “I never much cared for Russell,” he said. “A little too prim.”
“Philosophers can be that way,” Claire said.
“Let me ask you something,” Trumbull said. “Do you think the 9/11 hijackers were crazy?”
“Is this a trick question?” Claire said.
“Not in the least.”
“Okay then,” Claire said. “I think ‘crazy’ doesn’t begin to describe the batshit depravity of flying a jetliner into a building full of people.”
Trumbull turned to me. “What about you?” he asked.
“I’m not very useful with that kind of value judgment.”
“Ah. A true philosopher, this one,” Trumbull said. He forked more brisket into his mouth and looked back and forth between us as he chewed. “Well? Aren’t you going to ask what I think?”
“No,” Claire said.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“I think,” Trumbull said, “the 9/11 hijackers displayed a brand of courage so alien to our culture that we don’t know what to call it, except ‘crazy.’”
“They also murdered a whole bunch of people,” Claire said.
“Don’t misunderstand me,” Trumbull said. “I hate everything they stood for. They served a misguided, juvenile faith in desperate need of reformation. But they were courageous, and they were sane. When I saw what they’d done, I knew I wanted to be just like them. To see with clear eyes, to act without flinching. That’s how I ended up on three all-expenses-paid tours of Iraq.”
“Please,” Claire said. “You just wanted to shoot brown people and blow things up. Ideology had nothing to do with it. Don’t try to put lipstick on that pig.”
“When in your entire life have you displayed even a fraction of their courage?” Trumbull asked.
“Every day I showed up for work at Total Foods.”
The two of them stared at each other. Claire folded her arms over her chest. It was clear she meant to go without blinking for however long she had to.
One of the helicopters swooped low above us. The deer antler chandelier trembled, and shadows waved across the walls. In the kitchen, plates and glasses chattered against one another in their cabinets.
Claire and Trumbull went on staring for several more moments despite the racket. Then, finally, Trumbull looked away. Claire rose from her seat and walked toward the kitchen.
“Is there something I can get for you?” Trumbull asked.
“I’m perfectly capable of fetching myself a glass of water,” Claire said without looking back. She disappeared through the threshold.
Trumbull took a deep breath and tilted his head sharply to one side and then the other, making the vertebrae snap. At that moment a booming but garbled voice, like God talking around a mouthful of jawbreakers, spoke to us through the walls of the main building.
“Abraham Trumbull,” the voice said. “This is special agent Roy Pinto with the FBI. We’re trying to establish contact with you. Please answer the telephone.”
Trumbull looked at me. “So it begins,” he said.
From the kitchen came the sound of cupboards opening and closing.
Trumbull leaned back and turned his head toward the doorway. “Everything alright in there?” he asked.
“Fine,” Claire called out.
Trumbull wiggled his eyebrows and hooked a thumb toward the kitchen, as if inviting me to share in a private joke. “Claire,” he said, “I’m going to give you five seconds to rejoin us at the table.”
The sounds of rummaging stopped abruptly. “Or else what?” Cl
aire asked after a pause.
“Or else,” Trumbull said, “you are going to learn the limits of my hospitality.”
Silence from the kitchen.
“Why don’t you come back in here, now,” Trumbull said.
Claire drifted into the doorway like an apparition. She studied the back of Trumbull’s head for a moment, then made her way slowly to her seat.
“For future reference, we keep the knives in the top drawer to the right of the refrigerator,” Trumbull told her as she sat down again.
“I was looking for a glass,” Claire said.
“You think you’re the first woman ever wanted to slit my throat?” Trumbull asked her. “You think I don’t know what that looks like?”
Claire folded her arms again. “I have no idea,” she said, “what you’re talking about.”
“Course you don’t, darling,” Trumbull said. “Course you don’t.”
• • •
“I’m going to need you to take off the glasses for this,” Trumbull said to me after Claire had, at his request, left the dining room with an unsmiling escort.
“I think the battery died awhile ago,” I told him.
“Even still,” Trumbull said. He motioned with two fingers for me to hand them over.
I did as he asked. By this point I’d grown so accustomed to wearing the glasses every waking moment that I felt suddenly incomplete without them, as though I’d realized, in a most public place, that I’d forgotten to put on pants.
Trumbull turned the glasses over a few times, then took a lens in each hand and twisted, snapping the frames in two.
“Don’t worry,” he said. He placed the broken glasses on the table next to his empty plate. “The networks will record the important parts from here on out.”
“I’m not worried,” I told him.
“That’s good,” Trumbull said. He stood, lifted both our plates from the table, and walked toward the kitchen. “I’m going to have a beer. You want one?”