Cold Glory

by B. Kent Anderson

  Graves circled the Town Car. Pickett had left the driver’s door open. He felt the underside of the seat, then ran his hand along and under the instrument panel. He repeated the action on the opposite side, then for the backseats. Graves popped the trunk and inspected the spare tire storage area.

  He leaned farther into the trunk, his hand closing on the phone in his suit pocket. He made a show of pulling up the carpet in the trunk and running his hands all along the spare tire compartment. In one smooth motion, he pulled the phone out of his pocket, holding it flat against his palm. He wedged it alongside the Town Car’s wheel well, directly behind the gas tank. He replaced the carpet and smoothed it out.

  When he straightened, his heart was pounding. Graves brushed his upper lip. Pickett and Thornton were headed back toward him. He would have to check the duty roster—he wanted to know which of them, or of the remaining members of the detail, would be assigned to Chief Justice Darlington tomorrow morning.

  Casualties of war, the Judge had said.

  A hell of a different kind of war, Graves thought. The politicians talked a lot about wars on poverty or drugs or terror, and not much ever changed. Graves no longer had the same fire for the cause as he’d had twenty years ago. Until recently, the Glory Warriors had even become a bit of an abstraction to him. The “Washingtons” gathered from time to time and talked in sweeping tones about what they would do when the time finally came, and then they all went back to work and lived their everyday lives. The nation’s problems were attacked from the right or the left, and still nothing was accomplished.

  Graves had no illusions about Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant and their grand secret agreement the Judge had talked of for so long. Graves was just weary of stupidity and ineptitude. He wasn’t even gripped by the “patriotic” fervor of so many of the other Glory Warriors, who professed to be disgusted by how the nation was viewed from both within and without and wanted to “take back their country,” whatever that meant. Graves was a practical man, not an ideologue. He just wanted to make things work, and they hadn’t worked for a long time.

  But first, he had to get through tomorrow, the first time his two worlds—the one he lived in the shadows and the “real” one, though after this many years, it was hard to say which was which—would meet, with thunderous results.

  Graves swallowed, trying not to think about Thornton and Pickett and Hagy and Crowson and Gill and all the other members of the Judicial Security Division, the people whose faces he saw every day.

  Casualties of war.

  “Looks good,” he said. “You know me, though. I have to double-check for myself, control freak that I am.”

  Pickett and Thornton smiled. They knew their boss, after all.

  “All right,” Graves said. “Put it in service, and sign the current car back in. I’m headed to the office.”

  He walked back to his own car, and Washington Two made himself stop thinking about his Marshals Service subordinates. He couldn’t afford to be distracted now.

  CHAPTER

  22

  When he turned onto his street, Journey immediately saw the two cars: one was a silver four-door, something generic like a Toyota or Honda, the other a green VW Beetle, one of the new ones. Both cars sat in front of his house.

  As he approached the house, he saw the three figures in the yard. Two were men in dark suits, white shirts, nondescript ties. Sandra stood with them, talking and gesturing with both hands.

  Journey pulled into the driveway, cut the ignition, and sat for a moment while the engine ticked. He reached over the seat, unbuckled Andrew’s safety belt, and motioned at the boy to open his car door. By the time Journey was out of the car, Sandra was striding toward him.

  “Nick, these men are from the government,” she said. “They were here when I drove up.”

  “It’s about time.”

  Both men were of indistinct middle age, well built but clearly not gym freaks, white. One wore round silver glasses. They both produced ID cases. The one with the glasses spoke first. “Mr. Journey, I’m Special Agent Winters, FBI, Oklahoma City field office.”

  The other man nodded. “Senior Inspector Hendrickson of the Judicial Security Division, U.S. Marshals Service, Washington. We’d like to talk to you for a few minutes, sir.”

  “Judicial security.” He met Hendrickson’s eyes.

  “Let’s talk inside, if we may, sir.”

  “What about this Tolman woman?”

  “Could we please go inside, Mr. Journey?”

  Throughout the exchange, Sandra watched all three with a critical eye. She lagged behind as the three men started for the house. “Come on in, Sandra.”

  Special Agent Winters looked uncomfortable.

  “Dr. Kelly is aware of everything that I know,” Journey said. “She should hear whatever you have to say.”

  Hendrickson made a lead the way gesture with his hand. Andrew hummed. Inside, Journey tossed his keys onto his desk and said, “Just a moment, gentlemen.” He quickly took Andrew to the bathroom and changed him, then took the boy to his bedroom and turned on his music. In another minute, Andrew was whistling.

  When he returned to the living room, Sandra was sitting in the armchair. The two government men were still standing. “Sit down,” Journey said, and motioned them to the couch. “You’re here investigating a threat against the chief justice.”

  Hendrickson nodded. “A threat assessment was convened last night based on your phone call to Meg Tolman at the Research and Investigations Office. I’m here to determine whether the threat merits further investigation.”

  Journey nodded. He unzipped his backpack, withdrew the plastic sleeve, and handed it to Hendrickson. “Here’s the original document. Under the circumstances, I think the Oklahoma Historical Society will understand if I surrender custody of it to you.”

