Watchers in the Woods

by William W. Johnstone

  He was frying fresh-caught trout the next morning when he heard the men come stomping and cussing and crashing out of the timber. He figured he was about to meet some representatives of the CWA.

  “Well now,” the voice spoke from behind him. “We got us a camper who’s nice enough to fix us our breakfast, boys.”

  “I do believe you’re right, Monroe,” a second voice was added.

  “But he ain’t very friendly,” the third and last survivalist said.

  Without turning around, Matt pointed to the rushing stream below his campsite. “You want breakfast, go catch it.”

  “And he’s right testy, too.”

  Matt’s Mini-14 was covered by a blanket and he had turned slightly so the intruders could not see his pistol, now cocked and locked, in leather.

  “You boys want coffee, you’re welcome to it,” Matt said. “You want something to eat, you catch it and cook it.” He turned his head to look at the men and had to fight to keep from laughing. They were dressed all in camouflage, including their gloves. Their faces were painted in camouflage. They carried semiautomatic weapons, two pistols, two knives, and enough ammunition to re-wage the Tet Offensive. They looked a lot like deer hunters.

  “What you find to grin about, boy?” one asked. He had a lot of ear hairs.

  “You, hairy ears. Did World War Three start and somebody forget to tell me?”

  The one with hairy ears stared at Matt, mustering up his best tough-guy look. He managed to look ugly, which wasn’t that difficult, he already had a good start at it. “What you doin’ out here, boy?”

  “None of your goddamn business.” Matt returned the stare. The three men he faced were of the type that immediately brought out the worst in Matt. They were ignorant and proud of it. Rednecks, bullies, bigots. They browbeat their wives—physically hammered on them from time to time (“A man’s got to keep his woman in line, you know”)—and abused their children. They poached game out of season and bragged about it to their friends. The only rights they cared about were their own, and to hell with everybody else. “Carry your ass,” Matt told the man. He took the fish from the frying pan and put them on a tin plate.

  Hairy-ears flushed and began puffing up his chest, which was about the same size as his beer gut. “I think we’ll just whup your ass, boy.”

  As Matt had explained to Richard, vocal intent to do him physical harm was enough to trigger his temper. When he moved it was very fast and very unexpected. He tossed the hot grease from the frying pan in Hairy-ears’ face. Hairy-ears dropped his AK-47 and began bellowing in pain. Turning, Matt clobbered the second man with the pan, the metal clanging off his noggin. Before Number Three could close his gaping mouth, Matt hit him flush in the face with the heavy iron skillet.

  Hairy-ears was on his knees, both hands covering his blistered face, screaming in pain. Number Two was staggering around, his hands on his head, which was dripping blood from the frying pan’s impact with skull bone. Number Three was flat on his back, his nose broken, his lips pulped, and some teeth missing. Matt gave Number Two another whack on the noggin with the frying pan and that put him on the ground, moaning. Matt placed the skillet near the circle of rocks which held his small fire in check and then went to work.

  He gathered up their guns, their ammunition, and their knives. He unloaded the assault rifles and then smashed them against boulders. He unloaded their pistols and using a rock, pounded the autoloaders into ruin. He wedged the knives, one at a time, into a crack in a boulder and broke them. He dug a hole in the ground and buried their ammunition.

  Then he sat down and ate his breakfast and had his coffee.

  Hairy-ears lay on the ground and stared at Matt, his eyes filled with hate, hurt, and confusion. His face was horribly blistered. Number Two had managed to crawl to a tree and sit with his back against it. He moaned a lot. Number Three was looking at Matt with disbelief in his eyes. His face was bloody.

  “I’ll kill you for this.” Hairy-ears finally gasped out the words over his burning pain.

  “I doubt it,” Matt told him.

  “How come you attacked us?” Number Two asked.

  “Me attack you?” Matt stared at him. “Who threatened whom? Who came uninvited into whose camp and started lipping off?”

