The Green Ripper Part 7

Nine.

I GAVE up walking when the heel of my right foot began to bother me. The work shoes were too heavy for one who had spent such a chunk of his life barefoot. I wished I had taken the bus.

I found a good place to hitch a ride. I hate to see the d.a.m.n fools on the highways. .h.i.tching in the wrong places. It is a waste of energy. You have to be where they can see you a long way off, and where you, stand out well against the background. They have to be able to see a lot of highway beyond you, and they have to spot a place where they can pull off. You have to make a gesture at each car, a big sweeping one. You leave the duffel bag at your feet and you take your hat off, and you smile wide enough to show some teeth. An animal will roll onto his back to demonstrate his harmlessness. A man will grin. It is better to trust the animal.

A gaunt old man in a rattle-bang Ford pickup stopped at high noon and picked me up. He wore banker's clothes and a peaked cap that said Oakland Raiders.

"Only going as far as Lake Mendocino, friend," he said.

"Is that past Ukiah?"

"Next door. I can drop you off before I make my turn. Get in." He looked back, waiting for a hole in the traffic, and when one came along, he jumped into it with surprising acceleration.

"Don't know this country, eh?"

"Don't know it at all. This is the first time for me.

"Hunting work?"

"Well, I might have to do some to keep going. But mostly I'm trying to get some kind of trace of my little girl. I think she's out here somewhere."

"There's a lot of young girls out here somewhere. There was a time in the sixties when they'd come drifting up from San Francisco. Communes and farming and all. What they call alternative lifestyles. Potheads, mostly. No offense. I'm not saying your girl is one of those. She missing long?"

"Six years."

"Hear anything from her in all that time?"

"One time, and that was a few years ago. She'll be twenty now. Peg and me, we married young. Kathy was sixteen when we got those cards from her. They came over a month or so. They never gave an address we could write back to. They were mailed in San Francisco, and then the very last one was from Ukiah. It said she was joining up with some kind of church and we should forget about her forever. You know, when you've got just the one kid, you don't forget like that. It took the heart out of Peg. She died a while back, and after I sold off a little piece of land and the trailer and an old skiff, I thought I might as well use the money trying to find her."

"Friend, this state is chock-full of religions. You can find any kind you are looking for. There's some that'll take you to Guyana and teach you to raise oranges and how to kill yourself quick. They start in the north and go all the way down to the Mexican border, and to my way of thinking, the further south they go, the crazier they get. People are hunting around for something to believe in these days. All the stuff people used to believe in has kind of let them down hard. You'd have to know the name of the religion first, I'd say."

"I learned it by heart. The Church of the Apocrypha."

"I've lived pretty close to Ukiah for ten years, and I can't say I ever heard of it. But I've seen some strange ones drifting around the streets there, selling flowers and candy and wearing white robes."

"I can ask around there, I guess. Big place?"

"No. I'd guess maybe twelve thousand. What kind of work you do?"

"I fish commercial. Net work, mostly. Mullets usually. When they're hard to find, it pays good. When they're easy, it isn't hardly worthwhile going out, you get such small money. What kind of business are you in?"

"Investments."

"Oh." From the way he said it, I knew that was all I was going to learn. He moved the pickup right along, tailgating the people who wouldn't move over into the slow lane.

"Where would be a good place to ask in Ukiah?"

"Maybe the police. Police usually know about the crazies and where they live."

He dropped me off at the Ukiah ramp. The wind felt cool and fresh. I found one gas station that wouldn't let me use the rest room, and another one that would. I shaved off the stubble and put on my wire gla.s.ses and looked into the mirror. In the hard fluorescence, my deepwater tan looked yellowish. Deep grooves bracketed my mouth. The gold gla.s.ses did not give me a professorial look. I looked like a desert rat with bad eyes.

He was an officer of the law. Not too long ago he had been a fat, florid, hearty man. The balloon was deflating. He had made a couple of new holes in his belt. His color was bad. His chops sagged. He looked me over with a listless competence. And he listened to my story. "Apocrypha. Kind of rings a bell. Short dirty-white robes. Beards. Sister this and Brother that." He dialed a three-digit number and leaned back in his leather chair and began murmuring into the phone, listening for a time while he stared at the ceiling. Then he hung up and took a sheet of yellow paper and drew a crude map.

