Exile Hunter (57 page)

Linder stopped short.
Not far ahead, shoppers were entering and leaving the store.

“Can you describe
what’s not right?” he said.

“She promises to do
things and then she forgets them,” Caroline answered. “And she
hides things.”

Linder listened and
nodded. It seemed that he and Sharon Unger had not been the only ones
to notice the effects of Patricia’s drinking. But as neither was a
blood relative, there was little they could do to help mother or
daughter without Patricia’s consent.

“If there’s
anything I can do to help…” he began before Caroline cut him
short.

“Don’t,” she said
wearily. “Don’t get close. She’ll only break your heart.”

The greater danger for most lies not in setting our aims too high and
falling short, but in setting them to low and achieving them.
Michelangelo

FRIDAY, MID-JUNE, COALVILLE

The next morning,
Larry Becker summoned Linder and his son Jay to the front office and
closed the door behind him.

“Are you two
yardbirds paying attention to what’s been going on in Kamas?” he
demanded.

“I heard a rumor that
the prisoners took over the camp and troops have cordoned the place
off,” Jay replied. “I tried to get a look this morning but turned
around when I saw the roadblock.”

“I’ve heard much
the same,” Linder responded. “Why do you ask?”

“I hear it’s been a
standoff all week and that talks have gone nowhere,” the factory
owner replied. “It looks to me like the government is gearing up to
send in troops.”

“Those boys know what
they’re up against. I reckon they’ve decided to go down swinging
rather than bend over one more time,” Jay commented.

“And that’s
certainly their choice,” Larry agreed. “But it’s how a
government assault would affect the rest of us that has me worried.
Unless the prisoners settle, pretty soon all of Summit county will be
crawling with troops, and along with them will come hordes of
security men to round up parolees, dissidents, and anyone else they
suspect might interfere with a siege or the cover-up afterward.”

“So what are we
supposed to do about it?” Jay asked with a shrug. “We can’t
pick up stakes every time there’s some kind of security flap in the
neighborhood. We’ve got work to do.”

“Okay, then, here’s
my question, and maybe Tom can answer it,” Larry went on. “How
long do you suppose the prisoners can hold out? Or, more likely, how
long before the DSS brings in armor to demolish the place?”

“No revolt on this
scale has ever been seen in an American labor camp,” Linder
observed. “Even the Soviets had only one or two camp-wide revolts
and, as I recall, none of those was allowed to go on much more than a
few weeks.”

“Okay, let’s assume
it lasts a month. Why don’t the two of you hit the road for a
couple weeks till this blows over? We could arrange for you to hole
up in North Dakota, in friendly territory. Don’t worry about the
packaging lines. Jose and I can manage those.”

“Ahh, Dad, I don’t
know,” Jay demurred. “We’re buried in orders right now and we
need the volume. I think this thing will blow over.”

“I see your point,
Larry,” Linder agreed, “but right now isn’t a good time for me
to go away, either. Why don’t we wait it out? If they bring in
armor, it’ll arrive by rail and won’t be very easy to hide.
Meanwhile, we’ll all keep our eyes open.”

While Linder
appreciated the risk of being caught up in a security sweep, he felt
uncomfortable about traveling on his stolen Montana identity
documents. So long as he remained in Coalville, he felt reasonably
safe and expected sufficient advance warning of an assault on the
camp to hide out in the surrounding mountains, if required. To travel
further before he had made adequate preparations might be dangerous
not only for him, but for Patricia and Caroline.

“Okay, fellas, have
it your way,” Larry relented. “But at the first sign of trouble,
I want you out of here, okay? I’ll be making a quick trip to
Bismarck later this week and will set things up for you, just in
case.”

* * *

On returning to Jay
Becker’s apartment that evening, Linder sat down to draft a letter
to his cousin Ruth that Larry could post from North Dakota. Several
weeks had passed since Linder had heard from Ruth and the lack of
news troubled him. While his initial messages had sought to learn of
his sister’s condition without informing her of his escape, now he
felt the need to reveal more of himself to her.

