by Jeff Noonan
THE DEADLY RIVER
JEFF NOONAN
AN ACCIDENTAL WARRIOR
He was a teenager innocently passing through town when he found himself in the center of a war. He didn’t know the people, or the reason they were fighting, but somehow he’d become a target.
It was the spring of 1959 and the young orphan had hiked into the Montana mountains to honor a promise made to his dead parents. But when he became stranded in a small logging town, his life was changed forever.
The youngster, Lee Raines, was quietly eating dinner in a local café when the place was robbed. He intervened and the thief was captured. But this crime turned out to be the opening salvo in a small war and Lee was in the middle of it. He didn’t even know the antagonists, but within days a local politician was murdered and Lee also became a target.
Eventually, Lee was able to satisfy the promise to his parents. But in doing so, he accidentally witnessed major crimes committed in the beginning of Montana’s environmental movement. Before he could leave town, Lee found himself in a shooting war, forced to defend himself against powerful, brutal, enemies.
Finally the shooting stopped and the sheriff made arrests. Time moved on and the judge passed sentence on the offenders. Only then did Lee realize that the problems were more complex than anyone had realized.
Nothing was yet settled. It took a final gun battle, a battle that resulted in real Rocky Mountain Justice, to end the war.
THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN JUSTICE TRILOGY
The Deadly River is the second volume of the Rocky Mountain Justice trilogy. The three volumes, which span a time period from the 1940’s through the 1970’s, are as follows:
Book #1: Rocky Mountain Justice (The Legend of Camel’s Hump). The year is 1949. Deep in the Montana mountains, four teenagers fight a depraved sheriff in a war that sees death visit both sides. But the sheriff’s gang is too strong for the teens alone, so they turn to two combat-hardened former marines who recruit an Indian Nation to fight alongside them. Some die and some disappear, but the battle is won and a legend is born.
Book #2: The Deadly River. It’s ten years later, in the same Montana mountains. Two of the original young heroes from The Legend of Camel’s Hump return. Once again, they’re thrust into battle against cold-blooded killers. Lee Raines, an orphan from Pennsylvania, stumbles into the middle of this new battle and becomes the key to their eventual victory.
Book #3: Home Goes the Warrior. The year is 1974. Lee Raines, now a Navy Lieutenant, has come home after being badly wounded in the Viet Nam jungles. After that experience, he just wants to finish his service, marry his fiancée, and find a quiet home in the suburbs. Instead he finds himself caught between the Mafia and the FBI as he battles thieves, murderers, and a Soviet espionage ring on the mean streets of Philadelphia.
THE DEADLY RIVER
BOOK TWO OF THE “ROCKY MOUNTAIN JUSTICE” TRILOGY
BY JEFF NOONAN
DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to the descendents of my many good friends living in the Montana mountains.
Some of these friends are loggers, some are miners, and others are environmentalists. All of them are good people who love the mountains and the lives they’ve created there.
It is my most fervent hope that Montana’s industrial and environmental advocates, and the politicians who support them, can come together to create a more prosperous Montana while preserving the place we all love.
Our grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and their descendents deserve no less.
OTHER BOOKS BY JEFF NOONAN
The Long Escape (Amazon 2012)
Rocky Mountain Justice (The Legend of Camel’s Hump) (Amazon 2013)
Home Goes the Warrior (Amazon 2014)
DISCLOSURE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Reserved
Copyright 2015 by Jeff Noonan
Library of Congress Control Number: 2015900287
ISBN-13: 9781507685778
ISBN-10: 1507685777
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the author.
Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE: PENNSYLVANIA, 1959
CHAPTER TWO: MONTANA, 1959
CHAPTER THREE: CAR TROUBLE
CHAPTER FOUR: ROBBERY
CHAPTER FIVE: POLLUTED RIVER
CHAPTER SIX: LOCAL HERO
CHAPTER SEVEN: JOB OFFERS
CHAPTER EIGHT: SEARCH INTERRUPTED
CHAPTER NINE: REVELATION
CHAPTER TEN: FAREWELL
CHAPTER ELEVEN: THE ENCOUNTER
CHAPTER TWELVE: MURDER ON THE RIVER
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: A NEW PURPOSE
CHAPTER FOURTEEN: THE RIVER RATS
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: THE LAWMEN’S PLAN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN: WILLY GOHMERT
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: JOSE ORTEGA
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: THE TRIAL
CHAPTER NINETEEN: VERDICT AND CONFESSION
CHAPTER TWENTY: THE VETERAN
AUTHOR’S NOTE
CHAPTER ONE: PENNSYLVANIA, 1959
It was a tiny room in a building filled with identical tiny rooms. At a desk in this room, a young man was bent over an engineering text.
The man at the desk, Lee Raines, raised his head and stared wearily out his window. Today the campus was quiet, a perfect day for studying. A huge snow storm had been lashing the area and the university was almost totally closed. Everyone had been advised to stay indoors for the past two days. Even the Villanova Chapel was dark.
