by Gordon Ryan
Following a brief radio contact from Shaw, five men of the Shasta Brigade who had not been involved in the ambush stealthily approached the remote cabin holding the small-arms cache—three from the front and two from the rear. On signal, they kicked in the doors and assaulted the two agents holding the woman and sixteen-year-old Timothy Castleton. The previous twenty minutes had been slightly uncomfortable for Timothy, who had been forced to lie on his stomach, his arms handcuffed behind his back.
When the door flew open, the first agent reached for his weapon with quick reflexes, but not fast enough to avoid the three nine-millimeter slugs that entered his body and neck from the first brigade man through the door. The second agent raised his hands in surrender and lived for an additional two minutes—long enough to be taken outside, where he received a bullet to the back of the head, point blank.
Captain Roger Dahlgren, who also served as Woodland’s city manager, led the small contingent of men at the cabin. He ordered two of the men to load the dead agents’ bodies into their truck and take them to the ambush site. With two other men, he then entered the cabin.
“Get the weapons out of the cellar, fast,” he said as they entered the house.
“You got my money?” the woman said, recognizing Dahlgren as the man who had first met with her.
“We’ll take care of you, not to worry,” he said.
“You said we’d be here two days, three at most. It’s been near on to a week. I want more money,” she said.
“Shut up. I said you’d be taken care of. Tim,” he said to the young boy, “you’ve done a fine job here. Help load out the weapons and then get out.”
“Yes, sir,” the boy replied.
In ten minutes, two of the vehicles were gone, one with weapons loaded under a thick tarpaulin and one with two dead ATF agents bouncing in the truck bed. Only Captain Dahlgren remained, his Jeep Cherokee parked over the crest of a hill behind the cabin.
“Get your purse, and I’ll take you back into Redding,” he said to the woman.
As she turned to pick it up, without hesitation, Dahlgren fired a shot into the back of her head, instantly dropping her to the floor. He looked for a moment at the two smaller children, both too young to be aware of what had transpired. From the pocket of his jacket, he retrieved a small bottle of clear fluid and a wad of gauze wrapping. He poured the contents of the bottle onto the gauze and held the cloth over the nose and mouth of each child in turn, laying them gently on the floor of the cabin next to their mother. His last act was to sprinkle the floor of the cabin with liberal amounts of gasoline from a two-gallon can that had been stashed behind the cabin. Outside, he turned, looked over the cabin once more, and threw a match through the front door. The flames immediately swept throughout the small, dry, wooden structure.
Back at the ambush scene, brigade members salvaged radios, automatic weapons, and assorted ATF gear from the disabled vehicles. Commander Shaw, one task left to perform, motioned for Steve Turner, who jogged over to his side.
“Yeah, Commander?”
“Steve, get behind the wheel of that second vehicle and check the glove box for anything of interest. The team leader was in that car.”
“Right,” Steve replied. Shaw and First Sergeant Krueger followed Steve to the car and stood by as he slid over the seat toward the glove box. When Shaw slammed the driver’s door, Steve jerked upright and looked toward Shaw, who was glaring down at him.
“What are you doing?” Steve said.
“A good logger,” Shaw said, emphasizing the term, “should be careful in the woods, don’t you think, Steve?” At the mention of his code name, FBI Agent Alex Hunter, who had worked undercover within the Shasta Brigade for nearly a year, reached for his weapon, but Commander Jackson Shaw quickly triggered two rounds into the side of his head, then reached in to grab him by the collar and shove him forward against the steering wheel before pinning a California bear flag on his collar. Turning to Krueger, who was clearly surprised by the event that had just taken place, Shaw gave the order: “Clear out, First Sergeant. We’re through here.”
“Yes, sir,” Krueger replied, glancing once more at the lifeless body of Steve—or whatever his name was.
Shaw stood silently for a few moments, looking up at the sunlight filtering through the heavy stand of trees alongside the mountain trail. The woods were beautiful, tranquil, and they provided relief from the confines and confusion of the city. As he watched the smoke from the action slowly rise and dissipate, the acrid odor of cordite heavy in the air, he gave one further glance to the carnage strewn over the trail and turned to leave.
The Shasta Brigade, acting on orders from Commander Jackson Shaw, had planned, deployed, and then trapped and killed twenty-six agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms—all without having a man wounded. Shaw had also dealt with one undercover FBI agent whose cover had been blown by Grant Sully, deputy director of operations for the CIA, in his back-channel report to the brigade. The entire platoon was gone in twenty minutes. The only sound remaining in the forest was the radio in Riker’s vehicle, repeating at frequent intervals, “Bugle Base, Bugle Base, this is ATF Central, do you copy? Over.”
* * *
“Good evening. I’m Paul Spackman, and welcome to the Six O’ Clock Eyewitness News. Another brazen daylight attack was perpetrated today on agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Twenty-six agents were gunned down in the Sierra Nevada Mountains east of Red Bluff in what appears to have been a military-style ambush. From initial reports submitted by the sheriff’s department in Lassen County, the ATF agents were returning from a raid on a suspected weapons cache, and in the process of that raid, they burned a remote cabin in the high Sierras to the ground. Inside the cabin were the charred remains of a woman and two infant children,” Spackman said, shaking his head in a gesture of sadness.
