I’ve told you already how much I hate funerals. Especially cop funerals. Bud’s was no exception, so I’ll just hit a couple of highlights, so to speak.
The first came when Lamar showed up, being wheeled into the church by Art and me. We were all three in uniform again, which is de rigueur for cop funerals. We caused a minor sensation, even though we tried to avoid one by going down the side aisle. It was hard to be inconspicuous, with the nurse in trail and all.
The second point of interest was that every cop involved in the investigation was there, including Volont and Nichols, for God’s sake. In the same pew, but not together. I hate to admit it, but having them there did sort of soften my attitude toward them. I hate to admit it, but it did.
The third point of note was that good old Borcherding of the fourth estate was also there, way back on the sidelines outside the gym, but there nonetheless. Nancy was there too. At Hester’s suggestion, we had a DCI tech taking photos of Borcherding all day, and the people around him.
The fourth point of interest, and the best news as far as I was concerned, was that ‘‘The Lord Is My Shepherd, He Rides in My Patrol Car’’ wasn’t on the show bill.
We’d not been bothering Lamar about office business, on doctor’s orders. All through the service, the poor son of a bitch kept trying to get Art or me to answer questions about the state of the office, and the murder of Bud. We’d just put our finger to our lips, pretty much telling him to be quiet and respectful in church. He’d nod furiously, then lean over and whisper a question ten seconds later. He finally got us on the way to the ambulance that was to take him back to the hospital.
‘‘You guys better tell me what the fuck’s happening, or you’re both gonna have your asses on the street lookin’ for work…’’ Or something like that. It was kind of hard to hear, with the ambulance engine running and Lamar trying not to make a scene. Art and I both got in the ambulance with him for a minute. We both started with a ‘‘don’t sweat the details’’ attitude, but Lamar knew us better than that. By the time five minutes had elapsed, he knew just about everything, in a general sense. You ever see anybody who was unhappy but content at the same time?
Art and I waved at the ambulance as it pulled away.
‘‘Well,’’ he said. ‘‘That’s over.’’
‘‘For today,’’ I said.
He grinned. ‘‘Yeah. I think we got off easy, don’t you?’’
‘‘Absolutely. Until he finds out what we didn’t tell him.’’
Art and I didn’t always get along, but we’d been together for nineteen years. We coped well.
‘‘Oh,’’ I said, ‘‘I’m gonna have to go to Rumsford’s funeral on Monday.’’
‘‘Why so late?’’
‘‘I’m not sure, but I think it took ’em that long to find somebody other than his partner who gave a shit.’’
‘‘Too bad.’’
‘‘Yes,’’ I said, with feeling. ‘‘It sure is.’’ I figured he’d find out where the funeral was going to be shortly. Spice his life up.
The funeral lunch was excellent. I hobnobbed with Volont and Nichols, as well as Al and the other bigwigs. Everybody on their best behavior, polite, smiling. Volont even said I looked good in uniform. I got the impression he would be happier if it were something in, say, Foreign Legion blue… but I could have been wrong.
As soon as I got to the office, I found X1 there, with his laptop. I told him we really, really needed it to monitor something over the weekend, and maybe into Monday, and that I would clear it with Nichols and anybody else who needed to know. Cool with him.
I carted it to the back office, and set it up. Hester came in a few seconds afterward, and saw the laptop.
‘‘X1?’’
‘‘Yeah.’’ I turned it on. ‘‘That should do it.’’
‘‘Be careful, both Volont and Nichols are out front. Paying respects, so to speak.’’
‘‘Okay,’’ and I noticed that we had a message. ‘‘I think,’’ I said, ‘‘we’ve got a contact already.’’
We did, but it wasn’t really impressive.
FROM: AFREEMAN@xii. COMMONCOMMON. COM
TO: STRITCHHERMN@WIDETALK. COM
SUBJECT: RESPONSE
DATE: SATURDAY, JULY 27, 1996 10:21 AM
YES? GABRIEL
That was it. Oh, but it was a start. And we were widening the net, so to speak. This one wasn’t from ‘‘Bravo6,’’ but ‘‘afreeman.’’
Volont knocked on the open door and stuck his head around the corner. ‘‘May I come in?’’
Asking was more than he had done yesterday.
‘‘Sure,’’ I said, folding down the laptop screen. ‘‘Have a seat.’’
