If Angels Fall

FIFTY-NINE

Dust and pebbles pelted acting Calaveras County Sheriff Greg Brader as he watchedthe four helicopters descend one after the other, his shirt flapping angrilyagainst his back.

It was supposed to be his day off. He was painting hisgarage at his home in San Andreas when his wife had called him to the phone. Itwas his dispatcher: The SFPD and FBI were flying out immediately because of apossible county connection to the kidnapping case in the Bay Area. Brader hadless than an hour to prepare.

While some small town cops may have gotten jittery atthe prospect of a profile case popping up in their yard, Brader was cool.Before coming to the county eight years ago, he had put in twelve years withthe LAPD, six of them in Homicide. Without changing his torn jeans and stainedT-shirt, he kissed his wife and got in his marked Suburban. He made calls overthe radio and cellular while driving directly to West Point, a sleepy villageforty minutes away.

Brader and his two deputies cordoned off the balldiamond and its parking lot, turning it into a landing zone for the SanFrancisco FBI’s new MacDonnell Douglas 450-NOTAR and larger Huey, which carriedthe FBI’s SWAT team. Sydowski, Turgeon, and a handful of others from the taskforce landed next in the two CHiPs choppers.

Special Agent Merle Rust and SFPF Inspector WaltSydowski were the contact people, along with FBI SWAT Team Leader LangfordShaw. Brader introduced himself, shouting over the noise of the rotor blades.

“You fellas best ride with me. My guys will bring theothers.” As requested, he had obtained a school bus for the SWAT Team and itsequipment. Other task force members rode with Brader’s deputies as they roaredoff in a convoy of three police cars and the bus.

“We’ll be there in under twenty minutes,” Brader saidafter making a radio call to his deputies at the property. “I’ve had two peoplesitting back on the house since you called.”

“What have you got?” Rust asked.

“As you know, the pickup is currently registered to aWarren Urlich. He’s a sixty-eight-year-old recluse, a pensioner. Makes extracash fixing cars and trucks; sells them, too. Neighbors say he never talks toanybody and he’s got so many vehicles on his property, they never know whenhe’s home.”

“What about the kids?”

“Like I told you when you were flying out, Urlich’snearest neighbor thinks she saw two kids on the place that maybe arrived recently.A little boy and girl. She was only sure they weren’t living there before.”

Rust and Sydowski exchanged glances.

Stands of pine, cedar, and sequoias blurred by theSuburban as it ate up the paved ribbon snaking through the Sierras of CavalerasCounty. This was where prospectors flocked during the gold rush in 1849. It washome to Twain’s celebrated jumping frog, clear lakes, streams, tranquility, andpeople who wanted to be left alone.

Cars and pickups in various stages of disrepair, junk,a yapping dog on a long chain, and ramshackle outbuildings dotted WarrenUrlich’s land, a three-acre hilly site with an abundance of trees.

The FBI SWAT Team set up a perimeter around therickety house, while the county deputies and some task force members formed an outerperimeter. Brader’s Suburban and the bus, which was the command post, werevirtually out of sight about one hundred yards from the house.

From the hood of Brader’s truck, Sydowski glimpsed abroken toilet and a pit bull with a bloodied rabbit carcass in its jaws, as heswept the property with Brader’s binoculars. He chewed a Tums tablet — hissecond since they landed — and steadied himself for the worst. He fearedanother deadly shootout like the one with Shook. He prayed for the children tobe alive, but if they were in this shit hole, they were ninety-nine percent forsure dead.

He passed the binoculars to Turgeon. She rolled thefocus wheel slightly, bit her lip, then handed the glasses to Brader.

Sydowski studied her protectively for a moment.

Inside the bus, SWAT Team Leader Langford Shaw maderadio checks with his people. Everybody was in position. Fred Wheeler, the unit’shostage negotiator, called the house over the FBI’s satellite phone.

Someone answered.

“Mr. Warren Urlich?”

“Yup.”

