Seven Silent Men (14 page)

Whatever the dismay Strom Sunstrom, Cub Hennessy, Jez Jessup, Butch Cody, Happy de Camp, Ted Keon and Yates may have registered at learning they had underestimated the largest cash theft in history by approximately thirty million, nine hundred and ninety-three thousand, five hundred dollars was instantly eradicated by a deluge of telephone calls. Phone calls from Prairie Port FBI agents away from the office trying to find out what was coming down. Calls from local media people and national media people and city officials and county officials and state officials and federal officials and law-enforcement agencies across the Midwest, except for the Prairie Port Police Department, which eschewed the Bureau in general and the local office in particular. From professional tipsters and cranks and well-meaning citizens who thought they possessed relevant information regarding the crime. From seers and mystics who had no doubt they possessed relevant information. From amateur sleuths and waiting posses such as the Agatha Christie Garden and Deduction Society of Armbruster, Illinois, and the Covington Vigilant Riding Association of Covington, Kansas. From family and friends. From the masses of unknown curious. Twenty-eight hundred calls in all, before the day would be out, at an office which had never recorded more than one hundred and ten calls in any twenty-four-hour period.

Assistant senior resident agent John Sunstrom and his six shirt-sleeved subordinate agents, with their switchboard gone haywire, rushed from room to room and ringing phone to ringing phone trying to keep up with the incoming traffic blitz … not noticing in their scramble that a prophetic pattern of mud and the river and exploitation had begun to emerge. The fifth call into the office, logged by Cub Hennessy, was from an overwrought local druggist who requested the FBI come quickly because two mud geysers had just erupted through the sidewalk and street in front of his shop and he had no doubt the robbers were trapped below and up to no good. Ted Keon took and recorded the eleventh call, a tip from a Wayne County farmer with a “talking” mule, a beast which reputedly could tap out messages with its front left hoof and had just let it be known, tappingly, that the missing robbers were hiding on a Mississippi River delta island sixty-one and three-quarter miles downstream from Prairie Port. Butch Cody was recipient of the first “breather” call, number twenty-three, from a whispering voice which identified itself as “TA” and offered, for one million dollars in unmarked paper currency, to name every one of the actual robbers. TA allowed twenty-four hours for his offer to be considered and then hung up. Callers six, nine and fifteen each complained of home electrical power failures and were referred to the Missouri Power and Electric Company by exasperated agents who coded the messages “irrelevant” to Bureau business until Jez Jessup received the second mud alert, call number twenty-eight from the assistant deputy commissioner of the Prairie Port Fire Department, warning that the massive underground flooding not only had caused severe electrical short-circuiting and power failures but had activated a long-dormant mud river under the western section of the city … that three square miles of land in the western section was besieged by mud eruptions and the area was being cordoned off and evacuation procedures were under way … that at least two city councilmen thought the flooding and mud eruptions might be the result of international sabotage and terrorism and that these two council members would like the FBI to drop everything and immediately look into the matter. Cub Hennessy handled call number thirty, a reputed Mississippi River tour-boat captain who wanted to know if any of the missing millions had spilled into the river … and where. Strom took the thirty-third call, spoke to a St. Louis manufacturer of novelties who inquired as to a franchise for official robbery T-shirts. Butch Cody picked up on caller thirty-six, a hydrologist named St. Ives from the Missouri Valley Geological Survey who said the assistant deputy commissioner of the Prairie Port Fire Department had gotten his facts about the mud jumbled, then went on to explain that the geysering of mud in the three-square-mile area in the western section of the city was certainly caused by a subterranean mud river, but that the real danger was that this river was trapped and building up pressure at an enormous rate … that if this pressure wasn't substantially eased, by yet undetermined means, a mud volcano could rapidly form and erupt with enormous force as had been the case in that area in 1926 … that in 1926 thirty-one people had died in the earthquake effect accompanying the volcano explosions. It was call number forty-one, however, taken by Ted Keon, which was to prove pivotal to the career of John Sunstrom … and to the fate of his resident agents.