George followed him in, looking uncomfortable. ‘‘You too, George,’’ I said.
‘‘I’d better check in…’’ said Hester, starting to excuse herself.
‘‘Oh, please stay,’’ said Volont. ‘‘I insist.’’ He looked at me. ‘‘May we shut the door?’’
‘‘Sure,’’ I said.
Volont gestured to George, who shut the door and then sat on the corner of the desk behind his superior.
‘‘I understand,’’ said Volont, ‘‘that you have some idea about some sort of mission being conducted when they killed the two officers in the woods?’’
George looked guilty as all hell. Well, Volont had probably started to pry. We had known all along that George would have to answer up. The only problem was, neither Hester nor I had any idea how much George had been made to reveal.
‘‘Something like that,’’ I said.
‘‘I’m part of our antiterrorist intelligence unit,’’ said Volont. ‘‘Why don’t you run it by me?’’
‘‘Well,’’ I said, trying to buy a little thinking time, ‘‘Hester and I put this together from the physical evidence, mostly…’’
‘‘Let me save you some time,’’ said Volont. ‘‘Just tell me what you think happened, and we can get to the evidence later, if we need to.’’ He sounded like he was talking to errant children. On purpose, of course. Trying to get us to reveal more than we wanted. He was pretty good.
George looked up and down several times, very quickly. Nodding his eyeballs. It took me a second to realize that this was an affirmative sign.
‘‘Okay. What we believe is this: There was a right-wing group having a training session in the woods; they misidentified the narcotics officers for somebody from, say, your office who they thought were looking at them; they deliberately set out to ambush those officers the next day; a little doper named Turd inadvertently triggered the ambush prematurely, and they had to take him out; and tried for the cops too, because they were too close, to boot. They were going for a classic L ambush, but hadn’t quite got it set.’’ I stopped. George ‘‘nodded’’ his eyeballs again.
‘‘Have you identified this group who was having the training session?’’ asked Volont.
George’s eyeballs began frantically looking from left to right and back again. Shaking his eyeballs ‘‘no.’’
‘‘Not for sure,’’ I said.
‘‘Any leads?’’
George’s eyes went left and right so hard I thought Volont would hear them.
‘‘Not hard leads,’’ I said. I had to stop looking at George, or I was going to burst out laughing.
‘‘You’re being evasive,’’ said Volont in a matter-of-fact tone.
‘‘Yep,’’ I said, just as calm. I smiled.
‘‘I can’t force you to do anything, nor would I wish to do so,’’ said Volont, ‘‘but you might reconsider withholding information. I could be of some help.’’
‘‘I can tell you this,’’ I said. ‘‘Herman Stritch shot Bud and Lamar because he thought they were coming to arrest him for the killing of the two officers in the woods.’’
I glanced at George, and he was near apoplexy.
‘‘Really? Why would he think that?’’ Volont leaned slightly forward, expressing sincere interest for the first time in the conversation.
‘‘Because William Stritch was in the woods, and with the ambush team, most likely as an observer.’’
George put a thumb and forefinger astraddle the bridge of his nose, and began rubbing his eyes in the subtlest way possible, and slowly shaking his head.
‘‘An observer?’’
‘‘Yep.’’ I paused, and said, deliberately, ‘‘Courtesy of his leader.’’
‘‘A leader?’’ said Volont. ‘‘That would be…?’’
I just couldn’t resist, of course. George had turned his back, so I didn’t get the guilt vibes from him anymore.
‘‘They call him Gabriel, but I don’t think that’s his real name.’’
Silence. George coughed after a few seconds.
‘‘Where,’’ said Volont evenly, ‘‘did you come up with that name?’’
I looked him right in the eye. ‘‘I’m not at liberty to tell you that right now. It’s a highly confidential source.’’ And then chickened out, at least partway. ‘‘Should be able to tell you in a couple of days, though.’’
‘‘Hmmm,’’ said Volont. ‘‘So, exactly what do you want from this?’’
Exasperating.
‘‘What I want,’’ I said slowly, ‘‘is this: The person who shot Lamar, Bud, and Rumsford; and I realize there may be at least two shooters here. Then I want the persons who shot Turd and Kellerman in the woods.’’ I leaned back away from the table, tilting my chair onto its back legs. ‘‘That’s what I want. That’s what I’ve always wanted.’’
