Empire Of Salt by Weston Ochse Read Free Book Online Page B

but he jerked away. "We'll find him. Which one has gone missing?"
    "Obediah. He was getting driftwood and now no one's seen him."
    "It's the green," Frank said. "The green got him."
    "You hush your mouth, Frank," Gertie hissed. Back to Abel she said, "Do you know where he was collecting the wood?"
    Abel shook his head.
    Patrick stepped forward. "What about foot prints?"
    They all looked at him.
    "You're Amish, right?"
    Abel nodded.
    "If he's wearing boots like yours, which I bet he is, then all we need to do is look in the sand for the hobnailed prints."
    Abel's eyes brightened. "That's a great idea, Mister..."
    "Oliver," Maude said. "He's Lazlo's son, come to take over the place."
    Abel removed his straw hat and held it to his chest. "Sorry for your loss, Mister Oliver. Your father was a good man." His words came out in a rush. "He took care of our family and treated us well... always set a nice table." His gaze darted towards the door.
    Patrick felt an odd sensation of pride for the man who he'd never really known, but he didn't allow the thought to linger. He wanted nothing more than a couple of shots of something hard and wicked, but he found himself offering to help. "Listen, let me go with you and see if I can help."
    "Good idea," Maude said. "You go too, Gertie, and I'll call Will. With any luck, by the time he gets here Obediah will be at home drinking milk and eating some of his mother's bread. He's probably just goofing off."
    Abel shoved his hat back on his head. "Thank you," he said. Then he turned and bolted out the door.
    Gertie and Patrick followed. As they got to the door, Frank spoke one more time. "Green means no," he said. "If you see it. Don't go."
    The sea began right across from the restaurant between a break in the seawall. The break hadn't always been there. According to Gertie, Laz had bulldozed the seawall out of the way as soon as the Army Corps of Engineers had left. He wanted an ocean view from his restaurant even if the ocean was rotting.
    Will Toddrunner, who happened to be the Deputy Sheriff and the Justice of the Peace for the towns of Niland and Bombay Beach, arrived an hour into the search. After brief introductions between Patrick, Auntie Lin and Will, they set off down the beach, looking for tell-tale Amish boot prints.
    The sheriff ran down some of the vital statistics as they walked. The town had 345 people according to the last census, but he doubted that half of them were still living here. The unemployment rate was 25%. On a scale of one to ten with the average U.S. city at a three, the crime in Bombay Beach was at five. This was mostly the result of the unemployment rate and the air of hopelessness. Besides the unfortunate disaster of the Salton Sea, Bombay Beach - which was located squarely along the San Andreas Fault - was also blessed with earthquake swarms. Just last week three 4.7 earthquakes had struck the area. The only damage that had been done was to knock down the skeletal remains of a few of the teetering deserted homes. The only death had been Lazlo Oliver, which couldn't be and hadn't been connected to the geological events. Truth be told, earthquakes were a part of life around the Salton Sea. The residents enjoyed the frivolous violence of the quakes. Each one broke the monotony of another otherwise dreary day. Another interesting fact was that the nearest gas station was twenty miles away in Niland so the average Bombay Beach citizen got around on golf carts, or using the "often-preferred California flip_flop-powered locomotion."
    The deputy was pure Californian. As it turned out, Will's father had been a deep sea fishing master out of San Diego and his mother had been an artichoke picker from Brawley. When it came to a choice on what to do with his life, Will had done four years in the Marine Corps then joined the Imperial County Sheriff's Department. Now going on ten years, he'd kept his father's laissez-faire outlook on life, while maintaining his mother's