Following his conversation with the St. Louis T-shirt maker, John Sunstrom went out into the tiny anteroom and confronted a crunch of thirty-odd reporters, press photographers and TV cameramen. The soft-spoken and forthright Sunstrom stated that he had no official comment other than “no comment” and that, in fact, he hadn't yet been able to get through to Washington headquarters. It was at this juncture Ted Keon emerged from the inner offices and, leaving the door behind him open, forced his way forward through the crowd. Keon whispered something into Sunstrom's ear. Sunstrom politely excused himself from the gathering, kept apace as the fast-stepping Keon led the way back into the inner offices and onto a receiver lying off the hook and picked up and handed him the receiver.

“… Agent Sunstrom,” Sunstrom said into the phone.

“Sir,” an eminently familiar voice began, “this is J. Edgar Hoover speaking to you from Washington, District of Columbia. Why have you kept me waiting?”

“I'm sorry, Mister Director—”

“Look at your watch, sir. What time do you show?”

Studying his wristwatch, Sunstrom said, “Nine-fifty-one
A
.
M
., Mister Director.”

“Sir, are you aware we began to teletype orders through to you twenty-six minutes ago and received no response?”

“Our teletype machine is broken, Mister Director.”

“Then fix it.”

“Yes, Mister Director.”

“Are you, sir, further aware that I have been personally attempting to reach you by telephone for exactly seventeen minutes now and that your lines have been busy?”

“Mister Director, I was aware our telephones were busy but not that you were trying to reach us.”

“Repeat after me: Romor 91-22535!”

“Romor 91-22535?”

“Effective this moment,” Edgar Hoover proclaimed, “the code name for the investigation of the Mormon State National Bank theft is Romor … Robbery-Mormon State. The case number is 91-22535. You know what 91 stands for, do you, sir?”

“Yes, Mister Director.”

“What?”

“It's the prefix designation for bank robbery.”

“
Federal
bank robbery, sir.”

“… Federal bank robbery, Mister Director.”

“91-22535 … the twenty-two thousandth, five hundredth and thirty-fifth case to be investigated by the FBI since the enactment of the Federal Bank Act of 1934. And it is your case, sir. Yours and the men of your command. Romor 91-22535! It has a good ring to it. Make us proud of it, sir. Please stand.” Aftera moment Edgar asked, “Are you standing?”

Sunstrom, who had never sat down in taking the call, told him, “I am standing, Mister Director.”

“All that I am about to say is binding and irrefutable,” J. Edgar Hoover told him. “Effective this moment, Edward A. Grafton is relieved as senior resident agent for the Prairie Port office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. You, Mister John L. C. Sunstrom III, effective this moment, will replace Mister Grafton in his role as senior resident agent and assume all responsibilities inherent in that position. This promotion is temporary. Nonetheless, your expense remunerations will be adjusted upward upon receipt of proper vouchers. Your previous position as assistant senior resident agent will forthwith be filled, also on a temporary basis, by Mister Harold H. Hennessy. You will please inform Mister Hennessy of his good fortune and instruct as to his new duties. You are free to assign to Romor 91-22535 whomever you wish as supervisor and case agent. You and your men will, as of this moment, desist in referring to the investigation of the theft at Mormon State as anything but Romor 91-22535. Effective this moment, you and you alone, Mister Sunstrom, are in charge of Romor 91-22535. How does that strike you?”

“… It strikes me very positively, Mister Director.”

“Assistance is en route for deployment at your discretion. Thirty agents and support personnel. Prepare for them and disregard expense. Denis Corticun will arrive to assist you in any manner you so deem. He will tend to the additional personnel for you. I have suggested to Denis Corticun that he create a flying squad to answer directly and only to you. How does a flying squad strike you?”

“Very positively, Mister Director.” Strom had no idea what was meant by a flying squad.

“That broken teletype machine of yours, how old is it?”

“I'll find out, Mister Director.”

“Bother not, bother not. You shall have new machines. New whatever you need. You will turn the full skills and attention of your personnel to recouping the stolen monies and bringing to justice the insidious perpetrators of this momentous incursion. God be with you. God be with your men—what's all that clatter in the background?”

