Scalpers dgmm-2

by Robert W. Walker

  "We're finished here, medic,” Dean announced to the waiting attendents who moved in to take the body to the morgue. Dean urged Sid off. A glance in Dyer's direction told them nothing. They could only hope that Frank Dyer would cooperate, at least for now.

  Before they could successfully escape, however, Chief Hodges cornered Sid and began to ask questions. “Anything new, Corman? What can you give me?"

  "Nothing right now, Chief, except to say that it does look like the work of more than one man."

  "Great ... a lot of help. Am I supposed to give that to the friggin’ papers?"

  "I don't give a sand flea's fart what you give the—"

  "Sid, Sid,” Dean urged him off, saying to Hodges, “Look, Chief, this has been rough on us all, and the best thing for everyone now is to get Dr. Corman and me back to the crime lab."

  Hodges frowned but backed off and went for Dyer's jugular, transferring his questions and anger to the detective. Dean saw that Park stood far off, shaking his head, while the quiet, unassuming Dr. Hamel was on his knees over the victim, where he'd managed to get the medics to lay the stretcher down in the grass. Hamel looked like he was praying over the dead girl. Dean thought the psychiatrist was dedicated for a man in his position, to come out to the crime scene and view the body in such a way. It wasn't in his job description, Dean was certain, and yet the work of the Scalpers had affected them all very deeply, hadn't it?

  Park had lit up a cigarette and stuffed his hands in his pockets.

  A sergeant rushed down the incline to Chief Hodges, pleading in a polite way for the Chief to speak to the reporters. Dean and Sid watched from a distance, Sid saying sourly, “Hodges likes to play bigshot for the press and cameras."

  "Is that right?"

  "He has real ambitions to climb.'

  "Close to the Mayor?"

  "He likes to make you believe it."

  Dean wondered about the Mayor's poor redheaded relation.

  "The man knows how to stroke the press. It was he who convinced the Mayor to allow the photos of his niece to be splattered on the front pages. Convinced His Honor that it'd be like that television show, you know, America's Most Wanted, and it might have the effect of getting the whole city involved in this manhunt, but all it's done is cause chaos and panic."

  But to Dean's observant eye, Hodges didn't look like a man who relished the idea of facing reporters now. Still, he pulled himself upward, heaving up both stomach and shoulders, and marched toward the crowd.

  "Let ‘em through to take their pictures,” Hodges said, knowing this would appease the press more than any statement.

  "I can't believe he's doing that,” said Dean, amazed.

  "Watch, he'll turn it into hay. On camera he'll plead for anyone watching who might recognize the dead girl to come forward. Who knows, maybe someone will."

  "Then Jane Doe'll have a name, at least ... and people to bury her."

  "I'm starved,” said Sid as they drove for the Municipal Center and Sid's lab. With them they had all the samples taken from the crime scene. As always, when Dean had every shread of evidence gathered and every hair vacuumed from a body, every fiber and print and clipping, he felt like the custodial guardian angel of the deceased: the one long shot, the only possible hope remaining that the victim might have left her own message to her scientific pallbearer, and hidden within the folds of that message, the answer to the questions of who had so ruthlessly robbed her of life.

  "How Brando about you?” Sid asked.

  "What?"

  "Hungry ... are you hungry?"

  "Yeah, I guess I could eat, but—"

  "In the lab, you mean, right?"

  "I'm anxious to get started on what we've got,” Dean told Sid. “I need coffee and something in my stomach, and I need to telephone Jackie, and check in with my own lab, and maybe call Kelso in Chicago."

  "Hey, my phone is your phone, Dean ... my office is your office, and please treat it as such."

  "Thanks."

  "Ahh, you're a pain in the ass sometimes."

  "How's that?"

  "You stand on ceremony too damned much, Dean. Cool it—relax a little. Di and I are taking you to Church Street Exchange, tonight ... whaddya say?"

  "Church Street?"

  "Orlando's newest attraction, kinda like Bourbon Street in New Orleans. Al Hirt-type bands playing, good food and drink."

  "Sounds great!"

  "You'll love it, and it's just a block or so from here."

