Hunted

by William W. Johnstone

  Tom Doolin and Bobcat Blake exchanged glances. Tom said, “We was supposed to meet some friends here and go fishing.” He let that statement stand in silence for a few seconds.

  “Someone was here,” Rick said. “But the camp fire ashes are cold. Whether or not it was your friends, I can’t say. Where were you planning on fishing?”

  “Over there,” Bobcat said, pointing.

  Rick picked up on the lie immediately. Not unless you want to walk about ten miles, he thought. “Well, you men have a good time. I hope you find your friends. I’m sure they’re close by.” Of course, if you really wanted to contact them, you could use those radios you’re both carrying in leather on your belts. What the hell is going on around here?

  Tom squatted down beside the splotch of blood. “Bobcat? This is blood. Did you see this, Ranger?”

  “Yes. Probably animal blood. Someone’s been doing some poaching,” he added drily.

  “Not our friends,” Bobcat said. “They weren’t armed.” He looked at Doolin. “I don’t like this one damn bit.” He glanced at Rick. “You gonna do something about this?”

  “About what? Animal blood? If your friends haven’t shown up in a couple of days, contact the ranger station and we’ll launch a search party. Did your friends have a compass; were they skilled in back woods country?”

  “Oh, yeah. They wouldn’t get lost,” Tom said.

  Rick shrugged his shoulders. “Then don’t worry about it.” He paused. “You men have licenses to fish?”

  “Ah . . . sure we do,” Bobcat said, but the slight hesitation gave away the lie.

  “Show them to me, please.”

  The two mercenaries exchanged glances. Then Tom Doolin smiled. “Well, I guess we left them back at camp, Ranger. Sorry about that. We promise to do better.”

  “Leave your fishing gear with me. You can pick it up at the ranger station by showing a current fishing permit.”

  “That’s a little strong, isn’t it, Ranger?” Bobcat asked.

  “Put your fishing gear on the ground,” Rick said, backing up a few steps. “Right now. And show me some ID. And do that carefully.”

  “For the want of a nail,” Tom Doolin muttered, realizing that Robert Roche had thought of nearly everything... except for the men getting fishing licenses.

  “What’s that?” Rick asked.

  “Oh, nothing. Just a bit of verse from long ago.”

  The mercenaries were in a bind. If they opened the tubes, the ranger would see the tranquilizer guns, and they would really be in trouble.

  “Well,” Bobcat said, “I don’t reckon we have much choice in the matter, Tom.”

  “None at all,” Tom said. “I am sorry, Ranger. You just happened along at the wrong time.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Rick demanded.

  “Killing you.” Darry spoke from the edge of the small clearing.

  Tom Doolin grabbed for the weapon he carried in a shoulder holster. Darry crossed the clearing with amazing swiftness and hit Doolin with a shoulder running at full speed. The charge knocked the man into his partner, and they both went down, pistols flying from their hands.

  “Grab the guns, Rick!” Darry said, bouncing to his feet.

  Rick kicked the pistols away and spun around, hands balled into fists. “I was a pretty good boxer in college, Darry.”

  “Not here,” Darry said. “This isn’t going to be boxing.”

  Bobcat and Doolin were on their feet, both of them smiling, standing with their hands open, held in front of them.

  Rick jerked out his side arm. “I can stop this right now.”

  “No,” Darry said. “Let them show me what they’ve got. I think I’ve picked up a few tricks of my own over the years.”

  “You’re a fool, Ransom,” Bobcat said, as both mercs dropped their backpacks and tubes. “I can take you apart by myself.”

  Darry’s foot lashed out and impacted with the side of Bobcat’s face. As graceful as a ballet dancer, Darry spun around and kicked Doolin in the stomach . . . showing the pair a simple exercise in savate. Both men went down and got right back up.

  “He ain’t no pussy,” Bobcat remarked, blood leaking from one corner of his mouth.

