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Old Tashunka  waited outside  the sheriff's  office  long  past the time when Sternbach said he'd meet him. He had been trying to stay warm inside his  running truck. Sternbach invited  the fellow to come indoors for some fresh coffee.

STERNBACH: [I'm sorry I'm late. Doctor Wahkan had some   very interesting things to tell me about the deceased, and even more interesting things to show me]

Tashunka accepted   the  sheriff's  invitation  and    followed Sternbach inside. He sat shivering until the coffee was ready. His eyes landed on  a photograph  of the  elder Sheriff Sternb- ach, now deceased. Had it been two years already?

TASHUNKA: [Everyone respected your father. I was there at  his Final Rite]

Roy flushed  with  sudden  anger.

STERNBACH: [And I,  his  son,  was  not permitted to  be  there because I  don't  believe in  fairy tales about sun   gods  and killing relics  and I  made the  mistake of  letting  everybody know that]

TASHUNKA: [Sheriff, if you allow your heart  to grow black  you will take everything I say in a way I do not mean]

Sternbach glared  at him while he took another sip  of  coffee, then lowered his eyes.

STERNBACH: [You are absolutely right, Tashunka. I know how im- portant the relic is to the life of your church]

TASHUNKA: [The  Red and  White  wings of  the Church  swap  au- thority but the Staff of Melchizedek is an heirloom of the Shy- bear family. Jashen thought it would quiet things  to  let  it pass  out of his hands, but he gave it to his son Ruman  instead of Elder Warner or Deacon Shoenherr. STERNBACH: [I  count myself fortunate  I  never  embraced   the faith of the  Green Dome Church as my own, Tashunka. It's far too violent for me]

TASHUNKA: [There's more. Jashen set aside the rule that  Green- domites must marry only their  cousins. Everyone knows he  did this so Ruman could marry this poor girl who is now dead. When they heard Jashen's decree  Earl Warner  and half  the  Bunners stood up and walked  out of  the Temple]

Sternbach smiled  at the old man's use of the  word  'Bunners'. Greendomites had to wear their hair in a ponytail, even the men, but in  the White Wing  this ponytail was done  up in  a   bun. The Bunner perjorative overtook the original 'Stiffnecks'  that sounded a hell of a lot better. He remembered he was once a Bun- ner himself.

But even outsiders  knew the biggest hobby horse of the  Church was mandatory cousin marriage. Sternbach knew a deep stew  of racism   simmered  among  the Bunners  but the  Church's   dogma requiring consanguineous marriages had kept it from boiling over at the  expense of sujecting the whole  movement  to  ridicule. Kimberly Zinter was  in the  fourth generation  from the origi- nal pioneers, at least. She had no kin among  the Red Wing,  at least no legal kin,  but her marriage  to Ruman Shybear and  any subsequent children   and grandchildren  would blow  that  door wide open.

Tashunka seemed to read the sheriff's mind.

TASHUNKA: [Warner saw this marriage between  Ruman and  Kim  as  a horrible  disease infecting the pristine body of  the  Church. Their children would have marriageable cousins in  both  wings. With each generation this disease would just grow worse]

STERNBACH: [Now I have motive]

The deputies rushed in just then and threw a  Cellophane bag on Sternbach's desk. It contained a bloody blade.

BOB: [We found it, just  like you guessed. In Wyoming. No more than throwing distance from the body]

The blade was thin  and flexible. It was just a  steak knife, really. Sternbach frowned with disappointment.

STERNBACH: [This game isn't so fun when the perps   don't  even try to win. He could have used a Sears Roebuck kitchen knife, but no, something handmade]

What followed was a duty Sheriff Sternbach  did not relish. He recalled the recent death of Erik Zinter. How does one tell  a newly-widowed  woman  that her daughter has also been wiped  off the face of the earth? But the woman who answered  the   door was not Clara Zinter. She was younger and her hair was a rich, dark red. She had eyes that were a  light,  icy  green,  very striking for being so  rare. The young lady was  the  spitting image of the deceased.

