Always Unfaithful

By Hanes Segler

Sheriff Paul Gimble doesn't think Hale Slayton's disappearance is anything to worry about; the wealthy old rancher is well known for overcoming everything he's encountered in eight decades of life. But when he turns up brutally murdered, the sheriff finds himself investigating the biggest crime of his career, complicated by the victim's history of womanizing, questionable energy leases, illegal alien abuse, and conflicts with everyone in the county, including his own children.

With the help of four young deputies, Paul plows ahead, secure in the knowledge that he is doing the right thing for the victim, his family, and the community. His thoroughness and dedication to the job earn him high marks with everyone except his girlfriend, who sees the time-consuming investigation as an example of his misplaced priorities. Adding to his difficulties, Paul is stymied by false leads and long-held misperceptions about the gruff old Texan that make the list of suspects longer than a well rope.

Always Unfaithful is a tale of rumors, deceit, and outright lies that lead-not very directly-to the reason for Hale Slayton's untimely death. Along the way, Sheriff Gimble finds that almost nothing is what it seems, and everything, including his own personal life is subject to a closer look.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Nov 16, 2006
• ISBN: 9781462077564

Hanes Segler

Hanes Segler was born in San Antonio in 1949. Son of a career military man, he lived in Germany for three years as a young child before returning to Central Texas where he attended school. After a decade of odd jobs, he entered the commercial banking industry and remained for many years. Upon retirement, he returned to San Antonio where he continues to work occasionally and travel at every opportunity; however, writing remains his true passion. Traveling extensively throughout South Texas and Mexico, he observes and enjoys the culture, history and people—good and bad—of the Border Region. The Truth, Very Rare is his ninth novel set in the region and the fifth of the Carlton Westerfield Series. See the author’s entire body of work and contact him with questions or comments at www.hanessegler.com.

Book preview

C Η A Ρ Τ Ε R 1 

Sheriff Paul Gimble squinted in the bright sunlight that assaulted his eyes as he surveyed the scene. There was no relief from the glare within the parameters of his vision, no real shade or even a shadow, save the brim of his hat. When he removed it to wipe the sweat from his forehead, he had to close his eyes to the blinding whiteness, not opening them until the functional headgear was back in place. He grimaced in the heat and glare, then took another look at his surroundings.

A dome of pale sky, its blueness bleached away by the sun, presided over miles of rocky soil. A smattering of grass poked up between gray-green patches of scrub brush, mostly cenizo and creosote bushes. Here and there, stunted mesquite trees made an effort to extend into the harsh sky, but even the tallest offered shelter only for a jackrabbit, or possibly a rattlesnake. Any plant with more substantial nutritional needs didn’t have a chance.

Everything grew close to the ground, stunted, as if cowering from the heat and wind. Even the rocks appeared to be doing their best to avoid confrontation with the environment. Nothing jutting out of the ground, no imposing boulders; not even sizeable chunks of rock sitting about to provide contrast to the terrain. Just flat, smooth, rounded pieces about the size of a man’s palm, ranging in color from white to gray, and even some tan and pinkish ones. Rarely, one might spot a strikingly dark one, even ebony, the entire mix strewn haphazardly over the landscape. That, and the stones’ round flatness and varying colors, suggested a spilled bag of M and M’s melting in the withering heat.

The shape of the land itself was a rolling, undulating plain stretching toward the visible horizon several miles away, where a mesa interrupted the monotony of the rocky terrain. There the mesa dominated the horizon, a miles-long stretch of flat-topped mountain rising several hundred feet above the stone-covered land. Taking its name from the Spanish word for table, one look told the viewer why los conquistadores had so named the imposing formations which strode for miles across parts of southwestern Texas. Perhaps more appropriately, the table-topped mountain could have been named for a ship—an aircraft carrier?—sailing in a vast, rolling sea, its prow straining forward into emptiness. A few cumulus clouds had formed thunderheads behind the mesa, and as they were roiled by the constant wind currents they supported the appearance of a ship moving steadily through the Gravel Sea.

