Known Dead

Twenty-two

Gabriel,’’ said Volont, ‘‘lives in Idaho at the moment. When he’s not in London or Winnipeg or Burlington, Vermont.’’

‘‘Who is he?’’ I asked.

‘‘Well,’’ he said, ‘‘his real name is Jacob Henry Nieuhauser, and he was born in Winnipeg about fifty years ago. He and his parents moved to Idaho when he was about fourteen or so.’’

As Volont explained it, Gabriel had gone to college in the United States, then joined the U.S. Army, ending up as a major with Ranger training, but not a Ranger. He’d been stationed in Europe, and made friends with some liaison officer from the British Army on the Rhine. He also made friends with some ex-Nazis in Germany. That put him in touch with the aforementioned neo-Nazi group in Britain, which got him connected with the later arms theft. He’d retired from the U.S. Army about ten years back, and had been associating with some pretty extreme people ever since. He’d been involved with Wittman in the fraud scheme that had put Wittman in prison, but he’d never been touched. He’d been connected, mostly by inference, to several subsequent schemes, and could have raised as much as twenty-five million dollars. He was currently living in a fortified camp in Idaho with about fifty dedicated followers.

‘‘That’s where we thought all these arms would be,’’ said Volont. ‘‘Certainly not here.’’

‘‘I wonder if there are any more stashes like this one,’’ said Hester. ‘‘Around here.’’

‘‘Me too,’’ I said. I looked at Volont. ‘‘What are my chances of talking to Gabriel?’’

‘‘Zilch.’’ He didn’t even hesitate. ‘‘Because you don’t know who he is, remember?’’

Shit. ‘‘Some days,’’ I said, ‘‘it seems there just aren’t enough petards to go around.’’

Volont was the only one who got it.

The team leader suddenly stiffened.

‘‘What?’’ asked Volont.

‘‘Sky One’s just been ordered back to Cedar Rapids.’’

‘‘So?’’

‘‘There seems to be a fire at the jail.’’

‘‘Bad?’’

‘‘No, doesn’t sound like it, according to the chopper. They just want ’em for security.’’

We decided to take Wittman to the Homer County jail and to talk to him there.

I thought Wittman was a piece of cake after being properly softened up. First thing we did, well before we got to the jail, was to call in on the radio and get an attorney coming. The Homer County sheriff had decided to bring everybody to the jail and sort things out there. As we left, George was on his cell phone, assisting his partner in Cedar Rapids in obtaining a search warrant for the Wittman farm. George was in charge of the scene until the lab and ATF people arrived to take charge of the weapons and then to begin the search for more.

There had been a computer in the house, and I was sure George would let the lab folks do all the work on that. I figured he’d had about enough of computers. Besides, Wittman seemed a lot brighter about computer security than those at the Stritch farm. We might actually have some pretty sophisticated protection on that computer.

Wittman was really scared by the time we got him to the jail. He was introduced to his attorney, who was absolutely overwhelmed by us, the accusations, and the facts of the case. He just kept staring at the TAC people as they moved through the area, securing their equipment.

Wittman agreed to talk to us. His attorney was present.

‘‘I don’t know anything about whatever it is that you’re talking about,’’ said Wittman. ‘‘You have no jurisdiction over me. I’m a free, white male over twenty-one years of age, and I don’t recognize your authority to…’’

‘‘Understand one thing,’’ said Volont quietly. ‘‘We have jurisdiction. Never doubt that for a moment.’’ He looked at Wittman evenly. ‘‘We had it before, when we put you away for six months. Now you’re facing life at the state level, and thirty years at the federal level.’’ Wittman looked uncomfortable. ‘‘We mean it,’’ said Volont. ‘‘And you know we do.’’

‘‘I’m from Nation County,’’ I said, ‘‘like I said out at the farm. I’m here for one reason, and that’s to find out just who pulled the trigger on the newspaperman at the Stritch farm on the 24th day of June 1996.’’

