The Rule of Nine

by Steve Martini

The FBI had taken Sarah out of the house that afternoon. She was fine. They were providing protection. They had a place for us, a kind of “safe house” near Balboa Park, until they could figure out some way to get the media heat off us. We didn’t have to accept his offer. It was up to us. We could go to a hotel, but there was no assurance that the press wouldn’t find us. It was clear Thorpe didn’t want us in front of the cameras. There was no telling what we might say.

  All I wanted was to see Sarah, hold her in my arms, and bury her head in my shoulder. We took him up on his offer. If we had to, we could make other arrangements later.

  It was the beginning of a long nightmare. Harry, Herman, and I spent weeks hiding out in an office tower in San Diego. We shared two condos near Balboa Park, Sarah and I in one, Harry and Herman in the other. When the FBI tried to gather some clothes and personal belongings for us from home, stories on the cable channels with film footage showed authorities presumably removing evidence from the residence. There was nothing Thorpe could do to set them straight without revealing that he knew where we were, and that there was a reason for hiding us.

  Work files from the office were shuttled by secretaries, driven by the FBI to the office across the bay. Local police ran cover in squad cars if the media tried to follow them.

  Sarah was unable to tell her friends where she was living. She couldn’t go anywhere without an FBI chauffeur.

  It became impossible for me to show my face in court without being questioned by print reporters on the courthouse beat. The two times I appeared in the courthouse, a near press riot erupted when word got out that I was there. The FBI decided it was not a good idea. I was forced to step away from a case that was scheduled for trial. When the judge threw a fit, the U.S. attorney’s office quietly went behind closed doors and got a continuance along with a substitution of counsel. The bottom line was I could no longer practice.

  Over time the details of the shootout unfolded, a little more each day. Other names surfaced, most of them foreign sounding, all perpetrators who were dead. Slowly, like leaves from a tree in autumn, the satellite trucks in front of our office began to thin out.

  The authorities made it clear that the investigation now centered on those who had planned the attack. To their knowledge there were no other active perpetrators. The shooters and those carrying out the plot had all been accounted for.

  In time the myth of the IED was unveiled. A news blackout was thrown over the contents of the truck, all part of the continuing investigation.

  Thorpe was worried that if he simply went to the press and told them right up front that Herman and I were not involved, it might look suspicious. A sharp reporter would wonder what we knew that might cause the FBI to carry water for us. So instead, Thorpe posed one of his undercover agents as a journalist during a news conference. After all the hot questions were asked and answered, the agent, with his notebook out, his pencil at the ready, prefaced his question by saying, “This is sort of ancient stuff, but as I recall, just after the scene was secured outside the base, didn’t you arrest a local lawyer and a private investigator? Can you tell us, were they involved in any way?”

  Thorpe mustered up his best toothy grin and said, “No. They were taken into custody and questioned, but they were cleared. They weren’t involved in any way. As I recall, they just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Then he pretended that he couldn’t remember our names, until one of his minions behind him whispered in his ear.

  “That’s right. As I recall, Mr. Madriani was the lawyer and I think Mr. Diggs was his investigator. They…no, as I remember, I think they just happened to be in the area talking to a witness who lived in the neighborhood regarding a totally unrelated matter. And they got pulled up in the net. It’s regrettable, but it happens. No, they were cleared long ago,” he told them.

  Thorpe watched as some of the reporters in the room jotted down notes. “Next question.”

  It took a full day for the gardener to clean up the mess in my front yard after the media horde pulled out. Crushed paper cups, cigarette butts, and discarded sandwich wrappers covered the lawn. Part of the top rail on the low fence separating the garden from the sidewalk was gone. The flower bed behind it was flattened and the shrubs around it trampled where the fourth estate had decided to blaze a new trail to the house.

  The office fared a little better, but only because the owners of the building hired security to keep the cameras and equipment out on the sidewalk. Miguel’s Cocina sold enough coffee and chips with guacamole that Harry was afraid they might frame us on other charges just to get the customers back.