Sheriff Gimble pulled his straw hat a fraction lower on his forehead against the late-afternoon glare and climbed back into his pickup. Sitting there, he reflected on his afternoon’s project. He knew it was a waste of time to drive out here in the department vehicle, a four-wheel drive pickup. Oh, sure, it would traverse the ranch easily enough; the heavy-duty, four-wheel-drive rig was the vehicle of choice in this part of the world. But it would take weeks to cover the entire ranch by land vehicle. A real search, if it came to that, would have to be conducted by air, a small plane or helicopter. Seventy-seven thousand acres meant one hundred and twenty square miles. Lots of land to get lost in.

Except Hale Slayton wasn’t lost, of that Gimble was certain. The man who was missing might be hiding, injured, or maybe dead—but not lost. Like his father and grandfather before him, he had owned this ranch and lived here all his life. He knew every square foot of it and made that fact known to anyone who asked—and some who didn’t. When it came to his land, he exuded a confidence that came from years of experience, a familiarity as comfortable as an old sofa. Those who knew him well didn’t see it as arrogance, or even bold-ness—though he could exhibit those traits, too—but a wisdom borne from living here, breathing the air and dust, managing and overseeing the land and its resources to the point where he had become a fixture, just like the mesa and the rocks. No, it didn’t make sense that the wealthy old-timer could be lost, and the alternatives for his disappearance were not pleasant for a county sheriff to contemplate.

When the call had come earlier that day, Gimble promised to take action, more out of a sense of duty than a belief that the old man was really in need of help.

This is Sheriff Gimble.

Sheriff, this is Bud Crandall. How are you?

Good, Bud, just fine. How about you? You haven’t mildewed after all that rain, have you?

Bud chuckled at that, sharing in the sheriff’s dark humor and sticking to the steadfast code that it was better to laugh about the dry spell than to cry about it. Yeah, all three drops we got the other day fell on my hat and damn near ruined it.

Well, you probably needed a new one anyway. Get a waterproof one next time. What’s up, Bud?

I don’t know if anything is. But Hale has been gone for two days now. That’s not like him, going off and not telling me.

Gimble didn’t comment for several seconds, giving the ensuing silence on the line a chance to inform him of the ranch foreman’s knowledge of the event. Experience had taught him that people, left to talk, will sometimes impart more information than they had intended, or that they were aware of having. Nothing else was forthcoming, and he pulled a pad in front ofhim and reached for a pen. Is he in his pickup or on horseback?

Horseback. That’s what’s got me worried. If he was in the pickup, I’d have thought he might’ve gone to town or something. But he sure as hell didn’t take Buster onto I-10.

What does Mrs. Slayton think?

She’s out of town, gone to New York. Shopping, I guess. And going to Broadway plays, she likes that stuff. Been gone three days, supposed to be back Sunday. Today’s what, Wednesday? I don’t know if she’s tried to call him, but I didn’t want to call her with this news. Not till we know something for sure.

Yeah, that’s probably best. No sense in getting her upset. He might show up any minute. Gimble decided to probe a little, since his earlier waiting game hadn’t been productive. You got any idea where he might’ve gone? Would he go vistin’ on horseback?

Both men knew ‘vistin’ was a polite way of describing Hale Slayton’s reputed proclivity to wander in the direction of other women. His wife, Margaret, must have known of his forays, but no one in the community talked about it—not out loud, anyway. Her absence, a New York shopping trip no less, would have presented an excellent opportunity for the old man to slip out.

Wouldn’t surprise me, Bud answered dryly. Hard to think he’d go on horseback, though. Hell, he knows he could take his pickup, or any ranch vehicle, or even Margaret’s Cadillac for that matter. It sure wouldn’t make any difference to me or any of the men here on the ranch.

You want me to keep it unofficial, then? Gimble asked. ’Cause ifI write it up and enter the case on the computer, it’ll go out all over the state. You know how this Internet shit is, even the restricted law enforcement Web sites. Every swinging dick from Victoria to Van Horn will see it. And every one of them who knows Hale Slayton will be running their mouth about it. He turns up in a whorehouse in Ciudad Acuña, there’ll be hell to pay.

You’re right, Paul. Yeah, maybe you could just look around, check a few places. You know, like Betty’s. Or Sylvia’s. You could cruise by their places without it causing a stink. If I drive by their places in a ranch pickup, somebody will see me in town and think I’m checking on him. Hell, come to think of it, he’s got more girlfriends than anybody I know. How’s he do it?

