The Invisible Hand - A crime novel

Chapter 1

PART ONE: DOWSE

Chapter 1

Two beers later, the bartender in front of the Confederate flag decides I've been silent long enough.

"Got somewhere to be, Wil? Don't seem interested in being here," he says. Checks his watch.

He's no rebel. A Yankee through and through. Just a businessman. The other bar on the far side of town, it's called the Union. That's what passes for clever around here.

"Yeah, I'll have another one. Just thinking about...stuff," I say. Such as getting off the dot of a barstool seat in a pin of a central North Dakota prairie town, Betrug. And killing my neighbor's sick wife.

"I didn't offer another one," the bartender says.

"You are now," I say.

A wet mug materializes next to my parched hands.

"Plenty to think about these days," the bartender says. Nods to the radio.

The news report says something about a murder in the Bakken. No surprises there.

Bakken. That's the name for the oil patch. It's where hydraulic fracturing – "fracking" – sparked the NoDak oil boom a few years back. Suicide with a paycheck.

"Good to know the trouble is staying out there," I say. I hate competition.

Betrug, nestled inside Sheridan County, is still an hour or so from the boom. Close enough to inherit its problems. Too far away to reap any benefits.

"Hard to keep it that way," the bartender says. Calls out to the man in jeans behind me. He's been watching me drink from the far side of the bar. "Ain't that right, sheriff?"

The sheriff sighs. Nods. Goes back to his sandwich and newspaper. Working on hour three of lunch.

"You're young enough," the bartender says. "Still got a strong back. Go and make your oil money. It's a wonder why you sit in here all day."

"Who says I'm not making money?" I say. Pay for the drinks.

The bartender looks over the $100 bill.

"I guess you are. You want change?" he says.

"Keep it."

"You been back at your family's farm? Started working again?" the bartender says.

"Nope. Not since the accident," I say.

The sheriff clears his throat behind me. I keep staring straight ahead.

"Think you'll get back into farming?" the bartender says.

"Nope."

The bartender hesitates before putting the $100 bill in the register. Thumbs a corner like he's testing for a fake.

"OK. I won't ask again," he says. Not the first time he's seen a $100.

Don't give me this bleeding heart bullshit about the "poor farmers" out here. There aren't any. Every one of them is a millionaire times 10. Even more so now that the oil boom hit.

They don't clear a couple million in a year, the feds give it to them for nothing. But they still dress like prairie dogs. Flannel shirts. Shitty trucks. Dirty hair.

It ain't like it used to be. Now you've got GPS tractors. Remote-controlled everythings. Crops that do the thinking for you. Insurance, subsidies, trade protection and shit-knows-what-else ag programs. All greased with PR straight out of the Dustbowl.