The Watchmen (5 page)
“We always know where he is,” assured Reztsov, the condescension edging back. “We always know where all our major players are.”
“Let’s bring him in then; see what he’s got to say,” agreed Danilov.
The dinner that Danilov decided he had to accept and to which they drove in Reztsov’s perfumed car showed how fully the police chief’s preparation—and his misunderstanding—had been. The genuinely French owner greeted Reztsov at the door of the restaurant overlooking the oil-smooth river. It took a long time for Danilov’s disinterest to register with both Reztsov and Averin before they stopped recommending several girls smiling invitingly from the bar and an outer lounge.
There was a message from Yuri Pavin asking Danilov to call him at home, at any time, when he got back to the National Hotel. Pavin answered on the first ring. Two of the defense witnesses at Viktor Nikolaevich Nikov’s second trial were logged on Moscow’s criminal records as being associates of a family operating under the aegis of the Dolgopruadnanskaya, the city’s largest mafia grouping. The third had been shot dead in a territory war with a Chechen gang soon after testifying for Nikov.
“What Chechen gang?” Danilov demanded at once.
“Not the one that would interest you,” said Pavin, equally quickly, accustomed to the question. “Perhaps Nikov’s your man?”
“We’ll soon find out,” said Danilov. “He’s being brought in for questioning.” Danilov supposed his religiously minded deputy actually believed in miracles. He certainly didn’t.
William Cowley and Burt Bradley moved up to the more centrally convenient Manhattan FBI office and split equally between them the interviews with what in the end turned out to be six claimed eyewitnesses, three commuter plane pilots, a second trash barge captain, and a yacht charter skipper. They dismissed completely the account of the yacht skipper, whom they decided was seeking business publicity—and who later asked payment for media interviews—and at the end of a long day distilled down to just one page anything remotely of value from the remaining five. The consensus was that there had been two people—one possibly a woman—on the cruiser from which the missile had been fired. None of the witnesses had actually seen the ignition or anyone holding the launcher because the hitting of the Secretariat Tower had been more obvious. Four insisted the cruiser was blue and white, one that it had been entirely white. Two thought a blue canvas canopy had been erected over the flying bridge, three weren’t sure it had a flying bridge at all. None could suggest a make, and the estimates of its length varied from between thirty feet and fifty-five feet. Only two chose the same photograph of one of the eight cruisers reported stolen in the previous week. One of the commuter pilots was so unsure he said it could have been any one of three.
By the end of that third full day no terrorist group had claimed responsibility, and the special task force Bradley created at Pennsylvania Avenue to computer analyze and cross-reference every known and potential faction—with an emphasis on missile or military technical expertise—had processed eight, with four breakaway associations, covering the spectrum from the Ku Klux Klan to the Black Brotherhood. Islamic fundamentalism was definitely slammed. It was Cowley’s suggestion to ask Interpol to provide all likely international organizations in their files and to extend beyond known Islamic fundamentalist movements by asking the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, for what information they possessed on the state terror structures of Iraq, Iran, Algeria, and the Sudan. The personal authority of Leonard Ross had been invoked for all three branches of the military to research their files for people with specialized weapons knowledge—particularly missiles—who had recently left or been discharged from their service.
Bradley said, “We’re building ourselves a paper mountain and we ain’t got Jack squat. We’re just waiting for the next outrage.”
“I know,” accepted Cowley. He’d expected the FBI director to have more readily accepted his assessment that Washington was the most likely target. It had been bridge building to suggest it to Burt Bradley, too: The resentment from the other man at Cowley being officially designated case officer was obvious. For that reason Cowley had urged Bradley to include the warning in one of his early assessments, as if it had been his idea.
“You think your guy in Moscow’s going to get anything?”
“Not on what we’ve been able to give him so far.”
Bradley looked at his watch. “We’re too late for happy hour, but I’m ready to pay full price.”
If Bradley hadn’t suggested it, Cowley knew he would have done so. Continuing the bridge building, to the benefit of the investigation, he told himself.
Cowley was struggling into his coat, so Bradley took the telephone call. At once he shouted, “Leave it! Don’t touch a thing! Rope everything off until we get scientists up there.” He looked across at Cowley with the telephone still in his hand. “Highway Patrol took until this afternoon to check out a report of a fire in a creek near New Rochelle. And found the
Eschevaux
, one of our missing boats.”
Eschevaux
, one of our missing boats.”
“This is wonderful!” enthused Elizabeth Hollis.
