Serial fq-6

by John Lutz

  “To exactly where?” Westerley asked, feeling his pulse quicken.

  “State Road GG, just east of the Interstate 44 turnoff. The highway patrol dispatcher said the guy was behind a big deserted barn, about a hundred yards into the woods.”

  “That’s less than five miles from where I am,” Westerley said.

  He didn’t hear what Billy said. He’d already gotten the cruiser’s engine turned over, the transmission in drive, and the siren switched on.

  After a couple of miles, he switched the siren off but kept the roof bar lights flashing. That was enough to cause traffic to part in front of him so he could hold his speed. Within a few minutes he was turning onto the narrow blacktop road that was State GG.

  The barn came into sight almost immediately, a blight off to his left. It was huge and gray and weathered and leaned so it appeared it might collapse any second. Vertical bars of light showed between some of the boards.

  Westerley pulled the cruiser off the road and parked about twenty feet from the barn, near its black and cavernous entrance where the doors used to be. He switched off the engine and got out of the car without slamming the door.

  It was suddenly very quiet. Westerley stood still in the tall grass and could hear the buzz of insects, the occasional rush of a car passing on the Interstate well beyond the trees. A soft breeze came up, causing the grass to sway and the old timbers of the barn to creak. He understood why somebody wanting to rest or sleep would choose the woods instead of the barn; the damned thing didn’t provide much in the way of shelter and really might collapse any second. The breeze stiffened, and Westerley actually saw the structure sway.

  It was possible that the suspect had moved and was now inside the barn, but Westerley didn’t think that was the case. He unholstered his . 45 Colt revolver and checked to make sure it was loaded, and then he worked the action once to move one of the rounds in the cylinder into the breech that he usually left empty for safety’s sake.

  He turned his head to the side and listened closely. No sirens in the distance. Of course, that didn’t mean the highway patrol wasn’t close. And getting closer. Like Westerley, they’d probably run silent in their approach to where the suspect had been seen.

  Keeping the revolver at his side, pressed flat against his right thigh, he moved around the barn and entered the woods.

  There was a narrow dirt path, somewhat overgrown but easy to follow. Probably quite a few arrowhead expeditions, and maybe some lovers’ trysts, had occurred here. The woods were mostly in shadow, cooler than out by the barn in the blazing sun, and quieter.

  He saw the motorcycle first, a midnight-blue Harley-Davidson resting on its kickstand in a small clearing that the sunlight barely touched. In the center of the clearing, with the single sun patch almost to his head, lay a husky man with a dark beard. He was wearing a black T-shirt, dirty jeans, and brown leather boots with rundown heels. A beer can lay on its side near his limp right hand. Two identical cans were on the ground near the motorcycle. Wild Colt beer. The brand Beth had bought at the Quick Pick before the rape.

  Westerley could hear the man snoring and breathed easier himself. Deep sleep. Just what the situation called for.

  Reaching for the handcuffs hanging on his belt, Westerley moved in. He watched the man’s face closely as he advanced, observing a wisp of the suspect’s long and ragged beard stir slightly with each snore.

  When he was about five feet away, he saw a glint of something. Eye white. The man’s right eye was partly open.

  Even as Westerley realized the sleep and snores were feigned, the man was up and on his feet. He shook his head and beard, sending grass and bits of leaves flying, and he saw that Westerley was wearing a uniform. He must not have noticed the gun, though, because he spun on his heel and ran.

  Westerley was immediately after him. The man seemed to come all the way awake and lengthened his stride. He was picking up speed as they entered the woods, pulling away from Westerley, his long black hair whipping side to side like a metronome.

  “Halt!” Westerley yelled. “Sheriff’s department! I’ll shoot! I’ll shoot your goddamned heart out!”

  The suspect ran faster.

  Shit!

  Westerley stopped running and spread his feet wide. He leveled the gun then raised it slightly to fire a warning shot.

  It was at that moment that the fleeing suspect glanced back to see where Westerley was and ran hard into a tree.

