Cause of Death

  "In the trunk."

  We got it out together and carried it up to Dr. Mant's house, which looked even smaller and more forlorn in the weather. At the back was a screened-in porch, and we went in that way and deposited my gear on the wooden floor.

  Lucy opened the door leading into the kitchen, and we were enveloped by the aroma of tomatoes and garlic. She looked baffled as she stared at Marino and the dive equipment.

  "What the hell's going on?" she said.

  I could tell she was upset. This had been our night to be alone, and we did not have special nights like this often in our complicated lives.

  "It's a long story." I met her eyes.

  We followed her inside, where a large pot was simmering on the stove. Nearby on the counter was a cutting board, and Lucy apparently had been slicing peppers and onions when we arrived. She was dressed in FBI sweats and ski socks and looked flawlessly healthy, but I could tell she had not been getting much sleep.

  "There's a hose in the pantry, and just off the porch near a spigot is an empty plastic trash can," I said to Marino.

  "If you'd fill that, we can soak my gear."

  "I'll help," Lucy said.

  "You most certainly won't." I gave her a hug. "Not until we've visited for a minute."

  We waited until Marino was outside, then I pulled her over to the stove and lifted the lid from the pot. A delicious steam rose and I felt happy.

  "I can't believe you," I said. "God bless you."

  "When you weren't back by four I figured I'd better make the sauce or we weren't going to be eating lasagne tonight."

  "It might need a little more red wine. And maybe more basil and a pinch of salt. I was going to use artichokes instead of meat, although Marino won't be happy about that, but he can just eat prosciutto. How does that sound?"

  I returned the lid to the pot.

  "Aunt Kay, why is he here?" she asked.

  "Did you get my note?"

  "Sure. That's how I got in. But all it said was you had gone to a scene."

  "I'm sorry. But I called several times."

  "I wasn't going to answer a phone in somebody else's house," she said. "And you didn't leave a message."

  "My point is that I didn't think you were here, so I invited Marino. I didn't want him to drive back to Richmond in the snow."

  Disappointment glinted in her intense green eyes. "It's not a problem. As long as he and I don't have to sleep in the same room," she dryly remarked. "But I don't understand what he was even doing in Tidewater."

  "Like I said, it's a long story," I answered. "The case in question has a Richmond connection."

  We went out to the frigid porch and quickly swished fins, dive skin, wet suit and other gear in icy water. Then we carried all of it up to the attic, where nothing would freeze, and placed it on multiple layers of towels. I took as long a shower as the water heater would allow, and thought it unreal that Lucy, Marino and I were together in this tiny coastal cottage on a snowy New Year's Eve.

  When I emerged from my bedroom, I found them in the kitchen drinking Italian beer and reading about making bread.

  "All right," I said to them. "That's it. Now I take over."

  "Watch out," Lucy said.

  I shooed them out of the way and began measuring high gluten flour, yeast, a little sugar and olive oil into a large bowl. I turned the oven on low and opened a bottle of Cete Retie, which was for the cook to sip as she began her serious work. I would serve a Chianti with the meal.

  "Did you go through Eddings' wallet?" I asked Marino as I chopped porcini mushrooms.

  "Who's Eddings?" Lucy asked.

  She was sitting on a countertop, sipping Peroni. Through the windows behind her snow streaked the gathering dark.

  I explained more about what had happened today, and she asked no further questions, but was silent as Marino talked.

  "Nothing jumped out," he said. "One MasterCard, one Visa, AmEx, insurance info. Crap like that and a couple receipts. They look like restaurants, but we'll check. You mind if I get another one of these?" He dropped an empty bottle into the trash and opened the refrigerator door.

  "Let's see what else." Glass clattered. "He wasn't carrying much cash. Twenty-seven bucks."

  "What about photographs?" I asked, kneading dough on a board dusted with flour.

  "Nothing." He shut the refrigerator. "And as you know, he wasn't married."

  "We don't know that he didn't have a significant relationship with someone," I said.

  "That could be true because there sure isn't a hell of a lot we know." He looked at Lucy. "You know what Birdsong is?"

  "My Sig's got a Birdsong finish." She looked over at me. "So does Aunt Kay's Browning."

  "Well, this guy Eddings had a Browning nine-mil just like what your aunt's got and it has a desert brown Birdsong finish. Plus, his ammo's Teflon-coated and has red lacquer on the primer. I mean you could shoot the shit through twelve phone books in the friggin' pouring rain."

  She was surprised. "What's a journalist doing with something like that?"

  "Some people are just very enthusiastic about guns and ammo," I said. "Although I never knew Eddings was. He never mentioned it to me-not that he necessarily would have."

  "I've never seen KTW in Richmond at all," Marino said, referring to the brand name of the Teflon-coated cartridges. "Legal or otherwise."

  "Could he have gotten it at a gun show?" I asked.

