“There’s bonuses in it for everyone who stays on…and an extra two hundred bucks for each man who spends a night on watch with a shotgun.”

Every hand in the trailer was high in the air.

“Good,” Ceballo said. “That’s more like it. If the people around here want to play rough, we can play rougher.”

* * *

The bus was big and yellow, and made a lot of noise as it chugged up the road toward the protest site. There were arms sticking out of the windows on each side, ending in clenched fists or waving little Canadian flags.

The bus skidded to a stop at the edge of the protest site and for a moment was almost totally obscured by a cloud of dust. When the dust settled, the doors opened and people began filing out, one by one.

“Who are they?” Argus asked.

Noble took a closer look at the bus and read the banner draped across its side. “Says they’re from some writers’ union.”

“What’s this protest got to do with writing?” Harlan asked.

Noble shrugged. “Who knows?” he said. “Let’s just be glad they’re here.”

Chapter 14

After supper, the pack slid into their beds and slept until well after dark. Noble was the first to awaken, gently arousing the others without disturbing Ranger Brock and Phyllis.

Turning over a couple of cars had been good for the protesters’ cause, but it had done very little to convince the loggers that they should seriously think about harvesting another section of forest farther away from town. The public opinion war over the site was at a stalemate with an equal number of people for and against the logging company’s plans. The deadlock was misleading, since it was common knowledge that Conservco was paying their supporters to be there and was busing people in from out of town whenever the number of protesters grew. That bit of news hadn’t been reported on television yet, since there was no hard evidence to prove there was any foul play going on. Besides, none of the journalists working the site seemed interested in that side of the story, choosing instead to focus on Willie Greene and his angry spirits. Sure, it was a bit of a circus, but the circus was keeping the story in the news and as long as that was happening, the support for Donna Hughson and her group would likely grow. Eventually, Conservco would have no choice but to concede the land and move their operation onto the other side of the river.

“Harlan, wake up!” Noble whispered, giving his smaller brother’s shoulder a gentle shake.

“What? What is it?”

“We’ve got to go back up to the site.”

“I don’t want to go back up there,” Harlan moaned. “It doesn’t matter what we do, they’ll just bring in more people from Prince George.”