The Deadly River (22 page)

Lee was silent for a long moment, fixing the attorney with a penetrating stare. When he spoke, it was with a voice of cold anger that, while not loud, reached every corner of the courtroom. “Mr. Wards was less than thirty feet from where I was sitting. If you look at the pictures that the sheriff took of the area, you would know that. I have normal hearing and they were loud. I had no problem hearing every word that was spoken that day. As far as a conspiracy between me and Mr. Moore, that idea is nothing more than an attempt to shift blame from your client to two honest people who are the victims, not the perpetrators. No. There was no conspiracy of any kind between me and anyone else. I heard what I heard and that’s a fact.”

The Defense Counsel’s mouth was open to ask another question, but he shut it and was silent for a moment while he weighed this response from Lee. He’d obviously been counting on Lee’s youth and inexperience to give him a foothold on this case. But Lee wasn’t cooperating. In fact, this line of questioning was looking like it might do more harm than good for his client. Finally he turned toward the judge. “Your Honor, I have no further questions for this witness.”

Judge McClain addressed Lee. “Mr. Raines, you’re excused. But please remain available in case further testimony from you is required as the trial proceeds.”

“Certainly, Your Honor.”

As Lee made his way to an empty seat in the gallery beside Ray and Dawn, he heard the County Attorney behind him say, “I’d like to call Mr. Jose Ortega to the stand at this time.”

While the little Mexican was being sworn in and seated, Lee leaned over and whispered questions to Ray and Dawn Moore. “What do you think? Were we together on the stories?”

Dawn whispered her answer as Ray nodded in the affirmative. “Yeah, we all said the same things. That Defense Counsel was easier on you than he was on us. I guess he must be giving up at this point. He just seems to have run out of arguments.”

“Good. What did Willy Gohmert have to say?”

“He was adamant that Wards hired him to rob the café. Then he said that Wards promised him $10,000 if he wouldn’t talk about being hired. He stuck to his story even though the Defense Counsel did his best to shake him up. I think Willy did a good job.”

Lee nodded and smiled, but didn’t say anything. Jose Ortega was seated now and County Attorney Warthen was starting to question him.

“Mr. Ortega, how long have you lived in Mineral County?”

“Almost five years now.”

“Please, in your own words, tell the court how you came to live in Mineral County and how you began working for Mr. Wards.”

“Okay. I was working in the apple orchards in Washington State. When the apple picking was over for the season, I came this way looking for work. I ran out of money in St. Dubois and stopped there. I did some little jobs for people around town, but I couldn’t get any good work, so I came to Big River.”

The County Attorney stopped him there. “Mr. Ortega. When you were in St. Dubois, did you try to get work at the sawmill there?”

“Yeah. I talked to Mr. Benton, but he wouldn’t hire me ‘cause I didn’t have a green card. But he was really nice and he actually gave me twenty bucks to help me out. But he said he couldn’t hire me ‘cause it was against the law to hire a guy with no green card.”

“All right, Mr. Ortega, please continue with your story.”

“Well, after I got to Big River, I still had trouble getting any steady work. I did a lot of odd jobs around town and managed to live ‘till spring. Then Mr. Wards hired me to work on his logging crews.”

Again the County Attorney stopped the dialog. “Mr. Ortega, will you explain the work that you were doing for Mr. Wards at that time, the amount you were paid and the hours involved?”

“Sure. I was doing cleanup work for the logging crew. I’d cut limbs off the trees sometimes and I did all the stacking and burning of the waste branches and bushes and that kind of stuff. I ran errands for Bill and his foremen and I did whatever they told me to do that day. I was paid a dollar an hour. I usually made about seventy dollars a week.”

“Does that mean that you worked about seventy hours a week, Mr. Ortega?”

“Yeah. Pretty much every week. About that.”

“Did you have a green card then - or have you ever had one?”

“No. Mr. Wards paid me under the table, kinda like the guys in the apple orchards.”

“All right, Mr. Ortega. How long did this job in the woods for Mr. Wards last?”

“I was still doing it part of the time when I was arrested this summer. But I had been given other jobs by then.”

“What happened that caused Mr. Wards to give you other jobs - and what were these other jobs?”

“Well, one day about three years ago, the woods foreman sent me with a pickup truck to Mr. Ward’s house here in Big River to pick up some supplies that they needed out on the job. It was sometime in July of 1956, I think. I parked the truck and went into the storage shed and Mr. Wards was there beating some guy with a tire iron. I recognized the guy. He was Mr. Owens from the Owens Logging Company. He was in pretty bad shape when I walked in on them.”

