Free SurviRal by Ken Benton Page A

in this area was mostly gravel and rock, being as they were currently up in a pass. The highway would shortly descend to the Bear Dance golf course area, right before the small town of Larkspur. But the passage narrowed here. A side-road and the railway tracks ran alongside the highway to their right.
    The two lanes of southbound traffic continued to move agonizingly slow. It did seem like some kind of construction must be happening, as they advanced only one car length each time they went forward. After a while, they could see three men standing ahead directing traffic. They were burly, tough-looking guys.
    That’s when Clint noticed all the tow trucks stopped on both sides of the road, most of them hooked to cars. They, too, appeared to be stacked up waiting for the road to reopen. The center median and shoulder of the highway were now completely blocked by them. The two lines of southbound cars were trapped, closed-in by the tow trucks. Nothing to do now but wait it out, and keep moving ahead when they could.
    The highway men came up to the driver’s window of each car and briefly talked to drivers before directing them into either the left or right lane going forward.
    “There’s a wire fence separating these two lanes ahead,” Clint said.
    “Huh?” Harold squinted. “Yeah, you’re right. Looks temporary, standing on the lane marker. Wonder what that’s about.”
    “Guess we’ll find out soon enough. Think we’re only five cars back now.”
    Harold was in the left lane. The three of them watched as the driver at the head of the line in the right lane finished talking with the man on the road. He was directed into the left lane ahead.
    “The left lane’s moving,” Clint said. “The right one isn’t. Sure hope we don’t get funneled into that one.”
    “Oh my gosh, they’re taking bribes,” Jenny blurted.
    “What’s that?” Clint turned around.
    “I saw the person in the car up front hand the man something. It looked like cash. They were then put in the left lane.”
    Clint laughed. “I’m sure you’re imagining things, honey.”
    “I don’t know,” Harold said. “Now that she mentions it, I think I saw that driver hand him something, too. I can see the lead car in our lane now from my side. It looks like the driver is arguing with the construction guy.”
    They watched as the lead car in the left lane was then directed to the right lane, between the fence and the right shoulder, where cars were hardly moving at all.
    “There must be a normal explanation for this,” Clint said.
    They moved up, and were now only two cars from the front. The men talking to the drivers weren’t wearing hardhats or orange vests as construction workers usually do. They would bend down, talk to the driver through the window, and then direct the car into one of the two lanes—either the one that was moving on the left side of the fence, or the one on the right that wasn’t. And that one wasn’t moving at all. People were now outside of their cars on the right side, some talking to each other and others who seemed angry, shouting and throwing their hands in the air.
    Clint could clearly see the driver at the front of the left lane shake his head and roll his window up. He was in a small red car, possibly a Fiat. The highway men directed him to the right side of the fence. He started for it, but then did something unexpected. He veered onto the shoulder, squeezing between the line of cars and the tow trucks. Dust and gravel kicked up from his tires. Up ahead, he appeared to find a spot where there was a break in the tow trucks and abruptly cut through them.
    Harold laughed. “There’s an option. If he got through okay, he was probably able to cut over to Bear Dance Road. It leads to the golf course, but there’s a highway onramp up there.”
    Both cars in front of them handed the highway men something through the window. Both were allowed through on the left side. Harold pulled forward and rolled his window