  Darry stepped in and slapped the man hard, open-handed, rocking Bobcat’s head back and momentarily glazing his eyes. Darry turned as fast as a snake and jabbed stiffened fingers into Doolin’s eyes. Doolin backed up, his hands flying to his eyes and his head shaking. Darry drove a balled right fist into Bobcat’s chest, directly over the man’s heart. He hit him three times on the chest, blows delivered so fast they were a blur to Rick’s eyes. Bobcat paled as his heart skipped a couple of beats, faltered, and he struggled for breath. He sat down hard on the ground, both hands going to his chest. Darry spun and kicked Doolin in the mouth, pulping the man’s lips and knocking him down. Darry then stepped in close and brought both hands in hard and fast, palms open, over the man’s ears. Doolin’s world went silent for a few moments, and he rolled on the ground, his head exploding in pain.

  “You want to cuff them now?” Darry asked, stepping back. Rick noticed that the man was not even breathing hard, and he had not worked up a sweat.

  Rick handcuffed the men, hands behind their backs, using the cuffs he carried on his belt and cuffs he carried in his saddlebags.

  “Now let’s see what’s in those tubes,” Darry said, although he already knew, from George Eagle Dancer’s own lips.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Rick said, hefting a tranquilizer rifle.

  “What the hell are you charging us with?” Tom Doolin asked, shaking his head. His hearing still wasn’t right.

  “We’ll start with assault with a deadly weapon against a federal officer,” Rick said. “And work down from there.”

  “Shit!” Bobcat said.

  * * *

  “Mr. President,” the White House legal counsel advised him. “It is not against the law to live to be seven hundred years old. We have no right to send agents in to capture this . . . Darry Ransom or whatever his name is. He has broken no laws . . . well, not really. We’ve got more important matters confronting us than a man purportedly seven hundred years old.”

  The President looked at him. “Such as . . . ?”

  “The Collier family.”

  “Who?”

  “The doctor and lawyer who were roughed up in the Idaho wilderness area. While protecting his mother, their son shot and killed a federal agent.”

  “What about them?”

  “Agents from the Justice Department visited them in their home in Los Angeles, making veiled threats about what will happen to their son in prison . . . among other things.”

  “Son of a bitch!” the Pres said.

  “Then, when they refused to deal, the IRS froze their assets and put them under audit.”

  The Pres sighed. “Go on,” he said wearily.

  His chief of staff said, “Sir, it is common knowledge among the people, albeit unproven, that the government uses the IRS for punitive measures against citizens they want to silence or whip into line.”

  “That’s a damn lie!” the Pres said.

  “No, it isn’t,” the DIR/FBI spoke up. “But it sure needs to be stopped. This nation is borderlining on become a dictatorship.”

  “Horseshit!” the Pres flared.

  “You can shit your horse as much as you like,” the director told his long-time friend. “But you can’t deny the truth. And you just heard the truth.”

  The attorney general, who had finally been found plucking wildflowers and running barefoot through meadows in the Smoky Mountains National Park, stirred uneasily. She knew without a doubt that many (if not all) federal enforcement agencies were in bed with the IRS and had been for years.

  “I don’t want to hear this,” the Pres said.

  “Mr. President,” the legal counsel said. “Your approval ratings are very low. To be brutally honest, I have to say that the odds of your having a second term are slim to
none. This is a golden moment for you to rise in the polls. Denounce the practice of using the IRS in a punitive manner. Hell, you don’t have to stop it, just say you’re going to.”

  (Isn’t politics wonderful?)

  “We are investigating more private citizens than ever before in the history of this country,” Hank Wallace said. “We’re investigating a writer of popular fiction because—”

  The Pres waved a hand. “I don’t want to hear about it. If this writer is being investigated, there must be a good reason for the investigation.”

  “He makes fun of liberal Democrats,” Hank said. He looked over at the AG, who was fully aware of the order putting a full field investigation of the man into effect.

  The AG chose not to return the gaze or comment on the statement.

  The Pres answered his intercom. “An urgent call for Mr. Wallace.”

  “You can take it over there, Hank,” the Pres said.