STERNBACH: [Good  afternoon. I'm Sheriff Sternbach. Is Clara Zinter here at home?]

ROBYN: [Mother moved away  recently. She's with her own  folks back East. I'm Robyn. Do you want to come in? I'm sure you have questions and it will be better if you're not standing here  in the doorway]

Sternbach took off his hat  and accepted her offer. He saw the hardwood floors were covered with throw-rugs. He could smell the very  slight  odor of a  gas furnace. The radio was  tuned  to Headwater's  sole radio station. It was playing  "I've Got   a Gal   in Kalamazoo" by  Glenn Miller and  His  Orchestra. Robyn turned it down.

STERNBACH: [Please,  Robyn,  if you could turn  the  radio  off entirely. I afraid I have very bad news  for you]

The girl complied, then she invited the sheriff to be seated.

Sternbach got  the  impression  the  Zinters  were  firmly sit- uated in  the middle-class. Not destitute by any   means,  but not ostentatious either. A small coffee table lay between them. Robyn smoothed out her plaid woolen dress and Roy saw she  wore bobby socks and saddle shoes.

ROBYN: [You were  about to tell  me you found  the body of   my sister. You were  to break it to me how  she  was  stabbed  to death]

On  one  level Sternbach  was  relieved. His duty to   notify the next-of-kin had been mooted. But Robyn had stated   things she  should not  yet know. Sternbach took a pen and a   small notebook out of his jacket liner. The sympathetic bearer of bad news had become a detective again.

STERNBACH: [Your sister, you say? Are you Sophia Zinter?]

ROBYN: [Oh, no, Sophia is a lot more, ah, athletic than me, and she keeps her hair shorter than mine. Or rather, her hair keeps itself shorter than mine]

Robyn tugged on her long tresses to show Roy it wasn't a wig.

STERNBACH: [So, triplets?]

ROBYN (nodding her head): [But only two of the three are identi- cal]

STERNBACH: I didn't think that was possible. When did you know your sister was dead, Miss Zinter?]

ROBYN: [Call me Robyn, please, sheriff. Just one name:  Robyn. Not Miss Zinter. As to when I knew she was dead, it's hard  to say]

STERNBACH: [Did  an old Indian fellow pay you a  visit  earlier today?]

ROBYN: [Nobody else  has visited me today,  Sheriff. But if  I  tell you the truth you will probably think I'm a little crazy]

STERNBACH: [You   are  well   advised,  Robyn,  to   hold  that thought in  your mind,  that you  must  always   tell  me   the truth. But as for thinking  you  crazy,  I'm  already   having trouble  with   your casual attitude toward your  own  sister's murder]

ROBYN: [Sheriff,   have you  ever  heard those   stories  about identical twins who seem to have a link that defies any explana- tion? Twins who were separated at birth? They never met,  yet they they led lives with coincidence  piled  upon  coincidence, with similar jobs, and even similar spouses?]

STERNBACH: [And the same bone cup in the back of your head, Ro- byn?]

ROBYN: [That came in when I was sixteen, and a good thing  too. The brain is still growing until then]

STERNBACH: [Okay, so are you telling me you  have some kind  of  radio in your head tracking what was happening to your sister?]

ROBYN: [No, Sheriff, nothing like that]

STERNBACH: [Good, because  if that's what you  were  trying  to say   to me, I wouldn't  believe you  were  nuts. I  would  run you  in  to  the station  for knowing   material   facts  about this case with  no plausible explanation why]

ROBYN: [Sheriff, look, if  you do  that I'll  just clam  up and you'll run out  of time. None of the evidence  points to  me, circumstantial or otherwise, and the clock  is ticking. Someone is being very clever. He made this bigger than a  local  case and the  feds are  coming. You already know that. The killer thinks  he can cut  some sort of  deal with them. But he  also had  an accomplice who  is not so  clever. So here's a tip you can use if you take what you've already learned about this case and you don't dawdle: there's a  unique set of  kitchen  knives that are missing one blade. And tomorrow is trash day]

The Red Wing of the Church worshiped on Wednesdays. That al- lowed the Kuwapi men who were so employed to pick up  trash  on Sunday mornings while the white congregants were preparing to go to temple.

