Night Mask

by William W. Johnstone

  Leo, Lani, Brenda, and Ted were stunned into silence, then Lani started cussing. She went through her vocabulary of profanity, which was lengthy, and finally paused for breath. Ted was stunned. Brenda was impressed.

  “Stacy volunteered for blood testing?” Frank asked.

  “No,” Leo said. “We took hair from several of her brushes, and blood from where she’d cut herself on broken glass.”

  “You took this with her knowledge?” Connie asked.

  “No,” Lani said. “We jimmied the lock on her back door, while she was at work.”

  “Well, there is another theory right out the goddamn window!” Leo said.

  “But she is their sister,” Bill said. “She is definitely a Longwood.”

  Lani threw up her hands in exasperation.

  “That kid that Gene and the others brought in?” Bill said. “The wild one? He just killed a city uniform and escaped. He ate the cop’s throat before he left the hospital.”

  * * *

  It was madness. Every kid who had been released into the custody of their parents, turned on them. Those in jail went wild and began attacking fellow inmates and guards. Two guards and half a dozen inmates were killed by the sudden and vicious attacks, before those who did not escape in the bloody confusion were shot dead. The events of that day were so bizarre, it brought the anchors of all major network news flying into the city to report directly from the scene.

  Now the pressure was really on the police. Leo said to hell with it and pulled in Stacy Ryan. He pointed a blunt finger at her and said, “Stacy, you level with me. I want the truth, and I want it now.”

  The woman sighed deeply and nodded her head. “I had made up my mind to come to you anyway. To try to explain. I know you all believe I’m a part of this... horror that’s been taking place. But I’m not. My brother and sister are responsible. Yes, my blood parents are the New York Longwoods. I was told I was adopted when I was just a child. It didn’t make any difference to me at the time. It was only after I got into college that I began having some curiosity about it. I had some money of my own; some I worked and saved, and the rest came from the checks my adopted parents received from back East. I hired a private detective firm to investigate. What they found scared me half to death. My real parents were ruthless and cruel and evil. They were devil worshippers. You’re taping this? Good. I don’t want to repeat it. You want to know why they kept Jim and Jack, and put me up for adoption? So do I. My only guess is that they saw something in me that frightened them. The investigator learned that I was born with veil over my face. It’s not uncommon, but it must have really shook up my blood parents. I didn’t know what was happening in this county, until the news finally leaked out that it might be two twins named Longwood behind all the killings. I freaked out. I told Carla the whole story. She told me not to worry; that the twins could have no way of knowing I was their sister. I guess she was right. I was never contacted by either of them. But I knew, I felt, they were here. But I don’t think that either of them work at the station. Wouldn’t I know my own brothers? Wouldn’t I sense it somehow? I think so. Gil Brown, my brother? There is no resemblance there. None at all. And that poor sister of his, she lost the use of her legs years ago! There’s no resemblance in any way.”

  “Do you have a half brother and sister?” Lani asked.

  “Not that the private investigator ever found. And he was pretty good. Ex-CIA with a lot of contacts and leverage.” She wrote out his name and firm in Los Angeles and gave it to Leo.

  “When I was being interviewed by you people, I had a hunch I was being somehow polygraphed using some new technique. When the question was thrown at me about the Longwood family, I just about lost it. As long as you people used the word Ripper, I felt I could beat the test. But when you used Longwood, I felt sure you had seen the needle jump or the graph move or whatever it does.”

  “We did.”

  “I knew about Carla’s will. But I was getting desperate at that point. I knew I had nothing to do with her disappearance, but it seems to me that everything was pointing toward me as a murderer.”

  “What about Patricia Sessions?” Leo asked.

  Stacy shrugged her shoulders. “What about her?”

  “Why did you and Carla and Patricia use false names when you flew to Mexico?”

  “We didn’t. You can check that. Carla chartered a private plane. A Lear jet. We used the same boarding gate as a commercial flight. You can check with Carla’s bank. She wrote the company a personal check for the charter fee there and back. The pilot’s name is Bob Rossini. I’ve dated him several times since then.” She smiled at Leo’s expression. “I’m bi.”

