CHAPTER 10
When Matt had headed down to Texas from California, out of habit he had packed several of what he liked to refer to as critters. They were tiny little surveillance bugs, some equipped with cameras and microphones, and some that were just tracking devices. He had worked with computer mogul Derwin Dunlap on them and they had just hit the market and had proven to be extremely handy to Matt on several cases that he had worked.
Arriving at the tree trimming service, Matt noticed that some of the work crews were obviously already gone. But sitting right in front of the office door was a work van that matched the description that Ollie had given him. He pointed it out to him and the man agreed that it looked exactly like the one that he had seen. They sat on the street watching for a few minutes as crews continued to get the equipment ready and rolled out to various jobs. When the parking lot was almost empty, Matt walked up behind the van and stuck one of his critters behind the license plate, then went back to the truck and they pulled off. He parked on the street a short distance away and brought out the laptop, activating the bug. Ollie watched in fascination as a little green dot appeared on the screen. When the van started out of the parking lot, the dot began to move. Matt looked over and smiled at him. "Houston, I gotta say – I'm impressed."
They followed the van, not wanting to get too close. Evidently the driver was an estimator for the company and they followed it for a while without being seen or seeing anything incriminating. Matt parked the truck in a department store parking lot while the driver of the van stopped at a convenience store. "You said they picked up Clarence not long before dark, right?"
"Yeah." Ollie looked over at him.
"I've got a feeling we're not going to get too far following this guy right now. I think we should wait until later on." He started the truck and pulled out, headed back to the ranch. "It would seem to me that whoever is picking these folks up isn't doing it on the clock, know what I mean?"
Ollie nodded. He looked out the passenger side window and then looked over at Matt. "I don't think we're going to find Clarence alive – and I've got a feeling that you think the same thing."
Matt hesitated. "After twenty four hours a trail begins to go cold. To be honest with you, it's not looking real good." Neither one said anything for a minute. "But you can't give up hope. I've had cases where it took me a while to track someone down and they were still alive."
Burckhardt nodded. "You know, at the rodeo, even if I wasn't working I would pay attention when you rode. There were, and still are, a lot of good cowboys out there. But when you rode – it was like you had something to prove. You were completely focused on it. Some of 'em were just there to impress the girls – but not you."
Matt grinned. "No, I was too busy trying not to get killed to worry about the girls right then – but now afterwards, that was a different story." He laughed.
"I sure never thought you would end up being a private eye. Last I had heard you were working with your dad."
"I did for a while. Then he and I kind of had a few disagreements – about offshore oil rigs for one thing. He wanted me to run the ones that he had off the California coast. But I never cared for them. They are dangerous as hell and the environmental costs in my opinion are just too high. If folks spent more time trying to come up with a way to make them safer – not just for the employees but for the habitat – I would have jumped on them. But they didn't so I didn't, and I ended up going into business for myself and then opened the detective agency. Eventually I got rid of pretty much everything else."
"Well I gotta say you aren't like most rich folks."
Matt grinned. "I hope that's a good thing."
"Yep. You aren't all uppity – like Shackleford for instance." Ollie shook his head. "That man is just pure evil as far as I'm concerned."
Houston nodded his agreement and they were quiet all the way back to the ranch. When Matt pulled in front of the bunkhouse the bottom dropped out and the rain poured. He and Ollie walked inside and looked around. The Hoffmann brothers had started prepping the building for painting. "Looking good in here guys." Matt walked on through. "Boy I can remember a few poker games I got into down here as a teenager." He grinned. "Learned a lot." Picking up a broom, he started cleaning down cobwebs and sweeping up dust. By the time it was twelve o'clock the four of them had accomplished a good bit of work. Just then they heard a voice at the front door.
"Yoo-hoo, y'all in here?" It was CJ, coming in the door loaded down with sandwiches and chips. "Matt, there's some lemonade out there if you would be so kind as to bring it in."
"Yes ma'am." He walked out and pulled it out of the trunk of the car that she had brought down. "You should have hollered at me, I would have taken care of this for you." Matt leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Fellas, I'm not sure if y'all have met my wife CJ. CJ this is Marty and Pat Hoffmann." They shook hands with her.
"Thanks for bringing the lunch, we sure appreciate it." Marty had pulled out a roll of paper towels and they all plopped down in the common area of the bunkhouse to feast on the lunch.
"No problem. I saw Matt when he pulled in and figured y'all were hard at work so I thought I would help you out a little bit." She looked around. "This old place is looking pretty good."
Matt and the other men continued working on the bunkhouse. About 2:30 he looked at his watch. "Ollie, I think we might ought to head back toward town. I'm sure the work crews didn't get much done today, but the fella in the van probably didn't have too much trouble giving estimates." The older cowboy agreed and they got in the truck and headed for town. They pulled into a parking lot near the tree service and Matt pulled out the laptop. "Looks like the van is headed back this way." In a couple of minutes it passed right by them and pulled into the parking lot.
Ollie sat up straighter when he saw the man who had been driving. "That's one of the guys, Houston. He's the one that was wearing the chartreuse shirt."
