Known Dead

Seventeen

The first really difficult problem we had was that none of the suspects we had in custody would say anything.

Herman Stritch, who we pretty well had to take for the leader, was kept in a separate cell area from his son William. We’re talking fifteen feet apart here, by the way, so communications between them were quite possible. For that reason, the television in the main cell containing William was kept on, with the sound up, twenty-four hours a day. If Herman wanted to talk to him, he’d have to yell.

Mrs. Nola Stritch, loyal wife and mother, was kept in our third block of cells, nearly forty feet from either her husband or her son. She could probably communicate too, but since she couldn’t see either of them from her location, it was pretty difficult.

They had their act together, though. It was very typical of the extreme right… deny any recognition of the U.S. government, but claim constitutional rights under that government if they got in trouble. Slick. They thought of it as a win-win situation. We thought a little differently.

Nola Stritch was sort of unique, at least in that group. In the first place, after she had showered and put on a fresh orange jail uniform, it turned out that she was very, very attractive. I don’t know, maybe orange was just ‘‘her color.’’ With the salt-and-pepper hair in a ponytail, and the two-piece jail uniform turned into shorts and a top by the simple expedient of rolling up the legs and tying the top in a knot above the navel, she was as close to a knockout as we’d ever had in our jail.

Questions she asked the staff very quickly revealed a sharp, intelligent woman who was remarkably self-possessed. She’d asked for a couple of books from her home, and we’d provided them. One of poems by Walt Whitman and one textbook entitled The Calculus of One Variable. Turned out she was currently enrolled in a mathematics course and was studying. Whitman was for relaxing. The dispatchers, who watched her on the surveillance cameras in her cell, said that she kept busy and seemed very calm. She also did an exercise routine that involved abdominal crunches and pull-ups on the edge of the shower stall.

Herman, on the other hand, was now simply staring at the wall or the TV. When asked if he wanted something to read, he merely said something about not reading much. He ate quite a bit, and didn’t seem to show the expected signs of depression; he slept well, seemed energetic enough when he was taken out for exercise and fresh air, and was pretty good with the staff. His son was a regular chip off the old block.

The upshot of this was that it was almost immediately apparent that, if Herman was to be considered the ‘‘brains’’ of the group, you’d have to completely ignore his wife. Yet, from all accounts, she did not lead them. Interesting.

Hester and I, as the team investigating the shooting of Rumsford, had one very large problem. We knew the shots had come from the house. We just didn’t know who’d fired them. Autopsy results wouldn’t be available for a couple of days, but preliminary examination of his body showed that he’d been shot twice in the chest, both times with what was apparently a 7.62 mm projectile. Easy so far. Now, just check the ballistics on any weapon of similar caliber at the scene. Yeah. The subsequent search of the Herman Stritch residence had turned up the following rifles, according to the Seized Property Receipt:

[212-217] Six (6) Chinese-made SKS rifles, caliber 7.62 mm

[233-235] Three (3) Chinese-made AK-47 rifles, caliber 7.62 mm

[249] One (1) Soviet-made Dragunov SVD rifle, caliber 7.62 mm

[255] One (1) German Heckler amp; Koch G3 full-auto rifle, caliber 7.62 mm

[258] One (1) U.S. M-14 rifle, caliber 7.62 mm

[261] One (1) U.S. M-1 Garand, caliber. 30 (virtually 7.62 mm)

[270-272] Three (3) U.S. Colt AR-15 rifles, caliber 5.56 mm

[388] One (1) U.S. Remington bolt-action single-shot,. 22 caliber

Hester and I looked at the list. Thirteen weapons of the right caliber, and at least one weapon had left the scene with the unknown suspects in the cornfield.

‘‘Think they had enough weapons?’’ I asked, as much to myself as her.

‘‘Yeah.’’

‘‘You know,’’ I said, ‘‘if I were living on the extreme right, I’d be considered a patriot by my associates, right?’’

‘‘Sure.’’

‘‘Yet I buy mostly foreign weapons? Mostly Communist-manufactured military rifles?’’

‘‘Cheap.’’

‘‘Sure. Well, except for that Dragunov. But wouldn’t you wonder why the Communist countries were dumping assault rifles on the U.S. market, at one-tenth the price of U.S. rifles?’’

‘‘Well, yeah. I would.’’

‘‘So,’’ I asked, ‘‘why don’t they?’’

She thought a second. ‘‘Dumb?’’

Maybe, maybe not. Dumb would be a comfort. But I thought I had a kernel of an approach to William Stritch. If I could only talk to him. In the meantime, we had other things to do. Or, at least, wonder about.

The first thing was why they’d shot poor Rumsford in the first place. We sure as hell didn’t know, so we decided we’d better talk to Nancy Mitchell again. We got her that afternoon at 1325. She came to the office. I was kind of glad to see her, because I’d been feeling very bad about Rumsford. Irrational, I know, but it was almost like I’d sent him to his death.

