. "Where did the ship set sail from?" I asked Shaw as I noticed a marked car parking next to my Mercedes.

"Antwerp, Belgium, two weeks ago;" he replied as he looked at the Sirius and the Euroclip. "Foreign flag vessels like all the rest we get. The only American flags we see anymore are if someone raises one as a courtesy," he added with a trace of disappointment.

A man on the Euroclip was standing by the starboard side, looking back at us with binoculars. I thought it strange he was dressed in long sleeves and long pants, as warm as it was.

Shaw squinted. "Darn, this sun is bright."

"What about stowaways?" I asked. "Although I can't imagine anyone choosing to hide inside a locked container for two weeks on high seas."

"Never had one that I know of. Besides, we're not the first port of call. Chester, Pennsylvania, is. Most of our ships go from Antwerp to Chester to here, and then straight back to Antwerp. A stowaway's most likely going to bail out in Chester instead of waiting till he gets to Richmond.

"We're a niche port, Dr. Scarpetta," Shaw went on.

I watched in disbelief as Pete Marino climbed out of the cruiser that had just parked next to my car.

"Last year, maybe a hundred and twenty oceangoing ships and barges called in the port," Shaw was saying.

Marino has been a detective as long as I've known him. He didn't work in uniform. - "If it were me and I was trying to jump ship or was an illegal alien, I think I'd want to end up in some really big port like Miami or L.A. where I could get lost in the shuffle."

Anderson walked up to us, chewing gum.

"Point is, we don't break the seal and open them up unless we suspect something illegal, drugs, undeclared cargo," Shaw continued. "Every now and then we preselect a ship for a full shakedown search to keep people honest."

"Glad I don't have to dress like that anymore;'. Anderson remarked as Marino headed toward us, his demeanor cocky and pugilistic, the way he always acted when he was insecure and in an especially foul mood.