Running Dark

by Joseph Heywood

  “Order Seventeen is administrative wit’ no criminal penalties, and only if da bad guys repeatedly violate da rule, can we start proceedin’s to revoke dere licenses. But all dis takes a long time, and meanwhile da bastards keep dere stuff and dey’re out dere still takin’ fish and makin’ good money. Dose rats down dere tell da newspapers dey take fish to keep off welfare, which is a buncha hooey, eh. Dose rats got fifty-t’ousand-dollar houses, got new trucks, got new snow machines, and dey got new boats wid two-hunnert-horse motors dat leave us suckin’ wind. Seventeen says where and when dey can fish and what dey can fish for, so I say we see anyting even suggests dey’re violatin’, we move in, seize dere nets, take dere boats, grab dere motors, secure dere snowmobiles, seize anyting dey need to fish and impound da whole stinkin’ bloody lot and immediately start condemnation proceedings.”

  Captain Metrovich was shaking his head, trying to reason with Stone. “Proceedings take a long time, and what you’re suggesting surely would be reversed by the courts. It would undoubtedly be characterized as illegal seizure—and harassment.”

  “Maybe,” Stone said, “but we all know dat dose courts don’t move so fast, an’ every day we got dere gear, dose assholes down dere to da Garden won’t be takin’ fish. We don’t need no criminal penalties in Order Seventeen. All we gotta do is grab dere stuff an’ trow it all inta da courts and make da rats hire lawyers ta get it back.”

  The room began to buzz and Captain Metrovich had to hold up his hands to reassert control. “We have a policy,” he repeated. “We will make our patrols and enforce the laws we have and, if there are violations of Order Seventeen, we will follow the extant process. Am I being clear?”

  Even Stone took this declaration stoically.

  “One final item,” Metrovich said. “Chief Nill is stepping down, and I have been asked to deploy to Lansing for six months to serve as acting chief. In my absence Lt. Attalienti will be acting captain.”

  “Why’s the chief steppin’ down?” Colt Homes asked.

  “He has a health problem,” Metrovich said, not expanding.

  None of the men congratulated Metrovich on his assignment and none of them stuck around to talk. They got up en masse and quickly left the building.

  Service was walking to his vehicle to head for home when Attalienti pulled him aside.

  “You know where the Beer Barrel is?”

  “The bar in Rock?”

  “Be there tonight at seven-thirty. Wear civvies and drive your personal vehicle. Park behind the house with the barber pole out front, hoof it over to the bar, and don’t be late.”

  “I’m supposed to work tonight,” Service protested, his mind already back in the Mosquito Wilderness on things he needed to do there.

  “This will be work,” the new acting captain said, walking away.

  Now what the hell was going on? Service wondered. Since he’d gotten into the Garden mess, nothing made sense, and he was beginning to feel frustrations that reminded him of those he thought he had left behind in Vietnam.

  5

  ROCK, DECEMBER 15, 1975

  “I’d rather get stung in the face than in the ass.”

  Service found it mildly ironic that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a train run the railroad tracks that paralleled Rock. It was a town settled by railroad workers and known as Malton Spur and Maple Ridge before being named Rock by a long-forgotten postmaster. The area was well named: Glaciers had left a deep layer of drift rock that had to be turned over before any planting could be done, and as far as Service knew, the only reliable crop remained rocks and some small, hard potatoes and stunted sugar beets, equally hard. Rock was a town without flair, and it was appropriate that the Beer Barrel was a two-fisted drinker’s bar that made no pretense of being anything other than what it was.

  Service was dressed in jeans, a red plaid wool shirt, and a black down vest. He parked his black ten-year-old Ford pickup behind a white shotgun house with an ancient and faded barber pole out front, and walked a hundred yards over an icy gravel parking lot to the bar. The interior was dark, the floor and furniture nicked, and he and the acting captain appeared to be the only ones there. Attalienti led him upstairs to a small office, opened a small door in the floor beside an old oak desk, and said, “Sit here and keep quiet. Your job is to listen.” Service nodded and sat down, wondering if the acting captain had all his marbles.

  The meeting in the room below didn’t start for another hour, and over that time a dozen officers filtered in to be greeted by Attalienti and Sergeants Garwood and Stone.

  Service’s viewpoint was directly above tables pushed together in the main bar. Attalienti sat among the men, Stone and Garwood on either side of him. “I called you here because I think Len is right about this Garden money angle,” Attalienti began. “I think our lawyers in Lansing may get their assholes tight, but the Garden deal is about money, so we’re gonna put some bodies on this and poke the stick into the hornet’s nest.” The acting captain paused to let the words sink in, and added, “I’d rather get stung in the face than in the ass.”

  Service saw all the men grin.

  Attalienti continued, “You men are here because you’re going to be the core team, even if you’re in different districts. I don’t mean to disparage anyone, but we have some officers who’re not crazy about patrolling the Garden. You men may not be crazy about it either, but knowing what I know about each of you, I think you’ll go. You’ve been handpicked for this.”

  Service saw more nodding and sensed an unspoken swell of determination in the room below.

