The Fringe Dwellers

by Patrick K. Ball

  CHAPTER 28

  “I still think Dr. Austin is hiding something,” Torrie said to Ed as they walked out the clinic into the parking lot.

  “Yeah, I agree,” Ed said. “There’s got to be a connection between those experiments and the bodies, but I just can’t figure out what is.”

  “I think Dr. Austin purposefully left out anything that would link him, Nurse Trish or the clinic to those bodies,” Torrie said.

  Neither of them noticed Trish as they walked right by her because she was kneeling down between two cars tying her shoe. Trish heard them though.

  “At the moment, I’m more worried about finding Uncle Kane than anything,” Ed said. “Especially after my nightmare last night. I say we start looking for him in the woods where we met Tazz.”

  “Sounds like as good a plan as any.”

  Trish watched Torrie and Ed walk towards Kane’s alley. As soon as she was unable to hear anything else they were saying, she quickly ran into the clinic to find Dr. Austin.

  Torrie and Ed continued walking towards Kane’s alley, oblivious to Trish’s observations. Although the alley’s stench was particularly rancid in the mid-day sun, they took their time walking through the alley. Neither of them knew exactly which “house” belonged to Uncle Kane, so they took the time to look into each dwelling for any sign of him.

  “Well, I don’t see any signs of him here,” Ed said when they reached the end of the alley.

  “Me neither, and this place reeks,” Torrie said. “This place is gagging me. Let’s get away from here.”

  “The woods?”

  “Unless you have a better idea of where to look.”

  Torrie and Ed entered the woods through the same hole in the chain link fence that they walked through a couple of days before. They followed the same path leading to the Vagrant-ville Community Center, but when they arrived, the fire pit was deserted.

  “Where to now?” Torrie asked.

  “I kind of remember Uncle Kane talking about a hidden cave towards the water where he kept his valuables. Maybe he’s hiding out there.

  “A cave? I can’t imagine a cave around here big enough to hide anything larger than a possum.”

  “All right, where would you suggest looking?”

  Torrie scrunched her face, thinking, before saying, “The cave it is then. Lead the way oh fearless leader.”

  Ed wasn’t feeling too fearless at the moment, but he didn’t want to tell Torrie that. He didn’t feel the need to worry her too. From the moment they entered the woods, Ed felt like they were being watched . . . or followed. He figured that it was probably just his imagination working overtime, but nonetheless, he was feeling anything but fearless at the moment.

  It was hard to tell as they trampled through the woods, but Ed could swear that he heard something else trampling through the woods behind him. He still didn’t say anything to Torrie, but he did pick up the pace.

  “Hey, Tarzan, slow down,” Torrie said. “Twist an ankle in this brush and you’ll have to crawl out. Plus, I’m getting pretty scraped up.”

  “Sorry, it’s just . . .” Ed trailed off and came to a sudden stop as he looked into a small clearing directly in front of him.

  “What is it?” Torrie said.

  “Shh,” Ed said as he looked around.

  “What is it?” Torrie whispered this time.

  “I thought I heard some-” Ed started, then stopped in mid-sentence, eyes wide open. “Oh my God,” he whispered and pointed to an area just beyond the clearing.

  Torrie looked to where he was pointing. At first, she didn’t seem to see anything, but then it was obvious from her face that she saw what Ed was pointing to. “Is that what I think it is?” she said, still whispering.

  “I’m afraid so,” Ed whispered back.

  “Why are we whispering?”

  “I thought I heard something right before I spotted the body,” Ed said in a normal tone of voice. “It must’ve been my imagination, forget it. Come on, let’s get this over with. Let’s see if it’s Uncle Kane.”

  Torrie followed Ed towards the body lying on the ground. Before they got all the way up to the body, it was apparent that it wasn’t Uncle Kane. The body was way too big.

  “It’s Hulk,” Torrie said when they were standing over the body. She sounded despondent.

  “Are you sure? I mean, without the eyes . . . and the hair-”

  “I’m sure. He’s the only person on Edge Key who’s this big.”

