Fire in the Hole

  IV.

  It was Art Mullen, marshal in charge of this East Kentucky Special Op Group, who had requested Raylan Givens, now seated in Art's temporary office in the Harlan County courthouse. It was an overcast morning in October, the two sipping coffee, getting acquainted again.

  "I remember you were from around here."

  "A long time ago."

  "You still look the same as you did at Glynco," Art said, meaning the time they were both firearms instructors at the academy. "Still wearing the dark suit and wing-tip cowboy boots."

  "The boots're fairly new."

  "Don't tell me that hat is." The kind Art Mullen thought of as a businessman's Stetson, except no businessman'd wear this one with its creases and just slightly curled brim cocked toward one eye, the hat part of Raylan's lawman personality. He said no, it was old.

  "What do you pack these days?"

  "This trip my old Smith forty-five Target." He saw Art grin. "You and your big six-shooter—born a hundred years too late. You ever get married again?"

  "No, but I wouldn't mind some homelife. I can't say Winona ruined it for me. I stopped to see my two boys on the way up. They come down to Florida every summer and I get 'em jobs."

  There was a lull. Raylan looked toward the gray sky in the window, trees starting to change color. Art Mullen, a big, comfortable man with a quiet way of speaking, said, "Tell me what you remember of Boyd Crowder."

  Raylan, nodding his head a couple of times, went back to that time in his mind. "Well, we dug coal side by side for Eastover Mining, near Brookside. Boyd was a few years older and had become a powderman. He'd crawl down a hole with his case of Emulex five-twenty and come out stringing wire. You'd hear him call out 'Fire in the hole,' to clear the shaft. She'd blow and we'd go back in to dig out the pieces. We weren't what you'd call buddies, but you work a deep mine with a man you look out for each other."

  Art Mullen said, "Fire in the hole, uh?" in a thoughtful kind of way.

  "I hate to say he was good at it," Raylan said, and sipped his coffee, still back all those years in his mind. "I remember when we struck Eastover and Duke Power brought in scabs and gun thugs? Their cars'd drive in, Boyd'd be waiting to swing at 'em with a wrecking bar. He was put in jail twice. Then when he shot one of the scabs, almost killed him, Boyd took off and I heard he joined the army. Came out and what happened, he went to prison?"

  "Came out pissing and moaning," Art said, " 'cause we quit in Vietnam 'stead of getting it done. He bought a truck and went to work hauling timber for the mines. Ten years never paid his income tax, refused to, claiming he was a sovereign citizen. The U.S. attorney sent him to Alderson. That's where he got into what they call the patriot movement. You read his sheet?"

  "I've only had time to skim it so far," Raylan said. "He's been busy, huh? Has his own army now, bunch of serious morons sieg-heilin' each other?"

  "More serious'n you think," Art said. "Boyd's got 'em making horseshit bombs, fertilizer and fuel oil. They drive to a town like Somerset, blow up somebody's car to get the police busy and go rob a bank."

  Raylan was nodding. "I saw it in a Steve McQueen movie."

  "Well, these people aren't movie actors." Art leaned forward, resting his arms on the desk. "Lemme tell you about this guy they found at the Cincinnati airport, sitting in his new Chevy Blazer shot through the back of the head. This is Jared, on file with the Bureau as some kind of Aryan knight. Oklahoma driver's license and registration."

  "You put him with Boyd?"

  "Lemme get to it," Art said. "This is good. Just the night before, a black church in Cincinnati—they called it a street mission in the paper—was blown up."

  Raylan was frowning. "It was a church? I caught only part of it on the news."

  Art held up one hand. "Listen to me. Four witnesses say a guy got out of the Blazer with what looked like a bazooka and fired it into the church. But right before, you know what he said, yelled it out? 'Fire in the hole.' "

  Raylan straightened. He said, "Come on . . ." his interest picking up.

  "All four witnesses heard it. So now evidence techs go through the Blazer. They find this little cardboard cylinder you hook onto the back of an RPG rocket. It holds the juice, the propellant. One he must've missed."

  "So you got the dead guy with Boyd."

