cars?”
“I doubt it.”
“If it was a story they devised among themselves, or under the direction of some mysterious third party-for reasons yet unknown-why would each girl come up with a different brand of car?”
A possible answer occurred to Gurney, but he wanted more time to think about it. “How did you pick the names of the girls you tried to reach?”
“Nothing systematic. They were just girls from Jillian’s graduating class.”
“So they were all approximately the same age? All around nineteen or twenty?”
“I believe so.”
“You do realize now that you’ll have to turn over Mapleshade’s enrollment records to the police?”
“I’m afraid I don’t quite see it that way-at least not yet. All I know at the moment is that three girls, legally adults, left their homes after having similar arguments with their parents. I’ll grant you there’s something about it that seems peculiar-which is why I’m telling you about it-but so far there’s no evidence of criminality, no evidence of any wrongdoing at all.”
“There are more than three.”
“How do you know that?”
“As I explained before, I was told-”
Ashton cut in. “Yes, yes, I know, some unnamed person told you that they couldn’t reach some of our former students, also unnamed. That in itself means nothing. Let’s not mix apples and oranges, leap to some awful conclusion, and use it as a pretext for destroying the school’s guarantees of privacy.”
“Doctor, you just called me. You sounded concerned. Now you’re telling me there’s nothing to be concerned about. You’re not making a lot of sense.”
He could hear Ashton breathing a bit shakily. After a long five seconds, the man spoke in a more subdued voice.
“I just don’t want to pull the whole structure of the school down on our heads. Look, here’s what I propose: I’ll continue making calls. I’ll try to call every contact number I have for recent graduates. That way we can find out if there’s a serious pattern here before we cause irreversible damage to Mapleshade. Believe me, I’m not trying to be pointlessly obstructive. If we discover any additional examples…”
“All right, Doctor, make the calls. But be aware that I intend to pass along what I already know to BCI.”
“Do what you have to do. But please remember how little you actually
“I get your point. Eloquently expressed.” Ashton’s easy eloquence was, in fact, starting to get on Gurney’s nerves. “But speaking of the institution’s legacy, or mission, or reputation, or whatever you want to call it, I understand you made some dramatic changes in that area yourself a few years ago-some might say risky changes.”
Ashton answered simply, “Yes, I did. Tell me how the changes were described to you, and I’ll tell you the reason for them.”
“I’ll paraphrase: ‘Scott Ashton upended the institution’s mission, turned it from a facility that treated the treatable into a holding pen for incurable monsters.’ I think that captures the gist of it.”
Ashton uttered a small sigh. “I suppose that’s the way
Gurney ignored the apparent swipe at Simon Kale. “How do
“This country has an overabundance of therapeutic boarding schools for neurotics. What it lacks are residential environments where the problems of sexual abuse and destructive sexual obsessions can be addressed creatively and effectively. I’m trying to correct that imbalance.”
“And you’re happy with the way it’s working?”
There was the sound of a longer sigh. “The treatment of certain mental disorders is medieval. With the bar set so low, making improvements is not as difficult as you might think. When you have a free hour or two, we can go into it in more detail. Right now I’d rather proceed with those phone calls.”
Gurney checked the time on his car dashboard. “And I have a meeting I’m already five minutes late for. Please let me know what you can, as soon as you can. Oh-one last thing, Doctor. I assume you have phone numbers and addresses for Alessandro and for Karnala Fashion?”
“I beg your pardon?”
Gurney said nothing.
“You’re talking about the ad? Why would I have their numbers?”
“I assumed you’d gotten that photo on your wall from either the photographer or the company that commissioned it.”
“No. As a matter of fact, Jillian was the one who got it. She gave it to me as a wedding present. She gave it to me that morning. The morning of the wedding.”
Chapter 35
The County Office Building had an unusual history. Prior to 1935 it was known as the Bumblebee Lunatic Asylum-named after the eccentric British transplant Sir George Bumblebee, who endowed it with his entire estate in 1899 and who, his disinherited relatives argued, was as insane as any prospective resident. It was a history that provided endless fodder for local wags commenting on the workings of the government agencies that had been located there ever since the county took the place over during the Great Depression.
The dark brick edifice sat like an oppressive paperweight holding down the north side of the town square. The much-needed sandblasting to remove a century of grime was put off each year to the following year, the victim of a perennial budget crisis. In the mid-sixties, the inside had been gutted and redone. Fluorescent lights and plasterboard were installed in place of cracked globes and warped wainscoting. The elaborate lobby security apparatus that Gurney remembered from his visits to the building during the Mellery case was still in place and still frustratingly slow. Once one was past that barrier, however, the rectangular layout of the building was simple, and a minute later he was opening a frosted-glass door on which DISTRICT ATTORNEY appeared in elegant black letters.
He recognized the woman in the cashmere sweater behind the reception desk: Ellen Rackoff, the DA’s intensely sexy, though far from young, personal assistant. The look in her eyes was arrestingly cool and experienced.
“You’re late,” she said in her cashmere voice. The fact that she didn’t ask his name was the only acknowledgment that she remembered him from the Mellery case. “Come with me.” She led him back out through the glass door and down a corridor to a door with a black plastic sign on it that read CONFERENCE ROOM.
“Good luck.”
He opened the door and thought for a moment he’d been brought to the wrong meeting. There were several people in the room, but the one person he’d expected to be there, Sheridan Kline, wasn’t among them. He realized he was probably in the right place after all when he saw Captain Rodriguez of the state police glowering at him from the opposite side of the big round table that filled half the windowless room.
Rodriguez was a short, fleshy man with a closed face and a carefully coiffed mass of thick black hair, obviously dyed. His blue suit was immaculate, his shirt whiter than white, his tie bloodred. Glasses with thin steel frames emphasized dark, resentful eyes. Sitting on his left was Arlo Blatt, who was looking at Gurney with small, unfriendly eyes. The colorless man on Rodriguez’s right showed no emotion beyond a faintly depressed quality that Gurney guessed was more constitutional than situational. He gave Gurney the appraising once-over that cops automatically give strangers, looked at his watch, and yawned. Across from this trio, his chair pushed back a good three feet from the table, Jack Hardwick sat with his eyes closed and his arms folded on his chest, as if being in the same room with these people had put him to sleep.
“Hello, Dave.” The voice was strong, clear, female, and familiar. The source was a tall, auburn-haired woman
