Absolution River (11 page)

“Shit,” Ed said as he saw the spray of internal organs spray across the valley floor. The night vision scope didn’t miss much but he still couldn’t see the other figure. “That was fucking disgusting, not the weight loss program I would have suggested,” and he kind of laughed at that before realizing there was someone with skill out there in the darkness; a man knowledgeable of the skills necessary to bring pain. He knew of men like this in his old job working for the family, and they were serious. This guy was serious. He scanned the area quickly with the scope with no avail.

“You can live.”

Ed’s earpiece came alive with a man’s voice. “Oh yeah buddy, don’t need to tell me.”

“You can leave.”

“Ain’t leavin’ asshole, got a job to do you see. And it ain’t finished.”

“You continue down this road, and it will be.”

“You fuckin’ asshole.” Ed replied over the radio. He got up out of his position to a higher point to get a better view. Climbing the rocks of the cliff overlooking the river valley he could see the cabin and the road. As far as the scope would go, he could see. There was a ledge two hundred feet above his original position. It was sheer cliff above him and to each side. The only way to get to him was from below and he had clear view of it. “Try and get me now, asshole.” Ed said over the radio breathing heavily. There was no response.

Jack scanned the high points of the ridge, figuring that this guy had a vantage point. Through the trees he could see the shimmering of the glass of his scope in the moonlight several hundred feet above the valley floor. He moved quickly through the forest with shotgun in hand. Getting to the base of the cliff, he began to climb. The rock was cold to his grip and visibility was low, each hand and foothold seen only as he came upon them. Slowly making his way up the cliff face, the fatigue from the day was beginning to set in as his legs began to tremble under his own weight. A hundred feet up and he could feel the weight of the shotgun slung over his back, the cold of the steel penetrating his wet shirt. The wind was picking up and grinding through him like icicles, each gust wanting to thrust him into the darkness of the valley. Push him into the oblivion he was so familiar with. The image of Marie came into his mind as he hugged the cliff rock in an attempt to rest his weary muscles. Must keep going, she is alone and afraid, and he didn’t want to think of what they would do with her. Every hold was a struggle, but he found himself fifty feet above where he had seen the glassing of a scope. Shuffling over and above where the position was, he could see a man laying prone, looking through a scope down into the valley. Easing himself down as quietly as he could, he was now hanging ten feet above where the man was. His radio burst with a man’s voice, “Where you at boy!” Ed realized the sound of the other radio was right behind him and he turned with a look of shock. Wielding the assault rifle in Jack’s direction, he turned and began to fire. The loud cracks reverberated against the cliff and down into the valley. Jack lunged from his position and landed on the outcropping. Before the rifle had a chance to come into his direction he kicked it as it sprung from Ed’s hands down into the darkness. Jack straddled Ed, “I’m no boy,” and struck him on the jaw. The impact was devastating and his hand exploded with pain. Ed grabbed with his free hand a boot knife and pulled it. He began to thrash it in Jack’s face, cutting his arms and hands. The blood flowed, each clambering for the upper hand. Ed thrust his body up and Jack felt himself lift up and land on his back, his head leaning over the cliff’s edge. Ed lunged down with a double grip on the knife straight down to Jack’s chest. Holding back the force of the knife, Jack could feel his strength leaving his body and the knife inching closer. Sweat immediately formed on his brow and the knife cuts split even wider on his hands. The blood came down into his eyes, blinding him. “I’m gonna gut you, man!” said Ed with a fierce and violent look in his eyes. Using Ed’s body weight, Jack turned his wrists inward, turning the working end of the knife in Ed’s direction. Realizing this, Ed pushed harder and faster, using all of his strength to plunge the blade deep into the heart of Jack. With the last of his energy, Jack turned the blade and Ed lost his grip. All four inches of the blade penetrated his chest cavity, plunging it directly into his gut. Jack could feel Ed relax and fall over on his side. Ed rolled and began to go over the side. Without realizing where he was or where he was going Ed pulled the blade instinctively out of his stomach and blood spewed all over the cliff rocks. Jack grabbed Ed’s hand as he fell over the edge with all of his strength. “Don’t let go!” Jack cried as Ed hung there over the edge of the cliff, over the edge of the endless darkness. The wind was loud and hammering them both, making a whistling noise as it traversed the large rock outcroppings around them. Ed looked up at Jack with a blank stare, “What the fuck do you care, man?” Ed looked down and Jack struggled to hold his grip.

“It doesn’t have to end like this, man,” Jack said calmly.

