Winterkill - C. J. Box [128]
The “Shoot-out at Battle Mountain,” as it had been dubbed, faded quickly as a mainstream national news story, and didn’t linger much longer than that within the state and region, except within pockets of the suspicious and dispossessed. Robey Hersig explained to Joe that the reasons for this had been the inaccessibility of the compound, the lack of media buildup, more pressing war news, and the absence of television coverage. Without visuals, Hersig said, there was no news. He gave the late Dick Munker credit for that.
Therefore, what happened at Battle Mountain didn’t rank in the national conscience with Waco, Ruby Ridge, or the Montana Freeman standoff. Although the incident raged through Internet forums and simmered beneath the surface throughout the Mountain West, the lack of good information relegated the story to the back pages of newspapers. Robey told Joe that a few of the Sovereigns who had fled that day had contacted journalists in different parts of the country to offer their stories, but were generally deemed less than credible.
Melinda Strickland was hailed as a hero in a long-form feature in Rumour magazine written by Elle Broxton-Howard. Another feature in Us magazine—“Lady Ranger Bucks the System and Saves a Forest”—showed a photo of a shoeless Melinda Strickland on the couch in her home, with streaky blond hair, hugging her dog. A cable-television news crew came to Saddlestring and did a feel-good feature on Broxton-Howard and Melinda Strickland for a newsmagazine show.
As a result, Broxton-Howard’s U.S.-based publicist parlayed the segment, which showcased his client’s good looks, her on-screen presence, and an accent that seemed to have grown more refined and pronounced since she left Saddlestring, into a series of talk-show and twenty-four-hour cable-news bookings. Elle Broxton-Howard could now be seen on television several nights a week as a paid analyst specializing in gender and environmental issues.
Since January, Broxton-Howard had left three messages for Joe on his office answering machine. She still wanted to do his story, she said. She “smelled” a six-figure movie option. They could work out the details later, when they met, she said. Joe had yet to return her calls.
One night, while Marybeth was idly channel-surfing, Broxton-Howard’s face appeared on their television screen. Marybeth scowled at Joe and quickly changed the channel.
Bud Longbrake’s wife, the woman who had been Nate Romanowski’s secret lover and who had gone on a world cruise, sent divorce papers from somewhere in Nevada to her husband. He signed them. A week after that, Missy Vankueren moved to the Longbrake ranch.
Nate Romanowski had vanished. Joe was surprised to find out that Nate had not been identified by the assault team as the man who had fired on them. His bulky snowmobile suit and helmet had disguised him. They mistakenly assumed that the shooter had been a Sovereign who had somehow flanked them. Ballistics reports couldn’t positively identify the huge slugs that had disabled the Sno-Cats because the bullets were damaged beyond recognition. Joe realized that only two people could have positively identified Nate Romanowski as the shooter—Dick Munker and himself.
Joe told state and federal investigators everything he knew about the incident that day and the buildup to it, with the exceptions of Nate Romanowski’s identity and the conversation Joe had had with Romanowski as Dick Munker lay dying. He knew that his account was at odds with those of other witnesses, namely Melinda Strickland, Sheriff Barnum, Elle Broxton-Howard, and a half-dozen deputies. Joe was the only witness to claim that Munker’s “warning shot” damaged the propane pipe, or that Munker had manufactured the hostage situation on the fly when told that Spud Cargill was in custody. According to the others, the warning shot had been exactly