We started out by explaining to her that, if we could figure out why he’d been shot, we might be able to get a handle on who had done it. She was very helpful, considering.

‘‘I don’t have any idea why,’’ she said. ‘‘I’d love to help, but I just don’t know. God knows I’ve thought about it.’’ She glanced out the window, toward the media people who were gathered in the lot, and who were resenting her having access to us at this juncture. ‘‘How’s the rest of it coming?’’

Now, with a media type, you just don’t know how to answer that. After all, she did represent a newspaper. But then, she’d had her partner killed in front of her eyes, and with our encouragement, more or less.

‘‘You’re gonna hate this,’’ I said. ‘‘But it’s really too early to tell. Honest.’’

‘‘Okay.’’ She absently rubbed the knees of her beige slacks. ‘‘I’ve done the story about Phil, you know.’’

‘‘Sure,’’ said Hester. ‘‘That was part of the deal, I guess.’’

‘‘I was careful not to give up anything I felt that you’d need.’’ Nancy looked around the office. ‘‘But I did say that they ‘appear to be right-wing extremists.’ I hope that was all right.’’

‘‘Hard to escape,’’ I said.

‘‘You know,’’ she said, ‘‘I’ve always wanted to do a bit on them. Just never got around to it.’’

Hester sat back in her chair, clasping her hands behind her head. ‘‘All I want to know,’’ she said, very slowly, ‘‘is why in hell somebody would shoot the person they requested. The very one who was to be their public voice.’’ She looked at both of us. ‘‘Why would somebody do that?’’

‘‘They probably wouldn’t,’’ said Nancy.

‘‘Either of you see anything that would have indicated to anybody in the house that he was a cop?’’ I asked.

They both shook their heads.

‘‘If I remember correctly,’’ said Hester, ‘‘Mrs. Stritch was having some sort of a conversation with somebody in the house…’’

‘‘Yes,’’ said Nancy. ‘‘She was talking to them just as Phil was talking to her.’’

‘‘No,’’ I said. ‘‘Not really a conversation. At least not to me. More like they told her something.’’

‘‘Right,’’ said Hester. She put her foot back down and leaned forward. ‘‘And then she disappeared inside the house.’’

‘‘And then they shot Phil,’’ said Nancy.

‘‘So,’’ I asked nobody in particular, ‘‘is it safe to assume that they said either ‘Get out of the way’ or ‘We got him now’?’’

‘‘Something like that,’’ said Hester.

‘‘So the question is,’’ I said, ‘‘whether it was an announcement to her of something she hadn’t been aware of, or whether it was a confirmation of intentions known to her prior to the shooting.’’

Hester gave me that sort of squinty look. ‘‘You like to simplify that?’’

‘‘Yeah. Did she know in advance?’’

‘‘I don’t think so,’’ said Nancy.

‘‘Why,’’ said Hester.

‘‘I don’t know. Wait till I get my pictures back. I was focusing on her while Phil was talking.’’

My eyebrows went up about the same time Hester’s did.

‘‘Telephoto?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Five hundred millimeter Cas is what Phil called it,’’ answered Nancy. ‘‘Really gets you right in there, I’ll say that for it.’’

‘‘Cool,’’ I said. ‘‘Is it okay with you if we look ’em over with you?’’ You can’t be too careful with the press.

‘‘I’ll have to think about it,’’ said Nancy, ‘‘but I don’t see anything wrong with it… if I can get your promise that if we discover anything I get the exclusive right to it half a day before anybody else does.’’

Hester looked at me. ‘‘A gentleman would say yes,’’ she said.

‘‘So would a desperate cop,’’ I answered. I looked at Nancy. ‘‘Yes.’’

‘‘And an exclusive on the parts of the investigation I help you with?’’

‘‘And your time spent for extortion?’’ I asked.

‘‘Whatever works,’’ she said, and smiled. It was forced, but it was a smile.

We watched Nancy walk out the door. ‘‘Never gives up,’’ I said.

‘‘Well,’’ said Hester, ‘‘it could just be her way of coping.’’

‘‘Sure.’’

As soon as she left, I asked the secretaries if we’d had any word on Lamar. Undergoing surgery. I hoped they wouldn’t have to take off that lower leg, but it didn’t look good to me. They said they’d keep me posted.

We went to the jail kitchen for a late lunch. Hester had a bagel with thinly sliced turkey she’d brought that morning from Waterloo. I had brought my usual fat-free wieners, fat-free buns, no-fat cheese slices, and mustard. I put the wieners in the microwave, and set it on high for three minutes.

‘‘Isn’t that a long time for two hot dogs?’’ asked Hester as she carefully placed her paper napkin on the table between her paper plate and her silverware.

