by Mark Stevens
“It’s over.”
The voice was male and the words were uttered simultaneously as its owner stepped from the tent.
New guy.
He was dressed for a U.S. Marine assault of Corregidor and vastly overdressed for a hunt—or any camping activity—in Colorado in August. Complete fatigues, head to toe. Baseball-style cap with a long camo brim. Black boots.
“Ten minutes of bluster,” he said for the benefit of others inside the tent. “We’re fine.”
Allison brought up the binoculars. The hat bore the same insignia as what she’d seen earlier. This guy had a solid nose familiar to a dozen Mediterranean countries but the first one that came to mind was Greece. A proud nose. His skin was dark. He wore sunglasses that fit tight to his face, narrow strips of lenses no wider than fat Band-Aids but green-black and shiny. With her high school trigonometry and a wild-ass guess, Allison put him at six-two and 225 pounds. Fit, not fat.
“Let’s wait. No rush.” Not every word was crisply enunciated, but that was the gist of what Allison had heard. And her sense of it was confirmed by the retort from the man who had come out to check the weather.
“Come on, Dillard, get your ass out here. It’s over and done. Like springtime all over again out here.”
The man took three steps to the fire and gave it a sideways karate kick, stirring up the struggling embers in a hornet’s nest of swirling red flecks. One fact couldn’t be disputed—the camp was well-established. Undergrowth doesn’t get obliterated in one week or two of trampling around. The camp was neatly hidden, too. It was deep enough within the forest to be hard to be spot by the occasional passerby. Then, why the fire? Maybe they’d gotten cocky.
“Just a passing little hail deal, Dillard. Let’s get a move on.”
Dillard was muttonchops. “Thought the world was ending there for a minute or two,” he said.
“Fuck it, man, it’s only hail. Always sounds like hell. It’s over.”
Allison didn’t have to look to know the sky was still cast-iron black. She doubted the man’s primary occupation was meteorology.
Allison dropped the binoculars. Dillard carried a bow in his left hand. It was camo green and gray. It was one of those compound bows that looked fiendish and overly complicated. Dillard strapped on a pack and a quiver that appeared full.
Where was Mr. American Fat dude? How come he hadn’t come out to join the weather forecasting? He couldn’t have gone far.
Five more minutes…from now, she told herself.
Horses were good at waiting. Boyfriends, too. Could she step away from the camp as easily as she arrived? A minute ago, it was as loud as a jet engine, not that she cared to think about jets. Now it was as quiet as a country road at dawn. Her exit would have to be a model of stealth.
“Go check and see if they’re close,” said not-Dillard. “Bring the binos.”
Allison couldn’t see any eye-rolling, but she could feel Dillard’s reluctance to take orders. The first man kicked the fire while Dillard went back inside the tent and, a minute later, returned and headed straight out of the camp on the opposite side from where Allison watched.
Her heart thudded. Her lips and tongue dried at the same rate as a snowflake in the Sahara. Not-Dillard stared at the fire, didn’t bother to look at the sky above, which had the same patina as, say, coal. She should slip away now and spend the rest of the night admonishing her paranoid brain.
Or not. What could be observed so far wasn’t illegal, bad or in any way reportable. The way her alarms raged, like fireworks, was a different story
Dillard wasn’t gone long. He was trailed by two drenched cowboys on horseback in full body slickers. They dripped water and their horses looked like they they’d come through a car wash. On a long tether behind the horses were four dogs on a group harness. All muzzled. And all equally soaked. All the dogs were a breed, or mix, that Allison didn’t recognize. Maybe a bit of Bloodhound in their droopy ears and wrinkled snouts. Maybe a bit of Walker in their determined, eager looks.
If there was anything sinister going on, the dogs were the only indication. Dogs don’t hunt without snow and tracks. Dogs don’t come with hunters in archery season. Dogs are unpredictable, make noise. They aren’t necessary. They don’t help. The dogs added to the bizarre platter of issues that turned Allison’s stomach sour.
