No offence Intended - Barbara Seranella (25 page)

"Yeah, I did that once," Deb said.
"Terrible accident." Roxanne and Deb laughed. Munch
realized that they had no idea what she was talking about.

"No, I mean on purpose. I haven't had a drink or
a drug for eight months."

"Must be about time, then." More
laughter—sounding toxic and jittery.

She wanted to ask them if they'd been drinking, but
realized that was a stupid question.

"Well, come on then," Deb said. "We
got an hour-and-a-half drive to Canyonville. I hope you brought
money" She looked at Roxanne and the two of them laughed.

"Or we ain't getting out of the parking lot,"
Roxanne said.

Roxanne and Deb led the way Up ahead, she noticed the
crowd part with angry mumbling. She turned to pinpoint the cause of
this reaction and saw a trio of black men in the nucleus of the mob.
The three were dressed in long coats and superfly hats. She realized
that they were the only black faces in the airport.

"Boy did you make a wrong tum," someone in
the crowd said.

"You ain't in Kansas now," another voice
chimed in. The air was close with the threat of violence. Munch
looked at her companions, but they were oblivious to what was
unfolding. The black men regrouped, forming a circle so that their
eyes pointed out to every direction. They spoke quietly between
themselves, faces impassive, eyes never leaving the crowd. She could
only imagine what they were saying to each other. Were they as
surprised as she to find hatred flourishing in this remote place? Or
worse, were they not surprised at all?

She wanted to say something—to protest—but she
didn't. It wasn't really her business, was it? She hurried to catch
up with her friends. The scene haunted her as they left the terminal.
If blacks were treated this badly in a public place, what must it be
like for Boogie? Maybe Canyonville was different. Tux's rusty white
Ford pickup was parked at an angle in the parking lot, taking up two
parking spaces. The doors weren't locked. Roxanne opened the
passenger door and invited Munch to climb in. The door panels were
missing, as were much of the inner mechanisms. Pieces of wood held
the windows up.

Deb had to open the door to pay the parking attendant
with the five-dollar bill that Munch dug out of her pocket.

"We better get gas, too," Deb said.

"The gauge reads half-full," Munch said.

Deb laughed. "Oh, shit, that hasn't worked since
he's had the truck."

Munch fished out a twenty and handed it to Deb. This
was going to be an expensive vacation, she realized. She sat between
her two friends. The upholstery was stiff with cold and ripped in the
middle of the seat. It pinched her butt, even through the layers of
her jeans. She knew it was no accident that she was seated in the
middle. Next time she would jockey for a window seat. Deb pulled into
a gas station and came to a lurching stop at the self·serve pump.

"What's the story with you and Lisa?" Deb
asked as she filled the tank.

"I was all set to take Asia and Lisa up and
split on me.

"Sounds like we need to have a word with that
cunt," Deb said, finishing with the pump nozzle and screwing the
gas cap back on.

"I'll be happy to just get the baby back. By the
way what was your ol' man doing in L.A.?" Munch asked as they
got on their way

Deb snuck a sideways look at Roxanne. "He had
business there. I'm not supposed to say what."

Roxanne looked out the window.

"What kind of business?" Munch asked.

"Club business. He's a Gypsy Joker," Deb
added proudly

Munch whistled. " thought the Angels killed them
all off."

"Not all of them," Deb said. "The
Oakland chapter relocated up here."

"Welcome to the country" Roxanne said.

Munch drew her coat
tighter.

* * *

It took Blackstone two hours to complete the journey
to Canyonville in his rented sedan. The town had one main street
ending in a truck depot. On this boulevard were two bars, the
Snakepit being one of them. There was also a market, a Western
clothing store, and a tattoo parlor. He stopped at a market, noting
that it offered ammo and live bait for sale in addition to produce. A
sheepskin-lined suede coat displayed in the window of the shop next
door caught his eye. He wished Moody had warned him how cold it was
here. His gabardine sports Jacket wasn't getting the job done.

As he walked inside the market, customers and staff
alike viewed him with interest.

"Can I help you?" a large woman behind the
counter asked.

"You got a pay phone?" he asked.

"Sure, honey" She directed him to the back
of the store. "Anything else you need, don't be afraid to ask."
He pulled out his notebook, found Tom Moody's number, and dialed it.
While the phone rang, he glanced up at the bulletin board over his
head and read the flyers posted up there. The first one warned of a
Jewish banking conspiracy. The second invited him to discover the
truth about his Aryan heritage.

Moody answered his phone, "Sheriff's
Department."

"It's me," Blackstone said. "I'm in
town, at the market, freezing my ass off."

Moody chuckled. "I'm just two miles west of
you," he said and went on to describe a yellow house with a
white jimmy parked in the driveway "I'll be waiting."

"Anything new on the—"

"Let's talk in person," Moody said, cutting
him off. "I'll see you when you get here."

Moody like most resident deputies in small towns,
operated out of his house. His was a one-man show

Blackstone followed the directions he'd been given
and parked in the street. Moody's house was a simple one-story
building on a half-acre of land. The area between the road and the
house had been cleared of shrubbery Two large fir trees dominated the
back yard. Blackstone stepped carefully through the mud to reach the
front porch. A portly man in uniform answered his knock.

"You must be Blackstone," the man said,
gripping Blackstones hand briefly "Moody here." The deputy
guided Blackstone inside and bade him sit. The front room of the
house was similar to cop shops everywhere—a desk piled high with
paperwork, a bulletin board full of composite sketches and
photographs. The smell of coffee brewing wafted in from the kitchen.

