Murder at the Pentagon Page 10

  She’d made him angry. She wished she hadn’t.

  Margit left Bellis’s office and tried to sort out the conversation they’d had. His message, as veiled as it might have been, did not come as a surprise. Her years in the military had taught her many things, including the inescapable observation that there was an unstated but clearly defined animosity between the military and civilian sectors of society. Because much of the media was in the civilian camp, the Pentagon was viewed with considerable and consistent suspicion. Given a choice, the military preferred to keep its operations to itself, good and bad—particularly the bad. In the case of Joycelen’s murder—especially with the rumors that homosexuality might be at the root of it—it was natural that the military command would make every attempt to keep it “within the family.”

  Margit respected that, as she had from the beginning of her career in uniform. But there had to be exceptions. As she sat at her desk and pondered the morning’s activities, she became increasingly convinced that this should be one of them.

  Bellis acted quickly on her requests. In less than an hour a crew arrived and moved her to a small, private office directly across the hall from him. It was one of three rooms in a small suite; Margit would share with the other two occupants the services of a secretary who sat in an anteroom.

  As she was leaving her old office, she said pleasantly to Kraft, “Good news, Jay. Looks like you have your own place now. At least for a while.”

  He managed a weak smile and returned to the contracts on his desk. The hell with you, Margit thought as she scooped up the last remaining files and headed off to her new digs.

  At three that afternoon she received a call from a civilian, George Brown, who was in charge of the Defense Criminal Investigation Services’ Investigative Support Directorate. After introducing himself, he said, “I understand you need an investigator.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s correct.”

  “I spoke with Colonel Bellis a short while ago, and he outlined your needs. I can temp-duty one of our people over to you.”

  “That would be much appreciated, Mr. Brown. Will it be someone with a background in criminal investigation?”

  “Of course. Maybe not in the investigation of murder, but a trained person.”

  “Will this investigator be military or civilian?”

  “Military,” Brown answered.

  “When can I expect him?”

  “Might be a her.”

  “Doesn’t matter. When can I expect him—or her?”

  “It will take a few days. Let’s see, today is Thursday. We’ve got Labor Day coming up this weekend. How about next Wednesday?”

  Margit had hoped for help sooner, but realized that with the holiday weekend, not much would be accomplished anyway. “Fine,” she said.

  She was summoned to Bellis’s office at four.

  “Major, what do you think of the marines?” he asked. He now seemed in good humor.

  Margit laughed. “I’ve really never thought about it, sir.”

  “I’ve sprung a warrant officer from Quantico’s Legal Assistance Office for you. His name is Woosky, Peter Woosky. He does a lot of the routine legal work over there—wills, powers of attorney, that sort of thing. I’m sure he’ll be of help.”

  “Everything has moved so fast,” Margit said. “I received a call from Mr. Brown, who’s sending me an investigator on Wednesday.”

  “Good. How’s your new office?”

  “Fine, sir. Nice to have it to myself.”

  “Looks like you’ve got everything you need.”

  “Yes, I suppose I do.”

  “Good.” He paused. “A word of advice.”

  “Yes?”

  “Don’t get too involved with Cobol’s mother. I know the tendency is to want to go out and talk to everybody who ever knew Cobol, but that won’t help.”

  “I don’t think I understand, sir. If the evidence against him is as compelling as it seems to be, I’m going to have to depend, to a great extent, upon character witnesses, on people who, although they might not be helpful in the actual defense, could play a role in mitigating his sentence.”

  Bellis’s open good humor seemed to sour. He abruptly ended their meeting by standing and going to the door. “If Cobol is convicted of murdering Joycelen, there isn’t going to be much debate about his sentence.”

  Margit thanked him again for his help and returned to her office across the hall.

  The secretary she’d inherited handed her slips of paper. “You received these calls while you were out.” One was from Annabel Smith, who left the number of her Georgetown art gallery. The others were from offices within the Pentagon, including requests for interviews by reporters that the Information Office had collected.

  Margit ignored the interviews, returned the official calls, then reached Annabel.

  “Just thought you might like to use up the raincheck from last week,” Annabel said. “Mac and I are going out to dinner and wondered if you and Jeff could join us.”

  Margit immediately accepted the invitation for herself, and said she would try to reach Jeff. She’d spent enough time alone at night stewing over this new and problematic assignment. Until this day her energy level had been down. Now, for some reason, her batteries seemed fully charged, and the last thing she wanted to do was to hibernate in her BOQ. “One condition, though,” she told Annabel.

  “What’s that?”

  “No pizza.”

  “Deal. Mac was pushing for one of his favorite macho steak houses, but I convinced him lighter fare was more in keeping with the needs of our waistlines. Japanese okay?”

  “Sure.”

  “I’ll make a reservation for seven at Sushi-Ko, on Wisconsin. I’ll meet up with you and Mac there. I won’t be leaving the gallery until about that time. Table for four?”

  “I can’t promise Jeff will be there. Want me to call you back?”

  “No need. See you at seven.”

