The Bitter Past, page 19
“Which one, in particular?” the old deputy answers. “Wolverton, or my brother the mighty prophet?”
“Wolverton.”
Arshal laughs. “He tried escaping a couple times during the night. Practically had to tie him down at one point.” He points at my head. “Lost a fight with a tree branch, did ya?”
I fill him in on what happened during the night. Then one of Amon’s four wives leads us into the massive living area where Amon and Clem Edwards are waiting, along with Chuck Wolverton. I wonder what I’m going to do if Pete is right and Wolverton turns out to be the illegal from the 1950s.
“Damn it, Sheriff,” Wolverton groans loudly. “You can’t keep me here. I know my rights, and while these people have been good about feeding me, they don’t have any TV, let alone pay-per-view.”
“I’m sorry for the inconvenience, Mr. Wolverton,” I say, taking a seat in a high-backed leather chair. “It won’t be long now.”
“You haven’t found Michaela then?” Clem asks.
I bring my hands together. “Not yet, Clem. We’re starting house-to-house searches right now. If she’s in the county, we will find her.” There is no point in telling them that Michaela’s disappearance is tied to the hunt for a Russian spy.
Amon puts a hand on the younger man’s shoulder, and I ask them both to give me and Arshal a few minutes with Wolverton. After they leave the room, I walk over and sit down by the old man, the sound of his oxygen concentrator humming in the background.
“Chuck, I need to ask you some questions about your past.”
Wolverton is bone-thin, a thick gray stubble covering his weathered cheeks. “The hell do you mean, Sheriff? What’s so danged important about my past? I’m … nobody.”
It was how he said it. Nobody. With a little crack in his voice.
“Chuck, someone came out to your place to kill you last night. That someone has already kidnapped Clem’s wife and is holding an FBI agent, and it all seems to be tied to you. So, I’m thinking you’re … somebody. Why don’t you tell me who?”
The grizzled miner turns away. “I got no idea why someone would do those things. I got no enemies.”
“What did you do before coming to Lincoln County, Chuck?”
Wolverton doesn’t meet my gaze. His tired eyes dart around the room as if trying to find a way out. “Nothin’, I was a kid.”
“From where?” Arshal asks. “Where did you spring from, Chuck?”
Wolverton cackles. “Nowhere special, I can tell you that.” The old man nervously adjusts the tubing that keeps slipping out his nose.
I reach over and steady the cannula in his shaking hands. “We can’t find a birth record on you, Chuck. As a matter of fact, we can’t find any record of a Chuck Wolverton anywhere. I really need to know the truth here, and I need to know now.”
Wolverton’s head twitches back and forth until Arshal nudges him in the leg with his big boot. “Answer the man’s question.”
Arshal is an imposing figure in any room, and I know from experience that sometimes a little intimidation can go a long way. Eventually, Wolverton’s head cranes in my direction.
“Illinois. I’m from Illinois originally.”
I nod. “And?”
“I worked on cars through high school. Only thing I was ever good at, really. Only thing I wanted to do. Then in ’51 I got drafted to go to Korea.”
The corners of my mouth turn downward in dejection. I know what is coming. Wolverton is not the illegal.
“Was getting ready to go to basic and realized I just couldn’t do it. Didn’t want to kill no one. Had seen all those boys that was killed over in Europe and the Pacific a few years earlier, or worse, coming home all mangled and without their limbs.” The old man fights back the tears now and lowers his head, his already scattered breaths quickening. “I just didn’t see no reason to go halfway across the world to fight for some idea some people thought was important that I didn’t.”
Arshal and I exchange glances. “Where did you go, Chuck?”
Wolverton looks up toward the ceiling, searching his memory. “Oh, thought about running to Canada. Some guys were doing that. Vietnam wasn’t the first time that happened. But it’s too cold up there, so I wandered around, picking up odd jobs under different names at farms and garages. Did a lot of field labor in the South for a few years. Warm down there.” A tiny smile tugs at his lips. “Did that for, oh, nine or ten years before I saw an ad for miners out in Nevada. That’s how I got here. Just made up the name, like I did all the others.”
