Eddy's Current (26 page)

“Thank you for calling, Sargent Briggs, but I already knew that the crash was no accident. How did you come to believe that as well?”

“The left front fender. It’s a hot spot, clearly the point of an explosion. There’s no question that it was blown up and out by an explosion. An FBI agent met me at the wreck yard and inspected the fender with me. He saw it first hand. He was supposed to return the next morning with legions of geniuses to figure out the obvious, but he didn’t show up. Instead, other agents came very early in the morning and towed the SUV. They probably took it to a black hole somewhere and made up a report with pictures of a different fender, showing none of the signs of an explosion.”

“I was tipped off, so I knew, but I have no evidence,” River said. “Sargent Briggs, do you know that the USFIA has broad powers to investigate the other federal agencies, including the CIA and the FBI?”

“Yes, that’s one of the reasons I called you. I need an official channel to appeal the Montana State Highway Patrol accident report. It really isn’t our report. It came to us directly from the FBI. My boss signed off on it and filed it as our official report. The only way I can appeal is if I have an appeal process that is acceptable. The USFIA is my only hope for that. We need to meet and go over our notes. Can you come to Montana, but not to my town, and meet with me in a public place, a park, a mall or restaurant?”

“What about the Run ‘N Gun Café in Kalispell?” River asked.

“How did you know about the Run ‘N Gun?” Briggs asked.

“Within one minute of you calling here and identifying yourself, we found out more about you, the Montana State Highway Patrol, and the state of Montana than you would want me to tell you, Sargent,” River said with a slight chuckle. “I’ll meet you at the restaurant tomorrow afternoon at three o’clock. Please bring plenty of forms of identification with you. Being dressed in a Montana State Highway Patrol uniform will not be identification enough, even if you’re dressed real nice, in a tie and everything. You will be thoroughly checked out before we can talk,” River said.

“Great. And how will I know who you really are?”

“You won’t know for sure, but you’ll have a general idea.”

“How’s that?”

“I’ll be dressed like the people you despise the most.”

Food at the Run ‘N Gun was almost edible, but not quite. The owner, Charles F. Gates, Sr., and his family ran the Run ‘N Gun. They were proud of their restaurant business and proud of the awful food they served there. The Gates family displayed a sign over Mr. Gates’ cooking area, behind the swinging half doors that the servers went in and out of to drop off the meal orders and get the cooked food to bring back to the customers:

“I forgot to tell you that while we are able to find out most things about you and the area you’re from, we obviously don’t know much about the menu offerings here,” River said to Briggs, as they began with an appetizer of rotten potato skins stuffed with an unidentified mushy substance.

“I need every form of identification you can imagine—license, Social Security card, police I.D., credit card.”

“I’ve got it all, Warwick. Here it is.”

River removed his netbook from his inside coat pocket and began the five–minute process to verify Briggs’ identification.

“Place your right index finger tip here into this slot while looking directly into the tiny camera lense here, on the top of the back of the netbook cover.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No. I’m not kidding.”

River then pecked away for a few minutes, completing Briggs’ background check in record time.

“Done. Two minutes to spare and I’m done. That’s a record,” River said.

“You did all of that, and that fast, from that tiny computer? You don’t even have wires coming out of that thing. Where’s the phone cord?” River laughed. Briggs didn’t.

“That’s it. That’s all it took. You are Sargent Briggs. Would you like to know anything else about yourself? Would you like to know your complete fourth grade report card, including subject grades for each grading period? Remember your great aunt, Ida Jeanne Briggs Mason? Would you like the complete family genealogy of each of her in–laws? Ever wonder about them? Anything at all that you would like to know about you, I can tell you.”

“Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind. I never liked my great aunt Ida or any of her in–laws. She was the meanest woman I’ve ever known. She wasn’t very smart either.”

“You know that this is a huge issue,” Briggs said. “I’m sure you do. You would not have already been involved if it weren’t. How’s Winston? The poor guy was psychotic when we met to discuss the SUV crash.”

