Special Agent

He had been a sniper on a SWAT team in Connecticut, and investigated white-collar crime and public corruption in Washington. He'd served on the director's security detail, and recruited new agents. He'd supervised the Syracuse, N.Y., office and was made an assistant special agent in charge of the Buffalo office, where he oversaw the investigation of the murder of a doctor who performed abortions. Back in Washington he oversaw background investigations of presidential appointees and became Mueller's special assistant. He went to Sacramento as the special agent in charge, and then in 2003 he became head of the Washington office, the country's second-largest field division, where he oversaw the corruption probe of Jack Abramoff and the anthrax investigation.

You could see it on their faces in the restaurant, the way the supervisors admired him, appreciated his openness, even when the news was hard.

One of the special agents looked over at Mason: "That man has it all," he said. "He's a dynamic leader. He's articulate, charismatic and intelligent. And isn't he a good-looking guy?"

'Fear Pressure'

Denver was more than another field office visit, though. Howard Mason, Mason's older brother, was living there. They had been close growing up, the big brother always looking out for the younger one, but now more than miles separated them. How had 16 years gone by without them seeing each other, seven without them talking? They had recently reconnected by e-mail and were still trying to figure out when to get together. It wasn't going to be easy this trip. Mason's schedule was tight. Besides, he knew his brother was not quite ready to see him. Still, he called when he hit town but couldn't reach Howard.

Michael Anthony Mason grew up in a three-bedroom brick house on the South Side of Chicago. His mother died of lupus when he was a baby. The children -- Howard, Jacquelynn (called "Lynn") and Michael -- were raised by their father, also named Howard, who worked as a truck driver for the board of education. He had lived through segregation and believed he was still being held back on his job by the color of his skin. When Mason was a teenager, his father remarried, bringing three more children into the house.

Mason's father was a disciplinarian who lectured about the importance of hard work, saving money and a good education. "He used to say, 'I don't want to hear about a teacher not liking you,' " Mason said. " 'Two plus two is four, even if your teacher hates you.'

"He certainly felt like being average was not going to help me out." Mason loved his father, who he said shaped his core.

He has worked since he was 13, pumping gas, bagging groceries, shoveling snow, cutting grass, washing cars, cleaning houses. The jobs helped pay for his braces and tuition to Catholic school.

"I always remember my brother working," said his sister Anita Mason Sledge, 43, who still lives in Chicago. "I never saw him just hanging out. . . . He was so focused, setting goals and going after those goals."

He was never tempted by peer pressure, because he had "fear pressure," Mason said.

"At the end of the day, I always knew I had to answer to my father."

His brother Howard, who is five years older than Mason, had to answer, too. And Howard said it was brutal. His father yelled at him, hit him, Howard and Lynn said, sometimes so badly that it left scars on his back. Once, when his father threw a butter knife and then a brick at the 10-year-old, Lynn held up a frying pan and threatened to hit their father. Mason was younger and, though he said he never saw such abuse, doesn't doubt his siblings' experience.