  "It would seem, huh? But first," Art said, "we want to put Boyd and the dead guy at the church. What's interesting, it's only kind of a church. The pastor, it turns out, Israel Fandi, is one of the witnesses. Only at first he won't admit who he is till people start pointing at him. Israel wears an African outfit, a dashiki and a little pillbox hat and talks like he's Rasta-farian. You know what I mean?"

  "Ethiopian," Raylan said. "By way of Jamaica. I remember now on the news they said it was believed the people smoked ganja as part of the service."

  "They smoked it, they sold it—the place was a dope store passing as a church. It blew," Art said, "there was free grass all over the block. This was three days ago. Since then we got the Cincinnati police to loan us Israel Fandi. He's in a holding cell downstairs, but claims he didn't see the man's face had the bazooka. I said to him, 'Israel, you see him in a lineup, the man we know blew up your church, you might change your mind.'"

  "The power of suggestion," Raylan said. "Without holding the marijuana over his head. We'll save it. Next thing is to pick up Boyd, if he's still around."

  "What've you got on him otherwise?"

  "The U.S. attorney wants to collect indictments under a charge of sedition. That he did willfully and knowingly et cetera conspire to overthrow, put down and destroy by force the government of the United States."

  "But what've you got you can take to court?"

  "Only bits and pieces of evidence."

  "Then he's most likely still around," Raylan said.

  "Well, he's got sympathizers. Half the people living up in the hollers around here," Art said, "are on welfare but still don't trust the government, won't talk to census takers. Boyd's mother and his ex-wife are in Evarts. His skinheads train at a place up on Sukey Ridge, what he calls his Christian Aggression Church. Signs on the trees say you approach at your own risk, as the road's been mined."

  "You let him get away with that?"

  "ATF swept it. There aren't any mines. Another house, one he used to own up on Black Mountain? It's been under foreclosure since he went to prison. We want to sell it to cover his back taxes, but Boyd's put the word out, anybody buys the house, he'll blow it up."

  "I remember," Raylan said, "they used to raise marijuana crops up there, acres of plants all the way down across the Virginia line."

  "They're still growing it, but that's not our business, busting dopers.''

  "No, but what I was thinking," Raylan said, "Israel being into weed, what if you sold the house to him? Say for a hundred bucks or so." He had Art starting to grin. "And you let Boyd know a black guy's living in his house."

  Not a bad idea, Art saying yeah, that could bring him out. Saying then, "There's another situation could do it. You know Bowman, Boyd's brother?"

  Raylan saw him in a football uniform. "Sorta. He was a star running back in high school—this was after I got out. Boyd was always talking about him, how Bowman had the goods and would go on to play college ball and become a pro. I was never that sure."

  Art said, "You remember the girl he married, Ava?"

  Raylan's tone came alive as he said, "Ava, yeah, she lived down the street from us." He remembered her eyes. "She's married to Bowman?"

  "Was," Art said. "She ended the union the other day with a thirty-ought-six, plugged him through the heart."

  It stopped Raylan. He remembered a cute little dark-haired girl about sixteen and how she tried to act older, flirting, working her brown eyes on him. He remembered her sassy cheerleader moves on the field Friday nights, the girls in blue and gold doing their routines, and his eyes would be on Ava the whole time. Too young or he would've gone after her.

  He said to Art, "You t
alk to her?"

  "She admits shooting him. Ava said she got tired of him getting drunk and beating her up. She was arraigned this morning. Her lawyer had her plead not guilty to first and second degree and she was released on her own recognizance. Unusual, but the prosecutor, knowing Bowman, would just as soon not bring her up. They'll work out a plea deal."

  "Where is she now?"

  "Went home. I told her, you know Boyd's gonna come looking for you. She said it's none of our business. I told her it is if he shoots you. You want to talk to her?"

  "I wouldn't mind," Raylan said.

  She'd be fixing her face to go to work at Betty's Hair Salon, and Bowman would say, "Who you think you are, Ava Gardner? You don't look nothing like her."

