Cochrane was not beset with the self-doubts that had tormented him during his sabbatical with Mr. Hay. He knew he possessed the skills to be an outstanding detective. But he also knew that 95 percent of good detective work is routine, unspectacular inquiry, posing the right questions, ferreting out the proper responses. There are weeks of checking and double-checking. And there is the laborious placing together of disparate parts, never knowing exactly which parts are missing, which parts are incomplete, or how many make the whole.
Further, any successful federal investigation relied heavily at its inception on information received from local American police departments. Just as the cop on the beat had a better idea what was happening in his neighborhood than his commanding officer did, local police departments had a better insight than F.B.I. offices into their respective cities.
The departments knew who was in town to cause trouble or what unusual crimes had occurred. They knew what was perplexing and what was unsolved. They quickly noticed things out of the ordinary.
Over the years, Cochrane had always dealt respectfully with local police, from the department chiefs down to the rookies on patrol. Unlike most other special agents of the Bureau, Cochrane saw local cops as plodders perhaps, but men of a special sort of dedication. They were overworked and besieged. But they did their work to the best of their ability.
Equally, Cochrane reasoned that the man he was looking for had to break the law from time to time. By the very nature of the spy's profession, he had to have an assumed identity, at least part of the time. That meant the forgery of papers. Similarly, this particular spy had to have entered restricted areas to plant his devices. Had anyone gotten in his way? Somewhere along the line, the spy had probably stolen certain items. Who was a suspect in that theft? And where had the saboteur obtained the explosives to sink the Wolfe? Were they stolen? Purchased? From whom?
Somewhere, Cochrane knew, there were witnesses to this man. No one floated around like Peter Pan. No one failed to leave fingerprints. No one had no other human contact. Where did the spy live? To whom did he pay the rent? With whom did he sleep? Where did he buy his food? His clothes?
Cochrane began making notes.
*
In the early afternoon Cochrane reached for his telephone. He dialed numbers in Boston, Providence, Hartford, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. Since the Great War, every major American city had had a bomb disposal unit. Cochrane spoke to the head of that unit in each city. In many cases, such as New York, where the head of the Bomb Squad was Lieutenant Francis Xavier Sullivan, Cochrane spoke to men whom he knew personally. Cochrane guided the conversations carefully. Each took on an identical drift.
"Yes," Cochrane would answer to the first query, "I am acting in an official capacity… Conducting an investigation given the F.B.I.'s highest priority… We are looking for a man about whom we know very little… No, no name, yet. Not even a description… We know he is an expert on incendiary devices… Yes, there is loss of life involved. A considerable amount, in fact…"
In each case, the man on the other end of the line quickly asked why an inquiry was being lodged in his area. Further, what federal laws had been violated? Why was the F.B.I. pawing the ground for criminal activity in his city?
Cochrane was ready with a response which invariably brought a rising silence from the other end of the line.
"Unfortunately, it's not a simple matter of criminal activity," Cochrane explained. "It's a matter of military security. National security as well, sir. Our conjecture is that the man is either a well-trained mercenary or has extremely strong pro-Nazi sentiments.. . We assume he is a German, probably an infiltrator… No, we cannot confirm that. It's at the stage of theory, only… We'd like to know if you have anybody in this category in your files. Or if anyone springs to mind."
Inevitably, the men who received these calls promised that their files would be scoured immediately and that their top lieutenants would also be questioned. Cochrane thanked the men generously and asked that they each get back to him within twenty-four hours.
Then, with the eastern calls complete, Cochrane placed a series of identical calls to the cities of the American Midwest with large German-American populations: Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Chicago, and St. Louis. It was not until past seven in the evening that all Cochrane's telephone contacts had been established.
Cochrane then completed a printed form known within the Bureau as an LKW. The form, headed with the words LAST KNOWN WHEREABOUTS beneath the Bureau's imprimatur, was an official investigative request within the Bureau. Once filled in, and sent through proper channels, the paperwork would pass through one or another of the Bureau's clerical divisions and yield the current or last known place of residence for whoever was named on the form.
Carefully, Cochrane filled in a name. Otto Mauer, late of the Abwehr, the man Cochrane had helped defect from Germany with his family.
Minutes later, Cochrane left his own office, locked the door behind him, and dropped the inquiry at Central Alien Registry, where they would trace it in the morning. Cochrane had not seen Otto Mauer since Germany. He knew only from Frank Lerrick that Mauer had arrived in New York late in 1938.
As Cochrane left the Bureau's sixth floor, the day in Washington was dying. He saw through one of the slatted blinds the redness of the evening sky. Almost simultaneously, he noticed that several of the Bluebirds, like owls, were reporting to work. All other offices on the floor were quiet, with the exception of one poor soul slumped over a table in Cryptology. And like Dick Wheeler, the Virgin Mary had not been seen all day.
*
Back in England, Laura Worthington, had cause to smile.
At Barrett's, the antiquarian bookseller in Salisbury, she had invested one shilling in a thirty-year-old biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine. She spent the afternoon reading it on a bench on the cathedral square.
Eleanor had been the Queen consort first of Louis VII of France, then of Henry II of England. The peasants of each country contended that Eleanor had the devil's tail beneath her skirts and that, as the jargon happily put it, was how she hopped around from throne to throne. The devil's tail, for heaven's sake! Laura nearly laughed out loud, wondering how many women in the world had slept with and married two kings.
Such thoughts amused her, as it was a poor August for finding amusement elsewhere. Earlier in the month Chamberlain had spoken over the BBC about the recurrent Polish question. Anglo-French guarantees over Polish sovereignty would be fulfilled by force, if necessary, should Germany seize the Polish corridor and annex Danzig.
Hitler, as usual, was not to be outmaneuvered. On the previous day Germany had concluded a ten-year nonaggression pact with the Soviet Union. With one stroke of the pen, Hitler had rid himself of the specter of a two-front war with France and Britain in the West and the Soviet Union in the East. War in Europe appeared more certain than ever. And if war began, sea travel would be precarious. It might be years before Laura could return to America. A decision pressed upon her.
She returned to Salisbury Plain on a rare, partly sunny day late in the month. Out there, in God's open green fields, she felt at ease enough to think. She walked the plain by herself for the better part of an hour. The sun was confused as to seasons: it seemed more April than August. She wore a tweed skirt and cardigan, which sufficed for the day. Laura examined her own life. She considered what a return to America offered her; she weighed her future in England.