Patriots

by James Wesley, Rawles

  A vendor doing a very brisk business was Mr. Jones, the soap maker. Another was selling grain alcohol that he had distilled. He had the alcohol in an odd assortment of plastic bottles, jars, and cans. His sign read: “Pure Grain Alcohol. 180-Proof. Burns fine in kerosene wick lamps and Zippo lighters.

  Fine for sipping, too! One quart: 25¢ in genuine (1964 or earlier) coin or like value in barter goods.”When he spoke with Kevin Lendel, the man said that he had built his still several years before the Crunch. He said that because he had copper-flashed all of the internal parts, and had used lead-free solder, it made alcohol that was safe to drink.

  A few curious features of the Barter Faire were immediately apparent. First, there were only a few guns on display, and only small quantities of ammunition or reloading components. Of the few guns for sale, most were chambered in uncommon cartridges such as .257 Roberts, .25-06, .25-20, .35 Remington, and sixteen-gauge. Only two handguns were seen for sale. One was a well-worn Ruger Single Six .22 long rifle single-action revolver. The other was a Smith and Wesson .41 magnum with three boxes of fired brass and just eight rounds of live ammunition. Exorbitant prices were being asked for both of these guns.

  Another interesting phenomenon was the number of live animals for sale. There were a great number of ducks, chickens, and rabbits. There were a few goats, sheep, piglets, and dogs for sale, as well, but only two horses. To even an untrained eye, the horses clearly looked old and broken down.

  Most of the Fairegoers had come from the Palouse Hills region. A few traveled even farther. Some came from as far north as Coeur D’Alene and as far south as Lewiston. One stout man with gray hair whom everyone called “the Bee Man” had come all the way from Orofino on horseback. He was selling jars of honey, bee pollen, and beeswax candles. Doug Carlton chatted with him about the enormous .44 AutoMag pistol that he carried in a cross-draw holster. It sported unusual cream-colored grips. When asked about them, the Bee Man chortled, “Those black plastic grips that it came with were too thin and they started cracking the first year I got this thing. So I carved these new ones out of elk antler. They’re real sturdy.” When Doug asked him about the availability of ammunition for the unusual pistol, the Bee Man replied, “That’s no problem, son, I reload. I make the cases by cutting down .308 Winchester brass. The only problem is that I only have one magazine for the thing. I’d give my gold tooth for a spare, but I don’t suppose I’ll ever find one!”

  Most of the merchandise for sale would have been considered nothing but junk before the Crunch, but now every item was carefully scrutinized and considered. There was a lot of clothing, but not many shoes or boots. There were plenty of pots and pans and cutlery for sale, but not many hand tools. Predictably, there was a profusion of electrical and electronic items like lamps, clocks, and radios offered, but few interested buyers.

  There were many signs advertising cars and trucks for sale, but Todd didn’t hear anyone discussing actually buying one. One sign seemed particularly pitiful to him. It read:“For trade: Corvette Stingray. Power everything. Excellent condition. Stored in garage. Less than 4,000 miles on odometer. Will trade for a good quality spin-cast rod and reel and 40 rounds of .300 Weatherby Magnum.”

  In addition to the “for sale” signs, there was a profusion of “wanted” signs. Mike made a list of these items in his notepad. The list included: web gear, strike-anywhere matches, Mason jar lids, fish hooks, bleach, rolls of candle wicking, mouse and rat traps, non-hybrid garden seeds, kerosene lamp wicks, Visqueen, salt, band-aids, razor blades, cans of pipe tobacco, aluminum foil, Aladdin lamp mantles, small game traps, coffee beans, dental floss, pepper, rechargeable batteries—D cell, AA, and 9 VDC, sugar, baking soda, ant spray, decks of playing cards, Zippo flints, children’s Tylenol elixir, duct tape, toothbrushes, cloth diapers, boot laces, and penicillin. He filled up another column with just the reloading and ammunition wants. Reloading: Large rifle primers, de-capping pins, 3031 and 4831 smokeless powder, Bullseye pistol powder; Ammo: .308 Win., .30-06, 7.62 x 39 mm Russian, .45 ACP, .38 Special, .303 British, nine-mm, .30-30, .22 Long Rifle, .22 Magnum, .243 Winchester, .45

  Colt, twelve-gauge number-four and number-seven bird shot, twenty-gauge number-seven bird shot, and .44 Special and/or Magnum.