“Mr. Urlich, this is Fred Wheeler. I’m a special agentwith the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We’d like to talk to you, sir. Wehave heavily armed people positioned around your home and would like you toplease walk slowly out the front door with your hands in the air now.”

Wheeler was answered with silence.

“Mr. Urlich, Warren?”

Nothing.

“Did you hear me, sir?”

“I heard you, I just don’t believe you. This a joke?”

“We’ll sound a police siren now.”

Wheeler nodded to Shaw, who signaled Brader and theSuburban’s siren yelped.

“What do you want to talk about?”

“We’ll discuss everything when you come out.”

As Urlich and Wheeler talked, SWAT team memberstightened on the house, peeking inside windows with miniature dental mirrors. Agirl of about seven or eight was playing with a doll near the back door. In aheartbeat, an agent grabbed her, clasping his hand over her mouth, removing herto the outer perimeter.

Shaw, listening on his headset radio, nodded, andwhispered to Wheeler, “We have a girl removed safely. She says it’s just theman and a boy inside now and the man has lots of guns and bullets.”

On the phone, Urlich — who did not know the girl wasgone — had not decided to cooperate with Wheeler.

“You make me kinda nervous,” Urlich said. “Can’t wejust talk on the line here? ‘Cause if it’s about them kids, I don’t knownothin’. That’s Norm’s business and I ain’t a part of it.”

“It would be much better, Warren, if we could talkface to face.”

Shaw had more information.

“The girl says she and the boy were brought to theproperty a couple of weeks ago.”

Urlich was getting impatient. “I told you I don’t knownothing about nothing.”

“I didn’t say you did. We just want to talk, maybe youcan help us on a serious matter. Maybe this is all a misunderstanding. Pleasecome out now, sir. Help us clear things up, so we can be on our way.”

Several seconds passed before Urlich said, “I’m comingout.”

Wheeler told Shaw, who alerted the unit. Nearly adozen FBI guns were trained on Urlich’s front door. It cracked open. A long,rifle-like object slowly extended from it. A white dishrag was tied to whatturned out to be a broom. A weathered man in his sixties, dressed in stainedoveralls crept out.

“Please put the object down, Warren.” A loudspeakerordered.

He obeyed, looking around for the source as his pitbull howled, leaping at his chain toward him in a futile attempt to warn him ofthe SWAT member who stepped from the front of the house and forced Urlich tohis knees, frisking and handcuffing him before escorting him to the commandpost.

Rust, Sydowski, Ditmire, Turgeon, Brader, and Shawtook Urlich aside. Urlich’s eyes went round the group. He seemed indifferent.Rust and Sydowski began asking questions. Urlich answered them, and before longthey realized they were on the right track, but at the wrong address. Thechildren, a five-year-old boy and his seven-year-old sister, were Urlich’sgrandchildren, his son Norman’s kids. Norman had lost a custody fight, and lastmonth he had abducted them from his “ex-bitch Marcie” in Dayton, Ohio, andbrought them here.

“This is what this show is all about, ain’t it?”

Inside the shack, they found two kid’s video-moviemembership cards for a store in Dayton and two juvenile library cards forDayton. Calls made to the store, the library, and Dayton PD were furtherconfirmation of a parental abduction, contrary to a court custody order. Thechildren would be returned immediately to Mom in Ohio.

Meanwhile, two agents who checked every wreck on thegrounds approached Rust. “No pickup, sir,” one agent said.

Rust turned to Urlich. “According to California’sDepartment of Motor Vehicles, you own a 1978 Ford pickup, license ‘B754T3’.Where is it?”

Rust held an information sheet before Urlich’s face.He leaned forward, hand still cuffed behind his back, squinting at the page.

“I can’t see. My glasses are in my bib here.”

Urlich was uncuffed. He slipped on his glasses,studied the page.

“Well, shit, I sold that thing months ago to somefella from San Francisco. For cash. Got a bill of sale in the house.”