When the game was afoot Roy and his deputies took no days off.

Scissors, paper, rock, and Deputy Bob Lurz had to be the one to climb into the garbage truck at the place where 6th made a  lit- tle jog north. Alfred Shoenherr lived on N Street and 6th. Depu- ty Bill Holsinger stayed out of sight and drove to L and 7th to pick  up  Bob when he was done. The Kuwapi fellow  driving  the truck and  the Kuwapi fellow dumping the cans were  duly  depu- tized.

At O street Bob was told that Alfred Shoenherr was making a last minute addition of a grocery bag to the can already out on  the street.

Two more pickups and Bob had this grocery bag in his hands.

BILL: [Jesus Christ, Bob, you reek!]

BOB: [All in the line of duty. Look what we got]

He let  Bill peek inside at a wooden knife block. The handles matched the murder weapon and one blade was missing.

BILL: So it's Alfred Shoenherr for sure. I'm with the sheriff on this one. When the perpetrators make catching them this  easy it's no fun at all]

On the eve of Special Agent Felt's transfer to DC Hoover  tele- phoned him personally. Felt knew he was in for a disappointment. The San  Antonio field office was deemed  a  punishment  detail where agents were sent to be toughened up and it was particular- ly hard on ones who were married. Felt's transfer to Washington to work counter-espionage was put on hold until he solved a sim- ple homicide in the middle of the country. Hoover took the case personally and so, naturally, the FBI did as well.

HOOVER [You'll  be coordinating with Special  Agent  in  Charge Clyde Tolson on this one. Do you know him?]

FELT: [Sir,  I know SAiC Tolson runs a division of  the  Bureau known as D-E-C-O-N but no one seems to know what  the  initials mean]

HOOVER: In Clyde's pretty little head DECON stands for Domestic Enemies Containment,  Observation, and Neutralization. But to you,  me, the other agents and most important of all,  Congress, Tolson heads up the Special Projects section]

FELT: [I  understand sir, but what if, by some  misfortune,  my work runs at cross-purposes to those of SAiC Tolson?]

HOOVER: [Your case will take precedence. Mesh with Tolson where you can but your reports go directly to me. Also you will have the complete cooperation of the local law enforcement community, such as  it is. Not even Tolson has that. But be  forewarned, Agent Felt, Headwater is a small town at the ragged edge of no- where. They don't even have a motel where you can stay]

Hoover wrapped  up with a few more details, saying  Agent  Felt this and Agent Felt that. After twenty years J. Edgar would call Mark Felt 'Felt' but he'd never be on a first-name  basis  like with Clyde and that would suit Mark just fine.

He did win one important concession, permission to draw a Bureau sedan so  his  wife Audrey could proceed to  DC  as  originally planned while he took his own car north through most  of  Texas and three  other states to fix this burr under  the  Director's saddle.

Special Agent Mark Felt drove to the strip of Federal land where Hoover told him the Bureau had dropped a trailer. It was unoccu- pied. Felt let himself in using the spare key he had  obtained from the Wichita field office.

The kitchen was still a kitchen, but the living room was a work- space. He checked the trailer's two bedrooms and saw they con- tained two  cots apiece. Before anyone else arrived  he  shat, showered, and shaved to make himself presentable once more after two days on the road.

When he was finished Felt helped himself to the files stacked on the desks. One of them contained brittle yellowed paper  that Felt instinctively handled with great care. lt was a report on the final days of a certain Fort Price. The file contained pages from the commanding officer's journal and testimony of six sur- viving soldiers, including one who had been captured and maimed. Felt steadily read the file until he heard the sound of a vehi- cle's tires crunching up to the FBI trailer.