  "You think after a day like the one we've got ahead of us, we'll be up for partying?"

  "Hell, Dean, we got to eat a sit-down meal sometime ... it might as well be I n a good restaurant. I'm paying."

  Dean replied that he could, at the moment, use coffee and a roll. “But I'm damned anxious to look over what we've got here."

  "We'll have some coffee brought in."

  "Any word on the Carson woman at Mercy?"

  "Nothing yet, but I'll be the first to know. I have friends at Mercy."

  They pulled into Sid's parking place and took the elevator up to the labs, carrying with them the oversized black valise that contained vials, packets, and bags filled with samples. Dean carried a mold of a single footprint which Dyer had been able to locate after all.

  "Damned footprint is probably mine, too,” said Sid.

  Dean had taken the mold from Dyer just before leaving the crime scene, and he and Dyer had been the only ones who'd actually examined it closely. It seemed only half a foot, or a fist driven into the earth, or the ball of a child's foot, it was so small.

  "I rather doubt that possibility,” Dean answered Sid groggily, still sleepy.

  Coffee and croissants were brought in and the scientist in Sid kicked in. He was fast at work while Dean telephoned Jackie, finally reaching her at home.

  "Where've you been?” Jackie demanded. “When you didn't call, I thought all sorts of horrible things had happened."

  "I tried reaching you, but you were out—"

  "When? At what time?"

  "Jackie, it doesn't matter. I'm talking to you now, and I'm fine."

  "When are you coming home?"

  "I ... I can't say just yet."

  "In a week, in a month, for New Year's?"

  She was angry and her tone was biting.

  "Listen, Sid's ... well, Sid's in a bad jam here, and I think I can help him out.... “Dean had no idea how long it would take, or if there would ever be a resolution to the case. Some cases resolved themselves, even serial cases such as this, when the killing simply stopped, the murderer's taste for blood coming to an end. But no one was counting on that ... least of all Dean.

  "You do what you have to do, Dean,” she said, and for a moment Dean thought it sincere. “But don't lie to me. You're not there for Sid. You're down there for yourself ... yourself and your sick killer."

  "I'm trying to help resolve a serial murder case, to save lives. You can understand—"

  "Yeah ... I understand only too well...."

  Dean knew what she meant: Angel Rae, and Jackie's near-death encounter with her. Jackie still had gruesome nightmares in which Lake Michigan was so filled with floating corpses you might walk across it over their backs.

  "Are you still seeing—"

  "Dean, a shrink's no replacement for you!"

  "This dependence upon me, Jackie—it isn't good. Love is one thing, and I love you dearly, but dependence on another human being as much as this—it's destructive to both of us."

  She hung up.

  Dean started to re-dial, but then forced himself not to ... for her, he told himself, though wondering if it were not for him. He had been so bad at helping her through this ordeal. Perhaps he'd made all the wrong moves and said all the wrong things, yet his instincts told him he was right, that Jackie must face down her own fears rather than buffer them with his constant presence.

  Dean dialed the number for Chief Kelso, but learned only that his friend was in New York City. He missed Kelso's camaraderie, his
backup both professionally and personally. Dean thought about how Kelso had almost died with stab wounds not five months ago. Now he was chasing criminals again.

  Dean checked in with his right hand and associate at the lab, Dr. Sybil Shanley. She informed him that everything was running smoothly without him. This had the effect of making him feel both secure and insecure at once. Getting right to business, he replied, “I'm sending you some samples and want you to run backup tests on some items for us, Sybil."

  "It might have to take a back seat to—"

  "No, Sybil, this takes top priority."

  "How am I supposed to explain that to the boss?"

  "Don't explain, just tell him your orders came directly from me, should he ask. I'll take the heat."

  "That's easy for you to say. You're a thousand miles away."

  "Sybil"

  "Right, Dean. We've been reading about the Scalper up here. Sounds really sicko."

  "Scalpers, sweetheart ... we think it's two men."

  "God, really? That's—why, that's even sicker!"

  Dean didn't bother to ask her why she thought so. Instead, he told her it was costing Sid Corman too much for them to yammer on his phone any longer. “How's the new man working out?"

