Victim

by Gary Kinder

  “And he’s telling you you’re wasting your time,” said Bowcutt. “There ain’t no more bleeding and the kid’s choking down in his chest. That little piece of plastic you’re sticking in his mouth won’t reach his lungs!”

  None of the attendants seemed to hear.

  “What the hell,” said White, “they’re gonna die anyway.” He waved his flashlight over the woman and the boy, then in the corner behind. His own daughter was the same age and even looked similar to the girl lying on the floor. “I wish we could take some of these sob sister do-gooders by the scruff a the neck and drag them down here and show them just what the hell these animals did.”

  Youngberg floundered through the bodies on the floor. The smell of the basement was choking him. His eyes were bleary, and he felt sick, like he was about to vomit. He wobbled up the stairs. When he got to the top step, his eye was drawn to the edge of the carpet by a glimmer of brass. A crime-scene expert from Tech Services was walking in the back door. Youngberg stopped him with a hand on his shoulder and without speaking pointed to the glimmer. It was a .25 caliber bullet, still jacketed. The officer photographed the bullet, then stooped to pick it up. Youngberg stumbled out the back door.

  Red lights from the ambulance and a knot of police cars whirled around the buildings and flashed across his face. Sergeant White had run up the stairs ahead of him and was leaning against a wall in the alley. His face was enshrouded in white smoke, and a pile of cigarette butts at his feet was already beginning to build. Youngberg walked past him gagging, his hand cupped across his mouth.

  “Youngberg!” yelled White. “You’re a police officer, it’s time you started acting like one!”

  “Yessir,” said Youngberg. He gagged again.

  “Youngberg!”

  “Yessir?”

  “Come here, Youngberg. I’ve been a police officer almost seventeen years, and that’s the most shocking thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Any other rookie would’ve flat gone to pieces in there.” He flicked his wrist and a cigarette rose in the package. “Have a cigarette and go lean against the building for a few minutes. Try to relax.”

  “Thanks, Sergeant,” said Youngberg, as White snapped his lighter on. Youngberg walked away puffing on the cigarette, then stopped and turned around.

  “I don’t know why I did that,” he said to White. “I don’t even smoke.”

  The three people who had been upstairs when Youngberg and Bowcutt arrived were standing in the parking alley, away from the back door. When Youngberg had had a few moments alone, he got out his notebook and began questioning them. The man’s name was Orren Walker. The woman and the boy were his wife and younger son. When Stan had not shown up for dinner, Mr. Walker had driven to the shop to see if he had had trouble with the utility jeep they had just bought. Mrs. Walker began to worry when two hours had passed and neither had returned home. A little after ten she and the younger boy had gone to the shop. The boy, a strapping sixteen-year-old, had rung the buzzer in back. When he heard his father yelling for them to call the police and an ambulance, he had reared back and kicked in the locked door.

  While talking to Mr. Walker, Youngberg thought the man had a pen sitting on top of his ear. Now he looked closer. By the light cast from the streedamp and splashes of red from the ambulance and police cars, he saw Mr. Walker swallow and the pen rise half an inch. Youngberg looked away, easing off his hat and setting it on the hood of the ambulance.

  Within minutes police officers and ambulance attendants rushed the bodies out the back door into the ambulance, and the ambulance raced out of the parking lot, lights flashing and siren beginning to scream. Another backed up in its place, and Youngberg put Mr. Walker into the second ambulance, assuring him that his wife would be escorted to the hospital right behind him.

  Youngberg was then standing near the back door trying to record the license plate numbers of all vehicles in the parking lot, when the first of the press arrived. Television news stations opened up with their bright lights. Youngberg was trapped before the cameras. He was trying to appear smooth and professional, though he still felt dizzy and sick to his stomach. From back in the dark he heard a colleague’s voice.

  “You’re gonna get your ass chewed out, Youngberg, when the chief sees you on TV with no hat!”

  * * *

  “Byron, what the hell’s going on in Ogden?”

  It was a friend calling from Salt Lake City on the Naisbitt’s private phone. Byron was still reclining on the couch.

  “Not much,” he said.

