Trigger City (9 page)

M
y Para-Ordnance was snug
in its Kramer holster but the horsehide was not on my hip. I held it out in front of me, away from my body. Held it butt forward with the barrel facing my chest, placed it on the counter. I'd had another flashback episode at 4:00
A.M
. and hadn't been able to get back to sleep after, so I was a bit fuzzy this morning and compensated with a pot of strong black coffee. As a result I was now both fuzzy and jittery and didn't want to take any chances. A quick reveal of your gun is never a winning plan when facing armed guards with shoot-to-kill authority.

The guards in the security hut seemed to appreciate my careful approach and managed not to shoot me. The younger one even smiled and the older one called me
sir.
I gave him my ID and told him that I had an appointment with Special Agent Holborn. He checked my name on a list and called up to the main building. I emptied all the metal from my pockets and took off my diving watch and sunglasses and put everything in a little plastic tray. Took off my jacket, shoes, and belt and put them on the X-ray conveyor and walked through the metal detector. The younger guard held an electronic wand at the
ready but the metal detector didn't beep so all he got to do is stand there and smile at me some more. The older guard put my gun in a locker and gave me a claim check and returned my ID and asked me if I needed a shoehorn.

They seemed friendly enough.

A third armed guard arrived and escorted me from the security hut to the main building. Along the way, we passed an American flag and a City of Chicago flag and the FBI's own flag, just in case we became confused about our exact location. We passed through glass doors and entered the bright lobby of the new FBI Chicago Division Headquarters, where some more American flags and a big FBI seal left nothing to chance. A fourth armed security guard stood just inside the doors.

“How ya doin'?” I said.

“Please check in at reception, sir.”

The guard who'd escorted me from the security hut took his position by the interior door and stood at parade rest. I approached the reception counter, where a young woman sat behind thick bulletproof glass. She had lots of curly hair and a full figure and a face that you'd expect to see in an ad for some beauty soap that boasts of its purity. I didn't know her name but I'd checked in with her a few times before and we nodded mutual recognition to each other. I put my driver's license on the counter, slid it under the glass.

“Two tickets for the 7:30 showing of
The Maltese Falcon,
please,” I said.

She gave me a bigger smile than I'd earned. “Welcome back, Shamus.”

I played along, “How's tricks, G-Girl?”

“That's ‘G-Woman.'”

“I'll remember for next time.”

She winked at me and said, “See that you do,” then dropped the flirtation and checked my driver's license and nodded toward the seating area. “Special Agent Holborn will be down to see you.” She slid my license back under the glass.

A couple minutes later the inner office doors opened and Special Agent Holborn walked my way. He wore black wingtips and a dark blue suit.

There are dark blue suits and then there are
dark blue suits,
and his was decidedly not off-the-rack. But Holborn wasn't on the take; he just spent a larger portion of his income on clothing than do most FBI agents. A lifelong bachelor with no kids, he could afford to look good.

I stood and held out my hand. Holborn took my hand and said, “Don't get up,” and guided me back down on the couch and sat beside me. “What's up?”

“Maybe we should talk in your office,” I said, “for privacy.” Truth was, I felt slighted that he hadn't invited me in.

“I'm busy, Ray. You want my attention, tell me something.”

I considered what would best get his attention. I said, “Is Jia Lun a spy for China's MSS?”

“I said
tell
me something. That was a question.”

“Yeah, it was,” I said. “Don't you want to know why I'm asking it?” I smiled at him and waited. When the silence became heavy, I added, “That was another question, by the way.”

Holborn shot me a look. “I really don't have time for this.” He glanced at his watch, sighed, stood up. “All right, come with me.”

We passed through the inner doors and walked down a long hallway, past a granite display with photos honoring FBI agents who had fallen in the line of duty, and arrived at a bank of elevators. Holborn called the elevator and we got in and he punched a button and the doors closed and the elevator began to rise.

“Visitors are not normally allowed past the first floor,” said Holborn. That was as close to an apology as I was going to get and I decided to acknowledge it.

