Chapter 192: Pound Ridge

The April morning fog drifted low across the Westchester woods, carrying the damp scent of wet earth, pine needles, and fresh cedar shavings.

​Arthur Murphy stood on the porch of the central cabin with a steaming tin mug of chicory coffee in one hand and a thick, leather-bound clipboard tucked under his arm. He took a slow sip, looking out over the clearing.

​The camp Ricky had left behind over a month ago was barely recognizable.

​It wasn’t a fortress or a modern military base, but it was no longer a rough clearing in the woods where dozenz of men slept on straw pallets. Stretching around the entire six-acre compound was a heavy, six-foot woven-wire fence stapled securely to thick cedar posts driven deep into the soil. Solid timber gates guarded the eastern road, establishing a clear line between the private property of Pound Ridge and the surrounding wilderness.

​Inside the wire, Arthur had divided the camp into distinct, functional zones.

​To the west stood the central compound. The original men’s barracks had been expanded, and two new pine-board structures with tin roofs had been erected alongside it—one serving as an overflow barracks for the growing body of recruits, and the other built specifically for the new arrivals. The main mess hall had doubled in size, its long pine tables capable of seating eighty men at a time, backed by an enlarged kitchen featuring two massive cast-iron stoves and dry-storage shelves stacked high with sacks of flour, salted pork, and tinned coffee.

​To the south lay the physical training zone. The old obstacle course remained, but its timber climbing walls had been reinforced, its crawl trenches deepened, and a three-hundred-yard oval dirt track cleared around the outer edge.

​To the east stood the marksmanship and tactical facilities: the pistol range, the hundred-yard rifle range, and the windowless, flat-roofed timber building known simply as the CQB house.

​Arthur walked down the porch steps, his heavy leather boots crunching against the gravel pathway. He headed straight toward the CQB house, where two senior instructors—men from the very first batch of recruits Ricky had trained—were busy using claw hammers and crowbars to dismantle a pine wall inside the main doorway.

​"Changing the layout?" Arthur asked, leaning against the doorframe.

​"Setting up a narrow hallway with a side-door breakeven today, Boss," one of the instructors replied, wiping sweat from his forehead with a wool sleeve. "Yesterday they got too comfortable with the straight-through corridor. If they memorize the rooms, the drill is useless."

​Arthur nodded approvingly. The CQB house was easily the most sophisticated facility in the camp, despite being built entirely of rough-cut lumber and iron hinges. Inside, the walls were constructed as modular, sliding partitions. Every two days, the instructors reconfigured the layout—turning a bedroom into a tight hallway, moving door placements, or positioning paper targets behind blind corners. The recruits never entered the same building twice.

​Leaving the timber house, Arthur strolled down to the pistol range. A row of paper targets hung from wooden frames fifty feet away. On a bench behind the firing line rested a stack of neat cardboard binders.

​Arthur flipped open the top binder. Every recruit had a dedicated record page detailing their progress: entry dates, timed reload speeds, recoil control marks, and accuracy percentages from seven, fifteen, and twenty-five yards.

​Arthur closed the binder with a soft sigh, rubbing the bridge of his nose. The drill routines, the range records, the sixty-three recruits, the ten senior instructors were all manageable. He knew how to train men to shoot, move, and keep their mouths shut.

​His real headache was sitting on the mess hall porch twenty yards away.

​Women.

​Twenty seven women, recently rescued from Galnick’s illegal sweatshop operation in Queens, had been brought to Pound Ridge three weeks ago. Some had families to whom they could eventually return once things cooled down, but the rest had nowhere to go—no money, no family, and no safe harbor in the city. Ricky’s organization had absorbed them because there was simply no other choice.

​Arthur had spent two sleepless nights staring at his manual, entirely at a loss. He had a training program for street fighters and dock workers, but he had zero idea what to do with ten traumatized young women.

​At the edge of the mess hall porch, Evelyn Vance sat on a wooden bench, a sheaf of financial ledgers resting on her lap. She wore a tailored dark wool traveling coat, her hair pinned back with neat, clinical precision.

​Arthur walked over, pulling out a bench across from her and setting his coffee mug down.

​"You sure the trading company in Port Chester isn’t burning down without you, Evelyn?" Arthur asked, gesturing toward her paperwork.

​Evelyn didn’t look up immediately. She made a neat ink mark in the margin of a ledger before closing the book with a quiet snap.

​"The trading operation in Port Chester and Rye is functioning smoothly under the management of Michael, Arthur," she said, her voice dry and untroubled. "As is the publishing firm and the film studio in White Plains."

​"Must be nice, having a publishing company run themselves while you sit in the woods," Arthur muttered.

​"They don’t run themselves," Evelyn replied, turning her cool gaze toward him. "I trained three separate head secretaries before I left White Plains. Each woman manages a distinct department of the daily bookkeeping. None of them possesses full signature authority, and each is required to audit the other two’s weekly balance sheets. If one makes a suspicious entry, the other two notice immediately. If one attempts to overstep her position, the other two counterbalance her."

