Four Scarpetta Novels

by Patricia Cornwell

  “I know this isn’t my business,” Madelisa says, and it takes all her nerve to ask, “but do you know who lives in that house and if anything bad’s happened?”

  “We know who lives there, a woman whose name I don’t care to divulge. It just so happens she’s not home, and her dog and car are gone.”

  “Her car’s gone?” Madelisa’s lower lip starts to tremble.

  “Sounds like she went somewhere and took her dog, don’t you think? And you know what else I think? You wanted a free tour of her mansion and then worried someone might have seen you trespassing. So you made up this wild tale to cover your butts. That was almost clever.”

  “If you bother to look inside her house, you’ll know the truth.” Madelisa’s voice shakes.

  “We did bother, ma’am. I sent a few officers over there to check, and they didn’t find anything you supposedly saw. No pane of glass missing from a window by the laundry-room door. No broken glass. No blood. No knives. The gas grill was turned off, clean as a whistle. No sign something had recently been cooked on it. And the projector wasn’t on,” he says.

  In the arrangement office where Hollings and his staff meet with families, Scarpetta sits on a pale gold-and-cream-striped sofa and goes through a second guest book.

  Based on everything she’s seen so far, Hollings is a tasteful, thoughtful man. The large, thick guest books are bound in fine black leather with lined creamy pages, and because of the magnitude of his business, three to four books a year are required. A tedious search through the first four months of last year’s hasn’t produced evidence that Gianni Lupano attended a funeral here.

  She picks up another guest book and begins to work her way through it, running her finger down each page, recognizing well-known Charleston family names. No Gianni Lupano for January through March. No sign of him for April, and Scarpetta’s disappointment grows. Nothing for May or June. Her finger stops at a generous, looping signature easy to decipher. On July 12 of last year, it seems he attended the funeral service of someone named Holly Webster. It appears the attendance was small—only eleven people signed the guest book. Scarpetta writes down each name and gets up from the sofa. She walks past the chapel, where two ladies inside are arranging flowers around a polished bronze casket. Up a flight of mahogany stairs, she returns to Henry Hollings’s office. Once again, his back is to the door and he’s on the phone.

  “Some people prefer to fold the flag in tri-corners and place it behind the person’s head,” he is saying in his soothing, lilting voice. “Well, certainly. We can drape it over the casket. What do I recommend?” He holds up a sheet of paper. “You seem to be leaning toward the walnut with champagne satin. But also the twenty-gauge steel…I sure do know. Everybody says the same thing…. It’s hard. Just as hard as it can be to make decisions like this. You want me to be honest, I’d go for the steel.”

  He talks a few minutes longer, turns around, and sees Scarpetta in his doorway again. “Some of these are so hard,” he says to her. “Seventy-two-year-old veteran, recently lost his wife, very depressed. Puts a shotgun in his mouth. We did what we could, but no cosmetics or restorative procedures in the world were going to make him viewable, and I know you know what I’m talking about. You can’t possibly have an open casket, and the family won’t take no for an answer.”

  “Who was Holly Webster?” Scarpetta asks.

  “Such a terrible tragedy.” He doesn’t hesitate. “One of those cases you never forget.”

  “Do you remember Gianni Lupano attending her funeral?”

  “I wouldn’t have known him back then,” he oddly says.

  “Was he a family friend?”

  He gets up from his desk and slides open a cherry cabinet drawer. He looks through files and pulls one out.

  “What I have here are details of the funeral arrangements, copies of invoices and such, which I can’t let you look at out of respect for the family’s privacy. But I can let you look at news clippings.” He hands them to her. “I keep them on any death I handle. As you know, the only source of legal records on this will be from police and the medical examiner who worked the case, and the coroner who referred the case here for the autopsy, since Beaufort County doesn’t have an ME’s office. But then, you know all about that, since he’s referring his cases to you now. When Holly died, they weren’t using you yet. Otherwise, I suppose this sad situation would have landed in your lap instead of mine.”

  She detects no hint of resentment. He doesn’t seem to care.