‘‘Yes,’’ said Volont. He stood. ‘‘We’ll do everything we can to see you get that,’’ he said. ‘‘And now, I have to be getting along.. .’’ He turned to George. ‘‘May I see you for a moment?’’
As soon as they’d left the room, I looked at Hester. ‘‘He’s gonna be a lotta help.’’
‘‘Right.’’
‘‘Now,’’ I said, ‘‘how we approach Gabriel could be very, very important.’’ I said that I thought Hester should compose the messages from that point on, as she would bring what I hoped would be a convincing female touch to the correspondence.
‘‘What do you want, smiley faces, for Christ’s sake?’’ She glared at me. ‘‘You’re doin’ really good. Just get in touch with your feminine side, Buster, and you’ll be just fine.’’
Like they say, if you tend to rest your elbows on a keyboard, you’re bound to hit the wrong button some of the time.
‘‘Gee,’’ I said contritely, ‘‘I’m sorry, ma’am…’’
‘‘Houseman,’’ she said slowly, ‘‘you shouldn’t do this when we’re both armed.’’
Point well taken.
The reply to Gabriel, although critical, wasn’t too much of a pressure deal, since we had plenty of time to compose it. After all, it would take Nola some time to get back to her attorney’s laptop. Or some other computer.
‘‘We might think about coming up with another computer for her,’’ I said. ‘‘If we need fast communications.’’
‘‘I don’t expect more than three or four,’’ said Hester. ‘‘But while you’re at it, think about this… Nola is our target, not Billy or Herman.’’
I considered that. ‘‘You’re right. She’s smart, and, like Sally said, may have a little resentment over her position.’’
‘‘Think we can see her?’’ asked Hester. ‘‘Or you think Volont will stop that?’’
‘‘If we go fast,’’ I said, ‘‘before he realizes she’s probably the key, I think we can talk with her. If she’ll talk with us…’’
‘‘I wonder,’’ said Hester, ‘‘what’s become of George?’’
She and I drafted our response, after carefully considering what it would be that Nola would want, and how she could think that Gabriel could possibly help her. At the same time, we wanted to flush Gabriel out, if we could.
TELL HERMAN TO KEEP QUIET. MY LIAR TALKS ABOUT DEALS. I DON’T HAVE MY ADDRESS BOOK.
N
Personally, I thought the ‘‘N’’ was a nice touch. As I said to Hester, I was sure it had come from my feminine side. The ‘‘liar,’’ of course, was extreme-right talk for attorneys. They have a tendency to latch on to an old, and not particularly witty, joke and evolve it into jargon. The lack of an address book was Hester’s idea. That way, we just might be able to ask for an address in the future.
Anyway, we figured that implying that Herman wanted to talk would get Gabriel to make some sort of contact, both to reassure him and to tell him to shut up.
After that, I made a phone call to Melissa Stritch. I told her we really needed to talk with her, about Herman and the dope, and if he was involved with it in any way.
She said he didn’t have anything to do with dope, nor did the rest of the Stritch family. Never. Not at any time. But she would be very happy to come in and chat about it. I told her to plan on tomorrow afternoon.
I talked to Art for permission, changed out of my uniform into blue jeans and a pullover shirt and tennis shoes, and I was on my way to the Linn County jail in Cedar Rapids. The nearest federal holding facility.
Hester was going to spend the rest of the weekend at home, after we talked to Nola. I, naturally, was coming back to Nation County. We had to take two cars. The only bad thing, if you overlook cost to the ubiquitous taxpayer, was that we weren’t able to discuss things on the way down to see Nola. I’m always afraid that I’m going to have a solid thought and forget it before I get someplace… Slim odds, but it could happen.
As soon as we got to the interview room in the Linn County jail, we were met by a man named Victor Miller, attorney-at-law. He wasn’t happy about being there, but there he was. Nola’s ‘‘liar.’’ I noticed that, if he really did own a laptop, it wasn’t with him.
When Nola was brought in, resplendent in jail orange, I was the only familiar face in the room. A slight advantage. I introduced Hester.
‘‘Before we say anything more,’’ said Miller, ‘‘I want Nola to know that she is not required to answer any questions.’’
Nola nodded.
‘‘Maybe,’’ I said, ‘‘I can save us all time.’’ I looked at Miller. ‘‘I assume you want written questions, so you can advise her prior to the asking?’’