​Arthur blinked, processing the structure. "So... nobody can rob you, and nobody can take over."

​"Precisely," Evelyn said. "It is a decentralized system of mutual oversight. Ricky approved the design before he went back downtown."

​Arthur shook his head with a faint chuckle. "Of course he did. Sounds just like him." He paused, looking toward the women’s barracks where three of the new arrivals were sweeping the wooden porch. "Which brings me to my next question. Why are you out here, Evelyn?"

​"I am evaluating our new arrivals," Evelyn said simply. "Ricky’s organization cannot afford dead weight, but nor can it afford to leave vulnerable people exposed to men like Galnick. We need to determine what these women are capable of contributing."

​"Well, if I know Ricky, he’ll want them disciplined and useful," Arthur said, throwing his hands up in mild frustration. "But I don’t have a manual for this. I can’t have them running forty-pound sandbag drills on the obstacle course."

​"Then do not use your manual," Evelyn said calmly. "Use mine."

​She reached into her leather satchel and pulled out a single sheet of paper covered in her sharp, elegant handwriting. She slid it across the table toward Arthur.

​Arthur picked it up, squinting at the lines. "A curriculum?"

​"A daily schedule," Evelyn corrected. "Same core philosophy as the men’s training, but adjusted for their present conditioning. In the morning: two hours of intensive education. Reading, writing, basic arithmetic, ledger bookkeeping, and organizational security rules. We will also conduct observation and memory drills—teaching them to memorize faces, license plates, and room layouts at a glance."

​Arthur raised an eyebrow. "And the afternoons?"

​"Physical conditioning," Evelyn continued. "Light running, stretching, obstacle navigation, and basic hand-to-hand defensive movement. Those who demonstrate steady nerves and reliable coordination will eventually move to firearms familiarization on the range."

​"And the evenings?"

​"Rest, meals, study, and maintenance," Evelyn said. "They are already assisting in the kitchen and managing camp laundry. Working gives them purpose and structure. It stops them from sitting in their quarters feeling like charity cases."

​Arthur looked at the paper, then up at Evelyn. The plan was practical, grounded, and remarkably thorough.

​"Who’s going to run this?" Arthur asked. "My instructors know how to bark at dockworkers, not teach arithmetic."

​"I am," Evelyn said smoothly. "I will remain here and train alongside them until Ricky returns."

​Arthur stared at her in surprise. "You? You’re going to run obstacle drills and clean mess kits in the dirt?"

​"I am," she replied without a flicker of hesitation.

​Arthur looked at her closely. He saw the sharp, protective steel in her eyes—not just for the organization’s security, but a distinct, possessive vigilance regarding Ricky’s interests. Arthur hid a subtle smile behind his coffee mug. She wants to make sure none of these new girls get any strange ideas about the boss while he’s away, he thought to himself.

​"Fair enough," Arthur said, setting the paper down. "But if we’ve got men and women living in the same camp, we need hard rules. I’m not running a social parlor out here in Westchester."

​"Agreed," Evelyn said. "What do you propose?"

​"Strict perimeter separation," Arthur said firmly. "Separate quarters. No male recruits enter the women’s barracks after dusk, and no women enter the men’s quarters. Visitors require my direct permission. The senior instructors will maintain a rotating night watch around the central compound."

​"And what if someone decides were to test the boundaries?" Evelyn asked.

​Arthur grinned, reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small, polished brass handbell mounted on a steel spring hinge.

​"I bought a dozen of these from a hardware supplier in Peekskill," Arthur said, setting the bell on the table. "We mount one above the frame of every barracks door on the inside. If a door opens more than two inches after lights-out, the spring trips and the bell rings right over the night watch officer’s post. Simple, loud, and impossible to bypass quietly."

​Evelyn picked up the small brass bell, testing the spring with her thumb. A sharp, clear CLING echoed off the porch beams.

​"Inexpensive, mechanical, and effective," Evelyn noted, a rare, faint smile touching her lips. "Install them today."

​By mid-afternoon, the new routine had taken root across the compound.

​The camp no longer felt like a quiet hideout for armed men; it was rapidly evolving into a self-contained community. In the expanded kitchen, four of the rescued women worked alongside the head cook, chopping sacks of potatoes, seasoning large cauldrons of stew, and tracking dry-goods inventory on chalkboards.

​Near the armory shed, two other women sat on wooden crates under the supervision of a senior instructor, carefully wiping down disassembled Colt revolvers with oiled rags, checking firing pins, and sorting forty-five caliber rounds into wooden crates. They were focused, meticulous, and surprisingly quick to learn the routine.

​Over on the lower dirt track, Evelyn led most of the new women through a steady, rhythmic jogging exercise. They were winded and tired, but their heads were up, their movements growing stronger with every lap.

​Arthur stood near the main gate, resting his arm against a cedar fence post as he watched the compound bustling with disciplined activity.