Wolfman - Art Bourgeau

by Art Bourgeau

  Memories of missed chances, friendships offered and turned away. Each time he was too afraid they would find out about him . . . There had been no one until Margaret, and now he had hurt her, driven her away . . .

  A piece of broken glass cut the palm of his hand, he welcomed the pain. More memories broke in, no longer able to be shut out . . .

  His sister’s wedding. He mined that, too. Because of his stepfather, but not for the reasons he'd told himself . . .revulsion, hatred that spread to the whole family, even his sister. The voice was right. He remembered his fantasies. If he saw his stepfather, behind those all-seeing eyes leading him, how would he feel? Would he want it as much as he told himself he hated it . . . ?

  Around him dawn was breaking. He saw the eyes staring at him from a bush, heard the voice say, "Penance begins the admission and payment for sins. The next step is obedience. Get to your feet."

  Loring saw his body stand, legs and arms trembling from the strain of his crawl. He turned, looked back into the woods. He did not know how far he’d come. There were holes in the knees of his sweatpants, he could feel the stickiness of his blood as it trickled down his shins.

  He followed the commands, moving through the woods again toward the rocks at Devil’s Pool. He picked his way across the stream, the water from the small falls chilling his legs.

  Yes, the admission of sins . . . memory of the first time with his stepfather came back. He had protested but his stepfather threatened, said he would tell that the bad boy had killed his father, that it was no suicide, he would be taken away and locked up in jail for the rest of his life. Did he want that? He moved along the bank of the creek until he came to the parking lot by the bridge. Now he remembered, could not exorcise it, what he had done when he found the man in the car. It was crystal clear, no longer could he hide in the pretense of hallucination. That night, too, he had been the wolf, prowling the park until he found his prey —

  His stomach went into a spasm, emptied itself, Abaddon’s voice scolded him for it. "You are acting like a child. You did it because it was your destiny, it has been since your birth. I’ve explained that. You are my messenger, through your deeds others will be cleansed and find peace. I have brought you here for that reason. Now see to it."

  Loring looked across the parking lot. Less than fifty yards away from where he was concealed, an old Ford station wagon was pulling in at the foot of the steps to the Maison Catherine on the hill above. In the dawn’s early light he saw a petite woman with hennaed hair get out and go around to open the tailgate. He recognized her as the owner of the restaurant, although he didn't know her name. As he watched her bend forward to gather some bundles he heard Abaddon’s command to go to her, and knew what was expected of him.

  For a moment he hesitated, but when he tried to protest he found he could not speak. His voice had been taken from him. What came out was an absurd growl. Not his — "If you resist me I will strike you down and leave you to crawl around on all fours, with no voice. Do you want that?"

  Terror convinced him . . . the keeper of the bottomless pit held infinite power. Who was he to oppose him? They were linked together. And as he thought it, he began to move toward the woman.

  She did not see him until he was almost on her. She looked up in surprise at the sound, and in that moment he knew everything Abaddon said was true. The morning light illuminated her face, and deep in the dark portion of her left eye he saw it clearly . . . the number 13 twinkling like a diamond in the unfolding sunlight.

  The mark of the beast.

  And he heard Abaddon's voice say, "The new Jerusalem cannot come until those deceived by the mark of the beast are cleansed . . ."

  Exhilaration filled him. He was part of the master plan he had begun to perceive in that long-ago Bible class. All his pain had been for a reason . . . so that the beast and the false prophet could be cast into the lake of fire, and Satan bound in chains in the bottomless pit for a thousand years.

  The woman knew this, feared it. Before she could speak he grabbed her and smashed her head into the side of the car. Her face split open along her eye. He did it to her again, and again, until she was unconscious. Then he closed the tailgate and picked her up in his arms, walked across the parking lot and back into the woods.

  At the stream he switched to a fireman's carry and picked his way across on the rocks. On the other side he found a small clearing in the bushes, put her down, then looked about as he regained his breath.

