by Fritz Galt
The silence was even more unnerving because Stickler and the other men wore blank expressions as they waited for him to speak. It would take hard work to extract information from an agency devoted to listening and saying nothing. But Jake was on a special mission from the Director of the FBI, and he would kick down whatever doors he needed.
He began. “I’m here because of a murder that took place in Virginia last week. The man who was murdered ran a company called Quantum, Inc.”
He looked around at the faces, but saw no sign of recognition.
“The witness to the crime is a young woman named Stacy Stefansson, who runs the A root server.”
This time, he detected some concern.
“The FBI is in the process of determining the identity and motive of the murderer. We believe that there might have been some sort of relationship between the victim and the witness, Ms. Stefansson, and we’re trying to find out what that was.”
“Why don’t you ask Ms. Stefansson?” Stickler asked.
“I did question her,” Jake said. “But she was not particularly forthcoming, and we can’t force her to talk.”
“Do you suspect someone is trying to compromise the A root server?” another man asked.
“Yes, we do. And that’s where we need your help. It turns out that Quantum is a Chinese-American-owned and -run firm. They provide the encryption software to access the A root server.”
Stickler turned to a man at the end of the table, a slightly built nerd with a pocket protector. “Do we have historical records of access to the server?”
The man looked taciturn, and his words confirmed his mood. “Maybe.”
Stickler turned back to Jake. “So we may be able to fill in information for you as to when the server is accessed and possibly from where.”
“I want that done immediately, if not sooner,” Jake said. He made a note in his notebook to follow up with them. He had to pursue all lines of investigation. “I want past and present usage of the A root server, and I want to be alerted if it’s accessed from within China.”
Stickler frowned. “Not China.”
“This is the internet,” Jake said. “Can’t you point to a particular computer or company in China that is directing attacks?”
“China is a black box,” Stickler said. “From where we sit, once computer information disappears into the black box, we have no idea where it goes. We only have limited ability to monitor internet traffic internally within China. And all that has to be covert. There is no public information on where the traffic originates, or where it ends up.”
“Can’t you tell from the IP addresses?”
“China has obscured all the addresses in several ways. For one thing, they don’t rely on one computer. They have many different servers grinding away. Then they re-address IP addresses at the portals, so that we don’t really know the real origin of a piece of information.”
“So their hackers could be anywhere in the world.”
“…and probably are,” Stickler said. “Furthermore, we don’t know if their hackers are working for the army, their intelligence service, some company, or criminal enterprises. Probably all of the above.”
“That should make my job easy,” Jake said with an ironic smile.
“Sorry we can’t be of more help.”
Jake appreciated that the NSA couldn’t look very far into China, but they could still review the historical record of hacks. “As we discussed, send me any information you can find on past A root server attacks. I’ll press Stacy Stefansson on what she knows.”
“Press?”
“I won’t go as far as torture, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Jake said with a smile. “But if there’s more to learn, I’ll learn it.”
Michael Epstein was ultimately responsible for investigating Stacy, but if Jake were in that position, he’d threaten to revoke her security clearance and find out what she knew about Chu.
At any rate, it was up to Jake to take action on the national security front. This roomful of brainiacs might have lots of information at their fingertips, but they had as much initiative as a lump of clay.
He thanked the NSA folks, and walked out of the building knowing he had to continue the investigation. So much information flowed around the world, yet China managed to hide behind its Great Firewall.
The U.S. military couldn’t attack it. The NSA couldn’t spy through it.
Jake had never been to China, but it couldn’t be such a mystery. After all, the FBI had a legal attaché in Beijing.
As Epstein had told him that morning, many of the programmers at Quantum were Chinese citizens. Assuming that the Chinese government was behind the intrusion, why would they be trying to break into the A root server? What, exactly, did they have against America, or the rest of the world anyway? China’s economy relied on open and prosperous markets for their goods.
The more he thought about Chu’s connection to the A root server, the more he began to wonder if it wasn’t a case of coincidence after all. Jake didn’t have to connect all the dots if the dots weren’t related. Just because two dots were close to each other at the moment a crime was committed didn’t infer a relationship.
He passed through the reception area and stepped outside.
“Your cell phone, sir,” Corporal Jones said, catching up with him.
Jake thanked him and took it. It felt cold and heavy. He had owned it for years, but suddenly it felt alien to him.
Maybe that was the impression all NSA employees felt when leaving their world of numbers and entering the world where they were the ones being monitored.
Chapter 15
Jake returned to his car and followed Corporal Jones off the base. He returned his badge and the two said good-bye.
“Hope you find out who committed the murder,” Jones said.
Jake was struck by the simplicity of the remark. Here Jake was looking for motives and international plots and coming up empty.
Maybe the FBI should return the murder case to the Arlington County police.
Before pulling out of Fort Meade, Jake drew to the curb to check his phone for messages.
