The Web

by Jonathan Kellerman

  He came himself, an hour later, emotions hidden behind mirrored shades, a shotgun clamped to the dash of the little police car.

  As I walked out, he looked up at the gargoyle roof tiles and frowned, as if in imitation. I got in the car and he took off, speeding around the fountain and through the open gate, downshifting angrily and taking bumps hard. His head nearly touched the roof and he looked uncomfortable.

  When we were out of sight of the estate, he said, "I'll give you an hour, which is probably more than you need 'cause he's still playing statue."

  "Think he's faking?"

  "You're the expert." He grabbed the gearshift as we went around a sharp curve. His forearms were thick and brown, corded and veined and hairless. White crust flecked the corner of his mouth.

  "He told me you two grew up together."

  Bitter smile. "He was a couple of years older but we hung out. He was always small, I used to protect him."

  "Against who?"

  "Kids making fun— his family was trash. He was too, didn't comb his hair, didn't like to bathe. Later, he changed so much you couldn't believe it." He whipped his head toward the window, spat, returned his eyes to the road.

  "After he moved in with Moreland?"

  "Yeah. All of a sudden he got super-straight, studied all the time, preppy mail-order clothes, and Dr. Bill bought him a catamaran. We used to go out sailing. I'd have a beer; he never touched it."

  "All that due to Moreland's influence?"

  "Probably the military, too. We did that at the same time also. I was an MP in the Marines, he was Coast Guard. Then he got married, kids, all that good stuff. Probably decided it was a good idea to keep the straight life going."

  The next sentence came out a snarl: "I liked the bastard."

  "Hard to reconcile that with what he did."

  He glanced at me and picked up speed. "What're you trying to do? Put me on the couch? Dr. Bill tell you to do that?"

  "No. Sometimes I lapse into shoptalk."

  He shook his head and put on more speed, turning the final dip to the harbor into a roller-coaster swoop.

  The water enlarged as if at the hands of some celestial projectionist, blue, mottled platinum, where the clouds hovered.

  Laurent shoved the shift lever hard, yanked it back into neutral, gunned the engine, stopped so short I had to brace myself against the dash. My fingers landed inches from the shotgun and I saw his head swivel sharply. I put my hands in my lap and he chewed his cheek and stared out the windshield.

  More people than usual on the waterfront, mostly men, milling around the docks and congregating in front of the Trading Post, which was closed. The only open establishment, in fact, was Slim's Bar, where a few more drinkers than usual loitered, smoked, and swigged from long-necks. I picked out Skip Amalfi's fair hair among the sea of black, then his father, hovering nervously at the back of the crowd.

  Skip was animated, talking and gesturing and brushing hair out of his face. Some of the villagers nodded and gesticulated with their arms, slicing the air choppily, pointing up Front Street toward the road that led up to Victory Park.

  Laurent put the car into gear and rolled down so fast I couldn't focus on anyone's face. Ignoring the stop sign on Front Street, he made a sharp right and raced toward the municipal center. The parking spaces facing the whitewashed building were all taken. Nosing behind a crumbling Toyota, he jerked the key out of the ignition, freed the shotgun, and got out carrying the weapon against his thigh. His size made it look like a toy.

  Slamming the car door, he marched toward the center. Onlookers moved aside and I rode his wake, managing to get inside before the remarks to my back took form.

  The front room was tiny, dingy, and hot, filled with the salty-fatty smell of canned soup. Nicked walls were covered with wanted posters, Interpol communiquÉs, lists of the latest federal regulations. Two desks, messy, with phones tilting on mounds of yet more paper. One held a hotplate.

  The only spot of color was a tool company calendar over one of the workstations, starring a long-torsoed, pneumatic brunette in a red spandex bikini that could have been used for a handkerchief. A middle-aged deputy sat under sleek, tan thighs, writing and moving a toothpick around in his mouth. Skinny, he had a jutting stubbled chin and a sunken, lipless mouth. Lots of missing teeth. His hair was limp and graying, fringing unevenly over his collar. His uniform needed pressing but his engraved metal nameplate was shiny. Ruiz.

  "Ed," said Dennis. "This is Dr. Delaware, the psychologist from the castle."

  Ed pushed away from his desk and the legs of the folding chair groaned against the linoleum floor. The skin under his eyes was smudged. A pile of plastic-wrapped toothpicks was at his left hand. He lowered his head to the wastebasket and blew out the pick in his mouth, selected a new one, tore the plastic, rested the splinter on a ridge of bare gum, and laced his hands behind his head.

  "Anything?" said Dennis.

  "Uh-uh." Ed manipulated the pick with his tongue and watched me.

  "No action from the jokers at Slim's?"

  "Nah, just big talk." The sibilant voice. He touched the revolver in his belt with his left hand. I thought of something and filed it away.

  "Why don't you take a walk up and down Front. Check things out."

