North of the Rock

by Ian Jones

  Barlow was at the plant, sitting up high in the executive boardroom. He was pissed at Cane, nobody knew where he was. He had been at the plant, and by all accounts had done what he was asked, and checked everything was in place for the VIP visit tomorrow. The last anyone knew was a brief conversation with Hunter, and nothing at all since. If he was at the Country Club he was hiding out somewhere, probably with an expensive bottle of red wine. But he would have to explain himself, Barlow didn’t like to be ignored.

  His mobile rang shrilly, he looked at the display. Abel. Calling so soon after they just met. Jesus Christ. What the fuck had happened now. He could not believe the disaster of the last few days.

  ‘What?’ he growled.

  ‘Slight problem. Pilot has gone AWOL, there’s been some kind of message he’s sick or something.’

  ‘Shit. That’s all we need. So, do we have to get a car for Dallas or something? Christ. This won’t look good, we’re gonna look real amateur.’

  ‘No need, it’s all sorted. I called in a favour, got another pilot. So the chopper picked them up, just a little later. They’re all settled at the Country Club now, no problem. I just thought you’d want to know.’

  Barlow sat back, relieved. At last someone did something right.

  ‘That’s good. You did real good, well done. Ok, so you up there too?’

  ‘Yeah, we’re having cocktails looking at the eighteenth hole right now. The boys sure did some work this week, it kinda looks like it’s gonna be a golf course now. With all the shit we’ve been dealing with we never noticed.’

  Barlow looked at his watch, nearly 5 pm. Everything was as it should be. And the pilot would be out the door come Monday, he’d never liked him anyway, the guy looked like an idiot.

  ‘That’s great. Right then, I’ll be there in half an hour. Tiffany there yet?’

  ‘Yeah, she’s here. They’re getting everything ready.’

  ‘Right, well I have to say this is great news. At fucking last. It’s almost unexpected after everything. We are nearly home and dry. Nothing can get in our way now. You spoken to Hunter, any sign of Smith? Or Gilbey?’

  ‘Gilbey got spotted a couple of hours ago. The bastard is driving around in one of our fucking trucks! I guess he took it off the boys who were up at the plant earlier. But nothing since and no sign of Smith anywhere.’

  ‘That motherfucker Gilbey. Who saw him?’

  ‘Mrs Walton, at the motel. He drove past.’

  ‘He’ll get his. I’m gonna tell Hunter no limits on him, once we get everything done from our side.’

  ‘Yeah, good idea. But let’s get it straight first.’

  ‘Agreed.’

  Barlow hung up and stood looking out the window. Fucking Gilbey, just rubbing their noses in it now. He was first on the list once the signature was in place. But it seemed like they were out the worst of it now, Gilbey couldn’t do anything to hurt them, nor Smith, nobody could.

  But he would check.

  He called Hunter.

  ‘Hey, I just need to make sure you are all over the security. Our guests are in place at the club.’

  ‘Yeah, I know that Mr Barlow. And I got people in position. Nobody is getting anywhere near it.’

  ‘Abel just told me about Gilbey using one of our trucks, I don’t care about that, it’s ok for now, it makes no difference. It’s of no interest. But nothing on Smith, right?’

  ‘No, nothing. Nobody has seen him.’

  ‘Good, that’s all I wanted to hear. And Hunter? No more mistakes. You make sure that’s how it stays.’

  ‘Yeah Mr Barlow, I understand. I just got to talk to Carter to make sure he isn’t gonna screw anything up and knows exactly what to do.’

  ‘Good idea, tell him exactly what I am expecting. Tell him to earn his money. And if you bump into Cane, you tell him to get his sorry ass front and centre.’

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The drive out to Brown’s took a while. They headed back down the hill, around the rock into the south side, then picked up the meandering road that ran down through the old town, passing through the derelict area John had seen before. Then Gilbey reached the junction and followed the route further south, the pick-up dealing well with all the bumps, potholes and gravel. He drove confidently, used to handling unwieldy military vehicles across far worse than this.

