Circles in the Sand (26 page)

After finishing with his paperwork, Rodger Patton said, “Considering the wind and rain we had last night, I’m going to mosey on out and see how our RADAR target fared.”

Tony Elsas said, “Hey, I’ll ride along with you, Rodger. Can’t get enough of this @#$%&* site.”

On the way up the north road, as the target came into view, Patton said, “From here it don’t look too good. Wind must have really tore it up.”

Circling the target to get a closer look, Tony Elsas said, “I don’t think the wind did that.”

They saw both sides of each aluminum sheet dangling or twisting in the light wind.

“Me neither,” Patton replied. “Looks like they’ve been sliced right down the middle.”

“Yeah, wasn’t too tall. Barely touched the top sheets. Maybe reaching from his horse…or standing on his truck.”

“Balls. We got plenty of aluminum sheets. We can fix that, but do we have to start  patrols out here after dark?”

“Yeah, or find a way to keep track of Fritz Deutsche and his buddies.”

Getting back in the Jeep, Tony Elsas pointed to the southeast. “I never saw a bunch of buzzards like that around here before.”

“No, me neither. Must have spotted something big. Probably on the bomb site. We better take a look.”

They headed that direction just driving over the rough landscape…slow going. They saw more of the big birds circle overhead. “Those are dirty evil birds.” Tony Elsas said.

“Yeah, and something large must be drawing them. Too bad we don’t have a couple of shotguns. I’d like to blast them back to hell.”

When they got closer, Elsas said, “I can see a  large bloody carcass…through gaps among that cluster of hacking, demon birds.”

With Tony waving his hat, and both men yelling, Rodger speeded up and drove straight at the buzzards. The birds squawked and flapped their wings, but didn’t fly up. With his stomach churning, Rodger braked right up at the carcass. “Holy cow! That’s a man!”

“Oh my GOD!” Tony Elsas barfed over the side of the Jeep.

Staked out on the ground were the remains of a nude human being. Rodger Patton leaped from the Jeep, charged the birds, waved his arms, shouted, “Go! Go! Git you demons!”

Elsas ran at the birds  from the other side, waving his cap, screaming, “Get away! Get out of here! Beat it, Beat it!”

Both men continued to scream at the buzzards, ran at them, threw clods of dirt at them…drove them back. Patton knelt by the body. He held his kerchief over his nose against the overpowering smell of the rotted corpse. “Couldn’t be here long. Buzzards haven’t finished him…but there ain’t much left. Wonder who the hell it is…and who did this to him?” Tony Elsas knelt and crossed himself. Standing, his bloodless face a visual scream, he crossed himself again. “How could anyone do that? This is unreal.” Fearfully he looked all around them. “What we gonna do?”

“I can’t leave him for these birds.”

“Don’t have much choice.”

“Help me remove the canvas roof. I’m going to cut him free from those stakes. Maybe we can cover him then.” 

“Ya know what. See that whitewash? This the center of target one?”

Rodger looked around. “Ya got me. So much of this place looks the same. If it is…there might be a stake right in the middle of him.”

Back in the Jeep, Patton drove as fast as he dared over the rough countryside. “I’ll drop you off at Q-1 to tell Clint. I’ll continue into West Layover to notify the sheriff.”

In Q-1 Clint said, “What’ going on now? Patton drops Elsas and speeds away.”

Elsas ran into the hut. “There’s a body staked out there…buzzards eating it!”

White faced, the three airmen stared at Elsas. Clint recovered first. “Wha…what?”

“Yeah, dead body…vultures picking at it.”

“Slow down, start over…Tell us from the beginning.”

When Elsas finished, Kline shouted. “That might be Hooper. We need to get  out there!”

“Hold on, calm down.” Clint said. “Dead. He’s not going away. The guys covered him. Sheriff’s business now. Unless he says no, we’ll follow him out there.”

They waited outside until they saw Sheriff Radecker’s white pick-up. He  followed Patton in the Jeep. When Radecker saw them waiting he stopped. “You guys follow along if you want.”

Clint ran over to get in the Jeep with Patton. He hollered to the rest, “Take the weapons carrier.”

By the time the men got back to the body, the buzzards had tried their best to remove the Jeep cover. The three vehicles stormed at the birds and scattered them into the air. The airmen remained at their vehicles while Radecker and Kerns approached the body. Initially all Sheriff Radecker could say was, “Damn…Damn…Damn. How will we ever know who that is…and who did it?”