  "Maybe. One thing's for sure. This guy probably went to a lot of them. I ain't told you about his apartment yet."

  I covered the dough with a damp towel and put the bowl in the oven on the lowest setting.

  "I won't give you the whole tour," he went on. "Just the important parts, starting with the room where he's apparently been reloading his own ammo. Now where he's been shooting all these rounds, who knows. But he's got plenty of guns to choose from, including several other handguns, an AK-47, an MP5 and an M16. Not exactly what you use for varmint hunting. Plus, he subscribed to a number of survivalist magazines, including Soldier of Fortune, U.S. Cavalry Magazine, and Brigade Quartermaster.

  Finally"-Marino took another swallow of beer-"we found some videotapes on how to be a sniper. You know special forces training and shit like that."

  I folded eggs and Parmesan reggiano with ricotta. "Any hint as to what he may have been involved in?" I asked as the mystery of the dead man deepened and unsettled me more.

  "No, but he sure as hell seemed to be after something."

  "Or something was after him," I said.

  "He was scared," Lucy spoke as if she knew. "You don't go diving after dark and carry along a waterproof nine-mil loaded with armor-piercing ammo unless you're scared. That's the behavior of someone who thinks there's a contract out on him."

  It was then I told them about my strange early-morning phone call from an Officer Young who did not seem to exist. I mentioned Captain Green and described his behavior.

  "Why would he call, if he's the one who did?" Marino frowned.

  "Clearly, he didn't want me at the scene," I said. "And maybe if I were given ample information by the police, I would just wait for the body to come in, as I usually do."

  "Well, it sounds to me like you were being bullied," Lucy said.

  "I believe that was the overall plan," I agreed.

  "Have you tried the phone number this nonexistent Officer Young gave you?" she asked.

  "No," I said.

  "Where is it?"

  I got it for her and she dialed it.

  "It's the number for the local weather report," she said, hanging up.

  Marino pulled out a chair from the checker cloth--covered breakfast table and straddled it, his arms folded on top of the back. Nobody spoke for a while as we sifted through data that were getting only stranger by the minute.

  "Listen, Doc." Marino cracked his knuckles. "I really gotta smoke. You going to let me or do I have to go outside?"

  "Outside," Lucy said, jabbing her thumb toward the door a
nd looking meaner than I knew she felt.

  "And what if I fall into a snowdrift, you little runt?" he said.

  "It's four inches deep out there. The only drift you're going to fall into is the one in your mind."

  "Tomorrow we'll go out on the beach and shoot cans," he said. "Now and then you need someone to give you a little humility, Special Agent Lucy."

  "You most certainly will not be shooting anything on this beach," I said to both of them.

  "I guess we could let Pete open the window and blow smoke out," Lucy said. "But it just shows you how addicted you are."

  "As long as you smoke fast," I said to him. "This house is cold enough as it is."

  The window was stubborn, but no more so than Marino, who managed to get it open after a violent struggle. Moving his chair nearby, he lit up and blew smoke out the screen.

  Lucy and I placed silverware and napkins in the living room, deciding it would be cozier to eat in front of the fire than in Dr. Mant's kitchen or cramped, drafty dining room.

  "You haven't even told me how you're doing," I said to my niece as she started working on the fire.

  "I'm doing great."

  Sparks swarmed up the chimney's sooty throat as she shoved more wood inside, and veins stood out in her hands, muscles flexing in her back. Her gifts were in computer science and, most recently, robotics, which she had studied at MIT. They were areas of expertise that had made her very attractive to the FBI's Hostage Rescue Team, but the expectation of her was cerebral, not physical. No woman had ever passed HRT's punishing requirements, and I worried that she was not going to accept her limits.

  "How much are you working out?" I asked her.

  She closed the screen and sat on the hearth, looking at me. "A lot."

  "If your body fat gets much lower, you won't be healthy.

  "I'm very healthy and actually have too much body fat."

  "If you're getting anorexic, I'm not going to have my head in the sand about it, Lucy. I know that eating disorders kill. I've seen their victims."

  "I don't have an eating disorder."

  I came over and sat next to her, the fire warming our backs.

  "I guess I'll have to take your word on that."

  " Good."

  "Listen"-I patted her leg-"you've been assigned to HRT as their technical consultant. It has never been anyone's assumption that you will fast-rope out of helicopters and run four-minute miles with the men."

  She looked over at me with flashing eyes. "You're one to talk about limitations. I don't see that you've ever let your gender hold you back."

  "I absolutely know my limitations," I disagreed. "And I work around them with my mind. That is how I have survived."

  "Look," she said with feeling, "I'm tired of programming computers and robots, and then every time something big goes down-like the bombing in Oklahoma City-the guys head off to Andrews Air Force Base and I get left.

  Or even if I go with them, they lock me in some little room somewhere like I'm nothing but a nerd. I'm not a goddamn nerd. I don't want to be a latchkey agent."