“It’s foreign. A Jaguar,” said her son. “I can go 120 miles an hour at least.”
“You haven’t driven that fast?” the woman demanded, swiveling in her seat to look at him.
“Of course I haven’t, mother! That would be illegal.”
“You promise me?”
“I promise you.”
“I couldn’t live without you, Patrick. Without knowing you’re always going to be close to me, looking after me now that your father’s passed on.”
“You’re never going to have to. I keep telling you that.”
She patted the leather seat. “I love the new smell!”
“It’s nice, isn’t it?”
“Only what you deserve, working so hard for the bank as you do.”
“I don’t want you to tell anyone how grateful they are,” warned the man. “You know how jealous people get.” He still used the three-year-old Volkswagen to drive to Albany. Would Carole—would
any
of the girls—go out with him if they knew about the Jaguar?
any
of the girls—go out with him if they knew about the Jaguar?
“I’d like people to know how important you are.”
“No, mother. It’s better this way—the way the bank wants it.”
“I like going out for rides like this.”
“Then we’ll do it a lot,” Hollis said.
Ironically the exit Hollis took off the interstate to get back to Rensselaer was very close to the mobile home park in which Clarence Snelling lived.
Snelling said, “They’re not going to do anything about it, you know? They don’t understand the technology they’re relying on.”
“What are
you
going to do about it?” demanded his wife.
you
going to do about it?” demanded his wife.
“Go to the police,” decided Snelling.
“What can they do?”
“Maybe they can frighten the bank into taking more action than they are so far.”
The helicopter flight gave Cowley the chance to review everything he’d ordered put into place, as case officer in total charge with absolute authority and responsibility. He felt quite confident about it, with none of the first-day unreality.
He might have misunderstood, but he hadn’t detected any of the usual resentment at federal authority interference from the local police chief, sheriff, or Highway Patrol commander to whom he’d spoken in turn, not even when he’d insisted the sealed-off area remain clear until the helicopter arrival of the forensic scientists and technicians from Washington, whom he’d alerted first because they had the farthest to travel. He had, though, accepted the police chiefs offer of scene-of-crime forensic and communication vehicles and the suggestion that a sports field on the outskirts of New Rochelle, reasonably close to the coast, would be the best place for their helicopters to land. And there hadn’t been any argument against his asking for an initial media blackout, although the police commander, Steven Barr, had warned that with so many agencies involved, it might already be too late. If it was they’d ensure no one got anywhere near the boat.
“The
Eschevaux
was one of eight cruisers reported stolen,” reminded Bradley, beside Cowley. “What if this isn’t the right one—just burned out by joy riders when they’d finished with it?”
Eschevaux
was one of eight cruisers reported stolen,” reminded Bradley, beside Cowley. “What if this isn’t the right one—just burned out by joy riders when they’d finished with it?”
“Better overkill than underkill,” said Cowley. “Joy riders are more likely simply to have abandoned it.”
Bradley nodded, persuaded. “So how much forensic will be left for the scientists to find?”
“Pray to whoever your God is,” suggested Cowley, who didn’t have one.
Steven Barr’s distorted voice came on to their headsets from the already in-place communications van, promising to ferry them from the sports field to the boat. Then came the voice of Terry Osnan, the FBI agent in charge at Albany, who’d actually been working the area and reached New Rochelle by road, asking what he should do. Cowley repeated that he wanted no one anywhere near the cruiser until it had been scientifically checked for tire tracks or footprints “or for anything that might be there.” He said, “Absolutely no contamination. If there’s anything left at all it’ll be forensic.”
“Will do,” assured the man, in a Southern accent.
“How many more of our guys are coming in by road?”
“Maybe five or six. And I’m told the owner’s on his way down from Norwalk. A lawyer named Bonwitt. Harry Bonwitt. Bringing an insurance assessor with him.”
“Who the hell told him?” Their information was that the
Eschevaux
was a fifty-two-foot Sea Ray that had disappeared from the biggest marina at the Norwalk inlet on Sunday night, after Bonwitt had returned from that day’s sailing.
Eschevaux
was a fifty-two-foot Sea Ray that had disappeared from the biggest marina at the Norwalk inlet on Sunday night, after Bonwitt had returned from that day’s sailing.
“Marina people, I guess. When the check was made on the boat’s name.”
“If Bonwitt gets there before I do, tell him the boat has been seized as a federal exhibit. Same rules for them as everyone else. Nowhere near it.”
“He won’t,” intruded the pilot, linked to the conversation. “We’ll be there in five minutes.”