  Hendrickson looked at the page for a couple of seconds, then at Journey. “Tell us what happened, please.”

  Journey told them all of it, starting with the Fort Washita discovery, the attack at the college, the dead man, the Glory Warriors, ending with the assassination of the Speaker of the House. Winters and Hendrickson listened without interrupting. Winters looked at the paper occasionally, taking off his glasses and tapping them against his knee. The motion reminded Journey of Andrew with his straw.

  When he finished, they were all silent for a few moments. Sandra was in the chair, hands steepled in front of her face, fingertips to her lips. She met Journey’s eyes with a What more can you do? look.

  “You believe the shooting of Speaker Vandermeer is related to a threat against the chief justice,” Winters said. It was a statement, not a question.

  “Read the wording,” Journey said. “Ultimately, they’ll go after the president.”

  “What is their reasoning?”

  “I’ve told you all I know. My guess is that they’re preparing for some kind of power grab based on this.” Journey pointed at the page in Winters’s lap.

  “A power grab,” Hendrickson said.

  “You’re aware,” Winters said, “that the prevailing theory at the moment is that Speaker Vandermeer’s death was an act of random violence. There’s no evidence of an organized group. Believe me, the Bureau is investigating every possibility, but ordinarily there would be some claim of responsibility, and there’s been no credible claim so far.”

  “You say there’s more to this document?” Hendrickson said.

  “Yes. I mean, I think there has to be. This page alone doesn’t make clear what their goals are. It just lays out the circumstances.”

  “And you believe this document was signed by Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant in 1865?”

  “At Appomattox, yes.”

  “And it’s your contention that the group you’re calling the Glory Warriors is using this as a rationale to conduct assassinations today?”

  Journey raised his hands and let them drop back to his lap.

  “Surely you don’t believe in coincidences,�
�� Sandra said.

  Everyone looked at her.

  “This document comes to light,” she said, “with the first ‘provision’ on its list being the assassination of the Speaker of the House, and then Vandermeer is killed.”

  “Ms. Kelly…,” Winters said.

  “It’s Dr. Kelly, thank you.”

  “Dr. Kelly, this paper says nothing about assassination. It says ‘removal is accomplished by conspiratorial means.’”

  “What exactly do you think that is?” Sandra said, leaning forward. “It’s not talking about elections and Senate confirmation hearings, is it?”

  Winters was silent, then handed the page to Hendrickson.

  Journey looked at both of them. “I sound like a conspiracy nut.”

  No one spoke.

  “Don’t patronize me,” Journey said. “You think I’m crazy. Go ahead, run your background check on me, if you haven’t already. You won’t find any kind of extremism there. I’m an academic, a scholar, a father. I’m not an anti-government nut, and I’m not a radical. My politics are dead center.”

  Hendrickson rattled the paper, tracing a finger along it. “What’s this business at the bottom? The Poet’s Penn and waters falling. What do you make of that?”

  “I think…,” Journey said, then stopped.

  “Yes?”

  “I think it’s meant to lead to the rest of the pages.”

  “Like a clue,” Winters said. With effort, a small smile worked its way onto his face.

  “Something like that.”

  “Sort of like a puzzle,” the FBI agent said. “Like The Da Vinci Code?”

  Journey felt his temperature rising. He looked at the two men, then at Sandra. He remembered her words on the phone—“I think I’ve found the Poet’s Penn.” Her green eyes found his again.

  They don’t believe it, the look said. They’re going through the motions. They won’t believe anything you tell them.

  Journey dropped the gaze after looking into Sandra’s eyes for a long moment. He turned back toward the couch. “You gentlemen are familiar with the Oklahoma City bombing, aren’t you?”

  Both men nodded.

  “Do you remember the man in Arizona, the one who was a friend of McVeigh’s? McVeigh told him what he was going to do. He didn’t believe it, so he didn’t tell anyone. The FBI found him later, and he was convicted of knowing about the plot but not telling anyone about it.”

  “What’s your point?” Winters said. The smile was gone, the voice hard.

  Journey pointed at the paper. “I’ve tried to do my duty, to let the proper authorities know about what I think is a real threat. What more can I do, if you choose not to believe me?”

  “No one said we didn’t believe you,” Hendrickson said. “As a matter of fact, we’ve increased security on Chief Justice Darlington’s detail. We take threats very seriously.”

  “Some more than others.”

  “Yes.”

  The two government men stood. “We’ll see what the investigation turns up,” Winters said.

  Journey watched them leave, watched the silver four-door pull away from his house. Sandra stood beside him at the door. “They think I’m insane,” Journey said. “Granted, it sounds that way.”

  “You gave them the page. It’s out of your hands now.”

  Journey turned to face her. She was so close, he could feel her breath. “I made a copy,” he said. “But if I were them, I wouldn’t buy it, either.” He shook his head and backed away from the door.

  * * *

  In the car, Special Agent Winters drove, passing back through Carpenter Center to Highway 70, where he turned toward Madill. “You came a long way for this,” he said.

  “Tell me about it,” Hendrickson said. “And I’ll get on a plane and be back in D.C. tonight.”