“Dear Ruth,” his
letter began, “The time has come to inform my sister that I am
alive and well. Please go to her and tell her in person that I ask
forgiveness for the troubles I have caused her and will help as soon
as I can. You and she must tell no one that I am alive and she must
understand that she is being monitored at all times. Until I come for
her, she is to watch and wait and find several locations near home or
work where she and I can meet unobserved. I think of her always and
will love her forever. Please continue to post your replies on the
refugee locator board.

Signed/ Your Cousin

P.S. Burn this now.”

When the letter was
sealed, Linder slipped it between the pages of a magazine and set the
magazine aside. Then he opened a paper bag containing a boil-and-bite
mouthguard kit and some women’s makeup that he had bought from a
pharmacy in Park City and set to work creating a homemade dental
prosthesis to alter his bite and jawline. Having been trained in the
use of physical disguise and having employed it frequently in his
undercover work, Linder was reasonably confident that he could
deceive most live or photographic surveillance, as well as most
facial recognition software, through the skillful application of
makeup, eyewear, hairstyle, wardrobe and cosmetic dentistry, and
could do the same for Jay, as well, if needed. So for the rest of the
evening, he experimented before the bathroom mirror until he had
mastered three alternative looks for himself that could be produced
within minutes using his simple do-it-yourself kit.

On Larry Becker’s
return from Bismarck, Linder waited several days before his next
visit to the public library to check the refugee message board but
found nothing in it from Ruth. Meanwhile, his concerns for Patricia
and Caroline mounted with each passing day, as he heard nothing from
them or Mrs. Unger. While the landlady had reported the week before
that Patricia’s drinking appeared to have abated, possibly with the
help from Alcoholics Anonymous, Mrs. Unger’s communications had
intimated in no uncertain terms that she would prefer to handle
relations with Patricia her own way. Whatever might be brewing
between them, Linder knew it would be wise for him to stay away. His
job would be to deal with the aftermath.

Linder’s assessment
was confirmed when the landlady left him a voicemail at work to call
her. When he did, she told him that Patricia and Caroline had left
the bungalow by mutual agreement with her and had moved into a rental
cottage not far away, on 100th Street East, near the middle school.
Linder knew the house, as he had seen the ‘for rent’ sign in
front and recalled Patricia admiring it.

“I’m sorry to hear
that, Sharon,” Linder replied with a proper note of sympathy. “I
hope it all ended amicably.”

“Oh, yes, everything
turned out for the best,” came the chill reply, which conveyed the
exact opposite meaning.

“Not to pry or
anything, but is everyone doing okay?” he inquired gently. If
Patricia had moved out, he feared, her drinking was the probable
cause and a relapse might well send Patricia into a tailspin.

“It would seem so,”
Mrs. Unger answered with an audible sigh. “Of course, I will miss
Caroline terribly. We grew rather close, you know. And her mother
isn’t exactly the best example...”

“And Patricia?”
Linder interrupted. “Is she back on her feet?”

“For the moment, at
least,” Mrs. Linder replied. “And that’s not to deny the ordeal
that poor woman has been through. I have nothing but sympathy for
her.”

“Yes, of course,”
Linder agreed. “And I appreciate your taking them in when they
needed a place to stay. But now that they’ve moved out, let me
change the subject for a moment. By any chance, you wouldn’t have
rented out their rooms just yet, would you?”

“Not quite yet,”
the landlady answered coyly. “Why, do you have a tenant in mind?”

“I might,” Linder
replied. “Unfortunately, Jay’s sofa isn’t doing my back any
good, and I do miss your cooking, Sharon.”

“Very well, then,”
she replied with the hint of a smile in her voice. “Come by some
afternoon and we’ll talk.”

* * *

For the entire next
week, after moving back into his old room at the bungalow, Linder
could think of nothing else but paying a visit to Patricia and
Caroline Kendall at their new home. Not having heard from Patricia
since she received the letter from Roger, and not being sure of her
state of mind, he mapped out every conceivable permutation of his
planned approach to her until he was confident of being able to
handle them all. And so, on his next day off, he trailed mother and
daughter from the middle school to their cottage before retreating to
place a phone call.

“Hi, Patricia, it’s
Tom,” he greeted her. “It’s been a while, so I just thought I’d
call to check in.”