  “We was just kiddin’ with you,” Number Three said, the words slurry out of his busted mouth and swollen lips.

  “A joke is only a joke if all parties involved think it funny. That’s something assholes like you never quite understand.”

  “I’m a gonna sue you for bustin’ up our guns,” Hairy-ears said.

  Matt chuckled and finished his breakfast. He began cleaning up his camp. The three so-called survivalists sat or lay on the ground, watching, but making no more threatening noises with the mouth.

  “You a lawman?” Number Two finally asked.

  “Nope.” Matt carefully extinguished his fire and stirred the ashes to make certain no sparks remained. He poured water over the ashes.

  After he swung into the saddle, Matt turned, looking down at the men. When he spoke, his voice was filled with contempt. “You got off lucky this time, boys. The last time men like you came at me with hostile intent, I killed them and left them for the vultures. And don’t you think for one second I’m kidding.”

  Matt rode off. He was just a dot far away before the men got up off the ground. Hairy-ears said, “The next time I see that bastard, I’m gonna kill him.”

  Number Two carefully shook his aching head. “Best leave that one alone, Monroe. That one’s a bad man.”

  “Get the radio out of the pack and contact base camp,” Monroe said. “Advise them of our position and tell them we need help. Move.”

  Number Three looked around him, a mournful expression on his battered face. “To tell you the truth, Monroe, I ain’t right sure just where we is!”

  * * *

  Matt swung around and followed a dry creekbed back toward his last camp. He picketed his horses, took powerful binoculars from his pack, and climbed up onto the crest of a hill. He watched the three men stagger down to the creek and bathe their faces. Matt took out his compass and checked the location against his map. He sat back and began carefully scanning the treetops, looking for smoke. He finally found several thin tentacles of smoke drifting upward. The survivalists weren’t very smart or they would have built smaller fires using dry wood, and they would have built them under low branches that would have broken up the smoke.

  Nearly an hour passed before a half dozen men on horseback, leading three spare horses, picked their way out of the timber and up to the three men waiting by the creek. Matt watched as a lot of excited arm-waving and pointing in his direction went on. The newcomers looked at the broken rifles and pistols.

  The whole passel of rednecks finally mounted up and rode off, back toward the direction of the smoke. Matt swung into the saddle and headed back to the lodge. He had reports to make and a class reunion to attend.

  * * *

  “That would be Monroe Bishner,” the man from Langley told Matt. Matt was back in Denver, in his room at the motel. “From Alabama originally, although I’m sure the majority of residents of that state would refuse to claim him. He’s a bad one, Husky. Courtmartialed out of the army for refusing to take orders from a black officer. A barroom brawler from ’way back. Half a dozen arrests for assault. One conviction. Tried for aggravated arson; he was accused of burning down a man’s house with the man and his family in it. No conviction. He’s been a member of one racist group or another since he was in high school. He dropped out of school in the tenth grade. He was tried for rape. No conviction. Served five years in prison for attempted murder. The next time you see him, do the world a favor and kill him.”

  “It’ll probably come to that if we ever meet again. And I’m sure we will. How about the other two?”

  “Hell, Husky, those people all look alike. They could be any of a dozen known to belong to the Citizens for a White America. They’re all a bunc
h of jerk-offs.”

  “Anything new on the Unseen from the samples I sent?”

  “Nothing that was reported to me.”

  A little warning bell started to go off in Matt’s head. He’d heard it many times over the years. It played a tune that rhymed with the letters C, Y, and A. Put them together and they spelled Cover Your Ass. “Give it all to me, partner,” Matt said.

  “Number Two will be gone for at least a month, Husky. He’s inspecting stations all around this big ol’ globe.”

  “Well, now, if that isn’t a coincidence. Just about the time things are ready to pop, the boss takes off.”

  “He was sent, Husky. He pulled one too many strings in trying to get this operation called off on account of the kids. Persons we both know or at least are very familiar with, inside and out of this organization, and who shall remain unnamed, came down on him hard. Something is screwy about this operation, friend. And I mean big-time out of whack.”