  “Didn’t you just hear the news?” said the caller. “Five people were found shot in your nephew’s store.”

  “At the Hi-Fi Shop!” He sat up. “Who was it?”

  “They didn’t say, just five people. I figured you might know something.”

  “No. No, I don’t. Thanks for calling.”

  He dropped the phone and lay still for a moment, remembering Carol’s words. Something’s happened to Cortney! I know it! And you won’t even try to help me find him!

  That old feeling of fear and anxiety kind of struck like it would, and I figured that that was a good explanation for where they were, but I wasn’t sure, and I was hoping that wasn’t it, but I knew it might be. And so I hurried and threw some clothes on and grabbed the keys, and jumped in the car and went down there.

  I got down to the Hi-Fi Shop and went to the front door. I didn’t see any cars there and I started pounding on the door, but I couldn’t get anybody, and then I started getting angry and anxious and I beat on the damn door and no one answered, and it just takes more time to drive around the block. And then I got around back and a cop stopped me at the curb, and I told him I was going on in, that I thought my wife and son might be down there, and then I saw the wife’s station wagon and I knew I was in bad trouble. That wave of fear and despair and anxiety and the whole damn thing hit me. Then I saw Cort’s old Buick and I knew they were both in trouble.

  Robert Newey, the county prosecutor, had been called to the scene of the crime to witness firsthand the gathering of evidence and to determine whether autopsies would be performed on the bodies. During twenty years as a prosecutor Newey had tried nearly fifty first-degree murder cases. His style in the courtroom was imperturbable, dogged, meticulous. To match his relentless trial demeanor, he had a serious, square-jawed face, silver hair, and steady, sky-blue eyes.

  As young boys, Bob Newey and Byron Naisbitt had gone to school together in Ogden, and Cortney had swum competitively with Newey’s children at the Ogden Golf and Country Club. Newey was aware that Byron’s nephew owned the Hi-Fi Shop. When the victims who had just been rushed to the hospital were described to him by one of the officers, he had immediately pictured Carol and Cortney Naisbitt.

  Newey was at the back door of the Hi-Fi Shop, talking with a police captain, when Byron Naisbitt came running from the parking alley toward the rear entrance of the shop. The captain stepped in front of Byron.

  “You can’t go in there!”

  “I’ve gotta go in there,” said Byron. “I’ve got to go in!”

  Newey stepped up calmly beside the police captain. “Hello, By,” he said. “By, you can’t go in there.”

  “How many people are down there?” asked Byron angrily.

  Neither the captain nor Newey responded.

  “How many people are down there!” he repeated.

  “Well,” said Newey, “there are just two down there now.”

  Byron locked eyes with the prosecutor. “I don’t believe you,” he said. “My wife’s car’s parked right over there.” He pointed without looking. “My son’s car’s parked right next to it. They’re down there. I know they’re down there!”

  “By,” said Newey, speaking in his steady, courtroom voice, “they’re not down there. I’ve been down there, and they’re not there.”

  Byron said again, “I don’t believe you.”

  The basement was like no crime scene Newey had ever experienced. He was sickened by it. In his ow
n mind he assumed that Carol and Cortney had been trapped and tortured in the basement by the perpetrators. But since he had not seen the bodies himself for a positive identification, he did not want to tell Byron that, yes, his wife and son had been down there. He had seen immediately how the situation could get out of hand, and pictured Byron killing himself or someone else in a desperate drive to the hospital. Yet he didn’t know how to appease Byron’s anger and frustration. He chose his words carefully, hoping to calm him down.

  “They’ve taken a woman and a boy, a young boy,” he said, “up to Benedict’s.”

  “Is it Carol and Cortney?”

  “We don’t know,” said Newey. “We have no idea who they are.”

  “Is it my wife and son?”

  “We don’t know, we don’t know who it is.”

  “God damn it! I know they’re in there,” said Byron. “I’ve got to go down and see!”

