Sam spat out blood while gasping for breath. His knees had buckled after he was hit, and he twisted on the chain that held him. Betty, meanwhile, screamed ferociously. “You bastard! You fucking bastard!”
“Shut up, bitch,” Bauer said, almost bored. He brought up his arm and slapped her across her face, hard. “You’re next.” Betty had stopped screaming, but she was heaving sobs, wide-eyed with fear.
Bauer called out: “He’s ready.” Almost immediately, Northman entered the tiny room. He was so big, he had to bend over as he stepped into the soundproofed room. He was still wearing the bandana across his face. When he stood up, he seemed to fill the room.
Northman fiddled with a Polaroid camera, totally uninterested in the presence of Sam or Betty, who stared at him. When he was satisfied that the camera would work, he looked up at Sam for a long time, his blue eyes unblinking. After a minute or so, he silently handed the camera to Bauer and reached into the pocket of his lumber jacket. He extracted a box cutter.
Betty immediately started to sob again, but Northman had already slashed Sam’s forehead. The cut wasn’t deep. But more blood flowed down over Sam’s face and dripped off his chin onto the floor. Northman watched for a few seconds, then stepped over to Betty and grabbed the spiked hair at the back of her head. She was screaming and twisting, in a frenzy.
Slowly, Northman pulled the box cutter’s blade through her scalp, near her forehead. As with Sam, blood immediately started pouring down her face. Northman then reached up and pulled down the collar of Betty’s handmade X-Ray Spex T-shirt, ripping it. He stepped back and looked at her, his head cocked slightly to one side.
Satisfied, Northman turned to Bauer, who had been standing by the door, smirking. He took back the camera. “Get the light, hold it like I told you,” he said. Bauer rushed to get the light.
Bauer stood a few feet to one side of Sam, the portable light at arm’s length and pointed upward. The light’s glare cast dark shadows over Sam’s bloody face, and made him look a lot worse. “Good,” Northman said. “Don’t move.” He started taking Polaroids from different angles, silent. The only sounds that could be heard were Betty’s weeping, Sam’s gasping for air, and the clicking of the camera.
After taking a half-dozen shots of Sam’s face, Northman turned to Betty. Bauer hustled over and positioned the light at Betty’s side. The effect was similar: she looked like she was a bloodied corpse. Northman started taking pictures again.
That done, Bauer moved to Northman’s side and positioned the light over the dozen or so Polaroid snapshots, as Northman flipped through them. Northman nodded while the images of Sam and Betty came into focus. They were shocking.
“Good,” Northman said, gathering up the Polaroids. He glared at Bauer above the bandana. “I’ll be back in a few hours. Don’t do anything to either of them, her especially. Understand?”
Bauer nodded. Northman was taking the photos — wrapped in a sheet of Aryan Nations letterhead — to the Portsmouth Herald, the newspaper that served the Exeter area. Someone at the Herald would call the police, of course, but they would also share the photographs with other media, including Portland media. They would have the desired effect.
“That little bastard X will be here before you know it,” Northman said, bending slightly to exit the tiny room. “Be ready.”
C H A P T E R 53
The swing gate to the acreage had been left unlocked and slightly ajar. None of us knew it at the time, but this was an unusual, and probably unprecedented, event. Someone was expecting visitors.
I’d pulled over by the side of the road, way before the gate, and was squinting in the dark. I thought I could make out what looked like Mike and X near the gate. The police cruiser that had been idling there on our previous visit was gone. There weren’t any headlights, either, coming from east or west. There was a full moon, and it was super quiet.
Through the trees, a faint glow could be seen, coming from what looked like a rundown shack. Someone was home. I squinted. Mike seemed to be tapping X on the shoulder and saying something. X was nodding. I couldn’t hear anything they were saying.
I watched as Pete and Marty pulled out guns from the hockey bag in the back seat, and Mike popped the hood. Pete handed someone a sawed-off shotgun, and then they all looked at X for a bit longer. Mike said something again, and X nodded again. X seemed to be holding something.
