Winterkill (22 page)

On cue, a light-colored truck emerged from the brush
below and started climbing the opposite slope, directly across from him. The truck labored up the hill as well, sliding a little in loose shale and kicking out puffs of dislodged rock. At the rate Joe was flying down the hill and the other pickup was laboring up the opposite slope, he would be on it in seconds.

Joe tapped the brakes to slow his reckless plunge and gripped the wheel tighter. The tracks he drove in would soon be swallowed in the tangle of ancient juniper.

Suddenly, the brush closed over the top of his BLM truck and branches scratched the sides of his doors like fingernails on a chalkboard. A sap-heavy bough slapped the windshield, leaving needles and gray-blue berries smashed against the glass. He caught a flash of an opening through the branches ahead But then Joe did something Birch Wardell hadn’t done. He slammed on his brakes. Then, throwing the pickup into reverse, he floored the accelerator at the same time that he cranked the steering wheel to the right. The engine whined and the tires bit, and the vehicle flew back and to the side through the brush in a cacophony of snapping branches.

BOOM!

Joe hit something metal and solid so hard that his head jerked back and bounced off the rear-window glass. He slumped forward over the wheel as bright orange spangles washed across his eyes. Then smoke, or steam, enveloped the cab of the truck in darkness. Trying to shake his head clear, he looked up and smelled the steam. It was bitter and smelled like radiator fluid.

The spangles had shrunk to the size of shooting sparks when he fell out of the door of the pickup and landed on his hands and knees in the dirt and snow. His hat was smashed down hard on his head, and he pushed it up so he could see.

The twisted grille of the light-colored pickup furiously spewed green steam. A pool of radiator fluid smoked on the ground, and was beginning to cut its way through the snow toward him. Standing, Joe retrieved his shotgun from the seat. He walked around the back of the BLM pickup toward the vehicle he had smashed into.

The windshield of the light-colored truck was marred by a single spidery star where a man’s head would have hit it. Joe
skirted the steam and looked into the cab to see a man slumped over the steering wheel, a cap askew over his face and dark rivulets of blood coursing down from under the cap into the collar of his coat. Joe recognized the coat, and the logo that was painted on the truck’s door even though a thick smear of mud had been applied to obscure it.

It was a flying T-Lok shingle with wings.

Joe opened the door, and Rope Latham, the roofer, moaned and rolled his head toward him.

“How bad are you hurt, Rope?” Joe asked.

“Bad, I think,” Rope said. “I think I’m blind.”

Joe reached into the cab and lifted the baseball cap that had fallen over Rope’s eyes. A three-inch cut ran along Latham’s eyebrows. The cut looked like it would require stitches, Joe thought, but it didn’t look much worse than that.

“I can see!” Rope cried.

“Climb on out of there,” Joe ordered, prodding Rope Latham in the ribs with his shotgun. “Turn around and put your hands on the truck and kick your feet out.”

Moaning, Latham obeyed.

Joe pulled each of Latham’s arms back in turn and snapped handcuffs on his wrists. Then he turned Latham and pushed him back into the truck. Joe saw a Motorola Talkabout hand-held radio on the seat that Rope had obviously used to communicate with the other truck.

“Two trucks,” Joe said. “Two identical Bighorn Roofing trucks. One goes down the hill and pulls over at the last second into the brush. Another truck that looks just the same starts up the other side of the hill where it’s been parked out of sight. Looks like one truck that crosses the draw and goes on up the other side. Makes the poor BLM guy think he can cross the draw just like that other truck just did. Pretty good trick, even though he didn’t die out here like you two intended.”

Latham grimaced. Blood was pooling in his eyes as it ran down his face.

“There’s a six-foot drop down there once you clear the brush, isn’t there?” Joe asked.

“Spud thought of it,” Latham said. “But we waited a couple days for that BLM guy to bite. It worked pretty good before.”

Joe didn’t say that seeing twin antelope fawns had led him to think of how they’d pulled it off.

