"We can't prove that this cartridge case belongs to the bullet I found in Deborah Harvey's lumbar spine, and won't be able to do so unless we recover the pistol," I reminded her. "We can't even say with certainty it's from a Hydra-Shok cartridge. A11 we know is it's nine-millimeter, Federal.
"True. But Federal holds the patent for Hydra-Shok ammunition, has since the late eighties. For whatever that's worth. " "Does Federal sell Hydra-Shok bullets for reloading?" I asked.
"That's the problem. No. Only the cartridges are, available on the market. But that doesn't mean someone couldn't get hold of the bullets in some other way. Steal them from the factory, have a contact who steals them from the factory. I could get them, for example, if I claimed I were working on a special project. Who knows?"
She retrieved a can of Diet Coke from her desk, adding, nothing much surprises me anymore."
"Is Marino aware of what you found?"
"I called him."
"Thank you, Linda," I said, getting up, and I was formulating my own theory, which was quite different from hers and, unfortunately, more probable. Just the thought of it made me furious. In my office I snatched up the phone and dialed Marino's pager number. He returned my call almost immediately.
"The little fuckhead," he said right off.
"Who? Linda?"
I asked, startled.
"Morrell, that's who. The lying son of a bitch. Just got off the phone with him. Said he didn't know what I was talking about until I accused him of stealing evidence for reloads - asked him if he was stealing guns and live ammo, too. Said I'd have his ass investigated by Internal Affairs. Then he started singing."
"He etched his initials in the cartridge case and left it out there deliberately, didn't he, Marino?"
"Oh, yeah. They found the goddam cartridge case last week. The real one. Then the asshole leaves this goddam plant, starts whining that he was just doing what the FBI told him to do."
"Where is the real cartridge case?"
I demanded, blood pounding in my temples.
"The FBI lab's got it. You and yours truly spent an entire afternoon in the woods, and guess what, Doc? The whole goddam time we was being watched. The place is under physical surveillance. Just a damn good thing neither one of us wandered behind a bush to take a piss, right?"
"Have you talked to Benton?"
"Hell, no. As far as I'm concerned, he can screw himself."
Marino slammed down the receiver.
9
There was something reassuring about the Globe and Laurel that made me feel safe. Brick, with simple lines and not a hint of ostentation, the restaurant occupied a sliver of northern Virginia real estate in Triangle, near the U.S. Marine Corps base. The narrow strip of lawn in front was always tidy, boxwoods neatly pruned, the parking lot orderly, every car within the painted bound allotted space.
Semper Fidelis was over the door, and stepping inside I was welcomed by the cream of the "always faithful" crop: police chiefs, four-star generals, secretaries of defense, directors of the FBI and CIA, the photographs so apes of its familiar to me that the men sternly smiling in them seemed a host of long-lost friends. Maj. Jim Yancey whose bronzed combat boots from Vietnam were on top of the piano across from the bar, strode across recd: Highland tartan carpet and intercepted me.
"Dr. Scarpetta," he said, grinning as he shook my hand. "I was afraid you didn't like the food when last you were here, and that's why you waited so long come back."
The major's casual attire of turtleneck sweater a corduroy trousers could not camouflage his former profession. He was as military as a campaign hat, posture proudly straight, not an ounce of fat, white hair in a buzz cut. Past retirement age, he still looked fit enough for combat, and it wasn't hard for me to imagine him bumping over rugged terrain in a Jeep or eating rations from a can in the jungle while monsoon rains hammer down.
"I've never had a bad meal here, and you know it," I said warmly.
"You're looking for Benton, and he's looking for you. The old boy's around there" - he pointed - "in his usual foxhole."
"Thank you, Jim. I know the way. And it's so good see you again."
He winked at me and returned to the bar.
It was Mark who had introduced me to Major Yancey's restaurant when I drove to Quantico two weekend every month to see him. As I walked beneath a ceiling covered with police patches and passed displays of old Corps memorabilia, recollections tugged at my heart. I could pick out the tables where Mark and I had sat, and it seemed odd to see strangers there now, engaged in their own private conversations. I had not been to the Globe in almost a year.
Leaving the main dining room, I headed for a more secluded section where Wesley was waiting for me in his "foxhole," a corner table before a window with red draperies. He was sipping a drink and did not smile as we greeted each other formally. A waiter in a black tuxedo appeared to take my drink order.
Wesley looked up at me with eyes as impenetrable as a bank vault, and I responded in kind. He had signaled the first round, and we were going to come out swinging.
"I am very concerned that we're having a problem with communication, Kay," he began.
"My sentiments exactly," I said with the iron-hard calm I had perfected on the witness stand. "I, too, am concerned by our problem with communication. Is the Bureau tapping my phone, tailing me as well? I hope whoever was hiding in the woods got good photographs of Marino and me."
Wesley said just as calmly, "You, personally, are not under surveillance. The wooded area where you and Marino were spotted yesterday afternoon is under surveillance."