The three bikers then turned and slipped through the gate onto the property. They had not gone a dozen steps when they stopped. Off in the distance, to the south, a very faint sound could be heard — an engine, or a motor. Through the trees and the bush, it sounded like it was far away.
I started moving closer, on foot, my dad’s hunting rifle (the one he’d forgotten to take when he moved out) strapped to my back. I kept to the trees that lined the road.
When the sound faded, the three big men continued moving forward. Their speed and stealth surprised me. I wondered if they had done this sort of thing before, and concluded they probably had. Within seconds, they were out of sight, swallowed up by the dark brush. I stopped again, watching as X peered into the shadows. He then went and sat in Mike’s station wagon and quietly pulled the door shut.
I edged closer. I was pretty sure X hadn’t seen me. No one had seen me.
What the fuck am I doing?
Inside the gates, I could sort of almost make out Mike, Pete, and Marty. They’d stopped some thirty feet from the house, where they were crouched behind a cord of wood. Around them were some children’s bicycles, a broken trampoline, and a couple old generators scattered throughout the muddy clearing. Up by the back door, there was a doghouse, but fortunately, no dog.
A bluish light seeped through the biggest window, and I could faintly hear voices. Someone was inside, apparently, watching TV. I watched as Mike tapped Pete on the arm and Pete nodded. Pete remained there, staring at the house, while Mike and Marty moved further into the property. The pastor in Exeter had told us that two children lived in the tumbledown house, so it seemed pretty unlikely that Sam and Betty were being held there.
Mike and Marty backed away and crept down a dirt trail that went past a portable sawmill and off toward the south. They were heading toward the engine noise they had heard earlier.
After a couple minutes, I couldn’t see them anymore. Even with the full moon, it was too dark. So I slowly crept closer.
He and Marty had stepped into another clearing. Behind them, the shack was no longer visible. In front of them, they could see the whitish outline of a trailer. Mike extinguished his tiny flashlight. As their eyes adjusted to the dark, they saw that the trailer was old and rusted; it looked like it had been there a long time. Its wheels were gone, and it had been propped up, more or less level, with rough lumber that looked like it had come from the portable sawmill.
There were windows at one end, but they had been boarded up. At the opposite end of the trailer, tattered curtains could be seen in another window next to a door with a large padlock hanging from it. Outside the door, there were two old folding patio chairs and the remnants of a campfire. A few feet away sat two rusting propane tanks.
A pale light was coming through the window of the trailer.
“Don’t fucking move!”
Mike and Marty remained still.
“Don’t turn around. Drop them. I’ve got a thirty-thirty pointed right at you, you fuckers,” the man hissed.
After a few long seconds, they knelt, slightly, to place the sawed-off shotguns on the ground. They raised their hands.
“You fat cunts make a lot of noise,” the man said, his voice still low. “Could hear you a mile off.”
Mike turned around. Martin Bauer stepped out from behind the rear hitch of an ancient broken-down pickup. Despite his size, despite the Winchester .30-30 in his hands, Mike could tell Bauer was nervous. His hands were shaking.
“I didn’t say turn
around, motherfucker!” Bauer yelled, loud enough for Pete to hear him. I watched as the big biker started moving toward them, sawed-off shotgun already cocked.
“Just you here, boy?” Mike said, loudly. “Where’s your boss? He scared, too?”
Bauer moved out from behind the pickup. “I’ve got the gun, motherfucker,” he yelled. “I’m not scared of fuck all.”
“Right,” Mike said, calculating. His .45 was still tucked into the back of his jeans, and Bauer probably hadn’t seen it in the gloom. But he wouldn’t be able to get to the gun before the skinhead had fired off at least a couple rounds from the Winchester. He kept Bauer talking.
“Right,” he loudly repeated, moving his hands down slightly.
“Keep your fucking hands where they are!” Bauer yelled, now standing out in the open, but still beside the ancient pickup truck. He sounded afraid. “Put ’em back up!”
Mike did.
