Chapter 24

In the bleary daylight, across the dead fire, there were feet and, higher, green legs that even higher were attached to a man.

“Good morning,” the young man said.

“Good morning.” Warlock rolled off the ferns and onto his feet.

“I have to assume you had a fire permit?” There was a Forest Service insignia on the man’s shirt.

“Fuck off, junior.” Warlock strode down the hill toward the creek to wash up, with the man trotting along behind.

“I’m sorry but I’ll have to write a citation….” The man interrupted himself when Warlock took off his safari jacket. The .38 gleamed from the shoulder holster in the morning sun.

“So write. You’ll have to go to Washington to check me out. Then you’ll be back planting trees with the kids. What screams in the night around here?”

“Pardon, sir. I didn’t hear anything.”

“Last night. I heard three screams.”

“Has to be a bobcat or owl taking a rabbit. Rabbits scream. It sounds like a girl.”

“Sure does, kiddo.” Warlock felt much refreshed from the cold creek water. He lit a cigarette and took out his wallet, handing two C-notes to the young man. “I got a few hours work for you.”

“I can’t take money,” the man protested, letting the bills drop to the ground.

“Then leave it there. Two things. Is this water good to drink and where the fuck is my car?”

“The creek comes from a spring up that hill. It’s fine. Your car is only about a quarter a mile to the south. There’s an angry dog in it chewing on something.”

Warlock knelt down and drank until his teeth ached. When he got up he noted that the bills were no longer on the grass. The plight of the civil servant.

It took most of the day to cover Rabun’s two thousand acres by Forest Service Jeep. The young man, Bob by name, was first-rate at the maps, freeing Warlock to take notes. The thievery was cautious and selective, invisible from the more traveled log roads. Near the end of the tour they had added up some one hundred and eighty illegally cut acres.

“I can’t appear in court on this,” Bob said with extreme nervousness.

“We don’t need you, so relax.”

“It’s just that I live up here and got a wife and kids.”

“Everybody does. Kids like chickenshit, Dagwood daddies.”

“I resent that.”

“Go ahead …” Warlock suddenly held up his hand and the Jeep rumbled to a stop. He heard a chainsaw off to the right down a long gulley. He put on his binoculars and eased out of the vehicle.

“You’ll get your ass kicked,” Bob hissed.