Felt met  Clyde Tolson when he inspected his  graduating  class with Hoover but this fellow wasn't he. When the agent came  in Felt thought the man looked more movie gangster than G-man,  in- vestigatee more than investigator. Later Felt would learn he was one of the few liberal Democrats to be accepted into the Bureau.

SULLIVAN: [Are you William Mark Felt?]

Felt, who  had been sitting ramrod straight in his  chair,  now stood ramrod straight on his feet and extended his hand.

FELT: [Just Mark Felt, please]

The newcomer remarked on their mutual good fortune, as his  own name was Bill Sullivan, and two Williams would have been confus- ing. He approached the desk to see what Felt had been reading, amused by Mark's body language which seemed to dare him to  re- mark on the presumption.

SULLIVAN: [Ah yes, cowboys and Indians. The latest obsession of SAiC Clyde Tolson and part of the reason we're here. How far did you get?]

FELT: [The  Indians dropped a couple of cows, and  the  cowboys dropped a couple of Indians. If you hadn't shown up, Bill, I'm sure  I  would have plowed my way through to where the  US  Army lost their fort. Why is this one of Tolson's special projects?]

SULLIVAN: "Call it DECON. Domestic Enemies Containment, Observa- tion, and Neutralization. I'm sure the Director told  you  this was  Special Projects but my advice is that you play along  with Tolson, at least until you break the murder case]

Felt donned his overcoat.

FELT: [The  Director  gave me almost nothing in the  way  of  a briefing, but he did warn me about the DECON thing. What is Tol- son looking for, exactly?]

SULLIVAN: [That is a secret he's holding close to his own vest. Right now he's waiting for you at what qualifies for a hospital in this little pimple of a town. It's practically a one-room log cabin. He's with Dr. Ian Trochmann, who's attached to the  Bu- reau. I will take you there, but I won't be staying. I'm still looking for a fugitive, one Sophia Zinter]

Sullivan drove Felt to the hospital to take over the investiga- tion.

FELT: [You got me wondering why Tolson gives a damn  about  the Army losing a fort way back when. Hell, it was a lifetime ago]

Sullivan shrugged. Clyde Tolson was playing coy and there  was much he didn't know.

SULLIVAN: [I guess Fort Price was kinda like the little brother to Custer's Last Stand. One thing that really strikes me about the Indian wars is how the Indians gave as well as they got. We only beat them with numbers]

FELT: [Numbers, time, and the fact that they weren't really  as bloodthirsty as people made them out to be. Did you ever hear of something they called 'counting coup'? It was the wartime equiv- alent of  touch football. They went to war like we go to  ball games]

When they arrived at the clinic Tolson gave Mark what qualified as a warm greeting, coming from him.

TOLSON: [Oh, there you are, Felt]

Felt remembered his oblong face and searing gaze from  Quantico when he inspected the graduating class 15 with the Director. The sheriff was also there and Sullivan made the introduction.

SULLIVAN: [Special Agent Mark Felt, this is Sheriff Roy Sternb- ach]

Felt hit  the ground running. As he shook Sternbach's hand  he looked at his watch.

FELT: [Sheriff, it's quarter of four and I am now assuming  re- sponsibility for this investigation]

STERNBACH: [Special Agent Felt, this department will  pull  out every stop to cooperate with your investigation. But I'm  left wondering about another homicide just over the state line a few years back. My father reported it to the Bureau but they  told him to handle it locally]

FELT: [In the present case, Sheriff, the deceased  was  already the subject of a DECON investigation by SAiC Tolson  here,  and frankly the perps carried out this murder in a way that deliber- ately antagonized the Director]

Tolson seemed pleased that Felt didn't need to be  reminded  of his preferred term for the Special Projects section. He suspect- ed Sullivan was instrumental there.

Sheriff Sternbach introduced Dr. Wahkan, and Tolson  introduced yet another man, who was donning scrubs, as Dr. Ian  Trochmann. He was part of Tolson's DECON project and was preparing to per- form the autopsy all over again.

Wahkan said, "I don't think there will be much of the girl left if you insist on going through with this."

