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Angels to have people killed, and he saw other messages between DPR and Carl (as Nob) that were,
curiously, encrypted and couldn’t be read.
“That’s strange,” Jared said to Tarbell. “You think Carl Force is trying to obstruct our
investigation?”
“No clue, but something doesn’t feel right.”
Still, they had bigger things to worry about than a petulant and possibly rogue DEA agent in
Baltimore. Jared spent the next few days with the FBI crew, working in lab 1A, delving through the
server, listening to Tarbell’s unrelenting jokes, and then ending the evenings at the Whiskey Tavern a
few blocks away, where Jared learned what pickle juice and cheap whiskey tasted like. As those
nights would come to an end and everyone else went home to their families, Jared would plod back to
his hotel room overlooking the sacred ground of the World Trade Center, and he would transform into
Cirrus, the online forum moderator on the Silk Road, and spend the evening undercover working as an
admin on the site.
A couple of days went by and Tarbell told Jared that “some guy from the IRS is swinging by
later . . . Gary Alford or something like that. . . . He wants to take a look at the server.”
“Sounds good,” Jared replied, then looked back at his computer as he continued chatting with the
Dread Pirate Roberts as Cirrus.
A few hours later Tarbell entered the lab with an African American man in his wake. “Jared, this
is Gary Alford from IRS,” Tarbell said. “Gary, this is Agent Der-Yeghiayan from HSI Chicago.”
Jared looked up at Gary, taking in his wide figure, and as he was about to say hello, Gary looked
back at Jared with confusion and frustration.
“Why does he get to bring his devices up here but I have to leave mine downstairs?” Gary asked
Tarbell.
Tarbell had no desire to explain that Jared was working on his computer undercover and simply
replied, “Different rules for different folks.” Gary didn’t like this answer and seemed even more
annoyed now than he had been a few seconds earlier.
Jared then watched Gary peer up at the butcher paper on the wall with the words “silk road”
written across the top. He was inspecting it, noticing all the Princess Bride jokes in the corner of the
page and the IP addresses sprinkled everywhere. Gary seemed to be even more annoyed when he saw
this, as if there was a party going on that he hadn’t been invited to.
Tarbell then introduced Gary to Thom Kiernan, the computer forensics expert, who said he
would help Gary dig through the Silk Road server. Tarbell then sat back down at the table in the
center of the room, unaware, or not caring, that Gary was crestfallen that he wasn’t involved in their
investigation.
In a sulky mood, Gary got to work searching for people laundering money and Bitcoins on the
Silk Road, but he kept looking over at Jared and Tarbell and then over at the big sheet of butcher
paper. Finally Gary spoke up again. He had also noticed the words “Momi Toby’s café” on Laguna
Street in San Francisco written under one of the IP addresses, and he asked what it was.
Tarbell, his head buried in his computer, explained that it was the one place that the Dread Pirate
Roberts had logged in to the server. The only clue they had tying DPR to a location.
“Huh,” Gary replied. “I have a guy in San Francisco.”
“Oh yeah?” Tarbell said nonchalantly. “You’ll have to give us his info.” Gary seemingly didn’t
like this answer, either. Jared watched this interaction take place, and he felt somewhat bad for Gary,