Ice Hunter (20 page)

“I'm
so
stupid,” he said.

He went into the house and picked up the telephone.

“Mister Voydanov, this is Grady Service. Fine, thanks. I need for you to concentrate. Exactly how long was that chopper in view?”

Lehto walked inside and ran her fingernails along Service's stomach.

“You told me an hour, are you sure?”

He hung up and looked at Kira. “He said the chopper hovered for forty-five minutes to an hour, not an hour or two, which is what he told me when I first talked to him. The radar paint was around forty-five minutes, so now we have two observations that corroborate. A stripped-down Huey can run about two and a half hours, a heavily loaded one a lot less. So we subtract one hour from the two and a half—to give ourselves a margin. That leaves ninety minutes, meaning he could fly forty-five minutes each direction. But this guy is not going to pop up where he can get max speed, so he's on the deck and probably doing 100, not 120 or 130. This means our chopper could cover about seventy miles on the outbound leg. There's no way he came from the east because of the flatness, so he came from an arc within seventy miles to the west. He
has
to be in the west, Kira. That's where the hills are!”

Service hugged her and swung her around and she laughed.

But as soon as he put her down, he was on the telephone again.

Joe Flap sounded half asleep.

“Pranger, this is Service.”

“I ain't seen that beer yet. You're not a welsher, are ya? Your old man never welshed on anything.”

“You want to shoot for a case?”

“Hell yes.”

“How many choppers are based in the U.P., say, west of Escanaba within a hundred miles?”

“Hell, I don't know. Not many, I'd hafta guess.”

“Who uses them?”

“Rich pricks. Seems like they always got the best toys. Loggers. Miners. Construction companies. The USFS. State police. Aerial survey people. Maybe some flight instructors. Hell, I don't know. I heard a guy from Hurley used one to haul hookers up from Milwaukee to service the red jackets in November.”

Hurley was a town in Wisconsin once famous for prostitutes, drugs, and booze during the November deer hunting season in Michigan. In Wisconsin you could drink at eighteen, but not till twenty-one in Michigan, so they got thousands of crossovers.

“Can you find out?”

“Will sure give 'er a try. When do I get that case?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Pranger is on it.”

Service then called Nantz and gave her Flap's address. He asked her to take the man a case of beer in the morning.

“This will cost you,” she said.

“I'll pay you back when I see you,” he said.

“Is this guy hot?”

What the hell was she talking about? “He's sixty-seven.”

“You didn't answer my question,” she said before hanging up.

Service and Lehto went back to the porch with fresh beers and halfway through hers, Kira set her bottle on the deck floor and stood up.

“What?” Service asked.

“I'm going to unplug that Goddamn phone,” she said, walking into the house, shedding her clothes.

Service left his beer unfinished.

It was early morning and still dark. Newf sat at Service's feet, patiently waiting to be let out while he talked on the telephone.

“Seton Knipe now lives near Crystal Falls,” Gustus Turnage said. “He moved down there sometime in the early eighties. He owns a company called Wildcat, Inc. Land speculation is what I hear. Knipe is in his eighties and semi-retired. His son Ike runs the show, day to day. The son would be about sixty, I think.”

“What kind of land speculation?”

“Nothing big. Forty acres here, forty acres there. Bits and pieces. Parcels, mostly. I guess it pays, but I don't see how. Call Simon del Olmo in Crystal Falls. He's a real bird dog.”

CO del Olmo had been with the DNR about four years. He had been born near Traverse City to Mexican parents, migrant workers who spent summers in Michigan and winters in Texas. Simon had a degree from the University of Michigan and had been in combat with the air cavalry during the Gulf War in Iraq.

“Thanks, Gus.”

Knipe, mining, Crystal Falls. Scaffidi's contract with a mining company in Crystal Falls. He hoped del Olmo could tell him.

He let Newf out. She quickly took care of business, tried to cover the spot with weeds, and raced back to the porch. She followed him inside and curled up on the floor beside the bed. She was okay for a dog, he decided.

“You knew that dog wasn't going anywhere,” he said to Kira. “Don't pretend you're asleep.”

She giggled and pulled him toward her. Kira was still always in a hurry. Living together hadn't changed that.