  “Edey has decided to retire in January. As acting captain, I will appoint Len Stone to be acting lieutenant in Edey’s stead. Len will spearhead this effort,” Attalienti said.

  Eddie Moody, a new officer from Manistique, leaned forward. “Do we put the hammer on the rats right away?”

  “No,” Attalienti said. “The big push will start in April after the ice goes out and the walleye and perch spawns begin. Between now and then we will conduct routine road and snowmobile patrols.”

  Colt Homes spoke up. “How is dat different?”

  “Nobody goes solo into the Garden,” Attalienti said. “No exceptions.”

  Stone spoke up. “We never go down dere wit’ fewer den two vehicles and four men. I’ll always be one of da four. We’ll conduct no patrols without having county and Troop resources on standby. Between now and April we’ll go down dere, varying our days an’ times. Dey’ve been outnumbering us down dere, but we’re gonna try to rectify dat, and when April comes we’ll start going in with real force.”

  “You’ll be on every patrol?” Moody asked Stone.

  The blond sergeant said, “Can’t let you boys have all da fun, can I?”

  This lightened the mood in the room, and for more than an hour, Service listened and made notes while the officers and supervisors talked about rendezvous points, communications and backup procedures, and other technical matters.

  After the men were gone, Attalienti walked with Service to his truck.

  “You hear okay?”

  Service nodded.

  “That seem like work enough for you?”

  “Yessir,” Service said.

  “You’re probably wondering why I had you stashed upstairs, and I’ll answer that. You were a recon marine in Vietnam, and I know you keep your cool and use your brain. Garwood said you didn’t flinch during your patrol with him, and Shuck Gorley made a special point of calling me to talk about you—and I can tell you, Shuck is real picky about endorsing people. When I was an officer working with him, it took five years for him to decide I could be trusted. I have a job I’d like for you to do, but if you accept, what you’re doing will be strictly between us, understood?”

  Service nodded.

  Attalienti continued. “I understand how Len St
one feels, but Metrovich also has a valid point: Not everybody who lives on the Garden is a rat. Our main focus there has been the major commercial operations out of Garden and Fairport, the ones with the tugs, paid crews, and wholesale fish houses, but they already feel our presence. The guys I want to put the heat on now are the rat fishermen, the greedy little bastards with fast boats who flaunt the law and do whatever they please. We’re gonna put a dent in them.”

  “But?” Service said.

  “You can’t dent something you can’t identify. I’ve been contacted by a Garden resident who’s fed up with behavior down there and wants to help us. Frankly, I don’t know if this is legit, a provocation, or hooey. But if it’s real, it means I need to send somebody into the Garden alone to work with the contact.”

  “How do we beat the crow line?” The Garden was famous for its early warning system—a series of homes with lookouts who immediately used their telephones to report the appearance of any marked police vehicle on Garden Road, the main route down the peninsula.

  “That will be your problem to solve,” the acting captain said.

  “Me?”

  “I want you to go down there. Chances of one of the rats recognizing you is minimal, and you haven’t been involved in this mess long enough to be affected by the confusion and lack of direction. If you volunteer, you’ll report to me directly until you can authenticate the veracity of the volunteer informant. If you develop doubts—and I mean the slightest tickle in your gut—we’re gonna drop this. But if you think it feels right, I want you to go undercover to observe and gather information. You will be there strictly for surveillance. You will not be enforcing laws. Your job will be to stay invisible until you can gather what we need and get the hell out. Capisce?”

  “What about the Mosquito?”

  “Others will cover your area for you, and you’re going to be out at a time when there won’t be much going on anyway. Are you in?”

  Service said, “Who’s my contact?”

  “It’s good you volunteered,” Attalienti said with a grin. “You were asked for by name.” He had a twinkle in his eye. “The contact is a prominent personality in the Garden and is concerned about maintaining confidentiality. They’ll come to you.”

  “When?”

  “Soon, I’d think,” the acting captain said. “Come see me afterwards.”

  Service asked, “How will Lansing react to this?”

  Attalienti grinned, “Hell of a lot easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. I want to know who the rats are, who leads them, how they stage operations, their land-side tactics, meeting and gathering places—everything you can learn that will help us to understand who and what we’re dealing with. Observe and learn—do not act. Understood?”

  Service nodded, but he wasn’t really paying attention. Why had he been asked for by name, and why the hell did this feel more and more like Vietnam?

  6

  SLIPPERY CREEK, DECEMBER 17, 1975

  . . . he wondered if having one leg halved discomfort, or doubled it . . .

  It had been two days since the meeting in Rock, two days of routine patrols in the Mosquito. Conservation Officer Grady Service arrived home at Slippery Creek the way he had departed the night before—running dark, no interior lights, no headlights. It had begun to snow the previous afternoon, and overnight the storm had left six fluffy inches on the ground.

  There were tracks leading up his road, and next to the trailer he saw a small dark pickup still sweating snow off its metal skin. The tracks told him it had arrived not long before him.

  He parked behind the truck and approached it cautiously. He had spent last night’s patrol alone, and the sudden appearance of another human being always put him on alert.