Hoover said Felt's own investigation took precedence over what- ever Tolson was trying to do, but Felt wasn't sure Tolson  knew that. He decided to put that to the test.

FELT: [Talk me out of it, Dr. Wahkan. Tell me what you think you found and I'll see what I can do for the girl]

Dr. Wahkan accepted this gamble.

WAHKAN: [The deceased is a Caucasian female, known from her ap- pearance and dental records to be Kimberly Anne Zinter of Head- water, seventeen  years of age, a high school  student  at  the B'nei Hannebim Academy and a vocalist in her church choir. The deceased has  been dead for approximately eighteen  hours  with little evident  decay as she was discovered  outdoors  in  sub- freezing weather. I counted thirteen deep knife wounds to  the chest. Six of the wounds pierced the heart. Those six  wounds were the proximate cause of death. The actual cause of death was exsanguination. The size and the number of the wounds suggests she was killed by a weapon larger than a pocket knife but small- er than a hunting knife, with a thin flexible blade."

TOLSON (visibly agitated): [Please get to the good part, Doctor]

WAHKAN (indignant): [The good part? None of this is good]

TOLSON (annoyed): [I mean the part that must be  redacted  from your report]

The doctor sighed and got to it.

WAHKAN: [Protruding through the scalp in the back of the head of the deceased is a structure of bone and cartilage resembling  a dome]

Felt drew  near to Kimberly's body to confirm what  the  doctor just stated. Tolson regretted that Sheriff Sternbach couldn't be sliced out of the examination like the nurse had been.

TOLSON: [Have you ever seen the like before, Doctor Wahkan?]

WAHKAN: [Last May this girl's mother brought her to me. Her sis- ter Sophia came in also. The skin was not broken at the  time. The girls only had bumps on their heads. Their folks didn't like what I said so they went to another doctor for a second opinion]

TOLSON: [Did you tell them it was just a tick bite? The lack of urgency  that probably led Clara Zinter to seek  another  doctor causes me to believe you have seen this cup before, perhaps many times before. Is that not, in fact, the case?]

WAHKAN: [If  I answer one way, I'm lying to  a  federal  agent, which is a crime. And if I answer another way, I'm breaking doc- tor-patient confidentiality. So you will understand my position when I say nothing more about this]

TOLSON: [Doctor Wahkan, you could easily lose your  license  to practice medicine if you fail to help me contain this outbreak]

STERNBACH: [Special  Agent  in Charge  Tolson,  if  you  really thought the  girl had some sort of airborne contagion  I  don't believe you would be in the same building with her body]

To this  Tolson had no answer. Dr. Trochmann flashed a  raised eyebrow and wry smile at Tolson.

TROCHMANN: [He's got you there, sir]

FELT: [Pardon me, sir, but this girl's bone cyst, or whatever it is, what bearing does it have on my own investigation?"

TOLSON: [Possibly none at all, but as the doctor seems reticent to say, this defect is not new to these two girls, but it may be new to white girls. That may be why this one was killed]

FELT: [Unfortunately  for Dr. Wahkan, I agree with you  sir.  I have no professional objections to a second autopsy]

Tolson appeared pleased with this call, but Hoover had  ordered Felt to play nice when it was possible.

TOLSON (to Sullivan): [There is another young lady with the same symptoms, a miss Sophia Zinter. I presume she's still alive and hiding somewhere  in this very, very small  town. So, Special Agent Sullivan, you know what, and you know when]

SULLIVAN: [I do indeed, sir]

He put on his gray fedora, tipping it to the sheriff,  the  two doctors, and Felt as he made his farewells.

WAHKAN (to  Tolson): [My prayer is you find  whatever  you  are looking for, quickly, and never again return to Headwater. Not even uncivilized men treat their dead in this manner]

On the  way out of the clinic Sheriff Sternbach  heard  Special Agent Mark Felt's stomach growl and guessed the man  might  not have eaten  since breakfast. Felt agreed to dine with him,  so long  as there was no discussion of the case in the  restaurant. The Sheriff decided on Bea's Chicken Inn, only five blocks east of the hospital.

