A Serpent's Tooth: A Walt Longmire Mystery

15

The milk truck driver wasn’t sure what to make of the shapely woman standing in front of the Jeep with the hood up near where the first sentry had been positioned, but he knew what to make of the .45 Colt I poked through the driver’s-side window into his left ear.

As I cuffed him to the Jeep’s spare along with Carlson, I started having second thoughts and figured maybe we should find something larger to pin them to. I turned to Henry. “Do we need the Jeep anymore?”

“For speedy egress possibly.”

“If I cuff both of these guys to the spare they could just pick it up and walk off with it.”

Vic looked around as she closed the hood on the Rubicon. “Where the hell would they go?”

She had a point.

I turned back and looked at the two of them, the one from Minnesota, the other from Louisiana. “You guys aren’t that stupid, are you?”

They looked at each other and then back to me, their faces blank—and I was not reassured.

“Look, there isn’t much out here that can eat you, but what can eat you is the distance, okay? If the two of you go on walkabout in the dark you’re likely to get hurt or, more important, get lost and then you’ll just be two corpses handcuffed to a spare tire—another great mystery of the high plains. Got me?”

They looked around again.

I was still not reassured.

I threw a thumb toward my undersheriff. “Or I will let her shoot you.”

They seemed to get that last part.

I joined the squad back on the road, sighed deeply, and thought what a nice cool morning it was if you weren’t up to the types of things we were up to. “I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who knows how to drive this thing.” I studied the length of the milk truck and made some calculations.

The Bear stiffened and shook his head. “You are also the better shot.”

I glanced at the eighteen-wheeler. “It’s a tanker; I think you’ll hit it.”

He nodded reluctantly. “So, what is going to happen?”

“On Highway 1 in Vietnam, I saw a tracer round hit an oil truck.”

Vic leaned forward into my line of thought. “And?”

“Well, it was aircraft fuel, not crude. . . .” They both stared at me. “And it was more than one tracer, probably a bunch of them.” They continued to stare at me. “But it blew like a sailor on a three-day drunk.”

The Bear’s voice rumbled. “How many Claymores?”

Since Vietnam and our association with Claymore directional mines, Henry and I had developed our own private method of determining a demolition scale. “Eight.”

His eyes quickly traveled from Vic’s to mine. “Eight?”

“Maybe seven, but that was high-octane with lots of tracers.”

He raised an eyebrow, the closest thing the Cheyenne Nation did to a guffaw. “The concussion will collapse the canyon.”

“It’s crude oil—won’t be anywhere near that bad.”

Vic stretched a hand out and placed it on my arm. “How about we simply jackknife the trailer on the road?”

“We’ll fall into the creek. I think I’d rather blow it up and have them have to put it out, and I want a lot of smoke and noise.” I reached over and tapped the extended barrel of the TAC-50. “One blue-point from this should do that.” Henry still looked worried. “I don’t want anyone killed—just want to plug the bottle until we can get the weight of the law to swing to our side.”

Our attention was drawn to two individuals carrying a spare tire between them. I guess they were that stupid.

“Hey, where do you two idiots think you’re going?”

The Cajun was the first to answer. “I was looking to see if there was another lawn chair in the Jeep?”

The Minnesotan was next, and his tone was a little indignant as he pointed toward the cooler. “We’re out of water and figured we’d get a drink. Is that okay?”

My undersheriff made an exasperated sound, yanked the silenced S&W she’d taken from Carlson, and fired a round into the cooler. The two men might as well have been statues: still life, roughnecks with spare. “No, it’s not all right. You are under arrest, and you need to sit down. Now.”

They did, and quick.

The Cheyenne Nation continued to look at me. “Shoot one of them in the foot.”

“Don’t encourage her.”

He glanced at the Kenworth, still patiently idling in the roadway, pointed in the wrong direction. “Why you?”

“I told you . . .”

“Tell me.” Vic joined him in the interrogation, her eyes as angry as one of those snakes she so disliked. “Why you?”