  He says, “The death occurred at Hilton Head, a very wealthy family.”

  She opens the file. There are but a few clippings, the most detailed one in Hilton Head’s Island Packet. According to that account, in the late morning of July 10, 2006, Holly Webster was playing on the patio with her puppy basset hound. The Olympic-size pool was off-limits unless the child was supervised, and on this morning she wasn’t. According to the newspaper, her parents were out of town, and friends were staying at the house. No mention of the parents’ whereabouts or their friends’ names. At almost noon, someone went out to tell Holly it was time for lunch. She was nowhere in sight, the puppy walking back and forth at the edge of the pool, pawing at the water. The little girl’s body was discovered at the bottom, her long, dark hair caught in the drain. Nearby was a rubber bone that police believe the child was trying to retrieve for her dog.

  Another clipping, a very brief one. Not even two months later, the mother, Lydia Webster, was a guest on Dr. Self’s talk show.

  “I remember hearing about this case,” Scarpetta says. “I believe I was in Massachusetts when it happened.”

  “Bad news but not big news. The police played it down as best they could. For one reason, resort areas aren’t particularly keen on publicizing, shall we say, negative events.” Hollings reaches for the phone. “I don’t think he’ll tell you anything, the ME who did the autopsy. But let’s see.” He pauses, then, “Henry Hollings here…Fine, fine…Up to your ears. I know, I know…They really do need to get some help for you down there…No, haven’t been out in my boat for a while…. Right…I owe you a fishing trip. And you owe me for doing a lecture down there to all those wannabe kids who think death investigations are entertainment…The Holly Webster case. I’ve got Dr. Scarpetta here. Wonder if you would mind talking to her for a minute?”

  Hollings hands her the phone. She explains to the MUSC assistant chief medical examiner that she has been called in as a consultant on a case that might have a connection to Holly Webster’s drowning.

  “What case?” the assistant chief asks.

  “I’m sorry but I can’t discuss it,” she replies. “It’s a homicide under investigation.”

  “Glad you understand the way it works. I can’t discuss the Webster case.”

  What he means is he won’t.

  “I’m not trying to be difficult,” Scarpetta says to him. “Let me go this far out on a limb. I’m here with Coroner Hollings because it appears Drew Martin’s tennis coach, Gianni Lupano, attended Holly Webster’s funeral. I’m trying to figure out why and can’t say more than that.”

  “Not familiar. Never heard of him.”

  “That was one of my questions—if you had any idea what connection he might have had with the Webster family.”

  “No idea.”

  “What can you tell me about Holly’s death?”

  “Drowning. Accidental, and nothing to indicate otherwise.”

  “Meaning no pathognomonic findings. Diagnosis based on circumstances,” Scarpetta says. “Mostly based on the way she was found.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Would you mind telling me the name of the investigating officer?”

  “No problem. Hold on.” As computer keys click. “Let me see here. Right, I thought so. Turkington of the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Department. You want to know anything else, you need to call him.”

  Scarpetta thanks him again, gets off the phone, and says to Hollings. “Are you aware that the mot
her, Lydia Webster, appeared on Dr. Self’s talk show not even two months after her child’s death?”

  “I didn’t watch the show, don’t watch any of her shows. That woman ought to be shot,” he says.

  “Any idea how Mrs. Webster ended up on Dr. Self’s show?”

  “I would guess she has quite a team of researchers who scour the news for material. Line up guests that way. In my opinion, it would have been psychologically destructive for Mrs. Webster to expose herself in front of the world when she hadn’t coped with what happened. I understand it was the same sort of situation with Drew Martin,” he says.

  “You’re referring to her appearance on Dr. Self’s show last fall?”

  “I hear a lot of what goes on around here, whether I want to or not. When she comes to town, she always stays at the Charleston Place Hotel. This last time, not even three weeks ago, she was rarely in her room, certainly never slept there. Housekeeping would come in and find her bed made, no sign of her being there except her belongings, or at least some of them.”

  “And how might you know all this?” Scarpetta says.