Viagra? the sheriff suggested. Both men laughed at that, then fell silent for a moment before Gimble promised to take action. I’ll run his traps and see if I can spot him. If not, I’ll drive out and look around. If he doesn’t turn up, I’d say we need to decide in the morning when to file the missing person report, but no later than tomorrow evening.

Sounds good, Paul. I appreciate it. I don’t think anything’s happened to him. Crandall fell silent for a moment, as though trying to decide why he thought his boss was okay, finally voicing what Paul already knew. Hell, he’s still as tough as any sonofabitch ever to shit between two boots, but it’s odd that he hasn’t contacted me.

Well, if that’s out of character, then you’re probably right to be concerned. He isn’t a youngster any more. How old is Hale, anyway?

Um, seventy-nine his last birthday. He’s in good health, but hell, he could’ve fallen off that old nag and broke his back. And he won’t carry his cell phone, but it won’t work in some parts of the ranch anyway.

Paul laughed. Yeah, and if he did, I can’t picture Hale Slayton calling you up and saying he’d been hurt. I’ll get on it, check around town first. Then I’ll drive out to the east pasture and look around. If it turns out we got to look at all of it, we just as well start somewhere. Quicker for me to get there than you, I think. That’s the part that’s farthest from the house, right?

Yep. That gravelly mess out there south of Two-Mile Mesa. It’s ten or eleven miles over there from the headquarters if I go through the two middle pastures, eighteen if I take the county road. But hell, there’s nothing over there but a buzzard roost. Not enough grass for the cattle. I don’t know what he’d be doing there.

Both men fell silent again as the casual mention of carrion eaters sunk in. The Texas skies always had a few drifting on the currents. Although they usually were seeking the carcass of a dead armadillo or snake, a large flock of them might signal a bigger find, maybe a cow. Still, the sight of circling buzzards was a proven method for finding people in the wilderness who had been hurt—or worse. It seemed the opportunistic creatures could spot a potential meal with amazing speed and accuracy in the barren landscape. Indeed, a flock of vultures descending, gradually spiraling downward toward a spot on the ground, invariably pinpointed some living thing that wasn’t moving…never good news for the victim. Paul cleared his throat and closed the conversation. Remind the ranch hands to watch for buzzards circling, Bud. I’ll call you later.

Recalling the end of the phone conversation, Paul shielded his eyes with his hand and swept the sky above the horizon. Two buzzards, soaring a mile from each other and heading in different directions. No tight circle of twenty or thirty; that was a good sign. He sighed again and got back in his pickup. He drove west another two miles before turning right and crossed another cattle guard into what the ranch had labeled the east pasture, the northeastern portion of the Slayton spread which lay west of town and north of the interstate.

As the ranch foreman had mentioned, this part of the ranch was as desolate as the surface of the moon. But a few miles west, the gravel gave way to thin soil and reasonably good grass for another thirty miles or so before the edges of the West Texas mountains jutted their rocky guts above the ground. The bulk of the Slayton land was composed of that grassy terrain, a perfect grazing environment for cattle. In the good years, rains from the west coast of Mexico managed to clear the mountains and move into the area during late July and August, providing enough moisture to nourish the forage through the early fall. Newcomers to the area were surprised to learn of the quirk in the northern Chihuahuan Desert which made its hottest months the ones most likely to get significant rainfall and make the land productive.

The Slayton spread was productive, all right. Not only was most of it good for cattle production, but it also covered rich deposits of oil. And as the old Texas joke goes, Slayton was one of those poor souls who had perfectly good pasture land and went and ruined it by poking holes everywhere. The holes were numerous and spewed forth thousands of barrels of high-quality crude labeled West Texas Intermediate, among the finest in the world—not the worst way to have your land ruined, Paul thought.

The road worsened and he drove slowly, scanning the land left and right as he lurched around in the seat, looking for any sign of Slayton or his horse and knowing it was a long shot to drive out here and spot them—or anything else, for that matter. Hell, there wasn’t anything here Hale could have wanted to look at, he thought. Even the cattle were smart enough to stay out of this part; only rattlesnakes could eke out a living in this pasture. Maybe the old man just wanted to look at it because it was there and it belonged to him.

The only movement was due to the wind, the relentless wind that howled steadily at twenty miles an hour between gusts of over thirty. It rocked the creosote bushes and the dwarf mesquite trees, their delicate leaves flailing in the hot blasts. Here and there, the wind wafted up a miniature dust storm, carrying the gritty soil away from some areas and depositing it in others.

