Whiplash - Catherine Coulter [52]
25
Wednesday afternoon
Savich stepped out of the black FBI Bell helicopter at exactly five p.m. Special Agent Dane Carver waved him toward his Jeep. As Dane pulled out of Andrews Air Force Base, he said, "Everything's still in an uproar. The body of the lobbyist who was poisoned at the Foggy Bottom Grill is already with Dr. Branicki at Quantico. The paramedics who showed up a few minutes after she died said it looked like arsenic to them. We already know they were right. Of course, they've closed the place down and it's all over the news."
Savich said, "Where is Senator Hoffman?"
"Back at his home in Chevy Chase, with Mr. Maitland. He's shaken, as you can imagine. Look, Savich, Mr. Maitland told us you'd been working with Hoffman, that you told him his wife was trying to warn him-do you think the poison was meant for him? That Dana Frobisher was poisoned by mistake?"
Savich looked out the Jeep window at the sun baking the sidewalks, radiating enough heat to make you sweat just looking. Here it was mid-September and nearly ninety degrees. There were still tourists wandering around, families with tired children in tow. Wasn't school back in session? He remembered Dane's question. "To swallow a bullet meant for someone else, to die because of a mistake. That's tough, Dane."
Dane turned onto K Street. He spotted staffers thick on the ground, off for the day, heading for the local bars, maybe for home. He pulled the Jeep into a parking slot in the underground garage at the Hoover building.
Dane said, "According to Senator Hoffman, she'd had only a few bites of the salad, but she'd really plowed into the fried shrimp. I guess the poison was probably in the batter coating the shrimp. It's all being analyzed as we speak."
They walked through security, took an elevator to the fifth floor, and walked down the impossibly wide hall to the CAU, Savich's Criminal Apprehension Unit.
Ollie Hamish, Savich's second in command, was speaking to Ruth Warnecki, gesticulating as he always did. Agent Cooper McKnight, only three months in the unit, stood close, listening intently. Shirley, their unit assistant, sat on Dane's desk, chewing on an apple, listening as well.
Everyone turned when Savich and Dane walked into the large room. Ollie called out, "Mr. Maitland just phoned. Arsenic poison was all over the shrimp, in the batter, and she ate five of the six shrimp they served her. That's why she died so quickly. He said it wasn't elemental arsenic, but an arsenic compound-arsenic trioxide, to be exact. Get this-arsenic trioxide is approximately five hundred times more toxic than elemental arsenic. A lethal dose of pure arsenic in adults is about a hundred milligrams. The woman ate about four hundred milligrams of the arsenic trioxide. Dr. Branicki said she'd have died from just one shrimp.
"It literally exploded her system. She was dead within minutes, maybe less. The senator is in shock.
"Ruth here personally interviewed the waiter. Tell him, Ruth."
Ruth Warnecki said, "Mr. Graves is a twenty-year veteran waiter at the Foggy Bottom Grill. He told me the senator always orders the fried shrimp every week when he comes in. This time he didn't. Mr. Graves said he was surprised, but the senator told him, laughing, that his waistline was begging for only a salad today, and Mr. Graves recommended a small Cobb salad. He remembers the senator told his companion about how great the fried shrimp was, and she ordered it.
"When he brought their plates, Mr. Graves said he accidentally placed the shrimp plate in front of the senator, only to be reminded that Ms. Frobisher had ordered it. He said he remembered thinking that it was a forgivable mistake on his part, since he was used to serving it to the senator, and usually it was the ladies who ordered small salads."
Savich said, "Okay. Ruth, I'd really like to speak to Mr. Graves myself."
Ollie gave him a big grin. "Ruth and I figured you would. He's in the conference room with Lucy."
When Savich walked down the hall into the conference room, he saw Agent Lucy Carlisle