Five minutes more? From now?
It wasn’t likely they were about to stand around the fire and discuss the rest of the day’s planned activities for her benefit.
The two new men were cut from the same stock as the fatigue-clad nameless dude. One was white and he had the pink-pale complexion of a purebred Scandinavian, complete with diamond-blue eyes visible only with the aid of the binoculars. The second man was as brown as the first man was white. Allison raised the binos again to double-check the Hispanic features—a broad, round face with full cheeks, black eyes and thick dark eyebrows like two fuzzy caterpillars. Allison guessed he was fifty; a bit of gray dabbed his hair below the wet cowboy hat. The new white guy mumbled something Allison couldn’t hear, although the general tone berated the others. Something about complaining about the storm.
It started to rain again—a solid shower—and a fresh round of squawks erupted from the foursome. Dillard headed to the tent and the others weren’t far behind. Dogs, too. That made four grown wet men and four wet dogs in one medium-size canvas wall tent. Allison could only imagine the disarray and the stench, particularly after one or two inevitable cigars were torched.
The show was over. Allison stayed low as she backed away from the camp, but didn’t wait long to stand up and start heading back, picking up her pace in the pouring rain. She chose her return route by feel. She ran to make up time or at least create a good impression for Sunny Boy when she arrived. Surely being out of breath would show she cared. She didn’t want him to think she’d been dawdling.
The spot where she thought she’d left Sunny Boy must have had an identical twin, although it was odd that the exact match would exist so close—almost as if an adult had his doppelganger living next door. There was the same indent. There was the same pattern of trees. She was expecting to see a large brown mammal—and thinking about how to respond to his recriminations—that at first she didn’t see the stub of cotton rope, dangling there as if the tree had a white, braided and flaccid penis. The rope had been neatly chopped, perhaps the work of a hatchet. As quickly as she processed the fact that the Sunny Boy was gone, she realized they might be watching and waiting for her, too. She flinched and ducked, quickly darted back into deep cover.
No shot came.
Allison slowed to a walk and waited, turned and looked again.
Nothing.
She sat in the woods, stared out at the broad and empty valley in the distance.
She waited, watched. Waited some more. Listened. Stared. Took a breath. When nothing moved, she slipped back to the spot where Sunny Boy had waited, studied the grasses and occasional bare patches, thinking a print might show what direction he had headed.
The soaked grasses yielded nothing.
Inventory didn’t take long.
Binos, jean jacket, blue jeans, hat, bra, underwear, socks and boots. There might be a Fig Newton tucked in a stray pocket, but she didn’t want to look. Not yet. She found Colin’s atlatl tucked in an inside pocket, didn’t realize she’d been carrying it.
And no arrows.
Water? Real food? Horse? None of the above.
Cell phone? In Sunny Boy’s saddlebag.
Miles to cover? Seven or eight.
Hours of daylight left? Three at the most.
Rain re-doubled its lashing, added weight to her hat and dripping onto the back of her jacket.
The moment was tailor made for one of Colin’s favorite lines.
Welcome to the suck.
thirty:
wednesday, late a
fternoon
“He’s a fugitive,” said Jerry. “You can’t harbor a fugitive. I don’t know why they call it harbor but, you know, protect. Hide.”
“It doesn’t sound like any kind of justice system I know,” said Trudy. She was ready for him, had predicted this reaction. She tried to stay calm. “He needs a few days of hot soup. He’s banged up.”
Jerry sat in the office like he ran the place, which he did. It was his desk, his chair, his place to be comfortable.
“I can tell that much,” said Jerry. “And you know it hurts me too, to see him like this.”
Even in fresh jeans and a new blue Down to Earth T-shirt, anyone could see Alfredo was a beaten man. He kept his left palm over his left eye and his head was drooped. This was a brief stopover on the way to the Flat Tops and her house, where Alfredo could get well and where Duncan Bloom would come soon for the full interview. Diaz had negotiated every detail and had talked Alfredo out of catching the next ride south.
