Dark Harbor

by David Hosp

  “Yes, it was,” Flaherty said. Her voice was calm and reassuring. She’d instructed both Kozlowski and Stone not to speak unless she told them to. She’d undergone training in criminal psychology, and she knew that a confrontational tone was considered less effective than a sympathetic one in getting information out of a psychopath. That was what they were here for, she’d explained to Stone: information. The District Attorney’s office would have to handle punishment.

  “He didn’t have many options at the time,” she pointed out.

  “Oh, I don’t blame him,” Townsend said. “He was only doing God’s will. He could have done nothing else.”

  “Before we continue, John, I want to make sure you understand that you don’t have to talk to us. Has someone read you your rights?”

  “Yes, they have.”

  “So you understand that you don’t have to say anything to us? And you’re aware that, even if you want to talk to us, you have the right to have an attorney here with you? You understand these rights?”

  “Rights are things that man invented so he could usurp God’s role in the universe. I have no rights other than those given by God.”

  “But you understand that, legally speaking, you have these rights under the judicial system, right?”

  “I don’t mind talking to you, Lieutenant Flaherty.”

  It was the closest she was going to get to an explicit waiver of his constitutional protections, and Flaherty decided it was going to have to do. She wasn’t going to keep pushing him until he got himself a lawyer. She was determined to press forward.

  “John, we want to talk to you about the women you killed,” she started.

  “You mean the whores,” he corrected.

  “Is that why you killed them, John? Because they were whores?”

  “That’s why God killed them.”

  “But you were the one who actually killed them, John, not God.”

  “God was acting through me.”

  “Why would God want you to kill these women? Can you explain that to us so we can understand?”

  “I can’t explain it. But God can.” Townsend closed his eyes and leaned back his head. He was the picture of contentment, Flaherty thought. And then he began to speak. His voice was slow and clear as he made his way through the recitation.

  After this I heard what sounded like the roar of a great

  multitude in heaven, shouting:

  “Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our

  God,

  for true and just are His judgments.

  He has condemned the great whore

  who corrupted the earth by her adulteries.

  He has avenged on her the blood of His servants.”

  And again they shouted,

  “Hallelujah! The smoke goes up from her forever.”

  He stopped speaking and looked at the three police officers as if he’d explained everything and no more needed to be said.

  “What is that from?” Flaherty asked.

  Townsend’s eyes grew wide in horror at the question. “It’s from the word of the Lord, the giver of life and death everlasting, from the book of Revelation, chapter nineteen. Don’t you see, Lieutenant Flaherty? It’s all made so clear for us, if we’d only listen.”

  The room was silent for a moment as Flaherty just stared back at Townsend, wondering what to say next. “So this was a religious act?” she asked at last.

  “It was preordained by God. It was seen by me in prophecy.”

  Flaherty was struggling to remember her Bible scripture. It had been drilled into her as a schoolgirl by the nuns who were always eager to point out the sin they saw in young women. But it had been more than a decade since she’d been to church. It was coming back to her in dribs and drabs only.

  “But didn’t the words of the prophecy also tell us that God is the ultimate judge, and that it’s not our place to take His justice into our hands?” she asked. It was one of the few things she remembered as making sense to her as a child, and she felt like it was the best ammunition she had to keep the conversation going.

  Townsend nodded approvingly. “Yes, but we’re also warned not to tolerate the whores of the world.” He closed his eyes and began reading once again from the scripture in his head.

  I have this against you:

  You tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a

  prophetess.

  By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual

  immorality

  and the eating of foods sacrificed to idols.

  I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but

  she is unwilling.

  So I will cast her on a fire of suffering,

  and I will make those who commit adultery with her

  suffer intensely.

  They were dealing with a real psychopath, that much was obvious. Either that or he was a brilliant actor setting up an insanity defense, but Flaherty didn’t think so. The words from the Bible rolled off his tongue freely; not like they’d been memorized as part of an act, but like they’d become part of him—as familiar to him as his own name. Flaherty noticed the look in Townsend’s eyes and knew it would disturb her sleep for months. His eyes were narrow and intense and appeared ready to consume the world with their anger.

  “But isn’t it God’s choice to take His revenge, not yours?” Flaherty asked, still fishing.

  Townsend paused. He seemed unsettled by this suggestion, and his hands tugged involuntarily at the handcuffs, making them clink against the bed railings. His eyes went down for a moment, searching for an answer. Then the clinking stopped and he looked back at Flaherty. “God works through me,” he said.

  The answer seemed to calm him a little bit, but Flaherty could still feel the tension in him—an element of doubt that hadn’t been there before. His posture had changed, and he now sat straight up in his bed, as if he were consciously keeping himself on guard.

  “But if God works through you, why would He let us catch you?” she asked. “Why wouldn’t you be permitted to go on killing?”

  Townsend shook his head back and forth and smiled smugly, as if he’d been expecting that question and was ready with an answer. “That wasn’t God’s will! I’ve completed my task for God and cleared the way for the dawning of a new eternity. It was seven that He wanted, to make way for the seven angels of the apocalypse.