  “Glad to hear it,” Leo muttered. He cleared his throat. “Don’t leave town without checking with us first, Stacy. Not until we check out all that you’ve told us.”

  “You’ll find I’ve told you the truth.”

  “I hope so,” Leo said.

  After Stacy had gone, Lani asked, “You believe her, Leo?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “So another lead dead-ends. Where does this leave us now?” Frank asked.

  “Standing knee deep in shit and slowly sinking.”

  Chapter 29

  The city police and county deputies had no more time to devote solely to the Ripper. When the young people broke jail and/or left home, they went on a wild, bloody, senseless killing rampage that was unequalled in modern California history—or when it finally ended, in modern American history. No one was safe, especially cops—or really, anyone in any type of uniform, anywhere. For it was as if someone had pulled a cork, and let a wicked genie out of a bottle thrown up from Hell. Gangs of wild-eyed young people sprang up in cities and towns all over the nation, as if on cue, and for the next few days the police—and the National Guard in some states—fought a life-and-death struggle every waking moment of their lives.

  Police stations were firebombed and fired at. Police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks were easy targets. The actual numbers of young people involved were not that many—no more than about fifteen hundred nationwide. But what they lacked in numbers, they more than made up for in sheer savagery and viciousness.

  The wife of the Vice President of the United States said that the music the young people listened to had something to do with the uprising, and she was probably right to some small degree. One self-appointed guardian of everybody’s morality, headquartered in Mississippi, said it was not just the music and those terrible videos on TV, it was TV itself and Hollywood in particular, and he might have been correct to a smaller degree. A TV preacher proclaimed that the end of the world was near, and urged all his followers to send him a hundred dollars just as fast as they could—in cash, preferably, so he could continue to do Jesus’ work in the time we had left. He would accept checks, just make them out to him, not Jesus. The President went on nationwide TV (on the one network that would preempt regular programming for him) and urged calm. But to be on the slap-dab safe side, in case all this civil disobedience didn’t stop pretty durned quick, he had ordered the Navy to ready a whole bunch of Tomahawk missiles. It was unclear to all involved just exactly where he would have ordered the missiles to be targeted. Fortunately, the Secretary of Defense told him that it would be very unwise to launch a rocket attack against any American city, so the Prez ordered the Navy to stand down, completely unaware that they had never stood up.

  One citizen that was interviewed in Chicago pretty much summed up the situation. “I just don’t know what in the hell is going on!”

  * * *

  Lani and Leo did, for the moment at least. They were pinned down in an alley by at least two and probably more deranged punks holed up on the second floor of an old building, and the punks were using automatic weapons. They were really letting the lead fly.

  Leo looked through disgusted eyes at his Colt .45 autoloader. Lani was toting a 9 mm. Both fine weapons. But not in this sort of situation. There was no point in calling for backup. Every cop in th
e city and county had emergency calls backed up. Response time was about an hour and a half. Only a skeleton crew was manning city and county HQs, everyone else had been pulled away from desks and into the streets. Even Brownie and the chief of police were in units, answering calls.

  Leo and Lani kept their heads down as rapid-fire lead chipped brick and mortar from around the shattered window of the building in which they had taken refuge.

  “Keep your head down, Lani,” Leo said. “I’m going to the car for some heavier weapons.” He returned a couple of minutes later with two Colt AR—15’s—the semi-automatic versions—and a sack filled with thirty-round magazines. The .223 caliber weapons were not exactly heavy weapons, but they would give the two cops a lot more firepower.

  To prove that point, Leo and Lani waited until a brief lull in the firing, and gave the punks 60 rounds of rapid-fire .223’s. They got lucky, probably from a ricochet. A scream of pain ripped from the second floor, following by wild cursing and chanting.

  Leo and Lani changed magazines, and then looked at each other as the chanting grew louder.