"Good. Maybe now we'll make some progress." They sat and waited. At about 4:00, the employees started filtering out of the building, but not Mr. Chartreuse Shirt as Matt had started calling him. They continued to wait and about 4:30 when the parking lot was nearly empty, a car pulled in and a man got out.
"That's the other one!" Ollie was on the edge of his seat. They watched. A few minutes later the man came back out with Mr. Chartreuse Shirt and they started out in the van. Three of the trucks towing chipper machines pulled out and left the parking lot and turned in the opposite direction of the van. Matt and Ollie followed the van discreetly and parked at the end of an alley that was adjacent to some of the property that Paul Shackleford had recently purchased. The two men got out of the van and approached a man who appeared to be homeless. "That's Gus Whittaker. He lives down here." Ollie was keeping a close eye on him. He talked to the two men for a minute then got into the van with them. Matt and Ollie exchanged a glance and started following the van again.
The van got on the highway heading east toward Houston's ranch. It turned off on the road that ran on the other side of the river. Matt's stomach began to churn. He had just had an idea and was hoping that he was wrong.
As the van pulled into the end of a gravel driveway leading into one of the hayfields, Matt slowed down. He waited a minute, then pulled into the driveway and could just see the van disappearing into the trees heading down toward the river. Following at a safe distance, he noticed that there were tracks of some heavy equipment. His stomach began to churn even more and he was pretty sure that his intuition was right on the money.
Matt stopped the truck about one hundred and fifty feet from the van and shut off the engine. He was partially hidden behind some trees and could see down into the woods that ran along the river. There lined up in a single file, were the three chipper machines that he had seen leaving the tree service earlier. "Ollie, you stay here, okay?" Matt got out of the truck and Ollie began to protest. "Look," Matt pulled out his cell phone and pushed a button, "Chuck will answer in just a minute. Tell him where we are and what's going on. Tell him we need some back up ASAP, got it? And you stay here." He turned toward the river and pulled the P30L pistol out of the back of his jeans and began to sneak down through the woods to the trucks. He could hear several voices, one of which sounded scared. That must be Gus he thought to himself. As he got closer he could hear the sounds of a scuffle. Crouching down in front of the van, Matt snuck a peek around it: there were six men pushing Gus around in a circle, punching and hitting him as he was pushed in each man's direction. Matt thought for a minute: he had the element of surprise and he also had a pistol. Hopefully none of the six men were armed. He duck walked across the front of the van and carefully slipped along the passenger side until he was almost to the back of it. Then he heard the chippers start up. It was nearly deafening but he could hear Gus screaming above the sounds of the machinery. As he came around the end of the van, Matt saw all six of the men pick up Gus and walk with him towards the first chipper. He took a big breath and stepped out from behind the van. "HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!" All of the men jumped. Three of them let go of Gus and started toward Matt. "I SAID HOLD IT! DON'T MOVE!" They stopped in their tracks, evidently having just noticed the gun. The man who had been driving the van yelled. "It's one guy, for Christ's sake! Take him out!" As the three continued on toward Matt, he fired a warning shot at the ground in front of them. Two of them stopped and put their hands up, but not the third. He dove at Matt who sidestepped and shot him in the lower leg, then turned towards the others. The van driver had Gus by his shoulders and was attempting to throw him into the chipper.
"DOWN ON THE GROUND – NOW!" Matt yelled at the rest of the men. After seeing one of their own take a bullet, they had decided to cooperate and did as they were told. But Mr. Chartreuse shirt was still attempting to throw Gus into the machine. Matt leveled his pistol on the man as he had Gus on the edge of the chipper. As he started to push, Matt slowly squeezed the trigger, hitting the man in the side. He dropped like a sack of concrete, his hand trying to cover a now widening spot of blood on the chartreuse shirt. Gus had stumbled back toward the van.
"Gus, go up to my truck on the other side of the trees. Tell Ollie to bring down the rope that's in the back, okay?" The older man nodded and took off through the trees and in short order was back down beside Matt. "Ollie, think you remember how to truss up some steers?" Matt gave the old cowboy a grin as he and Gus started to work tying up the men who had tried to kill him.
Chuck and three other deputies came pulling down by Matt's truck several minutes later with sirens blaring. They got out, weapons drawn and came down to the riverside. When they discovered that the men were tied up, they holstered their pistols and slowed down. "Houston, you just can't seem to stay out of trouble, can you?" Chuck walked up next to his friend. He looked over at Ollie and Gus. "You fellas okay?" Both men nodded and Gus began telling the deputy about how the six men had tried to throw him in the chipper. Matt had walked down and was looking at the machines. The way they were arranged, whatever was thrown into the chipper at the back would have been blown into the next chipper and then the last one, resulting in tiny pieces. The last chipper was aimed at the river. Noticing a scrap of material, Matt found a twig on the ground and pulled it out: it was black material with an ace of spades on it. They wouldn't be finding Clarence. Matt knelt down and looked in the water as Chuck walked up to him. "Oh, God, that's why the fish weren't biting." He had a sick look on his face that was reflected by Matt.
"Yep. Don't think I'm going to be eating any fish out of this water for a long time." Matt turned and headed back up toward his truck. He reached inside for his phone that Ollie had left on the seat and called CJ. "You aren't gonna believe this…"