‘‘Oh, no,’’ I said. ‘‘Not at all. You gotta leave ’em in until you hear the steam squeaking as it escapes the skin.’’

‘‘You what?’’

‘‘Oh, sure,’’ I said. ‘‘Like little teapots.’’

‘‘I see…’’

‘‘That’s why I call ’em Screamin’ Weenies,’’ I said.

‘‘Jesus, you’re kidding?’’

I grinned. ‘‘No, I’m not kidding. That’s what I call ’em. Hell, Hester, if it enhances the price of lobsters, just think what it’ll do for hot dogs. You could go to the restaurant, pick the ones you wanted out of a tank…’’

‘‘Fat-free is affecting your mind,’’ she said, calmly pouring her mineral water into a small glass.

‘‘Now,’’ I said, listening for the little screams, ‘‘that’s probably true.’’

After lunch, I made a pot of coffee, and we talked about Nancy some more, and the situation in general.

‘‘You suppose,’’ said Hester, ‘‘that the people we missed, the ones who ran out the back door…’’

‘‘I know which ones, thank you very much.’’

‘‘… just might have been the ones who didn’t want Rumsford in the house?’’

I looked at her and sipped my coffee. ‘‘Go ahead.’’

‘‘Well, I was just thinking that maybe there was somebody in the house who really didn’t want to be seen.’’

That was pretty possible, actually. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed very damn possible. That Herman had agreed to Rumsford without consulting the right people. That they had shot Rumsford. Which meant, of course, that we would have a killer who got away, as opposed to just somebody who thought like Herman walking off after it was all over.

‘‘That could be tough,’’ I said.

‘‘You mean, that they got away?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Yep.’’

‘‘Yeah, I thought about that.’’

‘‘You have any good ideas to go with this one?’’

She shook her head. ‘‘Nope.’’

‘‘Wanna keep this to ourselves for a while?’’

‘‘Sure do. I was there too.’’

‘‘Yeah.’’ But it had been my call. And we’d never seen them again. No, not so. We’d never seen them in the first place. But we knew somebody who had. Somebody who’d talk to us. Melissa.

Melissa hit the office about 1645 with her daughter and her mother in tow. The media had gone to ground, probably for a beer and some supper, leaving one lonely fellow sitting on our lawn. He tried to speak to Melissa, but she just barged ahead. Her mom stopped to talk, and Melissa had to go back for her. I just shook my head.

Inside, we got everything settled in a hurry, with Mom at the reception area with her granddaughter, and Melissa in the back office with us. Mom, press relations aside, seemed suspicious, and a bit reluctant to let her daughter talk to us. She wanted to be in the room with Melissa during the interview. Melissa was an adult. Mom stayed outside the interview room.

Melissa, now that she was finally out, was ready to do anything we asked, and then some. The FBI had questioned her nearly to death, trying to establish that she was either kidnapped, a hostage, or both. Melissa kept telling them that she’d gone in of her own free will, and had come out as soon as it struck her that it was time to leave. Any shots fired at her were by Herman wanting to shoot a defector. Melissa, Hester, and I pretty well agreed that Herman had shot in the air. He really loved his granddaughter, and thought well of Melissa too. Well, that’s what she said, and we didn’t have any reason to doubt her.

‘‘There were three other men in the house with us, at least until I left. After that I don’t know.’’

‘‘Sure.’’

‘‘One,’’ said Melissa, ‘‘was Bob Nuhering, the neighbor from down toward the river?’’

‘‘Sure,’’ I said. I knew who he was.

‘‘The other two,’’ said Melissa, ‘‘were from Wisconsin. One is a big man, about fifty, really fit, crew cut. Wore camouflage clothes, with boots and a hat. They called him Gabe, although,’’ she said very confidentially, ‘‘I don’t think that was his real name.’’

‘‘Why?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘You know,’’ said Melissa, ‘‘I don’t know, you know?’’ She thought for a second. ‘‘Just the way everybody said ‘Gabe,’ you know?’’

‘‘I think I do,’’ said Hester.

‘‘And the other one?’’ I asked.

‘‘He was with Gabe. Came with him, I mean. Dressed the same way, except he had a white tee shirt under his cammo stuff, and Gabe was pretty disgusted, you know, because he could see the white a mile off.’’

‘‘Yep.’’

‘‘And he was called Al, or Albert, and I think that was his real name, ’cause I didn’t get any feeling about it not being his real name

…’’

‘‘Okay,’’ I said.

‘‘Both of them had attack guns, you know?’’

‘‘Assault rifles?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Yeah. That’s right.’’

‘‘So,’’ I asked, ‘‘what did everybody think about Gabe and Al?’’

‘‘Like, do you mean respect and like that?’’

‘‘That’s just what I mean.’’