‘‘I’d prefer that.’’
‘‘Forget it,’’ said Nola. ‘‘I’m not answering any questions at all.’’
I held up my hand. ‘‘Wait a minute. Hester will write out five or six questions.’’ I looked at Nola and her attorney. ‘‘I’m not going to ask any right now. All I want is to tell Nola what I know, and let her know that.’’ I grinned. ‘‘Sort of a prediscovery discovery, so to speak.’’
‘‘I’ll tell you now that that’s acceptable,’’ said Miller, ‘‘unless I begin to feel it’s an intimidation tactic.’’ He looked at Nola. ‘‘We’ll stop it at that point. Oh, yes, don’t think you can just read back the indictment, to buy time,’’ he said.
‘‘Of course not.’’
Nola had clamped her mouth shut. No matter what happened from now on, she was going to assume her ‘‘liar’’ and I were conspiring against her. Well, that was her business.
‘‘Nola,’’ I said, in my best monotone, ‘‘I want you to know just where things stand. I’m telling you this because, in the next few days, you may be approached by us again, and I want you to be absolutely clear as to what we’re talking about.’’
‘‘I just want to know what that nice insurance lady is doing here,’’ said Nola.
Oops. Hester. Late of Lloyds of London. I’d already introduced her as DCI, and she’d shown Nola her ID.
‘‘That was an authorized ruse, Nola,’’ I said, as matter-of-factly as possible. ‘‘It was done for the sole purpose of saving lives.’’ I looked her squarely in the eye. ‘‘Yours, as well as mine.’’
‘‘Hold it right there,’’ said Miller.
It took about two minutes to explain it to him. I made my points when I said, ‘‘I said I want to let Nola know everything that’s happening. I would have gotten to that. If you think I’m not telling the truth, why would I bring Hester here at all?’’
Now, he might have been thinking ‘‘because you’re so dumb,’’ but he would have been wrong. ‘‘Forgetful’’ is the word he should have used. I had thought of this on the way down. Along with too many other things, apparently.
That out of the way, I began again.
‘‘Nola, what we know is this…’’ I ran through the training exercise, the ambush as well as I could, and told her that we were relying on forensic evidence for some of the reconstruction. I really had Miller’s attention, but I wasn’t sure about Nola. She had large blue eyes that showed absolutely no expression. When I talked to her, I looked right between them most of the time, saving solid eye contact to make specific points. I had the distinct thought that, a few years ago, when her hair would have been black, she must have been very striking. The question of how Herman had ended up with her flickered through my mind.
Then I did the events at her house. The fact that Lamar and Bud were serving a paper which she and Herman should have known was coming. That Herman had shot both the officers. Making it very clear that she, as far as we could tell, had not shot anybody. Not yet. I also threw in the fact that Lamar wanted to ask Herman some questions, as the DCI team had missed him the first time around. All matter-of-fact. All low-key.
Then I did the shooting of Rumsford, and saw her eyes flicker. I said that the angles hadn’t been fully described as yet but we believed that the first shot had come from the second floor and the second shot from the ground floor. Where she was.
At that point, she started to speak and I held up my hand before her attorney did. ‘‘Personally, I don’t think that was you.’’ I looked directly into her eyes. ‘‘But I don’t know for sure, so we won’t talk any more about that aspect of this.
‘‘But now,’’ I said, ‘‘I want to let you know some things you probably think we don’t know. Just to let you be aware…’’
I reached behind me and grabbed the handle of the old square-cornered attache case my grandmother had given me when I went off to college. It looked pretty well worn, but it was still going. It was my favorite. I opened it and got out a couple of sheets of paper, as well as a small case containing my reading glasses. And a small pack of tissue.
‘‘Just a sec here,’’ I said, doing my little nervous act, ‘‘want to be able to read this.’’ I smiled apologetically. You have to be careful with this sort of tactic, because if you let it go a second too long, you lose their attention, and may never get it back.
I put the glasses on. ‘‘There!’’ I looked over them at Nola. Still had her.
‘‘Okay,’’ I said, looking at the paper in my hand. ‘‘We know your son Billy was with the ambush team, as an observer. But, hey, you knew that. What we also know is all about Borcherding.’’ I paused, looking over my glasses at her again. ‘‘You also know him as ‘Bravo6’, I believe.’’ That hit home.
