"This person finally hits her from the rear and Lucy applies the brakes," I continued to reconstruct what I believed had happened.
"She drives on, and realizes the person is gaining on her again. Panicking, Lucy floors it and loses control. All of this would have taken place in seconds."
"If what you found out there is right, it sure could have happened exactly like that."
"Will you look into it?"
"You bet. What about the paint?"
"I'll turn it, the taillight unit, and everything else in to the labs and ask them to put a rush on it."
"Put my name on the paperwork. Have them call me with the results right away." It was five o'clock and dark out when I got off the phone in my upstairs office. I looked around dazed, and felt like a stranger in my house. Hunger gnawing my stomach was followed by nausea, and I drank Mylanta from the bottle and rummaged in the medicine cabinet for Zantac. My ulcer had vanished during the summer, but unlike former lovers, it always came back. Both phone lines rang and were answered by voice mail. I heard the fax machine as I soaked in the tub and sipped wine on top of medicine. I had so much to do. I knew my sister, Dorothy, would want to come immediately. She always rose to crisis occasions because it fed her need for drama. She would use it for research. No doubt, in her next children's book, one of her characters would deal with an auto wreck. Critics again would rave about the sensitivity and wisdom of Dorothy, who mothered people she imagined much better than she did her only daughter. The fax, I found, was Dorothy's flight schedule. She was arriving late tomorrow afternoon and would stay with Lucy in my home.
"She won't be in the hospital long, will she?" she asked, when I called her minutes later.
"I imagine I'll be bringing her here in the afternoon," I said.
"She must look terrible."
"Most people do after automobile accidents."
"But is any of it permanent?" She almost whispered.
"She won't be disfigured, will she?"
"No, Dorothy. She won't be disfigured. How aware have you been of her drinking?"
"Now how would I know anything about that? She's up there near you in school and never seems to want to come home. And when she does she certainly doesn't confide in me or her grandmother. I would think if anyone were aware, you should have been."
"If she's convicted of DUI, the courts could order her into treatment," I said as patiently as possible. Silence. Then, "My God."
I went on, "Even if they don't, it would be a good idea for two reasons. The most obvious is that she needs to deal with the problem. Second, the judge may look upon her case with more sympathy if she volunteers to get some help. "
"Well, I'm just going to leave all that up to you. You're the doctor-lawyer in the family. But I know my little girl. She's not going to want to do it.
I can't imagine her going off to some mental ward where they don't have computers. She'd never be able to face anyone again."
"She will not be going off to a mental ward, and there is nothing the least bit shameful about being treated for alcohol or drug abuse. What's shameful is to let it go on to ruin your life. "
"I've always stopped at three glasses of wine."
"There are many types of addictions," I said.
"Yours happens to be to men."
"Oh, Kay." She laughed.
"That's quite something coming from you. By the way, are you seeing anyone?"
15
Senator Frank Lord heard a rumor that I had been in a wreck and called me before the sun was up the next morning.
"No," I told him as I sat half dressed on the edge of my bed.
"Lucy was driving my car."
"Oh, dear!"
"She's doing fine, Frank. I'll be bringing her home this afternoon."
"Apparently one of the papers up here printed that it was you who had wrecked and there was a suspicion alcohol was a factor."
"Lucy was trapped in the car for a while. No doubt some policeman made an assumption when the tags came back to me, and this ended up being relayed to a reporter on deadline." I thought of Officer Sinclair. He would get my vote for such a blunder.
"Kay, can I do anything to help?"
"Do you have any further clues as to what might have happened at ERF? "
"There are some interesting developments. Have you heard Lucy mention someone named Carrie Grethen?"
"They're co-workers. I've met her."
"Apparently she's connected to a spy shop, one of these places that sells high-tech surveillance devices."
"You aren't serious."
"Afraid so."
"Well, I can certainly see why she would have been interested in getting a job at ERF, and it stuns me that the Bureau would have hired her with that in her background."
"No one knew. Apparently, it's her boyfriend who owns the shop. The only reason we know she's a frequent visitor is she's been under surveillance."
"She dates a man?"
"Excuse me?"
"The owner of the spy shop is a man?"
"Yes."
"Who says it is her boyfriend?"
"Apparently she did when questioned after being seen in the shop."
"Can you tell me more about both of them?"
"Not much at present, but I have the shop's address, if you want to hold on a minute. Let me dig it out."
"What about her home address or the boyfriend's home address?"
"I'm afraid I don't have those."
"Whatever information you can give me, then."
I looked around for a pencil and wrote as my mind raced. The name of the shop was Eye Spy, and it was in the Springfield Mall, just off 1-95. If I left now, I could be there by mid-morning and back in time to bring Lucy home from the hospital.
"Just so you know," Senator Lord was saying, "Miss. Grethen has been dismissed from ERF because of the spy shop connection, which she obviously omitted divulging during her application process. But at this point, there's no evidence whatsover she was involved in the break-in."
"She certainly had motive," I said, holding my anger in check.
"ERF is a Santa's workshop for someone who sells espionage equipment." I paused, thinking.
"Do you know when she was hired by the Bureau, and did she apply for the job or did ERF recruit her?"
"Let's see. It's in my notes here. It just says here that she submitted an application last April and started mid-August."
"Mid-August was about the same time Lucy started. What did Carrie do before that?"
"It seems her entire career has been in computers. Hardware, software, programming. And engineering, which was partly why the Bureau was interested in her. She's very creative and ambitious, and unfortunately, dishonest.
Several people recently interviewed have begun to paint a portrait of a woman who has been lying and cheating her way to the top for years."
"Frank, she applied for the job at ERF so she could spy for the spy shop," I said.
"She may also be one of these people who hates the FBI. "
"Both scenarios are possible," he agreed.
"Ifs a matter of finding proof. Even if we can, unless there is evidence she took something, she can't be prosecuted."
"Lucy mentioned to me before all this happened that she was involved in some research pertaining to the biometric lock system at ERF. Do you know anything about that?"
"I'm not aware of any research projects of that nature."
"But would you necessarily know if there was one?"
"There's a good chance I would. I've been given quite a lot of detailed information pertaining to ongoing classified projects at Quantico-because of the crime bill, the money I've been trying to appropriate for the Bureau."
"Well, it's strange that Lucy would say she was involved in a project that doesn't seem to exist," I said.
"Sadly, that detail might only make her situation look more incriminating."
I knew he was right. As suspicious as Carrie Grethen appeared, the case against Lucy was still stronger.
"Frank," I went on, "do you happen to know what types of cars Carrie Grethen and her boyfriend drive?"