by R.J. Ellory
'Do you believe that? Really?'
'Yes I do.'
'So why do you keep doing this?'
'Because I'm no good for anything else. That's the truth. I'm just no fucking good for anything else.'
'And your current investigation?'
'Is the same bullshit as ever. I have to chase up phone records from a two-year-old account. I have to find some guy who used to work for Welfare and now seems to have disappeared. I have to go back to Family Welfare on Adams and interview another twenty employees. I have to try and convince everyone that half a dozen dead girls were all part of the same serial, even when there isn't a great deal of clues to suggest that they were, and even less evidence to prove it.'
'But you're convinced of it?'
'I have convinced myself that I am convinced of it.'
'And your daughter?'
'What about her?'
'Have you spoken to her since you kicked Chinese food down her stairwell.'
'I don't want to be reminded of that, and no, I haven't spoken to her.'
'Have you tried to contact her?'
'No.'
'And your partner?'
'We are still working together.'
'Has he mentioned his transfer request again?'
'No.'
'Do you feel that you can continue working with him?'
'Sure, he's a good guy. He does the job. He doesn't complain.'
'You think you can teach him something?'
'If he wants to learn, yes.'
'Good. That's good.'
'So what now?'
'I want to talk about your father some more. I think we need to keep on talking about him until you have reconciled yourself to who he was.'
'Really?'
'Yes, I think it's important.'
'I don't. Not anymore.'
'Bear with me. I think there's more to be unearthed about how he affected you.'
'Sounds exciting.'
'Okay, so just think about it for me. We'll meet again tomorrow, and in the meantime just try and remember how he was with you, who he was to you when you were younger, and how your viewpoint of him changed as you grew up. That's the kind of thing I want to discuss with you.'
'Okay ... if that's what you want.'
'And how are you sleeping?'
'Okay I guess. Not bad, not great. I'm having more dreams than I ever remember having.'
'That's a good sign.'
'Why?'
'Well, in and of themselves, dreams don't mean a great deal. There's no great significance to read into them. I know there's dream analysis and stuff like that, but frankly it's more about the interests and obsessions of the interpreter than anything else. What they do mean is that you are more mentally active than you used to be. If they start being nightmares then you need to start eating better and drinking less.'
'I didn't drink at all yesterday.'
'Well done.'
'Do I get a gold star on my progress chart?'
'Yes, Frank, you get a gold star.'
'See, you do have a sense of humor.'
'It's a rumor, Frank, just a rumor. Now go back to work. I'll see you in the morning.'
FIFTY-ONE
Melissa's phone was still theoretically functional, but the memory card within was beyond salvation. The micro-fine layer of protective material that covered the circuit board had corroded with time, and beneath that the tissue thin layer of metal had peeled away from the board and cracked. Melissa's purse had not been as airtight and waterproof as Parrish had hoped.
With the phone a dead end, Parrish and Radick had no other lines to pursue aside from returning to South Two to interview Supervisor Raymond Foley and the remaining twenty employees. Lester Young also needed to be found, but continuing along that line would have to wait until the interviews were completed.
On the way over Parrish explained his thoughts regarding the SUV.
'Makes sense,' Radick replied. 'No way that box would have gone in the back of a car, and even if it had it would have been one hell of a job to get it out in the confines of the alleyway and then carry it around back. Would have had to have been a larger vehicle - a station wagon with a tailgate would have done it perhaps, or - like you say - an SUV or a pickup.'
It was the first question they asked of Foley. Which of the employees owned an SUV, a pickup, or a large station wagon?
'No idea,' Foley replied. He waved Lavelle through from the outer office and asked him the same question.
'I think there's a few with pickups,' Lavelle said. 'Of course no- one comes to work in their car. They all use the subway. I couldn't be completely certain, but I would be surprised if some of them didn't have SUVs or whatever.'
Parrish and Radick went through the same interview with Supervisor Foley once Lavelle had left the room. How old was he, how long had he worked there, where had he come from, had he had any direct or indirect involvement in any of the girls' cases - official, unofficial, supervisory, review or otherwise. Parrish asked about marital status, number of kids, home address, Social Security number, and lastly what car he drove. He now planned to add this last question in for everyone. Just in case.
Foley came up clean. Nothing he could tell them bore any relevance to the investigation.
They resumed the employee interviews with Kevin Granger, went on through Barry Littman, Paul Kristalovich, Dean Larkin, Danny Ross, and after a while they all began to look the same, and sound the same, and feel like the same interview played through a loop with a different face saying the words.
By lunchtime they had covered twelve of the twenty. Parrish needed a break. Radick said he couldn't have agreed more. They took a walk down Adams and found a narrow-fronted diner on Tillary. Parrish sat in a booth in back. Radick ordered tuna cheese melts, coffee, a bowl of fries. When it came he ate slowly but methodically. Parrish picked at the sandwich, managed little more than half of it, but he drank two cups of coffee and asked for a third.