  “A very good friend of mine is the head of security. When relatives, friends of the deceased come to town, I recommend the Charleston Place. Providing they can afford it.”

  Scarpetta recalls what Ed the doorman said. Drew was in and out of the apartment building, always tipped him twenty dollars. Maybe it was more than generosity. Maybe she was reminding him to keep his mouth shut.

  Chapter 17

  Sea Pines, the most exclusive plantation on Hilton Head Island.

  For five dollars, one can buy a day pass at the security gate, and the guards, in their gray-and-blue uniforms, don’t demand identification. Scarpetta used to complain about it when she and Benton had a condo here, and the memories of those days are still painful.

  “She bought the Cadillac in Savannah,” Investigator Turkington is saying as he drives Scarpetta and Lucy in his unmarked cruiser. “White. Which isn’t helpful. You got any idea how many white Cadillacs and Lincolns there are around here? Probably two out of three rental cars are white.”

  “And the guards at the gate don’t remember seeing it, maybe at an unusual hour? The cameras pick up anything?” Lucy says from the front seat.

  “Nothing useful. You know how it is. One person says maybe they saw it. Another person says no. My thought is he drove it out, not in, so they wouldn’t have noticed it anyway.”

  “Depends on when he took it,” Lucy says. “She keep it in the garage?”

  “It’s been observed parked in her driveway, as a rule. So it would strike me as unlikely he’s had it for a while. What?” He glances at her as he drives. “He somehow got hold of her keys, took her car, and she didn’t notice?”

  “No telling what she noticed. Or didn’t.”

  “You’re still sure the worst happened,” Turkington starts to say.

  “Yes, I am. Based on facts and common sense.” Lucy has been bantering with him since he picked them up at the airport and made a smart-aleck comment about her helicopter.

  He called it an eggbeater. She called him a Luddite. He didn’t know what a Luddite was, still doesn’t. She didn’t define it for him.

  “But that doesn’t preclude her having been abducted for ransom,” Lucy says. “I’m not saying that’s impossible. I don’t believe it, but sure, it’s possible, and we should do exactly what we’re doing. Have every investigative agency looking.”

  “Sure as hell wish we could have kept it out of the news. Becky says they’ve been chasing people away from the house all morning.”

  “Who’s Becky?” Lucy asks.

  “Chief of crime scene investigation. Like me, she’s got a second job as an EMT.”

  Scarpetta wonders why that matters. Maybe he’s self-conscious about needing a second job.

  “Then again, I guess you don’t have to worry about paying the rent,” he says.

  “Sure do. It’s just mine’s a little bit more than yours.”

  “Yeah, just a little. Can’t imagine what those labs are costing you. Or your fifty houses and Ferraris.”

  “Not quite fifty, and how do you know what I’ve got?”

  “Many departments using your labs yet?” he asks.

  “A few. Still under construction, but we’ve got the basics. And we’re accredited. You get to choose. Us or SLED.” South Carolina Law Enforcement Division.

  “We’re faster,” she adds. “If you need something that’s not on the menu, we’ve got friends in high-tech places. Oak Ridge. Y-Twelve.”

  “I thought they make nuclear weapons.”

  “That’s not all they do.”

  “You’re kidding. They do forensic stuff? Like what?” he asks.

  “It’s a secret.”

  “Doesn’t matter. We can’t afford you.”

  “Nope, you can’t. Doesn’t mean we wouldn’t help.”

  His dark glasses appear in the rearview mirror. He says to Scarpetta, probably because he’s had enough of Lucy, “You still with us back there?”

  He wears a suit the color of cream, and Scarpetta wonders how he stays clean at crime scenes. She picks up on the more important points he and Lucy were discussing, reminds them that no one should assume anything at all, including when Lydia Webster’s Cadillac disappeared, because it appears she rarely drove anyway, only on occasion, for cigarettes, booze, some food. Sadly, driving wasn’t a good idea. She was too impaired. So the car could have been gone for days, and its disappearance may have nothing to do with the dog’s being gone. Then there are the images the Sandman e-mailed to Dr. Self. Both Drew Martin and Lydia Webster were photographed in bathtubs that seem to have been filled with cold water. Both of them look drugged, and what about what Mrs. Dooley saw? This case must be worked as a homicide, no matter what the truth may be. Because—and Scarpetta’s been preaching this for more than twenty years—you can’t go back.