“He’s bad. The situation is as bad as I’ve seen. He was used by Style & Shores, McCann and the FBI. Then he was thrown to the wolves. He’s got serious concerns. He’s right to be worried for his life and for the lives of those he loves. Even his own lawyer tossed him aside. Briggs, you and I are all he’s got, and I’ve already let him down once,” River explained.

“Who’s McCann?”

“He’s the senior managing partner of the audit firm that provides the auditing services to Style & Shores.”

“Auditors; I have an exclusive category for them. I despise them,” Briggs said quietly, under his breath.

“What’s that?” River asked, not wanting to miss any important information.

“Nothing—just a passing thought.”

“But this is even bigger than all that. It’s bigger than Style & Shores and auditors who participate in fraud. It’s bigger than corporate fraud. It’s even bigger than the lives of Winston and his children, believe it or not. This is about the entire system gone wrong. We’ll realize the full extent of it when it all comes crashing down,” River continued.

“What you don’t know is that Style & Shores has contributed millions to political campaigns of cooperative U.S. politicians, and millions more to Peterson’s planned Council,” River said.

“The ACC?” Briggs asked.

“No, not the ACC. The ACC’s old news. I wish people would get it about this guy. ACC was only a stepping stone. Peterson has moved on while we’re all still focusing on the ACC. I tried to get my boss to listen to me about Peterson. He moves fast. The ACC was a flash in the pan. He’s on to bigger things. He’s thinking bigger than anyone imagined.

“The U.S. can’t allow Style & Shores to go down. It will cause a chain reaction that will not only bring down the entire worldwide financial system, but also the plans for the Worldwide Economic, Religious and Cultural Authority,” River explained.

“That’s all too much for me, Warwick. I’m a cop from Montana investigating a car crash.”

“I know you are. But you’re too good a person to allow a man and his family to pay the ultimate price so the system can fulfill its plans, and politicians can get rich and stay out of jail. Your record is astonishing. I’ve checked. Believe me, I’ve checked. You have operated without a major mistake during your entire career. Not one investigation of yours has been criticized. If there were such a statistic as one hundred percent success rate for investigative work, you would have it to your credit. I could use a person like you in the USFIA.”

“I don’t like federal investigative people. I don’t trust them. No offense to you personally, but you types are always catering to the bureaucratic organizational messes you have to work for in Washington. You create the messes and then you’re slaves to them.

“And I don’t know about being too good a person. I just know that I can’t stand the thought of being sucked into some Washington investigation agency, whose agents all have Ph.D’s and yet they can’t figure out how to conduct an investigation unless they have several computers, at least two years to waste, legions of consultants and, of course, twelve or fifteen lawyers.

“And why in the hell do you guys have to carry two 9mm handguns instead of one Smith & Wesson 686?

“Again, no offense to you personally.”

“No offense taken,” River replied.

“But I also know that I can’t let anything else happen to Winston. This all stinks,” Briggs said.

“It stinks more than you can smell right now, believe me. Do you have your pictures with you?”

“No pictures; they’re not developed yet. I have my digital camera. Here, take a look at the shots. See, look at the shots of the fender. And note that I took a picture of the VIN number. There’s no question that this is the SUV. The first picture, of the VIN number, is close up enough to read the number. Then I backed up a foot, took a picture, then backed up another foot, took another picture, then another foot and so on, so that there can be no question that this is the SUV. These are not the same pictures that the FBI produced,” Briggs explained.

“They’ve undoubtedly turned the real SUV into scrap metal by now. It’s probably been melted and reformed into steel plates and used to erect a bridge or something. Please get those pictures developed—two copies of each. Place one copy of each in a safe deposit box and give me the other set. Keep the pictures in digital image, but don’t send them across the Internet for any reason,” River said.

“I don’t know how to send them over the Internet,” Briggs replied.