  Foxboro was out of the office when Margit called. She left her number and said she would be at it until six-thirty. He didn’t return the call, and she left the Pentagon disappointed. She was not at all pleased with the direction their relationship was taking, and knew that if she were going to get it back on track, it would take extra effort on her part. She also knew that wouldn’t be easy with the Cobol case facing her, but pledged to herself to find the time.

  “Will you at least think about it?” Margit asked Mac Smith as they left the restaurant.

  Smith looked at Annabel, who said, “We’d better get home. Rufus probably has his legs crossed.”

  “Just think about it. That’s all I ask,” Margit said.

  Annabel kissed her cheek. “Nice seeing you, Margit. Sorry Jeff couldn’t make it.”

  “It was a great evening. Thanks again.”

  As Smith went to the parking lot to bail out their car, Annabel said, “Margit, you aren’t serious, are you?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “He’s retired. He’s a professor.”

  It hadn’t occurred to Margit that Annabel would react negatively, and she wished she’d been more sensitive. “I hope I haven’t done something stupid tonight,” she said.

  Annabel shook her head. “No, nothing stupid. Mac is like any man his age who falls asleep each night pitching in the crucial game of a World Series, or throwing the winning touchdown in the Super Bowl. There he is, called back into action in middle age, the team’s only hope, relying on his cunning and experience to overcome a weak arm. And of course he wins the game in the final seconds.”

  Margit couldn’t help laughing. “How nice to fall asleep with visions like that.”

  “I agree. As long as they happen in bed. I just hate to see him tempted to get involved again in controversial cases. He did it when Senator Ewald’s aide was murdered at the Kennedy Center, and again last year at the National Cathedral when our friend Reverend Singletary was found murdered in a chapel.” She shrugged. “I know I’m being selfish when I
try to control him this way. It’s just that I like him as a professor.”

  “I understand,” said Margit.

  Smith pulled up and opened the door for Annabel. As she slid into the passenger seat, she winked at Margit and said in a stage whisper, “I’ll get him to think about it.”

  12

  “Thank you, Lieutenant, but I won’t need you today,” Margit told Lanning the following morning.

  “But I was told to drive you.”

  “I think you misunderstood the order,” Margit said. “You were told to be at my disposal should I need transportation. I don’t. Please close the door after you.” Dejectedly, he backed out of her office.

  She opened a recently revised telephone directory for the Central Intelligence Agency and turned to the R pages. There were two Reichs, neither a major. She called the Central Personnel Locator number, identified herself, and asked for Major Reich. “No Major Reich listed,” she was told.

  She hung up and made a note to ask Cobol for more details about this superior who, according to Cobol, had bent the rules on his behalf.

  Next, she opened a folder in which she’d collected newspaper accounts of the Joycelen murder. There had been something in the press every day; once she’d been assigned to defend his accused murderer, Margit tried to keep up with the clips. She made another note to have the assistant she’d inherit on Wednesday conduct a more thorough search.

  She removed one clipping from the file and read it again. It consisted, in part, of an interview with Joycelen’s fiancée, Christa Wren. Ms. Wren said she was devastated by the sudden death of the man she was to marry, and that he was the finest, brightest man she’d ever known. She said that although it could never replace him in her life, there was some small satisfaction in knowing his murderer had been apprehended. Her final comment was in response to the interviewer’s question about rumors that Joycelen was homosexual. “Utterly ridiculous! Absurd!” Christa had replied.

  Margit opened a city phone directory and looked up Wren. There was one—C. Wren. Her address was a new apartment building in the recently completed and fashionable Washington Harbour complex, on Georgetown’s waterfront.

  Margit had been thinking about contacting Christa Wren from the moment she’d got up that morning. She knew she should include her on a list of people to be interviewed by her investigator, but felt compelled to make the call herself—and to do it today. If nothing else, it would give her a sense of having actually begun the process of defending Cobol. And because she’d met Christa Wren at the picnic, however briefly, it made her feel as though she knew this woman.

  Her phone rang a half-dozen times before she picked up.

  “Ms. Wren, this is Major Falk. I’ve been assigned to defend Dr. Joycelen’s alleged killer, Captain Robert Cobol.”

  Christa Wren said nothing.

  Margit continued. “I met you at the picnic the morning of his death. Maybe you remember me.”

  “What do you want?” Wren asked.

  “I’m not sure I want anything. I do, of course, extend my condolences. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you.” The two simple words were delivered icily.

  “Ms. Wren, I know this will be difficult, but I would like a chance to meet with you.”

  “To help you defend the man who killed my fiancé?”

  “Yes, I suppose that is the purpose. As distasteful as it may seem, Captain Cobol, like any other accused criminal, is entitled to a proper defense. I did not choose this assignment. I was ordered to defend him, and I follow orders.”

  Wren let out a rueful laugh. “How very military. You want to speak with me, interview me about Dick?”

  “Yes.” Margit considered saying that an investigator might conduct the interview, but she decided to keep the option open.

  Christa said, “Sure, why not? If you come in the morning, I’ll serve tea. Any time after noon the bar is open. I’ve been making good use of it lately.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Wren. I’ll get back to you.”

  Later that morning, as Margit prepared to leave for National Airport to pick up Flo Cobol, she was summoned to Colonel Bellis’s office. “How goes it?” he asked.