  Ava had quit trying to get it through his head no one ever said she did. The day she was born her daddy named her Ava on account of Ava Gardner saying she was a country girl at heart with a country girl's values. He had read it somewhere and believed it and would remind her as she was growing up, "See, even a good-looking woman don't have to put on airs."

  She married Bowman a year out of high school because he was cute, because he was sure of himself and told her he'd never work in a goddamn coal mine. He'd wear the blue and white of the University of Kentucky and after that get drafted by a pro team; he wouldn't mind the Cowboys. But colleges either wouldn't accept his grades or didn't think he was good enough. He blamed her for their getting married and taking his mind off staying in shape so he could try out at some school as a walk-on. She said, "Honey, if your grade-point average sucks . . ." Uh-unh, that had nothing to do with it, it was her fault. Everything was. It was her fault he had to dig coal. Her own fault he hit her. If she didn't nag at him he wouldn't have to. Unless he slapped her for the way she was looking at him. He'd start drinking Jim Beam and Diet Coke—ate like a hog and drank diet soda—and she'd see it coming as his disposition turned from stupid to ugly and pretty soon he'd be slapping her, hard. She ran way to Corbin and got a job at the Holiday Inn waiting tables. Bowman found her and brought her back saying he missed her and would try to tolerate her acting up. It was her fault she miscarried after he'd beat her with his belt. Her fault he didn't have a son he could take hunting with him and his creepy brother. She told Bowman there were times he wasn't home Boyd would stop by wanting a drink, and if she gave him one he'd start getting funny, "your own brother." Bowman whipped her for telling him, kept after her with his belt till she fell and hit her head on the stove.

  This was the other night. She got up from the floor knowing he would never hit her again.

  The next day, Saturday, he walked in smelling of beer and gunfire, like nothing had happened the night before. She had his supper on the table, ham and yams, cream-style corn and leftover okra fixed with tomatoes, because she wanted him sitting down. Once he'd poured his Jim Beam and Diet Coke and took his place at the table, Ava went in the kitchen closet and came out with Bowman's Winchester. He looked up and said with his mouth full of sweet potato what sounded like "The hell you doing with that?"

  Ava said, "I'm gonna shoot you, you dummy," and she did, blew him out of the chair.

  When the prosecutor asked if she had loaded the rifle before firing it, she paused no more than a second before telling him Bowman always kept it loaded.

  Raylan was told Bowman himself couldn't find his house when he was drunk. Go on up along the Clover Fork, or take the Gas Road out to the diversion tunnels and turn right down to a road bears east where a sign says JESUS SAVES, and it ain't far; start looking for a red Dodge pickup in the yard.

  It was one-story with aluminum awnings set high among pines. Raylan got out of the Lincoln Town Car—one Art had taken off some convicted felon and given to Raylan to use— and crossed the yard past the Dodge pickup to the front door.

  It opened and he was looking at a woman in a soiled T-shirt worn over an old housedress that hung on her, her dark hair a mess. Ava was forty now, but he knew those eyes staring at him and she knew him, saying, "Oh my God—Raylan," in kind of a prayerful tone.

  He stepped into a room with bare walls, worn carpeting, a sofa. "You remember me, huh?"

  Ava pushed the door closed. She said, "I never forgot you," and went into his arms as he offered them, a girl he used to like now a woman who'd shot and killed her husband and wanted to be held. He could tell, he could feel her hands holding on to him. She raised her face to say, "I can't believe you're here." He kissed her on the cheek. She kept staring at him with those eyes and he kissed her on the mouth. Now they kept looking at each other until Raylan took off his hat and sailed it over to the sofa. He saw her eyes close, her hands slipping around his neck, and this time it became a serious kiss, their mouths finding the right fit and holding till finally they had to breathe. Now he didn't know what to say. He didn't know why he kissed her other than he wanted to. He could remember wanting to even when she was a teen.

  "I had a crush on you," Ava said, "from the time I was twelve years old. I knew you liked me, but you didn't want to show it."

  "You were too young."

  "I was sixteen when you left. I heard you got married. Are you still?"

  Raylan shook his head. "Turned out to be a mistake."

  "You want to talk about mistakes... I told Bowman I wanted a divorce? He goes, 'You file, you'll never be seen again.' Said I'd disappear from the face of the earth."