  By a prearranged schedule, everyone from Todd’s group got back together at the trucks at 4 p.m. Once there, they found that they had achieved their main goal of bartering for kerosene. They had collected eleven gallons. Most had been exchanged for ammunition.

  They all had something to say about the day’s proceedings, even Kevin, who was normally reserved. He said, “I must have had a dozen guys ask me about my H and K or my Gold Cup. It really got aggravating. They kept saying things like,‘Are you sure you don’t want to sell it?’ and I’d have to say,‘Yes I’m sure, absolutely not. End of discussion.’ I felt like I should have carried a sign that said ‘Don’t Bother Asking Me About Buying My Guns.’” Several others said that they had had similar experiences. T.K. then said, “The thing about the Faire that impressed me was the fact that it all seems so medieval. Perhaps it was seeing all those pelts that gave it that feel. It seems like a cross between a mountain man’s rendezvous and Barter Town from Mad Max III.” With that, everyone laughed.

  Mary then added, “Maybe we ought to just pick up the phone and give Tina Turner a call. Tell her we need her to do a repeat performance as Aunty Entity and supervise this mess. I wonder if she still has her slinky chain-mail?”

  There was more laughter.

  “Okay,” Mike said, “Now down to serious business. Aside from the kerosene, just what did everyone get in trade?”

  Mary spoke up first. “I got three Alpine dairy goats: two does and a dis-related young buck. I traded all three of them for a hundred rounds of .22 long rifle and ten rounds of .308 ball.”

  With this comment, Mike let out a whistle. “Not bad, Mrs. Honcho, not bad at all,” he said.

  With a note of pride in his voice, Lon Porter said, “I got a six-inch Unimat lathe with a complete set of accessories in exchange for four gallons of gasoline. I even got the guy to provide his own container for the gas. I also bought a pair of moccasins for ten rounds of .22.”

  Della raised her hand and then said, “I got a pair of moccasins for the same price at the same time Dad got his. I also got a pair of fence-mending pliers, two wool carding combs, a glass food canning funnel, and a dress. All together, those cost two dollars in ‘junk’ silver dimes that Doug gave me to spend at the Faire.”

  After Doug saw that Dell was finished, he said, “I ran into a Templar with an HK91. We both stood there staring at each other for a few seconds. I could see that he was eyeballing my M1A, so I knew that he was thinking the same thing that I was. As I’m sure you all know, the M1A is the group-standard rifle for the Templars, just like the H and K is with ours. After a few offers back and forth, we decided to be reasonable and trade straight across. I gave him my M1A and all eight of my magazines for his HK and nine twenty-rounders. We said that we’d get back together tomorrow and swap our spare parts for the guns. I figured that I’d be better off with a group-standard rifle, and the two guns are basically comparable in quality and function. My gun was National Match grade though, so I suppose that Thomas—the Templar guy—got the better end of the deal.

  “The only thing that I don’t like about the Heckler and Koch is that it doesn’t lock open after you fire the last round in a magazine, like M1As and AR-15s do. I guess I can make up for that little shortcoming by loading tracers as the last two or three rounds in each magazine. It’s an old Army trick. When you see a red light, you change magazines. That was my only major purchase, or trade rather, of the day. I also bought two monstrous bags of jerky—one of elk and one of bear—for a pre-’65 quarter. I figure the jerky will be great for patrols and picket duty. Oh yeah, almost forgot. I also got three big fat Seattle phone books. They will be great for toilet paper.”

  Obviously anxious to speak, Lisa was next. “I got
four little lambs. They are Targhee crosses. Three ewes and a ram. They are soooo cute. They’re already in the back of Kevin’s pickup munching on some grass hay. I traded two salt lick blocks for them. I also got a copy of Raising Sheep the Modern Way, some spare underwear, a hairbrush, and five pounds of homemade saltwater taffy from a really sweet Nez Perce Indian woman. All together, that cost ten rounds of West German seven-point-sixty-two ball. Later in the afternoon, I got four half-grown Khaki Campbell ducks in exchange for sixty sets of wide-mouth Mason jar lids and rings. This particular breed of duck is supposed to be good both for laying and for eating.”