  The mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right

  hand,

  and of the seven golden lampstands is this:

  The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches,

  and the seven lampstands are the seven churches!

  “It’s the seven angels and the seven plagues and the seven bowls of God’s wrath that portend the coming of the riders of the apocalypse. For the seven angels to be reborn from the dead on earth, they must take the place of the living. That’s what God needed of me. Even I didn’t know the purpose of my actions, but it was God all along. He guided my hands. He brought Officer Stone to my house at the moment that the task was complete. We are all a part of the greatest moment in mankind’s existence, and we should rejoice! The age of darkness is upon us, and the righteous shall emerge into the light! The seven bowls of the Lord’s wrath are upon us, and the dead shall rise to be judged!”

  Townsend’s sermon was gathering speed as he reveled in epiphanies only he could see. Flaherty had to calm him down.

  “But John, you didn’t kill seven women, you killed eight,” she said.

  At this, Townsend began shaking his head violently, thrashing his body back and forth in denial. His wrists pulled at the handcuffs, and Flaherty could see the edges of the restraints cutting into his skin, but he didn’t seem to notice. He was too busy throwing himself from side to side as his voice grew louder.

  “The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and out of the temple came a loud voice from the throne, saying, ‘It is done!’”

  Flaherty pulled out a picture of Natal
ie Caldwell. It was taken before the autopsy was conducted, and showed her head framed by the corners of the steel cutting table. The light from the surgical lamp gave her face an eerie glow, but the picture was clear and recognizable. Flaherty held it in front of Townsend’s face, moving it back and forth so he could see it as he thrashed around.

  “Did you kill this woman?” she yelled, trying to break through the trance Townsend had worked himself into.

  “The seventh angel poured out his bowl …” Townsend’s wrists were bleeding now, as the handcuffs cut through his flesh. On his shoulder, the bandages that covered the gunshot wound had turned deep crimson as the stitches pulled away at the edges and the bleeding began in earnest.

  “Did you kill this woman, John?” she yelled again, putting her face down close to his in an attempt to be heard through his rant.

  “… into the air, and out of the temple …”

  “You killed her, didn’t you, John?” she screamed.

  “… came a loud voice from the throne saying it was done …”

  “Did you kill her?” Flaherty’s fury was now approaching Townsend’s, and Stone shot a look at Kozlowski. The older cop ignored him, focusing on the reaction Townsend was having.

  Suddenly, Townsend seized. He started choking and throwing his head back against the bed. Blood was pouring from his shoulder, and the sheets near his wrists were stained red. Several buzzers attached to body monitors screamed, and his eyes rolled up into his head so that only the whites of his eyeballs were visible.

  A nurse came rushing into the room. “What did you do to him?” she screamed as she hurried over to the bed and started checking various different readouts. “Code blue! Code blue!” she shouted into an intercom. Then she leaned over and pressed down on Townsend’s chest, lodging her shoulder under his chin to keep him from biting off his tongue.

  Kozlowski was tugging at Flaherty’s elbow. “Come on, partner, let’s get out of here. There’s not much we’re going to get out of him for the rest of today.” He led her through the door as several doctors and nurses rushed in with a crash cart.

  “Did you hear him?” Flaherty asked in a daze as they headed out.

  “Yeah, I heard him,” Kozlowski replied.

  “Only seven. Not eight, only seven.”

  “Yeah,” Kozlowski said, nodding.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” she asked.

  “Caldwell,” he said simply.

  She nodded. “Caldwell.”

  Chapter Thirty-three

  IT HAD BEEN nearly two weeks since Finn had last heard from Linda. That was all right, he told himself; she was swamped dealing with the Little Jack case. Besides, she was on television so often that it was like having her in the apartment with him. The gruesome details of Little Jack’s capture had catapulted the saga from local preoccupation to genuine national phenomenon. Media outlets from around the country scrambled to get any piece of the story they could, from any source, credible or not. As the lead investigator, Flaherty was a national hero, interviewed repeatedly on all of the major networks. Finn felt sorry for her, though, noticing her obvious annoyance at being thrust into the media spotlight. Still, it wouldn’t hurt her career.

  The break allowed him the opportunity to concentrate on work again, which was good. The Tannery case was moving forward quickly, and it took all of his time just to keep up with the pace. As he sat in the office this afternoon, he was preparing an outline for the deposition of Amy Tannery, Edward Tannery’s widow. Preston Holland would use the outline to conduct a deposition that would leave her no room to wiggle when she testified at trial. Finn had spent several days going through every piece of information their investigators had been able to find on both Tannerys, which now amounted to a file more than two feet thick.

  If the American public knew how intensive this kind of litigation was, Finn thought, they’d probably vote to junk the entire judicial system and start from scratch. He now knew more about the Tannerys than they’d ever known about themselves. The firm’s investigators had credit reports going back fifteen years. They’d subpoenaed Ed Tannery’s entire work history, including every review he’d ever been given. They’d found all of the transcripts from both of their colleges and high schools, as well as the yearbooks from each school, and had interviewed many of both husband’s and wife’s former teachers. In all, Finn had notes from the interviews of more than one hundred Tannery friends, enemies, and acquaintances.

