Chapter 10

September 10

Jill and Marta were on their way to France to visit Jill's aunt before Marta flew down to Barcelona to stay with Alberto for a few days.  Marta had insisted on paying.  Although it was not certain that she would return, Richard would stay in Cartier until her security system was installed before taking his own trip to West Virginia for more background on Mic.  He had just returned from seeing them off at the airport when JR called.

"We found the source of your picture, Richard.  A Dr. C. P. Warren, professor of forensic psychology at Michigan State, says the picture came from his files.  He's got an archive of actual and suspected serial killings going back thirty years.  Someone hacked in."

"How old is the picture?" Richard asked, wondering if Mic would be foolish enough to send a photo of one of his own victims.

"The woman was killed in Murray, Kentucky in the eighties.  The perp is doing life at Marion for another murder.  Here's the good part.  Warren is connected with VICAP, and the feds are interested in our boy now.  Of course, the trick is to prove he did it."

"Well good," he said.  "I'm glad you called.  We're all going out of town for a while.  Jill and Marta are already on their way to Europe, and I'm going to West Virginia tomorrow to see if I can find out what Mic was doing there."

"Something else happen?"

"I would have told you.  I was getting ready to call and let you know where we all would be.  Don't let anyone else know where we are."

After noon he met the security people at Marta's, selected a suitable system, and got a briefing on its operation.  Leaving them to their work, he went home to pack the car and get some rest, intending to get an early start in the morning.  At eleven he remembered that he hadn't entered a temporary entrance code or set Mart's deadbolt as the security guys had told him to do.  So he got up and went to do it.  On the way back he thought about the probability of a decent night's rest, considered it wasn't good, said to heck with it, and headed east through a driving rain.

September 11

He spent his trek reviewing everything that had happened and everything he had done from the onset of the trouble with Mic.  The prolonged solitude provided his first extended opportunity to objectively evaluate his actions and their consequences since Jill had come to him for help.  Had he not abducted Jill to Bonne Femme Mic might not have killed her because he would have surely been a suspect.  But by taking her away he had provoked Mic, and perhaps had indirectly caused the death of Rose Ford.  Now Marta had been drawn into it.  He briefly considered the possibility that the whole thing was what Jill had once thought it was, a struggle between him and Mic.

Did I cause all this?

No.  Or if I did it was like what happens on a mission.  You have your goal and set off with a plan of action.  But the bad guys have plans of their own, or maybe you just run into each other by chance.  Shots are fired and you react.  The plan's gone to crap.  Stuff goes wrong.  Then it's all reaction and trying to keep yourselves alive.

"That's where we are," he said aloud.  "That's why they call it ‘the fog of war.'"

Mic had a plan and he had refined his tactics, but she got away from him in time.  Then I complicated things for him.  So he's never run into this before.  He's accustomed to attacking the defenseless and unsuspecting.  He can't con or charm us now.  So why doesn't he just call it off and go find a softer target?

The answer, of course, was that Mic had become obsessed with Jill to the point that it was clouding his judgment and overriding his common sense.

At least I've kept her out of his reach.

Or have I?  If Marta hadn't been along he could have abducted her from the parking lot that day.  And he harassed her in the clothing store, and again at the college.  That was all in daylight with other people around.  How many other times has he been there waiting for his chance?

It occurred to him that Jill's safety so far had been as much a matter of luck as of his efforts to keep Mic away from her.  Sooner or later luck would turn.  He or Jill would make a false step.  That's all it would take.  Meanwhile Richard's amateur detective work had turned up not one shred of evidence that Mic had ever done anything illegal since leaving Cassville as a boy.

"Maybe the FBI can make him for the e-mail and put some real resources into digging through his past," he said with a yawn as he passed a road sign.

"Crap," he said, realizing that he had taken a wrong turn.

He tried to improvise a way back to his route, but got hopelessly lost on back roads.  Wandering almost aimlessly, he finally found a route shown on his multi-state map, and backtracked to the main highway.  It was twilight when he reached the 47 and 33 junction at Glenville.  He drove on another twenty-five miles to Buckhannon, the nearest place he had been able to get a motel reservation, deciding to go to bed early and come back to Glenville in the morning.

He fell asleep quickly and slept straight through---all the way to three o'clock.  Tired of tossing and turning, he gave it up after an hour, dressed, but put off shaving until later, and went out, finally winding up at an all-night café where he read the Charleston paper until dawn-rising locals came in to compare illnesses and solve the world's problems.

The closer he got to Glenville the more the road hugged the flanks of steep slopes running parallel to numerous streams and nameless wet weather creeks webbing the rugged country.  Yesterday he hadn't really appreciated the way the twisting two-lane flirted with the many abysses in the terrain before it gave way to the newer section of highway near Buckhannon.  No one here ever went anywhere as the crow flies, perhaps not even the crows.  Finally he descended into the valley of the Little Kanawha River and made it safely back to Glenville.

It was a middling-sized small town like Cassville.  Everyone probably didn't really know everyone else, but a stranger asking questions would draw immediate attention.  Experience is that which lets you know you've made a fool of yourself without having someone else point it out.  He had learned that lesson in Cassville.  Here there would be a difference:  Mic had been an outsider in Glenville too, so there should be no clannish resistance to his inquiries.