  Dan then said, “I traded my Walther P-38, three extra magazines, and two hundred rounds of nine-mil ammo to some dude for a complete fishing outfit, a Bausch and Lomb spotting scope, a Merck Veterinary Manual, a big Craftsman socket set, and a leather working tool kit. The leather working set is pretty cool.

  It’s a standard Tandy kit, plus some extras. It has a mallet, about twenty of those miscellaneous patterning tools, a swivel cutting tool, a couple of tubes of Barge cement, a rotary hole punch, a snap-and-riveting kit, and a whole bunch of other items. He also threw in a whole tanned cowhide. It was strange, though, the guy actually seemed more excited about the ammo than the pistol.”

  Next, Kevin reported on his transactions. “I got an entire buffalo hide in really good shape for ten rounds of .30-06. I figure that it’ll help keep us warm up at the LP/OP next winter. Another guy traded me a small Bearcat scanner—one of the portable ones the size of a walkie-talkie—for twenty rounds of .45 ACP. It runs off of batteries, and we have plenty of ni-cads, so I thought, ‘why not?’ Not many people have any source of power nowadays. I figure that’s the only reason the guy was willing to sell it so cheap. I also got a pair of Belgian white rabbits—a buck and a doe, for twenty rounds of .22 long rifle. My mother would be proud. She’d say that I got ‘Such a deal!’ The cage for the rabbits cost a lot more, though. For it, I had to give up a whole fifty rounds of .22 and three pre-’65 silver quarters. I think it’s amazing what a few silver dimes or quarters will buy.”

  After a pause, Kevin said, “I feel sorry for all those people I knew who bought one-ounce gold coins as a ‘survival hedge.’ I can see now that a full-ounce gold coin is too compact a form of currency, and it isn’t easily divisible.

  I suppose that people who bought the gold coins minted in the one-tenth-of-an-ounce weights are more fortunate. What would a full ounce of gold buy?

  That Corvette that we saw advertised? A half a dozen cows? Maybe. It certainly wouldn’t do much good for someone trying to buy day-to-day necessities. It’s pretty apparent that our stock of .22-rimfire ammo is a lot more useful as a store of value and as a means of exchange.”

  Mike was the last to give his report. “Okay, get this. I ran into a major coup.

  I bought a horse. It’s not one of those nags you probably saw people trying to sell, either. It’s a real nice Morgan saddle horse. Three-year-old mare, very gentle. I took the approach of looking at the horses that were tied up along the fence. I looked for groups of two or more horses, all carrying the same brand.

  Then I picked out the good-looking ones from those, one at a time, and inquired after their owners. It took most of the day to get anyone to talk a serious deal, though. Most people aren’t in the position that they can spare a horse. This guy, who had four horses before the Crunch hit, and now has six, apparently could. When I first asked if he’d be interested in selling, he just said,

  ‘Ah, I don’t know, maaaaybe.’ But when I told him that I had stabilized gas to barter, his eyes lit up. I got the horse for forty-five gallons of gas.

  “The same guy also sold me a saddle, and a full set of tack, and grooming tools—you know, like a brush and a hoof pick and rasp—for another twelve gallons of gas. The saddle is quite nice, as well. It’s an old original Ray Holes mountain rig, but the leather is still strong and in good shape. The guy, his name is Thebault, lives just west of Troy. I talked with Roger Dunlap about him, and he confirmed that the guy is trustworthy and circumspect, so I described to him how to find our retreat. He’s going to ride over and swap the horse for the gas at the retreat in three days. I can hardly wait.”With a grin that betrayed considerable pride, Mike said, “That was my one and only purchase for the day. Okay, does anyone else have anything important to report that can’t wait until we get back to the hidey-hole? Okay, then.”

  After a pause, Mike continued. “Does anyone want to come back tomorrow?”

  “Yeah!” they all yelled in a chorus.

  “Yikes!” Mike roared. “You all sound like a bunch of cub scouts. I guess that makes me your den mother. When we get back home, we’ll draw lots to see which four of us will have to pull security back at the retreat, so the others can come tomorrow.” Putting on his oft-used John Wayne voice, he said, “Well, pilgrims, we’d better saddle up and head home before it gets dark.”