"Where that outfit was, McGraw, they were over in Lake County. They had a pretty goodsized tract. What you do, you take Twenty East and go over past Upper Lake, maybe two miles, and there's a little road heads off to the east, unpaved but a good surface. You go along that road, mostly uphill, and it winds around and there are little roads heading off it, smaller still, and that encampment is off at the end of one of those. You'll have to ask around."

"Thanks. I appreciate you taking the trouble."

"Afraid it won't help much. Seems they've pulled up and moved off someplace. Might be n.o.body left there at all."

"It's the only clue I've got."

For the moment he forgot his own woes. "Listen, McGraw. There's thousands of kids took off. A lot of them don't ever show again. It's a sign of the times. What I mean is, don't expect too much. It's a good thing to look around, to satisfy yourself you did all you could. But don't expect too much. Okay?"

"Thanks. I won't. I mean, I'll try not to."

By Sunday noon I had found it. I had spent the night in a small rental trailer under giant evergreens. I had hitched three rides, walked through two monstrous rainstorms, and climbed what seemed to be several mountains.

So now I stood where Gretel and her husband had stood. The signs were large and explicit. Red lettering on white.

PRIVATE PROPERTY.

NO TRESPa.s.sING.

The wire gate she had described blocked the road. Beyond the gate the road curved up and to the right, out of sight behind the trees and brush. There was a lean-to on the right, just beyond the gate. The last people I had asked, the ones who had given me the final directions, had said that they thought there were a few left up at the encampment, but that most of them had gone away. They said that sometimes they saw a van on the road. Black, with a gold cross painted on the sides.

I am Tom McGraw, looking for the traces of a daughter lost. I have a father's bullheaded determination. So I forge ahead. Climb the fence close to the gate, drop the duffel bag, and drop down beside it. Shoulder it and walk up the muddy road.

There was a cathedral of evergreens on either side of the road, standing at parade rest on the slope, the ground silent with needles. The sun was suddenly covered again, and I heard a high soft sigh of rainwind in the pine branches. I trudged up the curve and up a steeper pitch. The stand of trees dwindled, and there were boulders among them big as bungalows. I came out at the top. Far away to the northeast I could see sunlit mountains. I was on an old rocky plateau, quite level, as big as four football fields. It sloped gently down toward valleys and gullies on every side. Off to my right, at the end of the big plateau, was a clutter of small structures. The biggest was a corrugated steel and aluminum building that looked like a pre-fab warehouse. There were several small cementblock buildings, and several trailers on block foundations. I saw one derelict truck.

There was no sign of life. I wanted to see if the road continued on the other side of the field. I hollered and waited and heard no answer. I walked across and looked. There was no road down the slope. There had been a stand of small trees there, with the biggest about three inches in diameter. They were broken off about two feet above ground level. At first I thought somebody had driven up and down there with a vehicle. Something nagged at my memory. I walked down the slope. The damage was not fresh. The wood was splintered and dry. I squatted and found where slugs had creased the bark. Very heavy sustained fire from an automatic weapon would chew them off just like that. Using the bark creases for rough triangulation, I was able to go back up the slope to the approximate area where the weapon had been. I poked around and finally saw a glint of metal in a crack of the rock. I levered it out with a twig. It was a white metal sh.e.l.l casing, center-fire, in a smaller caliber than I would have expected. But it looked as if there was room for a hefty load of propellant. There was an unfamiliar symbol on the end of it, like a figure 4 open at the top, and with an extra horizontal line across the upright.

I tossed it up and caught it and put it, in my pocket. A strange exercise for a church group, shooting down a young forest. And then picking up all the sh.e.l.l casings.

I headed toward the buildings, but before I reached them I heard, coming toward me, the sound of a lot of footsteps, running almost in unison. They burst up a slope and onto the plateau about fifty yards away from me. Seven of them in single file, weapons slung, left hands holding the weapons, right arms swinging. I had the impression of great fitness and great effort. They were young. They wore gray-green coveralls, fatigue caps, ammo belts, and backpacks. One of them saw me and yelled something. With no hesitation they stopped and ran back, spreading into combat patrol interval, spinning, falling p.r.o.ne, right at the dropoff line, seven muzzles aimed at me. I shed the duffel bag and held my arms high.