I thought about it. “It’s my stupid idea, and if anybody’s going to get killed doing it, I’d just as soon it not be either of you.” I set the muscles in my jaw. “Also, I want Lockhart.”

The Cheyenne Nation shook his head. “That I can do better.”

“I want him alive.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re better than they are.”

He snorted. “I suppose we are about to find out if that is true.”

Vic still didn’t look convinced. “But if they start shooting, we shoot back, right?”

“I don’t think they’re that stupid.”

“Well, you didn’t think those morons were that stupid either. Let’s do the math, shall we?” She counted off on her fingers. “Desperate + guns = stupid.”

“I’m betting that the majority of the guys down there are just hired hands, brought in and told to keep their mouths shut.”

Her lips stiffened. “Maybe, but then there’s Frymire.”

I added. “And then there’s Bidarte.”

• • •

In all actuality, the Kenworth had an eight-ball suicide knob and an automatic transmission, but I didn’t see any reason to share that information with the rest of the crew. I had to drive the fully loaded tanker down to the T in the road before being able to turn it around but reassured myself by seeing that the blockaded youths were still hanging around the disabled vehicles.

I pulled the chain and sounded my horn as I turned, watching as they waved.

I throttled up the big tanker and started back down the road, pulling up and stopping to get Henry. He stepped onto the running board and shouted to be heard above the diesel engine. “We could still call in the Highway Patrol and the Natrona County Sheriff’s Department.”

I nodded. “We will, but first I want those hornets in a bottle.”

“You will be in the front of the tanker when it explodes—you will be trapped with them in that bottle.”

“I’m hoping to be out of the truck and a little ways down the road when the truck explodes.”

“Signal?”

I smiled. “Me running for my life from this damn truck.”

“Perhaps something more specific?”

I thought about it and remembered being told by a Special Forces colonel that in these situations a two-part signal was best so as to not inadvertently tip the shot. “I’ll push my hat up and scratch the back of my neck.”

He nodded. “They will see you coming and wonder why the truck has turned around.”

“I’m counting on that.”

“They will shoot you.”

“Not until they know what’s going on.”

The eyebrow again. “Maybe, brother, maybe.”

“Lockhart will want to parlay.”

“And Bidarte?”

Indicating that I was ready to go, I shrugged and put my hands on the wheel. “If he comes near me with that knife of his, you have my permission to shoot his arm off.”

Vic swung the Jeep out onto the road and pulled in front of the truck as he finally grunted a laugh. “Deal.”

I watched as she turned her classic profile to look at us. “Keep an eye on her, Henry.” He turned his head to regard my undersheriff. “Does she seem a little emotional to you lately?”

“She is worried about you.”

I batted my eyelashes at him. “Aren’t you worried about me?”

A full laugh. “No. I have this McMillan TAC-50.” He stuck his hand out and waited as I gripped him back. “Pax?”

I nodded into the glint in his eyes, perfectly confident that if things went completely wrong, it would be me and not the Cheyenne Nation that screwed the pooch. “Pax.”

• • •

The Kenworth was an older model but rode nicely on the hardpack and in no time we were at the cutoff to the canyon. Vic pulled past as Henry jumped out, pulling the brush away. I flipped off the headlights so that they wouldn’t reflect from the rock walls of the canyon, unconcerned with the noise of the engine since the machinery associated with the clandestine rig would mask that until the last moment.

It was quite possible that I wouldn’t have to detonate the tanker; that parking it in the middle of the one-lane road and stuffing the keys in my pocket or tossing them into Sulphur Creek far below would be enough. I was hoping that was the case, but it was also possible that Lockhart and Bidarte and a few of the others were desperate enough to avoid prison that they would rather kill some no-name sheriff than serve time or worse. Lockhart, I was sure, would try and negotiate, but Bidarte, looking at a lifelong jolt in Rawlins at the least, was another matter.

I took a certain comfort in watching the Jeep swing around. Henry walked up and stood on my running board with the .50 in his hand. I inched my way down the incline toward the only major curve in the road and a pavilion of sharp-edged rocks that would provide good cover and a magnificent shooting position.

