by Brett Baker
Davis had no answer. We both sat in silence, thinking about Logan and his operation, and the risk it posed to the U.S., and the risk it posed for Logan. I had just thought about the lawsuits that would ruin his company after he contaminated the land, when it all came together in my head.
“He’s only at risk to the extent that contamination can be traced back to his operation. In-situ leaching can process uranium from wide swaths of land with little disruption. That’s the allure of it. But if he’s able to mask his operation then no one will know he’s responsible for the contamination.”
“Mask it how?” Davis asked.
“Forestry,” I said.
“Green’s bill!”
“Exactly. The federal government returns public lands back to the states. But the states are too strapped to manage them. The firefighting budgets alone are prohibitive for most states. That’s why the feds manage the land. So states will be in control, they’ll have no money to do what they’re supposed to do, so there won’t be much opposition to just selling the land to private entities. And once it’s in private hands it becomes much easier to manipulate.”
“But I thought the bill only dealt with forests. How does that translate into mining?”
“Logan needs cover. And the forests provide it, literally and figuratively. He can purchase forest land and become a logger. File permits with the government for his new logging operation, have it inspected as a logging operation and make sure everything is on the level. But in-situ leaching is minimally invasive by design. It’s intended not to alter the land. It’s not like traditional mines where they have to strip away yards of earth to get down to the uranium and then there are waste piles of radioactive rock left behind. All they need are a few entry points where they run pipes into the ground, and some infrastructure on the surface. But with all the logging on, no one would even notice. He can find a huge, dense forest, set up his logging operation in one part and have in-situ leaching setup in another part and recover all of the uranium on his land from that one site.”
“That’s a big risk, isn’t it? I’m sure the EPA or some other Feds would be watching those lands closely. Especially if it’s a logging operation.”
“They’ll be watching, but not as closely as if they still owned the land. That’s why so many in Congress are pushing for the bill. It’s the old, tired argument of getting the federal government off of the back of private business. Return the land to the states and then the states will sell it. Then instead of the federal government inspecting a logging company that leases land from the government, they’re inspecting a company that’s logging their own land. Less regulation, fewer restrictions. He can’t just poison the land because he owns it, but there’s less of a chance that anyone will pay attention to what he’s doing if he owns the land instead of just leasing it.”
“But he still has the problem of culpability,” Davis said. “If his contamination makes people sick then won’t that ruin him?”
“It will, but good luck proving that it’s his contamination. He’ll have the forest to protect him from sight, and by the time the contamination is detected or manifests itself in people, he will have likely exhausted the site and moved on. And since in-situ leaves such a small footprint, it will be difficult to even track down the location of his operation. I’m sure he’ll remove any trace of it after he’s done. The only thing left behind will be some radioactive solution that will continue to poison people for a few thousand years. And that’s not even considering the possibility that he’ll be able to deflect blame. Chances are he’s looking for locations where other industry exists, or is likely to exist if this bill passes. If there’s other mining or drilling or even industrial building going on nearby, he’ll argue that he’s just a logger who’s cutting down some trees, and it’s just as possible one of these other companies did something to the land that caused the pollution. You don’t get to Lloyd Logan’s position in life without knowing how to defend yourself, and manipulate the system.”
“And outright lie, apparently,” Davis said.
“When we’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, how important is a lie?
“I guess I’m just not built for business. I can’t ignore my conscience well enough to succeed.”
“Lloyd Logan trends closer to criminal than he does businessman,” I said. “Some people know how to be successful and remain a good person. The ones who lie and cheat and steal to become successful weren’t good people to begin with, and don’t have the talent or intelligence to succeed without doing so.”
“So what do we do now?” Davis asked.
“There’s only one thing I can do,” I said. “I’ve got to go see Logan.”
“Oh fuck! How’s that going to go?”
“Not well. At least not for him. I have to figure out what’s going to happen, but I can’t let him succeed with this. If he finds the right location, something by a river or a lake or something, he could contaminate drinking water for thousands of people. We could have people dying horrific deaths before we even understand what’s causing it.”
“Can’t you just stop the bill?” Davis asked. “Without the bill he can’t begin his operation. He needs the cover of the forest. Obviously the bill is important to him or he wouldn’t have mentioned your name to Green.”
“That’s the part of this that doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Why did he mention my name to Green? Why not just take me out the same way he had Mount take out Chamberlain? If he didn’t say anything to Green, he wouldn’t have told Cleo, and she wouldn’t have told Chamberlain, and my name wouldn’t have been on a piece of paper for the Tulare County detective to track me down.”
“The Summit,” Davis said.
“What about it?”
“He had to tell Green about you because The Summit has us so well hidden. I’m sure he intended to take you out, but if he searched for you he wouldn’t have found anything. The Summit has made it so we don’t exist on Google. He probably needed Green’s help in finding you. And Green wants the bill to pass, so he’s willing to help Logan, but he also wants plausible deniability, so he doesn’t ask Logan for details. Logan probably told him that you could sabotage the whole thing, but he had no way of shutting you up. And Green can lean on federal resources to find you.”
