Red Jacket (8 page)

20

Laurium

SUNDAY, JUNE 15, 1913

Bapcat's operation of the Model T continued to be so erratic that Harju had decided to remain another day to help Bapcat polish his driving skills. The day before they'd driven up to Eagle River to visit Sheriff John Hepting, who admired the unusual vehicle and proclaimed, “Someday I can see every policeman in America in one of these contraptions.” They all laughed at him, but he said, “I'm not joking.”

Hepting looked at Bapcat's new badge, smirked, and raised an eyebrow.

“Something amuse you, Sheriff?” Harju asked.

“I'm just thinking that after that weasel Bestemand, there's a large adjustment ahead for Deputy Bapcat. When did this become official?”

“Three weeks ago,” Bapcat said. “I took the oath in Marquette.”

“Why has it been kept quiet?”

“Biding his time,” Harju said. “Eventually, people will know.”

Hepting nodded once and asked no further questions.

At noon on Sunday, Harju loaded his bags. Bapcat left Zakov with the rats and drove the other officer south six or so miles down to Laurium, less than a mile from Red Jacket proper. The other deputy obviously wanted to talk.

“Are you certain you want that crazy Russian wolfer with you?”

“He'll be all right,” Bapcat said.

“He's no physical help until he heals. You need someone to help you until the Russian's healthy. And it takes two men to operate the Ford.”

Bapcat said, “I know.” He pulled up to the Red Ball Pool Hall in Laurium, parked, left Harju alone, and went inside. It was dark with a single light suspended over each table. “George Gipp live around here?”

A man with a bushy mustache and a cigar stuck to his lower lip stood with a pool cue in hand. “If he's not here or playing ball, he'll be fast asleep at home. Hecla Street, number 432. Don't rub his old lady the wrong way; her tongue's sharp enough to skin a trout.”

Hecla Street was a block south of the business district, and the house at 432 Hecla Street was one and a half stories, with a gabled front, narrow lot, closed-in porch, shingled sides. It was painted, nice, but basically a lowly miner's house given some attention. There was a girl on the front porch, blonde, young, blue-eyed, ten or so. Bapcat was uncomfortable around children.

“George Gipp here?”

“Do I look like a boy?” the girl shot back.

“Does he live here?”

“Who wants to know?”

Bapcat held out his badge and let her look at it. “Is Georgie in trouble?” she asked.

“Should he be?”

“He's sleeping. My brother's always asleep, or he's not here,” she added.

“Wake him up.”

“He won't like it.”

“But I will,” he said.

The girl shrugged, slid inside.

Gipp shuffled onto the porch a few minutes later, barefoot and shirtless, suspenders over muscled shoulders, yawning. “Deputy?” he said.

“You find a job yet?”

“Like I said, I'm a ball player.”

“A real job.”

“Not yet.”

“How'd you like to drive for the State, for me?”

Gipp looked at the truck. “You mean that
contraption?”

“Yep. You'll have to bunk with us up near Allouez. Your schedule will be erratic.”

“Nothing new,” Gipp said. “My life's always that way. What's this so-called job pay?”

“Dollar a day, and you can use the Ford to get to your practices and ball games.”

Gipp grinned and nodded. “You got yourself a driver, boss.”

“Pack a bag for a couple of days,” Bapcat told the boy. “You can come back later for more.”

Harju showed Gipp how to drive, and the eighteen-year-old took to it immediately, his superior coordination letting him master all the skills effortlessly.

The Marquette deputy warden had some final words for Bapcat. “Squeeze Nayback and stay on that Bootjack business. The judge wouldn't have pointed you in that direction without a reason.”

“I'm taking orders from you now?” Bapcat challenged.

“For a few months. Jones says he's too far away, but I can get over here pretty quick. You need anything, wire me. The phones at my end are unreliable—too many ears.” The two men shook hands. “The kid there, you think he's up to this?” Harju asked.

Bapcat nodded. “Pretty sure.”

“Don't let your wife order him around,” Harju said. “And leave the wolfer out of the reports for now.”

“Yes, sir.”
What reports?

Bapcat and Harju shook hands and Gipp helped the deputy carry his bags into the station to await a trolley going south.

En route to Bumbletown Hill, Bapcat asked Gipp if he could write.

Gipp smiled. “How much extra does that pay?”

