Patricia Cornwell - The Scarpetta Factor

Of course he would be happy to appear on the air with her whenever she wanted. It would be unprecedented, he’d pointed out. He’d never been on camera before or in photographs and rarely gave interviews. He didn’t say it was because he’d never been asked, and she didn’t volunteer that she knew that was the reason. Carley wasn’t a decent person, and neither was he, but she’d been kind enough to him, as kind as she was capable of being. They tolerated each other and fell into a rhythm, a harmony of professional conspiracy, but it had yet to become anything more, and by now he’d accepted that their night of Bordeaux in the Starr mansion was not to be repeated.

It wasn’t a coincidence, because he didn’t believe in them, that what brought Agee and Carley together originally would be part of a bigger destiny. She didn’t believe in ESP or poltergeists and was neither a sender nor a receiver of telepathy-any information that might come her way too masked by sensory noise. But she trusted what was in the Starrs-specifically, Hannah, Rupe’s daughter-and when she disappeared, they instantly seized it as an opportunity, the case they had been waiting for. They had a right to it, had claims to it, because of a prior connection that wasn’t random in Agee’s mind but an information transfer from Hannah, whom he’d gotten to know at the mansion and had introduced to his paranormal preoccupations and then introduced her to people here and abroad, one of them the man she married. It wasn’t inconceivable to him that Hannah might begin to send telepathic signals after she vanished. It wasn’t inconceivable that Harvey Fahley would send something next. Not a thought or an image but a message.

What to do about him. Agee was extremely anxious and getting irritated, having replied to Harvey ’s e-mail about an hour ago and hearing nothing further. There wasn’t the luxury of time to wait any longer if Carley was to break the news tonight, and do it with the forensic pathologist who had autopsied Toni sitting right there. What could be better timing? It should be Agee sitting right there. That would be better timing, but he hadn’t been invited. He wouldn’t be asked when Scarpetta was on the show, couldn’t be on the set or in the same building. She refused to appear with him, didn’t consider him credible, according to Carley. Maybe Agee would give Scarpetta a lesson in credibility and do a favor for Carley. He needed a transcript.

How to get Harvey on the phone. How to engage him in a conversation. How to hijack his information. Agee contemplated e-mailing him a second time and including his own phone number, asking Harvey to call him, but it wouldn’t help if he did. The only way it would suit Agee’s purposes would be if Harvey dialed the 1-800 number for the hearing-impaired Web-based telephone service, but then Harvey would know that he was being monitored by a third party, a captioner who was transcribing every word he said in real time. If he was as cautious and traumatized as he seemed to be, he wasn’t going to allow any such thing.

If Agee initiated the call, however, then Harvey would have no idea that what he said was being transcribed, was proof, almost as good as a recording but perfectly legal. It was what Agee did all the time when he interviewed sources on Carley’s behalf, and on the infrequent occasion when the person complained or claimed he or she had said no such thing, Carley produced the transcript, which did not include Agee’s side of the conversation, only what the source said, which was even better. If there was no record of Agee’s questions and comments, then what the subject of the interview said could be interpreted rather much any way Carley pleased. Most people just wanted to be important. They didn’t care if they were misquoted, as long as she got their name right or, when appropriate, kept them anonymous.

Agee impatiently tapped the space bar of his laptop, waking it up, checking for any new e-mails in his CNN mailbox. Nothing of interest. He had been checking every five minutes, and Harvey wasn’t writing him back. Another prick of irritation and anxiety, more intense this time. He reread the e-mail Harvey had sent to him earlier:

Dear Dr. Agee,

I’ve watched you on The Crispin Report and am not writing to go on it. I don’t want attention.

My name is Harvey Fahley. I’m a witness in the case of the murdered jogger who I just saw on the news has been identified as Toni Darien. I was driving past Central Park on 110th Street early this morning and am positive I saw her being pulled out of a yellow cab. I now suspect it was her dead body being pulled out. This was just minutes before it was found.

Hannah Starr also was last seen in a yellow cab.

I’ve given my statement to the police, an investigator named L.A. Bonnell, who told me I can’t talk to anyone about what I saw. Since you’re a forensic psychiatrist, I believe I can trust that you’ll handle my information intelligently and in the strictest of confidence.

My obvious concern is whether the public should be warned, but I don’t feel it’s for me to do it, and anyway, I can’t or I’ll get in trouble with the police. But if someone else is hurt or killed, I’ll never be able to live with myself. I already feel guilty about not stopping my car instead of driving past. I should have stopped to check on her. It was probably too late, but what if it hadn’t been? I’m really upset about this. I don’t know if you see private patients, but I might need to talk to someone eventually.

I’m asking you to please handle my information as you think proper and appropriate, but do not reveal it came from me.

Sincerely, Harvey Fahley

Agee clicked on his sent folder and found the e-mail he’d written in response forty-six minutes ago, reviewing it again, wondering if there was something he said in it that might have discouraged Harvey from answering him:

Harvey:

Please give me a phone number where I can reach you, and we will handle this judiciously. In the meantime, I strongly advise that you not discuss this with anyone else.

Regards, Dr. Warner Agee

Harvey hadn’t answered because he didn’t want Agee to call him. That was likely it. The police had told Harvey not to talk, and he was afraid to divulge more than he already had, possibly regretted he’d contacted Agee to begin with, or maybe Harvey hadn’t checked his e-mail in the past hour. Agee couldn’t find a telephone listing for Harvey Fahley, had come across one on the Internet, but it was nonworking. He could have said thank you or at the very least acknowledged receiving Agee’s e-mail. Harvey was ignoring him. He might contact someone else. Poor impulse control, and next, Harvey divulges valuable information to another source and Agee is cheated again.

He pointed the remote at the TV and pressed the power button, and CNN blinked on. Another commercial announcing Kay Scarpetta’s appearance tonight. Agee looked at his watch. In less than an hour. A montage of images: Scarpetta climbing out of a medical examiner’s white SUV, her crime scene bag slung over her shoulder; Scarpetta in a white Tyvek disposable jumpsuit on the mobile platform unit, a colossal tractor-trailer with sifting stations set up for mass disasters, such as passenger plane crashes; Scarpetta on the set of CNN.

“What we need is the Scarpetta Factor and here for that is our own Dr. Kay Scarpetta. The best forensic advice on television, right here on CNN.” The anchors’ standard line these days before segueing into an interview with her. Agee kept hearing it in his memory as if he was hearing it in his bedroom, watching the silent commercial on the silent TV. Scarpetta and her special factor saving the day. Agee watched images of her, images of Carley, a thirty-second spot advertising tonight’s show, a show Agee should be on. Carley was frantic about her ratings, was sure she wasn’t going to make it another season if something didn’t change dramatically, and if she got canceled, what would Agee do? He was a kept man, kept by lesser mortals, kept by Carley, who didn’t feel about him the way he felt about her. If the show didn’t go on, neither did he.