Mulheisen said he understood. He knew that she'd had some kind of affair with Jacky Lee, the Butte deputy sheriff, though evidently that was long ended. It had contributed some uneasiness between him and Jacky, which he hadn't picked up on at first, but now it seemed resolved. He liked Jacky. He was a good cop and a smart detective. Mulheisen admired his reconstruction of the situation at Humann's, plausibly demonstrating how the Mafia killer Mario Soper must have been shot and killed at the hot springs.
When he asked her if they'd gotten a tree, she told him all about it, about the tramping through the high country above the house, chopping down a small fir, setting it up—"It takes up half the living room!"—and decorating it. Mulheisen wished privately that he could have gotten the kids, and her, some presents, but it seemed rather early days for that kind of intimacy. He told her about his mother being away and she said that it was awful to spend Christmas alone.
“Well, you're alone,” he pointed out, “except for the kids, I mean.”
There was a brief silence and then she said, “Well, not really. Their old man is back.”
Mulheisen felt cold. “Oh?” was all he could say. Then, “Is he there . . . now?”
“He's passed out,” she said. Her voice took on an unbecoming tone of almost whispered pleading. “What could I do, Mul? He's their father. He showed up about six, not in too bad a shape, with a bunch of presents. The kids were thrilled. Nothing was wrapped, of course, so they've already been playing with the dolls and the video games. So much for Christmas surprise. He also brought a bottle of Jim Beam.”
She didn't sound very happy now, clearly angry, but also depressed. Mulheisen's heart sank. “Jesus,” he said, and, “Damn. I'm sorry, hon . . . I . . . ,” but he didn't know what to say. He was surprised that he'd said “hon.”
“It's all right,” she said, her voice brightening. She had obviously caught the endearment, too. “It's fine, I—”
A distant man's voice said, gruffly, “Who's that? Who you talkin’ to?”
“Nobody,” she said. Then, to Mulheisen, she whispered, “I'll talk to you later. Bye.” And she hung up.
Mulheisen sat stupidly, holding the dead phone. He was swept by jumbled emotions, anger and fear and a kind of grief. He was alarmed enough to think for a moment that he had to leave, he had to get back out there and help her. He had visions of a drunken lout, probably naked, swaying angrily over Sally. She had told him little or nothing about her ex-husband except to say that she had one, but her manner and expressions when referring to him had led him to believe that it was not a pleasant subject. He had a feeling that it had been a sordid relationship. He imagined drunkenness and abuse. Still, what could he do? She was seventeen hundred miles away. Then he considered that she was a strong, competent woman. She may have been abused, once, but she had gotten rid of the man. Perhaps she was now strong enough to keep him at bay. If that was what she wanted. Maybe she wanted him back. He didn't know. Had they been to bed—not when he'd called, obviously, but earlier? He guessed not, if the kids had sat up late playing and then the man had passed out.
In desperation, he called the Butte-Silver Bow sheriffs department. Jacky Lee was off duty and the dispatcher wouldn't give Mulheisen his home phone number, but she said she'd pass along his message. He paced about, unable to eat his warmed-up meat loaf, sipping a snifter of brandy, until Jacky called, collect.
“What's up?” Jacky said.
Mulheisen explained. He tried to phrase it as delicately as possible, but Jacky brushed that aside. He understood the situation. He himself had met Sally by responding to her calls for help when her husband had beaten her—not once, but at least three times. Later, they had gotten intimately involved (now it was Jacky's turn to be diffident). He was very concerned.
“This guy is bad news, Mul,” Jacky said. “He's spent some time in Deer Lodge for assault and we've had our eye on him in the past for some robbery investigations. He was out of state, I heard. We don't have anything current on him, but there's a standing order out that he's not supposed to go near Sally. But you know how these things are. We can't just rush out there, even with the standing order, if she doesn't complain.”
“Well hell, Jacky, if there's a standing order . . . “
Jacky was sympathetic, and shortly he came up with an idea. He would get Carrie Conlin, a sheriff's deputy who lived in Tinstar, to call Sally. Carrie and Sally weren't good friends, he said, but they got along and Carrie was a woman, which might help in a situation like this. If Carrie felt that Sally was in trouble, or needed help, she could respond to the scene. This sounded like a plan and Mulheisen asked that Carrie, or Jacky, let him know what developed. He would be home, waiting.