  Her eyes were suddenly bright with tears and she averted them from me. "I can run any obstacle course they put me on. I can rappel, sniper-shoot and scuba-dive. More important, I can take it when they act like assholes. You know, not all of them are exactly happy to have me around."

  I had no doubt of that. Lucy had always been an extremely polarizing human being, because she was brilliant and could be so difficult. She was also beautiful in a sharpfeatured, strong way, and I frankly wondered how she survived at all on a special forces team of fifty men, not one of whom she would ever date.

  "How is Janet?" I asked.

  "They transferred her out to the Washington Field Office to do white-collar crime. So at least she's not far away."

  "This must have been recent." I was puzzled.

  "Real recent." Lucy rested her forearms on her knees.

  "And where is she tonight?"

  "Her family's got a condo in Aspen."

  My silence asked the question, and her voice was irritated as she answered it. "No, I wasn't invited. And not just because Janet and I aren't getting along. It just wasn't a good idea."

  "I see." I hesitated before adding, "Then her parents still don't know."

  "Hell, who does know? You think we don't hide it at work? So we go to things together and each of us gets to watch the other being hit on by men. That's a special pleasure," she bitterly said.

  "I know what it's like at work," I said. "It's no different than I told you it would be. What I'm more interested in is Janet's family."

  Lucy stared at her hands. "It's mostly her mom. To tell you the truth, I don't think her dad would care. He's not going to assume it's because of something he did wrong, like my mother assumes. Only she assumes it's because of something you did wrong since you pretty much raised me and are my mother, according to her."

  There was little point in my defending myself against the ignorant notions of my only sister, Dorothy, who unfortunately happened to be Lucy's parent.

  "And Mother has another theory now, too. She says you're the first woman I fell in love with, and somehow that explains everything," Lucy went on in an ironic tone.

  "Never mind that this would be called incest or that you're straight. Remember, she writes these insightful children's books, so she's an expert in psychology and apparently is a sex therapist, too.

  "I'm sorry you have to go through all this on top of everything else," I said with feeling. I never knew quite what to do when we had these conversations. They were still new to me, and in some ways scary.

  "Look"-she got up as Marino walked into the living room--some things you just live with."

  "Well, I got news for you," Marino announced, "the weather forecast is that this crap is going to melt. So come tomorrow morning, all of us should be able to get out of here."

  "Tomorrow's New Year's Day," Lucy said. "For the sake of argument, why should we get out of here?"

  "Because I need to take your aunt to Eddings' crib." He paused before adding, "And Benton needs to get his ass there, too."

  I did not visibly react. Benton Wesley was the unit chief of the Bureau's Criminal Investigative Analysis program, and I had hoped I would not have to see him during the holidays.

  "What are you telling me?" I quietly said.

  He sat down on the sofa and regarded me thoughtfully for a pause. Then he answered my question with one of his own, "I'm curious about something, Doc. How would you poison someone underwater?"

  "Maybe it didn't happen underwater," Lucy suggested.

  "Maybe he swallowed cyanide before he went diving."

  "No. That's not what happened," I said. "Cyanide is very corrosive, and had he taken it orally, I would have seen extensive damage to his stomach. Probably to his esophagus and mouth, as well."

  "So what could have happened?" Marino asked.

  "I think he inhaled cyanide gas."

  He looked baffled. "How? Through the compressor?"

  "it draws air through an intake valve that's covered with a filter," I reminded him. "What someone could have done was simply mix a little hydrochloric acid with a cyanide tablet and hold the vial close enough to the intake valve for the gas to be drawn in."

  "If Eddings inhaled cyanide gas while he was down there," Lucy said, "what would have happened?"

  "A seizure, then death. In seconds."

  I thought of the snagged air hose and wondered if Eddings had been close to the Exploiter's screw when he suddenly inhaled cyanide gas through his regulator. That might explain the position he was in when I found him.

  "Can you test the hookah for cyanide?" Lucy asked.

  "Well, we can try," I said, "but I don't expect to find anything unless the cyanide tablet was placed directly on the valve's filter. Even so, things may have been tampered with by the time I got there. We might have better luck with the section of hose that was closest to the body. I'll start tox testing tomorrow, if I can get
anybody to come into the lab on a holiday."

  My niece walked over to a window to look out. "It's still coming down hard. It's amazing how it lights up the night. I can see the ocean. It's this black wall," she said in a pensive tone.

  "What you're seeing is a wall," Marino said. "The brick wall at the back of the yard."

  She did not speak for a while, and I thought of how much I missed her. Although I had seen little of her during her undergraduate years at UVA, now we saw each other less, for even when a case brought me to Quantico there was never a guarantee we would find time to visit. It saddened me that her childhood was gone, and a part of me wished she had chosen a life and a career less harsh than what hers must be.