  The further south they travelled, the more the terrain changed. Steep inclines followed by identical declines, deep ruts and gullies, eventually they crossed what was effectively a bridge made of graded rubble, that had been piled up so traffic could cross a deep ravine.

  ‘Creek bed,’ Gilbey explained. ‘Used to be a big old river once upon a time, millions of years since. In fact, this was the border, not that long ago really, until someone here in the states decided the country wasn’t quite big enough, so let’s get another couple of hundred square miles we don’t need. Used to be a wooden bridge here so they tell me, till it fell down. Old man Brown created merry hell with the county, and they gave him this. Least that’s the story. They call this ten mile bridge.’

  John looked closely at it. He couldn’t see where the ten miles came from, it looked a whole lot less than a quarter in his eyes.

  Gilbey saw his confusion and smiled.

  ‘Ten miles from the rock or thereabouts anyways. Another three or four to go.’

  Shortly after they crossed the bridge, they arrived at a crossroads, which was basically just marked out rough areas of flat ground among the terrain. John had calculated they were travelling roughly southeast, and now Gilbey turned right. The road opened out slightly. Everywhere was parched. The sun had dried out the heavy rain from the previous night but out here it looked like it hadn’t seen a drop in centuries. They carried on in a long swooping curve left and then it straightened out, heading downhill. There were a couple more bends, and then straight again. John looked out the windows. It was like being on the moon he reasoned. Then the road turned sharply right and straightened out again. Gilbey hit the brakes, hard. John jolted forward in his seat and looked out trying to spot what had run into the road. An armadillo most likely. But Gilbey was staring ahead. John looked. But there was nothing to see apart from a fence.

  Gilbey didn’t speak, just rolled forward, then pulled in off the road. He climbed out, so John did too, wondering what it was that Gilbey found so fascinating. He had walked over to the fence and stood in front of it, staring.

  ‘What is it?’ John asked.

  ‘This goddamn fence,’ Gilbey replied, tapping it hard with his finger.

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘It wasn’t here before. Looks pretty new right? And very professional job it is too. Trust me, I seen a lot of fences. And whoever did this, knew what they were doing. This thing means business.’

  John studied it. The mesh was thick wire, made from small squares, impossible to climb. It was very high, at least six metres, and topped with razor wire, which was canted in sharply toward the inside. It glinted in the late afternoon sun. He looked along its length. The road was straight here, and the fence ran exactly parallel, a couple of metres set back. They were looking at the corner, and they could see the fence disappear off along the road one way, and into the wilderness the other, exact right angle. There were heavy steel uprights every three metres, and the whole thing was taught and solid.

  ‘When did it get built?’ John wondered aloud.

  ‘I don’t know. Like I said before, I was last out here, five, maybe more years ago. And it wasn’t there then. I mean there’s nothing to protect here, and this thing would have cost a fortune.’

  They looked through the fence at the inside, but the land was identical in there to the outside. Perplexed, they got back into the truck and drove along the road, following the fence line. A mile and a half further down there was a wide turning and a pair of massive gates, locked with a heavy padlock.

  Gilbey looked past the gates at the following fence.

  ‘Tell you what, let’s carr
y on driving down, find the end. Try and work out just how big this is.’

  It was another mile and a half, so the gates were dead centre of a three mile length of fence. John whistled.

  ‘Wow, three miles end to end. What do you think; the same off into the distance?’

  Gilbey shrugged.

  ‘I guess it’s likely. Three miles on every side. Means nine square miles in there. But what the hell for?’

  He turned around and drove back to the gates. John climbed out and dug the keys they took from Abel’s house out his pockets. He looked at the padlock and inserted a key. It turned freely, the lock opened with a loud snap. They looked at each other.

