The Deadly River

by Jeff Noonan

  The responses were instantaneous. Mike’s was, “Shit yes!” Tony was even more positive, “Bring on the nutcases. I’d fight the whole Russian army with this gear and the two of you! Bring ‘em on!” All three laughed.

  On Sunday, they moved the flat-bed and the raft to the far edge of the truck stop parking lot and left it for the night.

  Monday morning, Lee was at the café an hour and a half before the man from the university was expected. But when he arrived, he found that the other two had already finished breakfast and were noisily harassing the waitress. Betty was giving back as good as she received and the banter between the three was hilarious. Lee ordered and sat listening while his breakfast was prepared.

  They were laughing hysterically at one of Betty’s pointed remarks when Ray walked in through the door that divided the café from the garage. “Hey guys, you’d better take a look at your raft. Old Nate is attacking it.”

  All three rushed to the front door and out to where they could see the raft. Sure enough, a thin, stooped, man was beating on the side of the black and grey raft with a knob-headed walking stick. Lee started to yell and move toward the raft, but Mike grabbed his arm to stop him. “No Lee. I know him. Let me handle this.” Lee stopped and waved Mike on.

  “Hey Nate! What ‘cha doing?” The thin man didn’t react, so Mike yelled louder, “Hey, Nate!” That got the man’s attention and he turned, crouching and holding the walking stick as if he was going to fight Mike with it. Mike kept calmly walking forward, now speaking in a softer tone. “Hey, Nate. Why’re you beating on my raft? Is there a problem?”

  Now Lee could get a better look at the man Mike was calling Nate. He was small and thin, dressed in layers upon layers of what appeared to assorted rags. He wore an old army parka with sergeant’s stripes over the rags. A dirty cowboy hat completed the outfit.

  The man looked confused by Mike’s approach. Mike stopped and very quietly repeated his question. “Why’re you beating on my raft, Nate?”

  This time, the man’s face cleared a bit. “Hi Mike. How are you? I haven’t seen you for a long time, have I?”

  “It’s been a month or two, Nate. We don’t see you down here in St. Dubois much lately. How have you been?”

  The ragged apparition was totally relaxed now. Lee would have moved closer, but Tony stopped him. “Stay here, Lee. Mike is about the only person I know that don’t spook old Nate. Let Mike handle him.”

  Now Mike had walked past Nate and was inspecting the raft. There was no obvious damage from the little man’s beating. Mike turned back to Nate. “Why were you hitting my raft, Nate? I’ve never seen you get mad at anything before.”

  “That thing is yours, Mike? You sure about that?” When the little man turned and again noticed the raft, he went back into his crouch, and was again brandishing the stick above him.

  Tony, at Lee’s elbow, whispered, “There’s something about the raft that’s setting him off.” Lee nodded his agreement.

  Mike tried again. “Nate, that’s just my raft. Why’re you so mad at it?”

  “It’s bad, Mike. Seen rafts like that before in the islands. Japs come out of them and shoot everyone. Big black rafts with little yellow Japs in them. They’re bad. Japs kill everybody, even my friends.” He was waving his arms wildly now, his eyes darting from Mike to the raft as if he was massively confused.

  Mike held out his arms toward Nate. “Nate, we’re in Montana. No Japs here. Just friends. That’s just my old raft. I’m sorry if it is a bad color, but there aren’t any Japs in it. Come on over with me and I’ll show you. It’s empty. No Japs here, my friend. No Japs here.” He kept talking in a soft, reassuring tone that seemed to be having its desired effect. Slowly the ragged little man moved closer to where Mike was standing beside the raft. Mike reached over into the raft, slowly waving his hand back and forth. “See, Nate? No Japs in here. It’s just my old empty raft. It’s safe, you can look for yourself.”

  Very slowly the little man came to Mike’s side, still crouching as if to keep himself invisible from whatever was in the raft. When he was beside Mike, he suddenly straightened and peeked into the raft before swiftly crouching again. Mike kept up his chatter and slowly the little man straightened and looked into the raft. This time it was a long, careful inspection.