Mike, guessing that Pete was close, again raised his voice. “Just you and that old thirty-thirty, boy? That’s all your boss left you?” he said, derisively, loudly.
“Shut up! Shut up!” Bauer yelled, his voice panicky. “I’ll shoot you where you stand, old man!”
“No, you won’t,” Mike said, just as Pete fired off a barrel above their heads. Almost immediately, Mike and Marty tumbled to the ground, and rolled behind a tarp covering some lumber and insulation. Mike reached around for his .45.
Bauer scrambled back behind the pickup truck — but he was still able to fire in Pete’s direction. He shot twice, and hit the biker once, just below his right knee. Pete dropped to the ground, hard, cursing.
Before Mike could return fire, Bauer was already bounding away, running full-tilt toward the logging road. He had cut through the brush and was gone. At the same time, from inside the trailer, a muffled female voice could barely be heard.
“Go help Pete and I’ll get the kids,” Mike said to Marty. “Watch for the skinhead coming back or anyone coming from the house.”
zW
A hundred feet to the west, a shit-scared Martin Bauer was crashing through the woods like a wounded deer, circling around toward the front gate. He probably figured he could steal the High Aryan Warrior Priest’s truck and get out of there. He was a believer, but he hadn’t signed on to do a gun battle with three armed bikers all on his own. Let Northman deal with them.
He got to the fence at the north side of the acreage and peered back into the woods. The bikers were tending to their wounded friend, and working to free the Jew and the punk slut, he knew. He relaxed, slightly: he would have enough time to get away. He’d hitch south, maybe to Boston, then Texas. Disappear for a few months.
Then he saw X, sitting in Mike’s car. X had heard the shots, but he still hadn’t seen Bauer. He was looking in the wrong direction.
Bauer moved soundlessly over the fence. He slowly started to bring the .30-30 into position.
C H A P T E R 54
Before Bauer could shoot, a single shot rang out, and he grunted, then slammed into the still-frozen ground. He was still. He was dead.
X jumped out of the station wagon, the .22 in his hand, and looked at Bauer. He heard a sound and whirled around.
“Hey, brother,” I said, still holding my dad’s hunting rifle. “It’s me.”
Inside the dark trailer, Mike held his little flashlight in one hand and the .45 in the other. He could now hear Betty screaming for help from the other side of the small padded door. Pressed up against the plywood wall, the .45 ready, Marty yelled, “Betty, is anyone else in there?”
“No,” she yelled back. “Just me and Sam. I think he’s unconscious. Mike, is that you?”
“It’s me, kid,” Mike said, squeezing through the doorway.
“Thank God,” she said, crying. “Mike, please check on Sam, okay? Bauer hit him really hard.”
Mike peered at Sam’s face, which was bloody and swollen. He touched Sam’s neck with two big fingers. “He’s breathing. Unconscious, but alive. Bastard worked him over pretty good.” Mike pointed the flashlight up at the beam where they’d been chained. “Where’d they put the keys, Betty?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Are you sure they’re gone?”
“For now,” Mike said, scanning the floor and walls. “Let’s get you guys out of here before they decide to come back.”
On one of the cots in the next room, beside a portable lamp, Mike found a ring of keys. After a few seconds fumbling for the right ones, he managed to free her. He noticed that her shirt had been torn, her breasts partly visible, and her jeans were hanging open. She caught his look and zipped up her jacket and pants, her hands trembling. “I’m okay,” she said. “He was going to, but he didn’t have time. Stopped when he heard you guys outside. Let’s get Sam and get out of here.”
While Mike held Sam upright, Betty removed the padlock and chain that held him to the crossbeam. Sam groaned, his eyes swollen shut. “Let’s go, buddy,” Mike said, easing Sam through the doorway. Once outside, he carefully lifted Sam over his shoulder. The guitarist wasn’t heavy.
Mike called out to Pete and Marty. “Guys! Let’s go.”
Through the gloom, they could see Marty kneeling on the ground beside Pete. Around Pete’s upper leg, Marty had tightly tied his bandana. Mike started to speak to them, and then a shot was heard. It seemed to come from the direction of the road. Mike and Betty stopped in their tracks.