Of course he ran into problems immediately.  The local newspaper had a "gone out of business" notice in the window.  After inquiries he followed Walnut Street to the public library where he learned that back issues were unavailable because the editor-owner had died intestate earlier in the year, and the newspaper morgue was locked away in the building pending probate.  Yes, the librarian told him.  The heirs might grant access, but they all lived in Charleston.  Thus far (it was eleven o'clock) he had wasted all morning without learning a thing.  Dispirited, he decided on an early lunch in town.  And now rain appeared imminent.

He parked diagonally on the rain slick street and stepped out into raw dampness beneath a dark purple sky.  Most of the storefront windows were dark, but a few still glowed dimly yellow or stark florescent white.  Old downtown Glenville was under siege by the superstore down on I-79, and capitulation seemed near.  Crossing to a portico covering the entrances of shoulder-to-shoulder dead and dying businesses, he hunched against the heavy mist.  After traversing the full sloping length of the fractured sidewalk he found a functioning café at the corner.  A dingy window was half covered by a hand written poster proclaiming the cubbyhole inside as Martha's Café.  Mismatched furniture lent it a forlorn look, but it was clean and, more to the point, warm.  He slid over age-cracked vinyl seats at a booth away from the door and picked up a laminated single-sheet menu old enough to have undergone several corrections via black marker.

A short blonde waitress swooped in with a plastic glass of water, plucking a pen from the dishwater blonde hair above her right ear.

"Can I get you some coffee, Sugar?" she said immediately.

Lipstick several shades too dark for her pallid complexion made her mouth seem huge.  She was neither attractive nor plain.  Rather she had that sort of post-high school looks that would soon fade rather than mature.

"Please, black," he said.

"Hot, strong, and straight," she said perkily.  It was the opening salvo of her campaign.

She came back in record time carrying his cup and a carafe of coffee.

"What brings a handsome guy like you to the sticks?" she asked toothily before leaning forward in a prolonged effort to wipe an imaginary spot from his table.

Feeling almost under siege, he tried to concentrate on her face rather than the cleavage she was offering.  She was coming on so suddenly and strongly that Richard had visions of a trap-door spider.

"I'm trying to find a guy named William Boyd.  The last I heard he was living here."

"You're a friend of Billy's?"

Give me a break, he said to himself, thinking that she was just pretending.  The last thing that could happen after his futile morning's effort was to stumble onto someone who actually knew Mic.

"We're old service buddies.  Are you sure you know him?"

She nodded enthusiastically.

He asked her to give him of the description of the man she knew to be sure they were talking about the same person.  To his surprise her description was dead on.

"He came in here all the time before he ran off to California.  Got a job as an LA cop."

"Wait.  Was he a cop here?"

"No.  He was a security guard at Buckhannon, but he said he wanted to get back to real police work.  I was hoping he could catch on with the sheriff, but they didn't have no openings, I guess."

Richard had been worrying about leading her on, but he laid that aside.

"Say, do you think you're boss would mind you talking with me for awhile?  The restaurant doesn't seem too busy."

As if on cue, the only other patron cleared his throat loudly to attract her attention.

"My mom owns the place," she said, ignoring the man.  "What's she gonna do?  Fire me?  Hold where you are, Sugar.  I'll be right back."

Obviously peeved that the old man required attention, she refilled his cup without so much as a word and then left the pot with him.

"That ought to hold the old peckerwood," she said brightly as she scooted in across from him and leaned forward on her elbows inviting another glimpse down her blouse.  "So what do you want to talk about?"

The subject didn't matter.  She was eager to talk---for starters.

"Did Billy have any friends that might know his current address?"

"Maybe over at Buckhannon, but I doubt it.  When he wasn't working he was in here a lot.  We dated some."  She twisted a loose strand of hair before continuing wistfully.  "Then he just kinda walked out of my life.  That's the way it goes, I guess."

"You mentioned police work.  Did he ever tell you where he worked as a policeman?"

"I thought you were a friend of his."

"We were in the Marines together.  He never mentioned wanting to be a policeman to me.  But a pretty girl like you---maybe he was just trying to impress you."

Her laugh was a snort.

"Billy wasn't fibbing to impress me.  I seen his stuff."

"Stuff?"

She smiled conspiratorially, obviously sizing him up.

"At his apartment he showed me his gun and handcuffs.  You've got to buy those when you get to be a cop so they let you keep them."

"I didn't know that."

"Me neither.  I asked him what a security guard needs handcuffs for, and he says because he used to be a policeman.  He still had his uniform and one of those dash lights like the cops on TV.  You gotta buy those too.  Who woulda thunk?"

A chill ran up his spine.

"I shouldn't be telling you this," she continued with a mischievous glint in her eyes.  "No telling what kind of girl you'll think I am."

"He cuffed you?"

"Yeah.  He asked me if I knew what it felt like," she arched an eyebrow suggestively.  "‘Kind of kinky,' I said, ‘but I'll try anything once.'"

Given her level of discretion so far, Richard anticipated a detailed play-by-play of rough sex.

"I can see the way your mind's working, you bad boy," she said, wagging a finger in his face, "but nothing happened.  He acted like he was going to . . . you know, but he was just teasing me."

A frown eclipsed her smile for a moment.

"You know.  It ain't sexy like on the movies.  Those things hurt."

He wondered how close she had come to being another of Mic's victims.

"I'll never get out of this damned place," she said suddenly.

"You could be in a worse place than this," he said.

"Like Hell maybe!" she said with another snort.

Like a shallow grave, he said to himself.

Then it occurred to him that besides lurking to spring on eligible men, the desperate woman probably lived for gossip.

"I hear you all had a real tragedy back a few years.  Something about a murder-suicide by one of the locals."