I looked back down at the paper for an instant. You do that to make sure you’re the one initiating the eye contact. It’s a control thing.
‘‘That brings us,’’ I said slowly, ‘‘to Colonel Gabriel.’’
Nola’s anxiety became audible at that point. Just a little gasp, but it was there.
‘‘Well,’’ said Miller loudly, to break the spell, ‘‘I think we’ve heard about enough at this point… and we seem to be getting well on toward ‘menacing’ here…’’
Perfect. ‘‘Sure,’’ I said, removing my glasses. He’d just saved me. I really wasn’t sure of where I was headed after Colonel Gabriel. ‘‘If Nola has any questions…’’
She did. Now, you have to understand, she didn’t particularly like me, but I appeared to have my shit together, as they say. She didn’t like Miller, didn’t trust him for a whole bunch of reasons, none of which were true anywhere but in her own mind. She also thought he was in my pocket, which was very, very wide of the mark. But she had some pretty solid concerns. She was a very bright woman, but once the paranoid mind-set gets going, it’s virtually impossible to turn it around. A shame, in a way.
‘‘My Bill didn’t shoot anybody. Not in the woods. Not at the house. Nobody.’’
‘‘All right,’’ I said.
‘‘I didn’t either.’’
‘‘Okay,’’ I said. I believed her, especially since she’d placed Bill Stritch first on the list.
‘‘What Herman does is his business, but he never shot anybody in the woods.’’
‘‘Okay.’’
Miller started to speak, but she held up her hand. ‘‘Just a minute. He knows Herman shot Lamar and Bud. Nobody else could have.’’ She knew them by name. Well, so much for community policing. But she was right. There was nobody else who could have.
‘‘But we never shot the newspaperman.’’
‘‘I’ll buy that, Nola,’’ I said. ‘‘Herman’s carbine didn’t pack the punch, for one thing. But after you got that message, Gabriel sure had to.’’
She was quiet.
‘‘At least, one shot. I know he fired once. But he couldn’t be on both floors at the same time. Remember how Rumsford just sort of stood there, and then the second shot came to make sure… I’ll be honest, I have some thoughts about that being Billy…’’
‘‘No.’’
‘‘Or the guy who was with Gabriel,’’ I said, starting to rummage through my papers again…
‘‘Wittman,’’ she said, helpfully.
Well, thank you, God.
‘‘Nice,’’ said Miller. ‘‘Very nice. But I want to advise my client to stop talking at this point.’’
‘‘She’s not incriminating herself,’’ said Hester, ‘‘but if that’s what you want…’’
‘‘Time to stop,’’ said Miller.
‘‘I never should have said Connie’s name, you mean?’’ asked Nola.
Connie. Well, thanks to stress, we now had what might be the first name of Wittman. All right!
‘‘Thank you both,’’ I said. ‘‘I have no interest in seeing anybody railroaded. If you need to know anything, just ask us.’’ That was directed at Nola, but intended as much for Miller. He was going to need a bargain.
Just as we were finding our way out, I saw Herman Stritch being ushered into another interview room, which contained Volont and another man. Volont looked up as we went by. I couldn’t resist. I smiled and gave him a discreet wave.
Connie Wittman was our first order of business. We called the Nation County Sheriff’s Department, and got Sally, bless her. We had her start running driver’s license information in the form of a fifty-state inquiry. All we had for her was a partial name. We thought Connie might be short for Constantine. Hester, who was the only one who had even glimpsed the man, thought he’d been about five feet ten, and light. He had to be over twenty, and likely under sixty-five.
‘‘You’ve got to be kidding,’’ said Sally. ‘‘Can’t it be a little more vague?’’
‘‘Sorry, but that’s about all we have until I can get back up there and start going over some of the other stuff, and maybe talk to Melissa.’’
‘‘It’s way outside parameters,’’ she said. ‘‘State’ll get pissed.’’
‘‘Explain it’s part of our murder investigation,’’ I said.
‘‘Yeah, right. Maybe to their supervisor.’’
‘‘Do what you can. I’ll be up in a couple of hours.’’
‘‘Gonna eat, huh?’’ she asked.
‘‘Never mind,’’ I said.
We’d used Sally and my department because if we’d used Linn County, we figured Volont would have a lot better chance of knowing we were doing the checks. At least, right away. We knew he’d help where he could, but we also knew his sense of security could get in our way in a hurry.