The rattle of grit blowing against his pickup reminded Paul of the incessant wind and recent developments concerning a use for it. Researchers had decided that the wind blowing through these wide-open spaces should be harnessed to produce power, cheap power—once the harnessing apparatus was paid for—and lots of it. Not a finite resource like oil, no ecological repercussions from burning it, just a free, everlasting source of energy for electricity production. The higher elevations in most states had been tested, and the wind-driven electricity generators had been in use for years in the Midwest, California, and Nevada. In recent years, they could be seen clustered in large farms in several places in Texas where the wind’s velocity and continuity had proven to be adequate.

Paul looked toward the mesa’s easternmost end where construction presumably had begun for erection of the first of many gigantic wind turbines scheduled for the area. He couldn’t see any progress from this distance, but the talk in town was that Slayton’s neighbor had leased his land to a company out of Canada to erect a number of the fancy windmills, as they were termed by the locals. Whatever progress had been made, it wouldn’t be on the Slayton place, he reminded himself. It was widely rumored that Hale had declined repeated offers from the wind power company to lease his end of the mesa. Paul recalled a story he’d heard a few weeks before, claiming the old man had threatened the company’s pitch man who’d gone to visit and try one last time to convince him to lease his land for wind turbines. As he pondered the almost-forgotten gossip, it occurred to him that the old man may have ridden out here just to check on the location of the turbine sites, make sure they hadn’t encroached on his property, since he’d been so vehement about it. And what if they were? What if the old man had another confrontation with someone from the wind power company? Could it have something to do with his disappearance?

A jackrabbit launched from beneath a creosote bush and shot across the road in front of the pickup, interrupting his musings and making him automatically hit the brakes. That proved a needless gesture, since the wide-eyed hare cleared the road in a single leap, then juked and bobbed for another fifty yards before diving for cover. Paul grinned at the sight, never tiring of the antics of God’s critters in this land seemingly forsaken by Him—and everyone else, except for the tough ones like old man Slayton. Hale Slayton belonged to this land as much as the land belonged to him, he thought. And he was much like the jackrabbit; having perfectly good shelter under one bush, but, rather than hunkering down and remaining still, chose to leap forth into danger to seek out an identical bush a few yards away—just because he could do it. The old man had courted trouble all his life out here; it was an accepted part of ranching, or even living, in this country.

Paul slowed for a wide, rough wash across the road, the pickup lurching from side to side as he negotiated the result of a long-forgotten flash flood, then straightening as the road leveled. His thoughts wandered to the Slayton family history, some of it well-known to everyone in the state, and some of it—like a lot of information about wealthy or important people—simply the product of rumor and hearsay. After all, he mused, it was a lot more entertaining to gossip about a rich rancher and his escapades than to dwell on the history of the guy who works at Wal-Mart or Auto Zone…or the sheriff’s department. Everyone wants to identify with the notables instead of the regular people, he thought wryly; that’s why movie magazines are so popular. And notables included the rich, the famous, or the genetically gifted—though addle-brained—of society, whether that society existed in West Hollywood or West Texas.

Hale Slayton had grown up raising cattle in the early days, just as his father, Calvin, had done and his father before him. In the fifties, the cattle business was nearly destroyed by drought, almost to the point of permanent extinction of the industry. Families like the Slaytons struggled to maintain their herds, barely keeping enough stock alive to begin again when the rains returned and the grass grew. Those unfortunate ones who had not owned their land outright for years lost it to banks when incomes shriveled up like the grass and they were unable to meet payments. Even the Slaytons were forced to sell some land and mortgage every acre possible. For a while, it appeared they would lose everything except their home and the surrounding two hundred acres, which, in those days, were exempt from re-mortgaging under Texas law. Then the oil boom had begun—just in time to save the family from financial ruin, but not in time to save Calvin’s health. Despite the end of the struggle to save the ranch, Calvin Slayton’s heart was failing. Perhaps he had fought too long and hard to recover.

When Calvin died, his wife Bertha soon followed him to the Hereafter. Apparently, they’d been together so long that neither could survive without the other. Both of them had withered away like the pastures, seeming to die of thirst just as surely as the cattle and forage had. Oddly enough, even the ranch’s new-found liquid wealth couldn’t revive what they had formerly clung to, the perception that the land would always provide for them. No matter the number ofbarrels of oil, it failed to slake the thirst of those who believed in making a living on the land, not from underneath it.