  “Was this big,” Ed corrected.

  Torrie was about to say something when she heard the same sound Ed heard earlier. It sounded like footsteps trampling through the woods—and they were coming towards them.

  Ed heard the sound too. He didn’t hesitate. Ed pulled his cell phone out and quickly dialed a number. “Hello? Police?” Ed said in a voice loud enough for anyone in the woods to hear.

  The sounds of the footsteps stopped. Ed explained to the police operator who he was, what he’d found and his approximate location. The operator promised to dispatch an officer to the scene immediately.

  “So, just what the fuck were the two of you doing out here in the middle of the woods anyway?” Lieutenant Bischoff said after he’d examined the body and the surrounding area. He was the first police officer on the scene, but Captain Nash and a couple of other officers arrived soon after.

  “Easy, Lieutenant,” Captain Nash said while the other officers secured the scene. “This body’s been here for hours, probably since sometime last night, maybe longer. They had nothing to do with it.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” Bischoff said, still sounding angry. “It ain’t normal bein’ all the way out here. They ain’t kids. There are better places to go for a good roll in the hay. I still wanna know what they were doing here.”

  “That’s a fair question,” Captain Nash said, ignoring the sexual innuendo. “What were y’all doing out here?”

  Torrie looked to Ed. “We were looking for someone,” Ed answered.

  “Someone to make it a ménage a trois?” Bischoff said with a look of disgust on his face.

  “Enough!” Captain Nash said to Bischoff. “Who were you looking for?” he asked Ed.

  Ed hesitated.

  “Look,” Captain Nash said gently, “I’m not trying to bust your balls here, but this is a crime scene of a possible murder you discovered-”

  “Murder?” Ed interrupted. Now he was angry. “That’s a good one. That body’s in the same condition as over a half a dozen bodies discovered in Edge Key over the past forty years, but in every single one of those cases, the cause of death was listed as a suicide. Would you care to explain any differences you see between this body and those others? If not you, then how about your foul-mouthed lieutenant here? You want some answers? Well, so do I. What has this police force been covering up? What are you into?”

  Both Captain Nash and Lieutenant Bischoff were shocked into silence. Torrie was tugging on Ed trying to get him to calm down, but he shrugged her away. A few seconds later, Bischoff found his voice.

  “Why don’t we just run these assholes in? Maybe a couple of days behind bars will loosen their tongues.”

  “Go right ahead you son of a bitch!” Ed said with an amount of pent-up fury he’d never unleashed before in his entire life. “I’ll not only have my paper’s attorneys all over your ass, but I’ll also have a horde of media swarm down on this sleepy little town, the likes of which you’ve never seen! When they get here, you can explain to every single one of them how a police officer who purposefully traumatized a seven year old child by showing him a mutilated body, like the one over there, was able to rise up the ranks to Lieutenant of the Edge Key Police Department.”

  “Whoa, hold it everyone!” Captain Nash said. “Nobody’s running anybody in. Bischoff, take a walk. You’re doing nothing but aggravating the situation.” Lieutenant Bischoff started to object, but Captain Nash didn’t give him the chance. “Don’t fuck with me on this, Lieutenant. I told you to get t
he hell outta here. Now go. Leave! That’s an order!”

  Bischoff didn’t try to argue this time. He quietly walked away towards the body, pretending to investigate the area. Captain Nash watched until he was a safe distance away, and then rubbed his hands over his face in frustration.

  “I want to apologize for Lieutenant Bischoff,” Captain Nash said. “He can be a major pain in the ass sometimes.”

  “Thanks,” Torrie said. Ed was still fuming.

  “But I do need to know what y’all were doing out here,” Captain Nash said.

  “I was looking for my uncle,” Ed answered.

  “Out here?” Captain Nash said. “What would he be doing out here? Who’s your uncle?”

  “Why do you want to know?” Ed said.

