In Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 2005, the University of North Carolina was in summer session and things were buzzing along as usual. Dr. Guy King, the head of the Spanish language and history department was on sabbatical. Everyone guessed he had returned to study in Spain, as he had done before, but he had left no forwarding address.
A loud splash that had disturbed the tranquil water of the academic community was the disappearance of one graduate assistant, Mary McCay. She had been assigned to King’s department. But she seemed simply to have vanished.
In her unkempt one-room apartment, police found an empty red wine bottle on the eating table, a glass half filled with wine, a burnt out candle with wax spilled over onto the table, and some photocopied texts in Spanish that appeared to be fairly ancient.
Her apartment door was locked. Her car keys, purse and wallet were in a large terra cotta bowl near the door. Her old Ford pickup was parked in the drive. She was last seen wearing blue jeans, a Carolina blue T-shirt with Chapel Hill printed on it and Birkenstock sandals, her usual outfit. No other clothing seemed to be missing. There was no sign of forced entry.
A police detective sergeant speculated that she may have been slightly drunk and disoriented, left the apartment to fetch more wine, forgot her keys and money, accepted a ride from a stranger and been assaulted and murdered in some distant place, perhaps the mountains four hours to the west. But nobody showed up, and no one had seen anything, or anyone suspicious.
The police chief speculated that her disappearance had something to do with Homeland Security and had passed the information on to the Federal Justice Department. A spokesman for Homeland Security said no comment could be made about a case under investigation, but some progress was expected soon. He said there would be no change in the alert status.