“Well, thanks for seeing me,” I said.

It seemed to me that Holborn still spent far too much of his energy keeping me in my place. But even if I didn't tremble at the sight of his badge, I'd always played ball when it counted and I'd
even gift-wrapped the largest public corruption case of his career for him.

At least that's how I saw it—he might tell it differently. He'd probably say that I'd repeatedly held out information and broken more laws than there are commandments and shared evidence with the press that should've gone straight to the feds.

And we'd both be telling the truth.

I'd brought him another slam dunk just a couple of months ago when a woman tried to hire me to kill her abusive husband. That case had ended badly for me—and worse for the woman—but it was another gift-wrapped feather for Holborn's career cap. So I thought I'd done more than enough to merit a little respect.

We got off the elevator and walked down a narrow hallway. Framed photos of all the Chicago Division's honchos covered the wall, including the nation's first female special agent in charge. The current SAC was a handsome guy who looked like a movie star. Maybe George Clooney would play him on the big screen. Fifteen years ago, Treat Williams.

Holborn opened a door and led me into a long boardroom, closed the door behind us. We sat in two of the thousand leather chairs that surrounded an impressive table, its wood-inlay surface polished to a high shine. There was a six-foot flat-panel LCD screen on the end wall. Yet another American flag stood on one side of the screen. On the other side, a metal easel holding a giant pad of paper. The top sheet was blank.

I counted the chairs. There were twenty-two.

“Big room…we having company?” I said.

“My office, as you so generously called it, is a cubicle.”

“Didn't mean anything by it,” I said.

“Tell me what you heard about Jia Lun, and what you think it has to do with us.”

So I told my story, including the scrubbing of Hawk River from the Joan Richmond murder file, but leaving out my conversation with Mike Angelo as I had with Terry. I also left out Tim Dellitt and Ernie
Banks, but I told him Blake Sten's story about Steven Zhang and Jia Lun and the FBI. Holborn took notes as I talked.

“And since you brought me up here,” I concluded, “I assume that Jia Lun is in fact a Chinese agent.”

“He is,” said Holborn. “But that's an open secret, widely known throughout the intel community. So this Blake Sten of yours may or may not be selling you a line.”

“Did he bring Zhang to you guys?”

“How would I know?” Holborn blew out a long breath. “You really don't have a clue how we work around here, do you?”

“You've never been the talkative one in our relationship, Agent Holborn.”

“Watch it,” he said with a glare that would make a lesser detective flinch.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Then I realized how he'd taken it. “Christ,” I said, “do you hear a gay joke in everything I say?”

Holborn watched me closely for a second, nodded away the misunderstanding. “All right,” he said. “You remember Hanssen?”

“Sure.”

It was a famous story. The son of a Chicago cop, Robert Hanssen studied dentistry at Northwestern, but switched to an MBA. After graduation he went to work as an investigator in the CPD Internal Affairs Division, which probably didn't thrill his dad a whole lot. In 1976, Hanssen left CPD and joined the FBI. Within three years, he was assigned to Soviet counterintelligence. And unbeknownst to everyone, he became a spy for the Soviet Union.

Over the next two decades, Hanssen rose through the FBI ranks and did a lot of damage to the country. At one point, he was even tasked with finding the Soviet mole within the FBI. They actually put the mole in charge of the investigation that was supposed to catch the mole. He went straight for a few years after the breakup of the Soviet Union, then started selling secrets to the new Russian secret police, the FSB.

He wasn't found out until 2001. When they finally arrested him, he didn't howl or cry or protest his innocence.

He just said: “What took you so long?”

The Robert Hanssen story is right out of a John le Carré novel and it would take me an hour to scratch the surface. It is one of the most fascinating episodes in the history of the FBI.

Also the Bureau's biggest black eye, post-Hoover. At least, that we know about.