“It always ends like this, brother,” and Ed let go of Jack’s hand. His body fell lifeless into the dark abyss. Jack hung there over the edge, looking down at the waste of life. He never used to understand the value of a life, even in those who tried to take his. But in these last weeks it was different. He rolled on to his back, being careful of the edge, and lay there for a moment, exhausted. Thinking of Marie, of Eli, and what he must now do in order to get her back and to honor his friend. Above all he was thinking of how the hell he was going to get down.

XX

Anders sat on his porch in front of his home on the reservation. Without work his mind was left to wonder. About his new baby girl, and how he was going to make enough money to feed them. There was something else that bothered him even more. The realization that the man he saw in prison was somebody that he recognized. Sitting on his lawn chair sipping a beer, he held the photograph of himself and a few of the guys he was with in Vietnam. His wife came out of the front door, “She is down for a nap finally,” she said with a smile. She sat down next to him and put her hand on his arm.

“You okay sweetie?”

He smiled at her for a moment, but with a look of concern and deep thought.

“What is it?”

“I have to find him.”

“Find who baby, the guy from the picture?”

“He saved my life I don’t know how many times. I think he needs my help. I can’t really explain it. It’s something I need to do.”

“How are you going to find him?”

“There was an article in the Silver Post that said a man stole a woman’s truck and drove north. I think that could be him.”

“How do you know? It could have been anybody.”

“Not sure, but I have to see. I’ll only be a couple of days, earlier if I don’t find anything. Just have to see, you know?”

She nodded with a slight smile and looked off across the plains into the mountains. “It’s so beautiful here,” she said.

“It sure is.” He finished his beer and went inside the house. Gave a kiss to his little girl and put his hand on her head. Lingering for a moment, admiring the beauty of his child, he left for the bedroom. He packed a few things and took a shoebox out of the top shelf in the closet. Inside was an old service revolver. He held it in his hands wondering what he would need it for, but erred on the side of caution and grabbed the box of shells next to it, throwing both in his old gym bag. Walking out of the house he went over to his wife and kissed her on the head, “I’ll be right back.” She smiled, “I’ll be right here waiting.”

The old beat up Ford fired right up and he sped off down the road towards the highway. He pulled into the diner where the truck was taken and asked around. Some of the locals looked at him disdainfully as it was an unwritten rule, no natives in white businesses. One of the patrons finally told him to head north, confirming the report from the post. The afternoon was moving quickly and he hoped he would see some sign of his old friend. He pulled a can of chewing tobacco out of his back pocket and put a sizeable chunk into his cheek. After an hour of scanning the sides of the road he found an old truck about a hundred meters into an old county road. He pulled in behind it cautiously and got out of the truck. Walking around the back and seeing that it was empty, he was a bit relieved. He was unsure of what to expect. He hadn’t spoken with him in years and wasn’t sure what all that time in prison had done to him. Taking a jug of water out of his truck he began to walk into the woods. It had been years since he had tracked anyone and he found a niche in the service when they found out his skills. Like riding a bike, he thought. Looking down on the ground he noticed bent foliage and dirt with tracks. “Jack.” He looked up and walked further into the woods.

XXI

“Sorry about your friend, little missy. Both of them I guess,” Arch said with a snicker. “We’re gonna be friends though, is that okay, us being friends?” He looked over his shoulder at Marie and smiled, a smile with more than delight behind it. The look only a madman could pull off. On either side of her were Arch’s thugs, each wielding automatic pistols.

“What do you mean both of them?” Marie said nervously.

“Oh, well yeah, your little friend back at the cabin, yeah, we didn’t need him sneaking around. So he won’t be.”

Tears rolled down Marie’s face. “You bastard!” she yelled as she got up from the seat and started to hit Arch on his chest, striking him like a child in a tantrum. He laughed and the two men secured her in the seat.

“Now now, no need to be nasty. Just business, you know?”

“Some business, I thought you were loggers, not murderers.”

“Hey, you know how it is. All those environmental groups out there, ain’t as easy as it used to be trying to get an honest days work out here. What was your friend’s name?”

“Why do you care?”

“Just curious, I get curious about things, you know. By the way, you’re going to tell me his name along with some other things I’m curious about. Kind of a game. You tell me, and if you don’t, I’m going to hurt you. Sound like a plan?”

There was a look of fear and desperation in her eyes.
How did I get myself into this?
A couple weeks ago she was in a big city with a great job, a nice corner office with a view. Now she was in the back seat with a madman who was going to torture her, and he murdered the only two people that could have helped. Oh, that poor old man, she thought, and Jack… Oh Jack, and she started to cry.

“Now now, no need for that. It’s gonna be alright. Just tell me what I want to know and it will all be over soon.”

“You’re just going to kill me.”

He laughed, “Don’t go putting ideas in my head, they have a way of becoming reality. We’re just going to talk, okay?”

