you will have everything you need. I ask only that you ensure this information makes it home to the American public.
Still, Laura felt anxious. On February 9, she wrote in her journal, “I still wonder if they are trying to entrap me … My work might get shut down by the government.”
Soon after making this entry, she gave me the go-ahead to ask my friend about receiving the package. I wrote back on February 12: “That first sink is definitely the cool one. You always want to go with stainless steel. I hate porcelain.”
A week later, Laura emailed: “Thanks for feedback re the sink … The architect will be sending me links to view things as we move forward. I’ll let you know as things progress and timing for doing a site visit. The co-op has been quiet. I hope it stays that way.”
There was occasional confusion as to whether we were discussing her mystery source or the actual renovation, which was still going on. In a few instances, I had to remind myself: sometimes a countertop is just a countertop.
On March 15, Laura emailed, “Things are moving along with the renovation. Still in the preliminary stages. I hope things escalate soon.” She was, in this case, definitely talking about her source.
Before long, the source followed up with Laura, sending her a pep talk of sorts. It read:
By understanding the mechanisms through which our privacy is violated, we can win here. We can guarantee for all people equal protection against unreasonable search through universal laws, but only if the technical community is willing to face the threat and commit to implementing over-engineered solutions. In the end, we must enforce a principle whereby the only way the powerful may enjoy privacy is when it is the same kind shared by the ordinary: one enforced by the laws of nature, rather than the policies of man.
I went back home to California for a few weeks, returning to New York on May 4. Still, nothing had come. Six days later, Laura wrote, “Quick update: My architect is sending some materials. Let me know when you get them.”
I responded: “Will they arrive in the next day or two? My friend who is interested in those plans because of her own remodel is out of town.”
My friend in Brooklyn had decamped to Los Angeles to report a magazine story. A few more email exchanges followed.
“I will know more when that friend gets home and settles in,” I wrote to Laura. “I can’t wait to hear about the design … hope it includes a window for lots of light!”
She replied: “I really hope he figured out a way around the co-op rules to do a window. Keep me posted — I’m really eager to see. If they are ready I’d like to get them so I can start reviewing Thursday. See you soon.”
To which I responded: “Yes, windows are good. We can never have too many in our lives.”
Jessica Bruder
Over the course of a decade and a half of friendship, Dale and I have shared all sorts of experiences. We’ve accidentally driven over a cow after midnight on the high plains of Colorado. We’ve cleared overgrown wilderness trails with chainsaws. We’ve extracted a rancher pinned against a tree by his own truck, and pruned branches from a thirty-year-old Douglas fir on Dale’s California property using a shotgun. (They had been blocking his ocean view.)
Dale and I often jokingly refer to ourselves as a platonic married couple. I was confident that there was nothing he couldn’t tell me. I was wrong.
In February 2013, I was hanging out at his apartment near the Columbia Journalism School, preparing to teach a class. Dale made a sudden request: could we put our cellphones in the refrigerator? At the time, that sounded nonsensical to me — like stashing our shoes in the broiler or our wallets in the microwave. We’d done stranger things, though. “Okay,” I said.
His next question: would I be willing to receive a package in the mail for one of his friends? He didn’t say whom the delivery was for or what it would contain. He just blurted something vague about “investigative journalism,” following up quickly with “it could be nothing.” I wouldn’t be able to ask any questions, he added. Could I handle that?
“Sure,” I said. “No problem.”
The package, he continued, would be labeled “architectural materials.” I should not open it. And we would never, ever speak about it over the phone — or even with our phones sitting nearby. Any mention of the shipment had to be in code.
“We’ll call it the ‘elk antlers,’” Dale said soberly. This was a reference to my dog Max’s favorite chew treats. Elk shed their antlers each year, and apparently there’s a small profit to be made by sawing the racks into bits and selling them to urban pet owners like me. Such deliveries arrived at my apartment regularly by mail.
I tried to keep a straight face. “So when it comes, I’ll tell you, ‘I’ve got the elk antlers.’ ”
“Exactly.”
This sounds like a bad spy movie, I thought. But how do you tell that to someone you ran over a cow with? I agreed to help — even though Dale sounded paranoid to me — because that’s what friends do. Frankly, it never even crossed my mind to turn him down. We retrieved our phones from the fridge. The day went back to normal.
For more than three months after that conversation, nothing happened. Before long I had forgotten about the whole thing, busy with my own writing and teaching.
Then, on May 14, I returned home to Brooklyn after spending a few days in Los Angeles for work. I climbed the stairs to the fourth-floor landing. In front of my door was a box.
That was weird. No one ever bothered to walk all the way up to the fourth floor. Packages usually arrived in a haphazard scatter in the foyer. Sometimes they didn’t stick around for long. In recent months, quite a few boxes had disappeared in a spate of thefts. Their contents included vitamins, an LED tent lantern, a pair of earbuds, the book To Save Everything, Click Here by Evgeny Morozov, and a packet of Magic Grow sponge-capsule safari animals. That last item was to entertain my journalism students. In class we discussed the serendipitous nature of reporting — how small leads grow unpredictably into larger stories — and I mentioned the little gelatin caplets I’d played with as child, dropping them in water and marveling as their contents expanded to reveal the shapes of wild creatures.
Those items weren’t the only things to go missing. Around the same time, my bicycle also got stolen. Someone nicked it from the boiler room in our basement. When I mentioned that to a neighbor, he told me several of his bikes had been taken too.
So it seemed remarkable that the thieves had turned up their noses at this new package. I knelt down to grab it. The words “architect mats encl’d” were scrawled in block letters on the front of the box. How long has this been sitting here? I wondered. After letting myself into the apartment, I took a closer look. Nothing about the package appeared unusual at first. It had been postmarked May 10 in Kunia, Hawaii, and sent via USPS Priority Mail. I shook the box gently, like a child guessing at the contents of a gift. Something inside made a clunking noise. Otherwise it gave up no secrets.
Then I noticed the return address:
What the fuck? I thought. Is this a joke? There was no way this package had come from the Army intelligence specialist turned whistleblower who’d used WikiLeaks to disseminate