There was a call from Bob Snow in Arlington. Jake called back immediately.
Bob was brief and to the point. “The FBI lab came back with fingerprint results.”
“From the crime scene?”
“From one of the weapons. The baseball bat.”
Jake remembered that the Arlington County police had sent all evidence to the FBI lab for analysis. At last they had a breakthrough. “Did the prints match files of any known criminal?”
“No. But get this. The fingerprints on the baseball bat and partial prints on the hunting knife matched the prints we have on file for an employee at the Department of Justice.”
Several cars whizzed past before Jake could reply. “The fingerprints were one of us? The police must have allowed the weapons to be contaminated.”
“Not possible.”
“Someone at the lab, then?”
“No, Jake.”
“So whose fingerprints are on the bat and knife?”
“He works in the Witness Protection Program.”
Jake was confused. The Witness Protection Program was run by the U.S. Marshals Service in the Department of Justice. How could a U.S. marshal have committed the crime? “You mean a witness or someone protecting a witness?”
“A deputy U.S. marshal working for the Witness Protection Program.”
That was odd. Why would a deputy marshal kill Chu? “Got a name?”
“The prints match those of a Simon Wu.”
“Wu? As in a Chinese name?”
“That’s what it looks like.”
A truck rushed past with a loud rumble. “Has anybody called Wu in for questioning?”
“Nobody knows about this but you, me and the lab.”
Jake stared at the long, straight road. Assuming that was Wu using the bat and knife at the crime scene, there were two Chinese men involved
, one killing the other in the presence of Stacy Stefansson. Why? To protect her? To prevent the other from passing secrets to her? In competition with each other for her?
He thought back to Stacy at their interview. She had described the assailant in great detail, but why did she say that he was “American-looking” and not mention that he was Asian?
Finally Jake had a name. Once he interrogated Simon Wu, he might have the killer and learn if he was behind hacking the A root server.
After fifteen years at the FBI, Jake knew many special agents, but only met a handful of deputy U.S. marshals.
“Who is this Simon Wu, anyway?” Jake said over the phone. “What was he doing with the Witness Protection Program?”
“Tread carefully,” Bob said. “You will need to go to the DOJ’s Inspector General if you turn this into an internal investigation.”
Jake knew the procedure if the Department of Justice needed to investigate their own. The only fallback for the nation’s premier investigating bureau was the IG office within the Justice Department that could look into illegal activities of DOJ employees.
“I hear you,” Jake said.
“Good luck, and keep Hoffkeit in the loop.”
Jake disconnected, and tried to imagine the perpetrator’s motive.
Was he part of a larger plot to take down the members of Quantum? If Wu did it, on whose orders was he acting?
Jake headed to his office to find out more about Simon Wu.
The Witness Protection Program was an important branch of the U.S. Marshals Service, the oldest law enforcement arm of the federal government. The program had various methods at their disposal to change people’s identities and set them up with new lives. Why would a deputy marshal kill someone? Who would he be protecting?
After arriving at his office, he nodded at Maria at the front desk.
“Don’t see you much these days,” she said.
“On the road, mostly. Oh.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out Stacy’s business card. He needed Stacy to identify the suspect. “Please call this person and tell her to be here for another interview this afternoon at five o’clock.”
“Sure thing.”
A quick computer search of the DOJ’s personnel files got Jake straight to an ID photo and bio of Simon Wu. Just as he suspected, he was looking at an Asian fellow.
Then he looked at the vital statistics. Simon Wu was lean and dark haired as Stacy described, but she had said that the assailant was tall, and Wu was not.
Wu was five feet five inches.
Jake switched programs to review the autopsy from the crime lab. The baseball bat had struck the victim’s forehead in a downward motion. Since Chu wasn’t a tall man, the assailant had to be short or on his knees to only reach the front of the victim’s skull with a bat. Simon Wu’s short stature fit the facts.
“Simon, Simon,” he muttered at the picture of the suspect. “Why did you do it?”
He clicked the Print button and printed out Wu’s photo. Then he went to a computer program that printed out nine random shots of males in the same age range with dark hair.
Jake would ask Stacy if she saw the suspect in the stack of photos.
Would she pick Wu?
Chapter 16
Jake stood at his office window as a gray Jeep pulled off the street and circled the building to the parking lot. He turned to Bob. “She’s right on time.”
Was Stacy going to finger Wu as the murderer? Maybe he should have asked more probing or relevant questions during his first interrogation, but he had had no reason to doubt her. Now her description of the suspect didn’t fit the facts. For example, she had called him “tall,” and failed to mention his Asian features.
“This will be interesting,” Bob said.
Jake needed Bob there to verify Stacy’s selection of a mug shot. A grand jury would not accept only one observer at a line-up. Jake had the paperwork ready for Bob to sign once Stacy made the identification they were sure she would.
She arrived wearing a white business suit with wide shoulders, a sky blue blouse and a nice necklace and bracelet.