Bapcat liked the boy, sensed toughness mixed with playfulness, a lot of self-confidence. In some ways Bapcat envied the young man who just wanted to be a ball player.

21

Bumbletown Hill

TUESDAY, JUNE 17, 1913

“I am telling you he's out there again,” Zakov said, looking down the hill behind the cabin.

“Who is out there?” Bapcat asked.

“A little man, a troll perhaps, or an Arab
djinn
, a real American
manitou—­
any of these creatures, all of them. I saw him loitering several times on Sunday.”

Bapcat looked down the hill. “It's Nayback,” he said. “Why didn't you say something before?”

“Must I report every individual I observe?”

Bapcat picked up his Krag, loaded it, put extra cartridges in his pocket, slung the rifle, and went out the front door. He ducked into the high grasses near the boulder field and worked his way down the hill through cover, to just north of where he had seen Nayback.

He came up behind the man. “Is there a reason you're hiding in our woods?” The rifle was un-slung, but at his side in one hand.

Nayback was startled, jumped, and clutched at his chest. “Where in blazes did
you
come from?”

“From the very place you've been spying on for the past two days.”

“I've been waiting to see you,” Nayback said.

“We have doors.”

“I can't be seen with you, but I need to talk.”

“Talk,” Bapcat said, wondering what all the mystery was about and guessing Hedyn was somewhere in the mix.

Nayback held out an envelope. “One hundred dollars.”

“The hundred Bestemand gave you?”

“Yes,” the man said, looking down.

“Your eyes suggest differently. Whose money is this?”

“I just told you.”

“No, you haven't. Why did Bestemand give you the money?”

“To establish a local Forest Scouts group.”

“Which you failed to do, then lied about.”

“He promised to help and then he disappeared. After that, there seemed no point, so I kept the money.”

“Which you denied having.”

“I know; I'm sorry.”

“Do you know what happened to Bestemand?”

“Put his nose where it didn't belong.”

“Care to be more specific?”

“Unless you are expressly invited, one must avoid a certain captain's swamp.”

Bapcat didn't understand and didn't press. The man was shaking.

“Earlier you told me you never got the money.”

Nayback's twitch began to intensify.

“An error in judgment, a lapse I cannot adequately explain. You said the State wants its money back, and now you and the State have it. I'm sorry for what I said about your birth status. I would like to put this thing behind us and get on with educating youngsters.”

Bapcat weighed his choices, best as he could figure them. “You can't commit a crime, say I'm sorry, and escape justice. It doesn't work that way.”

“Justice . . .
here?
” the man sputtered. “We're all slaves to the barons of copper. I just want done with all this,” Nayback insisted, his voice reedy.

“I'll have to talk to my superiors and give you a receipt for the cash.”

Nayback's face was flushed, flashing panic. His hands came up and he backpedaled away. “No receipt, no record; I know nothing of that money.”

Which suggested to Bapcat the hundred was not the same that had been given to the man by Bestemand. It wasn't hard to figure out where it had come from, or why.
Hedyn wants me to back off Nayback.
Why?

Gipp and Zakov were waiting on the porch. “It was Nayback,” Bapcat said. “How well do you know Captain Hedyn?” he asked Gipp.

“Only of him. I guess everybody in Copper Country knows who he is.”

“Nayback was with the captain at the wrestling match.”

“Hedyn likes to keep track of things . . . personally.”

“You ever hear of Hedyn and Bestemand being tight?”

“Everybody said Bestemand was Cruse's boy, but Hedyn keeps track—and score, I hear.”

“Score?”

“Anybody crosses him gets paid back.”

“A perfectly understandable and advisable trait in a toy czar,” Zakov announced.

22

Upper Black Creek Canyon, Houghton County

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 18, 1913

John Hepting appeared without warning at Bapcat's cabin. “I've got a situation that might interest you,” the Keweenaw county sheriff told Bapcat.

Bapcat gathered his equipment and climbed into Hepting's Model A Ford. “Where we going?” He rode with the butt-end of his Krag on the floor between his legs.

“Upper end of Black Creek Canyon, camp of a fella named Enock Hannula. I've got a warrant.”

“Stumper Hannula,” Bapcat said with a sigh.

“You know him?”

“He used to trap beavers south of Copper Harbor, over in the Breakfast Lake area.”

“Used to?”

“I had to teach him about stealing my traps.”

