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For the second day in a row, Detective Tindall drove around the winding dirt roads of Shelburne, Mass. She saw a sign saying ‘Ly Farm.’ She pulled up a long dirt driveway to a freshly painted white farmhouse set upon a landscape of freshly tilled fields. As she got out of her cruiser, Karen could hear the noise of farm machinery echoing off the surrounding hills. She knocked on the front door, and a very small, middle-aged woman answered. “Can I help you?”
“Hi, I’m Detective Tindall from the Greenfield Police Department.” She showed her badge. “I’d like to ask you some questions about a farmer who is building a network of tunnels.”
The woman’s eyes lit up. “Finally! We’ve been complaining for months.”
“Please, what is your name?”
“My name is Binh Ly.” She pronounced her name Bin Lee.
A big old furry dog ambled over to Karen, sniffed the air near her, ambled back over to his spot on a braided rug, and he plopped down. “What have you been complaining about?” asked Karen.
Binh pointed toward a large window. “There’s been construction going on, up on the hill every day for months. Even on weekends! This used to be a nice, quiet place. My husband, Hao, went up there to find out about it, but the guy up there had a gun and warned him not to come up there again.”
“Did your husband see what was going on up there?”
“No, but a couple of weeks ago, when my son Ken was home from school, he snuck up there and spied on the guy. He said the guy is building a bomb shelter or something. The construction was underground and they were pouring concrete.”
“Do you know the name of the farmer up there?”
“We don’t know his name, and neither did the police. I don’t even think he’s a farmer. There’s no farm up there. I’m not sure it’s even his land. As far as I know, it’s always been state land up there.”
“How long have you lived here, Mrs. Ly?”
“Oh, about thirty-five years, ever since I got married. Hao’s father bought this farm. He escaped from Vietnam. He was one of the boat people, like my parents. He’s no longer alive.” Something slammed into the back screen door causing Karen to jump. “Oh, it’s just the goat. Hold on.” Binh went out back and yelled at the goat for a moment. When she came back in she said, “He chewed through his rope again, but I tied him back up. We’ll have to get a chain.”
“Mrs. Ly, is there anything else you can tell me about the man on the hill?”
“I think he’s some kind of survivalist or militia or something like that. He wears camo clothes and carries a gun.”
“Well, you and your family should probably stay away from him. I’ll investigate what’s going on. Here is my card if you think of anything else you want to tell me.”
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KAREN STOPPED BY THE Shelburne Town Clerk’s office. Perry Narden said, “Hello Officer Tindall. You saved me a call. I didn’t find a Keith Lyman, but I asked around and found out about a guy named Keith Wyman. He sold his farm in Leverett last year. I don’t show him owning any land in Shelburne, though.”
“Well, I talked to a woman named Binh Ly. She showed me a hill where someone was doing a lot of excavation work. Could you tell me who owns the land?”
Perry went over to a cabinet with wide drawers and pulled out several maps which he set on the counter. He pointed out the Ly farm and Karen showed him the hill where, according to Binh Ly, the excavation was taking place. He said, “This is state land. He would have to have a contract or a land-lease from the state to excavate there.”
“Is there a way for you to find out?”
“I’ll have to make some calls. I’ll give you a call later today. I have your card.”
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TWO DAYS LATER, KAREN stood by her car and watched as State Troopers Nash and Freelander confronted the man on the hilltop. The man didn’t point his gun at the troopers, and he placed it on the ground when directed. Officer Freelander put him in cuffs and Officer Nash asked him his name. He told them his name was Keith Wyman. Nash said, “Mr. Wyman, we are arresting you for unauthorized construction on state property. This warrant authorizes us to search this property for weapons and evidence related to the murder of Kevin Clarion.” Wyman didn’t say a word and Freelander put him in the back seat of their cruiser.
