Harris Mayer owned a white-painted, black-shuttered brick house on a narrow, prestigious Georgetown street. As Rook stood in the front room, he could see the overgrown rhododendron that grew past its first-floor window.Harris’s neighbors probably wished he had moved or gambled away the house. Rook and T.J. had checked with them, and they clearly hoped the FBI or the local police—someone—would find Harris dead of a heart attack. His disgrace wasn’t the issue so much as the shabby condition of his house. It needed paint, extensive repairs and a couple of guys with trimming shears and chainsaws to tackle the out-of-control greenery. The windows hadn’t been washed in years. Bees had built nests in various cracks and crevices.But Rook and T.J. and two other agents hadn’t found Mayer dead in his bed or passed out on his kitchen floor. They’d arrived an hour ago, in the heat of the afternoon, having obtained a warrant to check the house for him. The scope of the warrant limited them to searching places where a person could have fallen ill or be hiding—a closet, a shower, not a desk drawer.“He’s skipped,”