I pulled alongside the boulders, and he stepped off the running board with the McMillan and the canvas bag of ammo. I watched as he picked the exact spot I would’ve, another rock like the one before, although this one looked more like a chest freezer, that was angled a little downward with a protective shield of rubble in front. He began setting up the bipod for the big, magazine-fed bolt action, and I watched as he loaded the weapon with the blue-tip incendiary rounds. I guess he figured that an incendiary would take Bidarte’s arm off as well as a regular one.

Vic appeared in the window with the binoculars around her neck, her disparagement in full bloom. I looked at her and noticed that her hair was longer and even had a few butterscotch streaks leftover from the summer. “Do you dye your hair?”

She shook her head at me. “That’s what you’re thinking about right now?”

“I guess.”

She folded her arms on the sill and averted her gaze. “Yes, I dye my hair in hopes that you might someday notice.”

“I notice your hair and the rest of you to the point of distraction.”

The tarnished gold eyes came back to mine and stayed there. “So, where are we?”

“What?”

“You and me, where are we?”

I waited a moment before making the next statement. “You want to talk about that now?”

“You brought it up.”

I smiled and fiddled with the eight-ball on the steering wheel. “I’m trying, kiddo. You once said that you didn’t want hearth and home and to do like you said and take one day at a time. I’m attempting to adjust to that, but it’s hard for an old dog to learn new tricks.”

“Yeah, well, that may have changed.” She sighed. “I’m thinking that I love you and don’t want to share you with the rest of the populace.”

I stared at her, and it was like the world had stopped on its axis. “Are you proposing to me?”

“No, dumb ass. I’m trying to get you to propose to me.” She looked down the length of the Kenworth’s hood in the direction of the rock cornice and the disappearing road. “Get as far away from this damn thing as you can before playing with your hat and neck, okay?”

“I am always careful when playing with my neck.”

“Sure you are.” She watched Henry make the last adjustments on the McMillan and arrange the rounds within easy reach like not-so-small soldiers standing at attention. He rolled over on the rock to look at us with a downturned palm to the chest and a fist.

I turned back to my undersheriff, thinking about the things she’d just said. “You spotting?”

“I am; you got a problem with that?”

“Don’t shoot until I say so.”

Her lips kicked sideways, and she studied the suicide knob on the steering wheel of the Kenworth. “They shoot you—I’m having the Bear unload into every flammable piece of equipment down there and then I’m shooting every single motherfucker that tries to crawl out of this burning hole.” She turned back to look at me, and I could feel the warmth of her breath on my ear. “So for the sake of population density and your future relationship, don’t get killed.”

“I promise to do my levelheaded best.”

She reached over and grabbed my chin, pulling my mouth toward hers. “You never had a levelheaded day in your life.” She tasted like bottled water, sweat, and the slight tang of metal that was probably the uncertainty in both our mouths; she tasted good. She raked her nails across my jaw as she released me, and I was pretty sure there were fire trails there, marking my flesh. “Do not confuse that with a good-bye kiss.” She stepped off the running board, and I watched as she swung the desert tan FN carbine onto her shoulder. She blew me a kiss with a smile at the end of it. “Hit the road, Jack.”

I let off the air brakes and inched forward, getting a feel for the narrow road and making sure I didn’t strike the rocks where my team was set up, which might cause an avalanche. The Kenworth was now in the line of sight from the rig below, but with all the activity it would probably take a while for them to notice me.

I thought about what Vic had said and had to admit that it made a lot of sense. There was the difference in our ages, but obviously she was okay with that. There would be talk, but there was always talk in a small town. Here I was just getting used to the terms of our relationship, when all of a sudden she wasn’t. Perverseness of human behavior. Boy howdy.

I made the turn and started down the long straightaway, maybe an eighth of a mile. Still moving slowly, I glanced over the side into the drop-off that lead to Sulphur Creek, aware that if I made a mistake in my trajectory I would likely roll over and go into the shallow drink.

