Koch paused and looked around the room. "That's about it. Except we know that Hancock is connected to the Wolf and that he's been paid a lot of money for his services. So at twelve hundred hours, we're going in to take a look for ourselves inside the house. So tired," Agent Koch said in a singsong. "Tired of waiting."
There were smiles around the room, even from those who didn't get the reference to the Kinks song. Somebody patted me on the shoulder, as though I had something to do with the decision that must have come down from Washington.
"Not me." I turned and shrugged at the agent congratulating me. "I'm just a soldier here."
The team going inside Hancock's place was mostly FBI, but there was a handful of CIA agents, too, led by Rooney. The CIA was in Idaho as a courtesy, partly because of the new working relationship that existed between the two agencies, but mostly because Hancock was directly involved in the murder of Thomas Weir, one of theirs. But I doubted they wanted to take Hancock down any more than I did. I wanted the Wolf, and somehow, somewhere, I was going to get him. At least, that was what I needed to think.
Chapter 102
Koch and Rooney were in charge, and they finally gave us the go. At the appointed hour, we swarmed all over the Hancock house. FBI-emblazoned shirts and windbreakers were everywhere. Probably scared off a few deer and jackrabbits, even though not a single shot was fired.
Hancock was in bed with his girlfriend. He was sixty-four years old; Coral was supposed to be twenty-six. Lustrous black hair, good figure, lots and lots of rings and things, slept in the nude, on her back. Hancock at least had the decency to wear a Utah Jazz sweatshirt and sleep in a fetal position.
He began to shout at us, which was actually kind of ironic and funny. "What the hell is this shit? Get out of my damn house!"
But he forgot to look surprised, or he just wasn't a good actor. Either way, I got the feeling that he knew we were coming. How? Because he'd spotted us over the past few days? Or had Hancock been warned by someone in one of the cooperating agencies? Did the Wolf know we were onto Hancock?
During the first couple of hours of interviews, we tried Dr. O'Connell's truth serum on Hancock. It didn't work as well on him as it had with Joe Cahill. He got happy and high, but he just sat back and went with it. Didn't tell us much, wouldn't even confirm things that Cahill had already confessed.
Meanwhile, a search of the house, barn, and sixty acres of grounds was going on. Hancock owned an Aston Martin convertible-and the Wolf loved fast cars-but nothing else even vaguely suspicious turned up. Not for three whole days, during which nearly a hundred agents combed every square inch of the ranch. During that time, half a dozen computer experts-including loaners from Intel and IBM-tried to break into Hancock's two computers. They finally concluded that he'd had experts put up extra security to protect whatever was inside.
There was nothing to do but wait around some more. I read every magazine and newspaper in Hancock's house, including several back issues of the Idaho Mountain Express. I went for long walks and tried to figure out a direction for my life that made some sense to me. I didn't do real well, but the fresh mountain air was a nice treat for my lungs.
When a computer breakthrough finally came, there wasn't much to go on. No direct link to the Wolf or to anyone else who seemed suspicious to us, at least not at first.
The next day, though, a hacker from our offices in Austin, Texas, found a file inside an encrypted file. It contained regular communication with a bank in Zurich. Actually, with a couple of banks in Switzerland.
And suddenly we didn't just suspect, we knew that Hancock had a lot of money. Over six million. At least that much. Which was the best news we'd had in a long while.
So off to Zurich we went, at least for a day or two. I didn't expect to find the Wolf there. But you never know. And I'd never been to Switzerland. Jannie begged me to bring back chocolate, a suitcase full of the stuff, and I promised I would. A whole suitcase full of Swiss chocolate, sweetheart. Least I can do for missing most of your ninth year.
Chapter 103
If I were the Wolf, this would be a good place to live. Zurich is a beautiful, amazingly clean city on the lake-the Zürichsee-with lovely fragrant shade trees and wide, winding sidewalks along the water, and fresh mountain air meant to be breathed in deeply. When I arrived, a storm was imminent and the air smelled like brass. The exterior of a majority of the buildings were in light shades, sand and white, and several were adorned with Swiss flags twisting in the blustery wind off the lake.
As I drove into the city I noticed trolley tracks everywhere with heavy-looking wires hanging overhead. The power of the old. Also several life-size fiberglass cows painted with Alpine scenes, which reminded me of Little Alex's favorite toy, Moo. What was I going to do about Alex? What could I do?
The Zurich Bank was a sixties-looking building, glass-and-steel front, situated very close to the lake. Sandy Greenberg met me outside. She was wearing a gray suit, had a black handbag slung over her shoulder, and looked as though maybe she worked inside the bank instead of for Interpol.
"You ever been to Zurich, Alex?" Sandy asked as she gave me a hug and kiss on both cheeks.
"Never. Had one of their multipurpose knives once when I was ten or eleven."
"Alex, we have to eat a meal here. Promise me. Let's go inside now. They're waiting for us, and they don't like to wait in Zurich. Especially the bankers."
The inside of the Zurich Bank was expensive-looking, highly polished, wood paneling everywhere, as spotless as a hospital operating room. The teller area was natural stone, with more wood paneling. The tellers were efficient and professional-looking, and they whispered to one another. The bank's branding was understated, but there was a great deal of modern art on the wall. I thought that I understood: the art was the bank's branding.
"Zurich has always been a haven for avant-garde intellectuals, cultured types," Sandy said, and didn't whisper. "The Dada movement was born here. Wagner, Strauss, Jung all lived here."
"James Joyce wrote Ulysses in Zurich," I said, and winked at her.
Sandy laughed. "I forgot, you're a closet intellectual."
We were escorted to the bank president's office, which had a serious look. Neat as a pin, too. Only one transaction on the desk blotter, everything else filed away.
Sandy handed Mr. Delmar Pomeroy an envelope. "A signed warrant," she said. "The account number is 616479Q."
"Everything has been promptly arranged," Herr Pomeroy said to us. That was all. Then his warrant officer took us to look at the transactions in and out of account number 616479Q. So much for the secrecy and security of Swiss banks. Everything has been promptly arranged.
Chapter 104
This was feeling more like an efficient, orderly police investigation now. Even though I knew it really wasn't. Sandy, two of her agents from Interpol, and I got to look through all of Corky Hancock's transactions in a small, windowless room somewhere deep in the basement of the Zurich Bank. The former CIA agent's account had grown from two hundred thousand U.S. dollars to slightly over six million. Youza.
The latest, and largest, deposits totaled three and a half million and had come in four installments this year.