“Whoever they are,” said Jerry. “You don’t want these folks to find Alfredo at your place. Or here.”
Jerry’s tone was relaxed. He understood the need to make Tomás feel unthreatened.
In bits and pieces, Trudy had picked up the story of Alfredo’s terrifying day and night. Before she told Jerry the whole story, Trudy took a moment to corral her emotions. If she showed too much, she knew Jerry would be all the more likely to stay on the fence or, worse, disagree with her plan. But she thought his empathy would grow once he heard the details.
Alfredo had been plucked from the street on the way back from fishing with his brother. He was blindfolded, shoved down low on the floor of the van. He was cuffed. They had driven at high speeds, certainly on the highway. Not too long after they slowed down, maybe ten minutes, they put him inside a windowless room, removed his cuffs and told him he could take off the blindfold only after he heard the door shut. He was given water and three small slices of American cheese. When he needed the bathroom, he was blindfolded again. One of his jailers spoke fluent Spanish. After dusk, they told him he would be released. It was all a mistake. They had checked his background and he was fine. But Alfredo knew he was not legal, had no green card. Their claim made him nervous. On the trip back, the van blew a tire on the highway. He was still blindfolded, but not cuffed. He was sure it was night. When the van stopped for the flat, he half wondered if it was some sort of trick. He had heard the van’s sliding door open, but not close. From the voices, the three men were all outside the van and even with the blindfold he risked wriggling out from the back seat and running for it. He slammed into the guardrail and fell over and rolled down a long hill. He ended on some rocks, heard the men shouting and thought he’d landed on a riverbed. He guessed he was between New Castle and Glenwood Springs. He remembered the train tracks. The men came down the hill with flashlights and Alfredo had to make his way downstream until they gave up. He waited an hour in a riverbank bush, soaking wet and growing colder until he felt safe to start working his way back to Glenwood, occasionally waiting for a freight train to pass.
“Sounds like a bunch of vigilantes,” said Jerry. “He never got told anything official, was never shown an immigration badge, an ICE ID, nothing?”
“Blindfolds?” said Trudy. “Secret rooms? I have this friend with the newspaper and he called every official agency out there and there was no report of an escape. Nothing.”
Alfredo was their employee. They were responsible. She couldn’t flush him from her mind. Stray dogs and cats were treated better than Alfredo.
“Did Alfredo tell them where he worked?” said Jerry.
“He told them he was here on a visit, that he was a legal visitor and could produce his passport if needed,” said Trudy. “It was a lie, but that’s what he told them.”
“So you don’t think they can put two and two together, ask around, and come for you?” said Jerry. “They might know where he lived.”
“Crossed my mind,” said Trudy. “But then they would have to show their faces.”
“And if they are legit—you know ICE powers seem to shift every few weeks. What then? I’m only trying to think this through.”
He was the logic. She was the instinct. It was a successful balance, though at times she translated his “help” as stiff reluctance to change. It was easy to see he wasn’t enthusiastic about any of this.
“All I know is he needs my help,” said Trudy. “He’s agreed to tell his story to a reporter—”
“A reporter?” There was an edge this time. “The same one?”
“Yes,” said Trudy.
In reality, Duncan Bloom had heard all the details. He was going to come up for a more formal interview and review all the details. Alfredo had final approval on what went in print. She might need Juan Diaz to help as interpreter, although maybe Bloom would bring his own.
“Using his real name?” said Jerry.
“No names,” said Trudy. “Or identifying pictures.”
Jerry found a loose paper clip on his desk, started torturing it.
“Big leap of faith.”
“The reporter is a good guy,” said Trudy.
“Sometimes the reporter has editors who aren’t so hospitable.”
“We’ll see,” said Trudy. “You’ve got to trust at some point. Don’t you?”