“Have a little talk?”

“Not many words, and no conversation, but he got the point. Haven't seen him since.”

“I've dealt with him a time or two myself.”

“What's the warrant for?”

“Secreting property. Hannula ran up substantial debts, the court convicted him of same, and sentenced him to sell his belongings to settle the debt, but the booger moved all his belongings out of the county.”

“Big debts for what?”

“Supplies and so forth—from your own Widow Frei. We arrested him for constructive larceny, and he was released on bail.”

Bapcat shrugged. The widow wasn't his.

Hepting said, “The widow waited a year with Hannula promising he'd pay. Finally she swore charges, we made the arrest, and he was found guilty. That's when we learned he'd cleaned out his house at Copper Falls.”

“And moved them up the Black River?”

“We don't know exactly where he took them, but his wife sent me a note saying he's got a shack up the canyon, barely into Houghton County.”

“His
wife
turned him in?”

“Unhappy wives help us make a lot of cases. Hannula's a Church Finn and partial to the Book.”

“Book believer or not, Hannula isn't the kind to come along peacefully,” Bapcat offered.

Hepting furrowed his brow. “That's why I asked you along. Think Deputy Valo would be worth anything in a scrap?”

“He's
your
deputy, John.”

“Correction: He's my
inherited
deputy. His old man's on the county board. I don't have a single deputy I hired. They're all holdovers, and mostly worthless when the chips are down.”

“Get rid of him. Get rid of all of them.”

Hepting glanced at him. “You've got a lot to learn, Lute. Politics steers a lot of things. Ain't right, but that's how she is.”

“What if Hannula's not there?”

“We'll wait for him. Got something better to do?”

“I might,” Bapcat said.

The sheriff laughed.

Bapcat asked, “Is there more to this than you're telling me?”

“In addition to telling us where he might be, his wife mentioned he's getting an early start on venison.”

“She say more than that?”

Hepting looked at Bapcat. “Up here somebody telling the sheriff
anything
is by itself a whole lot!”

There was no sign of Hannula at his shack, but there was some evidence he had been around recently: semi-warm coals in the fire pit, a couple of partly burned cigarettes. One window in the shack was curtained over. The sheriff stepped into the woods and found a place to sit and watch, slapping mosquitoes.

Bapcat and Hepting circled the cabin slowly, and within a hundred yards, just beyond a sharp bend in the creek, they discovered a cellar storm door in the side of the hill. Bapcat tugged it open and found six deer on a bed of dry ice. No heads, just bodies, skinned, no hides in sight. Without the heads, there was no way to judge how long the animals had been dead.

When Hannula showed up he was dragging another deer, freshly killed, his arms and clothing bloody.

Hepting stepped out to the Finn and touched his arm. “You're under arrest, Hannula. The charge is secreting property.”

Hannula released the carcass. “What the hell's that mean, Sheriff?”

“Means larceny.”

The Finn wiped his hands on his shirt and leered. “This is because that Jezebel keeps a house of ill fame for prostitutes. I want the strumpet arrested on morals charges.”

Hepting said, “That business would be between you and your lawyer, Enock, not me. You and me got different business. Are you intending to come along peacefully?”

The man seemed to be weighing his chances with the sheriff when Bapcat stepped out. “What's that damn trapper here for?” Hannula asked, taking a step backwards. “Two against one ain't fair.”

“Deputy Bapcat's the game warden now.”

“
Him?
”

“That deer's illegal,” Bapcat said. “New season's August one to December fifteen.”

“A man's gotta eat.”

“There's six more on ice down the creek.”

“Not mine,” Hannula said, with enough conviction that it gave Bapcat pause.

“You knew they were there.”

Hannula gave him a cold stare. “Prove it.”

“Don't have to. They're on your property. That makes them yours.”

“It's not
my
property,” the Finn insisted.

“Prove it,” Bapcat played back at him.

“My property don't reach down that far.”

“That
far?
Meaning, you know where the carcasses are.”

“I said they ain't mine is all I said, eh.”

“You said your property doesn't stretch that far. I just said there are six more iced down the creek, not where.”

Hannula sighed, hunched over, and clenched his fists.

Bapcat knew the man was going to fight and bent his own knees, but Hepting wasn't waiting. The sheriff swept the man's legs from beneath him, smacked him in the head with a sap—a small fold of leather filled with lead—pinned him to the ground with his knee, and handcuffed him.