“The telephones, Mister Director. They haven't stopped ringing since your speech.”

“It was quite a speech, wasn't it?”

“Indeed, Mister Director.”

“… I don't know you, sir, but I like you.”

J. Edgar Hoover hung up.

… John Sunstrom, in the fall of 1960, was accepted by the FBI and sent to the Bureau's training academy on the grounds of the United States Marine Corps base at Quantico, Virginia. The recently widowed southern aristocrat had just turned thirty-five. Although the maximum age for acceptance into the FBI was forty-one, Sunstrom was considerably older than his academy classmates and was called Pappy by them. The moniker was short-lived. John's skill in investigatory and administrative matters, as well as his relaxed and gentlemanly and winning manner with co-workers and the public, first at the Minneapolis, Minnesota, field office and later at New Orleans, earned him the affectionate nickname of Strom. It also won him a transfer to Washington headquarters, where he began training for a supervisory position. Except for being slightly too old, Strom Sunstrom was all the FBI could hope for in a prospective special agent in charge at some field office. The FBI, in turn, had proved to be all Strom had hoped for and more … an endless string of challenges he could rise to … an enveloping, all-inclusive way of life … an escape from his long-grieved-over ghosts, memories of his first wife. He was happier than he had been in a long time.

On December 17, 1965, Strom Sunstrom married his dead wife's younger sister. She was twenty-three years old to the day, a graduate student of design, ravishingly beautiful and a virgin. He was forty, prematurely silver gray, in his second year of duty at FBI headquarters and anticipatory about sleeping with his bride. Their wedding night he was overwhelmed. She was, in bed, an extraordinary lover. He had never been so gratified, so free.

The marriage proved an instant asset. This sleek, dark-haired beauty and her tall, elegant, Lincolnesque husband made a charming and striking couple in a place where charm and appearance counted mightily. On July 1, 1967, a year earlier than most agents of equal experience would have been given such an assignment, Strom Sunstrom was made assistant special agent in charge of the Denver, Colorado, field office of the FBI. He and his wife, in their low-keyed, mellow manner, won the hearts of all whom they encountered. He became the official area spokesman for the Bureau. She was asked to speak on the women's club circuit. They entertained often and well. They were, briefly, a golden couple. FBI golden.

But John, secretly, longed for action … the challenge of field investigation. His wife sensed something was wrong, coaxed him into admitting he may have made a mistake becoming an administrator. Given his druthers, he confessed to her, he would revert to being a brick agent who could get out into the field and work cases instead of sitting in an office pushing pencils and practicing speeches. She urged him to resign as assistant special agent in charge. He cautioned it wasn't all that simple. Told her such a resignation could be taken as a betrayal by Bureau superiors who had championed his promotion. He warned he might be banished to some hellhole like Detroit or Butte, Montana. She chided him for believing such goosey-gander rumors as FBI retaliation, insisted the Bureau and Director Hoover were too noble for such pettiness … said if he would be happier in Detroit or Butte, she would be. So he requested of headquarters they reduce him in grade back to brick agent.

Punishment was swift.

Had Strom been alone, the retribution might not have been so vexing, but his wife insisted on accompanying him on each leg of the journey. Aside from Detroit and Butte, three other FBI offices, according to general agent consensus, qualified as bona fide “Siberias,” places of exile and often oafish and unpredictable SACs. He was first sent to Maine, arrived during a midwinter blizzard to find no one was, expecting him. When written orders did catch up, his demotion wasn't mentioned and he stayed on as assistant SAC during the balance of the winter, living with his wife in a rented suite of rooms. Costly rooms due to the number of expensive ski resorts in the area. The couple leased a house and, with the first break of spring, sent for their furniture. No sooner had the furniture arrived and the house been redecorated than Strom was sent to the FBI office at Brownsville, Texas. The transfer order reduced him in rank back down to a brick agent. The Sunstroms again trucked their furniture to storage, this time at their own expense, and abandoned the Maine house with nine months left on the lease.