I was so happy overall that I took Hester to a late supper. Most unlike me. We ate in a small restaurant that served excellent seafood. I had nothing breaded. The diet, you know.
I relaxed for the first time in what seemed like months.
‘‘I don’t know why,’’ I said before the entree, ‘‘but I finally feel like we’re making progress.’’
‘‘I don’t know,’’ said Hester, using her fork to push the little mushroom slices to a far corner of her salad plate. ‘‘Maybe when I can tell you why Johnny Marks was killed, and by whom.’’
We had a fine meal. About the time I was deciding whether or not my mood would justify chocolate cheesecake, Volont walked in. He was persistent, I’ll give him that. Neither Hester nor I had checked out on the radio.
He slid into our booth beside Hester. Obviously, he wanted to talk to me.
‘‘Enjoying your meal,’’ he said. He wasn’t asking. He was commenting.
‘‘Sure am,’’ I said. ‘‘You think we should have the cheesecake?’’
He looked at me for a beat. ‘‘Are you trying to screw this case up on purpose?’’
I’d had it. He was now going to thoroughly ruin my meal, as well as complicate my case. ‘‘I could ask you the same question,’’ I said pleasantly. ‘‘If I really gave a fuck what the answer would be.’’
He was the more mature one at that point. ‘‘We aren’t communicating very well, are we?’’ he asked.
‘‘No,’’ I said, conversationally, ‘‘we aren’t.’’
The waitress chose that moment to ask me if I had made up my mind about the cheesecake.
‘‘Sure,’’ I said, smiling at her. ‘‘Make it three. This gentleman’s going to be here for a bit.’’
Volont started to protest, but I cut him off. ‘‘You want peace, yellow hair, you gotta smoke the pipe.’’ I grinned. I was really making an attempt.
‘‘I’ll take some coffee too,’’ he said.
There was a short silence.
‘‘Can I put my gun away?’’ asked Hester.
Just before the dessert came, Volont said, ‘‘What is the problem? Seriously, I want to know.’’
‘‘Well,’’ I said, ‘‘it’s this.’’ A brief interruption as the dessert was placed on the table. ‘‘You have no jurisdiction in the murders. Okay. You have an interest, though, and not just the weapons charges. Okay. You have lots of information that you obviously can’t share. That’s not okay, but I could probably live with that. But you seem to think you can actively interfere with my obtaining that information myself. That’s what I don’t appreciate. You are a narcotics man, with that as your chief area of interest. I understand that. But your primary interest isn’t the murders.’’
‘‘I see.’’ Volont sipped his coffee, and took a bite of the cheesecake. ‘‘Not bad,’’ he said. ‘‘What you don’t see, Deputy Houseman, is that you are getting into a very sensitive and dangerous area.’’
‘‘Tell Lamar and Bud,’’ I said. Unfair, maybe. But true.
‘‘Point well taken,’’ he answered.
‘‘You know what I want.’’ I looked at him. Were we doomed to repeat this conversation every day until the case was solved?
‘‘Yes.’’
‘‘You also know that,’’ I said evenly, ‘‘aside from his involvement in the shooting of a narc cop, DEA couldn’t give a damn about what Gabriel does with his life.’’
‘‘Very true.’’
‘‘You should also know that I have a very deep interest in who he is, and what he does, and whom he associates with. Not to mention where he is.’’
‘‘I know that too. Yes,’’ said Volont. ‘‘I don’t doubt it.’’
‘‘What you obviously don’t know is that I am also able to differentiate between intelligence data and prosecution data.’’
‘‘Oh, no,’’ said Volont. ‘‘I don’t doubt that. Not at all.’’
‘‘Then,’’ I asked, ‘‘what’s the problem? Why won’t you brief us, Hester and George and me, and let us get on with the business at hand? With George to play watchdog for you. We have no problem with that.’’ Well, just a little bit of a lie, but I didn’t want George to get in any more trouble than he was already in.
‘‘There are things I’m not allowed to disclose.’’ He looked at both of us. ‘‘I simply can’t. You know that.’’
‘‘So,’’ I said, ‘‘the identity of Gabriel is one of those, right?’’
‘‘I shouldn’t even say that,’’ said Volont, and a small smile flickered over his face. ‘‘But, yes.’’