Calvin and Bertha’s only other son had died on D-Day, and Hale and his older sister, Olivia, inherited the ranch…sort of. A codicil to Calvin’s will excluded Olivia because of an affair she’d had as a young girl, a caveat she claimed was unenforceable because it simply wasn’t true. Bertha’s will contained no such provision, but since she had died last, after inheriting Calvin’s community property share, her ownership status was questioned in the resulting legal melee. Hale quickly obtained an attorney who opined that the will was enforceable as written, despite the wandering account of a daughter’s indiscretion. Olivia’s lawyer set out to find fault with the witnesses to the codicil’s execution, and the war was on. After a prolonged court battle, Hale bought out Olivia’s interest, and she moved to Los Angeles, vowing never to return, even for a visit. The success of the oil business provided the revenues to pay her for her share, and she was more than content to live a life ofluxury in the city, a far cry from the desolation of West Texas.

Hale Slayton had married and fathered two children: a son, Alan, who now lived in Houston, and a girl named Patricia. Rumor had it that Alan Slayton had attended college and law school on the GI Bill after a tour in the military service. Why he, the son of a wealthy man, had needed government assistance for his schooling wasn’t clear, but rumor again came to the rescue with a juicy tale of family conflict. In any event, Alan had founded a law practice specializing in foreign energy ventures. Though he never appeared in this part of the world, he was reputed to be a successful lawyer, now rich in his own right and entirely independent of the Slayton ranch empire.

Alan and his father maintained a bitterly strained relationship for years, finally culminating in a complete break when Hale remarried. Paul recalled when the children’s mother died, and that the elder Slayton had remained single for a long time before remarrying about two years ago, to a much younger woman named Margaret Smith. Margaret was a couple of years younger than Alan, about the same age as daughter Patricia, and the talk around town held that Alan vowed never to forgive his father for what he termed robbing the cradle. He never visited, and the relationship, always tenuous, was forgotten by all except the area’s most dedicated gossips. Some of them quietly mentioned at coffee shop gatherings that Hale Slayton had never seen his grandchildren, but like his philandering, it was not openly discussed.

Of the girl, Patricia, Paul knew nothing, although he’d heard she lived with another woman in Washington or Oregon, where she lobbied for same-sex parental rights. He had seen Alan a time or two, but couldn’t recall ever laying eyes on Patricia. He had moved here when he was twenty and the Slayton breakup had already begun, so all the information he had on the children was second-hand. It was safe to say, Paul thought, the family was a bit dysfunctional; however, the gossip mill may have embellished the situation.

Gossip or not, Paul wondered what, if anything, Alan told his children when they asked about their paternal grandfather. Maybe, He’s an old coot who married a woman young enough to be his daughter, so you can’t meet him. Was that a good enough reason to cut them off from the relationship? What about when they were older and could make their own judgment? Would they continue to see it the way Alan did, or would the latest batch of Slayton descendants have a different viewpoint? How about Patricia, living a lesbian lifestyle in the Pacific Northwest? Was Alan as closed-minded about his sister’s life as his father’s? And what would Alan think about his father’s current philandering, carried on even while married to a woman thirty years his junior?

Summing up the Slayton saga, Paul shook his head, wondering if the family members really enjoyed the life their wealth afforded them, or was it a chore to make it through each day, same as poor folks who worried about where their next meal would come from? Hale Slayton surely had enjoyed the good times, but like the jackrabbit dashing off for the next bush, he seemed to flourish when he was fighting siblings, drought, disease, falling beef prices, illegal immigrants, oil speculators, rustlers, smugglers, and dozens of other threats—real and perceived—to the continued success of his operation.

Right up to the latest of Slayton’s clashes: the brouhaha over the wind turbines, Paul thought, returning again to the possible reasons for his disappearance. Recalling the old man’s battles through the years and the recent tale of threatening the turbine company representative, he revised his earlier comparison to the jackrabbit. Hale Slayton was more like a coyote, maybe, or in some cases, like a rattlesnake.

