by Blake Banner
“We are almost certainly looking at Zak for this.”
We stared at each other for a long moment. Finally, I asked her, “Are we just reading a degree of planning and care into the placing of the arms, when really it was just a reckless act that paid off?” I shrugged at my own question and went and stood next to her, staring out at the concrete parking lot awash with water, covered in a mist of spray an inch deep. “He’s killed Lynda in some half-assed ritual in the woods in Connecticut. He buries her, but in his crazed mind he has some sick joke going on, about how Hank must be”—I spread my hands and looked at her—“missing the arms of his lover…”
“Jesus…”
“So he brings him the arms of his lover. But by the time he gets here he is tired, hungover, whatever, and suddenly the idea of walking in on Hank and handing him Lynda’s arms doesn’t seem such a great idea. So he does the next best thing. He picks the lock on his lockup—or so he thinks—and leaves the arms there for him to find.”
“It’s persuasive, Stone. But, he rolls open the steel blind and sees boxes, not bikes.”
“It’s dark, he’s tired, stoned. He just wants to sleep. He dumps them and goes.”
A squad car arrived from the 43rd to seal up the premises, and we climbed in the Jag and headed off slowly into the deluge. After a while, Dehan did a funny kind of one-shouldered shrug and said, “I could buy that.”
I didn’t say anything. I was trying to imagine Zak in plastic boot covers writing out, “Well, it took you long enough…”
It wasn’t easy.
We stopped at an English pub on Coney Island Avenue. Everything was dark mahogany and brass, and they had an open fire burning. We took a small, round table by the window and sat in the silver light of the afternoon clouds. Dehan looked tired. I realized that I felt tired. I hadn’t slept much in the last couple of days.
“I told Zak I was looking for Hank,” I said suddenly. “I liked Hank. He was making a real effort to be a better person. That’s something a lot of good people never do.”
She studied my face for a moment. “You’re not responsible, Stone. You did what you had to do, the best you could.”
“I know.”
She smiled. “You’re always telling me to think like a crook. With Zak you need to think like a psychopath, or a sociopath. He didn’t care whether Hank had shopped him or not. He might have. That was enough.”
“Yup. I should have seen that.”
She pulled a face. “And what? Would you have done any different? Hank took his chances. He rode with the Devil, and he got burned.”
We chinked glasses.
“We haven’t got enough to pull him in. We have to wait for forensics. In the meantime, we need to find out more about Pete, and especially Dave.”
She nodded. “You don’t think the arms are Lynda’s, do you?”
“I can’t make up my mind. It makes sense that they are. It makes sense that Zak killed her, and it makes sense that he planted the arms there as some kind of sick joke. But I can’t shake the feeling that there is somebody else, totally different, standing in the shadows watching.”
She chuckled. “Somebody who would write—” She put on a prissy voice and waggled her head and her bum. “Well, it took you long enough!”
I laughed. “You read my mind. It just doesn’t sound like Zak.”
I had ordered two burgers, and the waitress brought them over. We ate hungrily and in silence. After a while, she said, “You want me to take Peter?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I want to have a good look at Dave.”
ELEVEN
I called GCS, Dave’s company, and asked to be put through to the MD. The girl on reception said she’d put me through to Mr. Fischer, the owner and managing director. He agreed to see me that afternoon.
The Global Computer Shipping Company was somewhat smaller than its name suggested, and was located on the top floor of a brown, two-story building on East Tremont Avenue, about ten minutes’ walk from the lockup. I climbed a narrow staircase, carpeted in the same brown as the walls, and stepped into a large, brown reception area. The receptionist looked at me sadly as I approached her desk and asked me, “Mister, is it ever going to stop raining?”
I smiled cheerfully and said, “Yup, the day I get a Facebook account.”
“Please get a Facebook account…”
“Never!”
She wheezed like I was the funniest man in the world and asked me, “You the cop?” She picked up the internal phone and pressed a button. “Mr. Fischer, Detective Stone is here to see you… Okay…” She pointed at a door and said, “Right through there.”
I knocked and went in. It was a large room paneled in wood, with large windows overlooking a wet street where everybody seemed to be leaning forward under umbrellas. Fischer stood to greet me. He was in his early sixties with tightly curled gray hair and a pencil moustache of the sort that was fashionable back in the ’50s. He was slim and his clothes were on the flash side of elegant. He shook my hand and gestured me to a chair.
“Detective Stone,” he said as he sat. “How can we help you?”
“I was hoping you could give me some information on one of your employees?”
His eyebrows shot up. “Really? Which one? Is he in trouble?”
I held his eye a moment and asked him, “Do you not employ women?”
He smiled, sighed, and sat back. “We have a small staff, Detective, and I know them all very well. I am afraid there is only one of them who is likely to attract the attention of the police. It’s David, isn’t it?”
“David Hansen.”
He nodded. “He is my nephew. This company exists for him and because of him.”
I frowned. “How’s that?”
“His father, my sister’s husband, died when David was a very small boy, barely two years old. I created this company as a way to provide for them. What do you want to know about him? Is it the pornography again?”