Karen accompanied Trooper Nash on a search of the property. The underground complex was four stories down, with quite a few tunnels and rooms. They found a cache of weapons, including two fully automatic assault rifles and guns with suppressors, which were illegal in Massachusetts. Another State Police cruiser showed up and another officer helped catalog and confiscate the weapons. There were several bows, crossbows, and many razor-tipped arrows. Karen told the troopers that one of the crossbows might be the murder weapon in a New York case, and a gun with a suppressor could be relevant to a murder case in Greenfield. Nash told Karen that Wyman and the weapons would be taken to the State Police barracks in Northampton.
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KAREN WAS IN CHIEF Reyes’s office explaining what she had found and laying out her strategies on what should happen next. His desk phone rang and he picked it up. His face turned red, and he stood up and started pacing. “What about the potential murder weapons?” he asked. “What a mess! How can we help?” He put the phone on hold and collapsed into his chair. “This is ADA Chen. She said that some fancy lawyer from Boston showed up in Northampton with proof that, as of six months ago, the state property that Wyman was excavating became federal land. He also had proof that Keith Wyman received a federal land-lease with permission to build. He told Chen that, since they had no jurisdiction to search that federal property, they must release Wyman and return his confiscated property. Chen said that they would probably have to release Wyman within the next few hours while they figure this out. Chen wants to know who the FBI agent on this case is.”
Karen’s face went pale. “It’s Special Agent Jameson Davis, from Albany.” Karen wrote his number on a note pad. “Holy crap.” Chief Reyes started talking to ADA Chen again, so Karen left his office.
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SPECIAL AGENT DAVIS called and asked Karen to attend a late-afternoon meeting at the FBI office in Springfield, Mass. Davis was the only person Karen knew in the room. He led the meeting, which included quite a few people by video-conference. Davis ran through the background of his missing persons case involving Katrina Ryu, and how that case intersected with the mole-people case being investigated by Officer Tindall. Ms. Ryu was now in Witness Protection with the US Marshals. There had been two murders: one victim was Kevin Clarion, a college student, in Saratoga Springs, New York, and the other was Paul Combs, a suspected hit-man, in Greenfield, Mass. Clarion was killed by a bolt from a crossbow, and Combs was killed by a twenty-two caliber rifle.
Davis showed pictures on the monitor of each person being discussed. “A person of interest in both of these cases is Keith Wyman. No criminal record. He seems to be a doomsday prepper. He’s building an underground fortress of some kind on what was, until recently, state-owned land in Shelburne, Mass. Wyman was recently arrested for unlawful excavation of state land, and upon execution of a state search warrant, a cache of guns, ammo, bows, and arrows were confiscated. Among them were several fully-automatic guns and guns with suppressors. Shortly after his arrest, a lawyer from Boston showed up and provided evidence that, as of six months ago, the land was transferred by congressional legislation to be federally-owned, and Mr. Wyman was given a land-lease for a home construction project. The State Police released Mr. Wyman, but through some legal wrangling, I was able to obtain a federal warrant to retain some of the weapons for the murder investigations and to confiscate the illegal weapons. Massachusetts issued an arrest warrant for Kevin Wyman on a weapons charge. The FBI is working with the State Crime Lab to examine the guns and crossbows in relation to the murders.”
“We’re also looking for his son, Steven Wyman, aka Steve Lyman, aka Evan Melsty, as a person of interest. He is the third suspect in the mole people case, along with Katrina Ryu and the late Kevin Clarion. Steven Wyman’s real name was only recently identified, so we may be able to track him down quickly. Although this is a complex case, the reason you are attending this meeting has to do with the broader picture. On the monitor is a picture of US Representative Borden Ritchie from Idaho. Over the past year, Ritchie’s staff has inserted forty-one land transfers distributed over sixteen states into a variety of bills having nothing to do with land or land transfers. So far, our agents have inspected one in the Adirondack mountains where another underground fortress is being constructed. I don’t know if these people are preparing for war or an apocalypse, but whatever they’re doing may not be consistent with appropriate use of federal lands. I’m enlisting your support to initiate an investigation.”