I guess I was going to have to reassess my relationship with Vic and go back to my old way of thinking. I would really have to finish my cabin. It was a shame she’d just bought a house, but even with the market the way it was, she could sell it or maybe we could keep the little house in town for when Cady visited. Things were changing on that front with her married now and expecting my first grandchild. What would Cady think? She’d been bold enough to ask me about the relationship between Vic and me this summer, but I’d told her in a polite way that it wasn’t any of her business. I guess now it was.

The creek was a long way down, and I figured I better start paying attention to the job at hand when suddenly I felt as though somebody was staring at me. Feeling the adrenaline rush through my nervous system like a body blow, my hands jerked in surprise along with the rest of me as the hairy figure standing on the running board tapped on the passenger-side window.

Orrin Porter Rockwell.

I hit the brakes and watched as he almost fell off but then recovered and smiled at me with a grisly grin showing a missing tooth. He’d looked better—dried blood plastered his forehead and his hair stuck to one side of his face and beard. I caught my breath, slowed the truck, and punched the button that lowered the window. There wasn’t enough room on his side to open the door. “What the hell are you doing here?”

He scrambled through, finally settling in the seat beside me. “Howdy.”

“And where the hell did you come from?”

He laughed. “I apologize for my appearance, but I’m afraid when your lady friend had her accident I was knocked unconscious.”

“You were in the back of my truck again?”

“I was, yes.” He breathed heavily from his exertions and then shut his mouth sharply, as if the missing tooth was paining him. “I told the children to stay with the vehicles and started off in the direction they indicated. Fortunately, you came down the road in this majestic conveyance, and I couldn’t resist the temptation of jumping on board.”

I glanced down the road, aware that it was only a question of time before the men working below noticed a stainless-steel eighteen-wheeler sitting idling in the roadway. I also thought about the crosshairs of the Nightforce NXS 8-32×56 Mil-Dot telescopic sight that was now trained on the ass end of the tanker we sat in. “You have to get out of here.”

He looked around and then asked with genuine curiosity. “Where is it I should go?”

His point was well taken; it was too far back up the road to safety, and he wasn’t likely to receive any warmer a welcome than me if I sent him ahead. “Never mind.” I released the brakes again and began the slow roll down the narrow road, my mind scattering thoughts like pea gravel as I tried to figure out what to do with him.

The activity on the rig had blown into a full frenzy, and it looked like they were finished filling the next tanker, which was pulling forward. I allowed the transmission to shift into a higher gear and hoped that I could get to the bottom of the incline before they pulled onto the road, which would result in, appropriately, a full-blown Mexican standoff. “Well, Mr. Rockwell, it appears that you are along for the ride.”

He looked forward with an expression of deep anticipation. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, Sheriff.”

The driver of the other truck was the one to notice me first and tooted his air horns in confused concern. I in turn tugged mine to announce my arrival to any and all in a long, sustained blast echoing off the canyon walls.

There looked to be about forty to fifty men on and around the rig, but there might’ve been more in the few surrounding tin buildings to my right. All faces were turned toward us as I applied a steady pressure to the brakes and stopped dead in the road at the throat of the canyon where no one could pass. I listened as the air brakes locked like a vault, then switched off the diesel and tossed the keys over my shoulder.

I turned to Rockwell and spoke in a gentle and assured tone, thinking about how I wished that there had been another time for this, but that I needed to be sure that the man held some sort of mental stability in the coming moments. “We don’t have a lot of time, and I need you to listen to me.” He nodded his head. “These men up here are pretty bad, and I’m going to have a word with them. I would tell you to stay in the truck, but that isn’t an option. Now listen to me and listen closely—I think you know you had a life before this one, before you were MIA and before prison. You had a name—Tisdale, Dale Tisdale, Dale ‘Airdale’ Tisdale.” He seemed to be considering my words. “You had a wife—still have a wife—by the name of Eleanor.”

He stared at me and then his head dropped just a bit. “I seem to remember something about that.”