“Well, hello, Tom,”
she answered with more warmth than he expected. “It’s lovely to
hear your voice.”

“And yours,” he
replied. “Congratulations on finding your new place. Mrs. U gave me
the number. Is it the white cottage with the gray shutters on 100
East that you liked so much?”

“That’s it,”
Patricia acknowledged. “We’ll have you over to see it once we’ve
finished cleaning the place. Right now it’s in pretty bad shape
since the owners left it vacant so long.”

“I’d be happy to
help, if you need a handyman,” he offered. “I’m pretty good at
moving furniture. Strong back, weak mind, you know.”

He heard Caroline’s
stage whisper in the background: “Invite him! Invite him!” and
Patricia’s muffled “Hush!” in response.

“Well, actually, that
might not be a bad idea,” Patricia proposed. “We’re going to be
cleaning all evening, but the owners are bringing over some furniture
tomorrow and we might need some help finding room for it after
dinner. Might you be free to join us tomorrow evening, say, around
seven? I don’t know what we’ll eat yet, but Caroline will think
of something, I’m sure.”

“Well, yes, I suppose
I could adjust my schedule to fit it in,” he teased.

“Wear your overalls,”
she joked in return.

Linder appeared
promptly at seven the next evening bearing a bouquet of local irises
to match his blue coveralls with “Tom H.” embroidered on a patch
above the breast pocket. Patricia answered the kitchen door in jeans
and a sweatshirt, mop at her side, having just finished swabbing the
floor.

It had been a hot, dry
summer day, typical of late June in the Wasatch Mountains, and her
face was beaded with perspiration from the work. She held an icy
glass of lemonade in her spare hand and offered to pour him one from
a pitcher on the kitchen counter. The kitchen was spotless and the
kitchen chairs were still stacked upside down on the breakfast table.

“Let’s move
furniture later,” she suggested with a conspiratorial wink. “I’ve
done enough work for one day and would like to freshen up. Why don’t
you go in and ask Caroline to show you around?”

“Sounds great,”
Linder agreed, and followed Patricia into the spacious but sparsely
furnished living room, where Caroline slouched by the empty stone
fireplace in an easy chair, listening to a Joan Baez recording from
the 1960s.

“Wow, I think I’m
having a déjà vu moment!” Linder declared in a voice loud enough
to be heard over the music.

Caroline lowered the
volume and gave him a quizzical look.

“Déjà vu? Right
now?” she asked in disbelief.

“Did you realize that
Joan Baez was your mother’s absolute favorite when she was your
age?”

Aghast at the thought,
Caroline stuck out her tongue as if to gag.

“Where did you find
an old CD like that?” Linder inquired.

“A friend of mine
gave it to me,” she answered evasively.

“Just between you and
me, I wouldn’t let that one out of the house,” he advised.
“Owning banned music can get you into more trouble than you think.”

“I don’t care,”
she said defensively. “Besides, it’s nobody else’s business
what I listen to in private.”

“It wasn’t when I
was your age, but it is now,” he cautioned. “Just be careful,
okay? You’ve already seen where they send people who insist on
acting as if this were a free country. You don’t want to go back
there.”

Caroline scowled and
drew her knees up toward her chest. Then he saw her eyes glisten and
felt he might have laid it on too thick.

“Here, let me play
you something I think you’ll like,” he proposed.

He pulled a plastic
compact disc case from a zippered cargo pocket in his overalls and
inserted it into the player. Out of the speakers came the hammering
piano chords of Jerry Lee Lewis’s rock-and-roll tour de force,
“Great Balls of Fire.” In the next moment, Linder peeled the blue
coveralls from over his khakis and sport shirt and launched into a
frenzied jitterbug on the parquet floor. He held out his hands for
Caroline to join him.

“But I don’t know
how!” she giggled.

“Doesn’t matter,”
he answered breathlessly, “I’ll show you!”

Moments later, he had
her swinging and twirling to the music, doing steps she had never
imagined she could do. When the music stopped, both were beaming and
breathing hard.

“Want to try
something totally different?” he coaxed. It’s fantastic, I
promise.”