  The sky was overcast now, but he had spared her the gloom of the day. For her everything hereafter would be bright and shining. His gift to her. The thought made him feel good. More than "good" as he looked down at the unconscious woman. It was love such as he had never felt before. He knelt over her, all doubt and resistance gone. His role of the wolf was right. Through him, through the momentary pain, the physical would become spiritual. She would no longer bear the mark of the beast. She would be purified, a part of the new Jerusalem, as Abaddon said . . .

  He ripped her dress open. He had never seen a woman nude before, except his mother. As he touched her breasts and stomach he saw his hands. They looked like thorny claws, which seemed natural, and everywhere he touched, streaks of blood magically appeared, bright red against the whiteness of her flesh. It was so beautiful. For once in his life he was not afraid to give, not afraid to help another —

  She stirred, and he saw the look of fright as he bent forward. He was sad that she had to see him so changed, but he understood and soon she would too. Soon, in the next world, she would see many things beyond her understanding now. He sank his teeth into her throat, feeling the flesh give way. He heard the snap of her windpipe collapsing, the taste of her a sweetness in his mouth. She tried to struggle, feebly, as the blood sprayed over them, sealing their unspoken bargain.

  CHAPTER 21

  SLOAN HAD finished making the assignments and everyone had filed out of the conference room. Mercanto stayed to find out why he had been excluded.

  Before he could speak, Sloan said, "You’ve been involved in this case from the start. By now I'd have thought something would have occurred to you, that you'd at least have some decent theories, but all you've got is voodoo and some Germantown Avenue drug dealer."

  "What else have you got?" Mercanto challenged. "I’ve never worked homicide before. Where have you been?"

  Anger flashed in Sloan’s face, and Mercanto saw him double up his fists. He'd touched a nerve, okay, so be it. "Look, never mind what you feel about me, we should work together. We’ve got a case to solve. An important one. What do you want me to do?"

  Sloan shook his head. "I brought you back into this and all you've given me is cockamamie stuff. You're out."

  Before Mercanto could say anything, Mary Kane's voice sounded behind him. "Lieutenant, can I see you for a moment?"

  Mercanto turned and stalked out of the room.

  Outside he sat in his car trying to cool down. So nothing had changed, all his work was a waste. His career was still shot. Sloan wanted to lay the stigma of Ruth Gunther's death on him no matter what. He pounded the steering wheel. To hell with it, with Sloan. He would not be left out of this case. Erin . . . somewhere in what she'd told him was at least the beginning of a handle on this thing. He had to believe that . . . what the hell else did he have? He pulled away from the curb and headed for the Braddon.

  When he found Erin she was supervising the movement of some case of artifacts in the main room during the cleanup after the party.

  "Hi," she said, "what brings you out here again?"

  "Is there someplace we can talk? Get a cup of coffee or something?"

  She hesitated, saw the seriousness in his face. "In my office," she said.

  Her office was small and cramped. He took a seat while she went to pour coffee from the pot on top of a filing cabinet. In this light he could see she looked tired. "Hard night?" he asked.

  "The opening party"

  "Did you have a good time?" he said, making conversation
before he got to it.

  "I guess so, considering that my date vanished on me."

  "What do you mean, vanished?"

  "One minute he's there, the next he's gone . . ."

  "How did you get home?" He was concerned at the thought of her being stranded, just as he was jealous, admit it, that she'd had a "date." Cut it out, he told himself.

  "Friends," she replied . . . "What was it you wanted to see me about?"

  "Did you read the morning paper?" When she said no he showed it to her with its gruesome headline. He told her about the boy's body, and what had happened since their last meeting. She listened intently as he went into detail about the wounds, the crime scene.

  "The psychiatrist, the lieutenant, nobody buys my theory about the drug dealer. I know what you said about the voodoo, but I feel that there's something else. Something I missed.

  She was silent for several moments, then said, "Tell me about the wounds again, in both cases."

