The Stalker

by Bill Pronzini

  “A little of both, I guess.”

  Flagg said, “Probably draw the same blank we did on Kilduff and Conradin.”

  “Is that a considered opinion, or are you just being cynical?”

  Flagg grinned. “A little of both, I guess.”

  The phone on Commac’s desk buzzed; it was an interdepartmental call. He depressed the button and lifted the receiver. He listened for a moment, said “Yes, sir,” and replaced the instrument. To Flagg he said, “Boccalou wants to see us, Pat.”

  “What on?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Well,” Flagg said, getting to his feet, “here we go.”

  They went across the bull pen and Commac knocked on a door marked: CHIEF OF DETECTIVES. A voice said to come in. They stepped inside and stood respectfully before the desk of Chief Nello Boccalou. Boccalou had inscrutable green eyes, a firm chin with a Kirk Douglas cleft, and longish silver hair that gave him a leonine and properly authoritative appearance. He smoked imported English tobacco in a long-grain briar pipe, and the office was filled with gray-blue clouds of aromatic smoke. He said, “Commac, Flagg.”

  “Morning, Chief,” Commac said.

  “Turn anything new on this Kilduff you questioned yesterday?”

  “Not yet, sir,” Flagg told him.

  Boccalou took the pipe out of his mouth and scowled at it and put it in an ashtray. “Well, I may have something for you. Squeal from the Los Gatos police.”

  “Oh?”

  “Seems they had a fire-bombing down there last night. Local man killed, assailant or assailants unknown. There were a couple of witnesses—neighbors, the dead man’s pregnant girlfriend, and an unidentified man who chased after the victim when he came running out of the burning house, clothes afire. This unidentified man managed to put the flames out, but it was too late; before the fire department and the Gatos officers arrived, he took off. The girlfriend was hysterical, but when they got her to a hospital and calmed down, she managed to give them a description of the unidentified and a partial on the license plate of his car. One of the neighbors supplied the rest of the plate, and Gatos ran it through DMV. Who do you suppose the car belongs to?”

  “Steve Kilduff,” Commac said immediately.

  “Uh-huh,” Boccalou said. “Description matches, too. Gatos has a want on him for questioning. They’re requesting we pick him up.”

  “What’s the name of the guy who died?” Flagg asked. “The Gatos resident?”

  Boccalou looked at a form on his desk. “Drexel,” he answered. “Lawrence Drexel.”

  Commac and Flagg exchanged glances. “He’s on the Bellevue Personnel Roster,” Commac said. “He was stationed with Kilduff and Conradin.”

  “It looks like a tie-in on the Smithfield unsolved, then.”

  “Yeah, it sure does.”

  “Go on over to this Kilduff’s apartment and bring him in on a hold for Gatos,” Boccalou said. “We’ll see what he has to say for himself.”

  “Right.”

  While they were waiting for the elevator to take them down into the vehicle garage in the basement of the Hall of Justice, Commac said, “How does this whole thing look to you, Pat?”

  “Like there’s more to it than we might first credit,” Flagg answered.

  “I’ve been thinking the same thing.”

  “Any ideas?”

  “Not really.”

  “Do you think Kilduff had something to do with this Drexel’s death last night?”

  “Boccalou said he was the one who tried to save him.”

  “Yeah.”

  Commac rubbed the back of his neck. “Kilduff was scared when we talked to him yesterday. Scared shitless. The way you’re scared if somebody’s got a gun to the back of your neck.”

  “I had that feeling, too,” Flagg said. “But I can’t figure an angle either. Hell, it’s been eleven years since that Smithfield job. Why, all of a sudden; should the guys who pulled it off—if Kilduff and the others are the guys who pulled it off—begin dying mysteriously?”

  “There’s the obvious answer.”

  “One of their own, you mean?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “It doesn’t add,” Flagg said. “The time factor is all wrong. The only logical motive would be the money, and eleven years makes that ludicrous.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “So what else can it be?”

  “That I don’t know.”

  “Maybe Kilduff does.”