"They weren't locals," she said sourly, obviously disappointed at the turn of conversation.

Fear that she would end the conversation was premature.  She may not have set a hook just yet, but she wasn't ready to cut bait.

"Transplants.  Doc Scott brings his wife out to retire among us hillbillies.  Wifey gets bored and finds herself a local stud---nobody knows who.  The old man finds out and kills her.  And then he shoots himself too.  I didn't know her, but Doc Scott seemed like an okay guy.  I guess you just never know.  Then again, maybe he was kind of nuts all along ‘cause that's why a lot of them guys become shrinks in the first place, right?"

The man was a psychiatrist! he thought, feeling his skin crawl again as he made the connection.

"Yeah.  He did volunteer work with the juvenile officer over to the county seat, which, you know, means he was like basically a nice guy---except for the being nuts thing that is.  Maybe he was like teetering on the brink all along and his wife's messing around finally pushed him over the edge.  He seemed too gentle to do a thing like that, but I guess you never know what's crawling around like cockroach in someone's mind."

Richard barely heard her.

"Would you happen to know Doctor Scott's first name?" he asked.

"Charles or Carl?  Something like that, I think," she said impatiently.  "Speaking of names, you never did tell me yours."

"Richard Carter," he said distractedly.  "Are you sure it wasn't Olin or Olson or something like that?"

"No.  I would remember a weird name like that."

As he rose to leave he took out a five and placed it on the table.

"Thanks for talking to me Miss . . . "

"Hope," she said dispiritedly as she snatched the bill.  "Ironic, huh?"

It wasn't, but Richard understood.  He had done nothing to her but talk, yet he had become the latest in a string of men who had betrayed a sad and lonely woman who was fast becoming not so young anymore.  He wanted to tell her not to try so hard.  But how did a stranger say such a thing?

"I'm pretty sure it was Olin," he muttered to himself as he went out into the raw air.

He walked up to his car deep in thought, oblivious to the wet gusts blowing up the valley.  Preoccupied, he backed up on autopilot until a horn blast made him hit the brakes.  He shrugged acknowledgment of blame that earned him only a one-fingered salute from the bearded driver of the rusty pickup.

He killed an hour reading the Charleston paper while waiting in his car for the sheriff to return from lunch.  He could have used more coffee, but he'd had all the true confessions and cleavage he could use for the day.  At one on the dot an unmarked pulled up, and a tall thin man with wire-rimmed glasses, a wide-brimmed off-white hat, and the beginnings of a potbelly, got out and went up the steps.  It might have only been a deputy, but Richard was tired of sitting so he followed him inside.

He had given his name and stated his business earlier.  At the last minute he had added that he suspected that a man he knew, one William Boyd, might have been involved in an abduction in the area.  That he had traveled so far ought to earn him an audience, he thought, unless the man was a total jerk---not uncommon for elected officials, but not requisite either.  After a short wait, the secretary, a trim, efficient-looking woman on the far end of middle age opened the inner door and ushered Richard into the office of Sheriff John Osborne.  Without rising, the man nodded toward a chair.  He ran fingers through his straight white hair without modifying in the least the indentations made by his hat.

"Well, Mr. Richard Carter, you check out according to the uh . . . "  He peered through the fish scales of his bifocals at the blotter on his desk.  ". . .  Breton County Sheriff's Department in Cartier, Michigan.  But you're no longer with the department.  What's going on?"

Richard admired his succinctness.

"I'm here on my own.  I mentioned the department to establish my credibility."

Osborne tamped tobacco into the bowl of a well-used pipe before lighting it with a tubular pipe lighter.  As the flame licked downward, cherry tinted smoke curled around his head, evoking an image of his Uncle Bill sitting with shotgun across his knees and a golden lab called "Sugar" sitting patiently in the duck blind.

"I don't have a thing on this Boyd character," said Osborne.  "And no one has been abducted in Gilmer County recently.  Whatever gave you the notion to come out here and suggest such a thing?"

"I came here to find out about Boyd.  The abduction thing came from something a lady here told me this morning.  She knew him while he was living here---dated him she said."

Richard told him about the police paraphernalia and the handcuff play the waitress had described.  He added that what he knew about Boyd and the fact that he had the police gear made him think that an abduction was a possibility.

"He explained having that stuff by claiming he had been a policeman," he said.  "I don't think he ever was."

"Police uniforms, cuffs---you can buy that sort of thing mail order---online nowadays," said Osborne.  "Some guys like to play dress up and pretend, but like I told you, there haven't been any reports of women accosted while driving alone.  Of course, there are a boatload of women and girls who go missing.  Check the supermarket bulletin boards."

Richard had hoped that he was giving Osborne a hot lead.  It would have made his next question more likely to be received well.

"Well, all that's incidental to why I really came here.  What can you tell me about this Scott who killed his wife and himself?  I gather---"

"What does Charlie Scott have to do with this Boyd character?" interrupted the sheriff gruffly.

"I'm not sure.  Records show that Boyd saw a psychiatrist by the name of Scott.  Scott wasn't from around here, I take it."

"No.  He moved here to retire.  Service pension."

Richard felt a rush of adrenaline.

"Marines?"

Osborne nodded, but then held up his hand.  "Whoa.  Let's backtrack a little here.  A woman here tells you about the cuffs and stuff, and that gives you the idea about possible abductions, but you came here to ask about Charlie Scott and this same guy.  Did you make that other up just to get in here to talk to me?"

"No.  If you're interested in that go ask the waitress at Martha's Café.  She's the one that told me about the police gear.