The vehicles pulled into the logging complex and dawn was hours away.

“Take her into the work shed, I’ve got some phone calls to make.”

Arch walked into the office. There were three messages on his voicemail. He listened to them all, and all from the congressman. He sat down in his chair and swiveled around a few times, tapping his hands on the desk. Moments like these he cherished the most; solving problems, and enjoying the excitement of accomplishment. With that old man out of the picture he was finally able to renew his contract and make some real money. He opened the bottom left drawer and pulled out a fresh bottle of bourbon. He poured a glass and finished it. He poured another and finished that. He grabbed the phone and dialed for the congressman.

“What?” replied Coolidge in a raspy, sleepy voice. “You got any idea what time it is?”

“Oh, I’m sorry sir,” Arch said in a sarcastic tone. “I just wanted to return your message, or should I say messages.”

“Is it done? I got a meeting in the morning with a key member of the Montana Board of Commerce. Need to know it’s done.”

“Yes. There was a minor complication but it’s resolved.”

“What kind of complication? I don’t need to hear that shit right now.”

“A woman from the Department of Agriculture was at the cabin, she’s been around here the last couple weeks asking questions.”

“A fed!”

“Whoa, hey, it’s being taken care of, I assure you.”

“How in the hell are you going to make a fed just disappear?”

“We get a lot of missing persons around here, easy to get lost, you know.” Arch poured himself another drink. “Just need to know if she told anybody about what was going on around here.”

“You mean she’s still alive!”

“Hey relax, it’s all going to work out.”

“Just deal with it.”

“Oh and another thing there, Mr. Congressman.”

“What in God’s name else could be the problem? Don’t I pay you enough so I don’t have to hear about this shit?”

“There was another guy out there, don’t know who he was. Left my guys to take care of him.”

“So you know he’s out of the picture.”

“Well I left four guys armed to the teeth for one guy with moccasins, don’t think it takes much interpretation.”

“What did he look like?”

“Shit, I don’t know, it was dark.”

“Try.”

“Damn, alright, he had a beard, long hair, about six foot, couldn’t really see, why?”

“May be nothing, a guy I put away for reasons I won’t discuss got released a couple weeks ago. They last saw him up around where you were, supposedly stole a truck.”

“So what, it’s just some guy.”

“This ain’t just some guy, he’s got a beef with me and he was kind of a big deal in the war, medals and the like.”

“So you think that this random guy I saw in the woods with an old man is some war hero who you locked up for no reason. You’ve got to stop being so damn paranoid, and if I think you’re paranoid, then you’ve got a problem pal.”

“I want his name. Find out from the girl before you, you know.”

“Kill the bitch, you know, if you order it you gotta have the guts just to say it.” Arch slammed the phone. “Always something, I tell you,” Arch said to the empty room. Taking a swig from his glass he grabbed his silver .44 Magnum Revolver from the drawer and walked out of the office.

Arch’s men had Marie tied up in a small tool shed out across the motor pool near his other lucrative business. It was no bigger than the average size living room with all sorts of rusted logging tools hanging from the ceiling and along the walls. Inside was a single light bulb shining distorted light across the faces of the men inside. One of the men who held Marie was tall and lanky, wearing Timberland work boots and a shooting vest. The other was short, bald, and heading towards the kind of overweight common for middle-aged men. Arch walked in and scanned the room. “So, looks like we got a little party in here.” On the workbench was an assortment of tools not for logging but more out of the Spanish Inquisition. Under the workbench was a car battery with jagged copper wire connected to it. Over Marie’s eyes was a blindfold and in her mouth was a cotton cloth to gag her. Arch walked over and placed his pistol on the workbench. He moved toward Marie pulling the rag out of her mouth and lowered the blindfold.

“Like I said, we are just going to have a conversation,” as he said this he pulled a chair from the corner and sat on it with the back of the chair in front of him.

“Can I get you anything? Water perhaps?” Marie struggled in the chair and wiggled as hard as she could. Both her hands and feet were attached to the chair and she could barely move but a few inches in any direction.

“Nice tie job guys, way to go! You know Marie, that is the thing with loggers, safety first. Back to the conversation I was telling you about. Just two questions really, and if you answer them you get a gold star, and maybe your life. You ready?”

Marie just stared at him with anger and fear. At a loss for how she got herself into this situation.

“Question number one,” he did a drum roll on the back of the chair. “Who have you been in contact with about my operation, and go.”

“You’re just going to kill me.”

“Hey now, that’s not very nice. I said I’d let you live, didn’t I? This relationship isn’t going to work unless we have trust. I’ll ask again, in case you didn’t hear me. Who-have-you-told-about-my-operation? See, real easy one.”

“I’ve had constant phone calls and letters to my bosses about my findings. You’re done! They know everything!”