  The driver’s window slid down. “Officer Service?” He nodded. “We need to talk.” The voice came from a face cocooned in a parka hood pulled tight around a gaunt face.

  He nodded, opened the cabin door, and left it open as he shed his own parka and boots.

  “Sorry to barge in on you like this,” the voice said from the doorway.

  “Coffee?” he asked, glancing over and seeing that she had no left leg and a metal crutch attached to her left wrist.

  “Could use it,” the woman said, closing the door. She took off her parka and unzipped her knee-high boot, which folded over. It had a feminine contour and a low heel.

  “Fixings or black?” Service asked over his shoulder.

  “Natural,” she said.

  The woman sat silently while Service began to boil coffee. His father had always boiled coffee and though it was too strong for most people, it was what Service preferred.

  “Am I interrupting something?” she asked when he turned back to the table with cups and saucers that didn’t match.

  “No.” He was used to being called on at all hours.

  He brought the pot to the table, filled two cups, and sat down. His feet felt cold from a night in boots and snow, and he wondered if having one leg halved discomfort, or doubled it, from winter cold.

  She grinned slyly. “One leg is like half a glass of water. Am I half empty or half full?”

  “What can I do for you?” he asked, cursing himself for fixating on the one leg. Dope, he told himself.

  She sipped the strong coffee and showed no reaction. “Your Captain Attalienti said I could talk to you, so the real question is what can I do for you people—not vice versa. I’m Cecilia Lasurm,” she said with a formal air. She had a low, gravelly voice, jet-black hair cut short, a long neck poking out of a thick black turtleneck, no makeup or jewelry. Her eyes were huge and engaging, a faded blue color with green streaks.

  “I teach in the Garden,” she said. “Born there, went to school up to Northern, and came back to live and teach.”

  “Garden or Fairport?” Service asked.

  “This shows how little you people know,” she said. “I live in between,” she said, “but the only school is north of Garden and it’s called Big Bay de Noc. The Garden, Cooks, and Nahma school districts consolidated years ago.”

  “I’m sure the officers who are down there regularly know this,” he said.

  “Granted,” she said, “but there are a number of obvious things they don’t see or understand. I’m not a particularly subtle woman,” his guest announced. “The Garden is controlled by a bunch of thugs and punks. Most people there don’t want it that way, but if you go against them, your barn burns, your tires get cut, and windows start breaking.”

  Service understood. The lawless had always harassed the law-abiding into deaf- and dumbness in some reaches of the U.P.

  “I’ve spent nearly a year trying to find the right man, asking around, talking to people, trying to find the most competent game warden I could. Word is you’re new and cut no slack for scofflaws. I don’t need a knuckle-dragger. I want a thinker,” she added.

  “There are a lot more experienced people than me,” he said. “The Garden isn’t my turf.”

  “I want you, and Attalienti says you’re my contact. I also know that the DNR brings men in from all over the U.P. to handle jobs in the Garden. Right now your officers are not there as often as they used to be, and the local jerks think they’ve driven you out. I came to trade.”

  Service leaned forward.

  Lasurm continued. “There’s only one main road in and out, and the outlaws have lookouts and a CB-radio and telephone system for passing the word when the law comes down Garden Road. They probably have the back way covered too, but that road’s narrow and too easy to cut off and trap a lawman, so you’re forced to use the western route to go south, or come in by water; either way, you can’t exactly sneak in. What you people lack is information—a scorecard, who does what to whom. I can give you that.”

  “How?”

  “I teach at the elementar
y school, and I am also the district’s so-called visiting teacher—which means I go to houses to take lessons to shut-in kids. I have the kids and relatives of all the troublemakers in my classroom, and have for the past few years. Some of those kids are in high school or just out. When you have a job like mine, you hear and see things others don’t. For example, I can tell when the fish runs start and the rats go to work because their kids help unload fish, and the spines of the walleyes and perch puncture their hands. I see it every year. It’s like being a priest.”

  “A priest can’t break the confidence of the confessional.”

  “Don’t be literal. I said like a priest.” She frowned. “If somebody doesn’t start talking and teaching you people what in blazes is going on, we’re going to be at war for a long time, and sooner or later one of those potshots is going to hit somebody and all hell will break loose.”

  Interesting, Service thought. “What do you get out of this?” he asked.

  For the next hour she explained, and though he didn’t agree with some of her assumptions and theories, he realized that if she knew as much as she claimed, she could be the key that would finally open the Garden Peninsula to the law. All she wanted in return for her cooperation was that the Garden normalize for a few years so the kids now in elementary school could grow up in an environment where locals were not always pitted against all outsiders—DNR, trolls, sportfishermen—anyone “not from the Garden.” Her intensity was palpable. “You realize if they catch you down there alone, they might kill you,” she concluded.

  She had given him enough tidbits to convince him she was worth the risk. “I can’t promise anything,” he said, knowing the go, no-go decision was his.

  “You just take the offer where you have to and when you’re ready, put an ad in the Manistique classifieds.” She handed him a piece of paper that read matthew 7:7.

  “You run this and a date, time, and place, and I’ll be there to talk,” she said.