  Ed shrugged and rose to a slumping five four. Pocketing more toothpicks, he ambled out the door.

  Dennis said, "You can sit in his chair."

  I took my place under Miss Redi-Lathe, and he settled half a buttock atop the other desk and folded his arms across his chest.

  "Ed may not look like much to you, but he's reliable. Ex-Marine. In Vietnam he won enough medals to start a jewelry store."

  "Southpaw, too."

  He took off the mirrored glasses. His light eyes were clear and hard as bottle glass. "So?"

  "It reminded me that Ben's left-handed. I know because I saw him vaccinating the kids at the school. I read AnneMarie Valdos's file. Moreland said the killer was probably right-handed."

  "To me, "probably' means not for sure."

  I didn't answer.

  Laurent's arms tightened and his biceps jumped. "Moreland's no forensic pathologist."

  "He was good enough for the Valdos case."

  He chewed his cheek again and shot me a close-mouthed smile. "Are you his rent-a-sherlock, supposed to raise doubts about my investigation?"

  "The only thing he asked me to do was give Ben moral support. If my being here's a problem, take me back and I'll catch up on my sunbathing."

  Another bicep flex. Then the smile widened, flashing white. "Look at that, I pissed you off. Thought shrinks didn't lose their tempers."

  "I came to Aruk to do some interesting work and get away from city life. Since I got here it's been nothing but weirdness, and now you're treating me like some kind of sleazeball. I'm not Moreland's surrogate and I don't enjoy being placed under house arrest. When those boats pull up, I plan to be on one."

  I stood.

  He said, "Take it easy, sit down. I'll make coffee." Switching on the hotplate, he pulled packets of instant and creamer and styrofoam cups out of his desk.

  "It ain't Beverly Hills cafÉ au lait. That okay?"

  "Depends on what kind of conversation goes with it."

  Grinning, he went through a battered rear door. I heard water run and he returned with a metal coffeepot that he placed on the hotplate.

  "You want to stand, suit yourself."

  I waited until the pot bubbled before sitting.

  "Black or cream?"

  "Black."

  "Tough guy." Deep chuckle. "No offense, just trying to take the tension off. Sorry if I rubbed you wrong before."

  "Let's just get through this."

  He fixed two cups, handed me one. Terrible, but the bitterness was what I needed.

  "I know damn well Ben's a lefty," he said. "But all Moreland said in AnneMarie's case was that the killer was right-handed if she was grabbed from behind and done like this." Tilting his head back
, he exposed his Adam's apple and ran a hand along his throat. "If she was cut from the front, it could have been a lefty."

  He shifted his weight.

  "Yeah, I know what you're thinking. We dropped it before it was finished. But it's not like some big city, tons of money to follow every lead."

  "Hey," I said, "big-city cops don't always follow through. I watched thugs burn L.A. down while the police sat around waiting for instructions from brain-dead superiors."

  "You don't like cops?"

  "My best friend is one— seriously."

  He stirred creamer into his cup and sipped with surprising delicacy. "I've got a pathologist flying in. Looking at AnneMarie's file as well as Betty's. I don't know if she'll be able to make any determination about how Betty got cut, because her head was taken clean off. Maybe, though. I'm no expert."

  Shifting again, he got up and sat behind the other desk, propping his feet up.

  "Does your gut tell you Ben's guilty?" I said.

  "My gut? What the hell's that worth?"

  "My friend's a homicide detective. His hunches have led him to some good places."

  "Well," he said, "good for him. I'm just one third of a dinky-shit three-man police force on a dinky-shit island. Ed's my main backup and my other deputy's older than him."

  "You probably never needed more."

  "Till now I didn't. . . . Do I think Ben's guilty? It sure as hell looks like it, and he's not bothering to deny it. Only one who thinks otherwise is Dr. Bill, with his usual . . ."

  He shook his head.

  "His usual single-mindedness?" I said.

  He forced a smile. "My word was "fanaticism.' Don't get me wrong, I think he probably could have won a Nobel Prize for something if he'd put his mind to it. He's helped my mother and me plenty, giving her a free lease on the restaurant till things get better, paying for my schooling. I felt like a shithead, mouthing off to him last night. But you've got to understand, he's like a moray eel— gets hold of something and won't let go. What the hell does he want me to do? Let Ben walk on his say-so and watch the whole damn island explode?"

  "Is the island near exploding?"

  "Hotter than I've ever seen it— a lot worse than when AnneMarie got killed, and we had grumblings then."

  "The march up South Road?"

  "No march, just a few kids shouting and waving sticks— but look where it led. Now some people think they were fooled into believing a sailor did AnneMarie, and they're doubly pissed."

  "Fooled by Ben?"

  "And Dr. Bill. 'Cause Ben's seen as Dr. Bill's boy. And even though people admire Dr. Bill, they're also . . . nervous about him. You hear stories."

  "About what?"