  “I’m not really sure. I’m on my way to pick up Cobol’s mother at the airport and take her to see him.”

  “Sure you want to do that?”

  “Yes, sir. Why wouldn’t I?”

  Bellis, who was in shirtsleeves with cuffs rolled up, raised his hands into the air. “It just seems to me that you should be busy enough without interviewing people yourself. That’s why I acted quickly on your request for an assistant and an investigator.”

  “And I appreciate that, Colonel Bellis. I’m sure once the list of people to be interviewed grows, I’ll be happy not to be doing it myself. But, in this case, I feel it would be helpful for me to know more about Captain Cobol’s family and early life.”

  “Suit yourself, Major Falk, but don’t get trapped into too personal an involvement with this. I know you don’t have a great deal of experience as an attorney, so take it from this warhorse. Approach it the way doctors do with patients they’re about to cut open. Do your best professional job, but keep a distance.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind, sir, and I appreciate the advice.”

  He laughed gently. “I hate to admit it, Major, but I’m developing a sort of fatherly interest in you.”

  “Fatherly …? I’m flattered.”

  “I’m getting old, I suppose. I took another look at your service record. Damned impressive. I like the mix, chopper pilot, lawyer. Commendations from the Panama exercise. Your father was career military.”

  “Yes, he was.”

  “I don’t want to see you take any missteps to sully that fine record.” She started to ask him to be more specific, but he waved her off. “Let me finish. Assignment to the Pentagon carries with it a whole set of potential pitfalls that you don’t run into out in the field. Missions are pretty straightforward out there. Not here. This is Washington, D.C. Right across the river are the elected officials who pretty much determine what we can and can’t do, mostly because they pull the purse strings. Assignment to the Pentagon is considered a privilege, as you know. It can help an officer’s career. It can also sink one.”

  Margit listened carefully. He wasn’t giving her the standard inspirational lecture. He was delivering a message. What was it? Whom for? Should she ask? No. That would be accusatory.

  “Captain Cobol deserves a good defense,” Bellis said in a tone that indicated he was ending the conversation. “But he’s only part of a messy situation. Joycelen was important. Controversial. Keep that in mind.”

  “I’ll certainly try, sir. I have to admit that I’m not quite sure what you …”

  “What about that woman who was supposed to have been Joycelen’s fiancée?”

  Margit’s eyebrows went up. “I was just reading an interview a reporter did with her,” she said.

  “I’ve read some of those. I suppose she’ll be on your interview list.”

  “Yes.”

  “And I’m sure whatever investigator sent you by DCI will take care of that interview.”

  Was he telling her that she was not to interview Christa Wren? Should she take his previous comments about Flo Cobol to mean the same thing? She didn’t ask for clarification because she didn’t want to hear an order prohibiting her from doing what she’d already set in motion. As long as she wasn’t specifically told not to talk to Mrs. Cobol and Christa Wren, she could justify doing it, at least in her own mind.

  “Is that all, sir?” she asked.

  “Yes. I’d like to touch base with you on a regular basis. I thought a brief meeting every morning would make sense, and one at the end of the day. That okay with you?”

  “Of course.” She didn’t like the idea of a strict schedule of meetings, but it wasn’t her decision to make.

  “Check back with me after you’ve met with Cobol and his mother.”

  “I’
m not sure how long I’ll be with them,” Margit said.

  “I’ll be here all afternoon.”

  Although Margit had never met Mrs. Cobol, she knew her the minute she came through the door from the Delta shuttle. Margit’s first thought—and it certainly wasn’t meant to be flippant—was that she looked like a typecast mother from a TV situation comedy. She was a tall, plain woman with thin, mouse-brown hair. She was dressed in her threadbare finery, wore wire-rimmed glasses, and carried a small bag.

  Flo spotted Margit, who’d said she’d be wearing a tan summer air-force uniform, but approached as though unsure whether she should. Margit closed the gap. “Mrs. Cobol, I’m Margit Falk.”

  “Yes. I saw you. I saw the uniform.” A tic in her left eye confirmed her nervousness.

  Margit made small talk as they walked through the terminal: Had the flight been bumpy?; it seemed to be on time; was it full? Anything to avoid silence. When they were in the car, Margit said, “Mrs. Cobol, I know how difficult this is for you. I’m sorry you were not able to see Robert until now.”

  “I didn’t understand why. I thought …”

  “You were right in thinking you should have been able to. You’ll be free to see him on a regular basis now.”

  “I don’t know how long I can stay.”

  “Did you book a hotel?”

  “No. I thought—I mean, I thought maybe I would just go home.”

  “Let’s play that by ear. I would like to have time with you after you’ve seen Robert. Is that all right with you?”

  Flo nodded, and Margit headed for Fort McNair.

  This time they did not meet in a tastefully furnished office. Cobol was led into a bare-bones, bilge-green interview room that contained a table and four wooden chairs. A small window in the door allowed a military policeman to watch, but presumably not to hear.

  Robert Cobol looked at his mother, slowly shook his head and gazed down at the floor. “I’ll leave you alone for a while,” Margit said. “A half hour?” She told the guard she would be in Trial Defense Service’s offices.