to eat’. Apparently, he did a fairly brisk trade in dried foods, portable tents and the like: survivalist gear that would keep the freedom-loving American in food and shelter during the coming confrontation. In the remote world of the anti-government movement, Baxter was, if not a celebrity, then a fixture.
‘He was a great patriot and his death is a great blow to all those who love liberty,’ said Bob Hill, a self-styled commandant of the Montana militia.
Wednesday, 9am, Seattle Worryingly, the phone had not rung. When he finally awoke at nine – noon New York time – he saw that his cell phone was recording no missed calls at all. He reached for his BlackBerry; just some unimportant email. This was not right.
He reached for his laptop, pulling it down from the table and onto the bed, stretching its cable to breaking point. He checked the Times site: no sign of his story. He clicked down to the National section: links to stories out of Atlanta, Chicago and Washington, DC. He clicked and clicked. Here was something, datelined Seattle. But it was only an Associated Press wire story, written that morning. No sign of his own piece.
He phoned Beth. The hospital had to page her.
‘Hi babe, have you seen the paper today?’
‘Yes, I'm fine thank you. How kind of you to ask.’
‘Sorry, it's just – have you got it there?’
‘Hold on.’ A long pause. ‘OK, what am I looking for?’
‘Anything by me.’
‘I looked this morning. I couldn't see anything. I thought maybe you were going to do more work on it today.’
Will tutted silently: of course he wasn't going to work on it today. It was an on-the-day news story, about weather for Christ's sake: there was no more perishable commodity in journalism than a weather story.
‘You checked the National section inside? Each page?’
‘I did, Will. I'm sorry. Does this mean they didn't use it?’
That was exactly what it meant: his story had been spiked.
He braced himself for a call to the desk. If anyone but Jennifer, the news clerk, answered, he would hang up. He dialled.
‘National.’ Jennifer.
‘Hi, Jennifer, it's Will Monroe here, out in Seattle.’
‘Oh hi. Wanna speak to Susan?’
‘No! No. No need. You know that piece I filed yesterday, from the floods? Do you know what happened to it?’
Jennifer's voice suddenly dipped.
‘Kind of. I heard them talking about it. They said it was very nice and all, but that you hadn't talked about it with them first. If you had, they'd have told you they didn't need a story yesterday.’
‘But I did speak …’ Of course. He had only talked with Jennifer, told her his co-ordinates and his plans. He had assumed they wanted him to file. Had Harden not told him to pack his galoshes?
Now he realized: he was in Seattle just in case. He was keeping Bates's seat warm. All that soaking effort yesterday had been in vain. He felt embarrassed, like an over-eager intern. It was a stupid mistake.
‘Hold on, Susan wants a word.’
Three time zones away, Will readied himself for a roasting.
‘Hi, Will. Listen, I think the rule ought to be no filing unless we've talked about it first. OK? Maybe just find something that interests you, poke around a bit and see what it's worth. As for spot-news, keep your phone on and we'll call you if we need anything.’
Will ate a glum breakfast. He had screwed up and screwed up badly. By now Jennifer would have spread the word among the tiny circle of Times staffers in their twenties: they would be having a good laugh at his expense. The golden boy with a big-shot daddy had come down to earth.
There was only one solution. He would have to reel in a proper story. Somehow, from this far-off patch of snow, timber and potatoes, he would have to eke out a tale that would prove to New York that they had not made a mistake. He knew exactly where he would go.
Wednesday, 3.13pm, Washington State The flight across Washington State had been brief, if bumpy, and the drive from Spokane gorgeous. The mountains were almost painfully beautiful, each cap dusted with a snow that looked like the purest powdered sugar. The trees were as straight as pencils, lines of them, so densely packed, the light almost seemed to strobe.
He was driving east, soon crossing the state line into Idaho – or at least the long, slender upper part of the state where the United States appears to be giving the finger to its northern neighbour, Canada. He drove past Coeur d'Alene, which sounded like a Swiss skiing village but which was most famous as the home of a racist movement known as the Aryan Nations. Will had seen the pictures in the cuttings: the men dressed in quasi-Nazi uniforms, the ‘whites only’ sign at the entrance. It would make a fascinating stop, but Will did not leave the road. He had somewhere to go.
His destination lay across the Idaho finger, in the western part of Montana. The roads were small, but Will did not get frustrated. He loved driving in America, the land of the endless road. He loved the billboards, promoting furniture stores thirty-five miles away; he loved the Dairy Queen rest-stops; the bumper stickers, advising him of the politics, religion and sexual preferences of his fellow drivers. Besides, he was planning his attack.
He had spoken already to Bob Hill, who was expecting him. Dutifully, Hill had conformed to the media caricature of a backwoods gun-nut. He asked to have Will's full name and social security number: ‘That way I can check you out. Make sure y'are who y'say y'are.’ Will tried to imagine what Hill's research would turn up on him. Brit? That would be OK. Americans usually liked Brits. Even if they hated limp-wristed, faggot Europeans, Brits were OK: they were kind of honorary Americans. Father a federal judge? That could be problematic; federal officials were despised. But judges were not always lumped in with the rest of the hated bureaucrats who represented ‘the government’. Some were even seen as the protectors of liberty, fending off the encroaching hand of the politicians. If Hill looked, though, he would find plenty in Judge Monroe's record that was bound to offend. Will hoped his host was not going to dig too deep.
What else? Parents divorced: that might rile the militia men. Mind you, this wasn't Alabama; the survivalists were not the same as the Christian right. There was some overlap, but they were not identical.
The daydream ended the moment he saw the signs. ‘Welcome to Noxon, Population: 230’. He looked down at the scribbled note perched on his lap: Hill's directions. He had to turn left at the gas station, down a road that would become a path. The SUV began rocking from side to side, over the ruts of mud, earning, or so Will liked to think, the extra charge he, and therefore the Times, had had to pay for it.
Soon he reached a gate. No sign. He was about to call Hill, as arranged, but he was halfway through dialling the number when a man became visible in his windshield. Early sixties, jeans, cowboy boots, old jacket; unsmiling. Will got out.
‘Bob