‘‘Oh, Gabe,’’ she said, with her voice showing disrespect just the way a fourteen-year-old would, ‘‘was like God, you know? I mean, anything he just even said, they just ate it up…’’

As it turned out, Gabe was a real leader in that group. He was the one who had everybody but Melissa convinced that they should die for the cause. Whatever the cause was, and Melissa wasn’t too clear about that. Herman was a true believer, and so was his son. Nola had seemed a bit reluctant for others, particularly her daughter-in-law and granddaughter, to die for a cause. She’d helped Melissa out the door, in fact. But Nola was apparently determined to stay. Mostly with Gabe, according to Melissa.

‘‘I think they’ve got the hots for each other,’’ said Melissa.

‘‘Who?’’

‘‘Nola and Gabe.’’

My. She’d formed this opinion by the way they’d exchanged looks, by the way they talked to each other, and by little considerations they’d apparently shown each other. Herman, as far as she could tell, had been pretty much oblivious to the Nola and Gabe thing.

‘‘He’s got the hots for Gabe in another way,’’ said Melissa. ‘‘Thinks he’s just about God, or something.’’

Melissa said that they were also talking to people on the outside all the time.

‘‘How did they do that?’’ I asked. ‘‘We shut the phone lines off right away.’’

Gabe, it turned out, had attached the modem of the Stritch computer to a cell phone. Of course. He was receiving messages from people all the time he was there. And apparently sending them as well.

‘‘What kind of stuff did he do on the computer?’’ I asked.

‘‘I don’t know. I mean, like, they never let me see what it was. But he’d do stuff on it, and then he’d talk to us about the ‘mission.’ ’’

‘‘The mission?’’ asked Hester. ‘‘What mission?’’

Melissa had no idea whatsoever what the mission was. But it had to be important, because everybody listened up when the mission was brought up.

‘‘Had you ever heard of the mission before?’’

‘‘Yes, sir, Mr. Houseman. I sure did.’’

‘‘And had you ever seen Gabe before?’’ interjected Hester, before Melissa could start talking and lose her train of thought.

She had. Once. At Herman’s place. About the second week of June. He’d been getting into his car when she had driven up in her pickup, bringing used tires to Herman’s place. He’d been in a blue Ford, pretty new, and had a woman with him. He was dressed in blue jeans and a white shirt, but she was sure it was the same man. She’d been told he sold insurance, when she’d asked her mother-in-law, Nola Stritch.

‘‘And the mission?’’

‘‘Oh, yeah.’’

She’d first heard about the mission in May or early June, and that from her husband, Bill. He and his dad had been over at Melissa’s, and she’d heard them talking about a mission that was coming up. They’d seemed pretty excited about it. In fact, they’d been talking mission a lot when the two killings took place in the park. She was sure of that.

‘‘And Bill was there, but he didn’t shoot? Like you told us early yesterday morning?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘That’s right.’’

‘‘What about Gabe?’’ I asked.

‘‘He was there, as far as I know,’’ she said. ‘‘When Bill finally told me what had happened, I remember him saying that the colonel was really pissed.’’ Her eyes widened. ‘‘Did I tell you they called him the colonel, too?’’

‘‘No, you didn’t,’’ said Hester.

‘‘Oh, yeah, and he was really fit to be tied, according to Bill.’’

I’ll just bet he was, I thought. ‘‘He say why?’’ I asked her.

‘‘I don’t know about the details,’’ she said, ‘‘so much as he called it a ‘cluster fuck.’ I know he called it that.’’

Without a blush. I don’t think either Hester or Sally, for example, could have used the phrase ‘‘cluster fuck’’ in front of near-strangers. At least, not without showing some reaction. Not Melissa.

‘‘And,’’ she continued, ‘‘he said it was going to get a lot of attention that they didn’t want. At least, that’s what Bill said he’d said.’’

‘‘Any reason to doubt Bill?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘No.’’

We talked some more about Bill then. He didn’t really get going too much on the ‘‘political shit,’’ as he apparently called it. He did spend a lot of time shopping for guns, buying one once in a while, and talking with others who did the same thing. He’d clean the guns, and sometimes shoot one or two of them, after he was done with his farm work for the day. She and Bill had argued once or twice over the costs, but her objections had ceased when she found out that Herman was footing the bill for most of the guns and ammo. Also, by that time in their relationship, she didn’t seem to mind it too much when Bill was gone for a while. She didn’t go into many details, but I got the impression it really wasn’t something major that came between them. It had been just the usual little resentments, with the slights, and the lack of real signs of affection. Distance. Marriage, with a child a little sooner than they were ready for. She did say, however, that she felt that Bill was nailed to the farm. That was a little strange, as he was farming mostly grain and a few hogs. Not nearly as tied down as, for instance, a dairy farmer. That struck me.