All the sports field nighttime lights were on, perfectly illuminating it as a landing area. There didn’t seem to be a lot of light from nearby houses. There was one helicopter, marked Highway Patrol, already droop-rotored like a sleeping insect. There were a lot of cars and three vans, mostly marked police vehicles, parked in perfect pattern on the perimeter. As they began to descend, the pilot of the inbound Washington machine patched into their circuit with an estimate of ten minutes from landing. A new voice came on insisting the area remain totally untrampled. Cowley said he knew and so did everyone within a hundred miles, and the voice said he hoped so.
The three local force commanders were waiting by an unmarked but antenna-haired communications van. All were in uniform. Steven Barr was tall, bespectacled, and spoke in a slow New England accent. John Sharpe, the sheriff, made a stark comparison, short and overweight, his belt sagging. Alan Petrich, the Highway Patrol chief, was overweight, too, and clearly asthmatic, wheezing his way through the introductions performed by Osnan, a sports-jacketed, angular-faced man.
To the three men Cowley said, “Thank you for what you’ve done.”
“Let’s hope it produces something,” said Barr, flat-voiced. “Bastards hit New York again and it goes off this time—and the wind’s in the right direction—we could be right in line.”
“You’re the one who went into the tower with the secretary-general, aren’t you?” said Sharpe admiringly. “What was it like?”
If there was a media leak he’d know who it came from, Cowley decided. “A mess. How many people walked around after the boat was found?”
“My patrolman, Wayne Mitchell,” said Petrich.
“No one else?” pressed Cowley hopefully.
“No.”
“What about the person who found it?” Bradley asked.
“Wasn’t found,” wheezed the man. “It was a phone in. Woman said she’d seen a flash fire and gave a location that didn’t check out. That’s why it took so long for us to find it.”
“We got a name for who phoned in?”
Petrich and the sheriff exchanged looks. “Phone got put down. Gal cheating on her husband, maybe.”
“Lot of that goes on in these woods,” said Sharpe.
“You run a numbers check!” demanded Cowley.
“Doing it,” said the man.
“The message recorded?”
The man extended his hand, cupping the cassette. “Every word that went between the caller and my dispatcher.” He smiled.
“The original?” Cowley demanded again.
“Didn’t think you’d want the rest.”
“A copy won’t be admissable in a federal court!” said Cowley, the anger burning through him. He kept his voice even. “I need the original. Can you arrange that now? I don’t want it overrecorded.” He didn’t respond to Bradley’s sideways look.
As the Highway Patrol commander disappeared inside the communications truck, Cowley told Osnan he wanted the man to become communications and evidence officer, handing him the copied cassette. The end of the conversation was almost drowned out by the noise of the descending Washington helicopter, a huge fore- and aftrotored Chinook. The baggage-laden scientists and technicians filed off with military precision, led by a tall and heavy black man who imperiously demanded Cowley by name, said his was Jefferson Jones and that he hoped to Christ everything had been left as is. Cowley decided that if the man had brought spare scene-of-crime coveralls, he wouldn’t be as constricted as he’d been going into the UN building in the protective space suit.
Most of the Washington group fit into a commandeered bus Cowley hadn’t seen until it approached the control center. He traveled with Jones, Bradley, and the three local men in a backup carrier, which in turn was followed by marked and unmarked police cars. It was abruptly dark out of the sports field illumination, with only isolated house lights along the streets. Cowley guessed it was a comparatively high-priced residential area. Jones said they intended to carry out the most detailed search possible on the immediate surrounding area and what was left of the boat itself but would probably bring in a Tarhe Sky Crane the following day to fly the wreck for laboratory stripping and examination in Washington.
“We know how much
is
left?” he asked.
is
left?” he asked.
“My patrolman says it’s burned down mostly to the waterline but that there’s some cabin and superstructure in places,” said the Highway Patrol chief.
“Then we’re in business.” Jones grinned. “If the bad guys really knew how much we can recover, there wouldn’t be any crime—they’d know we’ll catch them in the end.”
Cowley thought the black man looked too old still to be influenced by the confidence of the bureau training videos. They left all house lights behind very quickly, and from the widely interspersed streetlamps and heavy jolting Cowley guessed they had turned on to country side roads. Steven Barr seemed to know where they were, warning they were only about two miles away. Almost at once they came to the first road block, jointly manned by Highway Patrol and local police. They had to stop for spiked, tire-puncturing strips to be moved out of their way. Cowley was impressed. There were two more blocks—although no puncturing strips—before Cowley became aware of a growing brightness. His initial, frightened thought was that somehow the fire had again taken hold of the cruiser.