“In a terse message left on this reporter’s voice mail, a caller identifying himself as a representative of the Western Patriot Movement claimed that the attack on the agents was in retaliation for the horrendous act committed against the woman and her children, who lived alone, unarmed, in their solitary cabin in the mountains.
“In a related news story today, thirty-eight of California’s fifty-two members of Congress filed a joint-action suit with the United States Supreme Court, seeking the court’s determination that the recent secession election was unconstitutional and should be overturned. We have a further report on today’s startling developments from our field correspondent, Janice Strickland, who will provide additional information. That report in a moment …”
* * *
Watching the evening news from his corporate suite in downtown San Francisco, John Henry Franklin leaned back in his chair and contemplated with satisfaction the endless possibilities this new direction offered. Whatever the U.S. Supreme Court might say wouldn’t really matter. The die had been cast. The Franklin Group had already conducted negotiations with Japanese and Korean corporate and labor leaders, paid the necessary “consideration fees,” and had received assurance of political acceptance. The Mexican government, with the intervention of General Valdez, had also promised immediate recognition of the Republic of California.
Franklin thought back to when General Valdez had first approached him, nearly twelve years before, with his scheme to provide an immigrant labor force. It was an ingenious plan, but limited in scope, until Franklin put his vast resources behind it. Valdez had thought to bring in thousands, but under Franklin’s planning it had grown to tens of thousands, and then nearly a half-million migrant workers in all aspects of menial labor throughout the western United States.
Receiving wages set by MexiCal and dozens of other shell employment agencies controlled by Franklin’s subsidiary companies, immigrant workers were hired to perform tasks not many Americans were willing to do. The workers received only about seventy percent of the current minimum wage, but more money than they could get for comparable work in Mexico, if a job could ev
en be found there. The remaining thirty percent was retained by the employment agencies in the form of a service and administrative fee.
At $5.40 an hour and a fifty-hour work week, the laborer could earn $270 a week, unencumbered by taxes. Even after subtracting the thirty percent service fee, the laborer would still clear $189, far more than he could earn in Mexico—or in East Asia, for that matter. Without federal withholding taxes or Social Security contributions to worry about, employers would realize substantial savings in labor costs.
From Franklin’s perspective, the real beauty of the plan was found in the $81 a week that would be generated in service fees. With half a million workers enrolled, a whopping $40 million a week, or $2.1 billion annually, dropped into his coffers. He cared little that the labor scheme resembled slavery, albeit paid slavery. If a laborer complained, he was simply visited by agents from BCI and deported back into the poverty he might otherwise have escaped. Mexican officials would then see that he did not return.
And now it would all become legal in this new nation he and his supporters had conceived, nurtured, and to which he would soon give birth. There would be no more relocation of American manufacturing to overseas countries, or being held to ransom by the instability of foreign governments through the constant threat of nationalization of the business. Based on centuries-old cultural and historical bonds, Mexican recognition of this new nation would be immediately forthcoming, to be followed quickly by Korean and Malaysian government political support. Immigrant labor from each of these countries would soon give the Republic of California the highest productivity and one of the lowest costs of labor of any nation in the world.
Franklin drew deeply on a hand-rolled Cuban cigar and relished his dream coming to fruition. The Republic of California. The seventh-largest economic power in the world, freed at last from the encumbrances of those Washington sycophants who had forever siphoned off California assets to strengthen neighboring states through the liberal “redistribution of wealth” philosophy.
Not anymore, Franklin thought. Not anymore.
Chapter 22
Dublin, Ireland
Dublin, six-two-four, eight-two-nine-five,” the man answered.
“Aye, Paddy. How’re the lads?”
Quickly recognizing the voice, Kevin Donahue, brigade commander of the Irish Republican Army, went on alert.
“You’ve been makin’ scarce of yerself, Fergus.”
“Aye. Me presence in Dublin tends to make people nervous,” Fergus McNally responded. “I think we should talk. Be warned, Kevin. You’ve been working both sides of the street these past few years, and I’m not up for a one-way ride. If I go down when we meet, as the Pope’s me witness, I’ll take ya with me.”
“Things have changed over the past two years. I talk to the Brits—doesn’t mean I agree with them.”
“Indeed. And in America and Australia they’re changing even more. It’s Ireland’s turn, don’t’cha know? When and where?”
“O’Connell Street Bridge, two o’clock. I’ll be alone and unarmed. You have my word.”
“That’s always been good enough for me, Kevin. ’Til then.”
* * *
“Good day to ya, Mr. Donahue.” McNally was dressed in a blue blazer with gray trousers, looking much the businessman. “Shall we stroll the beautiful Liffey?”
“You went to ground quite well, Fergus.”
“Well, now, surely y’know the story of the fox and the hare.”