They spoke little until Radick broke the silence with, 'I'm reminded of that scene in All The President's Men. You seen that movie?'
'Yeah, good movie. Really like that movie.'
'You know when Woodward and Bernstein are going to all the houses, one after the other, asking questions of people who worked under Haldeman and Dean and whoever?'
'Yeah, I remember that.'
'Well, they couldn't get anyone to talk. And Bernstein, Dustin Hoffman right? He says "It's like there's a pattern. Like there's a pattern to the way they're not talking". It's like that back there.' Radick nodded in the direction of South Two. 'There's a pattern to the way that we're not finding out anything that we don't already know.'
Parrish shook his head. 'I don't even know what that fucking means, Jimmy. I think maybe you're losing it.'
'Lost it already,' he replied.
'We have to think about interviewing the women as well. Not as the perp, but as a feeder-line to someone on the outside.'
Radick pushed the bowl of fries aside and leaned back. 'I can't think with that,' he said matter-of-factly. 'I just can't get my head around the idea that a woman would be involved in something like this. Killing a man, yes, maybe, but out of jealousy, anger, a heat of the moment thing, but not this . . .'
'Just because such a thing doesn't happen very often doesn't mean that such a thing never happens.'
'I agree, Frank, but six girls? Abducted, drugged, sex acts of one kind or another, and then strangled.'
'The issue here is time, Jimmy. The likelihood is it's going to be a man. We deal with the men first. If that comes to nothing then we start in on the women.'
'Agreed,' Radick replied, and then he paused for a moment, thoughtful, deliberate. 'You know what I've been thinking?'
'Tell me.'
'Snuff movies.'
'I've thought the same thing.'
'Teenage girls fucked and strangled at the same time. Someone's filming it, selling the films. Maybe not even here. Maybe in Europe, England, S
outh America. Keep it Out of the local market, you know? I want to talk to Vice. See if any of these girls have turned up in their territory.'
'Yes, we'll do that later. Let's finish up these interviews and then go speak with them.'
Radick paid for lunch. He insisted. Parrish let him.
They walked back to South Two, waited until all the remaining un-interviewed staff had returned from lunch, and began again. The last eight took them through until just after four, Parrish aware of the frustration such interviews engendered, cautious not to rush them for the sake of getting through it. The next one, he kept thinking. The next question, the next person . . . they will give us something else, something new, something that will take us somewhere . . . But they did not, and it did not come as a surprise to him.
Finally, ragged at the edges and desirous of anything but four close walls and a series of repetitive questions, Parrish and Radick met with Foley and Lavelle.
'Is there anything else we can do to help?' Lavelle asked.
'I don't believe there is/ Parrish said. 'If we need you or your employees again we'll be in touch. You have been very helpful, and it is greatly appreciated.'
'And can you tell us anything?' Foley asked, rising from his desk. What he was asking was simple. Are any of the people in my office responsible for kidnapping and killing six teenage girls? Protocol prevented him from being as direct as he would have liked. That, and the belief that if he was subtle he might glean a greater quantity of information from Parrish.
'We can't tell you anything about the investigation,' Parrish said bluntly. 'That's standard procedure in all such cases. All we can do is thank you for your time and co-operation and let you get back to your work.'
Foley didn't push it. Lavelle merely shook hands and showed them down to the lobby.
'You know where I am if you need me,' Lavelle said, perhaps believing that he had now been an integral part of the investigation, that without him they would have been stymied. To a degree he was right.
Parrish and Radick walked back to the car. They didn't speak on the way. Radick knew where Vice was, but Parrish knew what it was. Vice was a dark place, perhaps the darkest of all, and he had hoped - somewhere within the vestiges of humanity he had managed to preserve - that he would never have to walk those corridors again. The things he had heard back then. The things he had seen. It was a different world. A world that ran parallel to his own, parallel to everyone else's, and all but a few had the faintest idea of its existence.
FIFTY-TWO
'What do you want me to tell you? I got everything down here,
Frank. Anal, DP, gonzo, necro. I got gay, lesbian, underage, SM, water-sports, girls fucking animals, the whole goddamn catalog of human depravity. You think of something human beings can do, and I can pretty much show you it in all its many and varied forms.'
'Teenage snuff,' Parrish stated. 'Girl-next-door, teenagers, straight sex as far as we can tell, but more than likely being strangled during or immediately after. Girl will be passive we believe, as we have traced benzos in a couple of them. Will go back at least two years, perhaps longer . . . and it'll have been made locally.'
'Jesus, Frank, you know how many movies that covers?'
'I have an idea.'
