“Touchy, too.”
“You would be touchy if someone called you a machine.”
“I would. Okay, so no more machine language. I’ll get the hang of this eventually. Just be patient with me. I’m on your side.”
“Good to know,” Rogers said.
“You two got things all sorted out?” I said.
“Working in that direction,” Rosey said. “So, tell me what you are thinking in regards to the latest slayings. You are convinced that this is the work of Saunders?”
“Without a doubt,” I said.
“And the exsanguinations?”
“Maybe just a sick, graphic metaphor for her manic thinking,” Rogers said.
“Blood meaning life and her power to control it as she wishes,” Rosey said.
“Something like that,” I offered.
“It’s also the basic type of revenge dating back to prehistory. You can refer to those early chapters of the Bible, the book of Genesis, where revenge was not a mere eye for an eye. It’s the story of Cain and his descendants. Lamech, who was the great grandson of Cain according to the lineage of the Book of Genesis, vowed that if his great grandfather Cain was avenged sevenfold, or a perfect retribution as the concept was understood, then Lamech would be avenged seventy-sevenfold if anyone killed him or killed anyone in his family. In other words, there would be no end to his revenge. I suppose what that means is that the eye for an eye, tit for tat, was actually an improvement over the direction revenge was taking,” Rogers added. She was just showing off for Rosey’s benefit. Disgusting.
“Wow,” Rosey said. “I am impressed.”
“Don’t get her started. Her ego is the size of Texas as it is,” I said.
“I have no ego. I merely state the facts and help you interpret them.”
“Yeah, right,” I said.
“So you think that Saunders is not seeking the eye for an eye. She’s going after the seventy-sevenfold stuff?” Rosey said to Rogers.
“Her actions have indicated that so far. She captured both of you, but allowed you to escape. She threatened Clancy’s mother but did not detonate the bomb. She killed a black dog in order to send a warning to Clancy about Sam. She killed Clancy’s neighbor and friend, Phoebe, to send a message that she can get as close as she desires. The clear message is that she is in control of the whole drama. You guys are merely puppets on her stage.”
“Rogers, you really are something,” Rosey said.
“Oh, please,” I chimed in.
“Do you disagree with my assessment?” Rogers said to me.
“Well … no. As a matter of fact I think you are right.”
“So you are jealous of Rosey’s appreciative comments concerning my keen insights and great wisdom.”
“No one would believe me if I told them all of this,” I said. I was referring to the budding love affair developing between Rosey and Rogers, but no one picked up on that.
“She’s a lunatic and a smart one at that,” Rosey said. “Say, what’s become of your non-assassin?”
“Don’t use that term?”
“Non-assassin?”
“Use her name.”
“What are you talking about?” Rogers said.
Rosey told her what I had done.
“Are you kidding me? You hired an assassin?” Rogers said.
“I hired no one. I merely asked her to pick up Saunders’ scent and make her think that there was a contract out on her.”
“And how is Diamond supposed to do this?” Rogers said.
“I left that up to her.”
“What if she happens to kill her?” Rogers said.
“My troubles will be over sooner rather than later.”
“Yeah, with Saunders, but not necessarily with the law. I cannot believe that you did that.”
“It seemed like the thing to do at the time. I was desperate. Still am. I needed some help. Merely another angle from which to approach a difficult situation.”
“You’ve got Rosey and me. And the dog. You don’t need a hired assassin to solve your problems.”
She almost sounded angry. Normally her voice mechanism offered little emotion. It was the way we had programmed her. She was ninety-eight percent objective about most things. My uncle must have tweaked something to add a bit of emotion for her to offer such a strong opinion with feeling. Perhaps there were elements of artificial intelligence which science had not considered. Maybe it was a math equation undiscovered.
“For the last time, I did not hire Diamond to kill anybody. I merely asked her if she would help me by making Saunders think that there was a contract out on her.”
“And she was willing to do this because you guys are such buds?”
“She owed me.”
“What?” Rogers said.
“Her life. I could have killed her in Clancyville a several weeks back,” I said.
“She was trying to kill you as I recall. There was a contract out on you. If I am not too far off here, I seem to remember that Saunders hired her to assassinate you.”
“Rowland wanted me dead. Saunders hired a professional and Diamond was the one brought in.”
“And now you hire her to threaten Saunders. What’s wrong with this picture?” Rogers said.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” I said to Rosey. “Why don’t you join the attack? You agree with Rogers, right?”
“I am enjoying this and I do agree with Rogers; however, one, there is no need for me to join Rogers in this. She is doing quite well without any assistance from me. Two, I happen to think that you did the right thing in asking for Diamond’s help.”
“Rogers,” I said, “I do in fact see much about this as strange. Sometimes unorthodox methods are called for in an effort to fix a serious problem.”
“And you think this is one of those occasions?”
“I do.”
“And the logic for this?” Rogers said.