Headwater was not a very large town. Sternbach took him over in the half-ton truck and along the way Felt invited him to  spill, as quickly as he could, what he had uncovered up to that point.

STERNBACH: [We have what is very likely the murder  weapon. It has fingerprints. We have photographs of the scene with tire and boot marks in snow. And we have more evidence that I wanted to talk to you about first]

FELT: [Is there a problem?]

STERNBACH: [We collected the evidence this morning after a  tip given by a young lady named Robyn, no last name, but apparently she is the sister of the deceased. The lead was too good to risk passing up. If we waited too long the opportunity to obtain it would have been lost for good]

FELT: [Do you think Robyn is indulging in misdirection?]

STERNBACH: [Agent Felt, I can't figure her out at all. She ex- presses zero sorrow for her sister. She's intelligent and sweet but half the things that come out of her mouth make no sense at all]

FELT: [I look forward to meeting her. But first, Bea's Chicken Inn, you say? Do you know I haven't had a bite since early this morning in Witchita?]

STERNBACH: [Then  you're in luck, Agent Felt,  homestyle  fried chicken is Bea's forte. When I heard you were coming I thought I would put Headwater's best foot forward]

When they went inside and were seated Sternbach  remarked  that the place was much less busy that it used to be on weeknights.

STERNBACH: [Coal was the mainstay of the town and that's drying up]

FELT: [I understand wartime meat rationing will probably  start in a month or two]

STERNBACH: [Places like this won't close up, but they'll have to collect ration cards from customers and put them all together to get resupplied. I suppose it'll be even less crowded then. In wartime our country actually becomes, always temporarily, thank God, a military dictatorship]

FELT: [All hands on deck. And you're right, we have a genius for flipping everything back to the way it was when the  crisis  is over]

The waitress came to take their order. She took the menus  but left the two silver half-dollar coins that had been on the table when the men were seated.

STERNBACH: [The people who ate at this table before us were from the Red Wing of the Church of Green Dome]

FELT: [How do you know that?]

The sheriff gestured at the two coins.

STERNBACH: [Those  half-dollars. They're dated 1942. The mint mark should be D for Denver, but they'll both be O because  the die was worn and nobody caught it in time]

Mark Felt  looked  closely at both  coins  and  confirmed  that Sternbach's guess was true.

FELT: [How strange. But what's the connection to the Red Wing?]

STERNBACH: [There's a fellow I know here who runs a pawn  shop, he brought  these to my attention. Normally a mint mark  of  O would  make these collectible. He looked into it and found  out the Denver Mint struck about a hundred of these  flawed  fifty- cent pieces before their quality control spotted the problem and halted the run. But thousands are circulating! Everywhere you go in this town you'll see them. They're always from folks in the Red Wing. Usually it's retirees living on social security. This old fellow gets a tube for his radio at the hardware store  and leaves some half-dollars. That old lady gets her hair done and leaves another little stack]

FELT: [Do you think somebody in Headwater is actually  counter- feiting coins? I don't really see the point to doing that]

STERNBACH: [Right. If you melt a silver half-dollar down all you get is a half-dollar's worth of raw silver bullion]

FELT: [But  pawn shop guy says the little O under  'In  God  We Trust' makes it collectible]

STERNBACH: [Sure, if there was only a hundred of them. There's tens of thousands of them now and they're breeding. I chalk it down  to  one of the many unexplained things  about  this  town. Here's another one: The Squaw River provides a steady supply of water  even  in drought years and geologists can't  explain  it. They can't even explain why the river runs all year long in nor- mal years]

FELT: [How odd]

STERNBACH: [But tell me about yourself, Agent Felt. Why did you choose to go into the FBI?]

FELT: [I have a law degree. I was leaning toward the intersec- tion of business and government, but the war intervened. So as with your coal miners my work dried up]

STERNBACH: [Your education was not criminal law?]