“The whore,” Hannula hissed.

“Which one?” Hepting asked.

“All of them,” Hannula shouted, “all of them!”

Bapcat helped the sheriff get the dizzy prisoner to his feet. “You saw he was going to bolt,” Hepting said.

“Back, knees, fists.”

The sheriff smiled. “You learn fast, Lute. Next time don't give him the chance to act. Strike first and hit hard! What do you want to do about the carcasses?”

“Can we tie them to your Ford?”

The sheriff poked Hannula. “You got rope in your camp?”

“Not for the likes of you,” the man shot back.

“Break down the door,” Hepting said.

“You can't do that,” Hannula protested.

“When did you become a goddamn lawyer? I have a felony arrest warrant for your apprehension. We need to search for stolen goods. You emptied your place in Copper Falls. And you just resisted arrest.”

“There ain't nothing in there.”

“Open it,” Hepting told Bapcat, who kicked near the handle and shattered part of the door inward.

The prisoner was morose, but he was partly right. There were no stolen goods in the shack, but plenty of rope.

•••

The Eagle River justice of the peace was Hyppio Plew, a small, nervous man with a meticulously groomed beard and a silvery striped vest. He studied the warrant.

“I want bail,” Hannula announced.

“And God wants a land free of sinners. Neither of you is getting your way. You want the same lawyer you had last time around, Enock?”

“I guess he didn't do me no good first time, did he?”

“That's your problem, son.”

“This ain't no damn death case,” Hannula muttered gruffly.

“Ain't nobody said it was, son. But fact is, you're a convicted felon, Hannula, and knowing a little law is like knowing a little medicine—it just makes things worse, so you'd best be still. Sheriff, lock him up until we can perform the examination tomorrow at ten in the morning. Unless, of course, the prisoner waives examination and stipulates to charges.”

“What's that mean?” Hannula asked.

“We review the warrant and the arrest and the two officers here tell me what happened and then you tell me your side.”

“Will that get me bail?”

“That's not in the cards,” Plew said.

“What's the point then?”

“We're a country of laws, son, not a collection of howling damn heathens.”

“But I'm going to jail either way?”

“Until the circuit court can schedule a trial for you.”

Hannula slumped his shoulders. “Then put me on in. I'm hungry; what's for supper?”

Hepting and Bapcat stifled smiles.

Plew struck his table with a wooden gavel. “Give Mr. Hannula some supper.”

The Eagle River jailer's name was Taylor. “Jailer Taylor,” Hepting said, handing the prisoner to him, “Mr. Hannula's hungry for his supper.”

“We all got crosses to bear,” Taylor said.

Bapcat waited until the prisoner was behind bars. “You've got bigger problems than deer,” he told the prisoner.

“I got nothing to say to no damn game warden,” the Finn grumbled.

Back at Bumbletown Hill Bapcat looked at the sheriff. “What was all that business about Widow Frei and a house of ill fame?”

“You don't know? You're kidding me, right?”

“It's true?” Bapcat responded.

Hepting stammered, “Well, yes and no. She isn't a working girl herself, and she don't directly run no string of whores or nothing like that, but she's built a big business provisioning such places.”

“Provisioning?”

Hepting was smiling. “Say your establishment gets raided and the police confiscate all your stuff and close you down, arrest all your girls and such; well, you just get in touch with Jaquelle Frei and she'll outfit your business with furniture, beds, paintings of cavorting naked angels—even arrange new girls if you need them. She's sort of a wholesale outfitter.”

“This was Herr Frei's business?”

“Certainly not. Hers alone.”

“How'd she end up with Frei?”

“Life's full of imponderables, and the human heart's worst of all. She ain't a working girl, Lute. She's a businesswoman, maybe the greatest in the history of the Copper Country. 'Course, there ain't that many.”

This was too much information to process. “Hannula's wife told you about the deer?”

“Claims it's a business he runs.”

“Details?”

“You just heard everything I know.”

“Be all right if I talk to the wife?”

“Let me run it by her first. She come to me confidentially, and Hannula, Bible thumper or not, ain't the real forgiving sort. His Good Book tells him women are the fountainhead of all earthly evil.”

Bapcat got out of the vehicle, slung the Krag over his shoulder, took a deep breath, and went into the house.