I shook my head. “Not exactly.” I hadn’t expected this, and I wasn’t sure how best to proceed. He must have seen the uncertainty on my face, because he said, “It’s all right, Detective. We are a very religious family, and my first loyalty is to God. If he has done wrong, I will not shield him.”
I hesitated. “I believe he goes away occasionally, to information technology conferences…”
“Yes. As I told you”—he gestured with both hands at the office around him—“this company was created for him, and by him. We realized at an early age that David was…” He thought carefully about the word. “Special. He was diagnosed with moderate to severe dyspraxia, dyslexia, and mild autism. He has a very high IQ, bordering on genius, but he can come across as, well, frankly, dumb. Stupid. As you can imagine, all of these things make it very difficult for him to relate to people, and he suffered a great deal at school. He got very poor grades and did not go to university. University would have destroyed him.”
I figured he would eventually get around to answering my question. In the meantime, I was interested in what he was telling me. He thought for a moment, like he was imagining his nephew being destroyed at university, then went on.
“His great passion, from a very early age, was computers. I guess they provided him with a world where he felt safe, and he could communicate with people in a way where he did not feel threatened. So I paid for him to have private tuition, and eventually he went to a technical college and became qualified as, I don’t know what. I, personally, know nothing about computers. This is why I say that he created this company as much as I did.” He laughed like he’d made a joke and continued. “He passed all his exams with flying colors, and when I saw how good he was, and how dedicated, I started GCS. I started him at the bottom, and he is working his way up.
“Now, twice a year, as regular as clockwork, he attends these conferences where they exhibit the latest technology, give talks, discuss the latest research…” He made a “and so on” gesture with his hand. “And very properly, David attends
these conferences.”
“Where are these conferences held? Is it always the same place, or does the venue change?”
He was shaking his head before I had finished. Outside there was a roll of thunder, and a sudden squall of rain on the window made him glance outside.
“San Diego in the summer. It’s always the third weekend in July, Thursday to Sunday. And the first weekend in December in Los Angeles.”
“So on December 5, 2005, he had just come back from Los Angeles.”
He looked surprised. “I have no idea. That was twelve years ago. But if it was a Monday, then yes. As far as I am aware, he has never missed one yet.” He smiled. “He is also somewhat OCD.”
“How does he travel? Does he go by plane?”
“By train or car. He doesn’t like to fly.” He frowned suddenly. “Forgive me, Detective, but these are rather peculiar questions. Do you mind telling me what this is about?”
I felt suddenly weary and gazed out at the interminable gray rain and drizzle. I asked myself the same question. What was it all about? I sighed and said, “I wish I knew, Mr. Fischer.” Then, “We’re looking into the background and movements of a number of people who have a connection to the lockups at the back of Revere Avenue.”
“The lockups… Why on Earth…?”
“My next question may seem a little odd, Mr. Fischer.”
“They all seem a little odd, to be frank, Detective.”
“Would you say that David has a good relationship with his mother?”
His face flushed and his eyes shone. “What are you implying, Detective?”
“I’m not implying anything. I am asking you. I am trying to eliminate David from a list of possible suspects.”
“Suspects in what? Why won’t you tell me?”
“Twelve years ago, a woman’s arms were found in one of the units in that alley. The case went cold, and now we are reviewing it. David is one of a number of people we are looking into.”
His face, which had flushed red, now turned ashen. “I remember that case. You can’t possibly think David… He wasn’t even here…”
“We are looking into the possibility that the murder was committed somewhere else.”
He stood and walked to the window. “My God… David…”
I gave him a moment, then said, “He is just one of a number of people we are—” I hesitated. “—trying to eliminate from our inquiry.”
He turned and stared at me. “Yes… yes, of course. Eliminate from… As I said, he was not a happy child.” He returned to his chair and sat carefully, as though sitting quickly might somehow have made David guilty of murder. “His mother was—is—naturally, protective. Perhaps a little too much so, but there is nothing…” He glanced at me. “Nothing untoward or unhealthy in their relationship.” I went to speak, but he rushed on. “I can vouch for the fact that he was never in any way abused as a child. In any way at all!”
I nodded. For some reason, I had suddenly had enough of Fischer and his weird family. I went to stand and said, “Can you tell me the name of these conferences that David goes to? Or the venue?”
He shook his head. “I would have to ask him.”
“Your accounts department must have records…”
He shook his head. “No, he pays for them himself. You want me to ask him now?”
“No. It’s okay. Probably best if you don’t mention my visit. In all probability, he will be eliminated anyway.”
“Yes… You think so?”
I stood and held out my hand. “Thanks for your help, Mr. Fischer.”
The lights were starting to come on as I climbed into my car and closed the door. The air was a grainy dusk touched with wet amber and red. I sat, drumming the wheel and watching the dark close in. I fired up the engine and drove slowly the short distance back to the precinct. By the time I got there, it was dark.
Dehan looked up from her laptop and watched me sit down. We sat staring at each other for a while. It was a comfortable habit we had gotten into. When I switched on my computer, she returned to her research. After half an hour, I leaned back and said, “Dave is lying to his uncle.”