After making love, Service made breakfast while Kira took a shower. He was buttering Dutch whole-wheat toast when he realized there was someone at the screen door in front. He went instinctively toward the door before it dawned on him that he was nude. Suddenly he felt himself blushing. He grabbed for something, anything, to cover himself, but all he could find was a sock. Then he heard the woman at the front door laughing, and he began to laugh and just dropped the sock. He walked back to the bed and grabbed his trousers, which were draped over a chair. He tugged them on as he went to the door.

“That sock just didn't cut it,” the woman said with a smile. “I'm Cece Dirkmaat,” she added. “I'm sorry to startle you. I thought you'd hear my car door close.”

Service looked at Newf. “Great watchdog,” he complained to the animal.

“Come in,” he told the woman. “Coffee?”

“You bet. Black.”

The woman sat at the small kitchen table. She had short silver hair and several silver earrings in each ear.

“Where's Kira?”

“Bathroom,” Service said. At that instant Kira padded naked out of the bath area, wrapping a towel around her head.

Cece said, “You two aren't big on clothes.”

Kira squealed and retreated.

Cece laughed. “Maybe I ought to strip. That way we can all say we
really
know each other.”

Service said, “Let's leave it at this.”

Kira came back in a bathrobe. She was blushing. “What are you doing here, Cece?”

“I know it's early and I'm sorry to intrude, but at least I waited until sunrise. I wanted to come over in the middle of the night, but Glynnis wouldn't let me.”

Kira glanced at Service, who gave her a look of bewilderment.

Dirkmaat dumped pebbles on the table. Service saw that they had been polished. All but one of the stones were reddish purple. The one was sort of opaque with a yellowish tint and a greasy appearance. Cece picked up the odd stone.

“Do you know what this is?”

“Glass,” Service said. “The moving water rounds it off.”

Cece Dirkmaat smiled and held the stone out to Service.

“Not glass, but a glass cutter.”

Kira grinned. “What?”

“It's a diamond,” the art professor said. “An honest-to-God diamond.”

Lehto and Service stared, their mouths agape.

“Where in the world did you find these?” their visitor asked.

“Newf found them,” Service said.

“Come again?”

Service nodded at the dog. “Newf,” he said. She dutifully wagged her tail.

14

Service waited for Simon del Olmo at Alpo's, a run-down coffee shop in the village of Sagola, ten miles west of Crystal Falls. Sagola dated to the nineteenth century, when some Chicago investors formed a lumber company to capture the local white pine. All the yellow
deer crossing
signs on the road into town were shredded by bullet holes from high-caliber slugs, a definite indication that you were in the U.P.

The younger officer arrived in khaki shorts, sandals, and a green body shirt that said
castro sucks
. Del Olmo was tall and thin with jet-black hair and a neatly trimmed black mustache. He grinned and nodded when he saw Service, who was also out of uniform.

“Thanks for coming,” Service said.

“A chance to work with the great Grady Service.”

Service cringed. They ordered coffee and cinnamon rolls. In the U.P. there was intense competition among towns to see who could make the best rolls, with size more than flavor the deciding factor. These rolls were not as large as the one-pounders in the central part of the peninsula.

“Do you know Seton and Ike Knipe?”

“I don't think anybody really knows them,” del Olmo said. “They've been here since before my time, but they don't mix much with the people from town. Sort of do their own thing. Rich people are like that.”

“What about their company?”

“I know they have one. Wildcat, Inc. They have an office downtown.”

“Can you show me?”

“Sure. You want to tell me what this is about?”

“I would if I knew. It may be nothing, but you know how it goes. You have to move like a snail. Can you find out what land they own around here?”

“Shouldn't be a problem,
jeffe
. Them or their company?”

“Cut the
jeffe
crap. Both them and the company. If they have land near anything else, I want to know that too.”

“Like houses?”

“Not necessarily. Businesses, factories, other property investments, big lodges, summer camps, resorts, unusual stuff. Also, I want you to look at Wixon Inc. They have a contract with a mining company. Is it Wildcat?”

When they drove into Crystal Falls in del Olmo's vintage Volkswagen bus, Service saw that the offices of Wildcat, Inc., were directly behind an office front with a small sign in the window that said
laboratory
.

“What's that?” Service asked as they eased by slowly.

