Point of Law (6 page)

She steps up on the stump and begins to speak. Her voice is loud enough for me to hear across the meadow as she decries what the development will do to the valley. Almost as soon as she starts speaking, Fast, Burgermeister, and the other men move in behind the activists, encircling them. They begin chanting, “Local jobs! Local jobs!” drowning out Kim as she does her best to shout over them, her beautiful, damaged face getting redder and redder beneath her tan. A few of the activists, led by Cal, do their best to exhort the workers to shut up and listen, but it’s a halfhearted shushing—they’re clearly intimidated by the big, rough-looking men.

It’s over even more quickly than it began. Kim simply steps down from the stump, her head low but her jaw protruding sharply. She stalks away into the forest. I see the producer of the camera crew shrug her shoulders again and they begin packing up the equipment. The activists disperse back to their scattered camps at the meadow’s fringe while the construction workers slap one another’s shoulders and hands. I can hear their jeers.

When the television van bumps its way out of the meadow and down toward the road, the workers cheer again. This isn’t my fight—as my father advised, I’m not going to get too involved in a lost cause—but I’m angry. Fast and his hired muscle are simply bullies. Their tactics are dirty. I make myself stay in my chair and trace my hand over Oso’s heavy head where he’s laid it on one of my knees.

It looks like the show is over. I’m thinking about going to look for my dad down the canyon when Kim comes back out of the woods. She’s moving fast, her face determined, walking straight toward where Fast is distributing beer to his victorious minions. Cal and several of the activists stand up to watch from their scattered camps around the meadow. Burgermeister stands protectively in front of his boss, his hands on his hips and a nasty smile on his face.

Kim jabs a finger into the middle of his thick chest just as I’d seen him do to her earlier. Burgermeister laughs and pushes her away by placing his hands on her breasts. As she stumbles backward, her feet tangle in the grass and she falls. A small group of the workers encircle her like a grinning pack of wolves. Others back away, Fast among them, probably realizing that this is going too far. Things begin moving very quickly.

Before I can push myself out of the chair, Cal, the skinny firebrand, is stalking toward the group. Sunny trails behind him. Oso is at my side as I begin to run. Glancing over my shoulder, I check that the beast is still securely tied to the old truck with the long rope. “Stay!” I shout at him just as the rope snaps against his throat. I hear the truck creak behind me with the impact of his weight.

I’m still fifty feet away when Cal reaches the group. Through the bodies of the men, I can see Kim struggling to get up but the men keep pushing her over with their boots as Burgermeister leads them in pouring their beers on her. Fast looks as if he’s trying to intercede on Kim’s behalf. Cal leaps on somebody’s back like he’s mounting a wild horse. One of the man’s friends peels the wiry caver off his steed.

“Hey!” I yell as loud as I can. The grinning men all turn to me, but not before one of them slugs Cal in the face and sends him reeling back into the tall grass.

“Let her go! Let her go!” I’m almost to them. Their attention diverted, Kim struggles to her feet looking like an angry cat. Her wet hair is plastered across her face, her white shirt stained yellow from the soaking, her pale yellow sports bra visible through the transparent cotton. She sputters and spits.

Burgermeister steps through the throng of men and faces me. “Who the hell are you?” he asks as I stop just a few feet from him, breathing lightly from the run across the meadow.

“A witness.” I turn to Kim. “Get out of here.” She looks at me with her one good eye wide in outrage. She doesn’t move. Cal stands up, one hand held to his face, blood dripping between his fingers. “Get her out of here,” I snap at him.

“This is none of your business, buddy. And besides, the bitch touched me first.”

“You grabbed her breasts and pushed her. That’s assault. Then your boys held her down. That’s false imprisonment.”

“Alf!” David Fast barks, stepping forward and interrupting us. “That’s enough!”

For a moment I think I’m going to get out of this okay. But then Burgermeister turns to Fast with a growl. “Shut up, Dave. Let me do my job. You hired me and made me your partner, so this goddamn thing is as much mine as yours.”

Fast says, “Alf,” again, but this time his tone is plaintive. He’s ignored.

Cal has taken one of Kim’s arms and is trying to pull her away. Sunny takes the other. The construction workers move in a loose circle around where I face Burgermeister. This is what they’d wanted all morning, I realize. They’d come looking for a fight. I size up the man called Rent-a-Riot, taking in his considerable bulk. He probably weighs in at two hundred and twenty or so, forty pounds more than me. Even if I could take him, through speed and cunning and luck, his men will step in and rip me to shreds. I’m in serious trouble. A rush of fear floods through me. But for some reason the corners of my lips twist up in an expectant smile. My blood starts to tingle with a touch of my brother’s madness. Far behind me I can hear Oso bellowing across the meadow. I should have let him off the leash.

Grinning back, Burgermeister says, “She pushed me first, Scarface. Just like this.” He steps forward and shoves a thick finger hard into my chest. “Now what would you do if someone did that to you?”

I knock his wrist away. Oso roars again in the distance.

