Scotty laughs. “Yeah, as Benjamin Franklin once said, well, we must all hang together, or we’re all going to hang separately. Or something like that.”
A Hispanic male dressed in dirty black slacks, a black striped dress shirt, and a red necktie with a McDonald’s logo on it comes over and says, “Please. If you’re going to stay here, you must order something more to eat.”
I get out of the booth. “We were just leaving.”
CHAPTER 56
SINCE I WAS there last, the Westbrook Horse Farm has certainly gotten busier. Cars and trucks are parked on either side of the access road, even though it’s still a couple of hours before sunrise. We’re crowded in a Secret Service Suburban, and it takes the judicious use of flashing lights and sirens before we can get any farther.
Pamela is driving, and once she nudges the car into the parking lot, we all step out and take in the madhouse. There are at least a half-dozen television satellite trucks, with news correspondents doing stand-ups in halos of bright lights. There are bands of men and women going out on the trails with flashlights, wearing knapsacks and using walking sticks. There’s even what looks to be a troop of Boy Scouts, forming up and ready to join the search, and there’s a mass of law enforcement personnel, from the Virginia State Police to the county sheriff’s department to local police, plus a smattering of volunteer firefighters just to round things out. The thick woods with the riding trails are being lit up by bands of searchers, all heading to the river where some hours ago Parker Hoyt had told the Washington Post the First Lady had apparently drowned.
Standing next to me, Scotty says, “Talk about the circus coming to town.”
Next to him is Tanya, who just shakes her head. “What a mess, what a mess.”
“Forget it,” I say. “That’s not where we’re going.”
I lead my group of renegade investigators toward the stables and farm buildings, and within a few seconds, two security officers come out of the shadows and stop us.
“Sorry, folks, nobody’s allowed to come over here,” the first one says, and the second one says, “Bad enough to have all those crazies out tromping through the grounds.”
I hold out my identification. “We’re not nobody, and we’re not crazies. We’re the Secret Service, and we’re coming in.”
My folks line up behind me, and maybe the two security officers are tired or overwhelmed, but the near one unhitches the gate and we walk through, while he mutters something about not getting paid enough to handle this mess.
“All right,” I say. “Make it happen.” I start pointing to buildings, one after another, assigning them to the agents. I say, “Be thorough, but haul ass. We don’t have much time.”
For about thirty minutes I’m in one of the large barns, taking in the scent of horse, grain, and hay, and with flashlight in hand, I make my way across the cobblestoned floor, pointing the light into each stall. Most of the horses avoid me and ignore me, and some make grumbling noises and slight whinnies.
One horse stands out, the beautiful black Morgan named Arapahoe belonging to the missing First Lady.
I carefully flash the light around his enclosure, making sure the First Lady isn’t tied up in the corner with a bloody hand.
I say to the horse, “You know what happened, pal. Wish I could make you talk.”
He blinks his sad brown eyes.
I wonder if horses can mourn.
I resume walking and find a ladder at one end, and climb up, the small flashlight in my teeth.
The upper part of the barn has boxes, piles of leather gear, some old saddles and boots, and clumps of hay. I move around and twice bump my head on an overhead beam—painful but not limiting—and when I move my way back down the ladder, about ninety pounds and seventy years of Virginia womanhood is angrily waiting for me.
“I’m Connie Westbrook,” she announces. “Who the hell are you?”
She has steel-gray hair bundled at the back of her head in a tight bun, and she’s wearing a tan robe over a nightgown and knee-high Wellingtons. One wrinkled hand is holding the robe closed against her chest, and the other is holding a flashlight.
When I get to the bottom of the ladder, I do her the courtesy of showing her my identification. “I’m Sally Grissom of the Secret Service,” I say. “I’m the special agent in charge of the Presidential Protective Division.”
Connie seems to be one of those old Commonwealth of Virginia matrons who can trace their lineage back to the original founding of Richmond, and who still calls the Civil War the “Late Great Unpleasantness.”
“So?” she asks. “Why are you here?”
I start out of the barn, and she keeps up with my brisk pace. “You know why.”
“And where’s your warrant, Agent Grissom?”
I go out into the cool air. The sky is not yet lightening over in the east. “Really, ma’am? The First Lady has gone missing at your facility and you’re concerned about a warrant?”
She purses her lips. “You’re here illegally.”
“I’m here to find the First Lady.”
“She’s not here,” she snaps at me. “I’ve already told your … personnel that very same fact. And now my fields and trails are being trampled, torn up, and my horses are panicking. And I want you to leave … and just as soon as I can, I’m getting those other … people off my property.”
“Well, we’re looking again,” I say. “Just to be sure.”
“I forbid it.”
I give her a good stare, up and down, up and down, and I say, “Ma’am, you can forbid it all you want, and while you’re at it, you can forbid the sun to rise over there. Both will be equally effective. Now—”
A voice crackles in my earpiece. “Boss, Scotty.”
I lift up my wrist, trigger the microphone. “Sally here, Scotty. Go.”
“Small outbuilding, about fifty meters to the east, in a grove of oak trees,” he says. “There’s something going on.”
“Like what?”
“Like a locked door,” he says. “And a trash bag outside.”
A slight crackle of static. “With bloody bandages inside.”
CHAPTER 57
IN A MATTER of seconds, I’m at the building, and Scotty is standing outside, his flashlight illuminating a white plastic trash bag outside of a locked wooden door, painted green. Oak trees are nearby and overhead, and there’s a dirt path leading back to where we were. Unlike the other buildings we’ve been searching, this one is worn, with a sagging roof. It’s one story and there are small windows set up near the roofline.
I turn, and Connie Westbrook has managed to keep up with me.
I flash my light over at the building. “What’s in here?”
“Nothing,” she says.
Scotty says, “Over here, boss.”
I check the torn top of the white trash bag. Inside are crumpled fast-food bags, McDonald’s and Burger King, and I nudge the top, where there’s a couple of crumpled white gauze bandages, stained brown with old blood. There’s also bits of string— used sutures?—and cotton swabs.