  “I’ve got a dead body here,” Captain Nash said. “Your uncle could be a suspect . . . or he might have some information related to whatever happened here. With or without your cooperation, it won’t take me too long to figure out who he is, but it’ll be better for everyone involved if you do cooperate. Please?”

  “Fine,” Ed said. “My uncle’s name is Kane Nanreit. He’s been a full time resident of Vagrant-ville since before I was born. He walked out of Ivory Rock Clinic last night. We thought he might’ve come back here somewhere to hide.”

  “Okay, thanks,” Captain Nash said. “Um, I don’t think there’s any reason for me to keep you two here any longer. If I need any further information, I’ve got your contact information. You can leave.”

  Ed didn’t wait for him to change his mind. He grabbed Torrie by the hand and began walking away. As he was leaving, he glanced over his shoulder towards Captain Nash. Captain Nash had a cell phone up to his ear. Ed was too far away to hear clearly, but he swore he heard Captain Nash ask for Dr. Austin, and something about having a major problem.

  CHAPTER 29

  “It is common sense to take a method and try it; if it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.”

  —Franklin D. Roosevelt

  “So, what do we do now?” Torrie asked after they’d returned from the woods.

  “I don’t know,” Ed said. “I still want to find Uncle Kane, but at least we know now that it was Hulk and not Uncle Kane’s death that was the source of my nightmare last night. I know it sounds horrible, but it makes me feel a little better.”

  “What if there were two deaths last night instead of one?”

  “I don’t even want to think about that,” Ed said, but in reality, he was thinking the same thing. “Maybe I should call Undertaker,” he mumbled, more to himself than Torrie.

  “Do what?”

  “I was just thinking out loud,” Ed sighed and paused momentarily. “I think we should let Undertaker know that another body is coming his way . . . and ask him to let us know if he gets word of any other body discoveries.”

  Torrie thought it was a good idea too, but she didn’t say anything. She didn’t want to upset Ed further. It didn’t matter anyway. Ed had made up his mind to call Undertaker regardless of her reaction.

  “They found another body,” Ed said to Undertaker after he answered the phone. “It’s the same as the others. Actually, we found the body. It was another resident of Vagrant-ville, someone else we’d met the other day.”

  “Oh, Jesus, Ed!” Undertaker said. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I think so, but I’m not sure if that’ll be the only body that’s discovered.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “My uncle . . . he walked out of Ivory Rock last night. We haven’t been able to find him.”

  “Jesus, Ed, I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do?”

  “Just, um . . . just let me know if they bring anyone else in besides the one I know about. His name is, or rather was, Hulk.”

  “Sure thing, Ed.”

  “Also, see if you can get anything out of any of the cops about any of these bodies, especially as it relates to either the clinic, Nurse Trish or Dr. Austin. We had a, um, an interesting conversation with Dr. Austin this morning. I don’t have time to go into detail right now, but I’ll tell you all about it later, hopefully, after we’ve found Uncle Kane.”

  “Must’ve been one hellava conversation, but I’ll let you get on with your search. I can only imagine how worried you must be. And, I’ll let you know if I hear anything on my end. Watch your back, Ed.”

  “Thanks, you too, Undertaker,” Ed said and hung up.

  By the time Ed finished his conversation with Undertaker, they were back at the clinic parking lot, standing next to Torrie’s car, and trying to figure out what to do next. Searching the woods for Uncle Kane was out since the police now had the area cordoned off while they investigated Hulk’s death, and they didn’t know where else to begin looking for him. They decided on a plan of randomly driving around Edge Key in the hopes that they would see him somewhere, but before they exited the parking of the clinic, Ed’s phone rang.

  “Ed, this is Matthew Hardy from Manifesto Veritas. I’m-”

  “Matt!” Ed said into the phone, sounding excited and covering his end of the phone. “It’s a researcher from my paper,” Ed quickly explained to Torrie before returning to the conversation with Matt. “Whatcha got for me, Matt.”

  Ed knew there was only one reason why a researcher from Manifesto Veritas would be calling—he had found something on Dr. Austin, Nurse Trish or the clinic.

