Jeff Sherratt - The Brimstone Murders

Cold fear gripped my heart. I had a gut feeling Rita would try to confront Moran. She must have figured that the professor was tied in somehow. “Did she say anything about Moran or Professor Carmichael?”

“No, but she called Sol’s secretary, then left in a hurry.”

“I gotta go.” Hanging up, I quickly dialed Sol’s office. I didn’t think the cops were listening in on his phones. A judge would never grant a warrant to tap an innocent civilian’s line.

It took forever for Joyce to come to the phone. I glanced back at the barroom. The heavies at the pool table were pinning me hard, steely-eyed, like they were about to break out the long knives.

Finally, Joyce’s voice: “Oh, Jimmy, we’re all so worried-”

“Joyce, quick, what did Rita talk about when she called this morning?”

“She asked about the information Sol had me dig up on Moran, stuff about him owning those mines and the ore processing plant out there in the Mojave.”

“Damn, what is Rita doing?”

“Said she’s gonna serve them a writ or something, interrogatory, I dunno.”

“My God, a writ?”

“Yeah, she called about ten, fifteen minutes ago. And, Jimmy, she especially asked about Moran’s borax works, the ore refining plant. Why, what’s this all about?”

“Asked about the borax works?”

“Yeah, she wanted to know how to get there.”

I stood there in thesweltering phone booth, trembling, staring at the receiver in my hand. I should’ve leveled with Rita from the beginning, let her know just how dangerous Moran and his band of religious whackos were. She hadn’t gotten the whole story. She wasn’t aware that he was a stone-cold killer. She didn’t know he’d shoot her and watch her die just for the fun of it. I should’ve forced her to give it up, hang back, and let Sol and me work this out. Gonna serve a writ! Oh, Rita! Gonna walk right into a den of deadly vipers and hand them a writ, for chrissakes. I had to stop her. I had to get to the borax works before she did. Maybe I could block the road or something. I slammed the receiver down and elbowed out of the booth.

My photo still flashed on the TV screen, and from the way those Chinese King Kongs at the pool table were giving me the eye when I left the bar, I thought I was going to have to fight my way out. But they gave me a wide berth, and even the bartender seemed to shrink when I rushed by him. It pays to be famous.

Before we hung up, I’d asked Joyce to get a message to Sol. “Tell him I’m going to try to head off Rita. Send help,” I’d said.

Rita had a fifteen-minute head start, but she’d take the 605, and I’d be heading out on the 91 Freeway. If I hurried I might beat her there.

Leaving Dairy Valley, I held the El Camino close to the speed limit when in traffic-constantly watching for Chippies in their black-and white cruisers-but when alone I opened it up, pushing ninety.

Swerving off Highway 58, I bounced onto old Badwater Road, bypassing Barstow. I took a shortcut directly to the borax works, one that wouldn’t pass in front of the Rattlesnake Lake base. Once on the dirt road, I floored it. Now, with pistons hammering and the wind rushing by like the roar of a jet and trailing a tornado of dust in my wake, I screamed along Badwater Road in a frenzied rush.

I was flying low on the deserted gravel surface about ten miles from Moran’s complex, zeroed in on his borax works. Yeah, I was provoked.

I hadn’t taken the time to listen to Joyce’s detailed explanation of what she’d said to Rita. But before hanging up, I caught enough of it to give me a picture. She told Rita that the prior owners had abandoned the borax works before World War II, but Moran bought the plant and the mines that fed the ore to it fifteen years ago, roughly at the same time that the government sold Rattlesnake Base to the Jeroboam Corporation, which we now knew he also owned.

I knew how Rita’s mind worked. I could almost see the thoughts forming. She figured these guys were businessmen, figured legal documents would bring them to their knees. Christ , a writ. How could I let this happen?

Couldn’t this damned El Camino go any faster? I twisted the wheel to miss a jackrabbit, skidded and almost lost control. Then I stood on the gas pedal and kept the mass of metal bouncing forward.

I shot over a rise and sped down a long incline aiming for the small desolate valley below. Serrated peaks of hostile mountains off in the distance surrounded the desert floor, and laid out in the center of it was a long forgotten industrial complex. But now, twin smokestacks towering amid a gathering of old stone buildings belched swirling clouds of soot and smoke.

I slowed. Still a few hundred yards away from the works, I saw an area devoid of brush and rocks, where I pulled off the road and parked. I couldn’t let anyone at the borax works see me out here.

I crept away from the El Camino and moved a hundred yards closer. On a high mound, at the road’s edge, I hid behind a cluster of tall sagebrush. I shaded my eyes from the midday sun, and with one sweep I scanned the whole complex. Looking down from the vantage point, I saw dump trucks unloading their cargo of rocks and dirt, skip loaders operated by kids, scooping the stuff up and moving it about, and forklifts, also driven by teens, racing in and out of the smokestack building which had to be where the ore was processed. The guards slouched in the shade watching as the kids, in the sun-blinding yard, formed up into a line, lifting and hauling heavy bags to waiting trucks. A small kid stumbled when a large sack came at him too fast. One of the bastards ambled over and gave him a whack, grabbed him and slapped him around before shoving him back into the bag line.

As I watched, the shrill whine of a whistle filled the air and the activity slowed. I glanced at my Timex: noon. Must be lunch hour. Another short blast sounded and instantly a scratchy recording of Bickerton’s voice reverberated from loudspeakers: “Behold, the scripture saith, how good and how joyous it is for brethren to labor together in unity…” His voice droned on and on, extolling the virtues of hard work. Bastard.

In a matter of minutes, gun-toting guards escorted several rows of weary teenagers out of the smokestack building. Boys and girls marched like the dead across the yard to a smaller structure close by. Had to be the mess hall.

A low-rise clapboard building, probably the office, stood closer to the road. Behind the wooden structure, a small landing strip ran north for a couple thousand feet. Adjacent to the office was a vacant pad; must be the airplane parking ramp. Beyond that, disappearing into the distance was a dirt road on which a couple of empty dump trucks rambled away from the works, probably going to one of the mines to load up on more ore.

Parked in front of the office building were six or seven cars and a few black Ford passenger vans. But Rita’s yellow Datsun was nowhere in sight. I must’ve beaten her here. I gulped a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Thank God for that! But wait. Maybe she wasn’t coming out here after all. Yeah, that’s it. If she really was going to serve papers on these guys she’d use a process server. What’s the matter with me? Always dashing off half-cocked. Maybe Sol was right. He said I was impulsive. But what could I do? I couldn’t take any chances. Goddammit , not with Rita’s life.

But standing there watching the cruelty, seeing all those kids work until they dropped made my stomach churn. Bile welled in my throat.

It didn’t take a lightning bolt for me to realize what was going on out here in this desolate place. Moran, under the guise of rehabilitating lost kids, was exploiting them. He turned them into his slaves. He housed the teenagers at the base, then worked them like dray animals at his plant and at the borax mines. Obviously, he controlled them by using the timeworn techniques of brutality, fear, and religious brainwashing.