  Hank spoke for only a few seconds and then returned to stand behind his chair. “A few hours ago, Ranger Rick Battle brought in two of the mercenaries who were in the area during the, ah, incident. They’ve been positively identified by captured CDL members as being part of the group who killed several federal officers.” He looked at the director. “I’d like to talk to those people, sir.”

  The director looked at the Pres and received a slight nod. “Go.”

  Hank and Carol left the Oval Office.

  * * *

  Stormy took the video tape from the Colliers’ camcorder and showed it to the network’s legal department in Los Angeles . . . after making two dubs of the tape just in case the original tape might mysteriously disappear, and she felt sure it would if the federal government ever got its hands on it.

  Politically, Stormy was a changed woman.

  “We don’t want it,” was the legal opinion the next day, after the lawyers spoke with the CEO of the network.

  “I didn’t think any of you lace-pants liberal bastards and bitches would have the courage to show it,” Stormy said. “So I quit!”

  “Me, too,” Ki added.

  “That makes three of us,” Craig said.

  The news chief in New York, upon hearing that two of his top reporters and an award-winning camera-person had quit, told the head honcho of the network, “There is a fourth network out there who has been trying to assemble a good news team for several years. And as of right now, they’ve got a damn good nucleus of one. Fuck you! I quit!”

  “Harold, goddammit, listen to me!” the head honcho said. “Sit down, please, and listen to me.”

  Harold Rushing sat. “So talk to me.”

  “What do you want, Hal? For the government to yank our license?”

  “Oh, bullshit! It’s time to take a stand. The government is fucking people over. Get off your liberal ass and stand up for the people, goddammit!”

  “Are you forgetting who you’re talking to, Hal? I run this network. Not you.”

  “No, I’m not forgetting who you are. I know who you are. You and every anchor and the majority of the reporters on the Big Three. You’ve all got your noses jammed so far up the asses of cry-baby liberals, every time they fart you all have to put on a gas mask.”

  “You’re fired!”

  “You can’t fire me, I already quit!”

  “You’re through in this business! All of you. You’ll never work again.”

  Harold Rushing tossed him the Rigid Digit and walked out of the office. He passed Don Weather, the co-anchor of the evening news, in the hall.

  “His, Hal!” Don said, putting on his best “I like everybody, don’t you like me” tone.

  “Fuck you, too!” Hal said, and kept right on walking.

  “He must have really had a bad day,” Don said to a copy editor.

  She rolled her eyes.

  Just as Hal was approaching the door to his office, the other co-anchor of the evening news, Bonnie Fang, came strolling up the hall. “Hi, Hal!” she called.

  Hal really didn’t have anything against Bonnie. She was an okay sort of person. “Take a stand, Bonnie,” he told her. “Speak up for what you know is right.” Then he walked into his office and closed the door.

  Bonnie stood in the hall for a moment, looking rather confused. She blinked a couple of times and finally said, “What?” Bonnie opened the door to Hal’s office and found his secretary all red-eyed and opening a box of tissues. “What’s up, Sally?”

  Ten minutes later, Bonnie stormed into Don’s office and exploded all over the place.

  “I know all about it.” Don finally got her quieted down. “I just heard. I’m just sick about it. It’s regrettable, but I have to side with network policy. We simply can’t support a right wing radical movement.”

  “What the hell are you talking about, Don? This is an issue about basic human rights being violated. The government using its enforcement agencies in a punitive manner against good, decent citizens.”

  “I won’t support anarchy, Bonnie.”

  “Don,” she said softly. “You’re a real prick, you know that?”

  “I really, really resent that, Bonnie. That remark is so uncalled for.”

  She stood for a moment, glaring at him. Then, for the second time in less than twenty minutes, Don was told to go commit an impossible act on his person.

  “My word!” Don said, after Bonnie had exited his office, slamming the door so hard it almost came off its hinges.