“But I didn’t know anything about this,” I said. “The first I’d heard of the bill is when Detective Hertz, the guy from Tulare County, told me about it.”
“Logan wouldn’t have known that. He didn’t know anything about you. He didn’t want to take the risk of you being some NPR addict who follows every bill through Congress.”
“I guess that possible,” I said.
“It’s the only thing that makes sense. He’s shown he has no problem killing people who get in his way. Why not just kill you and be done with you?”
“I’ll be sure to ask him that when we talk,” I said.
“He might be difficult to find,” Davis said. “Mount went to his ranch a few weeks back, but who knows if he’s still there. Sounds like he’s quite the world traveler. Kazakhstan, Namibia, India.”
“Sunizona.”
“Sunizona? Did you just make that up?”
“No, that’s where his ranch is. Sunizona, Arizona. He told me all about it over dinner one night in Kazakhstan. Wanted me to come visit him and maybe stay there for a summer. Said he had a pool, but no bathing suits were allowed.”
“Wow, that guy sounds like a real charmer.”
“Amazing I didn’t fall for him, isn’t it? I’ll check with Polestar to see what they have to say, but if they don’t have any leads I guess I’ll start with the ranch.”
“Good luck,” Davis said. “I’m going to stick around here so I can check on Mount. He’s tied to a tree in the desert right now, and I think he’ll be fine for a few days, but I shouldn’t leave him unattended too long. I have a feeling he’s quite resourceful. Let me know how it goes with Logan.”
I hung up the phone and
pulled back onto the road, relieved to have a plan of action. I felt so charged after my conversation with Davis that I briefly considered driving all the way to Sunizona. My body flooded with adrenaline, open desert highway sounded like exactly what I needed. But Sunizona was twelve hours away by car. Best to fly to Tucson and go from there. I anticipated my encounter with Logan might turn into the longest of days. No need to show up tired.
That’s how people get killed.
36
Chapter 36
I drove to the nearest Roost, situated in an industrial park on the outskirts of Fresno, and called Polestar. The man I talked to sounded like he might have just graduated college, but he spoke with a confidence that implied he’d worked for The Summit for decades. I asked for information on Lloyd Logan, and after peppering me with a few questions the Polestar expert recited a few basic facts about Logan, and gave me his last known location. It all sounded very familiar to me as the experienced boy spoke, which I quickly realized was because all of the information came from me. They didn’t have any updated information about Logan, which seemed quite unusual. I’ve received updates on tribal chiefs in remote villages on the edge of the African savanna, so I expected them to have something new on Logan, even if they didn’t have his exact current location. With nothing else to go on, I planned to go to Sunizona.
I stayed at a hotel in Fresno that night and woke the next morning for an early flight to LAX. In the air for just an hour, I wondered why I didn’t just drive to L.A. the night before. Instead I landed in L.A. and waited a couple of hours in the airport for my flight to Tucson. It took off on time and we had a tailwind so we landed ahead of the ninety-minute projected time. I got my luggage, rented a car, and left the airport at exactly noon.
Southern Arizona has some of my favorite landscape in the world. The desolation that surrounds Interstate 10, and the intensity of the sun and the heat that radiates throughout everything provides an other-worldly sensation. Driving along remote state highways that pass through nothing but empty land, yet are bordered on both sides by an endless ribbon of barbed-wire fence insinuates that someone in charge of government contracts must have also owned a barbed-wire business. The installation of thousands of miles of barbed wire makes no sense for any other reason.
Populations of cities and towns in that part of the state are measured in hundreds, and ten miles separates the tiny settlement of Sunizona and its two hundred citizens from the next-closest town. I passed through Sunizona and continued eastbound for two miles when I saw a large building on the horizon. It looked like a house, but two small mountains that framed it on either side made it difficult to obtain any sense of scale. Whatever the actual size, I knew I wouldn’t have to turn back and go into town to ask about the location of Logan’s ranch.
The house came into clear view as I approached. It sat back a few hundred feet from the road, and despite its desert location a small pond provided a barrier between the street and the house. Four tall columns accented the grandiose façade of the white neoclassical sandstone structure, which reminded me of the White House. Burnt orange shutters accented the half-dozen large windows on the front of the house, and massive double wooden doors centered on the house between two columns served as the entrance. A circular drive led around the pond and to the front doors. Where the drive met the street, two wrought iron gates each with an L in the center of them prevented any unauthorized access. I didn’t slow as I passed the house. Logan wasn’t expecting me as far as I knew, but I still preferred to make my arrival an even greater surprise.
I drove north to Willcox, ate at a small roadside diner, and tried to devise a plan of action. I didn’t like going into a situation without some knowledge of what I’d encounter, but I had no choice. We had no intel on Logan, and no one in position to gather any. As I developed a plan I briefly considered taking a more patient approach and watching Logan’s ranch to see who came and went. I might get lucky and catch Logan out by himself, or a convoy of cars might arrive at the house, indicating that he was there, but not by himself. Patience usually paid off in very useful, actionable information. However, Logan had already had Chamberlain killed, and I couldn’t be sure he wasn’t trying to serve the same fate upon me, so patience had no place.