In the distance, he could see a white plume rising ahead of a speeding snow plow. A lull in the storm was allowing a few hardy souls to struggle their way across campus. In the nearby parking lot, most cars were just white lumps. But a few recent arrivals, clearly identified by the steam rising above them as well as the deep furrows behind them, stood nakedly uncovered, clashing with the pristine surrounding landscape. What could be important enough to get people out on the roads in this weather? Shaking his head, he turned back to the book in front of him.
A short time later, footsteps broke through the silence outside his door. There came a knock that Lee answered with “C’mon in. It isn’t locked.” Probably someone needing food. Trying to concentrate, he didn’t look up until he heard the voice. Startled, he swiveled around. It was his uncle, Michael Hare, and the look on his face told Lee that something was wrong, very wrong.
Lee almost tripped trying to extricate himself from the desk and chair in one motion. The chair fell with a clatter, but neither of them noticed. Lee’s eyes were fixed on his uncle’s face. “What is it, Uncle Michael? What’s wrong?” His uncle didn’t answer at first. It seemed like he was having trouble getting the words out. He slowly removed his gloves with his eyes never leaving Lee’s face. He tried to speak twice, but stopped both times. Then he crossed the room in one huge stride and gathered the startled boy in a bear hug.
“Lee, I don’t know how to tell you this. But there was an accident last night.” Several inches shorter than Lee, his voice was muffled by the boy’s shoulder. He stopped and shuddered, unable to continue. His body was shaking violently. Lee pulled back, staring wide-eyed. He had never known his uncle to show emotion of any kind, no matter what was happening around him. Something was definitely wrong!
Finally, Michael pulled himself together with a hugely visible effort. “Your dad and mom were coming home from Philadelphi
a last night and they hit an icy patch on the highway. Lee, they didn’t make it! They slid head-on into a bridge piling. They both died instantly. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” He kept repeating himself as if he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Lee was stunned. His knees gave way and he found himself sitting on the side of the chair that had fallen when he stood up. Mindlessly he reached back, picked the chair up and sat in it. His brain wouldn’t work. It was frozen. He sat there with a totally blank look on his face, listening to his uncle repeat those words again and again.
Slowly Lee raised his head, his eyes finally fixing on his uncle’s face. Michael stopped talking and stood there, looking back at Lee. Lee knew that he should say something, but nothing would come. It was Uncle Michael who lost control first, the sobs coming loud and long as he knelt on the hard floor and buried his head in his hands. Instinctively, Lee stood and moved to him, resting his hand on Michael’s shoulder in a gesture of compassion. Then it hit him. He collapsed in front of his uncle, finding his voice with a long piercing scream, “Nooooooooooooooo. Nooooo. No. No.” He couldn’t stop. His uncle reached across to hold him and they both sat there crying and holding one another. That’s where other dorm residents found them when they came to investigate
The next few weeks flew by for Lee. He lived in a daze and consciously tried to forget each day as it passed. Life was just too painful.
The funeral was a major event in Media, Pennsylvania. His parents had grown up in rougher sections of South Philadelphia before marrying and making their life in this suburb. Lee had been raised in Media, a relatively sheltered child whose family was well-known and respected. His father had been a popular attorney who had been active in local political circles. As a result of this background, the funeral attendees ranged from more recent acquaintances, professionals at many levels, to childhood friends who were now becoming infamous as leaders in the Philadelphia Cosa Nostra.
Lee attended the funeral, but later didn’t remember much about it. What he did remember seemed surreal, as if he had watched it from a comfortable theatre seat while it played out on a screen in front of him.
Uncle Michael and his wife, Ellen, were now Lee’s only living relatives. Michael was his mother’s younger brother who had followed his sister to Media many years ago. He was now the senior partner in a thriving CPA firm.
After the funeral, Michael and Ellen tried valiantly to fill the void in Lee’s life, but this was very hard to do. At the age of eighteen, Lee just wasn’t prepared to face life without the two people who had been everything to him. He tried, but there wasn’t a day in those two months when something didn’t happen to knock his mental equilibrium askew. Unashamedly, he cried himself to sleep almost every night.
Lee spent his days either doing chores for Michael, tinkering with his car, or just wandering aimlessly around the hills and fields that surrounded Media.
At his uncle’s insistence, Lee tried to return to Villanova. He couldn’t do it. He walked into his dorm room and broke down. He couldn’t stand the thought of returning. His former roommate helped him gather his belongings and he left the campus, never to return.
Uncle Michael, as the executor of the estate, tried to work with Lee to make arrangements for the family’s assets. But, much to Michael’s amazement, Lee simply wasn’t interested. Money had never been a concern to Lee. His parents had always been there for him and, although they insisted that he work for what he received, he never wanted for anything important. Additionally, he just couldn’t deal with anything that reminded him of his parents. He flatly refused to even look at the work that Michael was doing on his behalf.
So Michael did what was needed. First he arranged to transfer the family checking and saving accounts to Lee’s name. Then he set up a trust that included all of the financial investments made by the family while they were alive. When the life insurance proceeds were received, Michael added them to the trust. But try as he might, Michael couldn’t get Lee to look at these arrangements. It was as if Lee was afraid to acknowledge that anything had changed from his old life; as if he was pretending that his family was out of town and would return soon; as if his involvement in the financial transactions would somehow turn the grim truth into reality. Whatever the reason, Lee stubbornly refused to even look at anything related to his parents’ finances. So Michael had no choice but to maintain control of the trust. As a CPA, he knew what to do and he did it well. But Lee just didn’t care.