  He did.

  "And what did the psychiatrist think?"

  "He said the killer was probably a schizophrenic with paranoid delusions. I’m not too clear on all that."

  "Yes, I guess that would figure — "

  "What do you mean?"

  After several more moments of hesitation she said, "Have you ever heard the term lycanthropy?"

  He said he hadn’t, what was it?

  "It's a very rare form of schizophrenia. I saw it once in Haiti . . . You remember I said schizophrenics are often made shamen in primitive societies . . . Well, this one was afflicted with lycanthropy, and he did ultimately kill some people in just the way you've described." She set her coffee down. "Come with me and I'll show you something that belonged to him."

  As they went downstairs he said, "Why didn’t you tell me about this before?"

  "Because you were so specific about Jamaica and voodoo. This happened in Haiti, and it’s such a rare thing I didn’t see how it could apply . . . not then, at least."

  In the main hall there was a glass case with a single mask in it, a mask with tracks of rhinestone tears coming down from the eye holes. "This was his," Erin said.

  Mercanto could see the pain in it. "Tell me about it."

  "Some people believe lycanthropy is the oldest psychosis known to man, that it dates all the way back to when man made the break between being a farmer and a hunter. When roving bands of men, like wolf packs, preyed on the farmers, killing them, raping their women, cannibalizing them. There's data for both sides, but after seeing this man, I made a small study of it," she said, pointing to the case.

  "Go on," he said, more curious than excited by what she was saying.

  "The oldest recorded example of it is in the Old Testament book of Daniel when Nebuchadnezzar went into a seven-year depression during which he thought he was an ox and would only eat grass. Some people say that Lot’s wife tuming into a pillar of salt is another example but I don't see it. Anyway, mention of the disease later turned up in the medical writings of Paulus Aegineta during the Roman Empire — "

  "Wait a minute, are you saying the killer thinks he's an animal and acts like one?"

  "If he's suffering from lycanthropy, the answer is yes. And if so, most likely he thinks he's a wolf. That's what this shaman thought he was."

  "Why a wolf?"

  "Well, there are several theories. In primitive societies the wolf epitomized hunting prowess. It was supposed to bring good luck if the hunter dressed in a wolf pelt. By wearing it he would become like the wolf and be successful in his hunt."

  Mercanto remembered the looks of that dead boy, the teeth marks . . . "It sounds pretty farfetched," he said, "but still. . ."

  "You haven't heard the half of it. Which is why I didn’t want to bring it up . . . In the Middle Ages it became the basis of the werewolf legend. The term lycanthropy comes from the Latin for manwolf . . . Are you bored, still with me?"

  "I'm trying, go on."

  "Okay . . . well, during this time, especially during the Inquisition, the recorded cases took on a much stronger religious tone. Emphasis shifted from God’s punishment, like in the case of Nebuchadnezzar, to demonic possession"

  "You mean like witches?"

  "Exactly. All throughout Europe there were stories and supposed sightings of men who had become part or wholly wolves, and the idea of the wolf changed from the ultimate hunter endowed with desirable traits to the concept of the wolf as a servant of Satan preying on God’s flock . . . And so, the notion of the werewolf. A human cursed, and whose obsessive desire, need, was to kill and eat human flesh."

  "It sounds crazy — "

  "Yes, I know. . . Of course, these people didn’t actually turn into wolves, but they thought they did. That’s what lycanthropy is all about. There were two especially famous examples. The first, Stubbe Peeter, occurred in Germany in the late 1500s. He supposedly was a cruel man who made a pact with the devil and was given a girdle made from a wolf skin that turned him into one when he wore it."

  "What happened to him?"

  "Before he was caught he killed animals, over a dozen children and two pregnant women, cannibalizing them all, including the unborn babies. During the trial it came out that he had been committing incest with his daughter. They were both tortured to death as punishment."

  "And the other one?" Mercanto asked, not sure he wanted to hear.