“Why is this truck currently registered to you?”Sydowski said.

“Guess the registration never got changed like it wassupposed to.”

“What’s the buyer’s name?” Rust asked.

“I got it in the house, in my office.”

Urlich’s office was a cracked rolltop desk buriedunder mounds of auto magazines, newspapers, brochures, junk mail, notes, andphone books. Amazingly he reached into the heap and pulled out a slip of paper,smudged with engine grease. The pickup’s bill of sale.

Rust looked at it, cursed, and gave it to Sydowski.

John Smith had bought the truck.

“Says here he also bought a boat and trailer fromyou.”

“Yes. Northcraft with twin Mercs. Paid nine thousandfor the whole shooting match.”

“He said he was from San Francisco?” Sydowski wastaking notes.

“Yes.”

“Why come out here to buy a truck and boat?”

Urlich shrugged. “I only advertised the truck.”

“You advertised? In what?”

Urlich reached into the pile again, retrieving anautomotive buy-and-sell magazine. “I put all my stock in here.” He licked afinger, casually browsing through the pictures of cars and trucks, each bearingan information caption. “Goes all over Northern California. Here it is.” Hetapped the picture.

Rust and Sydowski stared at a profile photo of theFord pickup truck used in the abduction of Gabrielle Nunn from the Children’sPlayground of Golden Gate Park.

“You got a picture of the boat and trailer?” Sydowskisaid.

Urlich indicated his paper pile. “In theresomewheres.”

“You got any of the nine thousand he gave you left?”Rust said.

“Yup, why?”

“Can we see it?”

Urlich fished a jingling key chain from his coverallsand unlocked a drawer, then a metal strong box containing several envelopesfilled with cash. “Some is deposits on my stock.” He handed Rust an envelopecontaining several fifty-and hundred-dollar notes. They werefresh-from-the-mint bills with sequential serial numbers. They could yield thesuspect’s prints. And the Secret Service and Treasury people might be able togive the task for a point-of-circulation bank.

“Can you remember what this man looked like?” Sydowskisaid.

Urlich scratched his chin.

“Any distinguishing scars, tattoos, any memorablespeech patterns?”

“No,” Urlich said, before giving a vague, uselessdescription.

“He come with anybody?”

Urlich shook his head. “Said he hitchhiked.”

“Hitchhiked?” Sydowski took a note. “Any idea at allwhere he lived? Worked? His phone number?”

Urlich shook his head. “Nope. I see quite a few peopleand it was a long time ago.”

“Anything about him that sticks in your mind?” Turgeonsaid.

Urlich couldn’t recall anything.

“He say what he needed the truck for?” Ditmire said.

“Nope.”

“What about the boat?” Sydowski wondered. “He sayanything about it? He came for a truck and leaves with a truck and boat.”

“Now that you mention it, he was something of a holyman about the boat.”

“A holy man?” Ditmire said.

“Yes, he came for the truck and fell in love with theboat. He said it was destiny that he should find such a boat.”

“Destiny?”

“Destiny or fate, as I recall.”

“In what way?” Sydowski said.

“Well, I never advertised the boat. It was justsitting here, not really for sale and he spots it and starts on some Biblemumbo jumbo.”

“You remember any of it?”

“Just that it was about life and death, resurrection.”

“Resurrection?” Sydowski said. “He sees this boat andtalks about resurrection?”

“Guess it had something to do with why he needed theboat.”

“He say why he needed that boat?” Rust asked.

“Well … after that he sort of clammed up, it waslike he was talking to himself and suddenly remembered I was there.”

“Did he say why he needed the boat?” Sydowski pushed.

Urlich appraised Sydowski, Rust, and the others,chuckling at his memory before sharing it. “Said he needed it to find hischildren.”

To find his children?

The law men stared at each other, bewildered.

During the return flight to San Francisco, severalintense calls were made to the Hall of Justice and Golden Gate Avenue. Theentire task force was to meet within ninety minutes.