I studied him, hoping that I was doing the right thing in revealing this information now. I wasn’t sure how he was going to react, but I figured I’d rather have him have his epiphany here in the truck rather than out there with all those guns pointing at us. “That’s not all; you have a daughter, the young woman I’m trying to find—her name is Sarah.”

He didn’t move. “Hmm.” Finally his hand came up and rested on the dash, almost as if seeking support. “My daughter.”

“Yep.”

He mulled on it, and I glanced out the windshield where a large group of men were watching us and slowly starting to move our way. “When I was in prison in Missouri . . .”

“That wasn’t Missouri, Dale. It was Mexico.”

He nodded his head. “The man I made an acquaintance with . . . The man is here.”

I watched as the crowd drew nearer and concluded that we were almost out of time. “Bidarte, he’s the one that you were in prison with all those years.”

“He said he would help me find my daughter.”

“And the boy, Cord? He’s your grandson.”

“I see.” He studied me for a few moments, scratching at the blood flaking from his beard. “Sheriff?”

“Yep.”

He continued to stare at me with the opal eyes. “You are behaving very strangely.”

I nodded and pushed open my door; that’s what I got for trying to be the only sane person in the world.

• • •

The men had streamed toward the base of the incline but parted as a few that I recognized from before who were holding rifles appeared from the small building to my right.

I jumped down from the running board and walked around to the front of the Kenworth, forward enough, I hoped, that the Cheyenne Nation and Vic would be able to see me and, more important, my hat and neck.

A semicircle of men stood looking at me and my uniform. I searched their faces for somebody I might know, someone from in-county, but none of them looked familiar. Somewhere in the distance, someone shut off the generator that was making the majority of the racket and the other diesel truck shut down as well. Far from silent, it was a lot less noisy than it had been moments ago.

My voice sounded loud, even to me. “I’m looking for Tom Lockhart.”

Nobody said anything as Rockwell/Tisdale joined me, but they continued to train the automatic rifles on the two of us.

“This is an illegal drilling operation, and I’m here to tell all of you that you’re under arrest.”

“Oh, I doubt that.” Lockhart appeared from behind the crowd and approached with Bidarte trailing behind. The faux-CIA man was wearing a hooded tactical jacket, a battle dress uniform, and combat boots, all in black, effectively dressed for the role of a lifetime. “I’m not even sure we’re in your county.”

“Above 43"30' N latitude; and yes, you are in my county.”

He pulled up a few yards away. “Well, if we are, then we are certainly beyond the scope of your jurisdiction.” He turned and looked at the group, some of them looking at each other and then at me and my star. “You men can go back to work; we’re running out of time here. . . .”

“You’ve run out of time.” I spoke in what my father used to call my field voice so that they could all hear me. “You men know there’s something fishy about this operation, but it’s possible that Mr. Lockhart here has suckered you into thinking that he works for the government—well, he doesn’t and he and his friend Mr. Bidarte are responsible for the death of an Absaroka County sheriff’s deputy.”

Lockhart laughed. “That’s bullshit.”

I threw a thumb over my shoulder. “Now, at the top of this canyon, I’ve got detachments from the Absaroka County Sheriff’s Department—”

Lockhart was shouting now. “This is a United States government project, fully sanctioned by the Department of Homeland Security and a number of other agencies. . . .”

I raised my voice over his. “This man has no connection with the federal or any other government other than some polo shirts with embroidered patches on them. When all that honest-to-God law-enforcement personnel come barreling down that road, they’re going to take him and his bunch and lock them up. Now it’s possible that none of you will face prosecution, but he and his buddies with the rifles will. It’s up to you to decide how you want to play this, but my advice is to put your tools down, raise your hands, and get over to the side out of the line of fire.”

The workers were now talking among themselves, and you could see that there were at least some concerns.

Lockhart raised his voice again, gesturing toward Rockwell. “And is that one of your deputies, Sheriff, or a derelict?”

Rockwell’s voice rose above mine in a righteous indignation. “My name is Orrin Porter Rockwell!”

