Jeffery Deaver - The Empty Chair

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The Barnes Noble Review
May 2000
The Empty Chair is the third – or, if you count a guest appearance in the millennial thriller The Devil's Teardrop, the fourth – novel to feature Lincoln Rhyme, the irascible forensic genius who became a quadriplegic when a cave-in at a crime scene damaged his spinal cord beyond repair. The series began in 1997 with The Bone Collector, which was recently made into a so-so film starring Denzel Washington. Every Rhyme novel to date has been characterized by authentic forensic detail and wild, even extravagant plotting, and the latest entry is no exception. The Empty Chair may, in fact, be the single trickiest suspense novel published so far this year.
Unlike earlier volumes, The Empty Chair takes place outside of New York City in the bucolic but sinister environs of Paquenoke County, North Carolina. Rhyme – accompanied by his long-suffering physical therapist, Thom, and his beloved forensic assistant, Amelia Sachs – has just been accepted as a patient at the Medical Center of the University of North Carolina, where he is scheduled to undergo an experimental procedure that might increase the range of his mobility but might, on the other hand, result in his death. Shortly after his arrival, Lincoln 's plans are disrupted by an unforeseen emergency. Jim Bell, Paquenoke County sheriff, has trouble on his hands and needs Lincoln 's expertise.
According to Bell, a disturbed teenager – known, for reasons that become graphically clear, as the Insect Boy – has murdered a local football hero and abductedtwoyoung women. Convinced that the women have only hours to live, Bell asks Lincoln to examine the trace evidence found at the abduction site in the faint hope of pinpointing the kidnapper's location. Though he knows nothing about the physical composition of the surrounding area – he and Sachs, as he repeatedly comments, are "fish out of water" in the American South – Rhyme agrees to help. Once again using Amelia Sachs as his eyes and legs, he sets up an ad hoc forensic lab in a borrowed corner of the local Sheriff's office and goes to work.
This sort of scenario – a crazed killer, a race against time, a scattered handful of clues – offers more than enough drama to fuel any number of traditional suspense novels. In The Empty Chair, however, this same scenario is merely the first level of a complex, multitiered mystery that constantly confounds our most fundamental expectations. The first indication that The Empty Chair contains unexpected depths comes when Lincoln, flawlessly interpreting his disparate bits of evidence, locates both the Insect Boy (Garrett Hanlon) and his most recent victim (an oncology nurse named Lydia Johannsen) within the first 150 pages. At that point, Deaver throws away the rulebook.
After talking with Garrett Hanlon in the Paquenoke County jail, Amelia develops the instinctive sense that Garrett might, as he continually claims, be a victim, and that another unidentified killer might still be at large. In a moment of intuitive – and reckless – empathy, Amelia abandons her professional principles and escapes with Garrett, determined both to prove the boy's innocence and rescue the remaining victim, a local history student named Mary Beth McConnell. From this point forward, almost nothing that happens in The Empty Chair is even remotely predictable.
It would spoil too many of the carefully constructed surprises to reveal the plot in any more detail. Suffice it to say that the narrative – which seems, at first, a simple but effective chase story – broadens and deepens to become something stranger and infinitely more complex. Throwing a varied assortment of people and elements into the mix – a trio of Deliverance-style rednecks, an emotionally scarred cancer survivor, a revisionist account of the Lost Colony of Roanoke, an apparently deranged deputy sheriff, a pair of incipient rapists, the hidden motivations of a wealthy industrialist, and the tragic history of Tanner's Corner, a "town without children" – Deaver constructs an artful, entertaining melodrama that has much to say about the destructive consequences of uncontrolled greed.
If The Empty Chair has a besetting weakness, it is Deaver's relentless determination to dazzle the reader with his narrative sleight of hand, piling on an endless, constantly escalating series of shocks, surprises, and unexpected twists that might, in a lesser writer's hands, have become just a bit too much. But Deaver, as usual, is a consummate professional, and he holds it all together with the ease and assurance of a natural storyteller. Readers familiar with the earlier adventures of Lincoln Rhyme will be lining up for this one, which seems likely to attract a substantial number of new readers, as well. The Empty Chair is Jeffery Deaver at his best and most devious and is recommended, without reservation, to anyone in search of intelligent, high-adrenaline entertainment.
– Bill Sheehan

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"He claims the man wore gloves," she countered.

"But no leather grain prints either."

"Could've been cloth. Let me test it and -"

"' Could have, could have…' Come on, Sachs, this is pure speculation."

"But you should've heard him when he was talking about Mary Beth. He was concerned about her."

"He was acting. What's my number-one rule?"

"You have a lot of number-one rules," she muttered.

He continued unfazed, "You can't trust witnesses."

"He thinks he loves her, he cares for her. He really believes he's protecting her."

A man's voice interrupted. "Oh, he is protecting her." Sachs and Rhyme looked to the doorway. It was Dr. Elliott Penny. He added, "Protecting her from himself."

Sachs introduced them.

"I wanted to meet you, Lincoln," Dr. Penny said. "I specialize in forensic psychology. Bert Markham and I were on a panel together at the AALEO last year and he speaks highly of you."

"Bert's a good friend," Rhyme said. "Just appointed head of Chicago PD Forensics."

Dr. Penny nodded toward the corridor. "Garrett's lawyer's in there with the D.A. right now but I don't think the outcome's going to be very good for the boy."

"What did you mean just then, about protecting her from himself?" Sachs asked cynically. "Some kind of multiple personality crap?"