  Finally satisfied, Nate turned back to Mike. “Sure looks like a Jap boat though. Why you got a stinking Jap boat, Mike?”

  “I didn’t know it was a war raft, Nate. I’m sorry. Come on into the café and I’ll buy you a cup of coffee. I’m really sorry. I just didn’t know it was a bad thing.” He was leading the little man away from the raft now, heading for the café. Lee and Tony moved aside and let them enter. Mike winked at them as he went by. He settled himself and Nate in a far corner of the café, allowing Lee and Tony to enter. They got back to their table just as Lee’s breakfast arrived.

  Between bites, Lee queried Tony on this development. “What’s the story, Tony. He looks like a Philadelphia street person, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone like him around here.”

  “Yeah. Probably some similarities there. Nate was a lumber yard foremen from Big River when World War Two broke out. Like everyone around here, he went in the service and ended up in the army, fighting in the Philippines. To make a long story short, he was captured and spent most of the war in Japanese prison camps. They say he was tortured and I’ve heard that he was in that Bataan Death March thing. When the war was over, the Army sent him home with a disability retirement, but he’s never been all there since he came back. His family has all passed on now. I hear that he still lives in their old shack on the other side of Big River. But he walks everywhere and has turned up as far away as Missoula and Spokane. People take care of him and get him home somehow when he gets too far away. The kids that don’t know better call him Uncle Nutsy and give him a hard time. His real name is Nate Smith. That’s about all I know about him.”

  By the time Lee finished breakfast, Mike had steered the old veteran out of the café and toward the east side of the parking lot, away from the raft. Nate could be seen in the distance, walking purposefully toward Big River, talking to himself and waving the walking stick.

  Mike rejoined his friends when the old man was out of sight. He grinned at them in a sad way. “Old Nate was a friend of my father’s when they were growing up. They were both in the army during the war. When Nate came home all messed up, Dad kind of took care of him. Nate would come to our house from time to time and we’d feed him and let him stay overnight. He wouldn’t sleep in the house, but he stayed on a cot on our back porch. In the morning he would always be gone. But he still seems to remember. He still knows who I am, and that’s a miracle, because he doesn’t know anyone else around here anymore. I feel bad for him and feed him when I see him. That’s the least we can do, I think.”

  They were interrupted at that point when the man from the university finally arrived. He was a tall, stooped man about fifty years old. He was wearing wire-rimmed glasses and very much looked the part of a university professor. As soon as he entered the café, Lee rose and walked over to him, hand outstretched.

  “Hi. I’m Lee Raines. I’m guessing that you’re from the university?”

  “Yes, I am. My name is Don Davis. Call me Don, please. I’m very happy to make your acquaintance, Lee.”

  Lee introduced Davis to Mike and Tony and after some small talk, the four left the café. Lee explained the Sheriff’s objection to sampling upriver while his investigation was ongoing, so they agreed to start the project at the junction of the St. Dubois and Clark Fork rivers.

  When they arrived at the starting point, Davis took charge, telling them what he expected in the samples they were to gather. They soon realized that the project was a lot more complicated than they had thought. They were to sample the river water at various depths, on both sides of the river, every mile. They were also to take samples at any major lagoons or backwaters, and at every junction with another creek or river. Addi
tionally, every time they took their river water samples, they were to take scrapings of the grey, crusty, deposits that were obvious on the rocks and leaves along both sides of the river.

  When he was sure they thoroughly understood every aspect of the sampling process, Davis gave them directions on how to label each sample bottle and how to deliver them weekly to his office in Missoula.

  Finally, after several hours of instruction, the four launched the raft and took samples both above and below the point where the smaller river entered the Clarks Fork, on both sides of the bigger river.

  By the time they had taken samples at the river junction and had worked their way downriver for a mile or so, Davis decided his job was done. They pulled the raft ashore close to a local farmer’s apple orchard and tied it to a tree. Mike volunteered to walk back to get the flatbed truck while the others waited. By the time he returned, the sun was fading into the western mountains, so they called it a day.