Moody wore a dark brown uniform with light brown
piping up the leg. A silver star hung over his left pocket; his name
tag above the right. When he sat, his pantlegs hiked up to reveal
dark brown Wellington boots. Blackstone eyed the footwear enviously
feeling the cold dampness creeping through his socks and loafers.

Moody pushed aside the Stetson hat resting on top of
his desk and fished out some paperwork. It was the copy of the FBI
firearms alert memo. "Like I told you before, I called them in
three weeks ago and told them where all those weapons were. They got
all the pay phones trapped and traced," Moody said, staring at
Blackstone with bright blue eyes set in a ruddy face. As he talked,
he constantly smoothed the thin strands of his white-blond hair.

His gun belt was all but lost under his prominent
gut. "They really have a hard-on for this one," he added.

"You seem to know a lot about what's going on on
the inside," Blackstone said.

Moody shrugged and lit a cigar. " got my
sources." He opened his desk and pulled out the photograph of
Jonathan Garillo. "This guy might have been around," he
said. " can't be sure. All these hippies look alike after a
while. But there's something familiar about the eyes. I think he wore
a beard when he was up here, and he didn't have that messy hole in
his head. You say he had the number to the Snakepit in his wallet?"

"That's right." Blackstone poured himself a
cup of coffee. "My uh," he paused, struggling with the word
to use to describe Munch. He hated to call her a snitch, but
"concerned citizen" didn't quite cut it either. "The
Mancini woman, Munch, confirmed the link between Garillo and local
individuals. She also had physical evidence that tied together the
feds' case, the stolen weaponry and your resident bikers."

"Had?" Moody asked.

"There was a complication," Blackstone
said.

Moody nodded thoughtfully "So you want to clear
your homicide," he said, running his hand over his scalp.

"That's part of it," Blackstone said. "I
also want to vindicate my department."

"And you don't trust the feds to have your
departments best interests at heart?"

This time Blackstone laughed. "That goes without
saying."

"Where do you want to start?" Moody asked.

"The Mancini woman is going to check in with us
when she can get to a phone," Blackstone said.

"You gave her my number?" Moody asked.

"Yes."

"That might have been a mistake," Moody
said.

"The feds have traps on all the pay phones.
Speaking of which, let's find out what they're up to."

"You going to talk to your source?"
Blackstone asked.

Moody chuckled again. "Something like that."

Moody took Blackstone down the hallway of his house.
After passing one bedroom, Moody unlocked the door to a second room.
Blackstone was stunned to find an array of sophisticated electronic
equipment. Two out of three reel-to-reel tape recorders slowly
revolved. A shortwave radio set crackled. Another table was covered
with Teletype machines and an electronic typewriter. Moody even had a
videocassette recorder.

A red light mounted in front of the third tape
recorder lit. There was a click as the machine came to life and its
reels began to spin.

"Voice-activated," Moody said proudly

"Whose voice?" Blackstone asked.

"Why don't we find out?" Moody said,
sitting before the tape recorders. "Let's see what our
government servants are up to." He twisted a volume knob and
voices filled the room, familiar voices. They heard chairs scrape and
throats clear.

"
How was your vacation, sir?"
Blackstone recognized Claire's distinctive voice.

"Wonderful,
" a man's voice answered.
"Whats the latest?"

"That's the boss—the director out of
Sacramento," Moody explained. "He came up this morning.
They've been waiting for him to get back. He wanted to be in on the
raid."

"We're set for tomorrow night,"
Claire's voice answered.
"Bolt reports that all the
principals will be gathered for their monthly meeting. "

"What about the money?"
the director
asked.

"Brian Taxjford is driving up from Los
Angeles with the cash. We expect him to arrive around midnight and
then its a go."

"How about the L.A. end of things?"
the director asked.
" understand there was some trouble down
there."

"Nothing but. We've kept a lid on it,"
she said.
" had the woman who screwed up things for us at the
morgue remanded into custody "

"What about the shooting incident?"

"For now the LAPD think it was one of their
own. The human rights activists are up in arms. That should keep them
busy for a while."

"What really happened?"

"Willis shot a cop. Tuxford obviously decided
that it went against his interests for Willis to be taken alive."

"What about that homicide dick? Blackwood?"

"Blackstone,"
Claire corrected.

"Are you sure he won 't make any trouble?
I've heard he's pretty sharp."

"Oh, he's very clever,"
Claire said.
"Just ask him."

Moody and Blackstone heard guffaws. Blackstone's grip
tightened on the pen in his hand.

"Keep me informed,"
the one Moody
identified as the director said.

They heard sounds of doors opening and shutting, feet
walking.

"Bolt is the code name of their snitch,"
Moody explained.

"How did you bug their headquarters?"
Blackstone asked.

"They set up shop in the Motel 7 on the
interstate. I've had those rooms wired since I took over here,"
he explained. " like to know whats going on in my town." He
lit a cigar and then pointed it at Blackstone to emphasize his words.
"I might have been born at night," he added, "but it
wasn't last night."

"What do you know about Brian Tuxford?"

"He's the treasurer of the Gypsy jokers. Goes by
the moniker Tux. Drives an eighteen-wheeler."

"Treasurer, huh? Sounds like the feds have been
holding off their bust so they can catch him with the dope and the
money"

"Yep," Moody said. "Bigger money,
bigger bust. Looks good on a congressional report."

"Meanwhile, all those weapons have been
circulating."

"They'll probably leave that part out,"
Moody said.