  “Well, if he doesn’t,” Commac said, “he’s got a pretty good idea.”

  The elevator doors slid open and they stepped inside. They rode down to the basement in silence.

  16

  He had entered the hallway, walking stiffly, purposefully, and he was reaching out for the telephone receiver when the bell shrilled at him. He came up short, pulling his hand back as if the sudden cacophonous sound had somehow imparted a physical shock. He stood there listening to his heart plunge in his chest, and the bell rang a second time, and a third, and then he put out his hand and caught up the receiver and put it to his ear. He said “Hello?” carefully, guardedly.

  “Mr. Kilduff?” an unfamiliar masculine voice said. “Mr. Steven Kilduff?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Yes, speaking.”

  “My name is Fazackerly, Deputy Sheriff Ed Fazackerly. I’m with the Marin County Sheriff’s Office.”

  He frowned, working his tongue over his lips. Now what? he thought. Jesus, now what? He said, “I... don’t understand.”

  “You own a small fishing cabin on the Petaluma River, is that correct? In Duckblind Slough?”

  “Why... yes, that’s right.”

  “Well, we’re investigating the death by drowning of a young woman found about seven this morning near the dock at the rear of your cabin,” Fazackerly said. “Two foul-weather fishermen trolling the slough for catfish saw her floating face down in the water there. They summoned us immediately.”

  A cold thing began to work its way slowly up along Kilduff’s back. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but I don’t—”

  “We subsequently found evidence of recent occupancy of your cabin, Mr. Kilduff.”

  “You mean somebody’s been living there?”

  “Yes, for the past few days. You weren’t aware of this fact, I take it.”

  “No. No, I wasn’t.”

  “I wonder if I might speak to your wife?”

  “My wife?” he asked, and the cold thing grew colder.

  “Yes. Is she at home now?”

  “No, she’s not here.”

  “May I ask where she is?”

  “I... don’t know.”

  “Would you mind explaining that?”

  “We ... we separated last week . . . ” Pause—one heartbeat, two—and then the automatic and immediate defensive barriers constructed by his brain collapsed, and the inescapable implications of Fazackerly’s words overwhelmed him. His knees seemed to buckle, as if the joints had somehow liquefied, and the cold thing froze his spine into humped rigidity, and a terrible tingling pain flashed upward through his groin, into his belly, into his chest, taking the breath away from him momentarily.

  The telephone crackled. “Mr. Kilduff?”

  The hard rubber circle of the receiver crushed his ear painfully against the side of his head. He fought air into his lungs, and they responded convulsively, expanding, contracting, and he got words out then, breaking a silence that was, in his ears, as loud as the combing of surf in a storm: “Jesus God, you don’t think Andrea is—?”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Kilduff,” Fazackerly said. “We found your wife’s car, a tan Volkswagen, parked in the clearing in front, and her purse was inside the cabin, on the table. Your name was on her insurance ID card as next of kin...”

  He stood there, motionless, and after a long moment thick, liquid, tremulous words came out of his throat: “How... how did it happen? God, how . . . ?”

  “We have no way of being certain,” Fazackerly said quietl
y. “It’s been storming heavily up here for the past couple of days. There’s the possibility that she was walking along the bank for some reason, and an undermined section gave way and toppled her into the slough. That water can be treacherous at this time of year, as you surely know. Was your wife a good swimmer?”

  “She couldn’t swim at all,” he said numbly. “How—long has she...?”

  “It appears as if she was in the water about twelve hours, Mr. Kilduff.”

  “Twelve hours.”

  “I’m sorry to have to break such tragic news over the telephone,” Fazackerly said. His voice was sympathetic. “But we’re understaffed here and we couldn’t send a man down personally. I hope you understand.”

  “... yes...”

  “We haven’t moved the—remains as yet; we’d like a positive identification first. Will you be able to come to Duckblind Slough right away?”

  “Yes, within an hour . . . within an hour . . . ”

  He broke the connection. He put his thumb on the button and held it down, the receiver still clasped tightly in his left hand. He was trembling now, and his face was flushed and sheened with tiny globules of sweat, and there was ice on his back and under his arms and between his legs.