  He was groggy and struggling to get back up when Westerley reached him, kicked his legs out from under him, and cuffed him.

  “That made an ugly sound,” Westerley said, “when you hit that tree.”

  “Didn’t feel too good, neither,” the man said, gasping. Both of them were fighting for breath.

  “I was ready to put one into you,” Westerley said, hefting the revolver.

  “What for? Sleepin’ under an elm?”

  Westerley got a good handhold on the man’s shirt and belt and lifted him to his feet. He gave him a shove.

  “What’re you doin’?” the man asked.

  “Keep walking toward the barn,” Westerley said, shoving him onto the narrow path.

  “Why’d you chase me?”

  “Why’d you run?”

  “Where we goin’?” Answering a question with a question. The way guilty people did.

  “Walk.”

  “I got rights!”

  “I know,” Westerley said. “Soon as I catch my breath, I’m going to read them to you.”

  By the time they’d reached the cruiser, Westerley had introduced the suspect to Mr. Miranda. He secured him in back, behind the cage, and got in behind the steering wheel.

  Less than a minute after he’d turned the cruiser off GG and onto the Interstate, he saw the highway patrol. There were four cars with lights on but sirens off, across the median and heading at high speed in the opposite direction.

  “What about my bike?” the suspect whined from the back of the cruiser.

  “I don’t think you’ll need it anymore,” Westerley said.

  26

  New York, the present

  Quinn and Pearl had lunch in Quinn’s brownstone over on West Seventy-fifth Street, only a short walk from the office. They often did that, stopping at a deli to pick up carryout food.

  In the brownstone, they could relax and talk freely, and not always about whatever the agency was working on. Sometimes the talk was about converting closets to bathrooms, about wainscoting or crown molding, or what kind of tile should be in the entry hall. Quinn could catch the news on TV if he felt like it. Pearl could kick off her shoes and stretch out on the couch for an afternoon nap. The kinds of things you couldn’t do in a restaurant.

  Sometimes after lunch they would climb the narrow stairs leading up from the vestibule and visit the construction crew to see how the renovations were going.

  Pearl was becoming more and more interested in the renovations. Quinn hoped that meant she was becoming increasingly interested in the brownstone, and maybe in moving in with him. He thought that in a lot of ways it made sense. He didn’t know for sure what she thought.

  They didn’t stay long in the brownstone today. Even through the thick walls and floors, they could hear the tympani of hammering and the angry whine of power tools. It sounded as if this was the day the workmen had decided to tear down a wall.

  Not an ideal place to hang out.

  Back in the office, it didn’t take Quinn and Pearl long to fall again into the rhythm of work. Quinn was at his desk, Pearl at her computer, when Vitali and Mishkin entered. Both were in shirtsleeves and with loosened ties, Vitali short and decisive in his movements, Mishkin slightly taller and languid, looking like Mr. Milquetoast with his soup-strainer mustache.

  “Finished searching the victims’ apartments?” Quinn asked.

  Both men nodded. Mishkin walked over to the small refrigerator and got a bottled water. Vitali poured himself a cup of coffee and left it black.

  “Show th
em what we found, Sal,” Mishkin said.

  Vitali drew a folded slip of paper from his shirt pocket and handed it to Quinn. Pearl got up from her desk and crossed the room to peer over Quinn’s shoulder.

  “We found nothing previously overlooked indicating either victim played around with S and M or had any connection to anything called Socrates’s Cavern,” Vitali said. “But we did find this.”

  Quinn looked at what appeared to be a page torn from a small spiral notebook. It had the name Andy Drubb scrawled on it in dark blue ink, along with a phone number.

  “It was in one of Noon’s dresser drawers,” Mishkin said, “along with some thong underwear and a peculiar brassiere.”

  Pearl looked at him. “Peculiar how?”

  “Not all that peculiar,” Sal said. “It was for holding up boobs without straps. Harold was unfamiliar with that model.”

  “Sort of propped them up,” Mishkin said. “Cantilevered.”