Clint walked back to the weapons carrier. Observing grim faces and tense bodies he said. “You sure you guys want to see this? You don’t have to. Cover your noses if you do.”

At first, no one spoke. They could smell the corpse. Then Kline, who was twisting his cap, stood and said, “Well, shit we’re out here now. Might as well.” He jumped to the ground. The others followed. Nerves on edge, with shaky legs, stomachs churning, they walked on eggshells to join the lawmen. They just weren’t prepared for the sight under the cover. Sickened, Jewel and Kline turned away and threw up. Aghast, Priebe sniffled and held back tears.

“Oh God…Oh God…Oh God,” Alcocke moaned. “Who could have done this? Who could be so God damned evil? That looks like Apache torture…staked out on an ant hill. I can’t believe it.”

The sheriff pulled the Jeep cover back over the body. “Tommy I want you to stay out here and keep those buzzards away.” He looked at the airmen. “How about one of you guys staying for awhile too. It’ll be some time before the county coroner and state police get here.”

Clint said,  “We’ll pitch right in. I’ll rotate one of us out here long as necessary…two if necessary, so Tommy can take a break.”

“That’s decent of you Clint. I appreciate your help.” He drove off immediately.

Still white-faced, Kline’s shaky voice said, “That might be one of us…could be Hooper. I’ll take the first shift.”

Clint looked Kline over. He wanted to say, ‘you okay?’ but that might be demeaning. The man had volunteered. “Okay, Mitch. I’ll rotate someone every two hours. Meantime, I’ll get you guys some food and water.”

In town Clint filled two water bottles, and then asked Lorena to make up some hardy sandwiches for a couple of guys on guard duty.”

“Oh my goodness. What do they have to guard on Sunday?”

“The word will spread in a hurry, so I’ll tell you. Kline and Kearns are standing guard over a body found out on the bomb site. It was staked out on the ground. Buzzards fed on it. I don’t know how they’ll know for sure, but we’re guessing it may be Hooper.”

Lorena gasped. Her hands flew to her face. “How horrible. Oh that is so awful.” She asked the cook to make up the sandwiches while, crying, she went to tell her mother. Her face wrenched, her mouth agape, Dorris came out to see Clint.

“I can’t believe what I heard. It’s just too horrible. The body staked to the ground? Oh, it’s just too terrible. Please don’t tell me any more about it now.”

“I won’t. Got to get back out there with some water and grub.”

The other airmen didn’t say much, at supper…just picked at their food. Finally Alcocke asked what was on all of their minds. “Do think the body is Hooper, Chief?”

“I can only guess so. Don’t know if anyone else is missing around here.”

“Could that spooky Indian have done it?”

“Not if he’s a real spook. I’m gonna get my hands on him. Then we’ll find out.”
If Hooper, who will notify his next of kin? Me? I hope not. What the hell is going on around here? Who the hell could imagine the things that happen in this little jerk water place? Feels spooky just being here. What’s going to happen next?

During the night, the coroner and a state police patrol arrived to take charge of the body at target one. The coroner didn’t want to remove the corpse until the police detectives and scientific personnel investigated the scene first. No telling what they could miss in the dark. Early in the morning a team of detectives arrived. One of them took statements from everyone who was involved in the discovery.

Clint told all of the troops at breakfast they still had a job to do. Back at Q-1, Patton was to continue supervising the work. Rodger sent Elsas and a crew to repair the RADAR.  Clint outlined to Lance how to find the location for the other two observation towers at target two. Once that was done, Patton would show Lt. Byers where to drill post holes.

Promptly at eight-thirty Clint tried to contact Lt. Pearsall or LC Jenner. He got through around nine-ten. After Clint brought Pearsall up to speed, all the later could say was “Holy cow.”

A few minutes later LC Jenner came on the line. “I’m beginning to wonder if we haven’t placed you in the middle of a disaster area. That’s two men gone out of a potential thirteen. We’ve planned for a drone operator/mechanic, but no use sending him yet. I hate to ask, but what other problems do you have?”

“Nothing new, that you didn’t know about before now. Lt. Byers is really helping out. He dragged the tractor through a couple of target circles, but only to remove undergrowth and outline the circles. Need that dozer to make them visible from the air.”

“We’re still working on that. How are the rest of your troops working out?”