"Hey!" I yelled. "Hey, what's the matter?"

"Down," a voice yelled. "Face down, spreadeagle. Now!"

Once down, I peered up and saw two walking toward me, weapons still ready, while two others were heading for the buildings, running in a crouching zigzag, in the event I had come with friends.

Hands patted me. I was told to shut up. I was told to roll over. One stood over me, muzzle at my forehead, and I suddenly realized she was female. The other, a man with a drooping mustache, did the frisking.

"Now what the h.e.l.l are you doing here?" he demanded. "How did you get here? What did you do to Nicky?"

"The way I got here, I walked. I didn't see any Nicky."

"You come past the gate?"

"Yes."

"Can't you read? Didn't you see the signs?"

"I saw them. But I had to come up here and talk to somebody about my little girl. She joined up here. Maybe you know her. Kathy McGraw? I'm her daddy, Tom McGraw."

"Oh, for G.o.d's sake," the man said. The girl didn't relax her weapon.

"Can I get up?"

"Shut up," the girl said. "What are you going to do, Chuck?"

"What the h.e.l.l can we do? Put him in C Building and wait for Pers to get back."

The girl gasped and said, "Oh, Jesus! Look at what's coming, Chuck."

A huge young blond man was coming across the field, carrying a fair-sized dead buck across his shoulders.

"G.o.d d.a.m.n you, Nicky, why'd you leave the gate?"

He approached and eased the deer to the ground, rolled his shoulders to loosen them. "And this man came in, huh? Oh, great! I ought to kick you loose from your head, fellow."

"You're the one should be kicked, Nicky," the girl said.

"That sucker came right out onto the road and looked at me and ran back in. I shot too fast and missed and gutshot him, and you can't leave an animal go running off like that. I followed him a mile and a half, fast as I could go. What'd you expect me to do, Nena? I killed him, gutted him, and brought him in."

"It isn't what I expect you to do," she said. "It's what Brother Persival expects."

"You can get up," Chuck said.

After I stood up, I looked at Nicky. His face was troubled. "Boring d.a.m.n duty," he said. "Hang around down there eight hours at a time. n.o.body ever comes. And then when you leave for a couple minutes, some d.a.m.n fool climbs the fence."

"He's hunting his daughter. She used to be here," Chuck said.

"What was her name?" Nena asked me. She, appeared to be in her early twenties. Olive skin, slender face, very dark eyes. She had that excess of bursting health which gives the whites of the eyes a bluish tint. No makeup. The long dense black lashes were her own.

"Katherine McGraw. She'd be twenty years old by now. Reddish-brown hair and blue eyes and some freckles when she was younger. Maybe they went away"

"Got a picture of her?"

"The best picture we had of her, it was when she was thirteen, and after Peg died, that was my wife, d.a.m.n if I could find it. I looked all over for that picture. She was a pretty child. She ought to be a good-looking woman. Her ma was."

"You don't know what new name she took?"

"She never said. In those postcards."

"I can't help you. I don't know if anybody can-or wants to, Mr. McGraw. People that join up don't go back to the lives they had before."

"Where did everybody go from here?" I asked. No answer. They urged me along and shut me up in C Building. It was a cement-block building about ten feet square, with two windows with heavy wire mesh over them. There was a wooden chair, a tree-trunk table, a stained mattress on the floor, and a forty-watt bulb hanging from a cord from the middle of the ceiling. There was a ragged pile of religious comic books, a musty army blanket, a two-quart jug of tepid drinking water, and a bucket to use as a toilet. They had taken my belt, shoelaces, and duffel bag. The door was solidly locked. I heard some bird sounds, and that was all. I wondered if they had all left.

Darkness came, and there was a quick light rain on the corrugated roof of my prison. I heard a distant motor noise and tried to decide if it was coming or going. When the sound did not change, I realized it might be a generator, the engine turning over at an unchanging rpm. So I tried my light bulb again, and it went on. It did not help the decor.