  “Is that just a hunch on your part?”

  “Yes. But we all have played our hunches out in the field.”

  “True. Could Swallow tell me anything?”

  The voice a thousand miles away was silent. “You haven’t checked in, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Swallow’s dead. He had an accident—ho-ho-ho—last Thursday.”

  “Did they get to his wife?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “How did he die?”

  “Same old crap. A car wreck. He was buried quick. What about his wife? What the hell does she know? Talk to me, Husky.”

  Matt hung up. He wasn’t about to talk to a voice he wasn’t sure of; voices could be easily imitated. He drove to the religious bookstore. It was closed. An Out-of-Business sign hung inside the door.

  Matt knew there was no point in coming back that night and slipping the lock and snooping. The place would have been cleaned out by experts.

  He went next door and spoke to a clerk that looked like she might know what she was talking about. “Pardon me, miss. I’m with the American Unity and Fidelity Group Insurance Company out of New York. We hold a policy on the gentleman who ran the bookstore. You know he was killed? Yes. Terrible thing. Just awful. The highways are like a jungle, I should say. What it is, we’re trying to find his next of kin ...”

  “Why, that would be his wife!”

  “Yes, we know. But the address on the policy is an old one. The policy is an old one; all paid up for years. And I’m sure his wife could use the money. The problem is, we can’t find her to give it to her.”

  “Well, she went home right after the funeral. A little town in Idaho. Let me think. Well, actually, it isn’t in a town. It’s a ranch they had. The town is . . . oh, what is that name! Kooskia! That’s it.”

  Dress nicely but not flashy, be interested, look sincere, act polite, and you can get just about any type of information you want out of anybody, Matt thought.

  He caught the next flight out and was heading for the county seat in a rented car after spending the night in a small Lewiston motel. He was listening to a local radio station on AM when he slowed, signaled, and pulled off onto the shoulder.

  “... the sheriff’s department reports they have no leads in the brutal murder of Mrs. Gaston, who had recently returned to her home county to live after her husband was killed in a car accident in Colorado. Her badly mangled body was found yesterday afternoon. Weather is next.”

  Matt clicked off the radio. Badly mangled body. How about partially eaten body? Yeah, Dan, they’ve crossed the river all right, old son. The bastards have crossed the river, climbed the mountains, and busted out all over the goddamn place. He drove to the county sheriff’s office and asked to see the sheriff.

  “He’s busy. Take a seat.”

  Matt opened a leather ID case and showed the young deputy his real ID and his federal gun permit with picture, since the Agency had stopped putting agents’ photos on their IDs some time back.

  “Now,” Matt said.

  “I never seen one of them before,” the young deputy said, eyeballing the ID. He buzzed the sheriff. “There’s a CIA man out here to see you, right now, sir.”

  Since he had heard the radio news, all sorts of interesting ideas had been roaming around in Matt’s head. It was all speculation, not one shred of proof, but it made sense to Matt. It was the only thing that made sense to him.

  “I don’t believe I’ve ever met a CIA man before, Mr. Jordan,” the sheriff said, smiling at Matt.

  “Oh, you’ve probably met a hundred and didn’t know it, Sheriff.” He was carefully inspecting the man’s face. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but it was something he’d seen . . .

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Jordan?”

  “Let me see the body of Mrs. Gaston.”

  The sheriff leaned forward, putting both elbows on his desk. “Now why would I want to do that, sir?”

  Matt hesitated, then plunged ahead. Richard was gone, he was on his own, he wasn’t even sure the FBI team was still in place, so to hell with it.

  “Sheriff, my telling you this will most probably put you in danger—high—risk danger. And I’m not being melodramatic. I don’t have the authority to tell you this; I’m acting on my own.”

  “You were studying me closely a few seconds ago, Mr. Jordan. Did I pass inspection?”