  “They’re not down there, By,” said Newey. He looked at Byron’s anxious face and knew he was losing ground. “But I guess the only way I can convince you is for you to see.” He turned to the officer guarding the door. “This is Dr. Byron Naisbitt. He believes that his wife and son are down there. I told him they’re not, but he wants to see for himself. He’s not to disturb anything.” He looked back at Byron. “By, you can go down to the fourth step from the bottom. You can look for a second, and then you have to come out.”

  Byron hurriedly followed the officer down to the fourth step. The lighting in the basement was dim, broken only by the erratic pop of flashbulbs as Tech Services photographed the scene. On the floor in front of the master panel lay the body of a young man, blood soaking the green carpet brown beneath his head. Straight ahead, in front of a dark-paneled sliding door, a girl in her late teens was clad only in a pair of socks, a red hole in the back of her head.

  When I got downstairs, I saw the girl and I saw this other fellow both laying there dead. I didn’t know the circumstances and the cops weren’t anxious to say. They just said the other parties had gone to the hospital, the younger fellow and the lady down to Benedict’s, and the man had gone to the McKay. They described the lady and the boy, and then I knew for sure that the wife and Cort were there, that they’d been victims. Then I got a little ray of hope, because both were alive when they took them out.

  Within a few seconds Newey heard heavy footsteps running up the stairs toward him. He turned around as Byron hit the landing.

  “By,” he said, “let’s check this out. We’ll call the hospitals and find out if it’s Carol and Cortney, and if it is I’ll send one of the officers up there with you.”

  Byron looked at Newey, mumbled something Newey couldn’t hear, and pushed past him. He ran toward his car.

  Newey hollered: “Hold it, By! Hold it! I’ll get a police officer to drive you. By, stop!”

  The Mercedes leaped across the alley in reverse, spraying gravel. The tires grabbed, spun forward, and the car fishtailed out of the parking lot onto Kiesel. Newey turned to the captain.

  “That’s exactly what I was trying to avoid.”

  They heard the squeal of rubber as Byron took the first turn, racing toward the hospital.

  All the way to the hospital I didn’t know what to think. What can you think? You know you’re in trouble, but you don’t know how bad; you’re trying to get there as fast as you can and everything keeps getting in your way. I was angry and upset and speeding. I was thinking of all the possibilities, everything going through my mind all at once, one right after the other, but the one thing I knew for a fact was that they’d both been shot, my wife and my son had both been in a disaster, and there was no way I could do anything about it, but I wanted to get there to see if I could help, and I had a feeling that nothing could go fast enough, like I was coming to a deadline I couldn’t beat. I had a hollow feeling inside, I felt emptiness, I felt fear, I felt anxiety. I wanted to get there, get there, get there, and nothing could get me there fast enough. I guess it could have been dangerous for anyone around because I was going like hell. I had it floored all the way to the hospital.

  Dr. Allred was standing in the hallway, his back to the doors, when Byron Naisbitt swept into the emergency room. “My family!” he shouted, out of breath. “Are they here?”

  Allred turned and recognized the silver-haired obstetrician who was already abreast of him, still striding.

  “They brought some people in and took them up to ICU, but I don’t think they know their identification yet.”

  “Where the hell’s ICU?” He was down the hall now.

  “Third floor!” yelled Dr. Allred.

  Andy Tolsma, the medical technician, had heard the exchange and stepped into the hall as Dr. Naisbitt rushed past. “I’ll take you there,” he said, falling in next to the doctor who was now almost sprinting.

  They hurried around the corner in front of the Coke machines, and Andy reached out and slapped the elevator button. The doors rocked hesitantly open, and the two men stepped in. Neither had spoken. As the elevator shimmied to the third floor, Dr. Naisbitt glared up at the lighted floor numbers moving slowly by.

  “My wife,” he said, “is she serious?”

  The question startled Andy. He felt it wasn’t his place to tell Dr. Naisbitt that his wife was dead. But then what could he say, she’s fine, she’s fine, don’t worry about her?

  “I’m sorry, sir, she’s dead.”

  There was not even a ripple in his anxious demeanor. “Why didn’t somebody call me?” he blurted.

  “We tried,” said Andy.

  The doors spread and Dr. Wallace was standing in front of the elevator. Dr. Naisbitt bounded through the doors before they were fully opened and grabbed him by the arm.