  "Great! Got him trained the way I want."

  "Don't get yourself spoiled."

  "Say, are you still dating Carl Prather?"

  "Why the sudden interest in my love life?

  "You think Carl might do me a favor?"

  "Sure, he thinks the world of you, Dean—just as I do."

  "Good. Here it is."

  As Dean relayed his message to the former Gary, Indiana, policeman, now with the Chicago force, he saw that Sid was staring through the glass from the other room. No doubt Sid wondered just how many calls Dean planned to make to Chicago, and to whom.

  "You got that now?” Dean asked Sybil. “Read it back to me."

  Sybil did so. “This seems strange, Dean,” she said.

  "Just do it, Dr. Shanley,” Dean said loudly when Sid opened the door and entered. “Talk to you soon."

  "Hope you told Sybil hello for me,” Sid said.

  "Yeah, and she sends her regards."

  "Get Jackie?"

  "Yeah, all's well."

  "Didn't look that way from my standpoint."

  "Sid, I'm going to work."

  "Same old Dean."

  "Yeah, that's right ... same old Dean, Sid."

  Sid stared into Dean's eyes for a long time. “I'm the same old Sid, too. Maybe a little bigger around the gut, and my hair's thinned out considerably.” He ran his right hand over his scalp. “But Christ, Dean, I'm still your old war buddy, and if you're having problems—"

  "No problems, Sid, except the one we're faced with right here. And I suggest we stop talking and get to work on it"

  Dean left the office for the lab. Sid shook his head. “Same old Dean. Buries it all inside of him. The man's going to have a heart attack some day."

  The pathologists went to work trying to match fiber and hair samples taken from the black Jane Doe with samples from earlier victims. It was mid-morning before Dean had what amounted to a positive, if preliminary, matchup between any of the strands of hair. He called Sid over to confirm what his eyes had already told him via the comparison microscope.

  The hair Dean was working with was body hair, and at first the samples had been considered minor, since Sid's assistant had made the false assumption that they'd come off the victim. It was a natural enough mistake, and one that Dean himself might have made, given the circumstances and the earlier lack of evidence, or the theorem that more than one attacker was at work here. The fact that it was body hair, and not scalp or facial hair, further compounded the mystery. Yet a close analysis of the victim's body hair yielded a no-match, and in fact showed the hair to be that of a male, a third party, since the hair did not match that of either the victim or that of the primary attacker, dug out from beneath the victim's nails.

  So Sid had been working with a complex of problems which had gotten away from him. Now there was thin, brown-to-sandy hair from the head of the murderer, and thick, coarse, dark and curly hair from the body of a second killer. The samples of body hair were far and away greater in number than those from the scalp, and there was no true correlation to be made between these either—they could not have come from the same man. All this the electron microscope had proved, yet the proof had been put aside, had gone unrecognized all this time.

  Dean pointed out these facts to Sid now. They had found both kinds of hairs again on the latest Scalper victim.

  Sid's phone rang almost as much as Dean's in Chicago, and again Dean paid no attention to it. This time, however, Sid had been summoned by his young assistant, Tom Warner. Something was afoot. Sid waved Dean over, cupped the receiver in his hand, and said, “Peggy Carson's come around, and she's talking."

  "Damn, let's get over there."

  Dean stopped in his mad rush long enough to tell Sid's lab assistant how vitally important the materials and slides they were working on were, and to leave them untouched. Then they were off for the hospital to speak to the only eyewitness they had in the case.

  SIX

  "Hold up, doctors,” shouted Dave Park, catching them outside Peggy Carson's hospital room, where they'd just spent several minutes getting past the uniformed guard. “Sorry, but we got orders to keep everybody out until Hodges says otherwise."

  "She's alert and talking, isn't she?” Sid pointed out.

  "Yes, but for now—"

  "Park, back off,” said Dean, removing the other man's hand from his chest. “We're part of this investigation whether you like it or not. Now, please don't try to bully me again."

