The Department of Health & Human Services filled a six-story concrete building on Independence Avenue across the street from Bartholdi Park. Washington’s bureaucracy was still struggling with the reality that the farther technology advanced the more mayhem a handful of people could unleash. Back in the days of black powder and brass cannons half a dozen determined malcontents might have managed to take fifteen or twenty lives. Now with C4 and step-by-step instructions on how to make nerve gas just a few clicks away, a couple of nut-jobs could kill thousands and shut down a city of millions. Looking at the endless warren of cubicles that stretched out in front of him Kane wondered if the Government’s efforts to prevent a disaster weren’t little more than a replay of the Dutch boy madly trying to plug the holes in an already collapsing dike.
Brownstein’s subordinate, the Senior Assistant Deputy for the Department for the Control of Dangerous Biological Agents and Toxins, was Sandra Cray. Kane found her in a packing-crate-sized office on the Department’s fourth floor.
“Ms. Cray? I’m Agent Gregory Kane, Department of Homeland Security,” Kane announced, holding up his creds.
Sandra Cray’s chair was jammed between a steel desk mounded with brown folders and a windowless gray wall. Her complexion, already sallow under the fluorescent lights and the glow from an ancient Dell monitor, now paled even more.
“What? Homeland Security?” Cray looked at Kane with an expression halfway between confusion and fright.
Greg took that as an invitation and squeezed into the lone chair with his knees almost bumping against the front edge of her desk. With a long stretch of his arm he closed the door behind him.
“When was the last time you saw Senior Deputy Brownstein?”
“What’s this all about?”
“It’s about the last time you saw or talked with or communicated with Senior Deputy Brownstein. Is there some reason you don’t want to answer that question?”
“What? No. Of course not!”
Frightened people usually talked more than was good for them which was just what Kane wanted. He stared at Sandra Cray and waited for her to begin babbling in an attempt to prove herself innocent of a crime of which she had not yet been accused. It didn’t take long.
“Ummm, last Wednesday, around a quarter after five. I usually stay later but my daughter had a cello recital and I, well, anyway, I said goodnight to him on my way out.”
“And after that? Any calls? Emails?”
“No, I mean, I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think so? What does that mean?”
Cray looked helplessly around her tiny, steel box as if searching for a way out. A picture of a palm tree against a setting sun was stuck to the wall behind her. Kane calculated that she had just enough clearance to swivel around and stare at it during those moments when she felt the room closing in on her.
“I got a text, a partial text, from his cell around eight o’clock Wednesday night. I had my phone turned off for the recital so I didn’t see it until Thursday morning when I was getting ready for work.”
Kane stared at her for a heartbeat then snapped, “Am I supposed to guess what it said?”
Sandra gave him a chastened look and answered with exaggerated care. “Two words: ‘Sandy, I’m’ and that was all.” Kane stared. After another heartbeat she continued. “Albert was the only one who called me ‘Sandy’ so I’m sure it was from him.”
“You don’t like people calling you ‘Sandy’?”
“I’m not a beach!” she snapped, then continued in a forced-calm tone. “My name is Sandra, not Sandy.”
“But Brownstein was your boss and if he wanted to call you ‘Sandy’ you couldn’t stop him.” Sandra just stared at Kane. “When he didn’t show up at work on Thursday did you call him?”
“Of course. I called his home and his cell. He liked to keep his work calls separate from his personal ones so he had two phones, but they both went to voice mail. I also emailed him, several times, but I never got an answer. And I texted him.” Cray gave Kane a “so there” look.
Greg stared at her and conspicuously made a note in his pad. “What did you do next?”
“What do you mean?”
“What do I mean? Your boss goes missing. You can’t reach him. You’ve got an interrupted after-hours text from him. Are you telling me that you just ignored it and decided that eventually he’d show up dead or alive?”
“Are you saying that Albert is dead?”