Barr said, “We’ve got every available floodlight there—ours, the patrol’s, and fire department—each with separate generator trucks.”
Cowley was about to speak when Jones said, “Seems to me you’ve done one hell of a good job. If all local forces were as efficient, we’d all spend more time at home with our wives and families.”
When he got out Cowley realized what passed for a road had narrowed to little more than a track, which the generator trucks totally blocked ahead of the arriving vehicles. To the left a sparse forest was whitened by artificial light right to the track edge, where the yellow scene-of-crime sectioning tape began. Although the line of light indicated the direction of the burned-out cruiser, it wasn’t possible to see it or the creek. There was no path leading toward it, either, although about twenty yards back in the direction from which they’d come, their lane widened into a turnoff. In it, already parked, were several vans, one another communications vehicle. Another was Wayne Mitchell’s Highway Patrol car. He stood waiting beside it, a young, fresh-faced blond whom Cowley put no older than twenty-five. He saluted his commander as they approached. Cowley led but it was Jones who again spoke first. “You wanna tell me what we got in there?”
“Top part of the boat’s mostly gone, just odd bits still there and some deck railing,” said Mitchell. “What’s left is full of water, so I guess it’s holed somewhere although I didn’t see where. The moment I saw the name I recognized it as one of the boats reported missing so I came straight back to the car and called in.”
“How come you stopped and walked into the forest at this precise point?” asked Cowley.
“Didn’t,” said the man. “The report that was phoned in put the fire about a mile down the creek, toward the bigger inlet where there’s quite a few boats. So that’s where I started. When I didn’t find anything I walked along the bank until I came to it. It’s not in the creek itself. Looks like a long time ago someone dug out a space to leave a boat: a kind of a canal. That’s where it is—kinda pulled out of the channel and left in its own space.”
“So did you walk out that way?” pressed Jones, indicating the lighted area.
“No sir,” said Mitchell. “Took myself some markers toward the road here—those three trees over there, taller than the rest—and went back along the creek to my car. And drove up here.”
“Did you go in to check once you got here?” pressed the scientist.
“Just once. Straight in, straight out.”
“What’s the ground like, underfoot?”
“Soft. I can show you my tracks.”
“This is getting better.” Jones beamed.
“What about the creek bank and the canal itself?” asked Cowley.
“Mud.”
“But the creek is navigable for something fifty-two feet long?” queried Bradley. “That’s a big boat.”
“Hardly,” said the officer. “I didn’t spend any time looking closely and the current’s washed out any marks there might be on the bottom, but you can
see
the bottom. And where the water doesn’t reach there’s a lot of score marks on the bank, where it obviously hit.”
see
the bottom. And where the water doesn’t reach there’s a lot of score marks on the bank, where it obviously hit.”
Jones looked in the direction of the light again and said, “Don’t know how we’re going to get the goddamned thing out through those trees.”
“There’s some open ground by the canal itself,” offered Mitchell.
“Sufficient to get it clear of the water for the first examination?”
“I’d say so,” guessed the patrolman.
Turning to Steven Barr, the forensic leader said, “You think you could get me one of those dinky garden tractors, small enough to maneuver through those trees? I’ll want to haul the boat out of the water. Drain it and then go over it tonight and tomorrow. Depending on how we find the creek, after that I might raft it back to where there’s enough hard standing to bring in the lifting helicopter.”
“I got one of my own in the backyard,” Sheriff Sharpe said proudly. “Happy to make it available.”
“Then let’s go to work,” urged Jones to the scientific team assembled loosely behind them.
Jones did have a spare plastic anticontamination coverall, which he loaned to Cowley with the injunction not to enter the forest until there was a signal. Bradley borrowed one from another scientist approximately his size. The technical squad suited up and moved off with the military precision with which they’d disembarked from their helicopter, Wayne Mitchell going to the tree line with them to point out his route. One of the squad, another black man, immediately took a plaster cast of Mitchell’s indentation and one of the patrolman’s foot. From the way they worked Cowley guessed they were a permanent professional team. There was hardly any conversation, everyone seeming to know what to do without any instruction from Jefferson Jones. The group divided into three-man squads, each to a section that they subdivided by tape, stirring and lifting the forest debris with slim, rubber-encased sticks. Twice more footprint casts were taken. From the line, Cowley guessed they were again those of the Highway Patrol officer. Behind the main body a still photographer and a television operator maintained a constant record.
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