open, he realized that if the man started shooting, size made little final difference at all.
The door was open. One footfall, then a second into Fowler's study. And Cochrane was thinking, Dear God, let me see who it is before I'm shot! Dear God, this one last wish!
'Reverend Fowler?' asked the visitor.
Cochrane knew the voice from a thousand other times that he had heard it. But it was only when he swiveled quickly in his chair to face the intruder that the reality was upon him. Cochrane stared as Peter Whiteside pushed his closet door open and faced Dick Wheeler with a drawn pistol. Wheeler jumped in astonishment when he saw the movement, then gave an involuntary quake a second time when Hearn and Cianfrani appeared quietly behind him, weapons drawn.
There was little said, considering the moment. Cochrane spoke first, and his own voice sounded very distant in what was otherwise total silence.
'Please remain calm, Dick,' he said, still stunned, 'and keep your hands in full view. You're under arrest.'
A bewildered Wheeler looked at the Englishman. Simultaneously, Cianfrani held a cocked pistol to Wheeler's ribs while his hand darted very professionally under Wheeler's coat to remove the service revolver.
From the desk, Cochrane saw Laura appear. Then his attention went back to all the guns that were drawn and he prayed that nothing would happen accidentally. The evening had already been blackened enough.
Then another mood swept Cochrane and his overwhelming emotion was that of disappointment. He could barely bring himself to look Wheeler in the eye. 'Give him a thorough frisk,' Cochrane said in a subdued, sullen voice. 'He's probably carrying more than one.'
He was: a two-shot derringer was at the elbow in the left coat sleeve.
To which Dick Wheeler feigned confusion. 'Bill, what the devil is all this about? Some sort of joke? Not funny, brother, if it is.'
For several seconds Cochrane could not answer. He merely held Wheeler-who was moved to the wall and frisked by Cianfrani as Hearn stood guard-in a chilly assessing eye while several images flashed before him:
Kurkevics, the dead F.B.I. contact in Berlin, Theresia bloody and dead in her home, Mauer worried to the point of homicide and hysteria over the plight of his family, and then Cochrane's own long days of exile with the flatulent dwarf in the archives.
Disappointment gave way to anger and anger to confusion. Dick Wheeler, the ascendant star of the Bureau; the F.B.I. emissary and diplomatic courier to the House and Senate; Dick Wheeler, who stood to inherit the leadership of the whole department if any President ever had the temerity to send J. Edgar packing.
Wheeler had betrayed all this and betrayed every human being he knew within the Bureau. Why? For what in return? Bill Cochrane sat in the quiet room and watched Cianfrani and Hearn complete an all but routine arrest and search. But Bill Cochrane did not understand.
'No joke at all, Dick,' was all Cochrane could say. 'And you're right. It's not funny.'
Whiteside withdrew slightly, lowered his pistol, but kept it drawn and pointed toward the floor. He knew better than to involve himself further in what was now a preponderantly American operation. Cochrane stood from the desk.
There was something about Fowler's clothing that now rested very uneasily upon Cochrane. The white celluloid collar was unbearably tight all of a sudden and he wanted to be rid of it. He unfastened it.
Laura stepped through the doorway. 'There isn't anyone else,' she said. 'I kept watch.'
She moved to Peter Whiteside, who took her under his arm. Cochrane later remembered thinking how tired she looked. And Agent Hearn, looking back and forth from Cochrane to the prisoner, finally spoke in confusion, addressing Cochrane.
'Hey, what's going on?' he asked. 'You know this guy?'
'Somewhat,' answered Cochrane. 'But it's a long dismal story.'
*
Cochrane insisted that they leave for Washington immediately, drive through the night, and render their prisoner to a federal installation as soon as possible. Cianfrani suggested that a nice new cement and iron edifice in Newark was all ready, spiffy, and waiting, but Cochrane made the further point that this would only make another transfer inevitable.
'And we don't even know entirely what we're dealing with,' Cochrane said, with an eye to security and a larger conspiracy.
It fell to Laura to make coffee for the drive, an irony which was not lost upon her. A strange parochial little scene transpired as the coffee brewed and they sat around waiting, all of them chitchatting except for Wheeler, who had fallen silent, and Hearn, who sat with his pistol across his lap and stared at his shackled, manacled prisoner.
Then the whole crew was off to Washington in three cars. Hearn and Cianfrani drove the lead, transporting Wheeler in an enclosed rear seat designed for just such purposes: a leg chain linked him to the body of the car, an iron mesh divider separated him from the occupants of the front seat, and the rear doors locked from the outside.
Cochrane drove with Laura in the second car, his Hudson, and Whiteside drove the follow-up, staying a precautionary hundred yards behind the other two.
It was 7 A.M. when they reached Washington. The three cars remained together all the way to the Federal House of Detention. Everyone's eyelids were heavy, even Wheeler's. The prisoner had little to say, but said all of it when Cochrane helped him out of the rear of the F.B.I. car.
'You're making a hell of a mistake, Bill,' he said, hulking out of the rear seat into an upright position. 'I don't know what you think you're doing.'
'Uh-huh,' Cochrane answered.
'I'm just assuming that you've lost your mind completely and can't be legally held responsible for any of this.'
'Cianfrani and Hearn will handle the booking,' Cochrane answered.
Dick Wheeler looked at him sourly. Then Cianfrani and Hearn took Wheeler's arms and pulled him respectfully in the proper direction. Cochrane waited until the three figures disappeared into the federal jail.
Laura and Peter Whiteside moved to a spot a few feet behind Cochrane and were there when he turned.
'I'll take Laura over to the Shoreham,' Whiteside said. 'I'll check her in there, then I'll need some sleep myself. Been a bloody long stretch.'
Cochrane nodded. 'What about Fowler?'
'He'll be safe with my men in Baltimore for another day,' Whiteside said. 'Then I'll have him brought here. Acceptable?'
Cochrane did not care for the delay. But he needed the sleep himself. He acquiesced to Whiteside's plan. His attention turned to Laura.
'I think you should stay away from your home until your husband is safely locked up,' he said. And then for some reason, perhaps due to the fatigue that afflicted all of them, he added. 'I'm sorry.'
She nodded. Words were failing Laura at that hour, too. Something caught in both of their eyes and she reached to Cochrane and he embraced her. He gave her a comforting hug and slowly released her.
She pulled slowly from his arms. 'Thank you,' she said. 'Come say hello tomorrow.'
Cochrane promised that he would.
FORTY
'What you have to remember about the Germans,' said Reverend Fowler, entrancing his two guards, 'is that in the age of the Barbarians, we're talking about the 400’s and 500’s A.D. here, the first German converts to Christianity denied the divinity of Christ.'
Fowler's eyes twinkled. He was at the card table with Fussel and McPherson. His feet were chained together and linked to a tall armoire. His wrists were cuffed. For the past hour, he had regaled his captors with historical and religious anecdotes ranging from the death of Catherine the Great to Cardinal Richelieu supporting Catholicism in