“If it were a woman, I’d walk away.” I have the familiar sensation of my vision somehow widening, my sense of sound and smell and taste all expanding while time seems to slow to half-speed.

“Are you saying I’m a woman?” Burgermeister demands, his voice sounding to my ears like a tape playing on low batteries. He tries to jab me again with his finger, and I step back, again knocking his wrist away. I’m aware of the hollow rustle of my own breath flowing in and out of my lungs.

The men gathered around us laugh. Cal and Sunny are half dragging Kim toward their friends at the screen of trees. Kim’s good eye is locked on me, open wide now in panic rather than anger. She’s talking fast to Cal but he’s just shaking his head. With his free hand he still holds the blood that’s leaking from his face. I can hear Oso roaring and slamming against the heavy rope that binds him to my truck.

I turn to walk away but a heavily bearded man in a Harley-Davidson T-shirt blocks my path. In his hand he holds a Heineken bottle by the neck, ready to swing. They aren’t going to let me go. No way. The mob of Fast’s men is totally pumped up for this. The fun they’d had with Kim on the ground at their feet, her thin shirt transparent with beer, has stirred up a violent sexual energy that I can taste in the air.

My dad’s words come back to me. “There are two things worth fighting for, son. The things you can win and the things worth dying for.” I add a third:
You fight when you’ve got nothing to lose, just to get in as many licks as you can.
I spin back toward Burgermeister and shoot a clenched-fist jab at his face.

He has both hands raised like a boxer; he easily bats away my fist. But it was never my intention to hit him with my hand. That was another rule my dad had taught me about fighting—never hit a man in the face unless you want a broken hand. With my hands high in the air, I snap a clean front kick into his crotch. Then, as he doubles over with an explosion of exhaled air, I bring my left elbow down on the back of his head. I might as well be striking a boulder—a lightning bolt of pain shoots up my arm.

“Anton!” Kim shouts my name. The two syllables come out as crisp as hands clapping twice. A warning.

I whip my head toward the sound while dropping into a low crouch. A body is coming at me in a flying tackle. I shove into the air, coming out of the crouch like a whale breaching, and lift the incoming body high, flinging it into the air and sending it crashing into another man. Out of the corner of my eye I see another object arcing toward my skull—a green bottle clenched in someone’s raw-knuckled fist. There’s a flare of bright light as the bottle shatters against the side of my head.

SIX

T
HE PUNCHES AND
kicks of seven or eight big men fall on me with an almost mechanical rhythm. It feels as if I’m being run through a threshing machine. At first their blows just cause sharp explosions of pain before a sort of numbness overwhelms my body. And the realization that once they’re done beating me, there will be a lot more pain to come. Over their grunting curses and occasional barks of laughter, I can hear Oso roaring as he throws himself against the rope. I kick and punch back as best I can from where I’ve been pummeled onto my back in the grass. But every time I strike out with a leg or a fist, a new blow sneaks in to bang some exposed, vital part.

Over the whoops and the laughs of the men all around me, there comes an immense thundering sound, as if some gigantic tractor really is tearing its way through the meadow to finish the job of chewing me up. At first I think it’s my consciousness taking flight, lifting off a runway in my brain. But when my world doesn’t fade to black I realize it might be one of the trucks coming to run me over.

I picture the huge ribbed tires I’d seen churning the grass when the trucks had first pulled into the meadow. A part of me can’t believe that these men would actually intend to kill me—when it began it had seemed like a little fun, a simple mauling, and a lesson not to interfere, was all they were after. I ignore the sharp blows that hammer in every time I open myself up and fight back with every savage ounce of strength I possess.

Suddenly the men are leaping off me like flies swatted away from a piece of rotting meat. A shower of torn grass and dirt pelts my skin. When I twist my head to figure out which way to roll to avoid the thick rubber treads, all I can see are two spinning tires instead of four, smaller than I expect, and the chrome and glossy black paint of a speeding motorcycle. The bike’s just a few feet from my head. And then it’s gone. The machine races past me, chasing the fleeing, shouting men. The bike’s rider is screaming the Highland war cry Dad taught my brother and me when we were kids.

I prop myself up unsteadily onto my hands and knees. It’s Roberto on the bike. His black hair streams out from behind low-slung sunglasses. He’s wearing a pair of heavy brown jeans, faded to the color of buckskin, below a black T-shirt. A leather jacket is rolled on the bike behind his back, above the saddlebags. He looks like an avenging Apache ghost.

I feel a familiar thrill rush through me; it’s the same exhilaration I’d felt in a dozen schoolyard fights when older boys on some new military base sought to teach the new kid a lesson. So many times my brother had magically appeared, apparently out of nowhere, rescuing me, punishing my older tormenters, and finally chasing them off as they bawled like frightened children.

With confident ease he slams the bike’s rear brake while turning the handlebars, slewing the bike through the grass and turning it one hundred and eighty degrees. Even from across the meadow, I can see the wild grin I know so well on his face.