"Seems odd.  You come into town, and right away you find someone who knows this guy you're looking for and she tells you something like that."

"It surprised me too, but it's a small town."

"I think the expression is ‘small world,' said the sheriff skeptically.

"Okay.  It's a slow day so maybe I can indulge you for a bit.  Tell me what you want to know about the Scott case.  Maybe I can give some general information."

Richard wanted more than that, but he'd have to settle for what he could get.

"Did the violence seem out of character for him?"

"Charlie seemed stable, but family violence is usually invisible.  There was nothing to suggest he could be violent, just the opposite."

"So it's hard to believe that he did it?"

Osborne shrugged.  "Except for the facts.  There was a note, a contact gunshot wound in the right temple at the proper angle to be self-inflicted, GSR and blowback on his right hand and shirtsleeve.  The pistol was right there beside him on the floor.  And the ballistics matched."

It appeared to be a slam-dunk.  But what were the odds of two Marine psychologists named Scott could be connected to Mic Boyd?

"I'm positive that Scott and Boyd had a history, sir---I mean before either of them came here.  Could you call Breton County again and request Boyd's records faxed here?"

"It was a suicide, Carter," said Osborn, pushing his swivel chair back.  "The case is closed."

"If there's nothing to it all it will cost you is a little time."

A phone call, a fax, a few frowns, a second call, and another fax ate up half an hour.  Osborne paced, glancing first at one and then at the other badly copied facsimiles.  Boyd's discharge papers showed that he had been released before his six-year enlistment ran out on the recommendation of Captain Olin C. Scott.  West Virginia DMV confirmed that Olin C. and Charlie Scott were one and the same.

"Boyd and Scott had business in San Diego and then traveled separate two thousand mile paths only to end up here where one of them ends up dead and the other leaves without anyone knowing they ever knew each other," muttered Osborne, pacing the floor with the curled papers of the antique fax machine still clutched in his hand.

He went to the window and peered through the Venetian blinds.

"Carter, I would have thrown you out of here when I was younger."

Osborne went to his desk and held down the key on the intercom.

"Lill, bring in the Scott file."

"Right away," came a voice embedded in static and background buzz.

"Intercom's older than I am," said the sheriff.  "Can't waste the people's money on anything as trivial as decent equipment."

He keyed the box again.

"And, Lill, send Herb down to evidence for the envelopes on the case."

". . .-ight," came the tinny reply.

"Carter, what do you know about Charlie Scott?"

"Only what we've found out today."

Osborne shook his head.  "I'd kind of like to remember him the way I thought he was.  Maybe that's what's wrong with me."

The door opened and a graying man wearing horn rim glasses and carrying a considerable paunch held out two large manila envelopes wordlessly.

"Thanks, Herb," said Osborne, rising to take them.

The man withdrew with only a nod of his head and closed the door.

"The note always did bother me," mumbled the sheriff.  "More accusatory than explanatory, but it was in his handwriting."

"I don't suppose you can tell me what it said?"

"Not yet.  You obviously believe this Boyd killed both of them.  Now why do you believe that?"

"Because everywhere Boyd goes women end up strangled like Mrs. Scott.  And in this case---well, murder-suicides don't happen like this, do they?  I mean strangling takes a lot of determination.  It's not like hitting someone with a blunt object or pulling a trigger.  That's over in the blink of an eye.  Strangling takes time.  Isn't that inconsistent with remorse?"

"Remorse?  You mean because he shot himself afterwards.  Murder is not a rational act unless the killer is a psychopath.  Charlie wasn't."

"Can you show me the crime scene photos?  The reason I ask is that Boyd sent a crime scene photo to . . . a friend of mine---a woman.  I'd like to see if they're similar."

"I can't do that," said Osborne.  But he pawed through one of the envelopes as if he were going to.  "Here.  How similar are they?"

He handed Richard a crime scene diagram. 

Two rooms were drawn to scale, complete with furniture.  A female body was outlined face up on a rectangle representing the bed.  The arms were slightly akimbo and appeared to be tucked behind her waist.  A single line across the neck and down to each shoulder represented the ligature.  Another figure was outlined curled on its side near an overturned chair beside the bed.  Ten neat numbers had been printed around the bodies with an eleventh on the bed above the female figure.  One to ten were identified in the same neat script at the bottom of the page as "pistol," "skirt," "blouse," "panties," "brassiere," "blood spatter," "urine," "note pad," "suicide note," and "pen."  The one on the bed was identified as "bath robe."

"The woman in the picture he sent was positioned exactly like that," said Richard pointing to the outline on the bed.  "She was bound and the ligature was still around her neck."

"How do I know you're not making that up?"

"Call Breton County back."

"I might do that," said Osborne distractedly.  "You know, the way we figured it was that he became enraged when he found out about her infidelity and confronted her when she came in from taking a bath.  An argument escalated and he killed her.  Then when he realized what he had done he killed himself.  The note bothered me at first because he didn't finish it.  But then I thought that maybe he just couldn't find a way to."

"Can I see the note?" asked Richard.

"What's your connection to Boyd?" Osborne asked suddenly.

"We were in the Marines together, in Somalia.  He looked me up when he came to Cartier.  I don't know why because we were never friends."

"And what's your connection to the woman he sent that picture to?  You say she's a friend?"

"She's my fiancée.  He threatened to strangle her.  That's why I came here."

As soon as he said it, Richard wished he hadn't.  Osborne held his gaze a long moment, giving him an I-should-have-known-better look."