Joel Erickson, Vice Archive Supervisor, custodian of all things celluloid and digital, wore a face for the world. First appearances gave you the genial uncle, the helpful next-door neighbor, the cousin who showed up each Christmas with a different bleached- blonde forty-five-year-old girlfriend. Look a little deeper and the cracks and crevices began to show. The lines were there, and the shadows, and when asked about the things he knew he would smile sardonically and shake his head.
'You don't want to know the things I know,' he would say, and then proceed to tell you.
Joel Erickson was not the sort of man who was invited to dinner parties, and - even if he had been asked - he was not the sort of man who would accept.
'Off the top of my head I can think of three, four, five dozen that would fit the bill just in the last quarter.'
Parrish put the case files on Erickson's desk and pushed them towards him.
Erickson opened them one at a time, perused the picture within, and then closed the file and set it aside.
'All the same,' he said quietly, and shook his head. 'They all look the same after a while. Leave it with me for a few days. I'll take copies of the pictures now, and I'll start looking as and when I get a chance. But you know what it's like, right? Needle and a fucking haystack in the same sentence once again.'
Parrish smiled ruefully. 'I get it, Joel. I'm just asking you to do whatever you can. I got six. I think they're connected, and I think that some of those faces might be somewhere here.'
'Like I said, Frank, I'll do what I can.'
Parrish and Radick waited while Erickson photocopied the pictures. They thanked Erickson for his willingness.
'I got all the willingness in the world,' he replied. 'It's time and resources that are the problem.'
'Let's take a break,' Parrish said as they reached the car. 'Let's go get some coffee or something. I just want to take a few minutes to get oriented.'
There was a Starbucks a block and a half down. Parrish ordered the coffee while Radick found a table near the restrooms.
'Hangs together with a fucking spider's web,' was Radick's comment as Parrish sat down.
Parrish didn't reply until he was seated, until he'd removed his jacket, set down his files, fished his cell phone out of his pocket and set it on the table.
'A spider's web is a very good analogy,' he said. 'I think there's so many more threads to this than we see right now. Either that, or they're all unrelated.'
'I don't think they are unrelated,' Radick replied. 'The fingernails, the haircuts, the strangulations.'
'For sure, but how many girls get their nails done, get their hair cut? They're doing that kind of shit all the fucking time, aren't they? All we have that's MO-consistent is the COD, and strangulation as a COD has to be about as common as you can get.'
'I understand that, Frank, but I still think you're onto something. I think they're linked, I think they're all going to tietogether, and I think there's one person and he works for South Two.'
Parrish smiled. 'So who do you keep thinking about?'
Radick shook his head. 'I keep thinking about McKee, but I know I'm thinking about him because of the skin mags, and that. . . Well shit, it isn't even anything is it?'
'You're right. It isn't anything,' Parrish replied.
'What did you used to say? Something about how things are often exactly as they appear.'
'But also that the obvious can sometimes occlude the truth.'
'McKee is the model employee for sure, but he was also the most familiar with the cases.'
'But he would be,' Parrish replied. 'He deals with cases of his own, some he supervises, and he even does case reviews for the guys they're training.'
Radick didn't reply. He merely looked down for a moment.
'I'm not disagreeing with you, Jimmy. I'm not saying it couldn't be him, but without anything to directly connect him, no info on a car, nothing to . . . Hell, he's no more in the frame for this than any of them.'
'So who do you like for it?' Radick asked.
'I don't like any of them for it,' Parrish replied. 'I would love for it to be McKee. I would love for it to be that fucking simple.'
'Why d'you bring his name up then? Why d'you say you want it to be him?'
Parrish inhaled deeply. 'Gut feeling? Intuition? Fuck, I don't know. He came in the room, he sat down, and - I don't know, Jimmy, I just don't know. Something, nothing . . . maybe I just want it to be him so we aren't going round and round in fucking circles. I have no more reason to think it's him than I do any of them. If I'm completely logical and rational then there's nothing, and if I'm not . . .'
He didn't bother finishing the sentence.
'So let's just put some heat on him,' Radick said.
'Let's get him to come down to the 126th and ask him some more questions. We can ask him to assist us with the investigation without making it formal, and if he refuses then we have another little flag waving over his head, right?'
'We can do that, yes.'
'Only concern I have,' Radick went on, 'is that if we push him for some more info then he'll take evasive action with whatever evidence might be in his car and his home.'
'The mere fact that we're questioning everyone at South Two has done that already,' Parrish replied. 'If he had things to hide then he'll have hidden them already.'
'But they always miss something, don't they?' Radick asked.
'Not always,' Parrish said.
Radick hesitated. 'Shit, Frank, we're just making this up as we go along. In all honesty, Lester Young is more connected to this stuff than McKee.'
'Sure he is, but Lester Young we don't have. We have McKee, and McKee had skin mags in his locker.'