Chapter 3

Once the family meeting got going I really didn't have to wait too long to find out which way the wind was blowing. Hard and to the south ... a very cold wind from Valhalla. Nearly everyone was in favor of the more radical, but permanent solution to what now appeared to be an extremely significant problem ... and growing worse by the moment. Carrie had indeed been starting to run her mouth off to various state and federal governmental agencies, but no one so far was apparently taking an especially keen interest in what she had to say. Trying to play every side to her own advantage, Ned's misguided ex was holding out on details to hopefully cash in as a federal paid informant, but no one was biting, yet.

Just as well then, and thank heaven for small favors.

It had been decided already that there would be no family buyout — her 'golden parachute', just wasn't going to happen. Sure, we were going to continue to string her along for awhile, but she was already starting to become rather impatient. We'd paid off a few other disgruntled ex's in the past, mostly with successful end results, but Carrie was just too unstable to the family to seriously consider this option. She'd just take the money, move out of the area and then try to sell her story for another quick payday. Bribery is a very useful tool, but only if the bribed party is honorable enough to stay bribed.

Performing a 'Clarke' solution to the problem of dealing with her was now much too likely, in my opinion (voiced loudly but distinctly) to validate her ravings and invite a much closer and unfriendly examination of our family than we would obviously prefer. I suggested a more subtle approach.

Slowly, the tide of opinion began to take my side. Once I felt I had a bit of support (and enough rope to figuratively hang myself), I laid forth my proposed battle plan of action, which was very much in the August Wilde philosophy of crisis management. "Think twice, but act once" as he would say. A very Wise man, August. His other favorite quote was "If you're shooting, then you're not thinking".

Carrie was clearly more than just a bit of a nutcase, and she was already dangerously self-medicating at the moment, according to most accounts. These were character flaws that could be easily exploited for maximum result with very little, if any chance for a blowback upon us. Shit happens though, but I kept those darker thoughts to myself.

My proposed plan of action was fourfold:

•First, get more hard facts via a phone tap on her landline to hear exactly what criminal activities she was reporting the Wilde clan to be involved with. Odds were, 95% of it would be pure crap. Another bug inside their hilltop cabin would also be good as well to hear what if any additional plans they were making amongst themselves in private. Carrie's current fellow houseguests appeared to also be similar sorts of kooks and fellow travelers, but were very much still an unknown quantity and we had to know which way they would jump if and when we shouted "Boo".

•Second, exploit her current chemical dependencies, with additional chemical additives as necessary, to make her just a bit more unstable and possibly prone to even more reckless behavior. Ideally we should try to ratchet up her already existing paranoia a few more notches, if possible. Dress up a few unemployed family or kin as 'government watchers' that are spying on her and don't even be subtle about it. Make them think every three letter agency in the book suddenly now has an interest in their activities. Odds are that she wouldn't like this at all and become jumpier than a spring hare or an Iraq desert camel spider. The worse worst case scenario would be an unfortunate but genuine self-inflicted accident that could be readily proven by the local Medical Examiner and one of the Deputy County Sheriffs as such. Our local ME and most of the senior Deputies were senior Wilde family members ... and present upstairs at this meeting. The Sheriff himself was an ignorant tool only vaguely related to us and hailing from a minor allied family, but that's a different rant.

•Thirdly, prime her information pipeline by covertly providing her with a steady stream of patently false (and easily provable as such) misinformation. After being burned a few times, even the most interested governmental agency will tire of her cries of "Wolf" and consign her ravings to the loony bin paperwork cabinet, assuming that anyone would even then continue to take her crank phone calls. Also, if possible, find another local lady with a voice similar to Carrie's to make numerous other additional 'raving and nonsensical' phone calls at all hours of the day and night. Jack up the noise-to-signal ratio so badly that even if Carrie did start to spout profane truths, her facts would be lost in a sea of utter looney twaddle.

Lastly, sit back, poke them regularly with a long pointed stick until they pop, then point them into a suitable direction and wait for the train to run off of the tracks. Ideally, get them good and paranoid, brains teeming with dangerous drugs, and send them off driving out of the County ready to be caught by some other law enforcement agency with a trunk of weapons and enough WildeWeed to ensure a lengthy stay in a state criminal facility for the extremely naughty. Worse case scenario would be that they'd run off the road and hit a tree in the process, saving everyone involved a whole lot of expense and paperwork. We could live with that ... and even replant another tree there afterwards if necessary.

There was surprisingly little debate to these suggestions and I was quite surprised. Usually when you get twenty people in one room you can't get even half of them to agree on pizza ingredients, let alone a way to rid themselves of a very troublesome in-law. Guys would be asking me for advice for dealing with their mother-in-law's next. The older gray haired heads were especially nodding in agreement and our discussions pretty much immediately migrated into more tactical, rather than strategic terms for the remainder of the evening. The remaining problems seemed minor, and were quickly resolved to nearly everyone's complete satisfaction.

Everyone liked the basic plan and the chances of a catastrophic blowback seemed extremely minimal. Murphy's Law was sure to screw something up, but the odds of this turning into an complete and utter ratfuck appeared to be really minimal. It looked to be a good low risk-high reward sort of operation.

We passed out assignments:

•Rollie, who worked with the local baby Bell phone company, assured us that he could have both sets of wiretaps set up and operational by tomorrow morning. The voice recordings would all be digitally recorded and stored on a high security local server and would be immediately available for listening via an internet connection on a clean laptop that he would bring to me tomorrow. My plan, so I'd be the point guy for the operation (pending Elder approval). Not what I had in mind, but it wasn't unexpected. That's what I get for opening my mouth in the first place.