Arshal looks down at him. “Chuck, what is your real name?”
Wolverton looks up through one eye at the towering deputy. “Arnold Fletcher, sir, though it sounds funny when I hear it now. Haven’t said those words out loud in almost seventy years. You going to turn me over to the Army?”
I place a gentle hand on Wolverton’s arm. “Chuck, do you have anything that can substantiate what you’re telling us? Anything that can prove you are actually Arnold Fletcher from Illinois who was drafted in 1951?”
Wolverton’s head bobs slowly, his eyes narrowing. “Think I do. I believe I have my actual birth certificate down at the house.” He looks over at me. “I’m sure the Army has my draft notice. They don’t forget deserters, Sheriff.”
I nod. “Okay, Chuck. I don’t think we need to involve the government. Could I ask you just to sit tight here awhile longer?” I stand and turn to Arshal. “Deputy Jessup is going to hang around if that’s okay.”
Arshal rolls his eyes. After we leave the house, Arshal remarks on what happened at Wolverton’s. “So, your Russian probably has good reason to think that cranky old miner is his spy.”
“Yep, and we’re going to keep him thinking that for now. Might keep him from going after anyone else.”
Arshal snickers. “Who’s left?”
I get back in the truck. “No one except us knows Wolverton is out here, Arshal. Let’s keep it that way. Have Amon keep men at the front gate. Anybody trying to get onto this compound that you don’t know…”
My deputy nods. “Yeah, no shortage of guns out here. What are you going to do?”
I drape my arms over the steering wheel and stare out through the windshield. “Ivan has a couple of bargaining chips right now. I’m going to see if I can find one.”
He points a gnarled finger at me. “Keep your head down, young buck.”
I close the driver’s door and start to back up, but then something occurs to me. “Hey, Arshal, when you called me a few days ago about those graves down in Rachel, didn’t you say that was the second time they had been disturbed?”
The big deputy twirls his gray mustache to trigger his memory. “Ayup. Someone dug them up about three years ago. That’s why there was nothing in there this time. Probably some stupid kids.”
I look at my watch and pray that isn’t the case.
THE PAST
The air was unusually calm over Yucca Dry Lake, a perfect day to land an airplane carrying an XW-25 warhead. As Georgiy watched the C-124 Globemaster circle the airstrip, his stomach rumbled like a volcano. On the seat next to him, Dr. Ellison grinned like a silly schoolboy. “Here she comes, Freddie. If we’re lucky with the wind, this time tomorrow we’ll be measuring plutonium dispersal.”
Georgiy had the sudden urge to slam the scientist’s head through the passenger window. He was as much a devil as William, wanting nothing more than to see a large area of land poisoned. In William’s case, and his masters in Moscow as well, that desire included people, but even Ellison seemed to be fine with unleashing the deadly radioactive element in the open air, not knowing or caring how far it might travel and who it might ultimately kill.
Once the warhead was loaded onto the truck, Georgiy turned his vehicle onto the road and followed.
“Let’s pray the weather holds,” Ellison said. “Let’s pray for that.”
Part of Georgiy was doing just that. He could ignore his duty and let the test proceed as planned. But if the wind came up and the test was delayed, he would have to act. Or he would have to run.
Ellison noted Georgiy’s hands gripped around the steering wheel. “Easy, son, it’s just a nuclear warhead. Don’t go getting all white-knuckled on me.”
When they returned to CP-1, the control point for all nuclear tests at the site, Ellison set about the final preparations with the engineers from the Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico. The waiting wore on the man, and Georgiy could smell the alcohol on his breath. Around midday, Georgiy headed over to Area 13 as part of his scheduled patrol and check-in with the guards under his command. The animal cages were now occupied, and many of them were in the process of receiving their last supper, a thought that sickened Georgiy. He got out and walked over to them. The rats he didn’t care about. He had seen enough rats during the war to wish them all dead. The nine burros appeared sad but oblivious to their coming fate. Then came the dogs, a hundred or more of them, beagles for some reason, all black, brown, and white. Why beagles had drawn the short straw in the dog lottery, he could not fathom. They yelped at him, some climbing the walls of their cages in a plea for a last-minute pardon. Last, Georgiy walked over to the where the sheep were being kept, ten of them resting under the shade of their pens, unwitting participants in a deadly experiment. He imagined their deaths, cooking from the inside and bleeding from every orifice. Madness.