Keeping Rope Latham in his peripheral vision, Joe stepped back and looked up the opposite slope. Spud Cargill, the other half of Bighorn Roofing, had stopped at the top of the hill and was looking back with binoculars. Joe grabbed the hand-held radio from Spud’s pickup and held it up to his mouth.

“We’ve got you now, you son-of-a-bitch,” he said, then tossed the radio back inside. Joe raised his arm and pointed his index finger at Cargill, who was still looking back through binoculars, and pretended to shoot him.

Spud’s truck started to move again, and vanished over the top of the hill.

W
hile
Joe waited for Jamie Runyan to arrive in his pickup, Rope Latham began to tremble. He hoped Latham’s injuries weren’t worse than they appeared.

Joe read Rope his Miranda rights, then turned on the micro-recorder that he hid in his shirt pocket.

“Why were you targeting the BLM boys?” Joe asked. He leaned against a tree with his shotgun pointed vaguely at Rope Latham. The back of his own head had started to throb from the collision.

“They owed us money,” Latham said dejectedly. “So did the goddamned Forest Service.”

“They owed you money?” Joe was confused. “What?”

“Those bastards owed us from last summer. Twelve thousand dollars’ worth of work we did for them on their buildings. We replaced all the roofs, and paid for the material in advance. But it’s been six months and we still haven’t been paid.” Latham spat bloody saliva into the brush. “Some goddamned problem with the check request the BLM sent to Cheyenne has held it all up, and me and Spud want our money. When it comes to paying their bills, our government is just fucked. ‘Maybe next month,’ they tell us. Shit, how would those BLM shitheads feel if their paychecks were even a week late, much less six months?”

Joe pushed himself off the tree. The back of his neck was tingling, and it wasn’t from hitting the window.

“These people throw money around like it isn’t even real, you know? Just look at this stupid ‘joint management’ area that cost three million dollars between them just to string some fence and put up some signs.”

“What did you say before about the Forest Service?”

Latham’s voice suddenly caught in his throat. “Nothing.”

“No, you said the Forest Service owed you money as well.”

“Fuckers.” Latham coughed. “They’re the worst of all. They owe us fifteen thousand from work we did
last
summer!”

“This would be Lamar Gardiner,” Joe said flatly.

“It
was
Lamar Gardiner,” Latham said, smiling wickedly. His teeth were pink from a cut in his mouth. “He wouldn’t even return our calls about it, and he told Spud that if he didn’t stop harassing him, we’d be off the government bid list for good and he’d press charges!”

“Move aside,” Joe ordered, and Latham slid along the truck away from the cab.

Reaching inside, Joe pulled the bench seat forward. A well-used compound bow was wedged between the seat and the cab wall. A narrow quiver of arrows lay next to it.

Joe slid one of the arrows out and held it up.

“Bonebuster,” Joe said.

Latham’s eyes bulged, and his face drained of color. At the same time, the cut on his forehead started to gush again.

Joe was stunned. “This was about some
unpaid bills
? You killed a man and tried to kill another because their agencies owed you money?”

Latham nodded, fear in his face because of Joe’s tone.

“I ought to shoot you right here and leave you for the coyotes,” Joe said icily. “Do you realize what you two idiots almost set in motion?”

S
heriff
O. R. “Bud” Barnum sat shell-shocked as Joe Pickett dropped the bow and arrows with a clatter on his desk after he had turned Rope Latham over to Deputy Reed.

“I got one of ’em,” Joe said. “Spud Cargill is the other one and he got away. Rope shot the arrows and Spud cut Lamar’s throat.”

Barnum glared.

“Rope confessed everything on the way into town,” Joe said. “I’ve got it on tape.”

“Did you read him his rights?”

“That’s on the tape.”

“So where’s Spud?”

“I don’t know,” Joe said. “Why don’t you find him? You’re the sheriff.”

Barnum stared at Joe, his eyes darkening.

“I know you’re busy with the Sovereigns and Melinda Strickland and
‘Phase One’
and all, but Spud’s driving a tan pickup with a Bighorn Roofing logo on the door and Wyoming plates. It shouldn’t be all that hard to find,” Joe said. He put his hands on Barnum’s desk and leaned toward him.