“Could be a long wait,” Jacky said. “It's snowing and blowing. Carrie might be out in it, probably is.”
“Again?” Mulheisen said. “You just had a blizzard, a week ago.”
“This is Montana,” Jacky said, “high country. We like the snow. We need the snow pack to get through the summer. We've been having some dry winters, Mul.”
“Well, I'm not going anywhere. It's snowing here, too. Have Carrie call me. Or if you can't get hold of her, call me.”
It was very snug up at Grace Garland's ranch, the XOX. Grace was reading a Christmas story aloud to her convalescing visitor. It was a Charles Dickens story, but not the familiar one about Scrooge and Tiny Tim. This one was about a cricket on the hearth. Heather was enchanted. It had been a very long time since anyone had read to her. She felt like a child, a Christmas child, coddled and comforted and loved. The snow swirled about the farmhouse but the iron woodstove hummed, filling the house with a delicious heat. She lay on the big sofa, wrapped in a down comforter, wearing one of Grace's flannel nightgowns and listening to that homey voice read about the kettle on the hob and people with names like Peerybingle. By her side was a stand with a tray bearing tea and the remains of toasted home-baked bread and home-canned serviceberry jam. She couldn't remember when she had felt like this and perhaps she never had, but had only heard about such things. But she wasn't going to think about that now.
Heather was feeling much better. Her bullet wound was healing—the bullet had struck her just to the right of her right breast, cracking a rib and deflecting through the muscle tissue of her inner right arm—and she had recovered from the shock. Lying on the sofa listening to sweet Grace, listening to the lovely twistings and turnings of Dickens's nineteenth-century prose, she was able to detach at least a part of her mind to other things. In the sentimental nature of the holiday and the story and the prose, this detachment took the form of misty regret. Two things she regretted: never actually having had the delicious Cate Yoder, whose luscious golden body had tormented her for weeks, and not having succeeded in killing Joe Service. These thoughts entertained her while Grace's reedy voice rode over the humming of the stove.
Some deals just never work out, Heather thought. The contract on Joe Service had looked like a cinch job—a man lying helpless in a hospital—until she'd fallen for Cateyo. That had distracted her, caused her to prolong the business. But she'd bungled it. She'd never failed before, but then it wasn't over yet, was it? She was alive. She was feeling much, much stronger. It could still be done. All she'd have to do is contact DiEbola and get on with it. DiEbola might be a problem, though.
She must have frowned because Grace looked up from her book and said, “What is it, dear? Are you all right? Do you need some more tea?” Despite Heather's protests, the old woman got up and carried the teapot into the kitchen. The old blue enamel kettle sat on the woodstove, not quite boiling, but very close. Grace said it was good for adding moisture to the air in the winter, but she also used it to replenish the teapot. It was very like the Dickens story, and Heather appreciated it.
While Grace was making more tea, Heather considered her options. She pushed aside the problem of Grace—that would take care of itself, in time; but she decided quickly that what she would do, what she would definitely do, was tra
ck down Joe Service and tear his fucking head off. They had heard on the TV that Joseph Humann and his nurse had apparently eloped. That was how it was described. Grace had been surprised but pleased: “Isn't that nice. I knew that Helen woman wasn't for him.” The nurse had returned to Butte and had talked to the police, to allay any fears. She said she planned to rejoin Mr. Humann very soon but hadn't revealed where. Heather was indifferent to this news. She'd once thought she was in love with Cateyo, but now that she realized she'd never get close to that sweet body, she just shrugged it off.
Thinking about Humphrey DiEbola, Heather felt that the man owed her money; she determined to contact him, no matter how dangerous it might be. A swine like Humphrey could be deadly, but she had a contract, and a contract was a contract. She'd just have to be careful.