  Pearl rolled her eyes.

  “Did you cross-directory this guy Drubb and get his address?” Quinn asked.

  “Yeah,” Vitali said. “He lives down in the Village. We called the number but got no answer, and no answering machine. Drubb won’t know who called. We used a public phone in case he had caller ID.”

  “Go see him,” Quinn said, “but don’t call first. See how he takes to being surprised.”

  “That’s what we were on our way to do,” Sal said. “Wanted to check it with you first.”

  “Maybe Drubb was in a red hot S-and-M relationship with Nora Noon,” Mishkin said. “I mean, with the thong underwear and all. And that bra thing.” He glanced at Pearl, his gaze lingering on her large breasts.

  Pearl glared at him. “Are you for real, Harold?”

  “Funny you should ask. What I was wondering-”

  “Never mind, Harold!” Quinn and Vitali said in unison. Nobody wanted to see Pearl erupt.

  “We’ve got a printout of the Socrates’s Cavern membership list,” Pearl said. “I’ll check it and see if Drubb’s on it.” She went over to her desk and pulled some stapled sheets of paper from a drawer. “It’s alphabetical, so this’ll only take a few seconds.”

  “He’d probably be too young,” Sal said.

  “Then maybe his father,” Pearl said

  “That’s an ugly thought,” Mishkin said.

  “And wouldn’t mean much if it turned out to be true,” Sal told him.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Pearl said. “Drubb’s not on the list.”

  “If you don’t find Andy Drubb at home,” Quinn said, “ask around the neighborhood and see what you can learn about him. It won’t hurt if he hears about it and gets nervous.” He glanced at his watch. “Stop and grab some lunch on the way downtown.”

  “Wanna join us?” Vitali asked.

  “We already had lunch at my place,” Quinn said.

  “In the middle of the day?” Mishkin said.

  “That’s when people eat lunch, Harold,” Vitali said.

  Mishkin was staring at Pearl’s breasts again. Pearl was sure she wouldn’t like the reason why.

  The Albert A. Aal Library looked like a miniature court building. Though it wasn’t all that wide, it had shallow concrete steps leading to half a dozen columns framing five tall wooden doors outfitted with brass kick and push plates. One of the doors had a sign warning that it was automatic, as if anyone getting too close to it might be flipped back down the steps. Fedderman chose that one. The others looked too heavy to move.

  The library was surprisingly spacious inside, and well lighted. While it might be narrow, it was long, with rows of steel shelves laden with books. Off to the side was an arrangement of armchairs and wooden racks of magazines and newspapers. A blond boy who looked too young not to be in school was slumped in one of the chairs, reading a car magazine. Fedderman could see only a few people browsing the stacks.

  A gray-haired woman, long and narrow like the library, sat behind the wooden counter where books were checked out and returned. She had on round metal-framed glasses trailing a thin braided loop that was buttoned to her blouse. There was no way she could misplace the glasses, Fedderman thought. He’d bought reading glasses but could seldom find them so had stopped looking. He could still see well enough without glasses, if he held whatever he was reading at arm’s length and squinted. That was good enough for him because it had to be, unless he happened to stumble across his glasses by sheer luck. But with glasses like this woman’s…

  “Help you?” the woman asked. Fedderman realized she was staring at him with narrowed eyes. Her expression was faintly disapproving.

  “Research,” Fedderman said. He was uncomfortable around librarians. Had been since as a teenager he’d returned Lady Chatterley’s Lover three months overdue and-

  “What is it you’d like to research?”

  Fedderman sure wasn’t going to tell her that. “Something in an old newspaper.”

  She observed him as if he were a mildly interesting insect. “We have newspapers on microfiche,” she said. “Our research room is straight down and to your left at the end of those aisles. Someone back there will help you.”

  Fedderman thanked her and wandered off in the direction she’d instructed. Never a scholar, he still very much liked the unique musty scent of old books. And many of the library’s books were old. Only about half seemed to have dust jackets, and some of them were faded.