"Perhaps if you had kept me informed," I said, holding in my anger, "I might have told you in advance when Marino and I had decided to go back out there."
"It never occurred to me you might."
"I routinely pay retrospective visits to scenes. You've worked with me long enough to be aware of that."
"My mistake. But now you know. And I would prefer that you not go back out there again."
"I have no plans to do so," I said testily. "But should the need arise, I will be happy to give you advance warning. Might as well, since you'll find out anyway. And I certainly don't need to waste my time picking up evidence that has been planted by your agents or the police."
"Kay," he said in a softer tone, "I'm not trying interfere with your job."
"I'm being lied to, Benton. I'm told no cartridge case was recovered from the scene, only to discover it was receipted to the Bureau's laboratory more than a week ago."
"When we decided to set up surveillance, we didn't want word of it to leak," he said. "The fewer people told about what we were up to the better."
"Obviously, you must be assuming the killer might return to the scene."
"It's a possibility."
"Did you entertain this possibility with the first four cases?"
"It's different this time."
"Why?"
"Because he left evidence, and he knows it."
"If he were so worried about the cartridge case, he had had plenty of time to go back and look for it last
fall." I said.
"He may not know we would figure out Deborah Harvey was shot, that a Hydra-Shok bullet would be recovered from her body."
"I don't believe the individual we're dealing wig is stupid," I said.
The waiter returned with my Scotch and soda.
Wesley went on, "The cartridge case you recovered was planted. I won't deny that. And yes, you and Marino walked into an area under physical surveillance. There were two men hiding in the woods. They saw everything the two of you did, including picking up the cartridge case. Had you not called me, I would have called you."
"I'd like to think you would have."
"I would have explained. Would have had no choice, really, because you inadvertently upset the apple cart. And you're right."
He reached for his drink. "I should have let you know in advance; then none of this would have happened and we wouldn't have been
forced to call things off, or better put, postpone them."
"What have you postponed, exactly?"
"Had you and Marino not stumbled upon what we were doing, tomorrow morning's news would have carried a story targeted at the killer."
He paused. "Disinformation to draw him out, make him worry. The story will run, but not until Monday."
"And the point of it?" I asked.
"We want him to think that something turned up during the examination of the bodies. Something to make us believe he left important evidence at the scene.
Alleged this, alleged that, with plenty of denials and no comments from the police. All of it intended to imply that whatever this evidence is, we've had no luck finding it yet. The killer knows he left a cartridge case out there. If he gets sufficiently paranoid and returns to look for it we'll be waiting, watching him pick up the one we planted, get it on film, and then grab him."
"The cartridge case is worthless unless you have him and the gun. Why would he risk returning to the scene, especially if it appears that the police are busy looking around out there for this evidence?"
I wanted "He may be worried about a lot of things, because he lost control of the situation. Had to have, or it would not have been necessary to shoot Deborah in the back. It might not have been necessary to shoot her at all. It appears he murdered Cheney without using a gun. How does he know what we're really looking for, Kay? Maybe it's cartridge case. Maybe it's something else. He isn't going be certain about the exact condition of the bodies when they were found. We don't know what he did to the couple and he doesn't really know what you may have discovered while doing the autopsies. And he might not go back out there the day after the story runs, but he might try it week or two later if everything seems quiet."
"I doubt your disinformation tactic will work," I said.
"Nothing ventured, nothing gained. The killer evidence. We'd be foolish not to act on that."
The opening was too wide for me to resist walking through it. "And have you acted on evidence found in the first four cases, Benton? It's my understanding that a jack of hearts was recovered inside each of the vehicles.
A detail you apparently have worked very hard to suppress."
"Who told you this?"
he asked, the expression on his face unchanged. He did not even look surprised.
"Is it true?"
"Yes."
"And did you find a card in the Harvey-Cheney case?"
Wesley stared off across the room, nodding at the waiter. "I recommend the filet mignon."
He opened his menu. "That or the lamb chops."
I placed my order as my heart pounded. I lit a cigarette, unable to relax, my mind frenetically groping for a way to break through.
"You didn't answer my question."
"I don't see how it is relevant to your role in the investigation," he said.
"The police waited hours before calling me to the scene. The bodies had been moved, tampered with, by the time I got there. I'm being stonewalled by investigators, you've asked me to indefinitely pend the cause and manner of Fred's and Deborah's deaths. Meanwhile, Pat Harvey is threatening to get a court order because I won't release my findings."
I paused. He remained unflappable.
"Finally," I concluded, my words beginning to bite, "I make a retrospective visit to a scene without knowing it's under surveillance or that the evidence I collected was planted. And you don't think the details of these cases are relevant to my role in the investigation? I'm no longer sure I even have a role in the investigation. Or at least you seem determined to make sure I don't have one."
"I'm not doing anything of the sort."
"Then someone is."
He did not reply.
"If a jack of hearts was found inside Deborah's Jeep on somewhere near their bodies, it's important for me to know. It would link the deaths of all five couples. When there's a serial killer on the loose in Virginia, it is of great concern to me."