Two of them came and unlocked my door. They had a dazzling-bright gasoline lantern, an automatic weapon at the ready, and a tin bowl full of stew. They were two I had glimpsed before at a distance. One was a sallow blond girl with very little chin, and the other was a young man with an Asian cast to his features.

No harm to object. After all, I was Tom McGraw. "Why are you people pointing guns at me all the time? d.a.m.n it, I'm not some kind of criminal. I don't like being locked up like this. Where's my stuff you took away from me? I got my rights. You people are all gun-happy."

"Shut up, Dads," the Oriental said, and they closed the door and locked it.

Even though I had to eat it with a little white plastic spoon, I found the venison stew delicious. And it had been a long time since I had enjoyed the taste of anything. The lack of interest in eating had leaned me down a little over the past weeks.

There was a cook in the camp. Even a slight taste of wine in the stew. Boiled onions, carrots, celery, tomatoes. And a lot of it. After my dinner I read a religious comic book. All about Samson yanking down that temple. Samson looked like Burt Reynolds. Delilah looked like Liz Taylor. The temple looked like the Chase Bank.

After I turned my light off, I stretched out in my clothes on the dingy mattress and covered myself with the musty sheet. And in the darkness, I went over what I knew. I followed Meyer's injunction. Never mix up what you really know with what you think you know. Don't let speculation water down the proven truths. Leap to conclusions only when that is the only way to safety.

People talking outside my door awakened me. I knew it was late. I realized it was just the changing of the guard. I heard the clink of metal and a yawning good night and went back to sleep.

In the morning I was escorted down to a rushing tumbling icy creek by Nicky and the chinless blonde. She carried the weapon. I carried the soil bucket in one hand and held up my trousers with the other. I had asked politely for my belt, and they told me to shut up. They pointed me to the place on the bank where I could wash out the bucket in the fast water. Then I was allowed to go upstream to a place where I could dash some of the icy water into my face. Big Nicky was sullen. The blonde was trying to cheer him. When he answered, I found out her name was Stella. So I had four names out of the group of eight. They marched me back to C Building, again carrying the bucket, now empty, and holding up my trousers. I asked when they expected Mr. Persival, and they,told me to shut up. An hour later I was given cold scrambled eggs and cold toast on a pie tin, with another plastic spoon. They had changed cooks.

At midmorning I saw an interesting tableau from my window. I do not think they realized that I could see it. I had to get my face close to the screen and look slantwise. Two couples. Nena and a young man. Stella and a young man. Out of uniform. Casual clothes. Each carried luggage. Suitcase, or small bedroll or duffel bag. Chuck stood off to one side, watching them closely. He had a whistle in his mouth and what was apparently a stopwatch in his hand. I could not understand the instructions he yelled at them. They walked close and lovingly, laughing and talking together, looking at each other, not at their surroundings. When the whistle blew, they would s.n.a.t.c.h at the luggage, yank it open, remove an automatic weapon, let the luggage fall to the ground, stand with their backs to each other, leaning against each other, almost, in a little deadly square formation, hold the weapons aiming out in four directions, and revolve slowly.

Then they would repack and do it again. I think I watched fifteen rehearsals. Their time improved noticeably. I guessed that they had it down to just about four seconds before Chuck ended the exercise. Four seconds to change from two couples, lounging along, laughing together, to an engine of destruction.

I disobeyed one of Meyer's rules. I made an a.s.sumption or two. I a.s.sumed that they planned to put on. their little act in a crowded place, like an airport or a shopping plaza, and the guns would be loaded, and people would be blown apart while still caught up in a horror of disbelief.

But why? They worked so very hard at it. They seemed so dedicated and intent. These were bright young people, very fit and disciplined. Playing a, strange, strange game.

The noon meal was more venison stew. Still tasty.

The black van arrived in the late afternoon. It pa.s.sed my window before I could see anyone in it. But I saw the gold cross painted on the side.

At least twenty minutes pa.s.sed before my door was unlocked. Chuck said, "Strip and pile everything on the floor right in front of the door here. Fold it and pile it. Everything."

"d.a.m.n it all, I want to know why I'm-?"