  The next morning the three were on site at first light, excited and ready to begin the job that would take them the rest of the summer to complete.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: THE LAWMEN’S PLAN

  Sheriff Frank Rose was relaxed in the chair at the head of his big conference table. On either side of him were two people who were both his best friends and his most trusted advisors. He and his wife, Patty, were silently listening to the County Attorney, Don Warthen. The three were developing plans for the interrogation of the two prisoners housed upstairs in the little jail.

  “I think our best bet is to take on the dumb one, Willy Gohmert, first. I think he’ll roll on Wards if we can convince him that Wards can’t get to him. But that means that we won’t be able to send him to the state prison down in Deer Lodge. If he thinks he’s going to meet up with Wards in prison, he won’t tell us anything. He’s deathly afraid of Wards.” The DA went silent, looking at the other two for comment.

  Frank nodded. “Willy’s gonna be the easier one to get off the dime. But we need to think about the prison thing. I’d hate to have to keep him here for any long period of time. Taking care of him would be a pain in the ass. All he does is whine all day, every day. What other options do we have?”

  Don Warthen thought about that. “I don’t see many other options. It would cost too much to farm him to an out of town jail. The county just couldn’t afford that.”

  Now Patty proved her worth. “Wait a minute, guys. Let’s think about this. All the guy did was try to rob the café and get grabby with Dawn Moore. He’s small fry. By the time he gets to trial, he’ll have already served about four or five months. What if we offered him parole and time served for a sentence if he rolls on Wards as the boss of the operation?”

  The sheriff slapped his hand on the table. “Great! I bet he’d go for that and it would save us a bundle.”

  Warthen was more thoughtful about it. “I like it, but I’d add a condition to the probation. Make it a ten-year probation that we can revoke if he ever steps foot in Montana again.”

  “I love it.” The sheriff was chuckling and his wife was smiling widely.

  Warthen moved his bulk into a more comfortable position. “Okay, Frank. I guess it’s up to you to take it from here. If you get him to agree, I’ll write it up. Now, what about Jose Ortega?”

  Sheriff Rose was taking notes on a white tablet. He finished his notes on Willy’s case, then looked up and replied to the County Attorney. “He’ll be a bit tougher, Don. He’s been Wards’ shadow for five years that I know of, maybe longer. I’m sure that he knows a lot. If we can get him to spill his guts, we’ll probably have enough to put Wards away for a long, long time. But it’s going to take a lot of doing to get him to talk. He’s not only loyal to Wards, but he’s also scared to death of him.”

  Patty nodded her agreement. “Yes he is. When you moved Wards to Missoula, it scared the pants off of him. When I brought him his next meal, he was all over the place trying to find out what was going on with Wards. He was so worried that he was almost crying.”

  Warthen thought about this. “We have to be careful what we offer him. We don’t know what kind of thing he’s been doing for Wards. We have him cold on the attempted murders of Moore and Raines, but we don’t know what else is hiding there. Hell, he could be a mass murderer for all we know.”

  It was the sheriff’s turn to be thoughtful. He chewed his pencil and stared into space for what seemed like a very long time. But the others didn’t interrupt his thoughts. They knew him well enough to know that these periods of reflection often produced real results. Finally, his gaze returned to them. “Let’s capitalize on his relationship with Wards. Let’s not even approach him for a while. In the meantime, we can be planting rumors for Jose to hear. The rumors can be about how Wards has been taken away by the Feds and how he is falling apart and telling them everything. I can mumble about how much I wish that the Feds would tell me what’s going on. If we get Willy to talk, we can let that work on Jose for a while also. After a month or so of that, we can start encouraging him to cooperate. If we play it right, and keep him totally in the dark as to what is really happening, we may get through to him. I think something like that would work a lot better than trying to get heavy-handed with him. But it will take some time.”

  The County Attorney visibly relaxed in his chair. “Good plan. I like it! What do you think, Patty?”

  “Sounds okay to me. I can have some little tidbits of misinformation brought to him when we feed him. That might help.”