At sunset I pulled off the side of a state road and parked my car behind a stand of netleaf hackberry and velvet mesquite trees, which entirely camouflaged the car. With no traffic visible in any direction, I started out by foot through the desert landscape. The setting sun neared the end of its long decline and disappeared behind Logan’s house, which sat two miles directly west. The mostly flat, rocky terrain provided little cover as I walked, but the wide-open expanse meant that anyone looking from afar would be unlikely to settle on me. I was but one object on a gargantuan canvas that spread for miles and was cluttered with trees, plants, and boulders, few of which were large enough to hide me, but when taken together were numerous enough to distract a third party from afar.
With Logan’s house several hundred yards away, I came to a barbed-wire fence at least ten feet high with six inches between rows of wire. On the other side of the fence, five feet closer to the house, was another fence, this one only eight feet high, but with the same six inch gap between rows of wire. With no reason to rush over the fence, I decided to dig under it instead of battling the barbs. After a brief search I found a spade-like rock and dug a trench under the first fence, and then crawled to the second fence and repeated the action. Had Logan understood the ease with which an unrushed person could circumvent his fence, he wouldn’t have ever spent the money to build it. I’m sure the fence’s continuous, dense run of razor-sharp points provided a sense of security to Logan, which I appreciated, because the easiest victim to subdue is the victim who feels secure.
I remained flat on the ground just inside the second fence and waited for the sun to finish setting. With no light pollution and no moon, a pitch black enveloped the entire area, and when I held my hand at arm’s length in front of my face I could barely make out its shape. At least a dozen windows blanketed the back of Logan’s house, including a floor-to-ceiling series of glass panes that must have been twenty feet tall. Light shined through three of the windows on the first floor, and two more windows on the second floor. I remained still and gazed toward the house, looking for movement, but when I saw no action for ten minutes I decided to proceed.
The desert landscape gave way to well-manicured grass that looked entirely out of place in such an environment. In the middle of the grass a large swimming pool reflected the rays of two spotlights that shone against the calm water. A stone path led from the swimming pool to a brick patio with walls that doubled as benches, and a large fire pit around which sections of tree stump at least eighteen inches in diameter provided fireside seating. As I approached the house I ducked down and sought shelter behind the series of bushes and trees that adorned the well-landscaped backyard. I planned to surprise Logan, so the last thing I wanted was for him to see me creeping across his yard.
I waited in the backyard for close to half an hour and saw no sign of anyone in or outside the house. I began to wonder whether the lights inside were controlled by timers to make it look like someone was home. Just as I’d decided to make my way to the garage and the front of the house to scout for signs of life, a light inside the house flipped on. The light came from a second-floor window so I couldn’t see inside, but at least I knew the house wasn’t empty.
I moved toward the back of the yard in the hope that a greater distance from the house would provide a better angle to see inside. As soon as I found a safe place to wait, the light went out. A few seconds later a light on the first floor came on and I watched as Lloyd Logan emerged from a stairway, followed closely by a woman young enough to be his daughter. He held the woman’s hand and led her toward the back of the house, in my direction. She opened the door, stepped out onto the patio, picked up something off of a table, and returned inside. Logan closed the door behind her and the wom
an walked toward the front of the house. They stopped by the front door and the woman wrapped her arms around Logan’s neck and they kissed. Logan opened the door and the woman left.
He went back upstairs and I ran across the backyard to the side of the house, where a wooden privacy fence had replaced the barbed wire. I pulled myself up to the top of the fence and peered over just in time to see a yellow Porsche leave down the circular drive, stop at the gate, and then exit onto the road when the gate opened. I listened for voices to indicate that anyone else might be around, but heard only the faint yelp of a distant coyote.
Since I knew Logan was inside, and I didn’t see any other signs of activity, I decided to infiltrate the house. I had originally planned to subdue him outside of the house, but since his lady friend left the house and he returned upstairs it seemed possible he didn’t plan to leave the house again that night. With no one else around and the darkness of night to my advantage, I didn’t want to wait until morning.
The Summit always encourages us to find the easiest way to do things to avoid any unnecessary work and to put ourselves in the best position to carry out our missions. However, during my years in The Summit, I accomplished few things as easily as getting into Logan’s house. I walked across the back of the house, crouching to avoid detection, and simply turned the door handle on the French door Logan had opened a few minutes before. The handle clicked as I opened it, and for some reason I waited for a squeak from the door that never materialized.
Inside I heard almost complete silence. A large clock on the wall ticked, and a gentle hum from the air conditioner provided a subconscious background noise, but I heard no other sound. My footfalls seemed to echo throughout the house, and I imagined Logan sitting upstairs, startled by their thunderous claps. In reality, the sound traveled just a few inches and died.