If his entire ten acres looked this authentic, the audacity and the brilliance of his plan were breathtaking. “How come you can grow roots like this, but the cheeseheads up in Wisconsin can’t?”
“I’ll tell you, Doc, but then I’ll have to kill you.” Seeing my expression, he snorted and gave me a reassuring pat on the back. “Like I said, I’ve had some help from some good botanists. We found a way to shock the plants, chemically and thermally, at regular intervals during the growing season — not enough to really hurt ’em, just enough to make ’em pucker up in those constriction bands. Sort of like subjecting new wood to bleach and buckshot for that weathered, wormy look. Adds a year to the time required to get a mature, man-shaped root, but that extra year will pay for itself ten times over when we harvest.”
“You tested this on buyers yet?”
He grinned. “That’s where I was part of last week. Product testing. Not just buyers, but chemists, too. The chemists say it’s every bit the equal of wild black ginseng. The exporters say they’ll take all I can bring ’em.”
Suddenly all the secrecy made sense. “So the kudzu camouflage and the hidden road — you’re keeping the operation hidden so nobody knows it’s cultivated?”
He nodded. “Plus the kudzu creates the shade the ginseng needs. I figure my cover’s gonna get blown within a few years, but by then, I’ll be millions of dollars ahead. Besides, even if I have to come down some on the price eventually, I’ll still be way ahead of the cheeseheads. I mean, look at what they’re producing.” He pointed scornfully at the smooth root in my hand. “It’s like a supermarket tomato — the right size and color, but a sorry substitute for the vine-ripened real deal. Eventually, Cooke County Black Ginseng — I’ve trademarked the name already — will become the Vidalia onion of ginseng. People will always pay a premium for it, because it’ll be the best there is. If the marketing and business plan work like they’re supposed to, we’ll create a hundred jobs within two years. Maybe help reduce the poaching in the Smokies, too, which would be something to feel proud of.”
“You do defy expectations, Jim,” I said. “The hillbilly stereotype may never be the same.”
But O’Conner wasn’t listening to me. He’d suddenly taken a step to one side, cocking his head toward the house, then he cupped both hands behind his ears to catch more of whatever sound he was seeking. “Well, damn,” he said to himself, and ran for the kudzu tunnel.
By the time he disappeared through his back door, I could hear it myself. “Damn,” I echoed, and began running, too.
By the time I reached the front porch, the faint sound had become the distinctive, rhythmic, and ominous beat of a helicopter rotor. Unless I missed my guess, the helicopter would be piloted by Chief Deputy Orbin Kitchings.
O’Conner, one hand shading his eyes, stared toward the mouth of his hanging valley. Judging by the way the sound ricocheted off the ridges, the helicopter was flying low and closing fast. Suddenly it rose into view, climbing up out of the gorge at the lower end of the valley, almost as if emerging from the earth itself. Black with gold trim, it was unmistakably the sheriff’s JetRanger, and it was headed straight for us.
O’Conner cursed again. I was just opening my mouth to say something reassuring and probably wrong when a crack split the air. “My God, somebody’s shooting,” O’Conner said, and his head spun toward the ridge angling alongside the house. I saw sparks fly from the chopper’s tail boom as another shot rang out. “Top of the ridge,” he said. “That’s a high-powered rifle. Those aren’t warning shots — somebody’s trying to bring him down.”
As if the pilot had heard him, the chopper halted in midair, then veered sharply to the left and began weaving toward us in violent zigs and zags. Orbin had been an army pilot, I remembered. I hoped he recalled enough of his combat training to outmaneuver the sniper.
Wheels began turning frantically in my head, and I flashed back to my pot patch excursion with Waylon, and to the rage he’d shown when Orbin shot Vernon’s dog. “We need to find Waylon,” I said urgently. “Where’s Waylon?” Suddenly, magically — mercifully, even — Waylon’s truck stopped in front of the porch. O’Conner waved frantically and pointed toward the ridge just as another muzzle flash erupted. Without a word, Waylon roared to the treeline, then leapt from his truck and sprinted up the mountainside.
As bullets continued to slam into the chopper, the aircraft wove and dodged toward the spot the shots were coming from, as if Orbin wanted to confront his assailant face to face. Sparks flew as a bullet glanced off the main rotor. Suddenly a spiderweb of fracture lines painted the front windshield, and the plastic bubble burst. The helicopter seemed to leap up in surprise, then pitched forward and rolled to the left, plummeting toward the valley floor.
When it hit, it collapsed with surprisingly little resistance, the remainder of the Plexiglas windows shattering, the metal tail boom crumpling like cardboard tubing. The impact was followed by near silence — a few groaning aftershocks, little else. For some reason I was expecting alarms and sirens, so the quiet seemed eerie and wrong. Then, as O’Conner and I ran toward the wreckage, came the searing rush of intense flame. Within seconds fire engulfed the cockpit, making our approach — and his survival — utterly impossible.
O’Conner shielded his face, peering into the flames. “Jesus. What a godawful mess. What the hell is going on here, Doc?”
“I wish I knew. Just when I think things can’t get any worse up here, they do. I’ve heard a lot of bad things about Cooke County over the years. I didn’t realize they were all understatements.”
O’Conner took out a satellite phone — the nearest cell phone tower was several ridges away — and dialed the sheriff’s dispatcher. He told her the sheriff’s helicopter had just crashed and burned and that the pilot was dead. He gave directions, including a description of the kudzu tunnel, which the dispatcher asked him to repeat. Prompted, he gave his name. But he did not say that the helicopter had been shot down, and he did not stay on the line, as I could hear the dispatcher instructing him to. “When they get here, tell them about the shots. I don’t think it’s wise for me to be here when Tom Kitchings finds his brother dead in my front yard.” He turned and trotted toward the house.
I was about to go after him when Waylon emerged from the woods and stumbled across the clearing toward me. “Got away,” he gasped. “Some boot tracks heading down the back side of the ridge — they’s a old logging road down there. Heard a ATV leaving about the time I got to the top. Sorry.” He bent over, hands on knees, to catch his breath. “Did find this, though.” He fished a knotted bandanna from a pocket and untied it, revealing five brass shell cases, about two inches long, shaped like miniature artillery rounds. “Winchester thirty-thirty,” he said. “Hunnerd-fifty-grain load; muzzle velocity ’bout twenty-four-hunnerd feet a second. Same ammunition used by half the deer hunters in this county.”
“Waylon, did you touch these?”
“Nossir. Picked ’em up with my hanky here.”
“There might still be fingerprints on them. Hang onto them till the sheriff and his folks get here. Then make sure somebody gives you an evidence receipt for them.”
For the first time since I’d met him, Waylon suddenly looked nervous. “Doc, the sheriff might take these better coming from you than from me,” he said. I frowned, puzzled. “He’s gonna be out for blood, and it might not be good for my health if I was to be the one to give him these. Can I turn ’em over to you, and let you give ’em to him?”
“Sure.” I took the bundle from him and retied it. Then I pulled a small notepad from my back pocket and scrawled two makeshift evidence receipts. I signed and gave one to Waylon; I tucked the other away for later, to be signed by whoever I gave the brass to. “Keep that in a safe place,” I said. He nodded.