Lockhart smiled. “The Orrin Porter Rockwell, the Destroying Angel and Danite, Man of God, Son of Thunder?” Lockhart continued, turning to look at the group as he spoke. “The bodyguard of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, frontier legend, marksman, and man of iron nerve?”

Rockwell was studying him now, aware that he might be being made the butt of a joke. “Some would say, sir.”

Great. I stuck a hand out to silence the crazy man. “Orrin, you might want to let me talk here.”

“But I was to understand that you died in 1878, Mr. Rockwell.”

He looked at the crowd of them the way a bear would look at a baiting. “I was fortunate enough to receive the blessings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, saying that as long as I did not cut my hair I would be harmed by neither shot nor blade.”

“That means you would be two hundred years old?”

Rockwell’s eyes narrowed like train tunnels. “When the Prophet touched me, it imbued me with a spirit unlike any other living man and retarded the aging process so that I now stand here before you.”

Some of the roughnecks were drifting off and going back to work, assured that the sheriff and the fruitcake weren’t really a threat to the operation. Lockhart stepped in a little closer, with Bidarte and a few of the gunmen flanking him. “Thank you, Mr. Rockwell; you were most invaluable.”

I watched as Rockwell’s eyes moved past Lockhart to Bidarte. There was a change in his expression as he looked at the man, a softening that was unsettling. “Tomás, you can tell them.”

Bidarte dropped his face a little and then raised it to look at the man he’d shared a cell with those many years. “Orrin.”

Rockwell seemed disappointed, glancing first at him and then at Lockhart. “What are you doing working for this man?”

“It’s a job, my friend. Just a job.”

Lockhart spoke to me as the remainder of the workers siphoned off and began going about the business of dismantling the rig. “Sheriff, how about you and your friend here join me in the office and we can discuss what it is we need to do next?”

I shook my head at him. “How about you put your guns down and we stop playing games?”

Rockwell interrupted again. “I don’t understand, Tomás.”

“It’s just a job, Orrin, like looking for your daughter. I will explain to you later. I promise.”

“My daughter?” Rockwell stepped toward him as I reached out a hand. “You know where she is?”

“I do.” Bidarte threw a hand around Rockwell’s shoulders and pulled him in close. “I will take you to her.”

I surged forward, but the barrels of three automatic rifles pushed against me, holding me in place.

I saw Orrin’s shoulders slope and his body grow stiff, convulsing as Tomás Bidarte slipped the length of that deadly blade into him. Rockwell slumped, and I watched as the larger man supported his body and wrenched the knife up and sideways, a strike reminiscent of what he had done to Frymire. Tisdale went up on the toes of his boots in an attempt to ease the pressure, half-turned in Bidarte’s arms, the opal eyes draining like twin moons in his face as he looked at me, his mouth hanging open as he tried to speak.

We all stood there, the gunmen providing a visual insulation to the killing of a man.

With my aborted movement, my face was only inches from Lockhart’s, and I watched as a smile garroted his face before dropping into the easy speak of a boardroom deal maker. “You and I both know there’s no army of sheriffs and deputies up there.” He stepped in even closer. “This operation is chicken feed in comparison with what it is we’re going to make. . . .”

“From the Bakken pipeline.”

He stared at me.

“Which is why you’re setting up other fake religious compounds in Garden County, Nebraska, and Hodgeman County, Kansas—you’re planning on doing the exact same thing that you did in Mexico, siphoning off a percentage of the two hundred thousand barrels of crude oil a day that’s going to be coming down from the Bakken shale development in North Dakota when it comes through all four of your compounds. Only this time, it’ll be American oil.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment but then quickly shifted into damage control. “Sheriff, let’s be reasonable and go in the office and discuss this like rational men.”

I stared at Dale Tisdale and the saturated, dark dirt underneath him. “Reasonable rational men.”

Lockhart glanced around at the armaments at his disposal, and most specifically at Bidarte, still standing at his shoulder, and whispered. “We can do this the easy way or we can do this the hard way.”

“Well . . .” I reached up, casually tipping my hat back. “I guess we’ll do it the hard way.” I then tried to relax as I scratched the back of my neck.