  We’ve been back in the office now since early May, a couple of months. The first few days we noticed a black town car parked across the street in the same spot each day. The shadowed silhouette of two men could be seen in the front seat. Thorpe was probably trying to make sure that we weren’t inviting any journalists in for coffee. No doubt they were tailing us but it was hard to tell. After a while we noticed that the car was gone. Apparently the FBI was satisfied that Harry and I had developed a terminal aversion to publicity.

  We brought in a professional security service to check the office for electronic bugs, wires, and taps on our phones. Everything tested clean.

  The print press, always the first to find a story and the last to give it up, made a few calls to the office, mostly voice-mail messages that we never returned. One enterprising reporter tried to inspire a new angle with the rumor that we were preparing to sue the government for defamation and invasion of privacy. He wanted to know if it was true. Before Harry could warm to the idea, I shot a one-line e-mail back to the guy telling him, “No truth to the rumor and no further comment.” A lawyer unwilling to file a lawsuit; this seemed to kill the last vestige of the beast. Life had finally returned to normal.

  SIX

  Bart Snyder sat staring at the half-packed cardboard transfer box resting in the middle of his desk. One of his fleet of meaningless mementos was sticking out of the top like the prow of a sinking ship. The wall of respect behind his executive leather chair now stood stripped nude except for the patchwork quilt of nail holes and little brass hooks.

  It seemed that this was all Snyder had to show for forty years of labor in the trenches of the law. He had resigned his position as managing partner with Todd, Foster, and Williams, a firm with more than three hundred partners and associates and with offices in five cities. Snyder was waiting for the man who might be able to give him at least some clue as to why the stars, moon, and sun had caved in on him. Certainly the Washington Metropolitan Police were no help. They would call if they had any further information. That was three weeks ago, and Snyder hadn’t heard a word. Bart Snyder wanted to know who had killed his son, Jimmie, and why. And he wasn’t taking no for an answer.

  The phone rang on Snyder’s desk. He punched the com line on the speaker. “Yes.”

  “Your two o’clock is here,” said the receptionist.

  “Show him in.”

  A few seconds later the door to his office opened and a tall young man with dark, closely cropped hair wearing a blue serge suit with broad shoulders entered his office. He was carrying a light leather briefcase and all of the expression was in his eyes; he had a serious face that looked a lot like the actor Russell Crowe’s.

  “Mr. Snyder, I’m Special Agent Joseph Wallace.”

  Snyder got up from his chair. “Yes, of course, please come in. Can we offer you anything—coffee?”

  “No, thanks. Your secretary already offered.”

  “Please have a seat.”

  The agent took one of the client chairs on the other side of the desk and Snyder picked the half-packed box up and put it on the credenza behind him. “You have to excuse me. I’m in the process of moving to another office down the hall. I’m going to be taking some time off for a while.”

  “I understand,” said the agent. “First let me express my condolences and those of the entire bureau for the loss of your son. I know
it’s difficult, and I’m sorry for the intrusion at a time like this. But it’s necessary that we gather as much information as quickly as we can.”

  Snyder settled into his chair. “I understand. And I want to help in any way I can.”

  “Good,” said Wallace. He reached down and pulled a notepad out of his briefcase, then drew a pen from the inside coat pocket of his suit with the dexterity he probably used to draw a gun.

  Snyder couldn’t help but notice that the agent was probably no more than a few years older than Jimmie, but in terms of force of character and focus there was a galaxy of time between the two. It was a painful thing for Snyder to accept.

  “First let me say that some of my questions may be difficult for you, and I apologize for any pain they might cause, but they are necessary.”

  “Please, ask away.”

  “To your knowledge did your son ever use narcotics or any other form of illicit or illegal drugs?”