Her eyes peered at me over the top of her screen. I explained about my meeting with Fischer and then pointed at my computer. “I have scoured Google with every variation and permutation of IT conferences, and there are no major computer conferences that occur regularly on the third weekend of July and the first weekend of December.”
“You going to ask him where he’s been going for the past twelve years?”
“Not yet. I want to know the answer before I ask him. See if he lies.”
“We haven’t got enough for a warrant to see his bank and credit card records.”
“I know… Another couple of weeks and we could follow him. But something tells me we haven’t got a couple of weeks.”
I picked up my phone and called Bernie at the bureau.
“Stone. What can I do for you?”
“Hey, Bernie. I need a favor…” I explained the situation to him and concluded, “I know you cannot check his bank records and credit card without a warrant, so I am not asking you to do that… But I was thinking you might be able to come up with a creative idea, because I know in my bones that this killer is building up to another kill. You hearing me…?”
“Yeah, I’m hearing you, John. Email me his details, and I’ll give it some thought and get back to you.”
“Appreciate it, Bernie.”
Dehan was watching me with no expression at all. Behind her the window looked very black.
“You just asked a special agent to break the law.”
“You misheard. I specifically asked him not to. How are you doing?”
“I can certainly add to your general state of confusion, if that’s what you mean. I have been trawling through what is available in public records, and Peter has an interesting past.”
“Oh, God…”
“He was orphaned at the age of four. Witnessed both his parents killed in a robbery. They were both knifed. He was adopted at the age of five, and eleven years later, at the age of sixteen, he left home and started working, doing menial jobs—burger joints, shop assistant, that kind of thing. Got his driver’s license at seventeen and at eighteen got his job as a sales rep for Canadian American Chemicals. Progressed rapidly. Married Jenny at twenty-one and that same year took out a mortgage on the house he now owns.”
“Okay…”
“There is more. He attended St. Mary’s Catholic School, primary and secondary. I managed to track down one of his teachers—still works at the school, and I went over and had a chat with him.”
“Good work. What did you find out?”
“Don’t interrupt. He remembered Peter very well. He said the staff were all aware that he was adopted and that he had had a very traumatic experience. The parents were supposed to take him to a child psychologist on a regular basis, once a week, and for the first couple of years, they did and he seemed to be doing okay. He was a shy, timid child, but he was making friends, and the teachers kept an eye on him to make sure there was no bullying and that kind of stuff.
“But he said, around the time Peter turned eight, things started to go wrong at home. Word from the other parents was that Dad had started drinking heavily. Peter started missing days at school. When he did turn up, Mom sometimes had bruises. Teachers tried talking to her, she got mad, told them to mind their own business—the usual shit. When Peter started turning up with bruises, they contacted social services, who looked into it and concluded there was not enough evidence to do anything. A visit to the house apparently showed the house was clean, both parents were sober and seemed happy. The kid was shy, but that was to be expected. He had stopped going to the psychologist, but the parents were under no obligation to take him if they deemed him to be okay.”
“That explains why he left home at sixteen.”
“Yup.”
I rubbed my eyes. Brilliant drops of water were trickling down th
e black glass behind Dehan’s head. For some reason, they were making me sleepy. I really wanted to go home and sleep. I sighed. “We have to start eliminating suspects.”
She gave a humorless laugh. “You may want to rephrase that. And speaking of which, the lab phoned. The soap was mixed with chicken’s blood. There were no prints anywhere. The shoe print on your mat would be a man of about five ten to six foot. The tread belongs to a fairly uncommon shoe. It’s European and you’d have to buy it online or go to Europe.” She was leafing through pages in her notebook. “Gallardo. A Spanish shoe. Handmade, real leather, they have a website—gallardo.com.”
I typed it in and looked at their shoes. They were nice. I memorized the tread.
“Maybe, Dehan, maybe at last we have something.”
TWELVE
I dropped Dehan at her apartment and then passed by the shopping mall to get a bottle of Floradix liquid iron. When I got home, I checked the back door was bolted, poured some liquid iron into a tumbler, and went out on the porch. The road was silent but for the gentle patter of drizzle on the leaves. Nothing moved except the leaves of the evergreens bowing gently in the icy breeze. The gleam of the streetlamps on the wet blacktop gave it a feeling of desolation. I wondered if he was out there, watching me. I carried my glass down to the sidewalk and stood looking first one way, then the other, scanning the small front gardens, identifying each car by owner. There was nothing I could see that was out of the ordinary.
I went back up the steps to the porch, where the door stood open. I smelled the liquid iron. It was awful. I bent and carefully spilled it all over the porch. Then I went inside to make myself a steak and sleep the sleep of the babes and angels.
I was in bed by ten, and by four seconds past, I was asleep. I slept deeply and solidly for five hours. At three I woke up, and for a couple of seconds I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming or not. My front doorbell was ringing incessantly. I heard a car door slam and the rising pitch of a car pulling away, then fading. I pulled on my pants, slipped my automatic in my waistband, and went downstairs. There was a note on the mat, and the bell was still ringing.