  “What the hell are they saying?” Leo asked. “Sounds like kill.”

  “It is,” Lani replied. “The same chanting that is being heard from New York to California.”

  “Those damn Longwood boys set up cells to program young people. A very carefully thought-out and executed plan.”

  “You were right, Leo. They intend to end it right here. Go out in a blaze of glory.”

  Then conversation became impossible as the air was filled with lead, and all the pair of cops could do was huddle against the wall and wait it out. Then they heard the welcome pop of someone firing a tear-gas canister. Two more canisters were fired, and all three sailed through the broken windows of the second floor.

  “You two all right in there?” Sgt. Gene Clark of the La Barca PD called from the mouth of the littered alley.

  “We are now!” Lani hollered.

  There was a hard burst of gunfire and then silence. No coughing, no gasping. Nothing.

  “What the hell?” Gene called.

  “I don’t know,” Leo returned the shout. “But I’m not going to stick my head out there to find out.”

  “Leo?” came a shout. “It’s Frank and Connie. We’ve got the east end of the alley covered! Brenda and Ted are swinging around to beef up Gene Clark.”

  “That’s ten-four,” Leo called. “Any sign of the punks?”

  “Nothing. It’s quiet.”

  Leo chanced a quick look. No gunfire greeted him. The tear gas was quickly leaving the building across the alleyway. Leo stole a longer look, then keyed his walkie-talkie. “I’m going in. Lani will be right behind me.”

  “She will?” Lani questioned.

  “I wouldn’t want your feelings hurt by not inviting you along.”

  “Thanks so very much.”

  “That’s what friends are for.”

  It was talk to cover the nervousness and tension both cops were experiencing. Something to sooth jangled nerves. Adrenaline was pumping in both of them.

  “You ready?” Leo asked.

  “As I’ll ever be.”

  “Now!”

  The cops darted across the alley and into the building. Their eyes began to sting from the lingering but quickly fading gas.

  “Don’t rub your eyes,” Leo said.

  “Yes, Daddy.”

  There was no sound of life on the floor above them. The building was eerily silent. Their AR–15’s at the ready, the cops moved across the floor to the stairs at the far end of the room. Leo held up a hand and pointed to himself, then up the stairs. Lani nodded, and when Leo was on the stairs, she positioned herself at the foot of the stairs, back to a wall.

  She almost shot Frank Miller as the Bureau man suddenly appeared in the doorway leading to the alley. She expelled breath, calmed jumpy nerves, and nodded her head at him.

  Leo slipped up the steps, then rushed the landing, rolling as he hit it. Lani heard him say, “What the hell?” She took the stairs two at a time to stand beside her partner.

  The big room was filled with the bodies of young people.

  “They killed each other,” Lani said. “They shot each other! That was the last burst of gunfire we heard.”

  The FBI and the CBI and Gene Clark rushed up the stairs to stand in shocked silence at the carnage.

  “They were programmed to do it,” Brenda said. “The master programmer thought of everything.”

  “Is that possible?” Ted asked, his eyes taking in the bloody scene that sprawled before him.

  “I can’t think of any other explanation,” Lani said. “Can you?”

  The CBI man shook his head.

  “I’ll call it in,” Leo said, his voice tired. “But it’s gonna be an hour or more before the wagons arrive. Probably more. We’ll have to do some of the lab work; they’re all over on the other side of the county. Somebody get a camera and evidence bags. Get the kit and let’s chalk out the bodies.”

  “Should we be doing that?” Frank asked. “I think we should follow department procedure as closely as possible on this. There will be lawsuits for years to come.”

  “He may be right,” Brenda said.

  “Hell, Leo,” Lani said. “Let’s seal off the place and leave it for the lab boys and girls.”

  One of the punks farted in death.

  “I’ll stay for security,” Gene volunteered. “Just somebody please bring me back a cup of coffee and a sandwich. I haven’t eaten since breakfast. One sugar, no cream,” he added.