‘‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’’

‘‘Sure you do,’’ I said. ‘‘It happened just before you ran out the back door with Gabe and into the cornfield. Just after you got the e-mail message from Bravo6 telling you to kill him.’’

Wittman, who I’d thought was pale anyway, went ghostly white on us and started to tremble. Volont gave me a very strange look. We hadn’t told him about Bravo6, I guess.

Wittman’s attorney, who’d been rather stunned by it all, saw the condition of his client and said, ‘‘Well, I think it’s about time we terminated this interview.’’

Wittman shook his head. ‘‘Just give me a second,’’ he said. ‘‘Just a second.’’

We did.

He apparently realized that his attorney wasn’t going to be of much use. ‘‘So, what?’’ he asked. ‘‘What charges can I get out of if I talk to you?’’

‘‘I can’t promise anything,’’ I said, truthfully. ‘‘All I can do is recommend to the prosecuting attorney.’’ That always sounds so weak. But it’s true. ‘‘I am saying this in front of your attorney.. . I will try to get you some benefit on the charges of conspiracy to commit murder, unless you’re the shooter. If you’re the shooter. I’ll recommend that you get the maximum sentence, no matter what you say now.’’

‘‘I have,’’ said Volont, ‘‘permission from the U.S. Attorney’s office to offer you basically what was offered you several years ago. You remember what that was?’’

‘‘Yes,’’ said Wittman.

‘‘And what was that?’’ asked his attorney.

‘‘Basically,’’ said Volont coolly, ‘‘we offer to cut seventyfive percent off his sentence. If he hesitates for more than an hour, he only gets fifty percent off. We have to wait till tomorrow, and he gets twenty-five percent off. After that, no deals at all.’’

‘‘I don’t know that that’s advisable,’’ said the attorney.

‘‘If you’d like a moment with your client,’’ said Volont, ‘‘I’m sure he’ll be glad to tell you that we have him by the balls on over fifty separate charges, each of which will earn him thirty years in federal prison.’’ He squinted at the attorney. ‘‘Not Club Fed time. We’ll put him in a maximum-security facility. Very hard time indeed.’’

‘‘True,’’ said Wittman. He was breathing rather hard and sweating profusely. I was beginning to worry about his health. ‘‘I’ve got no problem with either one of them,’’ he said to his attorney. ‘‘I’ve been here before. Not this serious… but here.’’

‘‘Well,’’ said his attorney, ‘‘you’re probably the best judge of that.’’

‘‘Could I,’’ said Wittman, ‘‘talk to this federal officer… alone?’’

Wittman’s attorney looked at Volont, for God’s sake, as if to see if that would be all right. My, clout does wonders on a good day. Volont just said, ‘‘I think that would be a good idea, if it’s all right with your attorney, of course.’’

An hour later, Volont and Wittman came out of the secure room, and Wittman and his attorney conferred. Volont looked at Hester and me and gave us a tight little smile. ‘‘Gabriel stuff. Don’t ask. But you’ll get what you want.’’

Within forty-five minutes we had a complete statement. Hester and I did the basic interview regarding the events at the Stritch farm.

For our case, this is what he said:

He and Gabe had infiltrated into the Stritch compound about 2A.M. Right past our people. I could believe that. Herman Stritch was a heavy investor in Gabe’s financial and belief system, and Gabe had promised that he’d be there if any of his supporters ever needed him.

Gabe was helping the Stritch family, and Wittman was there because their tactical doctrine required two men, and he also was really good with computers. (He’d been appalled at the security of the Stritch system, and had intended to fix things just before everything went to hell. I didn’t say a word.) Anyway, it turned out that Gabe was the one who wanted to speak to the press. He was the one who asked for only one person, and newspaper, not TV. He wanted to plead the case of the Stritch family and get himself a little publicity at the same time. Wittman was adamant that there had been no violence planned. And when the message came in from Bravo6 about the bomb, Wittman said, Gabe took one look, apparently saw the ‘‘bomb,’’ and shot twice. About two seconds apart. Using the Vaime Mk 2 we’d seen in the basement. He said that Gabe preferred full-power rounds, so the silencer wasn’t effective at all. He also said that Gabe had some of the 7.62 x 51 subsonic rounds with him as well, and had Wittman load those into the rifle when they got into the cornfield. During the flight from the house, Gabe had been carrying one of the H amp;K G3s. For suppressive fire. That made Hester and me both a little sweaty. It had never occurred to us that there could have been silenced rounds coming from the corn. Gave me the willies.