  “No!” Snyder said it emphatically, then leaned forward and planted both hands flat out on the desk as if to punctuate the point. “Jimmie never used drugs. I know that to be a fact.”

  “No pot, no pills?”

  “Nothing,” said Snyder.

  This was the conclusion the FBI was leaning toward as well, as the result of a thorough postmortem and interviews with most of James Snyder’s friends. The victim possessed no apparent history of drug use. For his first experiment in the recreational world of narcotics to be a full-blown hit of heroin was unlikely.

  The agent then covered the usual questions, whether Snyder knew anyone who might want to harm his son, and whether Jimmie had been depressed or may have wanted to hurt himself.

  “No. Jimmie was a good boy. He was never in any trouble, even when he was young. He was an easy child to raise,” said Snyder. “Sometimes a little too easy, if you know what I mean.”

  “No, why don’t you tell me?”

  “Well, there were times when I wished that he might have been a little more headstrong. You could say he was easygoing, but Jimmie never seemed to argue with anyone, over anything. He seemed to have very few personal boundaries that others couldn’t invade. You didn’t have to push him. All you had to do was touch him and he’d move in any direction you wanted. I’m not saying he was weak,” said Snyder. “Please understand. I know he had a solid sense of values, and I’m sure there were limits beyond which he would not go. But I have to say, I couldn’t tell you what they were.”

  “Except for the use of drugs?” said the agent.

  “Well, there you go. You’re right,” said Snyder. “There’s one right there. The things a father never sees.”

  “Did you know that your son was in some difficulty at work?”

  Snyder looked up at him. “No. What kind of trouble?”

  The agent told him about the breach of security, the fact that authorities were looking into it, and the discovery that James Snyder had been informed of this by a coworker, something the FBI turned up in their preliminary interviews.

  “Was it serious? I mean, was he going to lose his job?”

  “I don’t know,” said the agent. “But it’s one of the threads we’re checking out.”

  “Did it have anything to do with Jimmie’s death?” said Snyder.

  “We don’t know. As I said, we’re still investigating. There are a couple of other items,” said the agent. He reached into his briefcase and pulled out three glossy color photos, five-by-sevens. “I’d like you to take a look at these pictures and tell me if you recognize the other man walking next to your son.”

  The photos were freeze-frames from the surveillance video in the building the day James Snyder had violated security with an unidentified man.

  Bart Snyder looked at them closely. Two of the pictures showed his son in various strides walking with another man down a stark white hallway. There was nothing on the walls except a single sign over Jimmie’s shoulder in the distance in one of the shots. The other man looked as if he was late middle age, overweight, heavy jowled, and, from what Snyder could see, he possessed a fair-size gut hanging over his belt. He was perhaps an inch shorter than Jimmie and was wearing a baseball cap, so it was difficult to make out the features of his face in two of the pictures. The third shot looked like an enlargement taken earlier in the sequence, because the sign on the wall was larger and he could actually make out some of the lettering. When he read the few words that were visible, Snyder knew instantly where the pictures had been taken. He had often heard about it, but he’d never seen it. It was off-limits, like the holy of holies, one of those insider places in D.C. that the active set among the power elite talked about, like playing the back nine at Spyglass in Carmel. It had been in the news recently because the president wanted to use it. He didn’t have one like it. The picture showed only the head and shoulders of the man in the baseball cap. Here his face was a little clearer, but the angle of the shot was still bad, so the bill of the cap continued to obstruct a clear view of one eye and put a shadow across his face.

  “Have you ever seen that man before?” said the agent.

  Snyder started to shake his head.

  “Perhaps a friend of the family or a relative, someone your son might have known?”

  “He’s no relation. I know that.” Snyder studied the photographs a few seconds longer, then shook his head again. “I’ve never seen him before.”

  “You’re sure?” said the agent.

  “Yes.” He handed the pictures back to the agent.

  “Just one more thing,” said Wallace. “Do you know whether your son might have taken a trip recently to the area around San Diego in California?”