They waited, completely silent. Then Marty spoke, pointing toward the path. “We got company,” he said.
Sam still on his shoulder, the .45 in his hand, Mike swung around. There, in the gloom, he could see two little girls, no more than ten or twelve. They were in pajamas and staring wide-eyed at the scene before them: a skinny, disheveled leather-jacketed teenage girl with blood all over her face; two big men on the ground, one who had been bleeding from his leg; and another big man, holding a gun, and with a bleeding, beat-up boy slung over his shoulder. The boy wasn’t moving, but he was groaning a little.
Betty took charge. “Hello, girls. It’s okay,” she said gently, moving forward, her arms wide. “Where’s your mom and dad?”
The oldest girl spoke. “They’re out drinking in town,” she said matter-of-factly. “They’ll be back later. Grandma’s at bingo.”
“Are you okay?” Betty asked them, crouching down as she got closer. “Did you see what happened?”
“No,” the older girl said. “But we’re okay.”
“Good,” Mike said. He turned to Betty. “Stay with them up by the house. We’ll get these two to the car. I’ll be back for you.”
Mike continued toward the main road as quickly as he could, Sam still slung over his shoulder. Marty came up the rear, steadying a cursing Pete has he hobbled along the path.
Once she had led the sisters back to the house, Betty crouched down beside them. She asked their names. Greta and Lena, the sisters said.
“Do your folks go out like this often?” Betty asked them. “Leave you alone?”
“Sometimes,” said Greta, the older sister. “But Northman told them they should. He gave them and Grandma money to go out, and he got us McDonald’s and he told us to stay inside and watch TV. But when we heard the guns, we got scared.”
“Who is Northman?” Betty asked. “Is he the man who owns the trailer?”
“No,” Greta said. “Our dad just lets him use it.”
“Is Northman his real name?”
Before they could answer, Mike came racing down the drive. He looked shaken. “We’ve got to go, right now,” he said, taking Betty’s hand. “Right now, Betty.”
“What about the girls?” Betty said. “We can’t just leave them.”
“We have to,” Mike said. “They’ll be fine.” He looked at the two girls, who were clearly scared of the big biker. “Girls, when we’re gone, I want you to call the police and tell th
em to get here fast. Can you do that?”
“Yes,” Greta said. “We can.”
“Good,” Mike said, yanking Betty toward the road. “Let’s go.”
They started running toward the station wagon. There, in the gloom, Betty saw that Sam and Pete had been propped up in the back of the station wagon, and X and Marty were standing around the car, waiting. And then she saw me, standing there too, and she started crying.
The two girls waited a minute, then ran into their house, locking the door behind them. Everything was silent again.
Kneeling in the woods near the portable sawmill, Northman also watched Mike’s station wagon disappear from view. He turned and headed back into the woods.
C H A P T E R 55
The mood in the barnlike barracks — located at the edge of the Aryan Nations compound in Potter County — was serious. The Brotherhood, the informant confirmed in the police report, was in a dark mood.
The assassination of the Jewish Toronto talk show host, the elimination of the big-mouth, the bank robberies, the bombings of synagogues and the porn shops: all had been bloody, but all had been part of the plan. First step, create the Brotherhood. Second step, identify the common goal: to create chaos. Third step, get the funds the movement would need to keep going. Fourth step, recruit new members.
Fifth step? The fifth step was the elimination of the enemies of the Aryan people: the Jews, the race traitors, the media, the politicians, the muds, the degenerates — like the fags, and the dykes, and the perverts. And, of course, the degenerate punks.
By doing that, the Brotherhood believed, a race war would start, and society would break down. The Aryan guerrilla force — led by the Brotherhood, naturally — would take the battle into urban areas. In the aftermath of it all, a new society would replace what had been there before. One that would be Identity, occupied by Aryan kinsmen, and based in the countryside. The Volk, back to being rooted in the land. Making it great again.
Recipe for Hate Page 19
