“This is Baca.”
“Good afternoon, sheriff. Warm day, isn’t it?”
“Get to the point, Radio.”
“Do you have hands-free on your car phone? You don’t seem to be holding anything.” Baca was silent. “Only the best for your department, eh, sheriff? You’re lucky to have such complacent taxpayers.”
“You’re wanted for questioning.”
“Catch me if you can,” Radio cackled. “Now why would that be?”
“You know good and well. I have a search warrant to look for a gun believed to be in your possession. And when you broke camp this morning, you left behind something I don’t like to see. A dead body.”
“If there’d been less of a hurry, we’d have cleaned up.”
“Why did you do it, Radio?”
“There was no way around it, sheriff. George Horton killed one of the Brotherhood. By our code, he had to pay for it with his life.”
“Did he admit to killing Dan McHenry?”
“Of course not. He denied it to the bitter end. But there was no getting around the facts. He had the gun; he had the opportunity; and he had the motive. Jealousy causes more murders than any other reason. Surely you know that. In your corrupt legal system, some pointy-headed lawyer could have stood the obvious on its head, but a people’s posse can deal with the facts more directly.”
“Where’s that rifle.”
“In here with us. We felt we should be prepared to defend ourselves, and we turned out to be right. Those ATF people shot first and asked questions later.”
“You’re in a deep hole, Radio, in more ways than one. If I were you, I’d come out while there was still a chance of saving something from the situation.”
Radio laughed. “I like your definition of chance.”
Gordon slipped Baca a piece of paper. He looked at it and nodded.
“If you think that staying in there is going to protect anything, you’re wrong. There were two people in that mine when George Horton and Hart Lee Bowen came in on Tuesday. We know you’ve found gold in there, and we know about the guns and explosives. We have a complete inventory on computer, and our list is probably better than yours.”
Radio was silent for a moment. When he spoke again there was a hardness in his voice, and the mockery had gone out of it.
“I see,” he said. “Well thank you, sheriff. Thank you for that information. It certainly gives us a little more to go on as we try to decide on our next move.”
“Your next move should be to give up while there’s still something an attorney can do for you. You may not like our legal system, but right now it’s your best friend.”
“We need some thinking time, sheriff. I’ll get back to you if I have anything to say.”
With that, Radio signed off, folded his phone, and ducked back into the mine.
• • •
Shortly before two o’clock, the first television crew and the Reno SWAT team arrived, in that order. Baca had left no one to guard the entrance to the ranch (a mistake he quickly rectified), and the television people — a camera man and a young reporter named Hunter George from one of the Reno stations — simply walked up to the sheriff’s car and caught him unaware. Baca was not pleased.
“Get out of here,” he growled.
“Wait a minute, sheriff, let’s talk,” said George. He was wearing a navy blazer with a pink striped shirt and a maroon patterned tie above blue jeans and running shoes. The viewing public never saw him below the waist, but from his belt up to his perfectly cut hair, he was turned out well.
“I’ll talk, but not here,” Baca said. “There are people up there with semiautomatic weapons. If you’re anywhere around this area, you might end up in the line of fire. Go back to the entrance of the ranch, and I’ll have someone come out and brief you on the hour.”
“Is it true that Rex Radio is one of the men in the mine.”
“Yes it is.”
George whistled. “Then we’re staying. You have the right to ask us to stay out of your way at a crime scene, but you can’t just order us off the ranch.”
Baca hesitated for a moment, weighing his desire to get rid of the reporters against the public relations implications of forcibly removing them. Ellen, who had been a few feet away during the discussion, came to his side.
“Excuse me, sheriff,” she said, “but these people are trespassing on my property.” She turned to the television men. “I’m going to ask you to leave. Since you’re from Nevada, you may not understand California law, so let me explain it to you. If you trespass and are asked to leave by the property owner or an agent of the owner, you’re subject to arrest.” She smiled. “Sheriff Baca could probably spare a man for that, and you can’t cover this story from jail.”
George hadn’t been expecting this. “All right,” he said weakly.
“Look,” said Baca, becoming conciliatory now that he had the upper hand, “I know you have your job to do, and I’m not trying to hold back information. I just don’t want anybody to get hurt if I can help it. Wait at the entrance to the ranch, and I’ll have somebody down there within an hour to brief you.”
They went meekly, and Baca turned to Ellen. “Nice work,” he said.
The SWAT team arrived moments later. Baca, Boyd, and the SWAT commander put their heads together and redeployed the men at their command. By carefully maneuvering their way into position, they were able to take cover in places that had them now surrounding the mine from every possible angle. There were about sixty officers and agents present by this time, and if Radio and his men had previously entertained any hope of making a break for freedom, that hope was now utterly dashed.
With the mine now covered and the helicopters still droning overhead, Baca went to the entrance of the ranch at three o’clock to face the news media. The original reporters had been joined by another TV crew from Reno, three from the Bay Area, two radio reporters, and a dozen print reporters and photographers. A standoff such as this would have been big news under any circumstances, but the involvement of Rex Radio made the story irresistible. By the time Baca went down for another briefing at five o’clock, there were nearly forty journalists waiting for him, with Associated Press and CNN now represented.