Holborn said, “In the wake of Hanssen, new operating procedures were implemented. The policy is called SCIFS, which stands for…Secret, Compartmentalized, Information…” He stopped and thought, smiled at himself. “Huh, can't remember the rest. Secret Compartmentalized Information…
F
…
S
.” He shrugged. “Nope. It's not there. Anyway, what it means is, now we work on a need-to-know basis.”

“That's gotta leave you guys pretty hamstrung.”

“It's an imperfect world,” said Holborn. “Anyway, we all work terrorism because that's the Bureau's main focus since 9/11, but otherwise it's strictly need to know. I don't work under the China desk, so I don't need to know.”

“But I've just given you a need,” I said. “If Hawk River engineered Joan Richmond's death to keep her from testifying to Congress…I'd think the FBI might take an interest in that. Or am I missing something.”

“Sure we would,” Holborn said, “but all you've offered is wild speculation. Looks to me like you're trying to get the Bureau to do your fishing for you.”

He wasn't completely wrong. “How about this…I'll keep working it from my angle and see where it leads. And if it leads somewhere, I'll bring it to you. But in the meantime you could talk to your China guys, explain your need to know, find out if Sten was telling the truth.” I reached inside my jacket and withdrew copies of the Steven Zhang and Blake Sten photos, put them on the shiny table.

Holborn picked up the photo of Blake Sten and his eyebrows danced. He didn't mention the burn scar or the weightlifter's neck. He
didn't have to. “And if this Sten character was lying about bringing it to us, then what?”

“The photo of Zhang and Jia Lun could've been Photoshopped, but it didn't look like it. So let's assume for the moment that Zhang met with a Chinese MSS case officer. If Sten didn't bring it to the FBI, maybe he used it as leverage against Zhang…”

“Blackmailed him into killing the Richmond woman.”

“That's what I'm thinking. Maybe. I don't know enough yet. Knowing if Sten brought it to you guys would be a big help.”

Holborn gestured to the photos. “I can keep these?”

“Be my guest.”

He put the photos between the pages of his notebook and stood up. We walked in silence to the elevators and rode down to the ground floor and walked out to the lobby.

“Okay,” he said, “I'll ask. But I won't tell you what I learn.”

“Agent Holborn…”

“Go do your private detecting, Ray. If you turn up something concrete, bring it back and perhaps we'll share information. Perhaps. But be warned—if you hold out on me, I'll put you out of business. I'm not getting played by you again.”

“Hey, I had to stay alive,” I reminded him. “And besides, you came out of it looking pretty good.”

“Hardly the point,” said Holborn.

“If I learn anything, you'll be the first to hear about it,” I said. “You gotta know, I have no intention of taking on these guys alone.”

And I meant it.

I
pulled out of the FBI visitor parking lot
and headed east on Roosevelt. A tan Crown Victoria turned in behind me, coming off Hoyne. Two white guys wearing suits and sunglasses. They settled into traffic three cars back. I could've circled the block to determine if they were following me, but I didn't want to overreact. My nerves were still raw from lack of sleep and caffeine overdose.

I continued east, turned north on Clark.

So did they.

I took Clark to Polk, turned east, and then north on Dearborn.

And so did they.

I picked up my cell phone and started to call Holborn just to thank him for the company, but the guys in the Crown Vic were now directly behind me, no longer trying to be coy about it. And the car didn't have government plates. I put the phone down and turned east on Jackson, crossed over to Lake Shore Drive, and headed north. Beyond North Avenue Beach the flow of traffic got faster and so did I.

To my left, luxury Lake Shore Drive condos towered over parks with trees showing the first blush of autumn on their leaves. To my
right, joggers jogged and cyclists cycled up and down the path, and people frolicked with their dogs on the beach. Lake Michigan was particularly blue today, dotted with dozens of white pleasure boats. I've always wondered what the people on those boats do for a living, that they can spend the workday sailing. Nice work if you can get it.

When I slowed and exited onto Lawrence, the Crown Vic was still behind me.

So I went apartment hunting. I cruised the residential side streets of Uptown, stopping whenever I saw a decent building with a
FOR RENT
sign, and jotted down the address for later reference. But I didn't get out of the car. Just drove, stopped, wrote, and drove away again.