“You don't know?” Del Olmo seemed surprised. “There were supposed to be diamonds around here, I shit you not. Hell, maybe there are. Dow Chemical got involved back in the eighties, then sold majority rights to some sort of subsidiary of an Australian mining outfit, called Crystal Exploration, I think. This was in the early nineties. Crystal has a Colorado-based subsidiary and they have some people here now, but the word is out that they're closing shop. The lab, I think, was set up by another company to serve all the needs of the diamond searchers.”

“Diamonds, huh?” Service's heart was racing. “Many people?”

“Actually there were several outfits in the diamond race and God knows how many wildcatters.” Wildcatters. Interesting word choice, thought Grady. Did Wildcat, Inc., connect to this in some way?

Del Olmo continued, “From what I read and hear, Dow and Crystal found formations associated with diamonds, and more than half of them held microdiamonds. But it's my understanding that microdiamonds aren't where the big bucks are. The companies were after gem-quality stones. Still, finding micros in more than half the formations was apparently an unexpectedly high percentage, and this got the diamond folks excited. They drilled samples to decide if they had something with real economic potential. I've heard rumors that based on the early results, the local formation had the potential to be the biggest diamond field in the world, but that might have been beer talk. Can you believe that? Biggest in the
world?
The chamber of commerce had an official stiffy over the whole deal. I've also heard that there's a lot more formations around, but most of them tend to be down toward Iron Mountain from here. All moot now. These companies are all pulling out, so I guess the whole thing was wishful thinking. The thing is, they were really tight mouthed about what they were doing around here. The stakes must be huge in that business.”

When they got back to Sagola, del Olmo said, “You think the Knipes are connected to this diamond business?”

Service looked at the younger man. He was smart. “What makes you ask that?”

“I believe in hunches, and my hunches are almost always good.”

Service understood. “Maybe, but you have to be quiet about this. With our people, with anybody.”

“No problem, but I gotta say it's not against the law to go for diamonds.”

“That depends on how you go after them,” Service said. “And where.”

“How it is,” del Olmo said with a sly grin. “Be cool,
compadre
. You call, Simon hauls.”

Service drove north toward Houghton. He had an appointment in the morning with petrologist Dr. Kermit Lemich. When he called Michigan Tech and got the name, it seemed vaguely familiar to him, but he couldn't peg it. Definitely not a violator. He remembered the names of violets forever. He had invited Kira to come to Houghton with him, but she had too much work and begged off, telling him she would miss him “terribly.” He was on his own. Gus Turnage was going to meet him tonight for dinner.

He was still chewing over the diamond discovery. When he'd told Cece Dirkmaat that the dog had found the stones—which was the truth—she had laughed this off as a nonanswer. She could think what she wanted for now. Kira too.

The diamond was high quality, Cece had insisted.
Very
high. She was almost passionate about it. She said a professional gemologist should do an official analysis with X rays, but she felt she was pretty much on target with her assessment. Under X rays diamonds showed a distinctive blue color. She said the garnets appeared to be first rate as well.

Diamonds and garnets in the Tract? It was still pretty hard to believe. But his life had been filled with strange events. Service found his mind drifting backward to another time on the other side of the planet.

Major Teddy Gates had awakened them in their bunker one night near midnight, told them to gather their gear, walked them down to the helipad at Camp MagNo, put them in a chopper, and said, “Don't get your asses killed.”

The chopper had taken them to Da Nang, where they were met by a full colonel who escorted them to an unmarked C-119, a model that the flyboys called a crowd killer because of its history of crashes. They flew to an air base in northeast Thailand called Naked Fanny. There they were fed in an air-conditioned club and given air-conditioned rooms to sleep in. “Fattening us up for the kill?” Treebone wondered out loud while they ate.

The next morning they were taken to a briefing room and surrounded by men in civilian clothes. The only other person in uniform was a two-star navy admiral.

“For a number of years,” the admiral began, “we have been airdropping ARVN commandos into North Vietnam. They were carefully selected men, well trained and well equipped. Of nearly one thousand men we have inserted, we have yet to get a single radio response after the drops. We are certain that someone in the South Vietnamese government is an agent for the north and tipping off Hanoi. We can't let this keep happening. We are sending you two in to observe and document the next drop.”

Treebone said, “I don't think I like this, sir.”

The admiral said, “You two have been handpicked. Your participation is voluntary. And if you say no, it will not be reflected in your records.”

“If a thousand men have been lost, what makes you think we'll be able to make it?” Service asked.