All afternoon, the heat never let up, and the angle of the sun was such that all those outside the mine spent several hours in its direct light. Gordon, Sam, and Ellen sat behind a patrol car, perspiration dripping down their faces and talking little.
“The sun should be behind the mountain in half an hour,” Ellen said, when Baca left for the five o’clock news briefing.
“I could sure use a beer,” Sam said.
“Same here,” said Gordon. “What are we going to do, anyway? This could go on for days.”
“Why don’t we wait for sundown, then go back to the house if nothing’s happened,” Ellen said. “I can fix drinks and dinner.”
“You’re an angel,” Sam said.
“We could take you out,” Gordon offered.
She shook her head. “I’m not leaving the ranch until this is over.”
“In one sense, though, it already is,” Gordon said. “I mean, I’m not an attorney, but I can’t see how Radio could possibly keep challenging the will. He has a charge of Murder One to contend with now. It looks as if the ranch will end up in the hands your father wanted it in.”
“With a vein of gold thrown in to boot,” Sam said.
“I’ll believe that when I see it,” Ellen said. “It sounds to me like wishful thinking on their part.”
They were silent for a few moments, then she spoke again.
“Funny how much can happen in a week,” she said to Gordon. “Just last Saturday my brother was alive and you, Kitty, the sheriff and I were having a barbecue with a hundred other happy people.”
“It seems like forever,” Gordon said.
“It’s hard to make sense out of just what’s happened in the last 24 hours,” she said. “It may have been George Horton who pulled t
he trigger, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s those men in the mine right now who killed my brother. They played on Dan’s weakness and prejudice, and once he fell in with them, he was in real trouble. If it hadn’t been for them, Dan and I could have worked something out about the ranch. I’m sure of that. But because they wanted it all, I had to fight.”
“The fight’s over at least,” Gordon said.
“Once the sheriff gets hold of Dan’s gun, that should settle the murder investigation,” said Sam to Ellen. “That should be a load off your mind.”
“The important thing from Ellen’s perspective is that the missing gun was with them, not her.” Gordon turned to her. “That’s what was throwing suspicion toward you, and now you’re off the hook.”
She touched him on the knee. “You’ve done so much,” she said.
“So have you.”
By the time Baca returned from his news briefing, it was nearly six o’clock. The sun had gone behind the mountain enough to put the cars and trees on the east side of the creek in shade, while still illuminating the entrance to the mine.
“This could take a while,” Baca said as he returned. I’ve sent a couple of men back to town for searchlights so we can light up the opening to the mine all night.”
“Are you still going to wait it out?” Gordon asked.
“Do you have a better idea?”
“How long do you think it’ll take?”
“It could be days, but I’m here for however long it takes. Whatever the cost in time and manpower, I won’t feel we’ve succeeded until every last man in that mine comes out alive and is in the hands of the law.”
“Do you think they’ll give themselves up willingly?”
“I don’t know,” Baca said. “That’s what I’m afraid of. They can’t win if they try to fight it out, but they can make a hell of a mess and take some people with them. One thing, though, the longer they’re in there, the better the odds they’ll see where the percentages are.”
“Look!” shouted Sam.
The sun had dropped lower, and the shadow of the mountain was now falling just below the entrance to the mine. A white flag had been pushed outside and was being waved around. After several seconds, it was withdrawn into the mine, and a moment later Radio stepped out. A cellular phone was in his right hand and what appeared to be a case of some sort was in the left. He placed the latter on the ground and began calling. Baca moved to his car, drawing a crowd with him as the phone began to ring.
“Well, sheriff, you’ve got us,” Radio said.
“I know that,” Baca replied. “There are more than sixty armed men watching the opening to that mine. There’s no way you can win a fight, Radio. Come out peacefully and let the attorneys take it from there.”
“It’s too bad, sheriff. If those men of yours had shown up just fifteen minutes later, we would have been combat-ready, and it would have been a different outcome. We’ve spent a lot of time practicing sniping from behind trees. Just like the original American patriots.”
“And then what would you have done?”
“Let’s just say we would have asserted ourselves. It was getting time to do that anyway, but circumstances pushed the schedule forward.”
“Give up, Radio. You can’t get out.”
“We may not be able to get out, but you can’t get in, and that’s a consideration, too. We have some weapons that I’d hate to see fall into the wrong hands. And there’s the gold in this mine. A rich vein of it. The society you represent, sheriff, is too corrupt to take possession of it.
Baca made no reply, but Gordon could see the anger in his eyes.
“No comment, sheriff? I don’t blame you. What could you say? You stand for a society that has gotten away from what the founding fathers intended. You represent the fourteen-year-old girls who go out and have a second or third kid to bring in more welfare money. You represent the taxpayers who allow the government to take their hard-earned money and give it to people who don’t work. You represent the decline and the decay of the American dream.”