When he finally arrived back at CP-1, it was 6:00 P.M. Just over twelve hours to detonation. The air was wasn’t exactly calm, and neither was Ellison, who was pacing back and forth from panel to panel and dial to dial watching the wind readings from north of the test site.
“Damn it!” Ellison’s voice boomed from his large chest, pipe smoke puffing from between his lips like steam from a train. “It’s picking up, and it’s out of the north now.”
“Thirteen knots,” another man said from his chair as he watched the needle move on the dial. “Not good for us.”
From the papers he had accessed and photographed over the weeks, Georgiy knew anything more than a ten-knot wind would effectively kill the shot, even if it was blowing east toward Utah. But a wind blowing south from the test site was an automatic kiss of death to any planned detonation. By 9:00 P.M. the decision would be made.
Arms folded across his chest and leaning against the entry door, Georgiy watched as Ellison sat down at his desk in a huff. The scientist badly wanted this monkey off his back. A phone rang. One of the technicians held up the receiver and nodded to his boss. Ellison got up and grabbed it. “Dr. Ellison,” he said gruffly. He listened for a moment, and Georgiy could see the man’s face contort. He looked at Georgiy and rolled his eyes. “That’s outrageous,” he said, his voice rising. “We’re twelve hours away, and Sergeant Meyer is running the security for this operation. I cannot spare him for some silly inquiry right now.”
The alarms sounded in Georgiy’s head as Ellison continued to argue. It was the CIA on the other end of the line, he was certain. They wanted to interview him—interrogate him—about the U-2. A cold current of terror ran through his veins. He would be found out, imprisoned for espionage.
“Look, I’m telling you, sir. This man has passed every security review required of him. He has been here for almost two years. You can speak to him after the test has been conducted, and if you have a problem with that, you can call Dr. Teller.” Ellison slammed the phone down. “Idiot,” he said to Georgiy with a wink. “You’re the only guy from Delta they haven’t spoken to yet, so as soon as this is over, you’ll have to go down to Mercury and strap on their stupid lie detector. Sorry, Freddie. The witch hunt continues.”
Georgiy waved a hand. “Not a problem, Doctor.” But it was. He was fucked three ways from Sunday now. If the shot went as scheduled, there would be no opportunity to steal the warhead. There simply wouldn’t be enough time, and he still didn’t have the combination that would get him inside Building 11. If it was delayed, he would have to get the combination and try getting it out of the building and off the test site, which was bound to get him killed. If he somehow avoided that, he would end up being grilled by the CIA about how the Russians found out about the U-2 and dragged to the gallows. He was going to live a very short life, of that much he was certain.
From the small control room, they waited, watching the minutes tick by and checking their gauges and dials. At 9:00 P.M., the shot was officially postponed. Georgiy saw Ellison’s shoulders slump. He would have to wait at least another day. Until his God changed the wind.
An hour later, after releasing the engineers and technicians at CP-1 for the evening, he turned to Georgiy. “I need to eat. Walk me over to the cafeteria?”
Georgiy swallowed the knot that had been forming in his throat. “Sure thing.” And just like that, everything had been decided for him. He would steal the warhead tonight. Or die trying.
* * *
The cafeteria at the NTS Control Point was nothing like the one at Camp Mercury. Smaller, and without the turnstiles that required a silver dollar, its primary use was to fill the bellies of the arming and firing parties who resided at CP-1 in the days leading up to a shot. The food, however, was just as good, and the weary scientist grabbed up a double order of pot roast and some mashed potatoes. Georgiy, too nervous to eat, got two cups of coffee, one for him and one for Ellison.
“You’re not hungry?” Ellison asked, as the man he knew as Freddie sat down at the table.
