Black Harvest

CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

Bob Elroy stood in the bed of a red Ford pickup, looking out over his wasted fields. Two other men stood next to him. Jack Wemberly was the local Farm Bureau man and USDA's man on the spot. He and Bob went back a long ways. Wemberly wore Levis and a light yellow checked shirt open at the collar. His sandy hair was covered by a brown Bailey felt hat, well worn, the brim curled like a Stetson.

The second man was as out of place as an elephant in a pigsty, or so Bob told Mae later over supper. The second man had introduced himself as Agent Brown. He didn't say what agency and Bob didn't ask. What difference did it make? Brown wore a black suit, a white shirt and a dark tie. His sunglasses were smoky, almost black. His shoes were shiny black, or had been, before he'd trudged through the fields with Elroy and Wemberly. Now the shine was covered with dust and debris. The debris came from dead, black plants stretching away as far as any of the men could see.

Men in white hazmat suits walked through the field taking samples. Government experts. As if hazmat suits made a damn bit of difference.

"This is awful." Wemberly shook his head.

"Yep." Bob couldn't take his eyes away from the blight. "It's gone way past my property. Showing up miles away from here. Everywhere the wind blows, seems to me."

"And everything is dead?"

"Everything that grows, anyway. Doesn't seem to bother the animals. Doesn't do anything to the feed corn we got stockpiled, or the hay. Just the live crops." His voice was bitter. "I'm finished. All of us around here are."

"Those are experts, Bob. They'll figure this out."

"They will? That going to put food on the table, Jack? Pay my loans?"

"I'll talk to the bank. The government will help."

Bob snorted. "Sure it will. Whyn't you have a nice talk with Agent Brown, here. He's from the government. I gotta feed the pigs."

He jumped down from the truck and stalked toward the barn. Brown watched him go.

"What's his politics?"

Wemberly stared at him. "His politics? What the hell has that got to do with anything? Bob's a farmer, for Christ's sake. He votes for the land."

"This started on his land."

"You think he did this on purpose? Poisoned his land?"

"Maybe not, but someone did. His land and a hundred and thirty thousand acres."

"What?" Jack tried to comprehend the figure. He couldn't get his mind around it.

"A hundred and thirty thousand and spreading. It'll be public by tomorrow. No harm in telling you now."

"You think this is some kind of terrorist thing? Who did you say you worked for?"

"I didn't say. And yes, it could be a terrorist attack. Bio war. Maybe the beginning of something bigger."

"Agent Brown," Jack said, "if that's really your name. Look at that." He swept his arm out at the blackened fields. "It doesn't get bigger than that."