  Snyder thought about it, and then shook his head. “Not that I know of.”

  “Do you know whether he recently conferred with a lawyer regarding any legal matters?”

  “If he needed a lawyer, I assume he would have called me.”

  “I see. But you say he didn’t tell you about the problem at work, the security breach.”

  “No. Was it that serious?”

  “We don’t know. Did he ever mention a name to you, a lawyer named Paul Madriani?” asked Wallace.

  “How is that spelled?” said Snyder.

  The agent spelled the last name for him as Snyder wrote it down on a pad on his desk and looked at it. “It sounds a little familiar, but not off the top of my head. Do you know where he practices?”

  “The area around San Diego,” said the agent.

  “I see. Do you know what field of law?”

  “Did your son ever mention that name, Mr. Snyder, or could you have referred him to someone by that name?”

  “No,” said Snyder. “And I can’t recall my son ever mentioning him. What makes you think my son talked with this lawyer?”

  “I’m sorry, but I can’t discuss that.” Thorpe and the FBI were reasonably certain that Madriani’s business card had been planted on James Snyder’s body by whoever killed him. Still, they were crossing all the t’s and dotting all the i’s. There was always the long shot that Madriani wasn’t telling them everything he knew. He could be involved with whoever killed Snyder. Then again he could be hiding something that wasn’t necessarily criminal but which fell into the dark hole of lawyer/client confidence. It anyone knew, it was likely to be Snyder’s father, who as next of kin now stood in his son’s legal shoes. It looked like a dead end.

  “I think that’s everything, Mr. Snyder. I want to thank you.” The agent picked up the photographs and started to put them back in his briefcase.

  “I wonder if I could look at those one more time,” said Snyder.

  “Sure.”

  Wallace handed them to him and Snyder looked at the pictures one at a time, very closely, for almost a minute.

  “Jimmie had a lot of friends, people I didn’t know. It’s possible this man is somebody that Jimmie knew from right here in Chicago. If I could have a copy of these I could show them to some of his friends and see if anybody recognizes him. Would
that be possible?”

  “It’s possible,” said the agent. “At least for the time being. We’ve got copies. You can keep those, for now. You will call us if you get any information?”

  “Of course.”

  The agent gave Snyder a card with his name and phone number on it, thanked him for his time, and left.

  Snyder immediately turned to his computer and hit one of the icons on the desktop. The page popped up on the screen. Martindale-Hubbell is a directory of lawyers with detailed profiles by name, location, fields of practice, education, and experience, whatever you want to know. Snyder typed in the name Madriani and the location, San Diego, California. A few seconds later the computer coughed up a note indicating no hits. Snyder tried again, this time with only the name. This time he hit pay dirt. Paul Madriani’s office was located in Coronado, not San Diego, and his field of practice was criminal law.

  SEVEN

  He had used so many names over the years that it was hard to remember some of them. Whether he called himself Dean Belden, Harold McAvoy, James Regal, or cloaked himself in the persona of Warren Humphreys, the amiable lawyer from Santa Rosa, the people who hired him knew him by only one name, Thorn. There was no first name. Most of his clients couldn’t be sure if it was a surname or a code name. Thorn liked it that way. The less they knew the better.

  This morning he sat hunched over one of the hotel’s computers in an office just off the lobby of the Hostal Conde de Villanueva, a nineteenth-century mansion turned boutique hotel in Old Havana. Thorn had slipped the staff a few American dollars to use the computer for a few minutes. There was no Internet connection in his room and no Internet cafés that he knew of. He was busy scanning the online edition of the Washington Times for a news article someone told him was there. It was the perfect location, close to the States but beyond their governmental grasp. He could relax, send out e-mails, do some recruiting, and refine the plan with the confidence that no one was looking over his shoulder, at least not anyone who would care. Thorn had flown to Cuba from Mexico on a Canadian passport two days earlier.