  ‘Funny if this is their only set,’ John commented, and pushed the gate open. Gilbey snorted and drove the truck through. He paused on the other side and John climbed back in. They negotiated between two high banks of rocks and earth in front of them, the gap not much wider than the truck was and followed a straight route forward. There were a lot of tyre tracks visible in the grit. It ran uphill for a stretch and then dropped down the other side, the track basically just a narrow gravel levelled off area of the ground, done simply. In front of them to the left they could see a small building.

  ‘That wasn’t there neither,’ Gilbey said and steered toward it.

  They pulled up and got out. Gilbey checked his watch.

  ‘Ten after five. I guess we shouldn’t hang around here, we need to get prepared.’

  They looked at the building, which was a block built single storey store room with a sloping corrugated tin roof. It was quite high, with a large steel shutter pulled down on the right side. To the left was a steel door with a small window next to it. John looked in, dark inside, nothing to really see. He took out the keys and unlocked the door.

  They walked in. It was just a small rectangular room, empty apart from some shelves on the back wall. Not much on them, a couple of powerful torches, a first aid kit and some shovels. There was door set at the back of the room in the right hand wall. Gilbey opened it and looked in, then ducked out and pressed a switch located next to the door frame. Gloomy lights came on inside the building. He disappeared into the room and then came out.

  ‘Just a backhoe,’ he said.

  John looked confused. Gilbey shook his head.

  ‘I don’t know what you call it in your bullshit language,’ he said, so John walked over and went in.

  Inside a big digger was parked up, blade on the front and a large shovel on an arm at the back. It looked fairly new, but the tyres and fittings were covered in dirt. Nothing else to see, other than a line of five gallon jerry cans. John popped the cap on one and sniffed.

  ‘Diesel,’ he said. ‘For the digger.’

  They stepped outside and looked at the building again. There was a high steel tower on the roof, which had a ring of powerful spotlights all around it near the top, and a kind of crow’s nest built in the centre, really just a simple deck with a low railing. A ladder ran up the side of the tower and there was another leading to it bolted onto the building. John climbed up, and stood on the deck looking around. From here, he could see all four fences. It was a huge area, with mesas, ravines, gullies and steep banks up and down everywhere. No wonder Gilbey had played his war games here, the place was perfect. He looked down to where Gilbey was standing, shading his eyes as he watched John.

  ‘What do you see?’ he called up.

  ‘Just the same as everywhere. The fences are as we thought, perfect square all around. This is a big place, they must be about to build something right?’

  ‘I guess so, yeah. But what, I don’t know. They got the contract to build a new prison, I heard about that but it’s out to the west a ways, past Lil’s. And this is real secure, I can’t imagine why if there’s nothing here.’

  ‘Could be an environmental thing, you know, protect something. Animals maybe or plants.’

  ‘Nah, I can’t see that John. This land goes hundreds of miles identical in both directions, nothing different here. Has to be another build happening, which ain’t a surprise I guess. But I got no idea why this has been done, got to be expensive.’

  ‘Must be so they are ready. Maybe it’s a requirement? Some legal thing? Another prison?’

  John climbed back down and stood next to Gilbey.

  ‘You know just possibly I was right, maybe it is gonna be a casino. Start a new Vegas right here,’ he said looking at Gilbey with a smile.

  ‘Maybe. It’s weird though, why would they want to meet all the way out here? I mean there’s nothing here, nothing to see. It’s exactly the same inside the fence as it is outside.’

  ‘Perhaps they want to look at the place.’

  ‘Right, but eleven at night? What the fuck are they gonna look at? Even with those huge goddamn lights switched on there won’t be a whole lot to see.’

  ‘I don’t know. But what do we do now?’

  Gilbey walked over and leant on the truck, scanning all around. They could see through the fence if anyone was coming, but they were alone. All around the building the ground was totally flat unlike the rest of the area, further past were two big rocks close together sticking up out the ground.

  ‘I say, we get back here later. Maybe around nine or so, and hide out. Let’s see what happens. They probably won’t even turn up, but at least we tried. We can get in behind those rocks, they’ll never notice us, even if they put the spotlights on.’

  ‘Yeah, ok.’