Then he caught me off guard. "How much have you been telling Abby Turnbull?"
"I haven't been telling her anything," I said, my heart pounding harder.
"You've met with her, Kay. I'm sure you won't deny that."
"Mark told you, and I'm sure you won't deny that."
"Mark would have no reason to know you saw Abby in Richmond or Washington unless you told him. And any event, he would have no reason to pass this along."
I stared at him. How could Wesley have known I had seen Abby in Washington unless she really was being watched? "When Abby came to see me in Richmond," I said "Mark called and I mentioned she was visiting. Are you telling me he said nothing to you?"
"He didn't."
"Then how did you find out?"
"There are some things I can't tell you. And you're just going to have to trust me."
The waiter set down our salads, and we ate in silence. Wesley did not speak again until our main courses arrived.
"I'm under a lot of pressure," he said in a quiet voice.
"I can see that. You look exhausted, run-down."
"Thank you, Doctor," he said ironically.
"You've changed in other ways as well."
I pushed the point.
"I'm sure that is your perception."
"You're shutting me out, Benton."
"I suppose I keep my distance because you ask questions that I can't answer; so does Marino. And then I feel even more pressure. Do you understand?"
"1'm trying to understand," I said.
"I can't tell you everything. Can you let it go at that?"
"Not quite. Because that's where we're at cross-purposes. I have information you need. And you have information I need. I'm not going to show you mine unless you show me yours."
He surprised me by laughing.
"Do you think we can strike a deal under these terms?"
I persisted.
"It looks like I don't have much of a choice."
"You don't," I said.
"Yes, we did find a jack of hearts in the Harvey-Cheney case. Yes, I did have their bodies moved before you arrived at the scene, and I know that was poor form, but you have no idea why the cards are so significant of the problems that would be precipitated by word of them leaking. If it made the newspapers, for example I'm not going to say anything further about that right now."
"Where was the card?" I asked.
"We found it inside Deborah Harvey's purse. When a couple of the cops helped me turn her over, we found the purse under her body."
"Are you suggesting that the killer carried her purse out into the woods?"
"Yes. It wouldn't make any sense to think Deborah carried her purse out there."
"In the other cases," I pointed out, the card was left in plain sight inside the vehicle."
"Exactly. Where the card was found is just one more inconsistency. Why wasn't it left inside the Jeep? Another inconsistency is that the cards left in the other cases are Bicycle playing cards. The one left with Deborah is a different brand. Then there's the matter of fibers."
"What fibers?" I asked.
Though I had collected fibers from all of the decomposed bodies, most of them were consistent with the victims' own clothing or the upholstery of the vehicles. Unknown fibers - what few I had found - had supplied no link between the cases, had proved useless so far.
"In the four cases preceding Deborah's and Fred's murders," Wesley said, "white cotton fibers were recovered from the driver's seat of each abandoned car.
"That's news to me," I said, irritation flaring again.
"The fiber analysis was done by our labs," he explained.
"And what is your interpretation?" I asked.
"The pattern of fibers recovered is interesting. Since the victims weren't wearing white cotton clothing at the time of their deaths, I have to assume that the fibers were left by the perpetrator, and this places him driving the victims' cars after the crimes. But we've been assuming that all along. One has to consider his clothi
ng. And a possibility is that he was wearing some type of uniform when he encountered the couples. White cotton trousers. I don't know. But no white cotton fibers were recovered from the driver's seat of Deborah Harvey's Jeep."
"What did you find inside her Jeep?" I asked.
"Nothing that tells me anything right now. In fact, the interior was immaculate."
He paused, cutting his steak. "The point is, the MO's different enough in this case to worry me a lot, because of the other circumstances."
"Because one of the victims is the Drug Czar's daughter, and you're still considering that what happened to Deborah may have been politically motivated, related to her mother's antidrug endeavors," I said.
He nodded. "We can't rule out that the murders of Deborah and her boyfriend were disguised to resemble the other cases."
"If their deaths aren't related to the others, and were a hit," I asked skeptically, "then how do you explain their killer knowing about the cards, Benton? Even I didn't find out about the jack of hearts until recently. Certainly it hasn't been in the newspapers."
"Pat Harvey knows," he startled me by saying.
Abby, I thought. And I was willing to bet that Abby had divulged the detail to Mrs. Harvey, and that Wesley knew this.
"How long has Mrs. Harvey known about the cards," I asked.
"When her daughter's Jeep was found, she asked if we'd recovered a card. And she called me about again after the bodies turned up."
"I don't understand," I said. "Why would she have known last fall? It sounds to me as if she knew the details of the other cases before Deborah and Fred disappeared."
"She knew some of the details. Pat Harvey was interested in these cases long before she had persona; motivation."
"You've heard some of the theories," he said. "Drug overdoses. Some new weird designer drug on the street, the kids going out in the woods to party and ending up dead. Or some drug dealer who gets his thrills by selling bad stuff in some remote place, then watching the couples die."
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