"I might as well get hanged for a sheep as a goat," he said, handing Richard a plastic bag with a ragged sheet of paper inside.

The note had been torn from the notebook, crumpled, and then flattened.  Blood spray flecked it.  Scrawled in blue "doctor's hand," two short sentences and the beginning of a third were barely legible.  He read it through twice:  Tilly is a slut.  She spreads her legs for anything in pants.  My wife

He smiled grimly at the phrasing.  He'd heard Mic refer to a woman "spreading her legs" more than once, but if he revealed that the sheriff my think he was making things up on the fly.

"Yeah," said Osborne, noticing his expression.  "The present tense bothered me too.  We wrote it off to his level of distress."

"Tilly?" said Richard, still puzzling over the note.

"Short for Matilda.  Charlie always called her that."

"Odd to use an endearment under the circumstances, don't you think?"

"None of it seemed like the Charlie Scott I knew.  That is his handwriting however."

"Was her body covered when they found them?"

"No.  Why?"

"It seems to me that if he was sorry afterwards, he might have covered her.  Of course, you'd have to talk to forensic psychologist about that.  The other thing is that your diagram shows her hands under her.  Was she tied up?"

"With the belt of her robe.  I see what you're saying.  It looks more like a premeditated thing than just a fit of passion."

"I'm sure Breton County will share anything they have if you decide to reopen the case," said Richard.

"You think we should reopen the case?  Out of curiosity, since you obviously have a theory, how do you think it happened?"

"Maybe something like this:  Scott comes home to find Boyd in the house and Mrs. Scott tied up already.  Boyd forces Scott to write.  Knowing the man's violent history, Scott begins, perhaps hoping to talk him out of whatever he has in mind.  He balks when he realizes that he's being asked to write a suicide note.  At that point Boyd immobilizes Scott in some way.  Maybe he kills him first, or ties him up.  After he kills Mrs. Scott he arranges the scene to look like a murder-suicide."

Osborne stared out the window.

"Toxicology showed nothing in either victim's system," he said.  There were no abrasions on Charlie's wrists.  There was no evidence of intercourse or robbery, both of which argue for murder-suicide rather than murder by an intruder.  Besides, if someone wanted to stage it to look like a murder-suicide---say a real smart guy---would he really leave the woman like that?  Admittedly, it made us suspicious, but in an odd sort of way, it argues against staging the scene, doesn't it?"  Osborne scowled skeptically.  "Something else here doesn't make sense.  If this guy you're so hot for me to take a look at is a serial killer or whatever, then why did he track Charlie Scott down?"

Richard realized that Scott and his wife were connected to Mic much the same as he and Jill.

"Maybe he fixated on the wife, and Mr. Scott was collateral damage," he said.

September 13

An early cold front had deposited a dirty rind of premature sleet and pebble snow on the grassy median.  Sun glinted blindingly off a camper ahead as another strong gust buffeted the Cougar alarmingly.  The clot of vehicles they were stuck in staggered into a quartering wind.  Richard had been surprised that his news of the Scott connection to Mic hadn't elicited much of a response.  She had seemed preoccupied since he had picked her up.

"So when will Marta be back?" he asked as he overtook a semi.

"Tomorrow unless she goes back to Merida with him."

He knew she would miss Marta terribly if she didn't return, and assumed that was the reason she had been so subdued since the airport.  Or perhaps the trip had given her time to reevaluate her relationship with him.  Whatever the reason for her unsettlingly demeanor it dampened the optimism over what he had accomplished against all odds in West Virginia.

Her detached reticence continued once they were back.  After they had brought in the luggage, she disappeared into the bedroom.  Only an occasional noise broke the illusion that he was alone in the house.  Unable to concentrate on the database he was trying to construct, he finally went to see if she would tell him what was wrong.

The door to the bedroom was closed.  He rapped softly, but she didn't respond.

"Jill are you all right?" he asked.

There was a long pause, and then, "Yes."

"Can I come in?"

"If you wish."

She stood with her back to the door.  In the mirror he saw that she was clutching something to her chest.

"What's wrong?" he asked gently.

"She did not know that I was there," she said almost inaudibly.  "Someone should have told me.  I could have gone back earlier.  Now she is gone."

"She died, Jill?"

"No, but there is only to wait until it happens."  She sniffed.  "I am alone, Richard.  I have no one."

He wished he could tell her that she had him, but of course he couldn't say that.  He ached for her pain, but there was nothing he could do or say.

"She would be angry with me for saying that.  She always said that self-pity is the sin of ingratitude to God."

"Maybe you should go back until . . ."

"Until the end?  No.  I could do nothing, and everything she sacrificed for me would be wasted.  She would be angry.  I will honor her wishes."

She carefully placed a picture he had never seen before on the bedside table.  A handsome woman held a bright-eyed little girl on her lap.  Both were smiling.

"I may need money for the trip back when . . . when the time comes.  I have not so much credit.  Can you lend it to me when I must go?"

"Of course I will."

"I am sorry to ask, but one must plan."

There was nothing he could say to offer hope or make things easier for her.  He felt frustratingly helpless.  It was painful to speak and perhaps unnecessary, but Richard said the only thing he could.

"I'm so sorry."

She pursed her lips to keep from crying.

"It's not fair!  It's not.  It's not.  She did everything right.  She was so good."

He spoke without thinking.  "Then be like her.  Be the person she taught you to be."

No longer able to restrain herself, Jill began to sob.

"I am crying for myself.  It is selfish."