  The sheriff smiled at her. “Okay then, that’s the plan for those two. Don, what’s the latest on Wards? Is he doing any talking?”

  “Hell, no. He’s hired a phalanx of Missoula lawyers and they’re stonewalling everything. They tried to get him released on bail, but I got to Judge McClain and that was disapproved. Now they’re pushing for a speedy trial. They don’t want us to have enough time to gather evidence on him. It’s just another defense tactic. I’ll be able to hold them off for now. Wards is more unpopular than I thought and a lot of people, including the judge, are on our side.”

  At that, Patty sat up. “There’s our first rumor for the boys upstairs - and it’s true! We can let them know that Wards has hired the best lawyers money can buy, for himself. But he’s refused to spend a dime on legal assistance for them! That’ll get them thinking.”

  County Attorney Warthen laughed aloud. “I can help you there. I’ll give you a copy of the petition Wards’ lawyers presented to the court to try to get bail for him. It’s got about four lawyers’ names on it and it’s on some really fancy letterhead. Hell, maybe you can let them think that he actually got bail.”

  Sheriff Rose didn’t like that. “No. We want them thinking that he’s in heavy federal custody. If they think he’s out on bail, they may toughen up on us, hoping that their leader will come for them. We can show them the papers and pull the “no lawyer for you peons” thing. But we need for them to think Wards is in big trouble.”

  “Yeah. That makes sense. Frank, why don’t you take firm control of all communications with the two of them. I think it’s best if there is one point-of-control on this.” With that, Warthen stood and started gathering the papers from the table in front of him. “Good get-together, my friends. Let’s get these buttheads before they screw up Mineral County more than they already have.”

  When the County Attorney was gone, the conversation between Frank and his wife drifted to other subjects. Soon Patty left to get dinner started for the prisoners and the sheriff stayed where he was, thinking and making notes. They had a good plan. Now he needed to get into the details.

  That evening, Patty personally delivered the prisoners’ dinners. Sliding the trey into Jose’s cell, she announced, loud enough for both prisoners to hear, “Eat up, fellas. I hear Wards has hired some fancy Missoula lawyers for himself. I bet he’ll get some good ones for you guys, too. So maybe you won’t be here too long after all.”

  Both men came fully alert at this. Gohmert asked her, “Have you heard wha
t lawyer he’s getting for us?”

  “No, haven’t heard anything about you-all yet. But I do know he’s paying a fortune for those Missoula guys. I imagine he will get someone out here for you guys as soon as he can. He isn’t the kind of a guy who would leave you behind, is he?”

  Gohmert replied confidently, “Nah. He’s a good guy and he’s rich enough to take care of everything.” Jose just looked at him, saying nothing.

  Patty left the cellblock, smiling widely.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: WILLY GOHMERT

  The sheriff moved the two prisoners to adjoining cells the next day, telling Patty, “I want the two of them to talk. The more they talk, the more they’ll worry about what’s happening on the outside.”

  Later that day, when the anxious prisoners tried to get information from her, Patty just told them that she hadn’t heard anything new.

  The next day, Patty still didn’t know anything, but the jailer showed the prisoners a copy of Wards’ lawyer’s application for bail. He said he’d found it in the conference room after the County Attorney had been in a meeting with the sheriff. But, unfortunately, he didn’t know anything more.

  Two more days went by. Still Patty and the jailer didn’t have any more information. It seemed that neither of them knew if Wards’ bail application had been approved or not.

  On the fifth day, Patty let them know that Wards’ bail application had been disapproved. “And I hear that the FBI has taken custody of him on a bunch of new charges. I’m not sure of the details. Bribery and possible multiple murders, the rumor is.” That caused many questions, but there were no answers from either the Jailer or Patty, and they were the only people the two prisoners had seen in days.

  Lee and his friends had started their river task early Tuesday morning. They soon found that there was a lot of hard physical work maneuvering the awkward raft from one side of the river to the other. The samples were to be taken on each side of the river, in spots directly across the river from one another. Inevitably, the raft was pushed downstream with every river crossing, so they had to row upstream for every second sample. It was demanding, exhausting, work.