And So it Began

by Owen Mullen

  What had happened to her?

  Just then, I saw Peter Roy heading away from the main hall. He was taller than almost everyone there, impossible to miss in his old tweed jacket.

  And suddenly, I knew what Tom Donald had been trying to tell us.

  Two words. The first was man – we were right about that. The second wasn’t match, batch, hatch, thatch or scratch. It was patch. Timmy’s father was describing his son’s killer. He’d been trying to say “patch.”

  Like the leather ones on Peter Roy’s jacket.

  38

  Eadie and Mama leaned forward in their seats, clasping each other’s hand. Bob Renaldi sat straight, lips pressed together. His heart pounded. When they heard the introduction – ‘Katie Renaldi!’ – they clapped; an island of applause in the hall. Katie stepped forward, small and vulnerable, alone on the stage. Her eyes darted to where her family waited, willing her to be good.

  Come on, Katie. Come on, baby.

  In rehearsals, hitting that first cue had been a problem. From then on, it was easy. Easy-peasy-japanesy-lemon-squeezy. Nursing her along, helping her find timing and confidence. Onstage, Katie took a big breath. When the single piano note played across the count, she caught it and sang the opening lines of “American Pie.”

  A faint sensation flickered inside Emily Russell, like a trapped bird struggling to be free. She ignored it, chastising herself for being an excitable old fool. Seconds later, she couldn’t breathe as an invisible band tightened across her chest. Her granddaughter’s singing faded; the noise in her head climbed to a roar.

  All Katie knew was the song. The hours of practice paying off with every line. When she reached the first chorus, Eadie began to relax. She didn’t see Mama’s ashen face or notice the tremble in her hands.

  The crowd joined in. Eadie hoped they wouldn’t put Katie off. In rehearsals, Mama talked and roamed around while the girl sang, insisting she carry on with her performance.

  ‘As soon as the music begins, you go to Katie’s world. And don’t let anyone in. Nothing exists but you and the song.’

  When Eadie suggested the Don McLean classic, both women knew it was a winner. Katie moved in the spotlight like a pro, the humiliation of the previous ill-starred performance gone. Pride washed through Bob and Eadie. They saw their child, happy, assured and enjoying herself this time. The song ended to generous and deserved applause.

  Mama Russell slumped in her seat gasping for air. It had worked, just as she’d hoped. Better.

  Easy-peasy-japanesy-lemon-squeezy.

  Her eyes closed, and the pain stopped.

  ‘Peter! Wait!’

  He looked over his shoulder. When he saw me running towards him, a feral expression clouded his features. Just for a moment. Then, it was gone.

  ‘Delaney?’ he said, once again the urbane, laid-back guy. ‘Where’s the fire?’

  ‘We need to talk, Peter.’

  ‘Sure. What about?’

  I tried a door. It was locked. The next one wasn’t. Inside, dust-covered boxes lay on the floor, a pile of broken chairs dominated one area of the room and the smell of damp was stronger than in the public spaces.

  Peter Roy seemed amused. ‘What’s up?’

  I faced him. He had the advantage in weight and height.

  ‘Where’s Labelle? What’ve you done with her?’

  He stiffened. ‘I really don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Where’s your daughter?’

  He shook his head, faking confusion. ‘With her mother. With Reba. Where do you think she is?’

  He was amazing. If I hadn’t known better I’d have believed him.

  ‘I think she’s dead. And I think you killed her.’

  ‘What? Delaney …’

  ‘It was you Tom Donald recognised, so you ran.’

  ‘Who? I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘She isn’t with Reba. She’s dead. You killed her.’

  He smiled and shook his head. His voice sounded stranger than ever. ‘You clown. You fucking idiot.’

  ‘She’s dead. Labelle’s dead.’

  He stepped closer. I pulled out my gun. Faced with its authority, he stopped, and the persona of easy-going Peter Roy fell away like the mask it had always been. I brought the weapon level with his chest. He believed I’d shoot him. He was right.

  ‘Over here. On your knees.’

  The gun forced him to the floor. When he got down, I used the handcuffs Delaup had given me to chain him to a big cast-iron radiator anchored to a wall; the heating system was useful for something.