“Just great, Sir. They do enough bitching, but they do a lot of joking around too. Seems like everyone gets along reasonably well, and they all damn sure pitch right in. Our smart mouth was so concerned that the body was another airmen, he volunteered to stand guard and drive off buzzards.”

“That’s encouraging. I’ll notify OSI about the body. Doubt if they’ll get directly involved but probably will  get reports from the civilian authorities.”

Oh yes, with the body, I almost forgot. Someone vandalized our completed RADAR target. Easily repaired, but still a nuisance. Hope I don’t have to start night time patrols.”

“You don’t have enough troops, and still get the work done.”

“Probably not. One of the new men is Air Police, but naturally he wasn’t assigned any weapons for here.”

“Won’t happen. He’ll just have to be another hard worker. Stay in touch.”

While the coroner and police were involved with the murder site, Sheriff Radecker  stayed in close touch with those officials. After the body was loaded on an ambulance, the coroner told Radecker, “We don’t have the tools or expertise to autopsy a body in this condition, so I’m sending it to a state police lab in Missoula. From my examination of some of the organs still extant, I’m guessing, just guessing at this point, he was dead before he was ever deposited on that stake. Maybe drowned. That’s not for general information.”

Of course, Tommy Kearns was not deaf, so it wasn’t long before word of possible drowning reached Chet Shaffer and anyone else in the bar at that time.

Back at the ranch, Fritz hung the phone up and said to Basil, “This place is getting weird. Some of Greybull’s crew found a body on one of the target areas. Staked out on the ground, buzzards chewing on him. You ain’t been up to something else I don’t know about have you?”

“Damn sure wasn’t me. Must be the airmen that disappeared out of the Boar Pen.”

“Reminds me. Find out anything from Tawny?”

“Yeah, but you ain’t gonna like it.”

“Let me decide. Git on with it.”

“Seems a Corporal Jewel has made a big hit with the gals. They like him so much he even gets a cut rate.”

“I’ll be go to hell! Whores givin’ a discount?”

“You ain’t heard why. He licks their cunts before he fucks them. Drives em’ wild.”

“Fer chris sake. I never heard anything like that before.”

“Well, even Marie-Elena was boastin’ on him, but then said, that’s what the gals are telling me and actin’ like she didn’t know first hand.”

“Oh? Do you think he’s dived in her crotch too?”

“Hell, I don’t know, but after hearing her, and the way Tawney acted when I asked her about Marie-Elena I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“What do you mean.”

“Tawny hemmed and hawed and didn’t want to answer me. Said I should ask Marie-Elena.”

“Yeah? Well even so but where would a corporal get a hundred bucks. I can’t believe he hasn’t heard that I’ll castrate any man gets in her pants.”

“Maybe he thinks it’s worth the risk.”

“If he has, I’ll damn sure make him know otherwise.”

“So what do we do now?”

“I need to think about it…need a plan to catch him…need to figure how to get him out in the barn…without anyone else knowing. She say how often he goes over there? Hell, even with a discount I don’t see a Corporal affording it that often.”

“Unless that discount is a hundred percent. They love that little pussy eater.”

“Aw, that’s bull shit.”

“Maybe so. But like you said, where’s he gonna get a hundred bucks? For all you know Marie-Elena might be in love with him.”

Fritz glared at Basil. For that suggestion, he felt like decking Tree. Instead, he just swore long and loud.

Before returning to Q-1,Clint dropped into Sheriff Radecker’s office to see if he had any news. “Well, off the record, Clint, coroner said he guessed the body was dead before put on that stake. Might even be drowned.”

“Sounds more and more like it could be Hooper.”

“Possible. Won’t know for sure until he gets the report back from Missoula.”

“How about Donkin? Anything new on him?”

“Naw. Don’t expect anything in a hurry.”

“We have another Negro on the team now. Came in the other day in that deuce.”

“Yeah, I know.” Radecker sat back and looked inquisitively at Clint.

“You should know, that’s no problem for us. Just hope he’s no problem for anyone else. I’ve cautioned him to be always alert. Back away from any incident that occurs.”

“Good idea. Tell him not to go out hunting alone. Some of the varmints around here have guns too.”

Lorena walked into the hotel office to talk to her mother. Dorris set aside her accounting to listen. “Mom, I don’t like it that Clint moved out of here.”

“I don’t either, but there was a very good reason for him to move.”