“How bad, Mr. Ortega?”

“Both his arms and legs was broke. I could see bone sticking out all over the place. Mr. Wards was hitting him in the ribs and was laughing. He had a funny look on his face, like he was really enjoying this stuff. When he saw me, he stopped for just a minute and then he hit the guy really hard on top of his head. That broke his head open and he just kinda died there.”

County Attorney Warthen stopped him there. “Mr. Ortega, are you saying that you saw Mr. Wards kill Mr. Ralph Owens by beating him to death with a tire iron?”

“Sure. That’s what I said.”

“Why did Mr. Wards let you live after you saw that?”

“Well, he was really excited and he picked me up by the neck and told me that he’d kill me if I ever said anything. He knew that I had a family in Arizona and he said that he’d kill them too, if I said anything. I told him that I wouldn’t say nothing ‘cause I really didn’t care what he did and I didn’t want anything to do with the law anyway.”

“What did Wards do then?”

“He put me down and told me to throw the dead guy in his pickup and cover him with a tarp. Then he told me to clean up the storage shed. It took me all night to get it cleaned up. It was really messy and bloody.”

“What did Mr. Wards do while you were cleaning up the mess?”

“He left in his pickup. When he came back, about four hours later, he told me to wash out the pickup. The dead guy and the tarp were gone.”

“Did Mr. Wards tell you what he had done with Mr. Owens and the tarp?”

“Nope. Never asked. None of my business.”

The County Attorney decided to move on. “Mr. Ortega, please tell us how your job changed after the incident with Mr. Owens.”

“Well, I sort of became Mr. Wards’ assistant on everything. I kept his storage stuff clean and stored right. I ran messages for him. I washed all the trucks, and greased them, and stuff like that. I still worked in the woods when there wasn’t anything else for me to do. The good part was that he kept me working all year around, even when the other guys were laid off for the winter. So I was able to send a lot of money home to my family. It was the best job I ever had.”

“All right, Mr. Ortega, please tell us what you know about the death of Ole Johnson.”

“Well, Johnson was a logger that worked for Wards during the summer of 1958. He was a pretty good guy, I thought. He talked funny and I had a hard time understanding him. I think he came from another
country, like me. He was always good to me. But he kept telling the other loggers that Wards wasn’t paying them enough. He got chewed out by the foremen a few times for that kinda talk. Finally, he started talking about starting a union for the loggers who worked for Wards. When the foreman heard this, he fired Ole and sent him to see Wards for his paycheck.”

“What was the name of this foreman?”

“I dunno. I wasn’t in the woods then. I was working with Mr. Wards unloading some supplies at the storage shed when Ole showed up for his paycheck. Ole was really mad and was saying stuff like he was going to turn in Mr. Wards for violating some kinda worker laws. I didn’t understand any of it, but it made Wards really mad. Anyway, I kept on unloading the truck while they argued. Then I heard a shot and jumped outa my skin. Really scared me. I looked over and Ole was on the ground and Wards was standing there with his pistol out. Ole had a big hole in his face where his nose used to be. He was deader than a doornail.”

“What happened then, Mr. Ortega?”

“I helped Wards put Ole in the back of the pickup and put another tarp over him. Wards took off with him and was gone until that night sometime. I cleaned up the pickup and the yard where Ole fell down. It was a lot easier this time. Ole wasn’t near as messy as the other guy had been.”

“Are you absolutely sure that both Mr. Owens and Mr. Johnson were dead when you put them in Mr. Wards’ pickup?”

“Yup. They were dead.”

Mr. Ortega, did you ever hear Mr. Wards say anything about Mr. Gohmert or the robbery of the café in St. Dubois?”

“Nope. He never mentioned them to me.”

“All right Mr. Ortega, please tell us what happened on the day that you stopped Ray Moore on the mountain above the Little Joe Creek.”

“Well, Mr. Wards had been watching Moore and that guy Kochran for a while. Every time he’d see them, he’d start cussing and threatening them.”

The County Attorney stopped him. “Wait, Mr. Ortega. Do you mean that Mr. Wards cussed and threatened them to their faces? Man-to-man, so to speak?”

“No, I don’t think so. If he did, I never saw it. He’d just sit in his truck and cuss at them when they went by. Stuff like that.”

“Can you give us an example of that?”