  ‘But we need to be ready. I got some stuff to pick up. Let’s go eat.’

  The locked up the padlock on the way through, they weren’t worried about the tyre tracks, they could have been there for forever by the time it got dark.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Carter was on his own in the sheriff’s station, bored and tapping aimlessly at the computer on the desk in front of him. A few years ago at least he’d been able to look at porn, but that had all been locked down now so all he had to look at was the county intranet site.

  He could be at home, but Hunter had said he needed to talk to him so he had no choice.

  Carter was scared of Hunter, in fact Carter was scared of a lot of people. He liked being sheriff because of the power it gave him, but in fact he very rarely did any real work, just what Hunter or the three wise men asked for. But he was always wary, and would avoid anyone who looked as if they could give him any trouble, he had missed that by a mile with John fucking Smith.

  The door opened and Hunter walked in, moving fast until he was standing in front of the desk. Carter sat up straight.

  ‘So, you know what to do right?’ Hunter barked.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I got it.’

  ‘And you know the times?’

  ‘Yeah, everything.’

  ‘Good, because you got an important job here. And we can’t have no fuck-ups, I don’t want no fucking excuses, for once you got to keep all your shit wired tight. Got that?’

  Carter winced.

  ‘Yeah, sure I got it. I know what to do. I mean, I never done this before but …’

  ‘But nothing. Just do exactly what we asked and then once it’s done forget you done it. As usual.’

  ‘Yeah, sure. It’s no problem, I’ll be there.’

  ‘Just you fucking remember, your hands are as dirty as all of ours. Don’t ever forget that.’

  Carter swallowed. He didn’t like to be reminded of that, in fact he refused to think about it. But it was there, always. Everything they had done. He had done.

  ‘Yes. Right. I’ll be right on time I swear.’

  ‘Right. Just make sure you are. Because if you fuck this …’

  Hunter leaned over the desk until he could smell Carter’s foul odour, who moved back and stopped breathing altogether. Hunter deliberately stared hard into the fat man’s eyes.

  ‘… up then it’s the last thing you will ever do. Don’t get fucking comfortable, I know you are a useless lump of shit Carter. Law enforcement my ass.’

  With that Hunter
whirled around and stalked out of the building.

  Carter breathed in and out fast, feeling faint.

  He would be glad when the day was over. Maybe tomorrow would be easier.

  There was still no sign of Cane, and something was niggling at the back of Abel’s brain. He was entertaining their guests, humorous, magnanimous, welcoming. But it troubled him, normally wherever Barlow was Cane wouldn’t be too far away, and there had been no word at all.

  He led the way into the dining room, smiling. Barlow had invited some of the managers at the plant to come for dinner that Friday evening, and to bring their families. So, for the first time since the club had opened the room was full. It looked completely different, a happy place to be, and with a hubbub of background noise that reinforced the whole setup. A successful restaurant in the beautiful new Country Club, the pinnacle of society at Gray Rock. Barlow had also arranged for extra staff, both on the floor and in the kitchen, and it smelled fantastic.

  He headed for their table, occasionally nodding at people that he faintly recognised and believed he probably should know. Barlow was working the room, shaking hands, and also steadily making his way over. Tiffany looked gorgeous, and had provided an excellent atmosphere to welcome the guests. She had brought along another beauty for the evening called Miranda, and as they sat down they were both very careful to choose their seats alongside the guests. As ever, Tiffany was in complete control, constantly listening, smiling, nodding and touching. Her guest was loving every second, Abel could see that.

  He checked his watch; seven-thirty.

  After dinner they would retire to a function room, where Tiffany could really do her stuff, and later, it would be time for the evening’s main event. All for a signature on some paperwork. But Abel knew, once tonight was over that action would be irrelevant. They would all know a terrible secret, one which would shock the entire world should it ever be known. Abel and Barlow would get what they wanted regardless, no choice. Nobody would ever want the truth to come out. Those concerned would be putty in their hands. Forever.