He shook her hand. This time, her hands were warm and she gave a friendly smile.
“Sorry to hold up traffic on the A root server,” he said.
“Things can wait. I keep a scheduled maintenance routine, and this is down time.”
“Interesting.”
Jake turned to introduce his boss. Bob was impassive and reserved, all business.
Before laying out the photographs, Jake needed to explain the procedure.
“We called you in this afternoon to see if you can assist us in identifying the assailant you saw during the murder last Friday. I’d like you to carefully review ten photos of possible suspects and tell me if you see the person who you saw committing the crime. Are you prepared for this?”
She pulled her frizzy blonde hair behind her ears and took a deep breath. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
Jake shuffled the ten photos and laid them on the edge of his desk.
She didn’t look at the entire group at once. She took her time and reviewed from left to right.
Simon Wu was number seven.
She looked at each photo carefully. She paused to pick up the fourth and studied it closely.
This worried Jake. It was a randomly selected photograph from the general public. Maybe she hadn’t gotten a good enough look at the assailant to recognize him.
Then she set number four back in its place and continued her systematic review. She passed smoothly over faces five and six and stopped at number seven.
Would she finger Simon Wu?
She stared at Wu’s photo for a long time. She looked at it almost critically, then passed on to the next one.
That momentary hesitation said a lot. But Jake was trained not to react, and watched her continue.
When she finished reviewing the ten photographs, she leaned back in her chair and looked at Jake evenly.
“He’s not here,” she said.
“What?”
“I don’t see the suspect in any of these photos. I would recognize him, but he isn’t here.”
“You’re sure?”
She looked completely poised and unflappable.
What was the next step? A lie detector?
Jake glanced at Bob, who shrugged and put a hand on the doorknob, ready to leave.
Jake turned to Stacy. “Thank you for coming in. We may have to call you again.”
She gave him a wry smile. “Don’t worry,” she said. “You’ll find your man.”
He wanted to tell her she was lying, but knew he shouldn’t.
“Before you leave, will you please review the photos one more time?” he asked.
She blinked, but complied.
Once again, she worked her way from left to right. This time she didn’t pause to study number four. She glided smoothly over each picture, her large blue eyes lingering on each man’s face long enough to do it justice.
She passed more quickly over Simon Wu.
She finished and looked up at Jake with a troubled expression. “You know,” she said at last, “this isn’t easy for me. The more I look at these pictures, the more I relive that awful moment. It was so cruel, and the man was so helpless.”
She sat limp in her chair. It seemed that she had ample emotional reason to want to find the culprit. Maybe he shouldn’t question her truthfulness.
He cleared his throat to bring her back from that vivid memory. “What if it turns out that one of these men did, in fact, commit the crime?”
“I wouldn’t be able to confirm it in a court of law,” she said. “I didn’t see any of these people attack him. I can tell you that for a fact.”
It occurred to Jake that she might be extra careful not to accuse someone if there was a shadow of a doubt.
“Remember,” he said, “this isn’t a court of law. This is a preliminary investigation. If you were only partially sure, say fifty percent, would you ch
oose one of these pictures?”
He hoped she would turn to Wu’s photo, but Bob interrupted the process. “I’m sorry, but we’ll have to stop at this point.”
Jake could kick himself. He had overstepped the bounds and was clearly leading the witness.
His face burning, Jake gathered up the photos and turned them upside down on the table.
Stacy didn’t seem ready to leave. “You want to solve this crime, don’t you?”
He nodded, but was unwilling to express his disappointment. It might have been his first big break in the case, and it produced nothing.
“Listen,” she said, her voice soft, her eyes on the stack of photos. “How about we go out for a quiet dinner and talk this over under less stressful conditions?”
“Sure,” Bob said.
Jake looked up.
Stacy wasn’t talking to Bob.
“I mean you, Jake,” she said.
Jake gave Bob an apologetic smile. His boss gave a disappointed twist of the lips and slipped out of the room.
That left Jake staring at the woman who he believed held the key to his investigation. Maybe the mug shots and office setting had put too much pressure on her. Maybe some subtle details might emerge over dinner.
She stared at him boldly and steadily. Her offer had been serious.
“You sure your boyfriend wouldn’t mind?” he asked.
She gave him a quizzical look that made him instantly regret his implication that one, she was even considering this a date, and two, even capable of cheating on a boyfriend.
“That,” he said, “came out kind of wrong.”
“What makes you think I have a boyfriend?” she asked.
“I…I.” He didn’t want to tell her how he had spied on her. At least he hadn’t read her Facebook posts. “Just a guess,” he said, neatly avoiding an outright lie.
Of course she might be lying, too.
This was one crazy way to continue.
“You look too pretty and successful not to have a boyfriend,” he said.
That was not a lie.
She smiled. “Come on.” She tossed her head toward the office door and stood up to leave. “I’ll drive.”