All the while she had stood with her back to him, shutting him out.  He took an uncertain step toward her, but stopped, torn between wanting to comfort her and fearing to intrude into her grief.

"Jill?"

She turned and reached for him.  As he wrapped his arms about her she buried her face in his chest and gave in to her grief.  He held her and murmured what comfort he could.

Around midnight he heard the bedroom door open, and saw Jill coming through the darkened room toward the couch.  He sat up.  She sat close, but not touching him.

"Do you want to talk?" he asked.

"There is nothing to say.  I just feel so alone," she said.  "I need to be with someone tonight."

"I'll be here as long as you want me to be.  I'll be whatever you want me to be for you."

"Do not expect me to say anything to that, Richard.  I cannot."

"I'm sorry, Jill.  I'm not very articulate.  All I want right now is for you to tell me about your Aunt Mirabelle.  Not the way she is now, because that's not how she wants you to think of her.  I think the way she was is who she is inside even now.  Tell me about her.  I want to know her."

She began slowly, reluctantly, almost mechanically, but gradually the good memories came.  There was no laughter, but there was comfort.  Richard did nothing but allow Mirabelle's life to provide a balm.  Finally, wrapped in her robe, with her feet tucked under her, and leaning against him, Jill slept.

September 14

Richard awoke to kitchen sounds.  On his way to the bathroom he noticed that caller ID light was winking.  Wondering how it had escaped his notice last night, he checked it and saw that JR had called three times yesterday, the last time at ten-thirty in the evening.  Then he noticed the position of a switch on the phone.

"Jill, did you turn off the ringer last night?" he called.

"No," she said, coming in with coffee.  "Why?"

"I don't remember doing it before we left."

Goose flesh prickled the small hairs at her nape as she recalled the lingerie she had found carelessly refolded in her dresser when they first returned from the island.

"He was here?" she asked.

"I don't thinks so.  But let me know if you find anything out of place."

Mic's words from the clothing store echoed in her mind.  "You felt my hands on you, didn't you?"

"JR tried to get in touch with me yesterday," he said picking up the phone.  "I'm going to call him back."

"You have not looked at the clock.  It's only five-thirty."

"He's an early riser," he said, punching in the number.

"News?" she heard him ask.  "Yeah, I can meet you.  Where?"

"Tell him to come here," said Jill loudly enough to be heard over the phone.  "Tell him I am fixing breakfast now."  Then softer to Richard  "Do not leave me alone."

Jill wanted him near for solace and for security, but also because she suspected that he might withhold things to keep from upsetting her.  She was having none of that.  Ignorance was no defense.  She had determined during the night that she would now learn all she could about all of it, no matter how horrifying and frightening.

"Come into the kitchen and help me prepare breakfast," she said as soon as he hung up.  "While we are waiting for him, you can tell me more about West Virginia."

With prompting, he finally revealed the details of the Scott crime scene and the discussion he'd had with the Gilmer County sheriff.

"Besides getting him interested in Mic, I found something else.  Believe it or not I ran into a waitress who claimed to have dated him apparently for some time.  He told her that he used to be a policeman.  Then he showed her a police uniform, handcuffs, and a red dash light like unmarked units have.  Would you believe that she even let him put the cuffs on her?"

"But you are a stranger to her.  Why would she tell you something so . . ."

"Indiscreet?  That's kind of her middle name I think.  It's a wonder she's still alive."

"He impersonated a policeman?  The flashing light devise.  Richard, he planned to stop vehicles with women drivers."

Jill resolved not to stop for a flashing light unless it was from a clearly marked police car---not even then if she were in an isolated area or it was at night.

"The sheriff said nothing like that happened in the county recently, but he's checking around the area.  So they may find out he did try to waylay women under the pretext of being a law officer."

"You think there are other victims there?"

"If there are maybe they can connect him."

"Yes.  But that is a hypothetical.  We must concentrate on the concrete.  Explain why you are so sure that he killed the Scotts.  It cannot be just because he knew Scott from earlier."

"That's precisely the reason.  Think about it.  He came all the way across the country to track the man down.  And the suicide note was nothing of the kind.  I know Mic forced him to write it because it contained one of his favorite phrases."

"Tell me.  Maybe I have heard it too."

"I doubt it.  It was ‘she spreads her legs.'"

"Oh.  A gross sexual remark.  There is more?"

"He wouldn't show me the crime scene photos, but I saw a diagram.  Mrs. Scott was left in the same position as the woman in the crime scene picture sent to your computer.  Carly Williams was left in a similar position.  All three were strangled from behind.  Of course Carly was already dead.  You see how it is the same fantasy he keeps working at."

"So Scott wasn't his intended victim," he continued.  "Mic saw the wife, fixated on her back in California, and followed them out to West Virginia."

Jill's face blanched suddenly.

"He is fixated on me now.  He will follow wherever I go---even to France."

"I'll protect you until they catch up to him.  It's only a matter of time now.  JR says he has some news for us so maybe there's been some kind of breakthrough."

An upscale neighborhood, Cartier

The mid-town apartment had warmed while he was in the shower, but the floor was still cold.  He straightened one of the pictures, and stopped to admire it.  A dark haired one.  The smile looked almost natural, but the dullness of her light blue eyes reminded him of how difficult it had been to extract.

The sprocket head with a soft spot for lost kittens.  Cynthia?  Cindy?  Maybe Mindy.

"She jumped out when I stopped to check the tires," he remembered saying.  "Can you help me find her?"

She was his first after he got back, the one he had gone back to see.  The park ranger had spotted him just before they found her.  It had been dangerous and stupid, but he had learned.