‘‘Do you have to obstruct our efforts, though?’’ asked Hester.
‘‘I’ll have to ask,’’ said Volont. Very serious. Wow.
‘‘I’ll tell you,’’ I said, ‘‘I’d rather go through you than have to try other approaches. And I’d think you, or your boss, or whoever would agree with that.’’ I forced a grin. ‘‘Better the devil you know …’’
He smiled. ‘‘I agree… Just who do you think my boss is, by the way? Nichols at the DEA?’’
‘‘Well, yeah,’’ I said, realizing that I really didn’t have any idea who his boss was.
‘‘I don’t believe I ever said I was in narcotics,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m a counterterrorist agent. I do counterintelligence. I have no interest in narcotics-specific cases.’’
Well, damn. Pieces clicked furiously. I began to feel we were right about the right-wing extremists, then. If that was it, then that was Volont’s interest in the whole thing.
‘‘I don’t think you’d have any connection with my boss,’’ he said.
‘‘Well,’’ I said, playing the only trump card I could think of, ‘‘I was thinking of a man I know with Mossad. One with Shin Beth. I even know a guy with GSG 9, for God’s sake. And I’ve got a friend with a connection with the SAS, now that I think of it. Could they know him?’’
‘‘What,’’ he said, ‘‘no CIA connections?’’ He smiled again.
He thought I was kidding. ‘‘I don’t know anybody in CIA,’’ I said. ‘‘I did attend a lecture by Admiral Bobby Inman once. But I sure wouldn’t want to imply that he’d even talk to me.’’
Volont was silent.
‘‘Your guys were the ones who brought the Mossad agent to our office to talk with us.’’
That got him. It was true. The Israelis had been checking on possible Nazi connections with the extreme right in the United States. We were far from the only ones the Israeli had talked with, and I personally think he was there because he’d pissed off his boss. But it had happened. The fact that I didn’t even remember his name, let alone have a way to reach him, had nothing to do with it. Volont wouldn’t be able to confirm that, and confirmation is the key word in the intelligence business.
That also got Hester, by the way. I’d only seen her look that surprised once before.
‘‘I really want to keep this in the family,’’ I said. I held up my thumb and forefinger, in a pinching motion. ‘‘But I want to solve these killings just a little, tiny bit more.’’
Volont pursed his lips. ‘‘Thanks for the dessert,’’ he said. ‘‘I’ll be in touch.’’
For the record, I felt a little angry with myself for having become angry at Volont. This was balanced, I felt, by my being delighted with the Mossad bit. If you threw in a meal that was excellent until dessert, the evening had been a plus. Hell, even the dessert wasn’t that bad.
I got to Maitland about 2300. Long, tired drive. I waited to use my radio until I pulled my unmarked into our garage, just so they wouldn’t be tempted to give me anything to do. I picked up the mike, and went 10-42, giving my ending mileage to the office, as required.
Sally was working. She acknowledged my transmission, and requested I phone her at the office ASAP.
Wonderful.
I walked in the door, and met Sue, who was bringing her popcorn dish to the kitchen sink. We kissed, and I said, ‘‘I’m supposed to call the office.’’
A short hug later, and I was on the phone.
‘‘Nation County Sheriff’s Department.’’
‘‘I hope you know what you’re asking, here,’’ I said.
‘‘ME!!!’’ She nearly took my ear off. ‘‘ME! Holy shit, Houseman. You should talk. You gave me some son of a bitch that doesn’t exist. I can’t get anywhere with this Connie Wittman. I mean it, I can’t get shit.’’
She was talking so fast I couldn’t get a word in.
‘‘What do you want, for shit’s sake? You want me to start running women with that last name, and then call ’em up and ask where their son Connie is? Huh?’’
She ran out of breath. I really liked that about Sally. She gave that job everything she had, and would drive herself harder than any boss ever could.
‘‘No. That’s okay,’’ I said blandly. On purpose, just to slow her down.
Silence. Then: ‘‘What?’’
‘‘Yeah, that’s okay. You can’t get ’em all.’’ I waited a beat. ‘‘Just go home and get a good sleep. It’s okay.’’
‘‘Well…’’
‘‘Sure. Good night, Sally.’’
‘‘Well… night.’’ As I put the phone down, I heard an increasingly faint ‘‘I’ll try again tomorrow…’’