  “I think so. I have to trust somebody. If you want to verify my identification, call the Denver FBI and ask for Simmons.”

  “Tell me your story, then I’ll decide whether to call or not. Why do you want to see the body?”

  “Because Gene Gaston had been with the Agency for nearly forty years. He was running a front in Denver for us. His death was no accident. Obviously, from what I heard on the radio, neither was the death of his widow.”

  The sheriff grunted. “Damn sure wasn’t.”

  “Was the body partially eaten?”

  That shook the man. But he recovered nicely. “Now how in the hell would you know that?”

  Matt stood up. “Let’s go see the body.”

  It was an ugly sight. What was left of her, that is.

  “Now you see why I can’t release much to the press. For the time being, it’s going to be a bear attack.”

  “It was no bear, Sheriff.”

  “I suppose you’re going to tell me who it was?”

  “No. But I can tell you what it was.”

  Fifteen minutes later, the sheriff whipped his patrol car off the road, stopped, looked at Matt, and said, “Are you fucking out of your mind?”

  “No. But it’s the only thing that makes any sense.”

  “This makes sense? To who? Not to me. I got years behind a badge and I think this is the wildest thing I ever heard of. I think you’re crazy. I think you must have just broken out of some nut house. I think I am gonna call the FBI. I think . . .” He stopped his harangue and shook his head. “I been hearing those stories all my life. I never dreamed they were anything but fairy tales. I been trying to tell myself all day that was a bear attack . . . but I knew it wasn’t. So does the coroner. The teeth marks don’t fit a bear’s. Problem is, they don’t fit anything I’m familiar with. Are you a drinking man, Matt?”

  “I have been known to tipple from time to time.”

  “Well, Mr. CIA Man, by all means, let us go tipple. After listening to you, I damn sure need some!”

  7

  The problem was, as the sheriff explained, that there was so much area for the Unseen—and he still was not convinced that any such tribe existed—to roam around in. And, he pointed out, that was federal land in there . . . most of it.

  Matt showed him his other credentials.

  “Which agency do you really work for, Matt?” the sheriff asked.

  “The CIA.”

  The sheriff called the Denver office of the FBI and asked for agent-in-charge Simmons. He listened for a few moments, then handed the phone to Matt.

  “What’s going on in that area, Matt?” the B
ureau man asked.

  “I wish I knew for sure. Are you getting any heat?”

  “Some. But nothing I can’t handle. And by the way, a wreck reconstruction team has concluded that Gaston’s death was no accident. Somebody offed him.”

  “I figured that. But thanks for confirming it.”

  “I liked that old man, Matt. He was a randy old rogue, but a nice guy once you got to know him. We worked closely on a lot of matters. I don’t like murder anywhere; but murder in my jurisdiction offends me. And what really offends me is when I’m told to stay out of it.”

  “You’re kidding!”

  “Not.”

  “From within your agency?”

  “Let’s just say that certain people, in and out of government, want this . . . tribe of whatever the hell they are . . . left alone.”

  “Left alone?”

  “Yes. I couldn’t believe it. Still can’t believe it. It boggles the mind.”

  “But my orders were to go in and get rid of them if at all possible.”

  “I know. And we were to back you up. The CWA was just an excuse for the overall operation. A cover story. I know for a fact that your DCI just recently told a very powerful man in government to go fuck himself. And that if this man in government wanted a lot of publicity on this matter, just push a little bit harder. Obviously, Gene Gaston was no average field agent.”

  “No. He was a man who knew where a lot of bodies were buried—literally.”

  The sheriff’s eyebrows went up at that.

  “And also he knew a lot about those things in the wilderness.”

  “Yes. Now I have that information. It’s tucked away in a very safe place. So where does this new decision leave me, I wonder?”

  “From what I can get, since your number two man is out of the country, your orders stand. He was your sole contact—officially. The Bureau backup team was at first ordered to stand down. Then the director got his ass up at so much outside interference and ordered them back in position. Right now, your bureau backup is in limbo.”