  I read him his Miranda Rights.

  ‘I’m arresting you on suspicion of murder. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a …’

  Laughter interrupted me; he thought it was funny. Tears formed in the corners of his eyes. He grinned. ‘Moron. The City of New Orleans is in big trouble, if you’re the best they’ve got.’

  The contempt and revulsion I felt for him won out. ‘You’re crazy. Pathetic. Inadequate and stark-raving mad.’

  ‘You think?’ He giggled and reminded me of Julian Boutte in the shotgun in Algiers. ‘That your professional opinion?’

  I took out my cell and called Fitzpatrick. He would take it from here. Tom Donald hadn’t failed; he’d given us what we needed.

  I waited for my friend to pick up. Deep in my stomach a bad feeling stirred.

  ‘How did it begin, Peter? Was Labelle the first? What lie did you tell her mother?’

  I heard myself and knew it couldn’t be right. My thinking wasn’t logical.

  ‘You fucking halfwit. Can’t you see it?’

  ‘See what?’ I tried to stay calm.

  ‘She told me you were a fool. I was worried she underestimated you. I was wrong.’

  He was enjoying himself. ‘Labelle, Labelle, Labelle. You stupid cunt!’

  A feeling too terrible to describe crawled through me. ‘What’re you saying? What’re you telling me?’

  ‘I didn’t kill Labelle, Delaney. I haven’t killed anybody.’

  The noise in my ears was deafening; the sound of my own stupidity.

  ‘How could I hurt Labelle? She doesn’t exist. She never did. We made her up.’ He shook his head at me. ‘There is no Labelle.’

  The phone fell to the dusty floor.

  We made her up. There is no Labelle.

  I raced from the room to find Reba Roy, with the sound of his insane cackle chasing after me. I doubted I’d ever outrun it.

  39

  It happened so fast. One minute, she was singing, the next, they were announcing her name.

  ‘And the winner is – Katie Renaldi!’

  She was overwhelmed but not too carried away to forget her mom and dad, and Gran Russell. She owed it all to her gran. A man shook her hand. She bowed and glanced to where her folks had been. Their seats were empty.

  In a small room to the side of the stage, her mother was fighting back tears, squeezing Emily Russell’s hand and pleading, ‘Come on, Mama. Please, Mama, come on’.

  Her dad paced the floor, asking over and over where in hell the ambulance was. The older woman was unconscious. Eadie Renaldi returned from wherever fear had taken her. A new terror seized her.

  ‘Where’s Katie? We forgot about Katie.’ Her voice was a frantic whisper, poised to become a scream. ‘Find her, Bob.’

  Bob Renaldi rushed into the hall. This couldn’t be. How could they let this happen? After all they’d talked about.

  Her safety is our responsibility, nobody else’s.

  How could they forget about Katie?

  The lights were on. The audience was settling down for the next group. He scanned the crowd, his eyes darting from face to face. There was no sign of his daughter. Then everything went dark.

  One unforeseen circumstance. Only the shortest time.

  A couple of seconds, either way.

  All it took.

  I raced towards the main hal
l. Before I could get there, a man burst through the door running towards me, the look on his face told it all.

  ‘Katie! Katie!’ His voice rasped with emotion. ‘Katie!’

  I grabbed his arm. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘My little girl. I can’t find her. She was in there.’

  This was the nightmare so many parents had gone through, beginning with a missing child: their child. The rising terror, then the guilt and the unimaginable sorrow of identifying the broken body.

  And it was about to happen.

  We’d come from opposite ends of the building, without finding what we were searching for. That left only two choices: the entrance or the door to my left. I didn’t hesitate; there wasn’t time for that. I shouted over my shoulder to the distraught father to take the entrance and tried the door handle. It turned and opened. Inside was a broad corridor and a sign pointing to the stage.

  I ran, conscious I’d been here before with Tom Donald, and remembering, all too clearly, how that had turned out. A hundred thoughts and a thousand images flashed through my mind, amongst them, Julian Boutte’s giggling face.