“This had nothing to do with any antigovernment movement in the county. It had to do with roofers who didn’t get paid when they should have been paid.” Joe glared at Barnum. “And it had a lot to do with sloppy police work by the sheriff’s department.”

Veins in Barnum’s temples began to throb. But he said nothing.

“When you release Nate Romanowski, please tell him I’m looking forward to talking with him,” Joe said. “That is, if your deputy is through hitting him with a hot shot.”

Joe turned and walked out.

T
hat
night, in bed, Marybeth shook Joe awake. When he opened his eyes, he found her staring at him.

“I’m sorry about last night and this morning,” she said. “You didn’t deserve it.”

“Yes, I did. You were right,” he said, his mood suddenly lifting. “It’s okay. The tension level was pretty high around here.”

She smiled, but stayed silent.

“What?” he asked, finally.

“Joe, sometimes you amaze me. Two antelope fawns?”

He laughed.

I
n the morning,
Joe confirmed Rope Latham’s story with Carrie Gardiner. He found her standing in front of her house in a heavy coat, hugging herself with both arms. A big moving truck had backed up to her front door across the yard, and a crew was carrying furniture and boxes up a ramp from her house into the back of the trailer.

“I heard,” Joe said, tipping the brim of his hat toward the moving truck. “Where are you going?”

“My parents live in Nebraska.” She sighed. “Still on the farm. They’ve got room for all of us.”

“I’m sorry to see you leave.”

Her eyes flared briefly. “I’m not,” she said.

“You heard about Rope?”

“Yes. The sheriff called this morning. Thank you for arresting him.”

“Yup.”

“Please tell me what happened,” Carrie said.

She listened, staring at her winter boots, while Joe told her everything Rope had said.

When he was done, she nodded.

“I believe it,” she said.

“You do?”

She nodded sadly. “I wish it didn’t make sense, but it does. The roofers even called our house a couple of times to complain. I spoke with Spud Cargill once, and he told me about it, so I asked Lamar about it when he got home that night.

“Lamar was going through a real tough time last summer. I guess he realized he wasn’t going any further in the Forest Service and it was really bothering him. He’d been applying for other districts for the past three years, and jobs at regional headquarters, but he wasn’t getting any encouragement. I think he realized that he would always be a midlevel manager, and he didn’t take it well at times. It was hard on me, and on the kids.”

Joe listened, shifting his gaze occasionally to watch the team of movers emerge from the house with something and disappear into the back of the truck.

“I’m not excusing what Lamar did up there in the mountains,” she said. “Shooting all those elk makes me sick to my stomach. But I know that his frustration level was really high. For the first time since we’d been married, he was snapping at me and the kids. He was drinking too much. I was thinking about leaving him just before, well, you know . . .”

“Carrie, what about the roofers?”

“Oh, yes.” She flushed. “From what Lamar told me, he did a standard request for bids in the spring to get all the buildings shingled. Bighorn Roofing—Spud and Rope—had the best bid. Lamar said he gave them a verbal okay to start working, then submitted the paperwork to the regional office in Denver. He said that in the past, submitting the paperwork was just a formality.

“But this time, after a couple of months, the regional office sent him everything back and said he hadn’t filled out a couple of the forms properly. Lamar was really angry when they did that, so he resubmitted everything and didn’t tell the roofers about it.”

“When was this?” Joe asked.

“I think it was about August,” she said. “The work was just about done already, and the roofers were getting mad about having to front the Forest Service all of the materials and labor without getting paid. Then the regional office denied the request altogether, because they said Lamar had entered into a contract without their approval.”

Joe shook his head.

“Lamar was fit to be tied over that one.”

“I can believe that he would be,” Joe said.

“They hung him out to dry,” she said. “They didn’t give one bit of consideration to what it would be like for him out here in the field. They didn’t really care that he had to look people in the eye and tell them they wouldn’t get paid for the work they did.”

It was so . . .
believable,
Joe thought. And so frustrating. It didn’t have to happen this way.

He thanked her and told her once again that he was sorry she was leaving.

As he approached his pickup, she called after him.