  “Jess, what’s going on with my family?”

  “By, I’ve been trying to call you. Come with me.”

  They rushed down the hall.

  As the ICU door swung slowly open, Byron Naisbitt beheld his son in the glass cubicle. The boy’s body was blue-gray like a cadaver, and the tracheostomy tube protruding from the base of his neck was filling with a bloody foam. Four people hovered over him, trying to clear the airway and pump oxygen to his lungs.

  Cortney looked dead. Byron ran into the small room, stopped abruptly, staring at his son, then turned away in complete detachment. He grabbed hold of Dr. Wallace again.

  “What the hell is going on?” he cursed.

  But before Wallace could explain, Byron began running from cubicle to cubicle, staring wildly into each one and mumbling: “Where’s my wife? Where’s my wife?” He ran the length of the ward, and when he got to the end, he just stood there, looking frantic and bewildered.

  Dr. Wallace grabbed his arm and pulled him into an alcove stacked with towels and linen.

  “By, will you listen to me, settle down. I’m going to try to explain what has happened … listen to me. I’ll do the best I can, but I don’t know much… . Cortney’s got a bullet in his head, and—”

  “They shot him in the head!”

  “—it looks like he drank some sort of acid.”

  “Acid! ACID! Jess, what in the hell’s going on? What kind of nightmare is this! My God!”

  Wallace gripped him by the shoulders. “I don’t know. We’ve heard all kinds of rumors, from the ambulance drivers, the police … nobody knows what’s going on. Cortney’s got some burns around his mouth and he’s been in severe pulmonary edema ever since he got here. We’ve established an airway in him and they’re shooting straight alcohol down his tube now, and it looks like we’re getting a little oxygen through, but that stuff’s tough to break up. His pupils are starting to react ...”

  “Jess, is Cortney going to live?”

  “I don’t know, By. He’s showing a few primitive signs of life, but I don’t know if it’s enough. Jim Hauser’s seen him and said he would probably die within a few minutes, that was about forty-five minutes ago, and he’s still hanging in there. I called Rees and he should be here any minute to see if
he can get these life-support systems plugged into him.”

  “What about my wife?” said Byron. “Where’s my wife?”

  “Carol? I don’t know,” said Wallace. “I haven’t seen her.”

  “She’s supposed to be here! Where the hell is she?”

  Although Byron had already been told that Carol was dead, he either refused to believe it or was asking to see her body to confirm it. Perhaps, in his emotional state on the elevator, he misunderstood what Andy had said.

  Curiously, in the confusion, Jess Wallace had not connected the woman with the boy. He knew Carol. He had examined the patient. He had thought she looked familiar. He was in the room when Cortney was identified. But he had failed to ascertain any relationship between the two. As he tried to explain to Byron that he knew nothing about Carol, a nurse began tugging at his sleeve, trying to whisper something to him. Finally, she dragged him aside.

  “Dr. Wallace!” she said impatiently. “That’s probably Mrs. Naisbitt down in the morgue!”

  Wallace was stunned and annoyed that he had not recognized Carol or thought of her when Cortney was identified. “Damn!” he cursed. He put his arm on Byron’s shoulder.

  “Let’s go outside, By.”

  Dr. Rees passed them in the ICU doorway. Byron turned to Rees and with no emotion said, “Get your ass in there and save my son.” Then he and Dr. Wallace proceeded down the hall to the nurses’ station.

  “By, I don’t know why this didn’t hit me before,” said Wallace. “They brought a woman in with Cortney. She was shot in the head, too.” He hesitated for a moment, searching for words. Then finally he said, “Does Carol wear a jade ring on her right hand?”

  Byron had bought the ring for Carol in Hawaii. She hardly ever took it off. “Yeah,” he answered slowly. “Yeah, she does.”

  “I’m sorry, By, she’s dead. They took her down to the morgue a little while ago.”

  They had reached the nurses’ station.

  Byron leaned heavily against the counter, his hand covering his eyes. Dr. Wallace phoned Frances Heward, the nursing supervisor, and told her to meet them downstairs with the key to the morgue.