  Déjà vu, all over again

  The competition had restarted. Far away, I could hear an off-key voice. Another corner brought me to another. Reba Roy was at the far end in front of a fire door. ‘Delaney.’ She greeted me like an old friend, her head tilted in a gesture of pleasant surprise. Still the charmer. ‘How are you? How’s Molly doin’?’

  What stopped my heart cold was the child holding her hand. Comfortable with her new friend: trusting. ‘This little thing has lost her mommy.’ Reba lifted their joined hands. ‘We’re off to find her, aren’t we, honey? She won’t be far.’ She ruffled the child’s hair with her free hand.

  ‘Where’s Labelle?’

  She replied, without missing a beat. ‘With her group, getting’ ready to go on. You’ll hear her soon.’

  Like her husband, she was very convincing.

  Our eyes locked. She knew.

  ‘Let her go, Reba.’

  ‘Who? Katie? Katie’s fine with me.’ Her hand tightened on the child’s.

  ‘Let her go. We know about Panama City and Fort Worth. Baton Rouge and the rest.’

  She moved her head from side to side, deciding her next move. Her lips pursed. Her eyes narrowed, and she morphed from a captivating southern belle into a cornered snarling beast. ‘Fuck you.’

  ‘Peter told me all about it.’

  The mask fell. ‘Fuck you! Fuck you!’

  She growled like an animal, through gritted teeth. Suddenly, a door to her right marked “Boiler Room” opened and a stagehand came through. Reba darted through it, dragging Katie Renaldi, and slammed it behind her. Precious seconds were lost trying to free whatever she’d used to bar it. Seconds – enough time to snuff out a young life. We put our shoulders against it. The door groaned and edged open. I ran into the bowels of the building; past pipes lagged with cloth, where the air smelled of oil and years of dust lay undisturbed, with Katie’s father at my heels. At first, I couldn’t see. But when my vision cleared, the horror her innocent victims must have known in their last moments – Timmy Donald, Mimi Valasquez; Pamela, Jolene, and all the others – washed over me.

  In the semi-darkness, Reba knelt on the stone floor, whispering words I couldn’t hear, looking deep into the girl’s eyes. One hand stroked the child’s blonde hair, while red-painted fingernails caressed the whiteness of her throat. Hands closed round the tiny neck, preparing to squeeze the life-force from the small body like she’d done more times than we’d ever know. In that hellish scene, the expression on Reba Roy’s face was terrifying and awful; something I never wanted to witness again. The only word to describe it was rapture: the ecstasy of the insane.

  ‘Reba! It’s over. However, it goes, it’s over.’

  The murderess smiled and spoke to her captive. ‘Is it over, Katie? Don’t you want it to be over, honey?’

  The child whimpered. Behind me, Katie’s father was frozen with fear. Agent Diskins had said the killer’s greatest thrill was being there when the end came. Maybe that’s what saved her – I don’t know. Reba Roy could have snapped the slender neck, and there would’ve been nothing anybody could have done to stop her. Instead, she kissed her forehead and threw her towards us.

  It was so unexpected, it took me by surprise. The father caught his daughter and held her in his arms, crying. The distraction had lasted seconds: no more. When I turned to face her, Reba wasn’t there. We’d had her. Now, she was gone. I moved forward, one careful step at a time, barely able to make anything out until I saw an illuminated EXIT sign above a door.

  She was getting away; I couldn’t let that happen.

  The door brought me to the bottom of a flight of stairs. Somewhere, a child was singing. I climbed them and found myself in the wings. Movement to my left – a figure half-running towards the back of the stage – told me she hadn’t escaped. I rushed after her, tripping over something on the floor, almost losing my balance but staying in pursuit. She pushed past a couple of people standing at the side. I followed at a run, with no idea where we were headed. Two stagehands drew apart as I charged between them behind the curtains. In the background, the tinny, tuneless vocals, jarring and surreal, added a discordant soundtrack.

  All I could make out were shadows. Then, I saw her crouching behind one of the secondary curtains. I ran between hanging ropes, chairs and abandoned props. When I was almost on her, she saw me, broke cover and ran across the stage. I dived and caught her round the waist. We fell together on to the boards. The singing stopped, the backing tape played on. She clawed and scratched at me, her face ravaged by a hatred frightening to be near. It took all I had to keep her pinned down. Nobody rushed to help.