“I trust the reporter more than the government,” said Jerry. “But that isn’t saying a whole heck of a lot. So how long are you going to take care of him?”
“Until he gets his legs back under him,” said Trudy. “It’s like he’s been dragged by a truck down a rocky road.”
Ever so slightly, Alfredo moaned, let out a breath of pain.
“He might need a hospital,” said Jerry. “What if he has internal injuries?”
“If he gets a fever, maybe,” said Trudy.
“Okay then,” said Jerry. “What can I do?”
“Give me a few days to stay with him,” said Trudy.
Jerry sighed. “You’re awfully popular around here,” he said. “You know that. People are always asking for you. They think being around you will rub off in a good way. You inspire them.”
“Couple days,” said Trudy.
Alfredo sat in the front seat of her pickup. He slumped over like he was asleep. She balled up an old flannel shirt for a pillow, went back in the office to fill a bottle with water and put it in his left hand. “Agua,” she said. “Agua fría.”
She drove through Glenwood Springs realizing that the last thing she needed would be a traffic stop for any reason, big or small. Crossing the bridge, she felt queasiness return as she drove by the spot where Lamott had been shot, now the site of a thick wall of flowers, signs, and banners. She wished she had the nerve to take Alfredo to the hot springs. He could use a soak.
Trudy pointed the pickup east, up the canyon. She drove like she had a precious egg rolling loose in the back and she couldn’t afford to break it.
Which, in some ways, was exactly the case.
thirty-one:
wednesday, late afternoon
Person of interest.
Bloom hated the phrase, something so unofficial about it. Wyatt Earp wouldn’t have gone looking for a person of interest. He would have picked up on the bad guy’s trail and tracked his ass down.
Person of interest for someone who shot a U.S. Senate candidate with a high-powered rifle from three hundred yards? The label was too wimpy. Bloom decided he wouldn’t use it, no matter the headline in the police department’s news release.
He had made it to the department in time for the assembled phalanx of cops to announce that they weren’t taking any more questions. DiMarco wasn’t there, but Bloom had tailed Kerry London back to his news truck and begged for a favor. Between the replay of the eight-minute news conference footage, the news release and a quick call to DiMarco to gauge the cops’ degree of certainty
about the suspected bad guy, Bloom was making up time like the cartoon roadrunner.
“Glad to help,” London had said. “That’s what friends are for.” London had started to tell him about something that happened up on the Flat Tops with Allison Coil but as much as Bloom wanted to hear it, he waved him off. No time.
Now, it was all about speed—getting the sucker on the web fast enough to make Coogan feel that newspapers based two thousand miles away weren’t beating them to the punch on stories in their own backyard.
Bloom finished a three-hundred word recap, four long paragraphs, in four minutes flat. It wasn’t pretty, but no one would be expecting a sonnet. When he hit send and gave the news desk a shout, he looked at his watch. It had been 53 minutes since he left the mobile home park and the story of the missing Alfredo Loya. The Post-Independent wouldn’t be the first, but it also wouldn’t be the last.
Undoubtedly, Coogan would want Bloom’s full attention on the ensuing manhunt and every inch of progress—or lack thereof.
The cops were looking for a man in his mid to late thirties. He was average height, 5' 10". He was trim, about 160 pounds. He had wiry red hair that curled down over his forehead and ears. When he had been spotted at Glenwood Manor, he had been wearing a dark blue baseball cap. The man had an elongated nose. It was long and it flattened against the rest of his face like he’d run into a brick wall. In the drawing, he had a three-day stubble on his narrow, under-slung jaw. From right below his cheekbones to the corners of his forehead, an art teacher would have drawn a perfect rectangle in demonstrating how to analyze face shapes. From right below his cheek bones to the tip of his jaw, a triangle pointing down. If a drawing could convict, Bloom would have no problem with the legal system. This dude had a brooding, sinister look.