The interview was pretty routine at that point. Then she mentioned the meetings.

‘‘And we always had to go to these meetings, you know.’’

‘‘Meetings?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Oh, yeah. All over, and even whole weekends shot. He wanted me to go, at least to some of ’em. But they were so damned dull… ’’

‘‘Where were these meetings?’’ began Hester. She had to start somewhere.

They really were all over, as Melissa had said. Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri… all around Iowa. Of course, there were meetings in Iowa too. For the weekend ones, they’d stay with relatives or friends or at a motel, whichever was possible. Some others had campers and stayed in them. Some meetings were attended by as few as ten people. Some by as many as two to three hundred. When asked, she said that if she had to put an average figure out, she’d go for twenty-five to forty. Once they just met in a park. Other times in rented halls and buildings, ranging from sales barns to motel conference rooms. The types of people seldom changed, nor did the food.

‘‘They always had the same handouts. Always the same shit, you know. I mean, the small parts would change, like the names of the people who were getting screwed, and the examples. But it was always really the same thing.’’

‘‘Like a theme?’’ I asked.

‘‘Yeah,’’ she said. ‘‘Like that. Like with the black helicopters and stuff. Same theme.’’

‘‘They were into the black choppers too?’’

‘‘Oh, yeah. Some people saw black helicopters just about every day, or so they said. They think it’s some foreign government, I guess, spying on ’em.’’

‘‘That’s what they said they were?’’ I asked.

‘‘Yeah. But you were supposed to know, you know? They’d just say ‘black’ and you’d just nod, like ‘oh, yeah, I know.’ It was weird. I mean, some of the nicest people, even the old women, would get goin’ on that.’’

‘‘Okay…’’ I glanced at Hester. ‘‘Sort of like they were talking about the weather?’’

‘‘Oh, no. They get, like, really excited about that black shit.. .’’

Being bored, she hadn’t paid too much attention to the names of the people who seemed to be in charge of the particular meetings, or the ones with the handouts. Except for one, whom she got to know because he ate with the Stritch contingent many, many times. Wilford Jeschonek. From Minnesota, as far as she knew. He was a lawyer. He’d told her so.

‘‘Oh, yeah, he was givin’ Herman all this advice about how to invest and such.’’

‘‘Investments?’’ asked Hester. ‘‘And did Herman give him any money?’’

‘‘Sure. He sold the third farm. Remember?’’ She was asking me. And I did. It had made the local paper, because Herman had claimed he was being forced off the farm by the Federal Land Bank people. It hadn’t been true, he just owed them money. A lot less than he got for the farm, if I remembered correctly.

‘‘After the sale, he borrowed all he could on the other two farms, and then he bought a lot of… oh, what do you call those things?’’

I spread my hands, palms up. ‘‘A little more specific?’’ I grinned.

‘‘Yeah,’’ said Melissa, grinning back. ‘‘Like, when you buy part of something, that a lot of other people bought too…’’

‘‘Shares?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Yeah, that’s it! Shares. Shares in a whole bunch of gold kept in some foreign country…’’

‘‘And then,’’ I asked her, ‘‘he would get certificates saying that he owned so much gold in such and such a bank in South America? That he could redeem it in fifteen years for ten times the face value?’’

‘‘That’s right… how did you know about that?’’

‘‘Been lots of fraud cases like that, Melissa. Lots.’’

‘‘Fraud? You mean it isn’t true?’’

‘‘Nope. The ‘investors’ never see a cent. It just disappears, mainly because there isn’t any gold in the first place.’’

I noticed the beginning of the stricken look just a little too late to soften the blow.

‘‘Melissa, you and Bill didn’t…’’

Her face was blotchy red, and she was very near tears. ‘‘Yeah, we did. Just about everything we made on the farm.’’ She took a deep breath and gestured at her clothes. ‘‘That’s why I dress like this.. . why we have a piece of shit pickup…’’

‘‘I’m sorry, Melissa. I didn’t know.’’

‘‘That fuckin’ Herman!’’

I had to agree with that. Not only had he shot at her, he’d managed to get all her money flushed down a toilet, along with his own. If she’d been sticking it out thinking of a possible inheritance from both farms…

We had to give her a long break with her mother before we could get the interview back on track. While she was outside, I called Sally, checking where our favorite FBI agent was. On his way to Maitland, as a matter of fact. With a bunch of ‘‘material.’’ Excellent. I wanted him to talk with Melissa, especially about the financial stuff. He was much more familiar with that sort of thing than either Hester or I were, and I felt that she might be able to put him on the track of another major fraud case.

I went back out to get Melissa, and her mother didn’t look one bit happier than her daughter, but a bit more aggressive about it. I had the impression that there’d just been a discussion about how Mom had never approved of Bill in the first place. Glad I missed that one.