He went to the dark room and took down one of the prints.  It was still too wet to handle, so he bent to examine it where it hung.

"Broke my camcorder, Brent, which is really a shame.  Your girl really put on a good show.  Her lines were almost perfect, and man, could she take direction."

He went to the living room and popped a tape into the VCR, hitting the stop button to keep it from playing before he settled into the recliner.  Before starting the tape he closed his eyes, remembering.

I'm checking out the action at the pool, and she strips off the T-shirt.  She came out of it the way a rabbit comes out when you skin it.  She prances around the pool in that skimpy bikini---just asking for it, and I'm just the guy to give it to her.  So I follow her when she leaves.

"Step out of the car, Miss."

She gives me that look, like she can charm me.  Well I showed her.  I showed her good.

He hit PLAY.  The poor quality of the tape irritated him immediately.  Something was happening to it.  It was deteriorating.  The lighting was bad.  She moved so much that the camcorder couldn't keep sharp focus.  The sound was even getting worse.

"Damn cheap microphone!"

He muted it.  More than once he had vowed to burn the tape, but he couldn't bring himself to.  What he needed was someone to operate the camera for him.

The cheap lens made her look so pudgy and pale.

"She's flopping around like a gaffed fish!" he said in disgust.

He drew a ragged breath when the tape ended.  He had watched it to the end, but his mind was no longer on the girl from Buckhannon.

When your time comes you're going to be a lot better than that.  We're going to give Ricky a real show.  I got it all worked out.  Well, almost.

"Maybe we're finally getting somewhere," said JR as he shrugged off his jacket and placed it along with his hat on the arm of the chair.

"They've found something in West Virginia?" asked Richard as he closed the door.

"Closer to home and more recent."

"Come into the kitchen," called Jill.  "I have sausage, and the skillet is ready if you wish to tell me how you want your eggs."

"Over easy," said JR as he and Richard joined her.  "But you don't need to go to all that trouble."

"It is no trouble," she said, handing him a mug of coffee.

Jill poured herself a cup.

"Let us hear what you have to say while I prepare the eggs," she said.

JR shifted uneasily and cleared his throat.  "Miss Belbenoit, I don't know if you need to hear this."

"Nonsense.  Ignorance will not make me safer.  And my name is Jill, JR."

JR looked at Richard.

"We don't have any secrets," he said.  "She can hear it from you or hear it second hand from me."

"Okay.  A man and his wife were murdered over at Walker while you two were down in Missouri.  The details resemble the Scott case except it wasn't a murder-suicide.  How much did that West Virginia sheriff tell you?"

"He showed me a diagram of the crime scene and let me read the so-called suicide note."

"Well he sent us copies of the scene.  They're eerily similar to what they found at Walker.  And both women were positioned like the photo that was sent to your computer.  In all three cases the ligature was left . . . in situ."

"In situ?  You mean the strangling device was left around her neck," said Jill.

"Yes.  And, like in West Virginia, the husband was killed with his own pistol, only in the forehead rather than the right temple.  He fired through a pillow to either silence the shot or to minimize blowback."

Jill brought JR's eggs and sausage to the table.  Then she sat and took a quick sip of coffee.  "Continue," she said softly.

"Except for the effort at deception with the Scotts, the crimes were identical.  The female victims were stripped, had their hands bound behind them, and strangled from behind.  Afterwards they were left face up on a bed."

"What about the men?" asked Jill.

The calmness of her voice disconcerted JR.  "Scott was sitting in a chair.  The Walker man was tied to one and gagged with duct tape."

"We don't need to dwell on these details," said Richard.  "We know who did it.  You need to find something to make it stick."

"Richard, the only evidence we have is one little scrap of circumstantial evidence, the circumstance being that Boyd knew Scott and was in the area at the time.  That's not enough."

"He had the opportunity, and he sure had the means," objected Richard.

"You've forgetting motive," said JR.

"Motive?  He's a homicidal maniac!  How's that for a motive?"

"It is one only derived by a priori reasoning," inserted Jill.  "We know he did it because we are involved.  The law is dispassionate.  It requires more evidence."

"He knew Rose Ford and was in the area at the time too," Richard countered.  "And the same with Carly Williams.  Now you've got two identical cases---and in one of them he was definitely connected with the victims.  That should be enough to get everyone going on him.  How many more victims do you guys need before you pick him up?"

"I overstated when I told you Walker and West Virginia were identical.  There was a major difference.  In West Virginia an important part of the paraphilia was absent."

"What is paraphilia?" asked Jill.

"It's a thing, maybe a ritual, that the perpetrator does that is not necessary to the commission of the crime," said Richard.

"What did he not do?"

"He strangled Mrs. Scott, but Miss Ford and the woman in Walker were repeatedly strangled."

"You mean he continued to strangle them after they were already dead like the girl in Missouri?"

"Yeah," Richard confirmed quickly.

Both men avoided her eyes.

"No," she said.  "He did it repeatedly while they were alive.  He tortured them."

No one spoke for a long moment.

"Well.  I wanted to know everything, did I not?"

"The ligature in West Virginia wasn't rope either.  It was Mr. Scott's belt."

"The deputy down in Missouri told me that the girl down there was posed also, but not in any effort to mislead the police.  I'll tell you about it later." 

"This is ridiculous," said Jill suddenly.  "Just tell him, Richard.  It cannot be worse than I already imagine."

He sighed in resignation, and began again.

