Until Dark - Mariah Stewart [18]
They had reached the car and Adam had opened the trunk, setting her briefcase alongside his own.
“Would you mind if I put the top down?” he asked as he removed the jacket of his obligatory dark suit.
Kendra shook her head. “It’ll feel good, maybe help clear my head a little.”
“I apologize,” she said as she got into the car. “As you can probably tell, this kind of carelessness always sets me off.”
“Ummm. I seem to recall that,” he said as he started the engine. “I seem to recall another case, in Virginia, a few years back.”
“Oh, don’t even remind me,” she said through gritted teeth. “That was the most blatant case of . . . I don’t even know what to call it. Ineptitude?”
“You were pretty hot, as I remember.”
“You know what made me angriest about that sketch? It wasn’t necessary to have done it. There was a witness who clearly saw the suspect’s face. Clearly saw it, as clearly as I can see you. So why use visual aids, when the best visual is right there? The witness’s memory.”
“Sometimes the emotions of the witness play into it.”
“That’s exactly why it’s important not to flood the person’s mind with too many images. The more acute the trauma, the more the witness might sometimes want to forget what he or she has seen. By giving the witness so many different features to look at, you’ve created a situation where you are offering an alternative, one that he or she may grab on to, to replace one image with another.”
“You mean create a face that’s inaccurate so the witness doesn’t have to ‘see’ the real suspect again.”
“I don’t think anyone consciously does that, but yes, I think that’s exactly what happens. It’s a means of banishing the bad memory and replacing it with something that isn’t quite real, and therefore less threatening.”
“Which I guess explains why there are so many composites floating around that ultimately are found to look so little like the criminal.”
“That’s my theory.” She leaned back in the seat as Adam accelerated. “I don’t mean to imply that there’s no one out there who does this the right way. There’s a woman on the West Coast who has literally written the book on this subject and has raised the art of compositing to a whole new level. And there are plenty of fine artists who insist on doing their own interviewing and who do not use mug shots and who are really careful about what they do. I’m sure that the person who drew that sketch of the man you’re looking for didn’t set out to do a bad job. But he made mistakes, and his mistakes may have cost the investigation. And may end up costing another young woman her life if he gets the urge to kill again soon.”
They rode in silence, both of them knowing that it really wasn’t a matter of if, but when.
Finally, Kendra spoke up.
“And that is why I think we need to speak with the witnesses from this third murder before anyone else can shove photographs or sketches under their noses, ask them leading questions, and otherwise distort their memories of what they really saw.”
“I’ve already called our agents on the scene and instructed them not to let anyone get to the witnesses until we have an opportunity to speak with them.”
“What time are we expected?”
“I told the chief we’d be there between three and four,” Adam said as he picked up Route 30 and headed east. “Which means we’ll have time to stop and grab a late lunch. Breakfast was a long, long time ago, and once we hit Walnut Crossing, we’ll be tied up for hours.”
“We passed a couple of fast-food restaurants on the way out of Deal.”
Adam looked at her as if she’d sprouted fangs.
“You don’t still eat that stuff, do you?”
“You mean, salty fries, fried chicken . . .”
“And here I thought you’d mended your ways.” Adam shook his head. “After that homemade soup you served me last night, I figured you’d had an epiphany.”
“Sorry to disappoint you, but the