The wind howled, the stove huffed. Heather put all those troublesome thoughts out of her mind and snuggled into the warm comforter. When the tea was ready and they had both sipped at it, with honey to make it sweet, Grace picked up the book and read: “The Dutch clock in the corner struck Ten . . . “
Grace read well. She practically knew the story by heart. The book had belonged to her mother, who had often read it to her and her brothers and sisters on winter nights like this in these very same mountains. But that was a time of isolation, of horses and heavy sleighs, few or no telephones, an uncertain old Philco radio that crackled with ethereal static, and certainly no television. It was, Grace felt, a better time. But a night like this, with the blizzard blowing up again, why it was almost the same as the winters of her youth—at once bitter, isolated, uncomfortable, and arduous, but also homey and snug. It wasn't so easy to win your bread, but the bread was a lot better.
9
Innocent Diversions
Colonel Vernon Tucker, USAF (retired), ushered Joe Service into the kitchen of the house next door to the house on Main Street that Helen Sedlacek had leased. He introduced his wife, Edna, a not very talkative woman much younger than he, a slim brunette who provided them with coffee and then withdrew from the kitchen. Joe had a feeling that she hadn't gone very far. He had other strange feelings about this couple, but he didn't dwell on them for the moment. He and Colonel Tucker sat at the kitchen table, on which the colonel had laid the .45, with the barrel pointing at Joe. They sat by a window through whose gauzy curtains one could see the house next door.
The colonel didn't seem to be in a hurry and Joe didn't mind. He knew he would find out what the deal was whenever the colonel got ready. In the meantime, the colonel hadn't called the cops, which was encouraging.
“So what's your name, pardner?” the colonel said, sipping his coffee.
“You can call me Joe.”
“No last name, Joe?”
“Last names get confusing. People are always changing them, the ladies especially. I bet Edna used to have a different name before she married you . . . although I did once know a lady who married a man with the same name. Are you really Colonel Vernon Tucker, USAF?”
“Used to be, Joe. Put twenty-two years into that, before they told me to go home.”
Joe could feel a story coming up. He sensed it was his duty to help it come out. “They sent you home?” he said. “Vietnam?”
“Oh yeah,” the colonel said, an edge of bitterness in his voice.
“But no pension,” Joe surmised, “or not enough of a pension.”
“Well Joe, you fly over a hundred missions to Route Pack Six and you're bound to get in a situation which—if you survive—ought to be worth a full disability.” The colonel looked grim. He sipped his coffee.
Joe glanced around the kitchen. He'd already taken in the sparse decor, but he just wanted to solidify his impressions. Simple and clean. One electric range, one refrigerator, one new-looking coffee maker, stock veneer cabinets over the sink and the working area. But no chopping board to protect the Formica work surface, no spices, no cute little stirring spoon rest, no matching dish towels. A small plastic container of liquid dish detergent sitting on the drainboard, another cup (belonging to the missus, no doubt) drying on a paper towel on the drainboard. What else? No notes under cute magnets on the refrigerator; no magnets.
“Route Pack Six,” Joe said, refocusing on the story.
“Hanoi,” the colonel said. “Lot of people don't realize what the air war was really like in Vietnam. They saw stock footage of B-52s unloading tons of bombs at high altitudes, out of the range of the poor, helpless peasants below. That's what they saw on the news, but it wasn't that way, Joe.”
Joe liked the sound of this story. He nodded encouragingly.
“Every day we took off from Korat—that's in Thailand. Flights of F-105s—'Thuds'—and F-4 Phantoms. On Route Pack Six, you go up north of Hanoi and turn south down Thud Ridge, which is a mountain ridge leading into the city. It's the only way to get into the city without getting shot down by the SAMs and the Fan-songs—those are radar-controlled anti-aircraft guns, Joe—and the Firecans—heavier anti-aircraft shells that detonate at preset altitudes . . . they knew our altitudes, Joe. You see, the ridge gives you at least a partial shield. So you run the same pattern, day after day. They're all set up and dug in and waiting for you. For them it was like pass shooting at ducks on a flyway: the ducks fly down the creek to the pond and the gunners are in the blinds, waiting. It was the most heavily defended aerial target in history, Joe. In the city they even had militia—just boys and girls, really—lying on their backs in the parks and on the tops of buildings, firing rifles into the air. You think a thirty-caliber bullet can't bring down a Thud? All it takes is hit a hydraulic line, a fuel line . . . one minute you're flying the most sophisticated piece of machinery in the world, the next you're riding a brick, a piece of junk.”