  Then she goes back into her own private place. She can’t help it. Her thoughts return to the last time she was in Hilton Head, when she cleared out Benton’s condo. It never entered her mind during the darkest of dark times that his murder might have been contrived to hide him from those who certainly would have killed him, given the chance. Where are those would-be hit men now? Did they lose interest, decide he was no longer a threat or worthy of retribution? She’s asked Benton. He won’t talk about it, says he can’t. She rolls down the window of Turkington’s car and her ring winks in the sun, but it doesn’t reassure her, and the good weather won’t last. Later today, yet another storm is supposed to roll in.

  The road winds through golf courses, and over short bridges that briefly span narrow canals and small ponds. On a grassy embankment, an alligator looks like a log, and turtles are quiet in the mud, and a snowy egret stands on stick legs in shallow water. The conversation in the front seat is centered on Dr. Self for a while, and light turns to shadow in the shade of huge oak trees. Spanish moss looks like dead, gray hair. Little has changed. A few new houses have been built here and there, and she remembers long walks and salt air and wind, and sunsets on the balcony, and the moment all of it came to an end. She envisions what she believed was him in the charred ruins of the building where he supposedly died. She sees his silver hair and incinerated flesh in the blackened wood and filth from a fire that was still smoldering when she arrived. His face was gone, nothing but burned bone, and his autopsy records were false. She was fooled. Devastated. Destroyed, and she is forever different because of what Benton did—far more different than she is because of Marino.

  They park in the driveway of Lydia Webster’s sprawling white villa. Scarpetta remembers seeing it before, from the beach, and it seems surreal because of why they’re here. Police cars line the street.

  “They got the place about a year ago. Some tycoon from Dubai had it before that,” Turkington says, opening his door. “Real sad. They’d just finished a massive renovation and moved in when the little girl drowned. I don’t know how Mr
s. Webster stood being inside the place after that.”

  “Sometimes people can’t let go,” Scarpetta says as they walk over pavers toward the double teakwood doors at the top of stone steps. “So they stay embedded in a place and its memories.”

  “She get this in the settlement?” Lucy asks.

  “Probably would have.” As if, in truth, there’s no doubt she’s dead. “Still in the middle of the divorce. Her husband’s into hedge funds, investments, whatever. Almost as rich as you are.”

  “How about we stop talking about that,” Lucy says, annoyed.

  Turkington opens the front door. Crime scene investigators are inside. Propped against a stucco wall in the foyer is a window with a broken pane of glass.

  “The lady on vacation,” Turkington says to Scarpetta. “Madelisa Dooley. According to her statement, the glass was removed from the window when she came in through the laundry room. This pane here.” He squats and points to a pane of glass on the bottom right-hand side of the window. “It’s the one he removed and glued back. If you look, you can just barely see the glue. I made her think we didn’t find the broken glass when officers first looked here. I wanted to see if she changed her story, so I told her the glass wasn’t broken.”

  “I guess you didn’t foam it first,” Scarpetta says.

  “I’ve heard about that,” Turkington says. “We need to start doing it. My theory is, if Mrs. Dooley’s got her story right, something went on in the house after she left.”

  “We’ll foam it before it’s wrapped up and transported,” Scarpetta says, “so we can stabilize the broken glass.”

  “Help yourself.” He walks off toward the living room, where an investigator takes photographs of the clutter on the coffee table and another lifts up cushions from the couch.

  Scarpetta and Lucy open their black cases. They put on shoe covers and gloves, and a woman in range pants and a polo shirt with FORENSICS in bold letters on the back walks out of the living room. She’s probably in her forties, with brown eyes and short, dark hair. She’s petite, and it’s difficult for Scarpetta to imagine that a woman so short and slight would want to go into law enforcement.