FELT: [Well, make no mistake, I was immersed in criminal law at Quantico. But the crimes that draw my attention don't happen in towns like Headwater. I want to go after spies]

The waitress arrived with their food so they stopped conversing for a time and ate while Mark Felt expressed  his  appreciation for the food with grunts and eyebrow gestures.

STERNBACH: [How many spies have you caught, Agent Felt?]

FELT: [None so far. I've only been with the Bureau for a year. Half of '42 was spent at the Academy and in DC, and for the rest of the  year I was in Texas in hot field  offices  interviewing references listed by applicants for government jobs]

STERNBACH: [Hardly  the exciting life of a g-man that  I  envi- sioned. But how's the pay?]

FELT: [About sixty a week]

STERNBACH: [Not shabby at all, Special Agent Felt]

FELT: [What is shabby is having to pick up and move  every  few months. My wife Audrey and I were in the middle of another move to DC so I could actually catch spies like I wanted, but I  got diverted here. The Director moves agents around just to toughen them up, as he puts it. That takes a toll he will never under- stand. He's a...confirmed bachelor, let us say]

At the station everyone donned gloves before Shoenherr's  knife holder was removed from the grocery bag. Photographs were taken from every angle. One blade was removed and photographed next to the tagged murder weapon for comparison.

The knife handles were not perfectly identical, but that was to be  expected  in a hand-crafted set. Everything was dusted  for fingerprints and  photographed once again. Then Felt began  to interrogate  the deputies as though he were some  pricey  Kansas City lawyer Shoenherr might retain.

FELT: [Are you sure this came from Mr. Shoenherr's house, Depu- ty?]

BOB: [I counted four stops after I got in the truck. There are three houses  between the Shoenherr place and where  I  crawled inside]

FELT: [But did you actually see that you were in front  of  his house?]

BOB: [No, sir, I was inside the truck]

Deputy Bill had also been out of sight.

BILL: [The driver of the garbage truck and the pick-up man both swear they saw Alfred Shoenherr throw this bag in his trash can just before they scooped it up]

Mark Felt looked simultaneously pleased and troubled.

FELT: [Sheriff  Sternbach,  I'm pleasantly  surprised  by  what you've managed to get so far, but I wonder if you see the glar- ing hole in our case?]

STERNBACH: [I do, Special Agent Felt]

BILL: [I can give you their names if you wish, Agent Felt. The trash men were deputized for this operation just like the Sher- iff told us to do. That gives them legal standing]

STERNBACH: [It also gives them elevated responsibility]

BOB: [If it's any help, right after stopping at  the  Shoenherr place the guy driving the truck immediately took me around  the corner and three blocks away to meet up with Bill out of sight. We had briefed them already. They both knew exactly what we were after. This bag came from the Shoenherr house, no doubt  about it]

That made Special Agent Felt relax a little bit.

FELT: [I think we're ready to see the local judge. We might have sufficient just cause to fingerprint Mr. and Mrs. Shoenherr]

The investigation  experienced the first headwinds  from  Judge Karl Porter when he refused to permit the sheriff to bring  the Shoenherrs to the station to be fingerprinted.

Undeterred, Felt then asked the Judge for permission  to  bring Robyn, the resident contacted by the sheriff at the home of the deceased, to the station for questioning. The judge allowed this but he mused aloud, from the den in his own home at 8 o'clock on a Sunday evening, that the case was becoming a fishing  expedi- tion.

If Special Agent Mark Felt was disappointed it didn't show.

FELT: [We'll visit the Shoenherrs tomorrow anyway. See if  you can bring  Robyn in tonight. I want to try to shake  something loose]

STERNBACH: [Do you want Bob and Bill to tag along?]

FELT: [No,  I need them to call the state capitol and  get  the number of Shoenherr's plates, then have them go up to the temple tomorrow morning and take photographs of his tire treads]

STERNBACH: [Oh,  we already have Shoenherr's plate  number. He doesn't think the wartime speed limit of 35 miles per hour  ap- plies to church officers]