“Aye,” Kevin grinned. “Given the events of recent months with the Aussies and the Yanks, perhaps it’s time for the fox and the hare to dine out—together.”
“I agree. Everybody and their brother’s castin’ free of the politicians what control ’em, and the Yanks and the Brits seem to be in sync with the idea without so much as a ‘how do you do’ to the Irish. It’s just not on. They’ve never dealt in good faith, Kevin. And you, sittin’ at the polished table these past two years, usin’ yer mouth instead of yer brains.”
Donahue nodded. “I’ve got to admit, the old ways made their mark in spite of the cost. It just might be time for a wake-up call to remind them the squeaky wheel is the one that gets the grease.”
“And I know just where to make the wheel squeak, Commander. The American vice president will be visiting London in a couple of weeks to see the bloody PM. They’ll get all cozy in some vehicle, don’t’cha think? Maybe we can send them a message. How say ye?”
“Keep talkin’.”
Chapter 23
Monterey Peninsula Airport
Monterey, California
United Express Flight 2340, a two-engine turbo prop of Brazilian construction, was a twenty-five minute hop from Monterey Peninsula Airport to San Francisco International, some ninety miles to the north. The 5:40 Tuesday evening flight log listed nine passengers, five of whom the airline manifest referred to as congressional VIPs. In addition to Mrs. Winifred Albertson of Kenai, Alaska, and her three children, all of whom were connecting to an Alaska Airlines flight destined for Anchorage, the roster included Representative John Hunter, Corona, California; Representative Mary Elizabeth Hopkins, Santa Rosa, California; Representative Robert Jensen, Bakersfield, California; Representative Donald Wilmont, Alamo, California; and Representative Clarence Joiner, Salinas, California. Flight 2340 also consisted of a pilot, co-pilot, and one flight attendant.
Representatives Hunter and Joiner had only just arrived, hastily transported from a last-minute round of golf at Pebble Beach, and their luggage, including two sets of golf clubs, was quickly loaded into the cargo compartment of the aircraft.
“Boys and their toys,” Congresswoman Hopkins teased as the two tardy passengers entered the aircraft, taking seats across the aisle.
“You should try golf, Mary,” Hunter said, laughing at her taunt. “It would help you relax.”
Laughing in reply, she said, “I can think of dozens of things more productive than a five-hour walk around a cow pasture.”
“Ah, but nothing quite so satisfying or challenging,” Joiner added as he buckled his seat belt. “Besides, Mary, at our age,” he said, nudging Hunter, “it’s the only thing left we can do for five hours straight without falling asleep … and that includes attending one of your housing and rent-control sub-committee meetings, Representative Hopkins.”
“Well, thank you very much, Clarence.” She smiled. “You brought us down here to Salinas for your ‘dog and pony’ show, if you’ll recall. But the next time you come begging for my vote for your farm subsidies, I’ll make you grovel for five hours—while staying awake.”
With the five members of the U.S. Congress securely seated aboard the aircraft, Mrs. Albertson, still inside the departure area, continued her frantic search for the youngest of her three children. As she pleaded with the United Airlines’ gate attendant to delay the flight while she retrieved the wayward child, Mrs. Albertson’s anxiety level was rising rapidly. Final boarding announcements had sounded in the small airport terminal, located on a flat mesa amid the lush, green, rolling hills west of Salinas.
“We’ve got to make our connecting flight in San Francisco. Please give me a few moments,” the woman pleaded.
“I’m very sorry, ma’am,” the young female ticket agent replied. “We have another flight at 6:20. That flight will also give you sufficient time to connect, and we have available seating. Perhaps we can locate your child by then, but I have to release this flight.”
“Oh, if you must,” the woman said, exasperation in her voice. “Where in the world can that boy be?” she asked, scurrying off down the corridor.
Given the signal from the ground crew, Captain Anderson started the number-one engine, wheeled his aircraft toward the taxiway, and pulled away from the terminal. By the time they had reached the end of the runway and obtained takeoff approval from the tower, Mrs. Albertson’s youngest child, Benjamin, age three, was located in the rear of the small restaurant facility, happily enjoying a large dish of ice cream. His story of a
nice man with “pictures on his arms” giving him ice cream and a stuffed doggie to play with went unheeded. All he earned for his absence was a stern rebuke from his mother for the unnecessary delay.
At the far end of the concourse, Otto Krueger took one last look at the commuter flight departing the gate area and slipped through the revolving doors, content that he had done his requisite good deed for the day.
* * *
Jean Wolff and Jackson Shaw drove their golf cart away from the 18th green at Pacific Grove Golf Course and parked beside the cart path. Adjusting the earpiece in his left ear, Wolff commenced to add up their scores while Shaw emptied his pockets of tees, an extra ball, and a sweat-stained golf glove.
“Seventy-eight,” Wolff said, nodding his head. “It seems you’ve had time for a bit more than brigade duties over the years, Jackson. That’s an impressive score for your first time on this course.”
“If not for that sixteenth and the—”
Wolff suddenly held his hand up for silence, pushing the earpiece further into his ear. Shaw waited quietly.