Jesus, how stupid is this woman? Kane thought but somehow managed not to say it out loud. Instead he took a deep breath and tried again.
“Was Mr. Brownstein having any problems that you were aware of? Money trouble? Disputes with anyone?”
“No. Our relationship was strictly business.”
Why would she go out of her way to add that? Kane thought. Does that mean she’s trying to cover up the fact that something was going on or that she would be insulted if anyone thought that she had become involved with Brownstein?
“You didn’t socialize?”
“No.” Sandra gave Kane a hard look. OK, Kane thought. You wouldn’t touch him with a ten-foot pole. Got it.
“Has anything unusual happened in the last few weeks? Was Mr. Brownstein upset, nervous, preoccupied, different in any way?”
“No, he was the same as always, but as I said, we didn’t have a personal relationship so I wouldn’t know anything about what was going on in his private life.”
Yeah, I got that loud and clear, Kane thought.
“Did you do anything in response to Mr. Brownstein’s absence?”
“I called Albert’s boss, our boss, the Deputy Assistant Director and I told him that Albert hadn’t come into work.”
“When did you do that?”
Cray glanced at the ceiling as if trying to remember the formula for calculating the circumference of a circle.
“Friday afternoon,” she said finally with a hint of pride. “Well, I didn’t want to get Albert in trouble if he was just, well, I don’t know, enjoying himself a little too much.”
“Did he do that, sometimes miss work because he was enjoying himself too much?”
“Albert? No, never. You could set your watch by him, but, well, there’s always the first time, isn’t there?”
No, there isn’t, Kane thought but just nodded for her to continue. She just stared at him.
“What did the Deputy Assistant Director say when you told him about Mr. Brownstein not coming to work?”
“He checked Albert’s file and said that Albert had six weeks accrued vacation so he was entitled to some time off.” She paused but in response to Kane’s stare finally continued. “He said that I should keep the office going until Albert returned and that I should keep a record of the number of days he missed so that his vacation time could be adjusted when he came back. He told me that if I hadn’t heard from Albert by the close of business today that I should call someone and file a report and to keep him in the loop.”
“So, you’re planning on filing a missing person’s report this afternoon?”
“If Albert hasn’t contacted me by then, yes, well, tomorrow actually. I’ve got a PTA meeting tonight and I won’t have time to sit around some police station filling out forms.”
Sandra glanced at a watercolor of a cat in an overstuffed chair taped to the wall. A juvenile hand had printed “Mr. Bonkers” in purple ink at the bottom.
“Your daughter’s work?” Kane asked, pointing at the picture.
“Olivia. She’s ten.” For the first time Sandra Cray smiled.
Within thirty seconds of entering her office Kane had been frustrated to the point of wanting to strangle Sandra Cray but now his anger melted in the glow of her smile. He hadn’t missed the lack of a ring and the cheap drugstore makeup and her hair going brown at the roots. Sandra Cray was a single mother stuck in a prison cell of an office pushing papers from one side of her desk to the other for forty hours a week all in order to build some kind of a future for her child. Cello lessons and PTA meetings and a boss who called her by a name usually applied to a beach.
Jesus, what’s wrong with me? Kane thought.
“Is that what you want me to do? File a missing person’s report?”
“No,” Kane said, feeling empty inside. “I’ll take care of it. I need Mr. Brownstein’s numbers, his email and his home address.”
Sandra punched a few buttons and a few seconds later handed Kane a page ejected from the printer.
“I’m going to check out Mr. Brownstein’s home. I’ll have some more questions for you after that. Call me if you hear from him.” Kane stood and gave her his card: Agent Gregory Kane, Department of Homeland Security, Office of Special Investigations. Cray gave it a disinterested glance and dropped it face-down on her desk.
“Open or closed?” Kane asked as he maneuvered himself out the door.
“Closed.”
Kane nodded, then took a quick, final glance at Mr. Bonkers before locking Sandra Cray back into her cell.