“Okay, now that would be a shame. Because if that were true, I would just kill you right now for the satisfaction of it. Care to venture another guess? No, okay, no problem.”

Arch nodded to the lanky man who grabbed the battery and placed it in front of her feet. He grabbed rubber gloves from a drawer on the workbench and put them on. The copper wire was alive from the juice of the battery and he rubbed them together, creating a spark. Arch looked at the fear in her eyes as she saw the electricity that would soon be coursing through her body.

“Last chance.” Marie sat defiant, a look of resolve in her face. “Don’t worry, they all have that look before we get started.”

The tall man moved over to her and placed an end of the copper wire to each leg. Marie tensed her entire body, feeling the shock move through her legs and up to the top of her head. The man pulled the wire away and she collapsed into the chair.

“That wasn’t so bad, now was it? Okay, do you have another more truthful response you would like to give?”

Marie forced her body into an upright position and stared directly into Arch’s eyes.

“Whoa, we got a live one here fellas! Again.” Arch said in a more serious tone.

The electricity flowed through her body once again for a much longer time. For Marie it felt like an eternity. Time slowed and she could only look inward to find some strength to continue. She felt herself losing the ability to withstand the pain. The desire to give in, “Wait! Please wait!”

“Oh goodie, yeah, that looked really painful,” said Arch as he laughed and slapped his hand on his knee. “Strike two you know, this battery isn’t going to last forever. Then we’ll have to move on to some more… primitive means. Who’d you tell? Come on, it’s easy.”

Marie shook her head, nearing the point of passing out. She never fully recovered from her ordeal in the wilderness and it had been non-stop since the night before. The exhaustion was overtaking her and she just wanted it to be over.

“You are shaking your head right now, does that mean you didn’t tell anyone?”

Marie nodded. “Ah good, that’s really good. You are doing such a good job! We are halfway there. Second question,” Arch said in a much more solemn tone, putting a fake serious look on his face trying to hide his sick pleasure. The night and day of his expressions was more terrifying to Marie than any torture device they planned on using on her. His mind seemed fractured and there was no telling what he would do next. The uncertainty was the real fear within Marie, not knowing the source or the extent of this man’s depravity.

“Who was the man you were with? Real easy, he’s dead anyway, so no harm no foul right?”

Marie just couldn’t give up Jack’s name. There was a connection between them. The time they had together was so short but it had been so long since she was able to connect with anyone, let alone a man. The thought of him lying out there in the cold woods alone, and the thought of his lifeless body lying sprawled out broke her right there. The sobs came flowing out of her in waves.

“Now now, it was a
really
easy question. A name.” Arch was beginning to lose patience. The day was going long and the bourbon was going to his head. Between last night’s alcohol fueled drug binge, offing a couple locals, and now torturing this woman, he was beginning to feel the exhaustion.

“Soon my patience will be gone and I’m going to ask you one final time. What was the name of the man-you-were-with?” A moment passed and Arch nodded to the middle-aged thug. On the workbench was an assortment of tools all very capable of inflicting bodily harm. The short man picked up a pair of surgical scissors and handed them to Arch.

“Do you know what these are?”

Marie shook her head.

“These are used to cut tendon and viscera, very sharp. But you know what it’s not designed for? Little fingers. Do you want to make a bet? I bet that these scissors could take your pinky finger right off, in one chop. Okay? Let’s try, here with go.” Arch had an expression like a doctor about to tend to a patient afraid of needles. Caring and kind in the eyes, but his intention was not bedside manor, only the opposite. As the cold of the surgical instrument touched her skin and the pressure from the blades sank deeper into the skin she yelled, “Wait!” Arch pulled back and cupped his hand around his ear in order to demonstrate his willingness to hear the answer he wanted.

“Jack.”

“Just Jack? Was he a stage performer? He needed only the one name?”

“Jackson McAulle you son of a bitch!”

“McAulle huh, could have sworn I heard that before. Well, not to worry, we are done here. I’m going to go lay down, all of this torturing has taken it right out of me,” as he outstretched his arms and faked a big obnoxious yawn.

“You just sit right there and don’t move, we’ll uh, let you go in a little while,” and he began to laugh as he said this. His men also began to laugh as they walked out of the shed. On their way out they turned off the light and darkness filled room. Marie sat there with sorrowful sobs, as she didn’t have the energy to fully express her sadness. “Jack,” she cried under her breath, “where are you?”

…

“It’s me.”

“Tell me you got it all.”

“She didn’t tell anyone.”

“And the name?”

“Jackson McAulle.”

“Shit!”

“He’s taken care of.”

“Did you see it happen?”

“No.”

“Then it didn’t.”