Brian Freemantle - The Watchmen

“I’d like people to know how important you are.”

“No, mother. It’s better this way-the way the bank wants it.”

“I like going out for rides like this.”

“Then we’ll do it a lot,” Hollis said.

Ironically the exit Hollis took off the interstate to get back to Rensselaer was very close to the mobile home park in which Clarence Snelling lived.

Snelling said, “They’re not going to do anything about it, you know? They don’t understand the technology they’re relying on.”

“What are you going to do about it?” demanded his wife.

“Go to the police,” decided Snelling.

“What can they do?”

“Maybe they can frighten the bank into taking more action than they are so far.”

The helicopter flight gave Cowley the chance to review everything he’d ordered put into place, as case officer in total charge with absolute authority and responsibility. He felt quite confident about it, with none of the first-day unreality.

He might have misunderstood, but he hadn’t detected any of the usual resentment at federal authority interference from the local police chief, sheriff, or Highway Patrol commander to whom he’d spoken in turn, not even when he’d insisted the sealed-off area remain clear until the helicopter arrival of the forensic scientists and technicians from Washington, whom he’d alerted first because they had the farthest to travel. He had, though, accepted the police chiefs offer of scene-of-crime forensic and communication vehicles and the suggestion that a sports field on the outskirts of New Rochelle, reasonably close to the coast, would be the best place for their helicopters to land. And there hadn’t been any argument against his asking for an initial media blackout, although the police commander, Steven Barr, had warned that with so many agencies involved, it might already be too late. If it was they’d ensure no one got anywhere near the boat.

“The Eschevaux was one of eight cruisers reported stolen,” reminded Bradley, beside Cowley. “What if this isn’t the right one-just burned out by joy riders when they’d finished with it?”

“Better overkill than underkill,” said Cowley. “Joy riders are more likely simply to have abandoned it.”

Bradley nodded, persuaded. “So how much forensic will be left for the scientists to find?”

“Pray to whoever your God is,” suggested Cowley, who didn’t have one.

Steven Barr’s distorted voice came on to their headsets from the already in-place communications van, promising to ferry them from the sports field to the boat. Then came the voice of Terry Osnan, the FBI agent in charge at Albany, who’d actually been working the area and reached New Rochelle by road, asking what he should do. Cowley repeated that he wanted no one anywhere near the cruiser until it had been scientifically checked for tire tracks or footprints “or for anything that might be there.” He said, “Absolutely no contamination. If there’s anything left at all it’ll be forensic.”

“Will do,” assured the man, in a Southern accent.

“How many more of our guys are coming in by road?”

“Maybe five or six. And I’m told the owner’s on his way down from Norwalk. A lawyer named Bonwitt. Harry Bonwitt. Bringing an insurance assessor with him.”

“Who the hell told him?” Their information was that the Eschevaux was a fifty-two-foot Sea Ray that had disappeared from the biggest marina at the Norwalk inlet on Sunday night, after Bonwitt had returned from that day’s sailing.

“Marina people, I guess. When the check was made on the boat’s name.”

“If Bonwitt gets there before I do, tell him the boat has been seized as a federal exhibit. Same rules for them as everyone else. Nowhere near it.”

“He won’t,” intruded the pilot, linked to the conversation. “We’ll be there in five minutes.”

All the sports field nighttime lights were on, perfectly illuminating it as a landing area. There didn’t seem to be a lot of light from nearby houses. There was one helicopter, marked Highway Patrol, already droop-rotored like a sleeping insect. There were a lot of cars and three vans, mostly marked police vehicles, parked in perfect pattern on the perimeter. As they began to descend, the pilot of the inbound Washington machine patched into their circuit with an estimate of ten minutes from landing. A new voice came on insisting the area remain totally untrampled. Cowley said he knew and so did everyone within a hundred miles, and the voice said he hoped so.

The three local force commanders were waiting by an unmarked but antenna-haired communications van. All were in uniform. Steven Barr was tall, bespectacled, and spoke in a slow New England accent. John Sharpe, the sheriff, made a stark comparison, short and overweight, his belt sagging. Alan Petrich, the Highway Patrol chief, was overweight, too, and clearly asthmatic, wheezing his way through the introductions performed by Osnan, a sports-jacketed, angular-faced man.

To the three men Cowley said, “Thank you for what you’ve done.”

“Let’s hope it produces something,” said Barr, flat-voiced. “Bastards hit New York again and it goes off this time-and the wind’s in the right direction-we could be right in line.”

“You’re the one who went into the tower with the secretary-general, aren’t you?” said Sharpe admiringly. “What was it like?”

If there was a media leak he’d know who it came from, Cowley decided. “A mess. How many people walked around after the boat was found?”

“My patrolman, Wayne Mitchell,” said Petrich.

“No one else?” pressed Cowley hopefully.

“No.”

“What about the person who found it?” Bradley asked.

“Wasn’t found,” wheezed the man. “It was a phone in. Woman said she’d seen a flash fire and gave a location that didn’t check out. That’s why it took so long for us to find it.”

“We got a name for who phoned in?”

Petrich and the sheriff exchanged looks. “Phone got put down. Gal cheating on her husband, maybe.”

“Lot of that goes on in these woods,” said Sharpe.

“You run a numbers check!” demanded Cowley.

“Doing it,” said the man.

“The message recorded?”

The man extended his hand, cupping the cassette. “Every word that went between the caller and my dispatcher.” He smiled.

“The original?” Cowley demanded again.

“Didn’t think you’d want the rest.”

“A copy won’t be admissable in a federal court!” said Cowley, the anger burning through him. He kept his voice even. “I need the original. Can you arrange that now? I don’t want it overrecorded.” He didn’t respond to Bradley’s sideways look.

As the Highway Patrol commander disappeared inside the communications truck, Cowley told Osnan he wanted the man to become communications and evidence officer, handing him the copied cassette. The end of the conversation was almost drowned out by the noise of the descending Washington helicopter, a huge fore- and aftrotored Chinook. The baggage-laden scientists and technicians filed off with military precision, led by a tall and heavy black man who imperiously demanded Cowley by name, said his was Jefferson Jones and that he hoped to Christ everything had been left as is. Cowley decided that if the man had brought spare scene-of-crime coveralls, he wouldn’t be as constricted as he’d been going into the UN building in the protective space suit.

Most of the Washington group fit into a commandeered bus Cowley hadn’t seen until it approached the control center. He traveled with Jones, Bradley, and the three local men in a backup carrier, which in turn was followed by marked and unmarked police cars. It was abruptly dark out of the sports field illumination, with only isolated house lights along the streets. Cowley guessed it was a comparatively high-priced residential area. Jones said they intended to carry out the most detailed search possible on the immediate surrounding area and what was left of the boat itself but would probably bring in a Tarhe Sky Crane the following day to fly the wreck for laboratory stripping and examination in Washington.