“And what, exactly, do you stand for, Radio? Besides hate and selfishness.”
“You’re wrong. I don’t hate people as a rule; I’m just a realist. This country is being overrun by the non-producers who are going to drive the real Americans into slavery if we don’t stand up. Did you know, sheriff, that earlier this year there was a convention of gang members in Atlantic City? Six hundred leaders of youth gangs got together to plan something. The media didn’t report it, of course, but it happened. I know. The Internet and the fax networks were full of reports about it. Where do you think the money for that convention came from? I’ll tell you. It came from drug sales and welfare fraud, that’s where.”
“Did that really happen?” whispered Gordon.
Baca shrugged his shoulders while Radio went on with his monologue.
“And do you suppose for one minute, sheriff, that the outcome of that conference is going to be beneficial to you and me? You know the answer to that. If those people get together with a plan, there’s going to be armed warfare in the streets of this country. Them against us. They have the weapons, and we have to match them, or we’re doomed. The white people who made this country great are going to have to retreat to places like Summit County and make them fortresses against all the decay outside. We were going to be the first, but you stopped us. As far as I’m concerned, you’re no better than they are.”
“Thanks for the civics lesson,” Baca said. “But you’re in no position to move right now, let alone turn the tide of history. And there’s a dead man at Sullivan Meadows you’re going to have to answer for before your statue goes up in the civic plaza. You have no choice but to come out.”
“Ah, but you’re wrong, sheriff. You want us to surrender, and that’ll never happen. We worked too hard to arm this people’s militia, and we won’t let our efforts fall into your hands. You see, there’s another option besides surrender, and that’s martyrdom. By making the ultimate sacrifice, we can call attention to our cause and inspire others to follow in our footsteps. We can do something glorious and noble and self-sacrificing that can change history. How many men ever get a chance to do that? We’ve been talking it over for several hours, and we agree on it to the last man. That’s our decision.”
“You’re crazy,” Baca said.
“And you’re corrupt. See you in hell, brother.”
The phone clicked off. Radio bent down to the box he’d carried out and touched it, then slipped, cat-like back into the mine shaft. The rapidly sinking sun had now left the entrance to it in shadow.
“Everybody on alert!” shouted Baca. “They may be pulling a Butch Cassidy. If they come out, anybody who shoots before they do is looking for a new job.” He turned to Gordon and muttered, “Where are those damn spotlights? It’s almost dark.”
Then the music began, and Gordon realized that the object Radio had left by the entrance to the mine was a boom box. The tinny sound of The Star-Spangled Banner resounded through the dusk-infused air while everyone outside sat in tense anticipation, wondering that the fifteen people in the mine would do next. It was the same version Radio had played at camp the night before, and Gordon thought the song had never seemed so melancholy. He looked at the tensed figures around him, then back up to the entrance to the mine. As the music reached its crescendo, he softly sang to himself the final words, “O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.” For a full five seconds after the tape finished, the last bars of the music reverberated in the still mountain air.
Just as the last note faded out, there was a deafening explosion that sent an enormous cloud of dust and debris out the entrance of the mine. Rocks and pieces of wood flew through the air, landing in the grass and creek. Gordon was first startled, then stunned into insensibility. It took nearly a minute for him to realize all the implications of what had happened, and it took nearly that long for the echo from the explosion to go away. For another full minute, no one said a word, a
nd many of the men looked on with eyes wide open and mouths agape. It was Baca who finally broke the silence.
“Jesus Christ,” he said.
Interlude: Thursday September 30
(From today’s edition of the Summit County Echo)
Last Friday, a week after the horrible tragedy that thrust Summit County into the national spotlight, Sheriff Mike Baca called off the search for fifteen men missing and presumed dead following an explosion in an abandoned mine located at the McHenry Ranch.
“We’ve been at it for a week and gotten nowhere,” Baca said. “The walls of that mine are unstable as can be, and I’m not going to put the life and limb of my deputies at further risk trying to recover those bodies, or what’s left of them.”
The men were part of a paramilitary organization headed by Rex Radio, an ultraconservative former talk show host in San Francisco, whose program was ultimately removed from the air when he made remarks offensive from a racial and religious viewpoint. Radio’s self-proclaimed “people’s posse” had stockpiled an enormous cache of weapons and explosives in the mine, and according to Sheriff Baca, they were planning to remove and use the cache when confronted by law enforcement authorities late in the morning of Friday Sept. 17.
The result was a standoff with local officers and federal agents that lasted the remainder of the day. Shortly before sunset, Radio engaged law enforcement personnel in a rambling telephone conversation, at the close of which he said he and his men intended to be martyrs to their cause. The explosion occurred about five minutes after that conversation.
“We’re going on the assumption that they detonated the explosives with suicidal intent,” Baca said, “though it’s possible they might have gone off by mistake. We know what was in there, and it wouldn’t have taken much to set it off.”
The McHenry Inheritance (Quill Gordon Mystery Book 1) Page 19