Melissa, as it happened, had a lot of her and Bill’s investment information at home. Company names, addresses, etc. She also had a little bomb to drop.

‘‘I was just thinkin’, Mr. Houseman. At those meetings. Some people said that we should raise marijuana, and sell it to the dopeheads, and make lots of money. Said, ‘Why let them spend their cash on foreign dope. We need the money.’ ’’

‘‘Do you think they were serious?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Well, I thought they were kidding, until the officer got shot.’’

We sent her home to get any documents she might have, with the suggestion that she leave Mom there with her daughter when she came back. Sounded good to her.

Well. Not too shabby for an afternoon. And we weren’t done yet.

When Melissa returned, George was there. We were just a little concerned about her reaction to another FBI agent, after the hassle about the kidnapping, and as we knew how her in-laws felt about the Feds. We needn’t have worried.

She smiled at George. ‘‘I wasn’t kidnapped, but I’m getting screwed over, and I want something done about it.’’

She had a stack of papers in a brown grocery sack. A thick stack.

‘‘I kind of brought stuff you might be interested in.’’

I picked up the phone. ‘‘Sally, could you come back here when you get a chance… we have a whole bunch of copying to be done…’’ I looked at Melissa. ‘‘If that’s okay with you?’’

‘‘Fine,’’ she said.

‘‘Then let her do it,’’ came a faint voice over the phone.

‘‘We’ll see you back here in a couple of minutes?’’

‘‘Yes…’’ said Sally, just a little disgusted.

‘‘You know,’’ said Melissa a few minutes later, ‘‘I’m just sorry the law won’t let me testify against Bill.’’

‘‘That’s no problem,’’ said Hester.

‘‘But I thought…’’

‘‘You can’t be compelled to testify against him. But you sure can, if it’s of your own free will. That’s how abused women can testify against their husbands.’’

‘‘No shit?’’ You could almost see the lightbulb come on.

‘‘Hey, there’s lots to learn here,’’ I said.

‘‘I guess so,’’ said Melissa.

‘‘For us too.’’ I leaned forward, pen in hand. ‘‘Let’s get back to that mission, or whatever they called it.’’ I adjusted my reading glasses and looked at her over the top. ‘‘Any idea whatever what they were talking about doing? Or when?’’

‘‘Honest, Mr. Houseman, I don’t think I do.’’

‘‘Mmmmm…’’

‘‘Really, I don’t. Only that it struck me that it would be sometime not too far off.’’

‘‘Any idea why?’’ asked Hester.

‘‘Why it was soon?’’

‘‘Why you think it is.’’

‘‘Well, Herman was saying things like ‘We have to be ready,’ and ‘any day and they could come,’ and stuff like that.’’

‘‘Oh.’’ Hester looked at me questioningly. Do I keep up this line, or what?

When you interview, it’s always best to avoid having the interviewee speculate regarding areas where they have no knowledge or experience. The danger is that you stop doing questions and answers, and cross the line into conversation. We were really close to that line with Melissa.

‘‘Did Herman make any specific preparations for the mission?’’ I asked. My last shot.

‘‘Oh, yeah, he did that all right. That’s when he bought the ski masks and the cammo clothes for him and Bill. They were the ‘blockers,’ or the ‘linemen,’ or something like that. Reminded me of football.’’

‘‘Blocking force?’’ asked George, looking up from the documents Melissa had brought.

‘‘That sounds right.’’

Melissa looked back at me, proud of herself. George looked at me and made a time-out sign.

‘‘Well, Melissa, thanks a lot. You’ve been a really big help.. .’’ And after about two or three minutes Melissa was leaving, with a promise to return with more documents, as soon as she could round them up.

George, Hester, and I had a discussion. Much about what George had discovered in the documents, and a little about the mission. The possible link to Herman and company raising the marijuana for cash. That came first, in fact, and just about thirty seconds after Melissa had left the building.

‘‘I’m worried about that mission business,’’ I said. ‘‘Whatever it is, it doesn’t sound like harvesting marijuana.’’

‘‘Yeah,’’ said Hester.

We both looked at George, half expecting a ‘‘pish tosh’’ official FBI disclaimer.

‘‘Yeah, it scares me half to death,’’ he said. Earnestly.

‘‘Oh, swell,’’ said Hester. ‘‘You were supposed to say that there was nothing to fear, or something like that.’’

‘‘Yeah, I know,’’ said George, sitting back down and picking up the stack of Melissa’s papers. ‘‘However… A ‘blocking force,’ of course, is a military term for force that blocks.’’ He looked up, pleased.

‘‘Boy,’’ I said, ‘‘am I glad you’re here.’’

‘‘No, no, no,’’ he said. ‘‘Let me finish. That dude you and Hester saw making his getaway from the farm, I think I’ve found him in here. Or his tracks anyway.’’ He pushed a single-page document toward us.