"He told me that she was . . . I think the term he uses was ‘messed with' after she was dead.  Her killer had taken her clothes away and put . . . scanty looking underwear on her bottom half.  He left her like they found Mrs. Scott."

It was difficult for Jill to believe that someone she knew could actually have done all the things they were discussing.

"He kills them from behind, but then rearranges them so that he can see their faces," she said with a shudder.  "What causes that kind of hatred, that degree of misogyny?"

JR drummed the table, lost in thought.

"I'm taking a lot of what I know from you two so I've got to get my ducks in a row before I put in my two cents with the other guys looking into him.  Richard, could you run to the store or something so that Jill and I could talk in private?"

"This is your procedure to see if our stories agree," said Jill.  "You still think we would lie?"

"People influence each other," said JR.

"It's okay with me---that is if you're comfortable with it, Jill," said Richard.

"Of course," she said, still mystified.  "But we have already told you everything already."

Jill spun her ‘engagement ring' around on her finger unconsciously.

"I know you dated Boyd before you and Richard got together," said JR.  "How long did you date him?"

"Several months.  Why?"

"I need to know how . . . well how involved did that relationship get?"

"Oh.  You mean were we intimate.  Did we have . . ." she trailed off without meeting his eyes.  "Why do you need to know that?"

"If this ever gets to trial it's going to come up.  It could compromise both your testimony and Richard's.  The relationship the three of you had will be central to your credibility."

"He seemed interested at first, but . . . it did not . . . we did not have a sexual relationship."

"Considering everything, that seems kind of odd."

"You asked, and I told you," she said frostily.  "I do not wish to discuss it further.  But I can prove it if I must."

"How could you do that?"

She gazed at him steadily.

"Oh," he said, feeling his face go red.  "Jill, the reason I brought the subject up was because none of the victims was sexually assaulted.  So you see the problem that would have arisen if you two had a consensual relationship."

"I have a superficial understanding of the psychopathology," she said, trying to turn the conversation to the more comfortable theoretical.  "You see I have researched this subject because of the . . . of what is happening."

"Well then you know why I asked.  In all likelihood he's impotent."

She shook her head.  "No.  The night he seized me by my neck I thought he would kill me.  He was so angry . . . but what frightened me the most---the most horrible thing was that he was . . . aroused.  It is why I became so frightened.  Please do not to discuss this with Richard."

"I won't discuss it with anyone."

"Thank you for that much at least," she said.  "I begin to see why rape victims do not go the police."

"I won't even pretend to know how you feel.  But I am sorry that I had to bring all this up."

"Do not be.  I understand objective inquiry."

Richard caught JR as he was about to leave.  "What did you ask her?"

"About her relationship with Boyd and why she broke it off.  I take it you guys have talked about it."

"If you mean about him grabbing her by the neck, yeah."

"I'll be honest with you, Richard.  I don't understand what a girl like her could see in him in the first place."

"He puts up a good front.  It just took her a while to see through him."

JR put the car in neutral.

"That's not the only thing I don't understand here," he said.  Why doesn't he seem to mind all this attention?  And why did he come here since he's not enrolled at the college?  Another thing is where his money comes from.  Can you help me with any of that?"

"I've been thinking that maybe he looked me up because of something he thinks I witnessed in Somalia.  Then once he got here he fixated on Jill.  I'm afraid it might be something like with the shrink and his wife.  If you could get ahold of his files, maybe you could find out what it was."

"Therapists' records are privileged," said JR dismissively.  "But back up a minute.  I thought you didn't start seeing Jill until she broke it off with him."

"I didn't, but she first came to his attention because he found out that I was interested in her."

"I see.  And the stuff in Somalia that you keep bringing up---none of that seems prosecutable, so why do you keep going back to it?"

"The way he acted after Jill quit seeing him made me remember something, and I began to suspect that he killed a Somali woman.  I saw him with her body, but I didn't see him do anything.  I don't know, JR.  Does it sound completely crazy that I just kind of collected all these disconnected pieces and gradually the picture got clearer and clearer?"

"Pieces huh?  You're sure you're not holding out on me?"

"Why would I do that?"

"You wouldn't unless you're as crazy as he is."

"You and JR talked a long time," she said when he came inside.

"Yeah," he said, still trying to think of something that might have made Mic come to Cartier to find him.

"Were you talking about me?"

"Just to clear up something about the sequence of when I started seeing you."

"That is all?"

"No.  We also speculated on what brought Mic here.  It had to have something to do with us in Africa, but I can't think of what it was."

"I see," she said distantly.

"What did JR say to upset you?  He crossed the line somehow."

"He asked about . . . Mic.  I told him we were not intimate."

"Why would he ask that?"

"He thinks Mic is dysfunctional."

"Well the literature says guys like that are often incapable of normal stuff."

"I can read.  But this is not a textbook.  It is me.  I was attracted to him!  How can that be?"

"You were attracted to an image.  He impressed you with a lot of lies about his compassion and stuff.  He can be charming."

"I was attracted by his stories.  I was attracted by his looks---by his body," she finished sarcastically.  "I am naïve like that foolish girl we see with him."

"No.  He deceived you.  And I helped him."

She looked at him sharply.

"Not intentionally, but by being with him I provided a kind of cover---like I was vouching for him, confirming that he was an okay guy.  I knew there was something wrong with him, and I didn't warn you.  I just hung around and . . . let it go on."

She turned away.

"What I did or did not do was my decision," she said.  "Please do not discuss it further.  Everyone knows enough.  I have no secrets now."

"But surely---"

"It is a violation, Richard.  Leave it be."