  But the investigation hadn’t stopped there. The firm’s investigators had gotten hold of some of the Tannerys’ garbage and had sifted through banana peels, cereal boxes, and diaper bags until they’d come across documents containing their social security numbers and credit card information. These provided the real window into the Tannerys’ souls, since they allowed the firm’s investigators to construct a nearly complete history of every purchase they’d made in a two-year period.

  For the most part, there was nothing interesting in the information they’d gathered. The Tannerys were a fairly normal couple with the usual spending habits. Finn was able to learn, however, that they’d had difficulty conceiving their child, and had made several payments to fertility specialists during the two years prior to her birth. In addition, there was a two-month period when they were seeing a marriage counselor. Finn noticed that the payments to the marriage counselor were preceded by a three-month stretch when Ed Tannery’s credit card had paid for several short stays in various local motels. It was possible he had been having an affair during that time, and that had led to difficulty in the couple’s marriage. There was no way to tell for sure, but Finn made a note to ask Mrs. Tannery about it during the deposition. It might just make her reconsider settlement if she knew her husband’s infidelity would be revealed during a trial.

  Finn pushed the stack of reports away from him and leaned back in his chair, stretching his body against the effects of several hours hunched over his desk. This type of work made him feel unclean, a bit like a voyeur. Still, what he was doing was simply part of his job. Mrs. Tannery was the one who’d brought the lawsuit and opened up this particular Pandora’s box. One of the goals was to make her understand that no one wins in a trial. If she insisted on pressing forward, she’d have her entire life laid out in front of the world. That was the price of justice, and she might as well know it now.

  It was Finn’s hope, however, that the case would settle before it came to that. He was beginning to find it hard to take any joy from the game. He wanted to feel clean again.

  He looked at the phone. With two weeks having elapsed since that morning in the station house with Linda, why shouldn’t he give her a call? He figured he wouldn’t seem too desperate. Rather, he’d simply be confirming he was interested. That’s what he wanted.

  He picked up the phone and began dialing her number …

  “Six hearts, all matching the first six victims. The hair clippings and skin samples found around the jars also matched the first six victims. The last jar was empty except for the formalde-hyde. We assume he was going to use the jar to hold the last girl’s heart.”

  Flaherty looked at the floor in despair as she received the report from Farmalant in the plush comfort of one of the leather chairs in his office. She’d known deep down that this was what he was going to tell her, but she still hoped there’d be something in the forensics that would link Townsend to Natalie Caldwell’s murder.

  “Was there anything in his house that matched the Caldwell woman?” she asked. “Any jewelry or clothing or anything?”

  “Nothing,” Farmalant replied.

  “So, where does that leave us?”

  Kozlowski was leaning against the filing cabinet near the door. “The captain wants this whole thing wrapped up in one neat package. So does the commissioner. So does the public. No one’s going to be happy to hear we’ve only solved part of the case.”

  Farmalant looked incredulous. “I’m not really hearing what I think I’m hearing, am I? You’d really t
ank the Caldwell murder just because it’s a PR problem? I thought you guys were better cops than that.”

  “I’m not saying we should tank anything,” Kozlowski snapped. “I’m just pointing out that there are going to be plenty of pissed-off people when and if they find out we’re continuing to investigate the Caldwell murder. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it, it just means we should recognize what we’re getting ourselves into.”

  “I get really nervous when you start to consider the political ramifications of something. That means we’re in way over our heads,” Flaherty said. She shrugged. “Maybe Townsend really did kill Natalie Caldwell, too, and he just didn’t keep any mementos for some reason. We’re dealing with a first-class psycho, after all.”

  “That’s a bullshit rationalization, and you know it,” Farmalant said. “There’s another guy out there, whether you want to look for him or not.”

  Flaherty let her head fall into her hands. “Yeah, I know it. I just don’t like it.”

  “Do you have any leads?” Farmalant asked.

  Flaherty and Kozlowski looked at each other. “Yeah, a couple,” Kozlowski said. “A friend from her law firm says she was sleeping with an older man—someone connected who might have had a great deal to lose if she ever went public about the relationship. That’s one possibility. Either that or …” He paused and looked at Flaherty.

  “Or her friend is lying and he killed her because he was in love with her,” Flaherty finished.

  Flaherty eyed with distrust the folded piece of paper containing Finn’s list of Natalie Caldwell’s political connections. It had been sitting on her desk since Finn gave it to her. She still hadn’t looked at it. After hearing Stone’s description of Finn slapping around a prostitute at the Kiss Club, she’d put this part of the investigation out of her head in the hope they’d find something linking Townsend to Caldwell. If they had found that linkage she would never have been forced to deal with her feelings for Scott Finn.

  What feelings? she asked herself. I had dinner with him once, that’s all. I kissed him, so what? That was hardly a sturdy foundation for a long-term relationship, or for real feelings. She could go back to treating him as she would any other suspect. She was sure of that.