“Oh, and one more thing, Sargent Briggs,” River said, as he waited at the cash register to pay the bill, in front of two signs that were posted side–by–side:

“What’s that?” Briggs asked.

“My offer for you to join me at USFIA is absolutely serious. I want you to come to Houston to interview. We need you. I sense a special mission coming up. Many of the people you’ll be investigating as a result of James’ crash investigation will tie into the bigger stuff we’re working on. Think about it.”

As River and Briggs approached the exit door, River noticed a sign posted on the inside of the door. He pointed it out to Briggs:

WHAT IF THE NUTS ARE RIGHT?

“My Smith & Wesson?” Briggs asked.

“Maybe. Call me. Let’s at least talk with my boss, Sydney Albert.”

Montana meant a great deal to Briggs. He didn’t want to leave there to go to Houston. Still, he felt he needed to consider leaving to join the USFIA. He got into his pickup truck and drove three hundred forty miles from his home — a ride he had taken many times in the past — to visit the huge Berkeley Pit Copper Mine in Butte.

Briggs stood on the edge of the lake that filled the former mine with water. He reflected on the millions of pounds of copper that had been mined there and on the millions of pounds of copper that remained in the ground in Montana and elsewhere in the world. Tons of copper, enough to make copper pipe that would circle the globe millions of times, had been removed from the earth. Yet his baby sister didn’t have enough copper to keep her little body going. He removed a jar from his truck, unscrewed the lid, dipped it into the water at the edge of the lake, then replaced the lid, tightening it securely.

Briggs climbed into his truck and drove away from the big pit. He drove a hundred and ten miles, to Sula, Montana, his old hometown, to his baby sister’s grave site. He got out of his truck with his jar of copper water, unscrewed the lid and gently poured the water over his baby sister’s grave, being careful not to get any on the headstone out of fear that he would desecrate her burial site. He said a prayer of thanksgiving to God for the fact that God allowed him the privilege of having such a brave little girl in his life as his sister. After his prayer, he rose from his knees, got into his truck and drove to his home.

29 MAY 2024

Briggs tried being rude, mean, obnoxious, angry, and just about everything else awful he could think of to get rid of River, including a creative obscene hand gesture or two clearly displayed during a video phone conference with River. Nothing worked. River would not let up. He called Briggs several times each week after River returned to Houston from Montana, to encourage Briggs to come to Houston to meet with Albert about joining the USFIA. River had good instincts, and his instincts told him to pursue Briggs regardless of the degree to which he resisted.

Briggs was not happy with his boss, Jim Washburn. Briggs believed that where character and backbone are concerned, it’s one strike and you’re out. Washburn struck out. He folded like a cheap camping chair under minimal pressure from the FBI about James Winston’s SUV crash report. Briggs was loyal and he followed orders, but he felt strongly that loyalty and respect for authority should be given only to those who deserved them. Washburn no longer deserved either, and Washburn was not leaving the Montana State Highway Patrol anytime soon. Briggs had to admit that to himself.

But Houston and D.C. over Montana! Big city hell over big sky heaven? It just didn’t seem possible to Briggs. What about his gun? And Briggs was sure that consultants flocked to places like Houston and D.C. the way birds fly south for the winter, releasing their droppings all along the way and saving their best dump for their destination. What if there are thousands of consultants in Houston and D.C. — flocks and flocks of them — who have nothing to do all day except advise Briggs in his new job at the USFIA? Briggs wondered if God could possibly administer that extreme degree of punishment to him. Still, River seemed like a good man, and River spoke highly of Albert. Maybe it was worth a try.

So Briggs booked a flight to Houston. He planned to spend a week there to get to know River and Eddy, and to interview with Albert. Briggs had a problem, though. He had created a new category for River that he named, “Might be Okay, But We’ll Wait and See.” He wanted to hold off categorizing Eddy, though, out of respect for River and out of fear that he would anger God for being disrespectful to a lady even before meeting her.