  Park and Dean glared at one another. Park's firm look broke, his lip curling into a smirk. His eyes were like steel, his skin tawny—Spanish, or perhaps American Indian, Dean thought, though his light hair said otherwise. “All right, Doc ... all right. It's just that there are too damned many people buzzing around Peggy right now ... and she's been through hell."

  "Does she know about the latest victim?” asked Dean.

  Park breathed deeply and nodded, his hand going through his hair. He seemed to rock on his feet, and Dean wondered what he was holding inside that was ready to explode. Anger, hatred, bitterness, frustration—or all of them at once? More than Dyer, more even than Hodges, Lt. David Park was a bomb about to go off. Perhaps he should be having sessions with Dr. Hamel to explore these emotions before they conspired to overwhelm him.

  Park must be in his late thirties, and he had a way of pinning a man to the wall with his eyes. The man had an unnerving quality about him. Was his anger directed at everyone else on the planet? Or was it such a frustrated anger at the Scalpers that it simply spilled over to whoever got near him?

  "What's your problem, Park?” Dean asked him outright, unable to contain his curiosity any longer.

  "Let's just say that I don't get it. I mean Dr. Corman here, in particular. He botches the lab report, and now he's on the scene to question the only eyewitness we have? You wrenched it out of me."

  Sid bit his lower lip and said, “I'm interested in the truth just as much as you, Park—maybe more."

  "Don't get me wrong, Dr. Corman. I don't suspect you of any willful wrongdoing. I just follow orders. If anything happens to Peggy Carson, especially if she knows something, my butt's in a sling."

  "Has she said anything to corroborate our theory of two men—"

  "Yeah, we're fairly sure it's two men."

  This news was exciting for the doctors. “Excuse us,” Dean said, going into Peggy Carson's room only to find that the young black woman was heatedly arguing with Hamel and Hodges. Dyer stood back.

  "I don't need an injection! I don't need time! Chief—” she told Hodges. “I know what I saw!"

  "Dr. Hamel only asks that you—"

  "Bull!" Peggy's forehead was one massive bandage, the white a glaring contrast to her chocolatey complexion a
nd dark, haunting eyes. Despite her injury, she was strikingly attractive.

  "You must allow her to rest!” insisted her doctor.

  Dean tried to intervene, to talk to her, when Hamel suddenly agreed with the physician. “Officer Carson has undergone a great deal of stress, Chief, and I must agree—bedrest and quiet are absolutely required now."

  "I know what I saw!” she repeated, her eyes fixing on Hamel as if he were evil incarnate. “Don't try to make me out a fool or a nut case!"

  "Please, please.” The doctor ushered Dyer and the others outside, where Park, at the very end of the hall, again watched from afar.

  "Obviously it's a delusion, suffered under stress. It happens,” Hamel was saying. Dressed in a light gray, three-piece pinstripe, Benjamin Hamel looked the picture of competence, but Dean wondered.

  "Are you going to tell us what the woman said?” Sid asked after a minute.

  "She's sticking to her story about the second man being a dwarf,” said Dyer.

  "And you men find that a bit hard to believe?” asked Dean of Hodges and Hamel.

  Hodges shook his head. “The woman's young, and it was her first encounter with a life-threatening situation on the street. A little guy, maybe. But a dwarf?"

  Hamel quickly agreed. “When fear and pain control the perceptions, a psychosis of the first order can, and often does, come into play. A person might see dwarfs and pink elephants as easily as a man in the grip of delirium tremens."

  "Delirium tremens?” asked Hodges.

  "Alcoholics, when they need a drink,” Dean explained.

  "Oh, yeah ... but Carson's record is clean of anything, so maybe Hamel's right—she just got too hyper under pressure and her thoughts ran away with her and started sending the wrong signals."

  "Maybe,” said Dyer, “and maybe not. Don't forget that print I took."

  "What do you suggest we do, Frank?” asked Hodges. “Comb Disneyland for every dwarf they've got?"

  "It'd be a start."

  "You do that, Frank,” Hodges turned his attention to Sid. “Anything new from the lab?"

  "We have now established proof positive that it is the work of two men."

  "Dr. Grant's doing you a lot of good, Sid. I heard about the scissors. Any match on them, Dr. Grant?"