“Oh, Mr. Pickett—I didn’t tell you who at regional headquarters kept sending back Lamar’s request.”

Joe turned.

“It was Melinda Strickland,” she said bitterly. “The woman who thinks my name is Cassie.”

T
he
combined law-enforcement agencies in and around Twelve Sleep County scrambled to find Spud Cargill, who was still at large. From the radio in his small office, Joe monitored their progress while writing an overdue report to his supervisor. A rookie deputy sheriff reported that Spud Cargill’s empty pickup had been found near the Saddlestring landfill with the driver’s-side door open and tracks in the snow indicating that Spud had run toward the two-lane highway. “The suspect’s tracks end at the pavement,” the deputy said. “He either had another car to climb into, or he stole one, or somebody picked him up on the highway. I don’t know where in the hell he is.” A citizen in town reported seeing someone who looked like Spud running across the Saddlestring High School football field, and the police were sent to check it out. It turned out to be the boys’ basketball team running outdoor windsprints for punishment. An all-points bulletin was issued by Sheriff Barnum, and the Wyoming highway patrol set up roadblocks on all four highways out of Saddlestring to check drivers, passengers, and anything that looked suspicious. Barnum dispatched his deputies to Bighorn Roofing, Spud’s
residence (where he lived alone except for a caged badger in the garage), and the Stockman’s Bar, where Spud liked to drink beer after work.

Spud Cargill could not be found.

I
t
had turned out to be a nice day for a manhunt, Joe observed through his window. After he had come home from seeing Carrie Gardiner, the wind had stopped, the sky had cleared, and the sun swelled bright and warm in the western sky. Water from the melting snow dropped like strings of glass beads from the eaves of the house and melted holes in the snow on the ground. The sound of running water through the outside drainpipes sounded like music to Joe. He loved water like a true Westerner. There was never enough of it. It pained him when the wind kicked up and blew the snow away. It seemed unfair.

He finished the report and e-mailed it to Terry Crump. He ended it by writing that since Rope Latham was in jail and Spud Cargill would no doubt soon be caught, the pressure that had been building in Twelve Sleep County should ease up.

At least he hoped so. For the first time in days, he didn’t have a dull pain in his stomach.

He wished he could have been there when Melinda Strickland, Dick Munker, and Tony Portenson heard that the likely motive for the killing of Lamar Gardiner and the ambush of Birch Wardell was not crazed, organized, antigovernment hate, but anger at unpaid bills from federal agencies. Joe couldn’t help but shake his head at that. He wondered if Munker and Portenson would simply sneak out of town now, and if Melinda Strickland would follow.

Then he could concentrate on something that mattered: April.

“
J
oe,
there’s someone out front,” Missy said from his office doorway. There was concern in her voice.

Joe had dozed off in his chair with his feet on his desk and his hat pulled down over his eyes. The week had worn him out.

He stood up and rubbed his face awake with his hands and looked at his mother-in-law through his fingers. Her face and
hair were . . . perfect, the result of at least two hours under construction, he guessed. She wore an oversized camel-colored cashmere sweater, pearls, shiny black tight pants, and shoes with straps and stiletto heels. She was obviously not dressed for dinner at their house.

Then he remembered why he was suddenly awake. She stepped aside for him and he parted the curtains in the living room.

“Who is that man?” she asked. “He didn’t knock on the door or anything. He’s just sitting out there.”

A battered and ancient snub-nosed Willys Jeep was outside, its grille and mesh-covered headlights leering over the top of the picket fence like a voyeur. Canvas from the shredded top hung in shreds inside the vehicle from a bent-up frame. Sitting on the hood of the Jeep, with his heavy boots resting on the front bumper, was Nate Romanowski. The setting sun, now dropping into a notch between two mountain peaks, backlit the visitor in a warm and otherworldly glow. The red-tailed hawk sat hooded on Romanowski’s shoulder, making him look like a pirate with a parrot. The peregrine gripped Romanowski’s fist, flaring his wings for balance.

“I don’t know how long he’s been out there,” Missy said, fretting. “Marybeth and Sheridan will have to pass right by him to get to the house.”