“Sure. The day before we had that run-in on the mountain, I was with Wards, coming back from getting a load of supplies in Missoula. We were driving down the highway, just east of Big River when we seen that big raft with Kochran and his buddy in it. As soon as he seen it, Wards pulled over and started cussing Kochran. I didn’t pay much attention but it was something about how Kochran had screwed him on that cedar tree thing. He pointed his finger at the raft and kinda went “Bang, Bang,” like he was shooting a bullet outa his finger. He said something about them being sitting ducks out on that river. He said that he’d be back and then we left. He did that kinda stuff all the time.”

County Attorney Warthen looked meaningfully at the seated jury and pressed Jose to explain this point further. “You mean that Mr. Wards faked shooting at Mr. Kochran as he floated by on the raft and then he said that he would be back?”

“Yeah.”

“All right. Please go ahead with the story of the encounter on the mountain, Mr. Ortega.”

“Okay. It was late that morning and I was riding with Mr. Wards in his truck on the way to a logging site when we saw Moore’s pickup turning off the main road, heading up towards the Little Joe. When Wards saw him, he says, “This is our chance. We’re gonna follow that asshole.”

The County Attorney stopped him there. “Mr. Ortega, can you remember what time of day it was when you first saw Mr. Moore’s pickup?”

“It was just about noon, I think. Maybe a little bit before that.”

“Where had you been before that, Mr. Ortega?”

“I was cleaning out the storehouse and waiting for Mr. Wards to come and get me. He was supposed to bring me up to work in the woods that day, but he was late picking me up. He had a flat tire, he said.”

“So you hadn’t seen Mr. Wards at all that morning? I mean before he came to pick you up sometime before noon?”

“Nope. I was waiting for him at our storehouse.”

Mr. Ortega, was it normal for Mr. Wards to be so late when he was meeting you for something?”

“Nope. He was usually early.”

“Thank you Mr. Ortega. Now please continue with your story. You were following Mr. Moore’s pickup, I believe?”

“Yeah, so we followed him up the Little Joe Creek road. We stayed back so he couldn’t see us. We could follow him ‘cause of the dust he was kicking up. We followed him a long ways. Saw him stop and get out at that little lake. That’s when we realized there were two of them in the pickup. Anyway, we turned around and went back down the road until we found a place that we could surprise them good. We stopped and blocked the road with the truck and waited. Mr. Wards gave me a rifle and told me to use it if I needed to. But he said he didn’t want to shoot them. He wanted to use his baseball bat on them.”

“What did you think he meant by that?”

“I thought he meant to beat on them like he did on that Owens guy.”

“And you went along with this, Mr. Ortega?”

This question agitated Jose. He looked a bit mad as he answered. “Sure I did. He was my boss. You Americans are always doing some strange shit and this was just one more stupid thing. He was the boss, so I did what he told me to do.”

“We understand, Mr. Ortega. Please continue telling us about that afternoon.”

“Well, after a while, Moore’s pickup came around the corner and started to stop. Then it sped up and tried to go around Wards’ truck. Wards told me to shoot a hole in the window between the two guys in the pickup, so I did. They stopped and Moore jumped out and took a run at Wards. Wards hit a home run off Moore’s ribs and Moore went down. Then they argued back and forth about some cedar trees. I wasn’t paying any attention ‘cause Wards told me to watch the kid who was still in the pickup.”

Jose stopped to gather his thoughts and take in a big breath. He glanced nervously at Bill Wards who was glaring at the little Mexican. Jose looked away and seemed to lose his train of thought.

The County Attorney’s voice was gentle as he brought Jose back on track. “All right Mr. Ortega. They were arguing. What happened next?”

“Well, I saw Wards hit Moore a couple of times, then he told me to get the kid out of the pickup. I told the kid to get out and he tried, but the door was stuck. Finally he kicked the door open and started climbing out. About then, Moore fell head-first onto the road and we all looked at him, trying to figure out what was wrong. I thought Wards had hurt him bad or something. Then I heard a metal noise, like a gun sound. When I looked back at the kid, he had a rifle pointed at my head. I dropped my gun and put my hands up. Wards tried something and the kid shot that bat right out of his hands. Then Moore told me to lie down in the road, so I did that. Then I heard Wards and Moore fighting. Pretty soon, Wards was lying in the road, close to me. He was out cold. Then they tied us up. The kid left to get help and Moore stayed there with a gun on us. After a while, the sheriff and a bunch of other people showed up and they took us to jail.”