  The second day at the Barter Faire went much like the first. Constant watch was kept on the trucks. There were numerous requests of the members to consider trading their guns. A few of the militia members stayed for the barn dance. Della and Rose had so many men ask them to dance that they were exhausted by the time they bedded down near the trucks. The gathering, including the dance, was peaceful. Those who stayed for the dance got a ride home the next day when the third increment from the retreat arrived. In all, the Faire was a big success.

  On the third day of the event, Todd ran into Roger Dunlap. They greeted each other warmly. Sitting near Roger’s horse, the two discussed their hopes and fears about the future. They both commented that the Faire was encouraging evidence that civilization was returning to the region. Roger said that it was planned to be an annual event. Todd then said, “Hopefully, it won’t be an annual event for very long. I’m sure that some enterprising individual is going to get up the gumption and a good-sized security force to set up a permanent trading post around here sometime soon. People are just aching for some sort of commerce. The number of folks who showed up here the last few days, and the distance that some of them traveled, shows that plainly enough.”

  Dunlap said, “Yes, I suppose you’re right. Next there’ll be a cobbler, and a blacksmith, and a barber, and so on. It’s inevitable.”

  Todd chuckled and said, “There’s one specialty that’s bound to come soon after….”

  “What’s that?” Dunlap asked.

  “A tax collector.” Both men laughed.

  Two days after the Faire ended, Thebault and two of his sons arrived on horseback with Mike’s horse and tack in tow. They spent twenty minutes giving Mike and several other group members a lesson on hoof trimming.

  Thebault ended the lesson by saying, “If you have any problems with thrush, you can use Clorox, full strength. It doesn’t work as good as Copper-Tox, so you’ll have to use more of it, and dose it more often.” Mike invited them to stay for lunch. The lunch consisted of venison stew, fresh baked bread, and spinach greens.

  Several group members made it clear to Thebault that they too were interested in buying horses, and asked him to keep them in mind the next time he had a weaned foal available. Thebault seemed most interested in Dan Fong’s mention that he might be persuaded to trade one of the guns from his collection for a good horse. In particular, Thebault said that he was looking for “a good quality pistol for shooting varmints.”

  Dan then described his T-C Contender single-shot pistol chambered in .223 Remington. He said, “I have plenty of ammunition for it, it’s a very common caliber, and it would be a great gun for hunting varmints or animals up to the size of coyotes.”

  “No, no,” Thebault said with a laugh, “What I’m looking for is a gun for shooting the other variety of varmints, the two-legged kind.”

  Dan laughed and then began to describe his Browning Hi-Power pistol with the tangent rear sight and detachable stock. Thebault asked if he could see the gun after lunch. Dan got his horse in less than a week, a four-year-old
mare with saddle and tack. In exchange, Dan traded the pistol, its combination stock/holster, a cleaning kit, four spare magazines, a double magazine pouch, and seven boxes of 9 mm hollow-point ammunition.

  CHAPTER 17

  The Parting

  “…But that same day

  Must end that work that the ides of March begun;

  And whether we shall meet again I know not.

  Therefore our everlasting farewell take:

  For ever, and for ever, farewell, Cassius!

  If we do meet again, why, then we shall smile;

  If not, why then, this parting was well made.”

  —William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act V, Scene 1

  On a warm June morning three weeks after the Barter Faire, a man on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle mounted with racks for two five-gallon gas cans pulled up to the gate at the county road. He got off of his motorcycle and stood waiting patiently. After being alerted by Lon, who was standing LP/OP duty, Todd, Mike, and Lisa walked at twenty-foot intervals down to the front gate to see what was going on. The stranger had short-cropped hair and was wearing an old olive drab army field jacket. He was carrying two Smith and Wesson 9 mm automatics, one in a shoulder holster and the other in a hip holster. He also carried a folding-stock Valmet Model 76 rifle in a leather scabbard mounted on the right-hand side of the motorcycle’s frame.

  From a distance of thirty feet, the man half-shouted, “Hello! Are you Mister Gray?”

  “Yes, I am,” Todd replied. “And who are you, sir?”

  The stranger announced, “My name’s Manny Olivera. I’m from Caldwell. I was given this letter by a guy who rode in to Caldwell on horseback from Idaho Falls. He got it in turn from a guy who drove in from northern Utah. When the fellow from Idaho Falls found out that I was headed north to Coeur D’Alene to join up with my cousin and his family, he asked me to drop this letter off to you.” Gray approached the man warily as he held out the envelope.