“It is out of character for Clancy to do something of this sort.”
“Confusing the enemy,” Rogers said.
“Bingo,” Rosey said.
Chapter 27
Rosey, Sam, and I were enjoying an unseasonably mild November early evening at a sidewalk café in downtown Norfolk. Sam was underneath the table waiting as patiently as possible for whatever Rosey and I would proffer him during our meal.
My cell phone vibrated in my jeans’ pocket. Unknown caller.
“Clancy, here.”
“Sorry about that lady and the dog.” It was Diamond’s voice.
“I didn’t know the dog.”
“The lady a friend?”
“For several years now.”
“She has no conscience and no mercy. I arrived in town just after she had displayed her handiwork. I watched as you and the cop searched the park.”
“You watched us?”
“Almost a ring-side seat. I could have saved you some time, but I couldn’t risk calling or exposing myself.”
“The Norfolk police know you?”
“Not yet, but one does not stay successful in this business by cuddling up to cops and private detectives in broad daylight and showing them dead carcasses. There would have been questions.”
“To say the least. So, are you on the trail now?”
“That’s why I am calling. Saunders is driving west on Highway 58. A man named Dooley is traveling with her. They’re heading in the direction of Clancyville, I suspect. You’re busy in Norfolk with Wineski, so she’s going to go hunting back home.”
“You have a strong feeling about this?”
“My sixth sense has served me well for years. I survive by knowing when, where, and often how something is coming down. My gut tells me that somebody close to you is in trouble in Clancyville.”
“What is she driving?”
“Dooley is the driver,” Diamond said. “They’re cruising along in an older model Ford pickup, white, looks like a farm vehicle to me. Two-door, no extended cab. They’re carrying so
mething in the bed, but there’s a blue tarp over it.”
“License number?”
“If I give you that, you might call the Highway Patrol.”
“You wouldn’t want some help?”
“You forget who I am and what I do.”
“I forget nothing, but I figure you would get out of the way once the law enforcement arrived.”
“If I could, but sometimes I am so deep into a situation that getting out presents obstacles. You want my help or not?”
“I do.”
“Then give me some more time and some leeway. I won’t let anything happen to your kith and kin on that end.”
“Is that a promise?”
“Take it to the bank.”
“Call me the minute she arrives in Clancyville.”
“You’re on my speed dial.”
I gave Sam a portion of my chicken sandwich. I was preoccupied.
“We headed to greater Clancyville?” Rosey said.
“Tomorrow as planned. My non-hired professional is tailing her at present. I need to allow her time to do her thing.”
“Need I inform you that we are more than three hours behind her once they arrive in Pitt County?”
“We’ve been behind Saunders from the beginning of this atrocity. Three hours might be as close as we have come to her.”
Captain Wineski arrived in his unmarked, but rather obvious police car. There was a parking space directly in front of the café near the table where the three of us were dining.
“You looking for me?” I said.
“I don’t dine at places like this,” he said and pulled a chair from a nearby table without asking permission from the two men who sat there.
“How’d you find me?”
“I’m a detective.”
“And a good one, too.”
“Modern technology is a wonder.”
“GPS.”
“Bingo. You have relatives in Boston.”
“An uncle.”
“There was an incident reported early this morning over the network regarding an explosion in a suburb of Boston, one Walters Clancy had his car destroyed it seems.”
Wineski had my attention.
“Uncle Walters okay?”
“It seems, the report said, that he was about to drive the vehicle to some unreported location, remembered something he forgot, went back inside his town house and the explosion rocked the neighborhood. Saved by the ever-present forgetfulness of the human condition.”
“Anyone hurt?”
“None reported. I can only imagine that most of the neighborhood was scared witless when you begin the day with an explosion that puts life in jeopardy and rocks your neighborhood.”
“You don’t say. Any damage beyond the car?”
“The front door of his town house and the adjacent windows will have to be replaced and/or refurbished. But according to the Boston police, Walters Clancy is alive. The Clancy name sort of struck me as too coincidental in light of what was happening down south here with you and yours.”
“Ever the foremost detective.”
“I try. So he is part of your extended family.”
“Closer than many of them.”
“Well, I hate to be the bearer of such an incident, but in this business, that’s about all there is. Glad he’s alive,” he said as he got up from the table. He put the chair back and nodded to the two men who offered him no acknowledgement.
“She’s a busy bee,” I said to Rosey as we watched Wineski drive away.
“You know too many people in too many places. Hard to protect them all.”
“We have to figure out a way to get ahead of her.”
“I’d settle for finding her and eliminating the threat.”
Chapter 28
Since Rosey preferred to drive, the three of us were headed west towards Pitt County in his Jag. I was still pondering how I was supposed to get ahead of a psychotic serial killer seeking revenge on me and anyone close to me. I knew that Saunders’ favorite method for murder was poison, but she was never above using other means to kill her intended victims. Like the bomb in Boston and the theft of my mother’s Studebaker weeks back in Clancyville with which she ran down an old man. Any evaluation of her and her psychosis would be all over the map, literally and figuratively.