  Andrea was dead.

  Andrea was dead!

  He dropped the receiver suddenly and turned and ran into the kitchen. He stopped by the table, putting his hands flat on the Formica top. He looked wildly about him. The walls began to move—he could see them moving—pale white vertical planes reaching for him, going to crush him, and he choked off the scream that spiraled into his throat, and turned again and ran into the living room. He fumbled at the pull-catches on the sliding glass window-doors, breaking a fingernail, and then he had them open. He ran out onto the balcony and stood there with his palms braced against the slippery wet iron railing.

  Andrea was dead.

  He opened his mouth and sucked ravenously the cold wet air, his chest heaving as if it were a blacksmith’s bellows. The shock of it entering his lungs eased the pressure that had been forming within his skull, and he straightened up, pivoting, looking back into the apartment. He felt the rain then, and the frigidity of the morning, and he stepped forward into the warmth of the living room again, shutting the window-doors behind him. Duckblind Slough, he thought, and he went on enervated legs into the bedroom and opened the paneled door on his half of the walk-in closet and took out his heavy wool topcoat. He laid it over his arm, walking back into the living room now, walking swiftly, and he went to the front door and threw it open.

  The woman standing in the hallway outside said “Oh!” in a small, startled voice, and took a step backward.

  Kilduff said, “Christ!” He tried to move around her.

  But the woman had recovered now, and she came forward again, blocking him. She was tall and angular, middle-aged, with short, layered reddish-brown hair. She held her hands as if she wasn’t quite sure what to do with them, elbows in close to her sides, palms turned upward, fingers spread and somewhat overlapping. She wore a multicolored silk muumuu and an old gray sweater around her shoulders.

  He said, “Mrs. Yarborough, for God’s sake!”

  “I have to talk to you, Mr. Kilduff,” she said rapidly, as if she wanted to get those words out—and the ones which were to follow—before she forgot them. “I really do, it won’t take very long, now you know, Mr. Kilduff, that I’m not a woman to pry into the affairs of my neighbors but I really do like you and Andrea, she and I have become very close friends you know, of course when I didn’t see her these past few days I thought perhaps she was visiting her sister, I had no idea you were separated, I really didn’t, until...”

  Not now, not now! Oh goddamn it, why did she have to come around now? He wanted to tell her to shut up, shut up, he wanted to tell her Andrea was dead: “Do you hear me, Andrea-is-dead!” But all he could say was her name, Mrs. Yarborough, and that was ineffective against the rushing, breathless flow of words.

  “... until she called me last night to ask if you had moved away because she’d tried to call you and you weren’t home and she was naturally upset, of course I told her no you hadn’t moved away, at least not that I knew about and you would surely tell me if you had since I’m the building manager, but you can’t imagine how surprised I was to hear from the poor thing like that, oh she sounds so miserable, Mr. Kilduff, she really does, that’s the reason I came up here this morning, now you understand I’m not a woman to pry into the affairs of my neighbors but I thought perhaps if you were to drive up to that fishing cabin of yours and just talk to her, I mean well she’s been there for five days now, I feel so sorry for her, Mr. Kilduff, she sounded so helpless, after all it was the middle of the night and I didn’t sleep at all not a wink after we hung up, thinking of her out driving alone in all this rain we’ve been having, alone up at that cabin—”

  “What?” he said. “What did you say?”

  She opened her mouth, and then closed it again. She looked at him blankly. He reached up and took hold of her shoulders, roughly, and his eyes bored into hers, making her cringe a little at the sudden fire which burned brightly there.

  “What did you say?” he repeated. His voice was flat now, without inflection, and very soft.

  “I... well, I don’t know what you—”

  “The middle of the night. You said Andrea called you in the middle of the night.”

  “Well, it wasn’t really the middle of the night, I suppose, I go to bed early during the winter months because of—”

  “What time did she call you!”

  “It was... after eleven sometime,” Mrs. Yarborough said hesitantly, a little frightened now. “I ... I’m not sure what the exact time was, but it was after eleven...”