Wittman had also been with the troops in the woods on the 19th of June, but claimed that he had not fired the shots. I asked him what the training mission was all about, and was told that Volont would handle that. Man can piss me off, even when he’s not there.

I asked Wittman about Johnny Marks.

‘‘Who?’’

I explained, very thoroughly, just who Marks was.

‘‘So what does he have to do with me?’’

I explained that Marks had been murdered, and that we had been told by his killers that it was to atone for the killing of the officer in the woods. I omitted the gory details, just in case he might know something.

You get blank stares for lots of reasons. Boredom. Ignorance. Lack of interest. In this case, it seemed too grounded in utter and complete incomprehension.

‘‘I don’t understand,’’ he said, ‘‘why someone would do that.’’ Complete honesty, as far as I could read him. ‘‘Whoever he was.’’

Damn. There had to be a connection. There had to be. Didn’t there?

We told Volont we were done.

Volont sort of pulled down a ‘‘cone of silence,’’ and talked to Wittman for a while alone again. The attorney didn’t recommend that either, but Wittman said it would be all right.

While they were doing that, Hester and I called George and got him to put our names on the Vaime Mk 2. If there was any chance of a ballistic matchup…

It did occur to me that Gabe had been pretty smart having Wittman carry the murder weapon into the cornfield. Like, if we had managed to find them, who would have been holding the ‘‘smoking gun’’? It also occurred to me that Wittman could be lying, but I really didn’t think so. Not the way his nerves had been working him over. Regardless, we still had him on good charges. He was in knowing possession of a murder weapon. He had been present at a murder, and fled to conceal his identity. He had been a co-conspirator with Gabriel in infiltrating police lines and thereby arriving at the scene of the murder-to-be. In other words, a very active co-conspirator all the way around. The murder charge would still stick, so we had a good bargain. Most people think that just talking to the cops is what gets them time off. Not so. Talking in court, under oath, is what counts. We needed to maintain the health of our charges until that time.

Hester and I decided to get back out to the Wittman farm and get our suspect rifle. On the way out, she showed me just how different our perspectives could be.

Idly and as if she thought I was thinking the same thing, she asked, ‘‘How long do you think Wittman’s been working for Volont?’’

‘‘What?’’

‘‘I said, ‘How long do you think Wittman’s been snitching for Volont?’ ’’

‘‘I heard what you said. What the hell makes you think he’s working with him?’’

‘‘Oh,’’ she said, ‘‘it’s like when I was working dope. You see that kind of synergistic relationship develop sometimes. Between the doper and the cop who’s got him by the balls. Especially after a long time. They get to, well, sort of read each other.’’

I looked at her as she drove. ‘‘Then, you’re basing this on intuition or something, right?’’

‘‘Yep. Trust me.’’

‘‘I don’t think so…’’

‘‘At Stritch’s, you ducked, Houseman, as soon as you came around the building and saw me hit the dirt. Before you saw the man with the gun. Am I right?’’

‘‘Sure.’’

‘‘You trusted my intuition then, didn’t you?’’

‘‘Well,’’ I said, ‘‘it was more like trusting the fact that you wouldn’t get dirty unless your life was in danger.’’

‘‘Houseman…’’

‘‘Right. But, yeah, I did.’’

She grinned. ‘‘Don’t say I didn’t warn you.’’

We drove in silence for a few seconds.

‘‘Well,’’ I said, ‘‘it’s been a great day anyway. Everything just like clockwork.’’ I leaned back in the seat. ‘‘Yes, by God, just like a clock.’’

Hester winced.