  Two and a half hours later, they were in the FBI’s Oklahoma City field office, in a new modern complex along Memorial Road in the far north part of the city. Winters let Hendrickson use a spare computer, and the JSD man logged in to the Department of Justice database. He got no hits for “Glory Warriors” in the extensive files on terrorist cells or domestic extremist groups. In fact, there was no reference to the name in any of the DOJ databases at all.

  After an hour on the computer, Hendrickson gave up and called D.C. “We met with Nick Journey,” he said. “He spun a pretty good historical tale, but in the end, there’s no evidence to support the existence of any kind of organized plot against the chief justice, and nothing tying her to Vandermeer. There’s nothing anywhere in the database to indicate the existence of the group Journey talked about. I think the guy is wrapped up in his history, and is attaching a lot more importance to this old document than he should.”

  “Did he give you the document?” said the voice from Washington.

  “It’s in my hand now.”

  “Bring it. Write your report and we’ll add it to the file; then the file will be closed.”

  “Maybe this one should have stayed with RIO,” Hendrickson said.

  “They had to bring it to us, though. You know they did.”

  “Yeah. You going to keep the extra people on the chief?”

  “Just through the night, I think, to be on the safe side. Come on home, and be sure to fill out your travel paperwork.”

  “Will do,” Hendrickson said.

  “We had to check it out,” said Senior Inspector Brent Graves. “At least we can say we did our job.”

  CHAPTER

  23

  Sandra watched the two agents drive away while Journey checked on Andrew. When he returned to the living room, Sandra said, “They didn’t buy a single word of it. I have a lot of cops in my family. I have one cousin who used to be a deputy U.S. marshal, one in Customs, and lots of others who are city police. I know a lot of cops, and I’m telling you, these two didn’t get it and they think this is just another stupid conspiracy theory, and they’re not going to do a damn thing about it.”

  Journey looked up at her sudden vehemence. Something kicked at the back of his mind. “Sandra … why are you here?”

  She turned her head halfway, as if the question had caught her off guard. She tucked a strand of red hair behind her ear. “What do you mean? You asked me to meet you here.”

  Journey made an all-encompassing gesture. “No, I don’t just mean right now, this minute. I mean all this. You don’t need to be part of it. Don’t you have a class?”

  “I had class this morning. I’m just trying to help.”

  “Why? I mean…” Journey went quiet for a moment—he couldn’t quite grasp the thoughts tumbling through him. “You don’t have to help me.”

  Sandra’s eyes—those intense, burning green eyes—bore into his. “I can’t just go home and forget about it now. Like I said—”

  “I know, you’re just trying to help. I saw the book on your desk.”

  “The book…” Sandra’s voice trailed away.

  “The one on autism.”

  “Oh. I don’t know that much about it, so I thought I’d do a little research. Being around Andrew a little bit has made me … curious.” She cleared her throat. “That sounds lame, doesn’t it?”

  “You don’t have to do anything for me. I appreciate it, but you don’t have to.”

  Sandra took a step forward. “I think you’re not used to anyone offering to help you with anything. And I’m not just talking about this whole thing with the treaty and Vandermeer.”

  Journey said nothing.

  “I never met your wife,” Sandra said. “She was gone before I started here. But some of the other people in the department have told me she was—”

  Journey looked up at her. “Say it.”

  “That she couldn’t deal with Andrew. That she sort of signed out where he was concerned.”

  Journey was silent.

  “You know, people respect you,” Sandra said. “For doing what you do with him.”

  “Well, they shouldn’t,” Journey said. “He’s my s
on. It’s my job.”

  “I know that. Everyone knows that. Believe it or not, accepting a little help from someone doesn’t make you a lesser man or a lesser father. Look, I really don’t have any expectations, Nick. You trusted me with the document. I know that was a big deal for you. I can help you a little.”

  Journey looked up at her. In the other room, Andrew hooted. Finally he dropped his eyes from Sandra’s. “These two cops … I wonder what happened to the other one, this woman who e-mailed me asking for information. The one I called. Why wasn’t she part of this?”

  “If it was perceived to be an actual threat against Justice Darlington, they’d have to hand it off. The FBI investigates threats, the Marshals Service provides security.”

  Journey looked at her.

  “I told you. Cops galore in my family. I hear a lot of this kind of thing.”

  “Maybe I am losing it, and maybe there isn’t any threat against the chief justice. But something is going on.” He went on to tell her what he’d learned about the Glory Warriors, and about his encounter with the two men on the highway.

  “And you faced them down, just like that?” Sandra said when he’d finished.

  “Brave or stupid, do you think?”

  “Maybe a little of both.” They shared tight smiles. “What were you thinking?”

  Journey hesitated. “They were just sitting there, pretty as you please, not even trying to conceal themselves. I called them on it. I’m not going to hide from them.”

  “Nick, these are the kind of people who shoot at you. They shot at you. You can’t just walk up to people like that and have a reasonable conversation with them.”

  Journey shrugged. “What was I supposed to do?”

  “I don’t know, but marching up to them and getting in their faces a few days after what happened to you would not be high on my list.”