BY SIX THIRTY A.M., THE OLD ABANDONED FARM WAS A FULL-BLOWN federal crime scene, and it was lit up like Nationals stadium on a game night. The tension was unbelievable. I could see it on every face. I’m sure the others could see it on mine.
A military excavation crew had been driven up from Fort Detrick. Peter Lindley sent a team from the Crisis Management Unit in DC to supervise the logistics, including security.
Even the Frederick County Sheriff’s department was kept out on the road. And word was that the Bureau director himself, Ron Burns, was on his way to the scene. I didn’t doubt it for a second. I wondered if the president or First Lady would come here. I hoped not, for their sakes.
The toughest part was not knowing what to expect. Nobody was calling this a recovery mission yet, but no one was calling it a rescue, either. The feeling on the farm was incredibly intense. I’ve never seen such a huge operation get under way so quietly, and with so much mystery.
After a fast consult with an engineering unit from Quantico, it was decided that all the digging would be done by hand. There was a rotating auger and mini excavator parked in the yard, but this root cellar was a complete question mark. We couldn’t risk the machinery, or the vibrations it would cause.
Three soldiers in fatigues and headlamps got right to it. They worked with sawed-off shovels, taking shallow scoops as quickly and as carefully as possible.
Even the soil itself had to be loaded out, bucket by bucket, for transport to the Bureau’s forensics lab.
Ned, Sampson, and I split up. John helped haul equipment at first, and then dirt, as the digging got under way. Mahoney ran interference on Rodney Glass, who was sleeping off the last of his scopolamine in the back of a Bureau car. As for what Glass would say, or even remember, when he woke up, I couldn’t be bothered right now. I had other things on my mind.
I spent my time with two of the Bureau’s witness-victim specialists, Agents Wardrip and Daya. Both of them had extensive backgrounds in child and trauma psychology and knew a great deal about the impact that something like this could have on a kid. Survival was just the beginning.
I told them everything I knew about the case, but it was a tough conversation. We needed to be ready for the best and worst possible outcomes at the same time. The longer this went on, the harder it was to stay optimistic.
But then around seven thirty, everything changed.
I was outside with Wardrip and Daya when word started circulating that the crew had found something. We dropped everything and ran inside.
As I came to the edge of the stall, I saw one of the three soldiers, up to his waist in the hole. He was conferring with the special agent in charge from DC, while the other two were crouched down under the floorboards, furiously pulling dirt away from one side with their hands.
So far, the digging had exposed only an old stone and mortar wall under the barn. But now they’d come to a wooden frame of some kind, and beneath that, the beginnings of a steel panel. Or maybe a door.
I could hear the first soldier talking with the SAC now. He was excited, and his voice carried above all the other chatter around me.
“Sir, I don’t think we’ve been digging out the root cellar all this time,” he said. “I think we just found it!”