  "Mad scientist shit. Growing all this fruit and vegetables, bringing some into town, but rumor is he hoards it."

  "Is that true?"

  "Who the hell knows? Guys who work the estate say he fools around with dehydration, nutritional research. But who cares? What's to stop anyone from growing their own stuff? My mother does. Dr. Bill set her up years ago with soil and seeds, and she grows her own Chinese vegetables for the restaurant. But people get dependent, they like to piss and moan. Doesn't take much to get their tongues flapping. AnneMarie was a newcomer, no roots here, but everyone liked Betty."

  "Including the sailors."

  He turned toward me very slowly. "Meaning?"

  "Moreland said she'd socialized with them. As had AnneMarie."

  "Socialized . . . yeah, Betty liked to party before she got engaged, but for your own safety I wouldn't repeat that."

  "Any chance Betty and Ben had an affair?"

  "Not that I heard, but who knows? But whatever Betty did, she was a nice kid. Didn't deserve to be ripped up like that."

  "I know. I spoke to her the morning before she died."

  He put his cup down. "Where?"

  "At the Trading Post. I bought drinks and magazines. She told me about her baby."

  He arced his feet off the desk and they hit the floor hard.

  "Yeah, her mom said she loved the idea of having a baby." Real pain clouded his eyes. "Anyone who'd do that should have his nuts cut off and stuffed down his throat."

  The phone rang. He grabbed it. "Yeah? No, not yet. No, not before his lawyer— I don't know."

  He slammed the phone down. "That was Mr. Creedman. Wants to do a story for the wire services."

  "Opportunity knocks," I said.

  "Meaning?"

  "He's a writer. Now he's got a story."

  "What do you think of him?"

  "Not much."

  "Me, neither. First day he got here, he hit on my mother. She straightened him out soon enough."

  He trained his eyes on me. He was a handsome man but I thought of a rhino, ready to charge.

  "So tell me, doc, is Ben one of those guys, when you hear about his killing someone you say, "No way, couldn't be'?"

  "I don't know him well enough to answer that."

  He laughed. "Got my answer. Not that I've got any grudge against him. I've always admired him for the way he pulled himself up. I grew up without a father, but my mother's good enough for ten parents. Ben's mom was a dirty drunk and his dad was a real asshole, beat the hell out of him just for laughs. According to you guys, isn't that exactly the kind of thing that grows killers?"

  "It helps," I said. "But there are plenty of abused kids who don't end up violent, and people from good homes who turn bad."

  "Sure," he said, "anything's possible. But we're talking odds. I took psychology, learned about early influences. Someone like Ben, I guess it's no surprise he cracked. I guess the big surprise is the time he had in between, acting normal."

  "In between what?"

  Instead of answering, he finished his coffee. I'd barely touched mine and he noticed.

  "Yeah, it's lousy— want some tea instead?"

  "No, thanks."

  "The situation's really bad," he said into his empty cup. "Betty's family, Mauricio. Claire, her kids. Everyone thrown together, people can't escape each other."

  The phone rang again. He got rid of the caller with a couple of barks.

  "Everyone wants to know everything." He looked above me, at the bikini girl. "I should take that down. Ed and Elijah like it, but it's disrespectful."

  He got up and came toward me. "I've seen plenty, doctor, but never anything like what happened to those two women."

  "One thing you might want to know," I said. "After I read the Valdos file I called my detective friend. He ran a search for similar murders and came up with one, ten years old, in Maryland."

  "Why'd you ask him to look?"

  "I didn't. He did it on his own."

  "Why?"

  "He's a curious guy."

  "Checking out the island savages, huh? Yeah, I know about that one. Two satanists ate a working girl." He shot out some details. "My computer rarely works right, but I phone stuff in to the MPs on Guam and they hook into NCIC."

  "What do you think of the similarities?"

  "I think satanic psychos have some sort of script."

  "Any evidence Ben was into satanism?"

  "Nope."

  "Have you ever seen evidence of satanism on Aruk?"

  "Not a trace, everyone's Catholic. But Ben was in Hawaii ten years ago— who knows what kind of shit he picked up?"

  "Did he take any side trips to the mainland?"

  "Like to Maryland? Good question. I'll look into it. For all I know, he killed girls in Hawaii and never got caught. For all I know, he was lucky the only thing they got him for was indecent exposure."

  The look on my face made him smile.

  "That's what I meant by acting normal in between."

  "When?" I said.

  "Ten years ago. He peeped in some lady's window with his pants down and his dick out. He was in the Guard and they handled it. Ninety days in the brig. That's how a lot of sex killers get started, isn't it? Watching and beating off, then moving on to the heavy stuff?"

  "So
metimes."

  "This time." He looked disgusted. "Okay, have your hour with him. Give him his moral support."

  27

  Behind the battered door was a warren of small, dim rooms and narrow corridors. At the back was a dented sheet-metal door bolted by a stout iron bar.