Rogers was checking out any unusual prescription medicines which Saunders might try to purchase using under her own name or any of the names associated with her. A sane person might avoid using his or her name since there was an APB out. As far as I was concerned, Saunders was brazen enough to use any method to get what she desired. Rational, sane thinking was not part of the equation. I doubt if Saunders seriously considered the possibility of getting caught.
Rogers called me when we were just outside of Dan River.
“Got a hit on a purchase in Lynchburg this morning on the name Marilyn Rowland.”
“Lots of Rowlands in that area.”
“But there are no records of anyone named Marilyn Rowland.”
“What’d she buy?”
“Had a prescription filled for pentobarbital. Doctor’s name on the prescription was Jones-McCann.”
“Too much of a coincidence. Similar usage to that wonderful stuff chloral hydrate.”
“I am told,” Rogers said, “by so-called experts in the field of investigations, there is no such thing as a coincidence.”
“Run with that. Also, keep checking to be sure that there is no one named Marilyn Rowland living in that area. I don’t have time to chase down a legitimate prescription. My gut tells me that you have found something.”
“That would be my calling – help the weak and ignorant.”
“Call if you find anything else, O humble, ever-vigilant one.”
I ended that call and dialed Dr. Susan Jones-McCann’s number. Of course she was busy seeing patients, but I left word for her to call me as soon as she could. I also mentioned that I was investigating the theft of a prescription pad with Jones-McCann’s name on it. I figured that would almost guarantee a return call from her.
I told Rosey what Rogers had discovered.
“Sounds like she’s coming in from the north. Could already be wherever it is she is going.”
“Likely as not,” I said. “I have a hunch or two as to her location.”
“On to Aunt May’s?”
“She doesn’t know where Aunt May lives.”
“Easy to discover,” he said.
“Maybe not so easy. Aunt May does not use modern technological gadgetry. No cell phone. No computer. No satellite dish for television. She even has a post office box in town for her mail. The folks who know her best in the community can’t find her place. She likes the remoteness and isolation. Except for her affable and gregarious nature, the lady could qualify as a recluse.”
“You’re satisfied that mother and aunt are safe,” Rosey said.
“I’m fairly certain that Saunders isn’t there and can’t afford to show her face to many folks in Pitt County. The law is still after her and she knows that.”
“Still, not impossible for a cunning maniac,” he said.
“True enough.”
“So where to?”
“Leftwich Street.”
“Saunders’ own house? She’d go there?”
“The woman has brass. You honestly think the Clancyville Sheriff’s Department will have her house staked out? Or the Dan River Police? With all the law enforcement looking for her, it just might be the safest place for her to go. And if she wants to do harm to someone close to me, that location would put her at the center.”
“I’ll be surprised. Rather exposed.”
“Hasn’t stopped her yet.”
There were no signs of activity at Saunders’ home on Leftwich. No vehicles parked in the back or front. Rosey and I checked out the small dwelling with our usual B&E style. There were no signs that Saunders had been there in the last several weeks. Good detective work leaves no stone unturned.
/> “Where to now, Miss Holmes?” Rosey said.
“Let’s go visit the Rowland Estate.”
“You think anyone is living there?”
“Unlikely. The good reverend has some grown children, but there hasn’t been enough time for the estate to be settled. Saunders would feel at home there.”
“It’s remote.”
“And another option.”
My cell phone rang as we were driving towards the Rowland Mansion. It was an unknown caller.
“Yeah.”
“Dooley is dead. I clipped Saunders so she would know that this is a real threat.”
“Where are you?”
“Heading towards Clancyville from Robert Lee Rowland’s country estate.”
“And Saunders?”
“She fled the scene going north, I suspect.”
“You are not following her?”
“Well, yes and no.”
“Explain.”
“Since she is wounded, left shoulder, bleeding, and hurting like hell, I figure her options are limited at present. She will have to find a doctor, or maybe even a surgeon to fix her injury.”
“Is she in your sights?”
“No, but since I know she is going north, I figure she will head to Lynchburg and find someone to help her.”
“A small town doctor might serve her desperate purposes better. I don’t think she will leave Clancyville. She knows of another medical person,” I said.
“You in Clancyville yet?”
“On our way to the Rowland Estate.”
“Better not go there. Dead body and all. Too many questions to answer.”
“Then Rosey and I are heading towards Jones-McCann’s office.”
Before Diamond clicked off, she asked for directions to Jones-McCann’s clinic. I told her the location. Rosey and I arrived, parked at the far end of the parking lot and waited. There was no sign of a white truck. Diamond had refused to give me the license number, so all I had was the color of an aging truck in good condition. I had seen the truck in question before, but an older model white truck was common in rural Virginia. Nothing in the parking lot even came close to white.
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