Veering onto a faint track to the right, Paul turned in the direction of the eastern boundary of the ranch and the foot of the mesa looming over the landscape. Somewhere over there he would find Slayton’s fence line and follow it to the mesa. The adjoining land was owned by a rancher named Ed Crowley, who had leased his end of the mesa for the turbines. It wouldn’t hurt to check on the construction and, later on, visit with Crowley about the proposal the company made to him and to Hale Slayton. Maybe it would shed some light on why the old man had been so adamant in declining it.

Right now, Sheriff Paul Gimble’s job wasn’t looking too easy. Despite his earlier confidence that the old man would turn up unharmed, it needed to happen soon, before it was time to make his absence official. At that point, it would be necessary to start asking a lot of questions, and Paul’s recollection of the old man’s closet full of skeletons—and present activities—could make that process downright uncomfortable. Hopefully, he thought, something easier would present itself. Feeling guilty, he looked again to the sky for circling buzzards.

C Η A Ρ Τ Ε R 2 

Paul turned left at the fence line to follow the perimeter road toward the mesa. Like most big spreads, the perimeter road was used to patrol and maintain fence lines, so it was in better shape than the ones crisscrossing the interior. He kicked the speed up to thirty and made good time for several miles as he neared the foot of the mesa. At its base, the road began an abrupt climb and as the incline increased, he eased the pickup into four-wheel drive and pressed ahead, hoping he could make it without having to get out and walk the steepest part. Near the crest, the rim of the mesa had been bladed to alleviate the incline, and the pickup purred to the top without a murmur.

From the summit, a full three hundred sixty-degree, panoramic view of southwestern Texas afforded a stunning sight. If the view from below had seemed vast, this vantage point made the lower elevation’s perspective seem minor in comparison. Paul drove another few hundred yards along the top of the mesa and parked. To his right, across the fence, he could see two vehicles, some trailers, and several men working on what appeared to be a foundation of sorts. He got out and climbed through the fence for a closer look.

As he approached, Paul noticed the wariness of some of the workers, which didn’t surprise him. He knew they had spotted him as a lawman and were concerned that he was there to check their immigration status. Any job in this part of the world that entailed hard labor attracted Mexican nationals, a good number of them undocumented and illegally in the States. The sudden appearance of a lawman out here in the middle of nowhere surely didn’t look like good news for any worker who didn’t have his green card or some type of temporary work visa. Technically, he could require every worker to show his documentation and arrest anyone who did not have legal status to be employed.

Paul wished he could convey to them that his visit was for an entirely different purpose. He wasn’t interested in busting a few workers toiling out here to make a buck, not today and not out here, anyway. If he’d wanted to round up illegals, he could catch them coming out of the grocery stores any Friday evening after they’d been paid, carrying bags of frijoles and tortillas, along with a couple of quarts of cheap beer. Then he could arrange to have an Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service bus drop by and pick them up for deportation across the border. He preferred to leave such busts to the ICE or the Border Patrol, now that the Department of Homeland Security controlled their operations. Besides, illegal immigration in order to obtain work was a situation that had existed for years, and no amount of arrests, deportations, or political wrangling would result in a perfect outcome. The sheriff’s department had better things to do, Paul thought, unless an illegal was causing trouble or actually committing a crime against a local citizen. When that occurred, his staff had standing instructions to act swiftly and to the fullest extent of the law—such as it was—to arrest and process illegal aliens for prosecution or deportation. It was a policy that had worked for years in this, a rural area with plenty of hard labor and limited people to do it.

He sauntered over to an older Anglo who looked like he was in charge—and was the only person whose eyes had met his. Afternoon. I’m Sheriff Gimble, he said, extending his hand.

Ned Sommers. How are you, Sheriff? The man shook his hand, then pushed back his hardhat and pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket. Mopping his face, he squinted into the sun and shifted his body to look directly at Paul without being blinded. What can I do for you? he asked.

I was out this way checking on something, and I thought I’d look in on how these things are built.

Well, I can sure do that. Hell, I can even put you to work, he added, grinning. My hands don’t always show up for work, so I’m generally a little short-handed out here. I’m short two men today.

Paul laughed. Afraid this work would be too tough for an old goat like me. You’d run me off before dinner.

Old? Hell, you ain’t old, Sheriff, you look to be in the prime oflife to me! Sommers exclaimed, tilting his head and squinting in the sun to look closely at him. "But the work’s hard enough, all right. We drill holes for pouring the piers with that rig over there, but there’s rebar to tie in and