  She caught me on the side of the head. My hold loosened. I reacted instinctively and grabbed her hair.

  It came away in my hand.

  Underneath, Reba Roy was bald. Writhing and spitting; rouged cheeks and red lipstick: a raging distortion. To be face to face with such insanity was sickening and disgusting. But I didn’t let go.

  I held on.

  40

  Fitzpatrick arrived with three uniforms. The Metairie PD was happy to turn Peter and Reba Roy over. It was enough to have held them even for a short time. In the future, it would be hard to come across anyone who hadn’t had a hand in their capture. That success-has-many-fathers thing again.

  I watched a handcuffed Peter Roy placed in the back seat of the cruiser and remembered his contempt. The leather patches on the elbows of his jacket brought Tom Donald’s face to my mind. This time, I felt no need to shrink from it.

  Over by another cruiser, Reba Roy refused to look my way. She’d had me fooled; for months on end. A talented lady and a heartless killer.

  Driving to the city was a strange experience. Like dreaming in black and white. I ought to have been elated. I wasn’t. It had been a rough weekend – and it wasn’t over yet.

  The moment I went through the door, the applause began. Someone shouted, ‘Wayta go, Delaney!’

  It had been good work. I’d got there in the end. But it had taken too long. I flopped into Danny’s chair and waited for him to appear. When he didn’t, I got some paper and began to structure my report, then abandoned it and called Stella.

  ‘Hi there,’ she said. ‘What’s cooking?’

  ‘Tell you later, if you can hang on ‘til then.’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘You all right?’

  ‘I will be when I see you. Just don’t know when that’ll be.’

  ‘Well, I’m around until whenever.’

  ‘Thanks, baby.’

  I replaced the telephone on its cradle just as Danny walked through the door. The energy coming off him crackled.

  ‘Yeah! Yeah!’ He slapped my hand in a high-five. ‘You did it. You caught them.’

  ‘Where are they?’

  ‘Downstairs.’

&
nbsp; ‘Have they said anything yet?’

  ‘Not a word. Not one, and d’you know what? It doesn’t matter. They’re gone. Thanks to you.’

  ‘When will McLaren get here?’

  ‘He’s on his way as we speak.’

  ‘And Delaup?’

  ‘Any minute. This is a load off for him.’

  I remembered how beaten he’d looked. ‘What happens next?’

  Danny sat on the edge of the desk. ‘The Bureau’ll take over when they arrive. Our work is done.’ He pointed a finger. ‘You solved it for them. We could do with you back here. Full time.’

  ‘Dream on. I’ve got a report to write and a debriefing to attend. Then, I return to my own life.’

  Fitzpatrick didn’t try to give me an argument. He knew better. Still, he couldn’t resist taking a pitch. ‘That’s an awful lot of talent going to waste, my friend.’

  ‘What makes you think it’ll go to waste? I’ve a business to run, clients to help …’

  ‘Wrongs to right?’

  ‘Not my motivation. Not anymore.’

  ‘No interest in righting wrongs?’

  ‘What I’m interested in is writing a report.’

  ‘Two reports.’

  ‘Two reports, and I’m gone. For good this time.’

  ‘Want to bet?’

  ‘Save your money, Danny. You’d lose.’

  He leaned on the desk. ‘Delaney, take a second to let what you’ve done sink in. Two sick bastards are in our cells. It’s over. And it didn’t take years. Because of you.’

  ‘It’s a shitty business. I hate it.’

  ‘No argument there. Right now, you’re on a comedown. On a different day …’

  I shook my head.

  ‘It’s a shitty business, Fitz. Even when we win, it’s a shitty business.’

  When Delaup arrived, he shook my hand. ‘Well done, Delaney. Well done.’

  His skin had florid splashes that made him look like a seasoned drinker, though I’d never seen him touch a drop.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘I knew you’d do it.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said again, and let go of his hand. He spoke to Fitzpatrick. ‘Update?’