It was a letter, obviously mimeographed, with the recipient’s name newer and darker than the rest. ‘‘Armed Forces of the Reoccupation Government’’ was in a curved letterhead, with a little guy in a tricornered hat, with a musket and a flag. Very similar to the National Guard symbol, except the man was standing in front of a capitol-shaped building with a cracked dome. There was one of those little wavy banners below that, which said ‘‘White Freedom.’’ The body seemed to be a notification of a meeting of some sort, and exhorted everyone from the ‘‘unit’’ to be there. The date was about three months ago, April 14th, and the location was a town in Minnesota I never heard of. The signature was Edward Killgore, Col., AFRG. But it was actually signed with a scrawl that looked kind of like a G with a couple of circles after it.

‘‘So?’’ I asked.

‘‘The signature,’’ said George. ‘‘Look at the signature.’’

I squinted, then put on my reading glasses. ‘‘God?’’ I asked.

‘‘No, no, no!’’ he said, exasperated. ‘‘Not God, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, that’s Gabe. That’s an e that he trails off, and it looks like

…’’

‘‘Gabe.’’

‘‘Gabe.’’

We all needed coffee after that. Sally came back to copy the papers, and we got her some coffee too.

It turned out that what Melissa had provided us with was a fairly complete paper trail for a theoretical hoard of gold, kept in Belize and manipulated from San Jose, Costa Rica. The manipulating organization was known as the P.M. Corporation, with offices in San Jose; Portland, OR; Corpus Christi, TX; and St. Paul, MN. Well, box numbers. They listed suites only in San Jose and Portland. P.M., it seemed, stood for Precious Metals. So…

What they did was this: You bought a share in the P.M. gold, for $500. This got you an ounce. They kept the gold marked with your name, and it would be instantly available to you when and if the government of the United States collapsed and there was a ‘‘World Upheaval followed by a World Crash.’’ This, by the way, seemed to be pretty inevitable, if you listened to P.M. If, on the off chance, the United States hadn’t collapsed by 2015, you would receive $5,000 per invested share. Right. Wanna buy a bridge?

Interestingly enough, although P.M. stoutly claimed that there was no money of value except gold (the rest were all ‘‘false creations of credit’’), they would accept your personal check.

And it was in this bunch that Herman had invested his and his son’s net worth. So had many, many others, if you could believe that part of the P.M. spiel. This wasn’t the first group that did this that I’d had information about, but P.M. was the first one I’d seen with glossy, slick brochures.

‘‘People can’t really be this dumb, can they?’’

‘‘Carl,’’ said George, ‘‘they get a lot dumber than that.’’

I’d worked fraud cases before, but it had been my experience that the average Iowa farmer would read a spiel like that one and spit on the shiny shoes that tried to sell it to him. Politely, of course. Maybe even apologetically. But he’d spit accurately, nonetheless. Herman must have been a little short of saliva one day. Not to mention brains. Yet he was known to be a little short on assets as well. He’d been convinced enough to borrow and beg to get the funds to buy into the P.M. hoard. The ‘‘pot of gold,’’ as I began to think of it.

‘‘God,’’ said Hester. ‘‘He borrowed money to buy into that?’’

‘‘Yeah,’’ I said.

‘‘Well,’’ said George, ‘‘that’s not half of it. We’ve dealt with P.M. and its right-wing connections before this. There actually is some gold, you know.’’

No, I hadn’t known. As it turned out, P.M. was just one of several names used by a small group of Nazi types in South America who were supporting the neo-Nazis in the United States. The money that they gathered in was shipped back into the United States and ended up in the coffers of some militant groups, who used it mostly to buy equipment and for publicity and recruitment propaganda. Well, a lot of it went into the pockets of certain individuals too.

‘‘You know,’’ said George, ‘‘that’s one of the stranger aspects of all this business. Most of the individuals who prosper here have followers. Most of them exhort those followers not to pay their federal taxes, and many don’t. But most of those making the big profits do report to the IRS, and pay their taxes up front. They just claim that they don’t. Neat, isn’t it?’’

‘‘That it is.’’ I got up to go get more coffee. ‘‘Anybody else want more?’’

‘‘Me,’’ said Sally.

‘‘Okay.’’

‘‘Can I ask a question?’’ said Sally.

All three of us officers had worked with Sally enough to know that she could be trusted completely and that she frequently contributed quite a bit to investigations.

‘‘Sure,’’ I said.

‘‘What do you think Herman’s wife thinks about all this? I mean, don’t you think she’d be furious about the money?’’

‘‘I don’t think Nola probably gave him too much crap about it,’’ I said, sort of absently. I hadn’t really thought about it.

‘‘I sure would,’’ she said earnestly.