“Because nobody in the South Vietnamese government knows about you or what you will be doing. Your job will be to shadow the ARVN commando drop and report back. I won't blow smoke up your asses, men. This is going to be dicey even if all goes the way we think it will.”

After nearly a whole day of briefings and discussion, Service and Treebone agreed to go.

Three days later they were parachuted into eastern Laos, from where they infiltrated the North Vietnamese border, descending through a brutal range of mountains.

Along the way they saw a herd of a dozen animals that looked a bit like antelope, but were unlike anything they had ever seen before. They took photographs.

Days later they witnessed the ARVN airdrop and watched in horror as the parachutists were shot while they descended in their 'chutes. The North Vietnamese had rolled into position only an hour before the drop and were waiting. They used a small camera to record the entire disaster, then retreated to Laos for their pickup, which went uneventfully.

Based on their evidence the infiltration program was terminated and a hunt begun for the traitor in the government who was tipping the North Vietnamese, where no questions were asked.

They never heard another word about any of this and were returned to their unit.

But the strange animals had piqued their curiosity. They showed the photographs around, but nobody could identify them. They eventually gave the photos to a UPI reporter, who sent them to university contacts, who in turn declared that the animals were a previously unknown species. The lesson stuck in Service's mind. There were a lot of things in the world yet to be discovered.

When it came to natural phenomena, you just never knew. So far in this diamond deal, there were a lot of peculiar circumstances, but no conclusive evidence. Which was not unusual in a complex case, he reminded himself. Case? There was no case yet. The cops would handle the murder of Jerry Allerdyce. All he had was a bunch of stuff.

And alarms in his gut.

Service stopped at a small general store in Amasa, which sat west of the Hemlock River where iron ore had been found before the turn of the twentieth century. Amasa somehow remained one of the few villages in the U.P. not yet invaded by downstaters and outstaters. A developer had once tried to attract rich Japanese to the shore of Lake Superior between Marquette and Munising, but the locals had not been receptive and the whole thing had died. He had read about moneyed Californians invading Montana and Idaho, buying huge chunks of land, bulling their way into local and state politics, trying to reshape or abolish local customs and ways of life. In Michigan the relocation influx was primarily from suburban Detroit, but the disruption was not appreciably different than what Montana was experiencing.

Amasa had fended off such an invasion in part because the old town was surrounded by the Copper Country State Forest, a tough, dirt-poor, isolated region.

Sometimes Service wished he had the power to declare the entire U.P. a wilderness and limit human occupation to a few large towns, the way things were already done at Cape Hatteras. Outside the towns there would be no development, and all the villages and places there now would be let go to be reclaimed by nature. There was too damn little wilderness left in America and when it was all gone, America would no longer be America. Something had to be done. He felt it almost as a rising panic.

Governor Sam Bozian sure as hell wouldn't do the right thing. Bozian believed that previous incompetent state governments had prevented the sort of investment in Michigan that would put it in the top tier of the lower forty-eight economically. He repeatedly reminded the public of the Arab oil boycott of decades ago and how that had crippled the state, which had only one major industry: cars. If Clearcut had his way, the whole state would be reduced to concrete and factories.

There was a huge blaze orange billboard across the street from the store.
let them go. let them grow
. The DNR knew that habitat supported only so many animals and unless the herd was reduced, the animals would be stunted. The DNR wanted hunters to shoot does and small bucks in most U.P. areas, but some self-styled experts from know-it-all sportsmen's groups that vehemently disagreed had run their own campaign against DNR policy. Real men shot only big bucks, and you couldn't have big males if you shot all the small ones. It was all baloney, bereft of science, one of those situations where science seemed to be counterintuitive. The no-kill bucks crowd reasoned that the more small bucks you had, the more big ones you would eventually get. This wasn't true, but the sportsmen refused to believe the studies and considered the deer their own, not the charges of distant bureaucrats. Too many residents of the UP seemed to think they knew more than the professionals in the DNR, and Bozian's careless disregard of the environment just served to embolden others.

A middle-aged woman and a girl of eight or nine were sitting on the sagging wooden steps outside the store, eating ice cream cones.

“Nice day,” the woman said when Service came out. She had thin, pale red hair and patches of freckles peeking through sun-reddened skin. There were gold rings on several fingers, and her wrists were weighted down with bracelets. Fifty, sixty? It was hard to tell her age.