“You did this a hundred times,” Joe asked, trying to help, “this Route Pack Six?”
“We called it ‘goin’ downtown.’” The colonel emphasized the first syllable: downtown. “You're rolling in about four thousand feet, see, maybe seven hundred knots, and you have to jump up to twelve thousand before you make your dive on the railroad tracks or the steel mill. The Wild Weasels lead you in.”
“Wild Weasels?” Joe said.
“Thuds. Two-seaters loaded with electronic gear. They run in to get the Fan-songs and the SAMs to key on them. They have Shrikes—anti-missile missiles. When the enemy radar locks onto them they launch the Shrike, which hopefully takes out the SAM, or better yet, if the SAM wasn't launched yet, it takes out the launch site. Also, the Weasels divert the MiGs on the breakaway, when you haul ass down the Red River. The MiGs were very good, Joe. They shot down more of us than we did of them . . . Colonel Kong took out thirty of our guys.”
He went on in this vein for several minutes and Joe let him. Joe was interested, but he was alert to the rest of the house, as well. He could sense that the woman was nearby, but he also picked up some other sounds. There was at least one other person in the house, perhaps two more . . . upstairs, he thought.
“You were a Wild Weasel,” Joe said.
“Yeah,” the colonel said, offhandedly.
“So . . . you went downtown once too often.” When the colonel just stared at him, Joe said, “And you got picked up but not by a rescue chopper. You spent some time in the Hanoi Hilton.”
“There's guys still there, Joe.”
“That's what we hear, but it's been a long time, Colonel. Why would the Vietnamese want to hang on to these guys? They want to trade with us. It has no advantage for them now.”
The colonel shrugged. He got up to fetch the coffee pot, taking the .45 with him. He brought the pot back to fill his and Joe's cups. The coffee was not bad, Joe thought, probably Colombian.
“They're zips,” the colonel said as he poured, evidently referring to the Vietnamese. Joe had heard the phrase. “They're not white people. They hate us. They want what we have, what we built.”
“Mud people,” Joe prompted.
The colonel smiled, gratified, and put the coffee pot back unde
r the hood of the maker. “You got it, Joe. Mud people. Not hardly the same species.”
“Mud people didn't treat you too well, I guess,” Joe said.
The colonel lifted his brows and rolled his eyes in amazement that anyone would ask such an obvious question.
“But now the air force says that you aren't disabled,” Joe said. “Are you disabled?”
The colonel said, “I'm not going to strip to show you, Joe,
but if I did. . . . And then, there's the mind-fuck.” He looked mean now, bitter.
Joe nodded, understandingly. “And your wife,” he asked, “how does Edna feel about the mud people?”
“Edna's a good woman. She stood by me. She believes what I believe.”
Joe figured the colonel for about fifty. The woman was more Joe's age. She hadn't been married to anyone in 1968, when the bombing was on, or for that matter, 1974, when the war ended. She'd have been about ten at the most. He saw that a question was being solicited here. He obliged: “So what are you doing about your gripe, Colonel?”
The colonel almost imperceptibly relaxed. “We have a little group. Guys like me who have been shafted by the government, sympathizers. We've been, ah, studying the situation.”
“The mud people situation,” Joe said. When the colonel nodded slightly, Joe speculated on this scenario. Was this really the situation? Was this guy really an invalided fighter-bomber jock, enraged at his mistreatment by the Vietnamese, and then the Veterans Administration, the government, the air force? Was he really involved in some racist organization, probably underground? Joe knew that there were groups like this, drawn to the relative isolation of the Mountain West, particularly. Aryan Nation people, skinheads, survivalists, the so-called militia movement. They made a lot of noise and alarmed plenty of people, including the government. There had been the shootout at Weaver's cabin in Idaho, the siege of the Branch Davidians in Waco, the incidents at gatherings of Aryan Nation encampments in the mountains, reports of the Church Universal and Triumphant in Montana stockpiling tons of automatic weapons. In Montana's Bitterroot Valley a group of militia types had freaked out when a National Guard helicopter accidentally wandered by one of their strongholds. And, of course, the Oklahoma City bombing had given them even more publicity. He thought the colonel's story sounded plausible.
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