Patricia Cornwell - The Scarpetta Factor

“Hannah Starr was a socialite, ran with a fast crowd, hobnobbed with the rich and the famous here and abroad but never at the mansion,” Berger went on. “She was much more public, would rather be on Page Six of the Post than in the family dining room, her style the antithesis of her father’s. Her priorities clearly very different. She’s the one who first connected to Hap, according to him. They met at the Monkey Bar. Soon after, he was a guest at one of Rupe’s dinners and became a client. Hannah personally handled his money. Hap claims Hannah was afraid of Bobby.”

“It wasn’t Bobby who was in town the night Hannah vanished and then on a plane the very next day,” Lanier pointedly said.

“Exactly right,” Berger said, looking at Benton. “I’m very concerned about Hap’s involvements with everyone. And his proclivities. Kay says Toni Darien was dead for a day and a half before her body was left in the park. She was kept in a cool environment, indoors somewhere. Maybe now that’s making sense.”

More names were being added to the graph on the wall.

“And Warner Agee and Carley Crispin,” Benton said to Stockman. “They should be up there.”

“We’ve got no reason to think Agee or Carley had any association with anybody we’ve got up here on the wall,” O’Dell said.

“We know Carley’s connected to Kay,” Benton said. “And I’m connected to Agee.”

The click of keys. Scarpetta’s and Benton’s names appeared on the flat screen. It was awful seeing them there. Connected to everyone. Connected to the root, Jean-Baptiste Chandonne.

Benton went on. “And based on what Lucy and Kay found inside Agee’s hotel room, I suspect he was involved in the casino business.”

Casinos was added to the wall.

“He was using his paranormal interests and influence to research something, manipulate something.”

Paranormal was another branch on the tree.

“Maybe doing so under the patronage of a wealthy Frenchman supposedly named Lecoq,” Benton continued, and that name appeared next. “Someone-possibly this Monsieur Lecoq-was paying Agee in cash. And possibly Freddie Maestro was, too. So Lecoq and Maestro might be connected, and that would link Detroit to France.”

“We don’t know who Lecoq is or if he really exists,” Lanier said to Benton.

“He exists. But we don’t know who he is.”

“You thinking this Lecoq guy’s the Wolfman?” O’Dell asked Benton.

“Let’s don’t call him that. Jean-Baptiste Chandonne is no stereotype. He’s not a myth. He’s a man who could at this point in time be fully capable of looking normal. He could have a number of aliases. In fact, he would have to.”

“He speak with a French accent?” Stockman was on his laptop, adding offshoots that appeared on the tree on the wall.

“He can speak with a number of accents or no accent,” Benton said. “In addition to French, he’s fluent in Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and English. Maybe other languages by now. I don’t know.”

“Why Carley Crispin?” Stockman asked as he worked on the graph. “And why was she paying for Agee’s room? Or was someone else funneling money through her?”

“Probably a type of petty money laundering.” Lanier was making notes. “Sounds like a lot of that going on here, even if in relatively small ways. People paying in cash. People paying other people to pay for other people. No credit cards or wire transfers or checks that leave a paper trail. At least not for business that might not be considered legitimate.”

“Carley was going to kick him out of his room this weekend.” Berger met Benton’s eyes, and hers were as impenetrable as stone. “Why?”

“I can offer a theory,” Benton said. “Agee e-mailed Carley information allegedly from a witness, and we know it was bogus. He impersonated Harvey Fahley by using a Web captioning service. Lucy found that transcript and a number of other ones on Agee’s computer. The producers of The Crispin Report are in a hell of a lot of hot water because of what she released on the air last night about Hannah Starr’s hair being recovered from a yellow cab. A detail Agee fabricated in a phony phone interview, and Carley fell for it. Or it suited her to fall for it. Either way, she didn’t bank on getting into more trouble with the network than she was already in.”

“So she fired him,” Lanier said to him.

“Why wouldn’t she? She also knew she was about to get fired. She wasn’t going to need Agee anymore, no matter who was paying for his room. There may be a personal element,” Benton said. “We don’t know what Carley told Agee when she called him from CNN at close to eleven p.m. last night. The last phone call he got, it seems.”

“We got to talk to Carley Crispin,” Stockman said. “Too bad Agee’s dead. It’s sounding to me like he might be the key to everything.”

“What he did was stupid as hell,” said O’Dell. “He was a forensic psychiatrist. He should have known better. This Harvey Fahley guy was going to deny talking to him.”

Berger said, “He has. I spoke to Detective Bonnell while we were getting coffee. She got hold of him after the show last night. He admits e-mailing Agee but claims he never talked to him and never said anything about Hannah’s hair being found.”

“Harvey Fahley’s phone records should show if he talked to him…” O’Dell began.

“A Tracfone made the call, and it’s missing,” Benton interrupted. “Agee had a drawer full of empty Tracfone boxes. I believe the interview with Fahley was bogus, and so does Lucy. But I doubt it was Agee’s conscious intention to get fired.”

“An unconscious intention,” Lanier offered.

“That’s my opinion.” Benton believed Warner Agee was ready to self-destruct. “I seriously doubt last night was the first time suicide ever entered his mind. His condo in D.C. is about to be foreclosed on. His credit cards are expired. He relies on others for infusions of cash, is a parasite with nothing but his infirmities and demons to look forward to, and it appears he got tangled up with something that was over his head. He probably knew he was going to get caught.”

“Another recruit that would have been a poor choice,” Lanier said to everyone as she looked at Benton. “You think Jean-Baptiste would know?”

“What?” Benton’s anger flared. “Know that Agee made sure I was exiled from my life and my reward was to be shunned by the FBI, and the reason he was able to do that was because of the Chandonnes?”

Silence inside the FBI conference room.

“Do I think he encountered Jean-Baptiste, that they were somehow acquainted? Yes, I do,” Benton said. “Agee the wannabe would have lusted to talk to a so-called monster like Jean-Baptiste Chandonne, and he would have been drawn to him even if he didn’t know who he was, saying it was an alias Agee met. He would have been drawn to Jean-Baptiste’s psychopathology, to the evil he emanates, and it would be the biggest fucking mistake Warner Agee would fucking ever make.”

“Obviously,” Lanier said after a pause. “Since he’s in the morgue as we speak.”

“The Hotel Elysée is very close to the Starr mansion on Park Avenue.” Berger’s demeanor was calm. Too calm. “Only three or four blocks. You walk out of the hotel and can be at their mansion in five, ten minutes.”

Stockman typed, and Hotel Elysée and Starr Mansion appeared on the flat screen, the newest branches on the tree.

“And you need to put Lucy Farinelli’s name up there,” Berger said. “Which means you have to add mine, too. Not just because I’ve been investigating Hannah’s disappearance and have interviewed her husband and Hap Judd, but because I’m connected to Lucy. She was a client of Rupe Starr’s. Had been for more than a decade. Hard to imagine she never met Hannah and possibly Bobby.”