  After eleven sometime. After eleven. He released her shoulders and stepped back, and his heart was hammering loudly, crazily, against his chest cavity. After eleven sometime.

  It appears as if she was in the water about twelve hours, Mr. Kilduff...

  Twelve hours. Found at seven this morning. Twelve hours. Time of death would have to have been around seven last night, but she had called Mrs. Yarborough after eleven. Eleven P.M. to seven A.M. Eight hours. Less than eight hours. And Fazackerly had said twelve hours, and a doctor or a coroner or a medical examiner or whoever the hell it was who examined a dead body couldn’t make a mistake of four hours, could he? No, it was impossible, impossible.

  Then-?

  Fazackerly had been lying.

  Sweet Mother of God, Fazackerly had been lying and the only reason he could have been lying was because he wasn’t a deputy sheriff with the Marin County Sheriff’s Office, wasn’t even named Fazackerly; he was the killer, the nameless and faceless murderer of five men, setting up Number Six, the last one left. What better spot than Duckblind Slough—isolated, desolate—what more fitting spot? How he had known of the shack there wasn’t important; he had known and he had gone there and Andrea had been there, Andrea had been there for the past five days...

  But he had lied about the twelve hours.

  Andrea had been alive, and safe, between eleven and midnight. If she was dead, if he had killed her, why had he lied about the twelve hours? What reason would he have for lying about that?

  No reason, none at all...

  Abruptly, then, his legs moved, carrying him forward, past Mrs. Yarborough, almost knocking her down. He hit the stairs running.

  Because maybe, just maybe, dear God, just maybe Andrea was still alive!

  She lay huddled foetus-like, cold and afraid on the floor of the storage closet, lay in the Stygian blackness and listened to the vague, muted sounds of wind and rain, and to the imagined gnawings of a dozen rats in the mud beneath the shack’s rough wood flooring. The nylon fishing line which bound her hands and her ankles was mercilessly taut, and her splayed fingers were numb against the cross-grained boards of the rear wall behind her. The strip of cloth which had been tied tightly, painfully, across her mouth tasted of grease,
of must, of darkly crawling microbes.

  She had been in there less than an hour.

  She had harbored the idea, at first, of trying to kick down the closet door—the wood was old and very dry, and the hasp was somewhat rusted—and then crawling into the other room and finding a sharp knife or breaking a glass and using one of the shards to cut the nylon line. But the closet space was cramped, allowing no room for maneuverability, for leverage; if she had been a man, with a man’s strength and stamina, with a man’s bravery, she might still have been able to do it. But she wasn’t, she was a small frightened woman, and she could only lie there, shivering in the darkness, waiting, waiting for him to come back, waiting for the nondescript, innocuous-looking man who walked with a noticeable limp.

  And who had the eyes of a madman.

  Andrea began to tremble again as she thought about those eyes. They were wide, penetrating, soulless; they looked through you, burned holes in you; they contained something indefinably but unmistakably terrifying. She had almost fainted the first time she’d seen them in the illumination from the Coleman pressure lantern, seen how the black, black pupils reflected the light and gave the impression of flames dancing and flickering deep within their inner recesses.

  In that moment, she had fully expected him to kill her.

  After performing unspeakable atrocities on her flesh.

  But he hadn’t touched her, except to slap her once very hard with the palm of his left hand when he had broken in, commanding her as he did so to stop screaming. When she had complied, he had told her in a flat, toneless voice that nothing would happen to her if she was quiet and responsive—not elaborating what he meant by responsive—and that was when he had put on the Coleman lantern and she had seen his eyes. She had had to exercise a tremendous effort of will to keep from panicking at that moment, to keep from screaming again, but she had done so, sitting on the Army cot and pulling the wool blanket up to cover her body even though she was clad in heavy lemon-colored pajamas. He had only nodded, and then had dragged in one of the chairs from the half-table and sat down on it facing her, crossing his legs and holding the gun very loosely, very casually on his knee, watching her, not speaking for a long while.