‘‘Yeah,’’ I said, ‘‘but think about this situation. They’ve been married, what, about thirty years by now? Experienced the same ups and downs. Know the same people. They were probably quite a bit alike when they got married, for that matter.’’

‘‘So,’’ said Sally, ‘‘you think she agrees with him?’’

‘‘I think so,’’ I answered. ‘‘Either that or she could be behind it and he’s just following her. It sure wouldn’t be the first time.’’

‘‘But that big an investment?’’ Sally seemed truly perplexed.

‘‘Actually,’’ said George of the Bureau, ‘‘it’s not so much an investment as… as a commitment, I guess you’d say.’’

‘‘Commitment?’’ said Sally. ‘‘Like, in a promise?’’

‘‘Sort of,’’ said Hester. ‘‘I think George’s right. It would be like a couple investing heavily in their church or their mutual religion. That happens a lot, for a lot less of a promise of a good return on the investment.’’

‘‘Oh.’’

‘‘On the other hand,’’ said George.

‘‘No!’’ came from me and Hester at about the same time. George is an attorney by education, and an agent only by trade. He can argue endlessly on either side of a question.

‘‘Sorry I asked.’’ Sally grinned. ‘‘But I still say I’d be bent about that… even if’’-and the grin broadened- ‘‘it was my fault in the first place. I mean, if he’s dumb enough to do what I told him to do?’’ She smiled coyly. ‘‘What’s a girl to do?’’

The point? How well did we know Nola Stritch? Obviously not well enough to know if she was like Sally, so not well enough at all.

‘‘I’ll do her,’’ sighed Hester. ‘‘Thanks, Sally.’’

‘‘No problem. Just too bad the smartest cop got stuck with it.’’ With that, she stuck out her tongue at George and me and went back to copying papers.

In the meantime, George told us about the computers.

The combined DCI/FBI evidence team, working the Stritch residence, had apparently seized three computers, along with numerous disks. Neat. They were coming into the office with them before going to the lab.

‘‘We think,’’ said George, ‘‘that Herman and company probably did a lot of their correspondence on the machines, along with, maybe, a database of addresses…’’

‘‘Great,’’ said Hester. ‘‘We get to go over it?’’

‘‘That could be a problem,’’ said George. ‘‘The lab folks want their experts to do it, in case there’s any crypto stuff, and messages might be destroyed if we pry…’’

‘‘I don’t think,’’ I said, ‘‘that Herman’s able to cope with anything complex…’’

‘‘But do we want to take the chance?’’

Normally, I wouldn’t want to take a chance on destroying evidence. But George told us that it would be about three weeks before the information would be back from the lab.

‘‘Your lab, the FBI lab, right?’’ I asked.

‘‘Sure.’’

‘‘And they won’t give us shit,’’ I said. ‘‘If there’s anything concerning the P.M. organization, for instance… it’ll be classified because it’s part of an ongoing investigation, and we’ll never hear about it. Right?’’

George didn’t say anything.

‘‘And no matter what’s there, it just might as well be destroyed as far as our little investigation is concerned. Right?’’ I asked again.

George had kind of a pained look on his face. ‘‘Probably.’’

‘‘And even if your people,’’ I said, turning to Hester, ‘‘had rights to the stuff, they’d just hand it over to Eff Bee One.’’ I used the derogatory term for the FBI. Well, one of them.

‘‘Sure,’’ said Hester. ‘‘No administrator can take the hard decision. Even if it kills the investigation. He’s still ‘done the right thing.’ ’’ She shrugged. ‘‘That’s a lot better than trying to explain why you permanently screwed up the evidence.’’

It was quiet in our little room.

‘‘Well,’’ said Sally, ‘‘that’s terrible.’’

It was quiet again, for what seemed like a minute.

‘‘Are we agreed,’’ I asked, ‘‘that there’s likely to be stuff on those machines we need to see?’’

‘‘Oh, sure,’’ said George. ‘‘No doubt.’’

‘‘Yeah,’’ said Hester. ‘‘Probably quite a bit. For all the good it’ll do us.’’

‘‘Well,’’ I said, ‘‘do we agree that Herman is probably not a computer genius?’’

We did.

‘‘And even if his wife is ten times brighter, he’s still going to have to be able to run it without screwing it up too bad if he makes a mistake?’’

We agreed about that too.

‘‘So just how heavily encrypted can this be? Just a simple password, probably?’’

Probably would be. We agreed on that too. In fact, we also agreed that it wouldn’t be too complex, and would be something that Herman couldn’t possibly mess up.

‘‘Like,’’ said Sally, ‘‘his name?’’

I’d almost forgotten she was there. But she was probably right.

It was silent for a few seconds more.

‘‘Is it time to eat supper yet?’’ I asked.

‘‘That all you think of?’’ asked George.