  "A Frenchman named lean Grenier. In the early 1600s. His case marked the turning point between the werewolf legend and the idea of lycanthropy. He was tried for murdering and cannibalizing several young girls in his village. Like Stubbe Peeter, he claimed to have been changed into a wolf by the devil. The judge, even then, didn’t buy it. He said men could not be turned into wolves. They were imaginings, what we call hallucinations. Rather than send an insane Grenier to prison or execute him, he was sentenced to life in a monastery for religious instruction. That wasn’t an easy sentence in those days. He died there two years later, but the important thing is that this was possibly the first time in history when alternative incarceration was used for the mentally unbalanced. Looking back, we can see what a milestone that was."

  Mercanto shook his head. "Now tell me about the one you saw."

  "I told you, he was a shaman of a village in Haiti. They don't call them shamen, but that’s what he was. This wasn’t the village he was from originally so I don't know much about his past history. One day he just wandered in and began telling everyone about the devil and that he was a wolf. . ."

  "Wasn't anyone skeptical? I mean, these are the 1980s, not the l600s."

  "You have to understand something about the shaman concept to know what I’m saying." She paused to collect her thoughts. "In the Oriental culture and sometimes in the Caribbean, too, a shaman is believed to be a reincarnate, someone who has had communication with a so-called higher power. Traditionally he's a person of powerful spirituality who has had an emotional experience so strong that it has caused him to . . . to become noticeably different from those around him. And this experience is the basis of his teachings. If people like his teaching they listen. If not, they get rid of him."

  "And he was popularizing the devil?"

  "Right! It fit in perfectly with a culture that embraces voodoo and zombies . . . you know, the undead. It was just what they wanted to hear . . . that is, until people began disappearing from the village, and they found he was killing them and cannibalizing them . . . exactly like you described."

  "How did he act when you saw him? I mean, was he crazy all the time or what?"

  "I only saw him once. By the time I heard what happened to him he was already dead. The villagers had killed him. When I saw him it was during a ceremony. He didn’t go into a trance or anything, but let's just say he wasn’t with us. He stalked, howled and in general acted out the part of the wolf. He killed an animal with his hands and ate it. It was, I assure you, scary as hell. There's not much else I can add."

  Mercanto shook his head. What she was saying was extreme, weird, b
ut, damn it, it did provide the missing link, the explanation for the mutilations. But he also knew what it was going to sound like when he brought it to Sloan. Still, he had to do it. . .

  An idea came to him, he wouldn’t start with Sloan. "Would you be willing to go with me and talk about this with the psychiatrist on the case?" he asked.

  She hesitated, then agreed.

  "This means a lot to me," he said as he took her arm and helped her up. "Have you a phone book handy?"

  While she got it for him she wondered just what this man was doing in her life. Was it only professional? Stop worrying it to death, she told herself as he looked up Dr. Foster's number and made the call, asking to see the psychiatrist immediately.

  They took the elevator down and went to where Mercanto was parked. His car did not exactly surprise her. A beat-up old Camaro was him. And she liked it. She got in on the passenger side and cleared a place for her feet among the empty coffee cups, Burger King wrappers and newspapers. He pulled away from the curb in a hurry. As he drove he thought over what she’d just told him. Suddenly something else came to mind. "You said the first guy, this Stubbe Peeter, killed animals too, and you said the same thing about the guy you saw, right?"

  She turned to look at him as he drove. "That's right."

  "Before we found the first body we had some things happen with animals in the park. Ducks killed. We thought it was a dog from the way they were torn up. But now . . . well, it might have been this guy."

  She noted the excitement in his voice, and liked it. "Yes, it might have been," she said.

  * * *

  At the psychiatrists office building near Jefferson Hospital, Mercanto parked beside a fire hydrant and they hurried inside. Mercanto showed his badge to the receptionist, who said, "He's waiting for you, go right in." A patient in the waiting room glared at them as they went in.