Finally, at dinner one evening, Michael decided to try something to awaken his nephew. Staring across the dinner table, He opened with, “Lee, what are your plans for tomorrow?”
Lee didn’t hesitate, “I dunno. Is there anything you need me to do?”
“Yeah. I think that it is time that we make a decision on what we should do with your parents’ house. It can’t just sit there unattended forever. We need to either rent it or sell it. It’s yours now. What do you want to do?”
The question obviously caught Lee by surprise. He slowly put his fork on his plate before looking up at his uncle. “I’ve thought about this a lot. I’m not ready to live there. Maybe I never will be. But I don’t want to cut it loose right now. Too many memories. I guess we could rent it if you think we should do something.”
The response surprised both his uncle and his aunt. It was the first indication of coherent thought they had seen from Lee lately. Aunt Ellen’s eyes watered a bit out of pure relief. But Michael continued the conversation. “That’s probably a good idea. We can get one of the local realtors to manage it and let him rent it. That way it will be in good shape when you’re ready to make a decision on it.
“Sounds good.” Lee went back to eating his dinner. But Michael wasn’t ready to stop. “If we’re going to rent it, we need to get it cleaned out. I can have a service come in and clean it and we can put the furniture and stuff in storage. But someone has to sort out the things that need to be kept and the things we need to throw out. Lee, you’re going to have to do that. Only you can make the hard decisions about the disposition of the personal possessions in the house.”
He stopped speaking at the look on the boy’s face. Lee’s fork had stopped in mid-air and his face wore an expression of absolute terror. He choked on the food he was eating and there was a brief flurry of activity as Aunt Ellen held up his left arm and thumped on his back.
Finally calm prevailed and the boy looked long and hard at his uncle before speaking. The look of terror was gone, replaced by one of desperate determination. His fork went down again, his eyes following its motion. Then he glanced up at Michael, “Okay, I’ll go do it tomorrow. I’ll make two piles. One pile will be things that I want with me now. I’ll get that one out of there. Then I’ll put a pile of stuff in the garage that can be sold or trashed. I’ll leave everything else where it is and it can be stored with the furniture. Does that sound all right to you?”
It was Michael’s turn to hesitate. He was absolutely stunned to hear such rational thought. “Yeah. That sounds fine. Do you want us to help? I can take off from work tomorrow and we can do it together.” Aunt Ellen chimed in with, “Don’t forget me. I can help too.”
But Lee demurred. “No. This isn’t going to be easy. I need to do it at my own pace. It might take me a few days, but I really need to do this myself. But when I’m done, Uncle Michael, I’d like you to go in and take care of Dad’s office. You know the value of that kind of thing better than me.”
True to his word, after breakfast the next morning Lee backed his car up to the garage and walked into his former home. At first, he just wandered aimlessly from room to room. At times he stopped to touch something or dry his eyes with his handkerchief. But for the most part, he was able to hold himself together. Then he went to work.
It was the following afternoon before Lee felt comfortable that the job was done. He had suitcases in his car filled with the clothes he wanted. In the back seat of the car were his sports equipment, his baseball trophies, a
nd some family pictures. In the garage were the two piles that he had planned. One pile was just trash. The other was made up of items that could be useful to someone. Each pile was carefully marked by a hand-lettered sign.
Satisfied that his job was done, Lee went back into the house for one last look. He walked through the kitchen, remembering the last time he’d seen his parents. It had been in this room and they’d been sipping wine, cheerfully arguing about which eagle should be the national symbol. It was a silly old argument they had been having for years. His mom had always advocated for the majestic golden eagle, while his Dad had been more the traditionalist, loudly defending the more familiar bald eagle. It had been a standing, good-humored, argument between the two. An argument that would never be settled now.
Shaking his head to clear the memories, he left the kitchen and entered his father’s office where he took a seat behind his father’s big desk. Stretching out, with his hands behind his head, he looked around the room. It had always been one of his favorite places. His earliest memories were of being in this room, pretending to read his little books while his father worked silently at the big desk, a cigar always in the ashtray. He just wanted one more look at the room before he left. He had already made up his mind that he wouldn’t be coming back to this house. It was something he instinctively knew he had to put behind him. He didn’t know what he was going to do, but he knew that his future didn’t include this home with all of its memories.
His eyes fell on the big painting on the wall opposite the desk. His father had always loved that painting, a large depiction of a small lake surrounded by snow-capped mountains. Grey cliffs came down one side of the lake and a cabin could be seen at its farthest shore. The quality of the painting wasn’t the best. In fact, it had been purchased at a local flea market for the princely sum of ten dollars. But his father had loved it because it represented a dream he’d cherished. In his dream, he was going to someday just take off and explore the Rocky Mountains. He talked about this dream often and with such enthusiasm that both Lee and his mother had become part of the dream with both of them agreeing that they were going to do this when Lee graduated from university.
