Russell Andrews - Aphrodite

In the weeks that followed, two other women came forward with similar stories. One woman, Esther Forrester, is a secretary at a Washington insurance company; the other, Felicity Black, is an out-of-work advertising executive. Both said that when their affairs with Secretary Manwaring became serious they talked to him about his promise to leave his wife and he became enraged and violent and ended the relationship.

At this moment, the various mysteries remain as such. What will happen to Frank Manwaring? He denies ever having met Ms. Grey or either of the two other women. He did-nearly a month after Maura's disappearance-admit to the affair with her but denies knowing anything about what has happened to her. There has been a tremendous public outcry for Secretary Manwaring to step down from his cabinet position, something he has thus far refused to do. There is also great political pressure being put on him to resign. The head of the Food and Drug Administration, where Maura Greer was interning and where she met Mr. Manwaring, is Chase Welles. Mr. Welles is the man most often rumored to be Mr. Manwaring's replacement. Welles has a close relationship with the president, and his positions are often much more in line with the president's. Manwaring and the president have differed publicly on the question of stem-cell research. The president has signed a bill restricting such research and is on record as opposing it on religious and moral grounds. Mr. Manwaring is a vocal proponent of the need for such research. Mr. Welles has stated that he believes the president is on the side of the angels when it comes to this issue.

Welles and Manwaring have clashed repeatedly and angrily over the past several months, particularly over the potential ban of Rectose 4, a new drug that passes fat through the body without being absorbed. Since Rectose 4 appeared on the market just over twelve months ago, there are reports that sixteen people who have taken it have died. Secretary Manwaring infuriated lobbyists and drug companies, particularly the KranMar Corporation-which has donated large sums of money to the president in the past and which holds the patent on Rectose 4-by demanding that the product be taken off the market. Mr. Welles has opposed Secretary Manwaring's demands, saying that the drug is safe and has been properly tested and approved. He has implied that he believes Manwaring's decisions are suspect and steeped in corruption. He has not accused Mr. Manwaring of taking bribes from KranMar's competition, but it has not been difficult to read between the lines of Mr. Welles's criticisms.

Secretary Manwaring did not return phone calls asking for a comment for this article, but a close friend has said that "he feels that his mistakes have been of a personal and private nature. He has committed no crime and has told no lies. In this time of perpetual national crisis, he feels he is the best man to hold his position and he intends to hold it until he is asked to step aside by the president of the United States."

At the heart of it all is, of course, the question of what has happened to Maura Greer. Is she dead, as her mother believes? Or will she suddenly return home, safe and sound, as her father so desperately hopes?

Right now, there are no answers. There is only the missing twenty-four-year-old woman whose disappearance reminds us that tragedies do not only happen on grand and global scales.

They happen to everyday people in everyday life. When the ferry docked, Justin Westwood drove straight to the East End Harbor police station. During the fifteen-minute drive, he tried to figure out how Maura Greer's body had wound up back in her hometown. Had she come into town to see someone without telling her parents? A lover? That didn't make sense, not if the stories about her relationship with Frank Manwaring were to be believed. So why would she come back without telling anyone? And if she hadn't come back, how did she wind up in the water there?

When he arrived at the station, Justin quickly learned that several of the mysteries he'd just read about surrounding Maura Greer and Secretary Frank Manwaring had now been solved.

He learned that at four-thirty that morning Hank Lobel, a local resident who made his living installing sprinkler systems, had taken two buddies out on his twenty-six-foot Hunter 260 for a day of sailing, beer drinking, and fishing in the waters of East End Bay. A fishing line had snagged on something in the water. Under the influence of many cans of Budweiser, the men refused to cut the line, determined to haul in whatever was causing the problem. After a lengthy struggle, they dragged in the decayed and gnawed-upon body of Maura Greer. By the time Justin returned from Connecticut, the coroner had determined that Maura had not drowned but rather had been killed, her neck broken, before being put in the bay. The lengthy investigation into her disappearance was now a murder investigation.

As soon as the news had leaked out about the discovery of Maura's corpse and the ensuing coroner's report, a CNN report revealed that Frank Manwaring had been in East Hampton, just several miles from where Maura's body had been found. He had been there two and a half months earlier, which was the approximate length of time the coroner estimated the body had been in the water. Minutes after that report aired, the secretary of Health and Human Services was asked by the president of the United States to resign. Chase Welles, head of the FDA, was immediately named as Manwaring's replacement and there was expected to be no trouble with his confirmation. The president called a press conference and read a prepared statement that said: "I wholeheartedly believe in Secretary Manwaring's innocence. I believe his statements that he had nothing to do with the tragic death of Maura Greer, and I accept at face value his rejection of all the other charges and accusations that have been leveled at him. However, in these very dangerous times, the fact that the secretary is now involved in a murder investigation, however peripheral his involvement, will be such a major distraction that I no longer feel he can fulfill his duties in a timely and competent manner. I am confident that Chase Welles will be a superb secretary, more than capable of handling this crucial cabinet position."

At his own press conference, Frank Manwaring declared his innocence in Maura Greer's murder. He also reiterated that all the other women who had revealed their relationships with him were lying. "For what reason, I don't know," he said. "I assume that greed enters into it and it is a sad day when greed overcomes any and all sense of morality." He refused to comment on his replacement other than to warn against changes in current policy. Secretary Manwaring also said that he would no longer comment publicly on the Maura Greer situation. He had been told to keep silent from this point forward. When asked who had told him to keep silent, the secretary declined to comment.

Rachel and Marcus Greer held a press conference too. They tearfully expressed gratitude that they at last had some closure but said that, of course, their gratitude was tainted by their sorrow. They stated that they did not believe Secretary Manwaring's declarations of innocence and ignorance, and they demanded that he take a lie-detector test. When that demand was relayed to Frank Manwaring, he nodded and said that he would be happy to take such a test, but before he could finish making a commitment, he was hustled away by two aides.

Justin learned all this from Special Agent Len Rollins of the FBI. He learned from his boss, Jimmy Leggett, that the Maura Greer murder now took precedence over the investigation into Susanna Morgan's death.

"Since when is one murder more important than the next?" Justin asked.

"I thought you said he wouldn't be any trouble," Agent Rollins said to Leggett, not even bothering to look at Justin.