  Before the sun set that day on the concrete canyons of New York City, dozens more resignations from employees who worked for the big three networks landed on various desks and twenty-two faxes announcing resignation came in from around the world. By late afternoon, seventy-two people, representing top reporters, news chiefs, producers, directors, award-winning camera-persons, and other experienced people in all aspects of news gathering grouped in the lobby of the offices of the Coyote Network, a maverick network that was fast becoming a major player in entertainment, sports, and investigative reporting. The owner of the Coyote Network, a free-wheeling, do-anything, hell-for-leather individualist who was Scotland-born, smiled at the group. As soon as he had heard word of the mass resignations, he had begun contacting TV and radio stations around the nation. The response had been so overwhelming it had staggered the man. Ian MacVay had sensed some time back that the American public wanted real news about America and Americans, not the same old tired bullshit that filled the TV screens every evening; not the same old time-worn liberal sobbing and hanky twisting; but real news about real working, law-abiding, over-tax-burdened Americans struggling to survive while it appeared the very government that was supposed to represent them was doing everything possible to grind them under the heel of socialism.

  Tables were set up all around the huge lobby. Coyote personnel were ready to start hiring. Ian raised his arms for silence. He said, “We’re going to go on the air in seventy-two hours, people. It might be rough and ragged for a time, but we’re going to do it. We’re going to give the American people news about America; news about big and small government waste and excesses; news about government sticking their noses into the private lives of the citizens; news about lost rights and personal liberties of American citizens. The bulk of our news will be for Americans and about Americans. Coyote affiliates have agreed, unanimously, for an hour’s news each evening. We’re going to go in-depth; we’re going to bulldog stories from beginning to end. We’re going to start a news revolution in this country. We’re going to go after big government with a vengeance. Now, Washington will do its best to silence us. Be ready. They’ll be sending their secret police in to snoop and pry and try to discredit us. It’s going to get dirty, people, for Washington doesn’t like its lid to be lifted up, exposing all the slime underneath. But we’re going to do it. And we’re going to have unlimited resources behind us. As you all know, I am a wealthy man, but just moments ago, the richest man in the world called me and agreed to throw his wealth behind our new endeavor. Mr. Robert Roche, of Roche Industr
ies, is now officially on board.”

  Ian waited until the applause died down. He then waved toward the tables situated around the lobby. “Step up and sign on, people. The news revolution has begun.”

  Darry, listening to a small, battery-operated radio, leaned back against a tree and sipped his coffee, his face a study in concentration. “Well, now,” he murmured. “Isn’t that interesting. I wonder why the great billionaire capitalist, Robert Roche, would suddenly turn philanthropist and be so concerned about truth in government and so very distressed about the lives of ordinary American citizens?” He laughed. Of course he knew why: to get at him.

  Not far away, a wolf sang its lonely, lovely song to the fading afternoon skies. Darry smiled as the plaintive call was answered. Darry threw back his own head and howled. Then the twilight was filled with returning calls of the wild.

  “You want me, Robert Roche?” Darry muttered. “Come get me.”

  25

  “Shit, shit shit!” the President said, using the remote to click off the TV after Ian MacVay had concluded his press conference. He looked at an aide. “Get me the commissioner at the FCC.”

  “Don’t do it,” his chief of staff cautioned. “You’ll be playing right into their hands. That’s the first move they’ll expect, and they’ll be ready for it.”

  “You expect me to stand by and let that pack of right-wing radicals get this network off the ground. No way will I allow that to happen.”

  “You can’t stop it, sir,” the chief legal counsel said. “I’ve already spoken with the FCC. Coyote submitted all the proper papers for a news department some time back, and it was approved. All we can do is ride it out.”

  “You mean ride this administration right out of office,” the attorney general said. “Because that’s what they plan on doing. Let me approve a full field investigation by the Bureau against everyone involved in this crazy scheme. We’ll discredit them. We’ll—”

  “Good God, no!” the White House counsel said, considerable heat behind his words. “That would backfire on us before the ink was dry.”

  The President looked at the sheets of paper spread out on his desk. On the sheets of paper were the names of all who had resigned from the big three networks. “Hard-line conservatives,” the Pres said. “Every one of them. Men and women who have, up until this moment, had to conceal their political leanings in order to keep their jobs. God, just look at this list. These people hate me. They hate all liberals. One can only shudder at the type of reporting that will be coming from the Coyote Network.”