  He had no trouble finding the research room. It had three walls and four viewers, and a wall of shelves on which were stacks of small cardboard boxes with writing on them in black felt-tip ink. A scholarly looking man in a saggy brown corduroy jacket and sloppily knotted pink tie sat at one of the viewers, intent on what was sliding past sideways on the glowing monitor. Fedderman noticed that the corduroy jacket had leather elbow patches. He had never owned anything with elbow patches.

  At the far end of the room was the librarian Fedderman had been told would help him. She was reaching up to replace one of the boxes that held a cartridge when she glanced over and saw him. And smiled.

  Penny Noon.

  She looked more like a librarian today, wearing light gray slacks, a darker gray blazer, and what looked like a man’s miniature tie over a white blouse. A large white button with red lettering was pinned to her blazer’s lapel. It read Save the Book.

  “More questions about Nora’s murder?” she asked.

  “You know me,” Fedderman said, though she didn’t know him all that well. “Always working.”

  “So it seems.”

  “I thought we’d… gotten more trusting of each other. That maybe we should see each other again.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that. I’m the victim’s half sister. Isn’t there a conflict of interest there?”

  “If there is,” Fedderman said, “I don’t care. When certain situations occur, when you meet certain, special people, you should take advantage of them.”

  “Of the special people?”

  He felt a flicker of annoyance and embarrassment. “Is this what’s known as verbal fencing?”

  “No, it’s a way of avoiding the subject. We are the subject. Rather, our relationship, brief as it is. I apologize. I’m being evasive and you’re being direct.”

  “There isn’t that much time to say what’s on your mind,” Fedderman said. “For any of us. I know that because of my work. You should know it because of… what’s happened.”

  They were both quiet for a moment. Both thinking about Nora. Both knowing that the last thing Fedderman had come here for was to discuss the murder case.

  Fedderman began to perspire. He had to break the silence, change the subject. He wasn’t good at this kind of patter, especially in the presence of this woman who made him tongue-tied.

  “The book,” he said, nodding toward her lapel button. “Who’s it need saving from?”

  “Oh, so many people. Most of them with e-books.”

  “Huh?”

  “Electronic readers.”

&
nbsp; “Those things can’t be much fun,” Fedderman said.

  “Someone closer than you imagine might disagree with you.”

  “How do you turn pages with them?”

  “I’m afraid pages are becoming obsolete. Like librarians.”

  “Save the librarians,” Fedderman said.

  The guy in the corduroy jacket gave him an annoyed look, like a man on the verge of growling. Instead of growling, he gathered up some papers, and then glanced in Penny’s direction and stood and left the research room. What? Had they been talking too loud?

  Penny walked over and switched off the viewer Mr. Corduroy had left on. Fedderman enjoyed watching her do that. Maybe too obviously.

  “Did you come here to save this librarian?” she asked.

  “Yes. From the electronic book.”

  “Is that what you told Ms. Culver?”

  “The woman at the desk? No, I told her I wanted to find something in an old newspaper.”

  She smiled and moved closer to him. He noticed she was wearing perfume. He couldn’t place the scent, but it smelled better than old books.

  “Was that a fib?” she asked.

  “Who would fib to Ms. Culver?”

  “I bet you would,” she said. She absently buttoned his shirt cuff, then stood on her toes and kissed him lightly on the cheek.

  He embraced her and brought her close, held her tight, kissed her on the lips, felt her tongue warm and soft against his own.

  Their hands were all over each other, there in the research room.

  27

  It was easy to get into Candice Culligan’s apartment. When the doorman was about half a block away, hailing a taxi at the busy intersection for some tenants, the Skinner simply entered the lobby and crossed to the elevators. Even if the doorman returned immediately, the killer wouldn’t be seen, as the elevators were around a corner and out of sight from the building entrance. Not that it mattered, because there was an elevator at lobby level. He stepped inside, pressed the close-door button, then the button for Candice’s floor. He leaned his shoulder blades against the back wall of the elevator and relaxed as he rose.