Jeffery Deaver - The Empty Chair

One deputy offering the cool reception was Mason Germain, a short man in his early forties. Dark eyes, graying features, posture a little too perfect for a human being. His hair was slicked back and showed off ruler-straight teeth marks from the comb. He wore excessive aftershave, a cheap, musky smell. He greeted Rhyme and Sachs with a stiff, canny nod and Rhyme imagined that he was actually glad the criminalist was disabled so he wouldn't have to shake his hand. Sachs, being a woman, was entitled to only a condescending "Miss."

Lucy Kerr was the third senior deputy and she wasn't any happier to see the visitors than Mason was. She was a tall woman – just a bit shorter than willowy Sachs. Trim and athletic-looking with a long, pretty face. Mason's uniform was wrinkled and smudged but Lucy's was perfectly ironed. Her blond hair was done up in a taut French braid. You could easily picture her as a model for L.L. Bean or Lands' End – in boots, denim and a down vest.

Rhyme knew that their cold shoulders would be an automatic reaction to interloping cops (especially a crip and a woman – and Northerners, no less). But he had no interest in winning them over. The kidnapper would be harder to find with every passing minute. And he had a date with a surgeon he absolutely was not going to miss.

A solidly built man – the only black deputy Rhyme had seen – wheeled in a large chalkboard and unfolded a map of Paquenoke County.

"Tape it up there, Trey." Bell pointed to the wall. Rhyme scanned the map. It was a good one, very detailed.

Rhyme said, "Now. Tell me exactly what happened. Start with the first victim."

"Mary Beth McConnell," Bell said. "She's twenty-three. A grad student over at the campus at Avery."

"Go on. What happened yesterday?"

Mason said, "Well, it was pretty early. Mary Beth was -"

"Could you be more specific?" Rhyme asked. "About the time?"

"Well, we don't know for certain," Mason responded coolly. "Weren't any stopped clocks like on the Titanic , you know."

"Had to've been before eight," Jesse Corn offered. "Billy – the boy was killed – was out jogging and the crime scene is a half hour away from home. He was making up some credits in summer school and had to be back by eight-thirty to shower and get to class."

Good , Rhyme thought, nodding. "Go on."

Mason continued. "Mary Beth had some class project, digging up old Indian artifacts at Blackwater Landing."

"What's that, a town?" Sachs asked.

"No, just an unincorporated area on the river. 'Bout three-dozen houses, a factory. No stores or anything. Mostly woods and swamp."

Rhyme noticed numbers and letters along the margins of the map. "Where?" he asked. "Show me."

Mason touched Location G-10. "Way we see it, Garrett comes by and grabs Mary Beth. He's going to rape her but Billy Stall's out jogging and sees them from the road and tries to stop it. But Garrett grabs a shovel and kills Billy. Beats his head in. Then he takes Mary Beth and disappears." Mason's jaw was tight. "Billy was a good kid. Really good. Went to church regular. Last season he intercepted a pass in the last two minutes of a tied game with Albemarle High and ran it back -"

"I'm sure he was a fine boy," Rhyme said impatiently. "Garrett and Mary Beth, they're on foot?"

"That's right," Lucy answered. "Garrett wouldn't drive. Doesn't even have a license. Think it was because of his folks' dying in a car crash."

"What physical evidence did you find?"

"Oh, we got the murder weapon," Mason said proudly. "The shovel. Were real buttoned up about handling it too. Wore gloves. And we did the chain-of-custody thing, like's in the books."

Rhyme waited for more. Finally he asked, "What else did you find?"

"Well, some footprints." Mason looked at Jesse, who said, "Oh, right. I took pictures of 'em."

"That's all? " Sachs asked.

Lucy nodded, tight-lipped at the Northerner's implicit criticism.

Rhyme: "Didn't you search the scene?"

Jesse said, "Sure we did. Just, there wasn't anything else."

Wasn't anything else? At a scene where a perp kills one victim and abducts another there'd be enough evidence to make a movie of who did what to whom and probably what each member of the cast had been doing for the last twenty-four hours. It seemed they were up against two perpetrators: the Insect Boy and law-enforcement incompetence. Rhyme caught Sachs' eye and saw she was thinking the same.

"Who conducted the search?" Rhyme asked.

"I did," Mason said. "I got there first. I was nearby when the call came in."

"And when was that? "

"Nine-thirty. A truck driver saw Billy's body from the highway and called nine-one-one."

And the boy was killed before eight. Rhyme wasn't pleased. An hour and a half – at least – was a long time for a crime scene to be unprotected. A lot of evidence could get stolen, a lot could get added. The boy could have raped and killed the girl and hidden the body then returned to remove some pieces of evidence and plant others to lead investigators off. "You searched it by yourself?" Rhyme asked Mason.

"First time through. Then we got three, four deputies out there. They went over the area real good."

And found only the murder weapon? Lord almighty… Not to mention the damage done by four cops unfamiliar with crime scene search techniques.

"Can I ask," Sachs said, "how you know Garrett was the perp?"

"I saw him," Jesse Corn said. "When he took Lydia this morning."

"That doesn't mean he killed Billy and kidnapped the other girl."

"Oh," Bell said. "The fingerprints – we got them off the shovel."

Rhyme nodded and said to the sheriff, "And his prints were on file because of those prior arrests?"

"Right."

Rhyme said, "Now tell me about this morning."

Jesse took over. "It was early. Just after sunup. Ed Schaeffer and I were there keeping an eye on the crime scene in case Garrett came back. Ed was north of the river, I was south. Lydia comes 'round to lay some flowers. I left her alone and went back to the car. Which I guess I shouldn't've done. Next thing I know she's screaming and I see the two of them disappear over the Paquo. They were gone 'fore I could find a boat or anything to get across. Ed wouldn't answer his radio. I was worried about him and when I got over there I found him stung half to death. Garrett'd set a trap."

Bell said, "We think Ed knows where he's got Mary Beth. He got a look at a map that was in that blind Garrett'd been hiding in. But he got stung and passed out before he could tell us what the map showed and Garrett must've took it with him after he kidnapped Lydia. We couldn't find it."

"What's the deputy's condition?" Sachs asked.

"Went into shock because of the stinging. Nobody knows if he's going to make it or not. Or if he'll remember anything if he does come to."

So we rely on the evidence , Rhyme thought. Which was, after all, his preference; far better than witnesses any day. "Any clues from this morning's scene?"

"Found this." Jesse opened an attaché case and took out a running shoe in a plastic bag. "Garrett lost it when he was grabbing Lydia. Nothing else."

A shovel at yesterday's scene, a shoe at today's… Nothing more. Rhyme glanced hopelessly at the lone shoe.

"Just set it over there." Nodding toward a table. "Tell me about these other deaths Garrett was a suspect in."

Bell said, "All in and around Blackwater Landing. Two of the victims drowned in the canal. Evidence looked like they'd fallen and hit their heads. But the medical examiner said they could've been hit intentionally and pushed in. Garrett'd been seen around their houses not long before they died. Then last year somebody was stung to death. Wasps. Just like with Ed. We know Garrett did it."