While I had the notebook handy I wrote down the license plate number of the Crown Vic. My escorts stayed with me the whole time and the guy in the passenger seat took a photo of each building where I stopped. They made no effort to hide their presence.

They seemed content to do this all day, but I soon grew tired of the game. I took Clark south and parked at a meter just north of Wilson and ducked into Max's Place, removed my sunglasses, and let my eyes adjust. Dim lighting fought to penetrate the haze and the dark wood surroundings soaked up what light made it through.

I bought three bottles of Old Style from Erica and took a stool, as Marvin Gaye called out from the jukebox for a witness. I pressed the Record button on my little digital voice recorder, dropped it in my handkerchief pocket. I took a swig of beer and lit a cigarette. I looked at my watch. It was just past noon.

My escorts entered the bar. They weren't big guys—the taller one was about five-ten, which put him an inch taller than me. The shorter one was maybe five-seven or -eight. They both sported receding hairlines and both were clean shaven. Their suits may not have been up to Special Agent Holborn's standards but they were above average and custom cut to help conceal their weapons.

They approached with a special swagger. Not the authoritarian FBI swagger, nor the militaristic strut that I'd seen on Blake Sten, and definitely not the aggressive bluster of the career criminal, but something
entirely different. Something loose and dangerous. Something that said they were above all laws and they knew it for certain.

“Thank God you're here,” I said. “I was beginning to think I'd have to drink all these myself.” I gestured for them to take a beer but they didn't.

“Mr. Dudgeon,” said the taller one, “we're with the Department of Homeland Security. We need you to answer a few questions.”

“Sure. May I see some ID?”

“No, you may not.” It wasn't the answer I expected.

“You serious?”

“Test me and find out.”

“I guess I'll have to. You say you're government but for all I know you could be aliens from Neptune,” I said.
And your car doesn't have government plates.

“You had a meeting today with Special Agent Holborn at the FBI building,” said the shorter one. “We need to know what you talked about.”

“Then you should ask Special Agent Holborn,” I said. “I'm sure you wouldn't mind showing him your tin.”

“We want to hear it from you.” On the jukebox, Marvin Gaye was done asking for a witness and was now wondering “What's Going On.” That made two of us.

“Okay, I'll tell you,” I said. “We were discussing an ongoing investigation into the recent wave of people posing as federal agents. Rumor is, some even claim to be with DHS.”

“Listen,
fucktard,
” said the taller one, “you are going to talk to us. You do not want to be labeled as obstructing our agency's efforts to protect the homeland. Suppose we put you on the terrorism watch list. Could take
years
to clear your name. Suppose we contact the State of Illinois and tell them it is the opinion of the federal government that Ray Dudgeon is a security risk and should not be carrying a firearm or working with a PI license.”

“I can't believe you guys operate like this,” I said. “While we're supposing, suppose I divulged the content of my conversation with an FBI
agent to a couple of guys who
said
they were with DHS. How much of a security risk would that make me?”

The shorter one said, “This is a very bad time for you to make enemies of us. America is at war.”

“I couldn't help but notice.” I stood up. “Look, I'm done with this conversation. If you show me some identification, I'll be happy to meet with you tomorrow at the Federal Center.”
After I talk to Holborn and check you out with DHS.
“Failing that, you can call the Illinois Department of Professional Regulation and say nasty things about me.” I pulled a business card from my wallet and placed it on the bartop. “Here, I'll make it easy for you—the number of my detective's license is on the card.” I put my wallet away.

The shorter one picked up the card and stuck it in his pocket.

The taller one said, “I'm sure you've made a lot of bad decisions in your pathetic little life, Mr. Dudgeon. But this was the worst. You will be hearing from us again in the near future.” They turned and left the bar.

I clicked Stop on my digital voice recorder. I put a cigarette between my lips and set it on fire. I reached for the second beer.

And thought some about my pathetic little life.