I took the picture from Tito. It was another old one, this time from the 1950s or before, black and white. Blaine’s grandfather with two other men in front of a sign that read, “Camp Eagle Bluff Grand Opening.”
The men were wearing casual clothing of the era, high-waisted khaki pants and plaid shirts, short-brimmed Stetsons. In front of them stood several children. Everyone was smiling.
I held up the picture. “Before we go, we’re going to need to discuss this.”
He looked at his watch. “Fine. But we have to be quick.”
I put the photo on the coffee table, sat on one of the sofas, waited.
After a few seconds, Blaine said, “Well? What do you want to know?”
“Start at the beginning,” I said.
Mia sat next to me. Tito plopped on the second sofa, loosened his tie.
“What do you mean, ‘the beginning?’” Blaine asked.
“Neanderthals were hunting wooly mammoths with pointy sticks,” I said. “Start there.”
He stared at each of us, no doubt wondering how he had lost control of the situation.
After a moment, he said, “My family made a strategic decision after the Second World War to add to their land holdings. Eagle Bluff, that was part of what they acquired.”
“You’re doing great,” I said. “Keep going.”
He continued, telling us a story about generational wealth, a peek behind the curtain of old money, how the rich got richer.
The most lucrative play was north of Dallas, he told us, the direction of growth. Huge tracts of farmland were acquired with the idea that one day the real estate developers would come calling and the family could cash out at fifty or a hundred times their purchase price. Land bought by the acre would sell by the square foot. The family followed the same strategy in the major metropolitan areas of the state, and it paid off handsomely, a nice addition to the wealth created by their oil and ranching empires.
The price for land in southeastern Dallas County where the camp had been located was so cheap, bordering on free, the family also acquired vast swaths along the Trinity River, figuring why not?
Blaine’s grandmother had the idea for the camp. She’d been active in a number of charities and saw a need for children from low-income families stuck in the city during the summer. We have all this land, she’d told everyone, beautiful acreage that was not ever going to be suitable for construction. Why not put some of it to use?
So, the family created Camp Eagle Bluff, seeding the nonprofit organization with money and a donation of two hundred acres, a small portion of which was out of the floodplain, a suitable location for camp buildings.
Another plus, the grandmother had argued, was the opportunity for the McFadden offspring to be around those less fortunate.
“What do you mean by that?” I asked.
“My grandmother wanted the younger generation to work at the camp,” he said. “You know, as counselors.”
Mia took a sharp breath.
“In the sixties and seventies,” Blaine said, “just about every McFadden of a certain age worked at the camp. They came from all over the state. It was like a rite of passage.”
“What about you?” Tito asked. “Did you work there?”
He shook his head. “The tradition started dying out in the 1980s. The camp had begun to fall apart. My grandmother was old. You know how it is.”
“Tell me about Rye,” I said. “Did he work there?”
A caterer stuck his head in the study. “Sir, when you have a second, I need to talk to you.”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” Blaine said.
The caterer left.
“What do you care where Rye worked?” Blaine asked. “I don’t understand how this helps locate him.”
“Just answer the damn question,” I said.
A flash of anger appeared in his eyes. He took a deep breath. “Rye was already showing signs of, well, not being quite right. The family thought it would be a good experience, a way to get him back on track.”
“To be around children,” Mia said. “The family thought that was a good idea?”
Blaine crossed his arms, avoiding our gaze.
“Has Rye ever assaulted anyone?” I asked. “Sexually abused a child?”
“I don’t know how to answer that,” Blaine said, his voice soft, hard to hear.
Tito leaned forward. “How about yes or no?”
“To the best of my knowledge, no.” Blaine paused. “But I couldn’t swear to that.”
“When did Rye work at the camp?” I asked.
“I don’t remember. Late high school, I think. That would have been the mid-1990s.”
Mia, Tito, and I all looked at each other.
“We need you to remember exactly,” I said. “And then we want to know about McFadden Memorial Hospital.”
“What about the hospital?” Blaine asked. “That’s another branch of the family foundation. I don’t see—”
BZZZ. A cell rang. Blaine pulled a phone from his pocket, looked at the screen.
“This is the governor,” he said. “I need to take the call.”
He left the room.