  “Probably not as much as you were hoping for, Ed. We were able to confirm that both Steven Austin, M.D. and Trish Stratigias, R.N. from Edge Key had been the subject of some type of investigation by the state medical board, but you already knew that. The final determination by the board was a finding of no evidence of wrongdoing; no action was taken against either the doctor or the nurse, and no further investigation was deemed warranted. This is where it gets weird though. The board’s final determination was the only record we could find; there were no transcripts of hearings, no paperwork regarding a complaint being filed . . . nothing at all. I’ve never seen anything like it before, but it’s like all the records of those proceedings were destroyed.”

  “You mean sealed?”

  “No, I mean destroyed. None of my sources can find any records, sealed or unsealed. It’s possible to lose a couple of pieces of paper here and there, but not all the records. They’re just . . . gone. Like I said, I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

  “Great, back to square one.”

  “Not necessarily. I don’t know how helpful this’ll be, but we were able to find out some information on that clinic back in the sixties. It was originally set up as some sort of research facility with its funding coming entirely from one source, a trust that we traced back to a Hearst Brian Kendrick. That name mean anything to you?”

  “Hearst Brian Kendrick,” Ed repeated, thinking. The name sounded familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it.

  Torrie helped him out. “As in HBK Street?”

  “Of course,” Ed said. “Hearst Brian Kendrick was the founder of Edge Key. There’s even a street bearing his initials running across the island.”

  “Right,” said Matt. “He was some sort of gold prospector who struck it rich out west somewhere—details are kind of sketchy about him—and then retired to Edge Key as a multi-multi-millionaire by today’s standards. He apparently intended on keeping the entire island of Edge Key as a private residence, but had to open at least two-thirds of it for sale to the general public in order to get a public causeway built out from the mainland.

  “We also found some conflicting reports about his personal life. He was married to either a Molly or Holly Van Dam when he first bought the island, but we couldn’t find either divorce papers or a death certificate on her. Soon after that though, we found records of a marriage to a Lilian Garcia. He had either one or two sons that we’ve confirmed from other sources, but we can’t find birth certificates for any children. It’s strange.

  “Soon after his marriage to Lilian, Hearst Kendrick
became a recluse. He set up a trust fund administered through the law firm of Bradshaw, Batista and Dudley, but we weren’t able to find out what the purpose of the trust was, other than that it was the source of funding for the clinic in the sixties.”

  “Were you able to find out anything about why the clinic was started and funded by the HBK trust fund?” Ed asked.

  “Nothing we were able to confirm. The rumors we heard had something to do with it being started for one or both of his sons’ benefit. There was some gossip we read about a child who had some kind of medical problem, but I’m not even sure whether the problem was physical, mental or both.”

  “Why such a mystery?”

  “I don’t know. Usually, records from that time period are pretty good, but with this HBK character, we kept running into dead ends. Like I said before, it’s strange, I’ve never seen anything like it. Sorry, but that’s all I could get.”

  “Maybe I can fill in the gaps on my end. Thanks, Matt. If you get anything else, give me a shout.”

  “Will do,” Matt said and hung up.

  “So, what did he say?” Torrie asked as soon as Ed pushed the off button on the phone.

  “Not too much. Dr. Austin and Trish were under investigation by the medical board, but nothing came of it. The strange thing was that Matt and his crew weren’t able to find any records of the actual proceedings.”

  “That is odd. From what he told us this morning, there had to have been detailed records kept pertaining to his hypnosis experiments consisting of thousands and thousands of pages. If there was even a suggestion that his hypnosis techniques had anything to do with his patient’s death . . .” Torrie suddenly stopped. Ed could almost see the wheels turning in her mind. “You don’t think it’s possible . . . What if . . .”

  As Torrie fumbled for the right words and her excitement grew, Ed became impatient. “Take a deep breath and calm down before you speak, Torrie. Walk me through whatever you’re thinking.”