Marino was talking to a thin, blond man, someone he introduced as Jay Morrell with the state police, whom I did not know. He seemed to be in charge.
“Kay Scarpetta,” I volunteered, since Marino identified me only as “Doc.”
Morrell fixed dark green Ray Bans on me and nodded. Out of uniform and sporting a mustache that was little more than teenage fuzz, he exuded the all-business bravado I associated with investigators brand-new on the job.
“Here’s what we know so far.”
He was glancing around nervously. “The Jeep belongs to Deborah Harvey, and she and her boyfriend, uh, Fred Cheney left the Harveys’ residence last night at approximately eight P.M. They were heading to Spindrift, where the Harvey family owns a beach house.”
“Was Deborah Harvey’s family home when the couple left Richmond?” I inquired.
“No, ma’am.”
He briefly turned his shades my way. “They were already at Spindrift, had left earlier in the day. Deborah and Fred wanted to go in a separate car because they planned to return to Richmond on Monday.
Both of them are sophomores at Carolina, and needed to come back early to get ready to return to school.”
Marino explained as he got out his cigarettes, “Right before they left the Harvey house last night, they called up Spindrift, told one of Deborah’s brothers they was heading out and would be arriving sometime between midnight and one A.M. When they didn’t show up by four o’clock this morning, Pat Harvey called the police.”
“Pat Harvey?”
I looked at Marino in disbelief.
It was Officer Morrell who replied, “Oh, yeah. We got us a good one, all right Pat Harvey’s on her way here even as we speak. A chopper picked her up”- he glanced at his watch – “about a half hour ago. The father, uh, Bob Harvey, he’s on the road. Was in Charlotte on business and was supposed to get to Spindrift sometime tomorrow. As far as we know, he hasn’t been reached yet, doesn’t know what’s happened.”
Pat Harvey was the National Drug Policy Director, a position the media had dubbed Drug Czar. A presidential appointee who not so long ago had been on the cover of Time magazine, Mrs. Harvey was one of the most powerful and admired women in America.
“What about Benton?”
I asked Marino. “Is he aware Deborah Harvey is Pat Harvey’s daughter?”
“He didn’t say nothing about it to me. When he called, he’d just landed in Newport News – the Bureau flew him in. He was in a hurry to find a rental car. We didn’t talk long.”
That answered my question. Benton Wesley would not be rushing here in a Bureau plane unless he knew who Deborah Harvey was. I wondered why he had not said anything to Marino, his CAP partner, and I tried to read Marino’s broad, impassive face. His jaw mules were flexing, the top of his balding head flushed and beaded with sweat.
“What’s going on now,” Morrell resumed, “is I got a lot of men stationed around to keep out traffic. We’ve looked in the bathrooms, poked around a little, to make sure the kids aren’t in the immediate area. Once Peninsula Search and Rescue get here, we’ll start in on the woods.”
Immediately north of the Jeep’s front hood the well attended landscaping of the rest stop was overcome by brush and fees that within an acre became so dense I could see nothing but sunlight caught in leaves and a hawk making circles over a distant stand of pines. Though shopping malls and housing developments continued their encroachment upon I-64, this stretch between Richmond and Tidewater so far had remained unspoiled. The scenery, which I would have found reassuring and soothing in the past, now seemed ominous to me.
“Shit,” Marino complained as we left Morrell and began walking around.
“I’m sorry about your fishing trip,” I said.
“Hey. Ain’t it the way it always goes? Been planning this damn trip for months. Screwed again. Nothing new.”
“I noticed that when you pull off the Interstate,” I observed, ignoring his irritation, “the entrance ramp immediately divides into two ramps, one leading back here, the other to the front of the rest stop.