  * * *

  Lani and Leo, the FBI, and the CBI drove about the city in separate vehicles and took in the devastation. That just a very small handful of young people could do so much damage in such a short time boggled their minds. Hulks of burned-out and/or wrecked cars and pickups were in evidence. Dozens of stores had been looted by those types of human vermin who crawl out of their stinking lairs whenever disaster strikes a community. But this time Brownie and the chief of police issued orders to their people to shoot looters on the spot.

  The governor intervened an hour later, under pressure from various civil rights groups, and ordered that proclamation rescinded.

  “Asshole!” Leo muttered. “He caved in.”

  But the governor did order out units of the National Guard to assist the cops. Later that night, down the coast, Los Angeles blew up ... to no one’s surprise.

  The Longwood boys watched it all on TV and were highly amused.

  * * *

  Morning dawned smoky, and with just a hint of the many canisters of tear gas that had been fired. Weary cops drank more bitter coffee and hoped to God it was all over.

  It wasn’t.

  Two La Barca city uniforms responded to a call, and were cut to bloody shards of flesh and bone by sawed-off shotguns as they walked up to the house.

  A deputy stopped to check on a car parked by the side of the road and was shot and then hacked to death by young people wielding machetes and axes. When he was found, his head was missing.

  At a public housing project, a La Barca city uniform killed a young black man who was advancing upon the cop, making wild threats refusing to drop the knife he was waving around. A riot broke out, soon spilling into the downtown area.

  And Dick Hale figured that come the night, it would be a dandy time to see if he could finish off Agnes Peters.

  * * *

  Leo and his team had gone to their homes (the Bureau back to their motel) for a quick shower, change of clothing, and a bite to eat. The mayor of the city had asked cafes and restaurants to close voluntarily, and for the hotels and motels to serve meals only to those registered there. Nearly everyone had complied. Only a few die-hards remained open. And they were about to be closed—permanently.

  One small cafe (whose owner was foolhardy enough to stay open in the middle of city-wide riots) took a firebomb through the front window. Nobody was seriously hurt, but the cafe was gutted. Another owner decided to close a
fter some passing punks pumped about a hundred rounds of 9 mm lead through the windows and door. Another small convenience store was closed after the owner was pistol-whipped into unconsciousness and robbed. When he woke up, he found his store had been completely looted.

  The rioting and looting was brought under control by late afternoon, and an uneasy peace reigned for a few hours. But the cops knew that when full darkness fell, the odds of peace being maintained were slim to none. The police had taken catnaps whenever they could, and most were in pretty good shape for the long night ahead.

  Dennis Potter had insisted upon keeping his people guarding Leo’s family, even though no attempts had yet been made on their lives, and in view of everything that was taking place, Leo was more than happy to have the professional bodyguards in place around his wife and kids.

  Every cop on the streets and patrolling the county roads was in body armor. Kevlar helmets were on the seat beside them, ready to be put on. All of them had a terrible gut feeling that this night was going to wrap it all up, and before they got it under control, it was going to be a real son of a bitch.

  Lani was riding with Leo, Brenda with Ted, and the Bureau people were together. Leo had put the psychic, Anna Kokalis, at his house for safekeeping. The kids liked her.

  “This would be a dandy time for Dick to surface,” Lani remarked.

  “Yeah. I was thinking the same thing.” He cut his eyes to her. “Surely he wouldn’t go after Agnes again?”

  “Don’t bet on it. He hates that woman.”

  “He’s not alone,” Leo muttered.

  Lani smiled and consulted a briefing paper. “Six of the punks are still unaccounted for. We’ve taken none alive,” she added softly. “The sight of that fifteen-year-old girl with half her head blown off got to me, Leo.”

  “It wasn’t pretty,” Leo acknowledged. “But that’s the master plan of the Longwood boys. Dead people don’t talk.” He hit the steering wheel with his palm. “Goddamnit, Lani. I’ve got a very bad feeling in my guts, that when we do wind up this mess, we’re still going to be in the dark about a lot of things.”