Hungry? Georgiy couldn’t remember when he last felt like eating. “I had something earlier.” He placed a cup of coffee on Ellison’s tray and watched the man pull it down under the table where he added some whisky to it from his flask. He quickly took a few sips.
“You look tense, Freddie. I hope it’s not that silly interview the spy guys want to do.”
Georgiy paused a moment, feigning a look of uncertainty. “Actually, sir, it’s something else. I was hoping I could … well, I would like it very much if…”
Ellison’s stuffed his mouth with a forkful of meat. “Just spit it out, son. Whatever it is won’t be as disappointing as this shot delay, I can assure you.”
Georgiy looked down at the table. “I want to ask Kitty to marry me, and I was hoping you would give me your blessing.” He loved the sound of those words and wished more than anything they could be true. But he needed Ellison’s help right now, and he was certain this was the way to get it.
The older man extended his hand. “Freddie, this is very great news.” They shook hands. “When are you planning on proposing?”
“As soon as the test is over, I think.” He produced a small box from his jacket pocket and opened it on the table. “Think she’ll like it, sir? It’s all I could afford.”
Ellison stared down at the ring with the small diamond setting. “I think she’s going to be over the moon.” He reached out and grabbed Georgiy’s upper arm. “This is the best news, Freddie. You certainly have my blessing.”
As Ellison finished off his meal, he became pensive. “We’re going to have to get you a better job out here, Freddie. If you’re going to be taking care of Kitty, you’ll need something with a better salary.”
If only that was my universe, he thought, his hands trembling beneath the table. “That would be fascinating, Dr. Ellison.”
Project 57’s director leaned forward on his elbows, cradling his bearded chin in his hands. “Let me tell you just how fascinating.”
Georgiy listened intently as Ellison, his tongue already loosened by the whiskey, related what his team projected would happen once his device was detonated. Now he knew why William and Moscow were so intent on going forward with their plan.
“Incredible,” Georgiy said. “You know, I would really love to see the warhead up close. Do you think since we’re delayed anyway, we could take a quick look at it?”
Ellison grinned, and Georgiy could tell the whisky was already working its magic. “What the hell, why not? I have clearance. You have clearance. Let’s go.”
“Now?”
The big man winked and held up his flask. “Maybe another coffee first.”
Georgiy rose from his chair. “I’ll get it.” At the coffee counter, before adding cream and sugar, he looked around the mostly empty dining room to be sure no one was watching and then placed six drops of the liquid William had provided in Ellison’s cup. He checked his watch. Thirty to forty minutes, William had said. No more.
As the scientist finished his second cup, Georgiy said, “I just need to make a call before we go. Check in with my guys.”
Ellison grinned. “Well, make it quick, young man. Your future awaits.”
A few seconds later, Georgiy entered the phone booth by the cafeteria front door and picked up the receiver. A moment later, a switchboard operator at the test site answered. “Number please?” Georgiy gave her the exchange and number. He knew full well that his call was probably being monitored. In fact, the small sign in the phone booth indicated as much. Half a minute later, he heard a ring and a woman answered. “Hello?”
“Hi, Susan? It’s Freddie. I’m sorry to call so late.”
“Oh, hey Freddie. Don’t apologize. I’m still up. I know you needed those measurements for the deck. Are you ready?”
She sounded like she was older, middle-aged perhaps. “Yes, please. Go ahead.”
“It’s 95 by 88 by 38. Do you have that?”
He memorized the numbers instantly, subtracting one from each digit as he had been trained. That meant the combination was 847727. “Yep, got it. Thanks very much. Anything else?” William had indicated there would be further instructions.
“Just that Tom and I really liked meeting Kitty the other night. She’s a wonderful girl. We know you’re busy out there, so we’ll keep tabs on her for you.”
Georgiy felt his chest tighten and his jaw go rigid. The message was clear. We have the girl. “Oh,” he said. “I’m so glad you like her. I’ll see you soon.” He hung up.
* * *
Georgiy drove faster than he would have liked, but with Ellison already dozing in the other seat, he was worried the man would change his mind about showing him the warhead. Even with the combination to the electronic lock, he needed a legitimate reason to be inside the storage facility, and Ellison was the best possible reason.