"No," replied the doctor, not at all troubled by her abrasive skepticism. "There's definitely some mental or emotional disturbance at work but it's nothing as exotic as multiple personalities. Garrett knows exactly what he did to Mary Beth and Billy Stail. I'm pretty sure he's hidden her someplace to keep her away from Blackwater Landing, where he probably did kill those other people over the past couple of years. And scared – what was his name? – the Wilkes boy into killing himself. I think he was planning to rape and kill Mary Beth at the same time he killed Billy but that the part of him that quote loves her wouldn't let him. He got her away from Blackwater Landing as fast as he could to keep from hurting her. I think he did rape her, though to him it's not rape, just the consummation of what he sees as their quote relationship . As normal to him as a husband and wife on their honeymoon. But he still felt the urge to kill her and so he went back to Blackwater Landing the next day and got a substitute victim, Lydia Johansson. He was undoubtedly going to murder her in place of Mary Beth."

"I hope you're not billing the defense," Sachs said acerbically, "if that's your sympathetic testimony."

Dr. Penny shook his head. "Based on the evidence I've heard that boy's going to jail with or without expert witnesses."

"I don't think he killed the boy. And I think the kidnapping's not as black-and-white as we're making it."

Dr. Penny shrugged. "My professional opinion is that he did. Obviously I haven't run all the tests but he exhibits clear dissocial and sociopathic behavior – and I'm thinking of all three major diagnostic systems. The International Classification of Diseases , The DSM-IV and The Revised Psychopathy Checklist . Would I have to run the complete battery of tests? Of course. But he clearly presents with an affect-less antisocial/criminal personality. He's got a high IQ, he exhibits strategic thinking patterns and organized-offender behavior, considers revenge acceptable, displays no remorse… he's a very dangerous person."

"Sachs," Rhyme said, "what's the point? This isn't our game anymore."

She ignored him and his piercing eyes. "But, Doctor -"

The doctor held up a hand. "Can I ask you a question?"

"What?"

"Do you have children?"

A hesitation. "No," she responded. "Why?"

"You understandably feel sympathy for him – I think we all do – but you might be confusing that with some latent maternal sense."

"What does that mean?"

The doctor continued, "I mean that if you have some desire to have children yourself you might not be able to take an objective view about a sixteen-year-old boy's innocence or guilt. Especially one who's an orphan and has had a tough time in life."

"I can take a perfectly objective role," she snapped. "There's just too much that doesn't add up. Garrett's motives don't make sense, he -"

"Motives are the weak leg of the evidentiary stool, Sachs, you know that."

"I don't need any more maxims, Rhyme," she snapped.

The criminalist sighed in frustration, glanced at the clock.

Dr. Penny continued. "I heard you asking Cal Fredericks about Lancaster, about what was going to happen to the boy."

She lifted an eyebrow.

"Well, I think you can help him," the doctor said. "The best thing you can do is to just spend some time with him. The county'll assign a caseworker to liaise with the guardian the court appoints and you'll have to get their approval but I'm sure it can be arranged. He might even open up with you about Mary Beth."

As she was considering this Thom appeared in the doorway. "Van's outside, Lincoln."

Rhyme glanced at the map one last time and then turned toward the doorway. "'Once more into the breach, dear friends.'"

Jim Bell walked into the room and rested his hand on Rhyme's insensate arm. "We're organizing a search of the Outer Banks. With a little luck we'll have her in a few days. Listen, I can't thank you enough, Lincoln."

Rhyme deflected the gratitude with a nod and wished the sheriff good luck.

"I'll come visit you at the hospital, Lincoln," Ben said. "I'll bring some scotch. When're they going to let you start drinking again?"

"Not soon enough."

"I'll help Ben finish up," Sachs told him. Bell said to her, "We'll get you a ride over to Avery." She nodded. "Thanks. I'll be there soon, Rhyme." But the criminalist had, it seemed, already departed from Tanner's Corner, mentally if not physically, and he said nothing. Sachs heard only the vanishing whine as the Storm Arrow steamed down the corridor.

• • •

Fifteen minutes later they had most of the forensic equipment put away and Sachs sent Ben Kerr home, thanking him for his volunteer efforts.

In his wake Jesse Corn had appeared at Sachs' side. She wondered if he'd been staking out the corridor, waiting for a chance to catch her alone.

"He's quite somebody, isn't he?" Jesse asked. "Mr. Rhyme." The deputy began stacking boxes that didn't need to be stacked.

"That he is," she said noncommittally.

"That operation he's talking about. Will it fix him?"

It'll kill him. It'll make him worse. It'll turn him into a vegetable.

"No."

She thought Jesse would ask, Then why's he doing it? But the deputy offered another one of his sayings: "Sometimes you just find yourself standing in need to do something . No matter it seems hopeless."

Sachs shrugged, thinking: Yeah, sometimes you just do.

She snapped the locks on a microscope case and coiled the last of the electrical cords. She noticed a stack of books on the table, the ones she'd found in Garrett's room in his foster parents' house. She picked up The Miniature World , the book that the boy had asked Dr. Penny for. She opened it. Flipped through the pages, read a passage.

There are 4,500 known species of mammals in the world but 980,000 known species of insects and an estimated two to three million more not yet discovered. The diversity and astonishing resilience of these creatures arouses more than simple admiration. One thinks of Harvard biologist and entomologist E. O. Wilson's coined term "Biofilia," by which he means the emotional affiliation humans feel toward other living organisms. There is certainly as great an opportunity for such a connection with insects as there is for a pet dog or prize racehorse, or indeed, other humans.

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