That’s right,
Joe remembered.
Marybeth’s picking Sheridan up from basketball practice.

“His name is Nate Romanowski,” Joe said.

Missy gasped and raised her hand to her mouth. “He’s the one who . . .”

“He didn’t do it,” Joe said bluntly.

Joe let go of the curtain and went to find his coat. Although the sun had warmed up the afternoon nicely, it would be much different when the sun dropped behind the mountains.

As he pulled his coat on, he noticed that Lucy had emerged from her bedroom and was standing next to Missy. It was a jarring sight, and he realized he’d done a double-take. Lucy was a miniature version of Missy Vankueren. The sweater, pants, pearls, and shoes she wore were identical to her
grandmother’s, except that the sweater was cotton and the pearls were fake. Even her swept-up hairstyle was the same.

Joe looked up for an explanation, and found Missy beaming.

“Isn’t she adorable?” Missy gushed. “The outfit is a late Christmas present from me. We’re going out to dinner tonight, my little granddaughter and me.”

“Going out? Like that?” Joe asked, incredulous.

“Show him,” Missy commanded.

Lucy swung her little hips and did a slow turn with her arms raised above her head. She looked and moved so much like Missy that Joe cringed.

“What did you do that for?” he asked, refraining from saying
what in the hell
because of Lucy.

Missy looked back, hurt.

“Come on, honey,” she said, turning on her heel. “Your daddy doesn’t appreciate style.” Lucy turned as well, following Missy stride for stride toward the bathroom. Unlike Missy, though, Lucy looked over her shoulder as she entered the bathroom and winked at Joe. Lucy knew it was a joke, even if Missy didn’t.

Joe didn’t know whether to laugh or run from the house.

“
I
owe you,” Nate said, as Joe approached.

“No, you don’t.”

Nate fixed his sharp eyes on Joe. “I asked you for two things and you did both of them. I knew I could trust you.”

Joe stuffed his hands in his pockets and kicked uncomfortably at the snow. “Forget it. I’m just real glad we found the guys.”

“Is Spud Cargill still out there?” Nate asked.

“As far as I know.”

Nate nodded and seemed to be thinking about that.

“Why? Do you know something?” Joe asked.

There was a hint of a smile. “I know just enough to be dangerous. I overheard a lot of things in that jail—snippets between Barnum and his deputies and between Melinda Strickland and Barnum. And I could tell what they were thinking by what they questioned me about. Things are in motion to
get those Sovereigns out of here. The sheriff and Strickland were convinced I was one of them, you know. Dick Munker even tried to get me to admit I was a soldier for the militia types. That whole sick crowd is real disappointed to find out that all the Sovereigns are guilty of at this point is hating the federal government—which isn’t a crime—and staying too many nights in a campground. They’re trying like hell to pin something on those people up there.”

“Maybe now things will ease off,” Joe said, hopeful.

“Don’t count on it.”

“No,” Joe said sternly. “It
needs
to happen.”

A set of headlights appeared on Bighorn Road from the direction of town. Absently, Joe watched the car approach and the headlights pool wider on the freezing road. It was Marybeth, and Sheridan.

“My wife’s home,” Joe said. “Would you like to come in? It’s getting cold out here.”

Instead of answering, Nate studied Joe, his eyes narrowing.

“What?” he asked, annoyed.

“You really are a good guy, aren’t you?”

Joe’s shoulders slumped. “Knock it off.”

“I’m not kidding around,” Nate said softly. “I’ve spent most of my life around hypocrites and assholes. McLanahan and Barnum types. Most of them haven’t had a thimbleful of character. So it’s just kind of heartwarming to see that there are still some good guys left.”

Joe was grateful for the darkness because he knew his face was flushing.

“Are you drunk, Nate?”

Nate laughed. “I had a few. After I saw what they did to my cabin.”

“They trashed it, all right. Sheridan and I put a bunch of your stuff back in your house.” The minute Joe said it he cringed, because he knew what was coming.

“See!” Nate exclaimed, raising his arm and turning it as if showing Joe off to his peregrine. “See what I mean? You
are
a good man. With a good wife and good children!”