Three days later, the Brandon letter about the New York bomb cell, mailed from a busy camera-free location in Baltimore, arrived at its destination, Maryland State Police Headquarters, ATTN: Deputy Superintendent of the Maryland State Police, Lieutenant Colonel Robert Terrell. LtCol Terrell, the officer-in-charge of the Maryland State Police Counter-Terrorist Task Force, sat at his desk drinking his first office coffee of the day, savoring what he hoped would be a routine day allowing him to attack his damn inbox. His hope shattered when Alicia walked in with his morning mail.

Rather than drop his mail on top of the overflowing inbox, as was her custom, Alicia handed him an envelope and said, “Colonel Terrell, I think you should look at this one.”

“And why should I do that? You screen my mail. Tell me about it.”

“No, you should read this one yourself. I think it may be too important for a simple ‘we will look into it’ note.”

“Okay. Okay. Give to me!” Terrell took the letter with the attached envelope and leaned back in his chair with his feet on the desk to read the letter his usually unflappable assistant thought he should see right away. Thirty seconds later he yelled out to Alicia to call the superintendent and tell him he was on his way to his office.

After reading the letter, the superintendent asked his deputy what he thought. Terrell said, “I can’t believe it! How could this guy know about the weapons we found, that a total of four shots had been fired from the weapons, identified the rifles, told us the positions of the bodies and that one was wearing glasses? No one outside of us and the Bureau knows all that. And how about the data on this so-called New York cell and their plan to explode two car bombs between the first and the fifteenth of May? He has given us the names, addresses and descriptions of the bombers. I know one thing. We cannot sit on this. It has got to go to the Bureau right now. Hell, it’s already the twenty-eighth of April.”

The superintendent said, “I agree. Call the head of the FBI task force and tell him we are coming right over, with a hot terrorist lead.”

So far no one had done anything to protect the letter or envelope for later forensic analysis, just as Kathy and Jack had hoped.

After the story about the hillside killings a few days before, there hadn’t been anything new in the media. This morning, however, the spokesperson for the Maryland State Police said they had been told by someone working in the restaurant about a white Jeep station wagon parked at the bottom of the lot about the time the police believed the activity took place. The police spokesperson asked the public to come forward with any information regarding the station wagon reported to be a 200l or 02 model seen anywhere in the general area of the shooting about 6:00 p.m. on Monday the 15th of April.

After the morning news anchor had moved on to other news, Jack said, “That’s the advantage large official organizations have in solving a crime. They have the resources to pick any number of loose strands and start the unraveling process. The Jeep will be a dead end because we took steps to keep any of the cars from being traced back to us. To quote my Dad, ‘no detail is too small for attention. Do not overlook any parts of your execution plan.’ Authorities can recover from mistakes. We cannot.”

Jack asked Kathy and Anita if they saw any loose ends.

Anita said, “The honest answer is I don’t know. I’m satisfied with our precautions at the restaurant. The Tilghman Island operation has the potential for more loose ends. We had a boat, a marina docking and the chance of a bystander reporting some of the action at the Morgan Marina, but our precautions were pretty good. All bills were paid in cash. All IDs were in various aliases. No brass was left on the scene. By the time all the firemen and police and gawkers walked all over the area, it is unlikely any footprints could be cast. It has not yet been designated a crime scene. When the Maryland cops identify the two dead shooters as Morgans from Tilghman Island, the Marina will be gone over with a fine tooth comb. Every day that goes by without identification is in our favor. You and I came back to the Zodiac through the marsh grass at the marina on a dead run. Footprints in soft soil are always a possibility. The boots we wore are long gone. In this business it is always dangerous to believe you are home free. In this case, I feel we are okay.”

***

Buy “Justice Beyond Law” on Amazon, as well as the rest of the Jack Brandon series and other books by Barry Kelly, a former CIA agent and adviser to President Reagan.