Burgermeister runs toward my brother. He moves with surprising agility for a bodybuilder. In his hand he holds a piece of metal—a tire iron or maybe a crowbar he’s lifted from the back of a pickup. I shout a warning at Roberto. The motorcycle gives a throaty roar as he spins the rear wheel in the grass and heads straight toward the threat. Over the engine’s noise, I can hear my brother laughing. The scene looks like something out of a medieval joust, only Rent-a-Riot is horseless. I can’t help but be impressed by the big man’s courage. Or stupidity. He’s about to feel the full force of my brother’s madness.

Fast and his remaining men gather near the safety of their parked trucks. They’re staring at the action in the center of the meadow. Someone yells at Burgermeister, “Get that crazy fucker!”

Roberto weaves the bike back and forth as he gooses the throttle. I can see every sinew and muscle in his lean arms where he grips the handlebars. Burgermeister keeps running toward him, bobbing from side to side in answer to my brother’s changes in course. The burly man with the linebacker’s muscles dances with an odd, determined grace as he runs. His face is set in an intense scowl. It looks as if he’s hoping to step aside like a matador at the last moment, hoping to have the chance to swing the piece of iron and take my brother’s head off with it.

They come together just as the big man raises his weapon. Roberto gooses the throttle again and shoots forward in a sudden burst. With one hand he grabs the iron close to Burgermeister’s wrist. But the big man holds on tight enough to cause Roberto to start to spill the heavy bike into the grass. Still grasping the bar, my brother springs from the seat and drives a knee into the other man’s chest. They both go down in a tangle. The two wrestle for just a moment before Roberto flips him on his back with a judo throw. Burgermeister is discovering my brother’s crazed strength. The other men are running toward them.

An explosion splits the air just as Roberto raises the tire iron over the man’s face, ready to strike. The gunshot seems to rip the valley wide open, freezing time. The only move anyone makes is to jerk their heads at the sound. It had come from where Oso is still slamming against the rope, jerking my truck’s four tires a few inches with each lunge.

My father stalks across the meadow with my .40 caliber Heckler & Koch held high. He must have found my keys and pulled it out of the glove box. “Get off him, Roberto.”

My brother shakes his head as if amused, then climbs off Fast’s enforcer.

Despite the gun in my father’s hand, David Fast walks right up to him. “Put that gun away, mister,” he demands, his voice out of breath. “It’s over.”

Behind him Burgermeister gets unsteadily to his feet with his eyes fixed on my brother.

My father complies. He uncocks my pistol with a snap of his thumb and slips the gun into a pocket of his baggy shorts. “You and your men leave. Now.” His voice is crisp and sharp, a colonel’s voice, used to having his orders obeyed. The force of his presence and his tone has all the men but Fast and Burgermeister walking toward their trucks. Roberto is righting his huge motorcycle, ignoring them all.

“Hold it!” Burgermeister shouts at them. Then to Fast he prods, “Tell him, Dave.”

Fast looks slightly uncomfortable, as if his dignity is offended by Burgermeister’s coarse presence, but he speaks with a firm voice. “This is my meadow. My valley. It will be by the end of the week, anyhow. We’re not going anywhere.”

Dad reaches into his pocket. For a moment I’m afraid he’s going to bring the H&K back out—the colonel isn’t used to being disobeyed. But instead he brings out the almost brick-sized shape of his satellite phone.

“If that’s the way you want it, then I’m going to have to call the authorities. Let them know that you and your men assaulted a young man and woman.”

Fast chuckles. “You go right ahead, mister. The girl and that fellow”—he points at me—“started it. Besides, the sheriff’s a good friend of mine.”

Dad doesn’t even blink. “I mean the federal authorities. This is still National Forest land.”

Still chuckling, but now to save face rather than out of amusement, Fast holds up his hands. I can see his face is red and that his thin lips twitch while trying to hold up his false good humor. “All right, all right. We’ll leave you and the hippies to smoke pot and do whatever else you people do while working men are out there trying to make a living.”

It’s funny to hear my dad called a hippie. If I weren’t hurting so much, I might laugh.

Then Fast calls out louder so that the entire meadow can hear him, even the Tribe members who watch from the trees, “But on Friday, you people better be out of here. I mean that. This will be my land by then.”

Burgermeister adds in a booming voice, “My boys and me are going to do what we call a ‘citizen’s arrest’ to anyone who’s still here. For trespassing. And I hope no one
accidentally
resists.”

As Fast and Burgermeister walk by where Roberto’s crouching by his motorcycle and plucking grass and mud from the cowling, Burgermeister points at him. “You’re gonna be mine, bitch.”

For a long moment they stare at one another. Roberto slowly comes to his feet. A smile creeps onto his face, then slowly disappears. He’s a lot smaller than the weight lifter, but as his smile fades, he looks just as mean.

“Roberto,” my father says warningly.

Fast, too, tries to intervene. “Come on, Alf.”

Burgermeister pauses before leaving and turns to me. “You too, Scarface.”