  "I hear he used to beat you up."

  "That last time—I've still got a knot where I fell and hit my head on the stove. You want to feel it?" She was touching her scalp, fingers probing into her wild-looking hair, and her expression changed. She said, "Oh my God, don't look at me," pulling the T-shirt over her head, the hem of the housedress rising to show her legs hurrying away from him. "Close your eyes, I don't want you to see me like this." But then she stopped before going in the bedroom and looked back at him.

  "Raylan, the minute you walked in I knew everything would be all right."

  The bedroom door closed and he wanted to go knock on it before she started assuming too much. Show her he was a federal marshal and tell her why he was here. But then had to ask himself, Why are you? Art had said she didn't want protection. He'd offer it anyway. No, he was here to get a lead on Boyd. Kissing her had confused his purpose there for a minute.

  Raylan walked over to the table where they said Bowman was sitting. He looked in the kitchen at a pile of dishes in the sink—Ava letting her housework go, letting herself go, not knowing what was to become of her. But she had all of a sudden pulled herself together, ashamed of the way she looked, and it sounded like she was expecting him to see her through this. And if she was, what was he supposed to do? For one thing they'd better quit kissing.

  It wasn't a minute later the front door banged open and a guy wearing alligator teeth walked in the house.

  V

  Gator teeth, spiked hair dyed blond and a tattoo on his chest, part of it showing the way his shirt hung open. He stood there looking Raylan over before saying, "Who in the hell are you, the undertaker?"

  Raylan got his hat from the sofa and set it on his head the way he wore it. He said, "I might be undertaking a situation here. Lemme see what you have on your chest," wanting this skinhead with hair to open his shirt.

  He did, held it apart to show Raylan his heil hitler tattoo, no weapon stuck in his belt. Raylan decided not to mess with Adolf Hitler, saying now, "You buy that necklace or poach the gator and yank her teeth out?"

  It got the skin to squint at him but still wanting to tell, because he said, "I shot her and ate her tail."

  Now Raylan squinted to show he was thinking. "That would put you in Florida, around Lake Okeechobee."

  It got the skin to tell him, "Belle Glade."

  "Is that right?" Raylan reached into his inside pocket for his ID case. "I sent a boy to Starke was from Belle Glade, fella name Dale Crowe Junior." He flipped open the case to show his star. "I'm Raylan Givens, deputy United States marshal." He flipped the case closed. "You
mind telling me who you are?"

  The skin was staring now like he did mind and had to decide whether or not to tell. Raylan said, "You know your name, don't you?"

  "It's Dewey Crowe," the skin said, putting some defiance into the sound of it. "Dale Junior's my kin."

  Raylan said, "Man, that's some family you belong to. I know of four Crowes either shot dead or sent to prison. Tell me what you're doing here."

  Dewey said, "I come to take Ava someplace," and started toward the bedroom.

  Raylan held up his hand and it stopped him.

  "Lemme tell you something, Mr. Crowe. You don't walk in a person's house 'less you're invited. What you better do, go on outside and knock on the door. If Ava wants to see you I'll let you in. She doesn't, you can be on your way."

  Raylan watched him, curious as to how this boy wearing alligator teeth would take it—big, ugly teeth but no apparent weapon on him.

  What he said was, "All right." Keeping it simple to show he was cool. He said, "I'm gonna go out.'' Paused to set up the rest of it and said, "Then I'm coming back in." He turned and went out the door, leaving it open.

  Raylan came over to stand in the doorway. He watched young Mr. Crowe hurrying toward his car standing in the road, an old rusting-out Cadillac, and watched him raise the trunk lid.

  Raylan took off his suitcoat and hooked it on the doorknob. He wore a blue shirt with a mostly dark-blue striped tie. He reset his hat on his head. Now his hand went to the grip of the revolver on his right hip, the .45-caliber Smith & Wesson, but did not clear it from the worn leather holster.

  He watched Dewey Crowe bring a pump shotgun out of the trunk and start back this way, all business now, his mind made up, his dumb pride taking him to a place it would be hard to back out of.