Outsider

by Stephen King

  ‘I think they must have run a DNA test on it, to see if it belonged to one of the Howard girls.’

  ‘Bet your ass they did. CSI stuff.’

  ‘Those results were never made public,’ Holly said. ‘Were they?’

  ‘No. But you know what the cops found in Mrs Holmes’s basement, don’t you?’

  Holly nodded. That detail had been made public, and reading it must have been like putting an arrow in the parents’ hearts. Someone had talked and the paper had printed it. Probably it had been on TV, too.

  ‘A lot of sex-killers take trophies,’ Candy said authoritatively. ‘I’ve seen it on Forensic Files and Dateline. It’s common behavior with these whackos.’

  ‘Although Heath Holmes never seemed like a whacko to you.’

  ‘They hide it,’ Candy Wilson said ominously.

  ‘But he didn’t try very hard to hide this crime, did he? People saw him, and there was even that surveillance video.’

  ‘So what? He went crazy, and crazy people don’t give a shit.’

  I’m sure Detective Anderson and the Flint County DA said the exact same thing about Terry Maitland, Holly thought. Even though some serial killers – sex-killers, to use Candy Wilson’s term – keep getting away with it for years. Ted Bundy for one, John Wayne Gacy for another.

  Holly got up. ‘Thank you so much for your time.’

  ‘Thank me by making sure Mrs Kelly doesn’t find out I talked to you.’

  ‘I’ll do that,’ Holly said.

  As she was stepping out the door, Candy said, ‘You know about his mom, right? What she did after Heath offed himself in jail?’

  Holly stopped, keys in hand. ‘No.’

  ‘It was a month later. Guess you didn’t get that far in your researches. She hung herself. Just like him, only in her basement instead of a jail cell.’

  ‘Holy frack! Did she leave a note?’

  ‘That I don’t know,’ Candy said, ‘but the basement was where the cops found those bloody underpants. The ones with Winnie and Tigger and Roo on them. If your only son does a thing like that, who needs to leave a note?’

  9

  When Holly was unsure about what to do next, she almost always sought out either an International House of Pancakes or a Denny’s. Both served breakfast all day, comfort food that you could eat slowly without being bothered by things like wine lists and pushy waiters. She found an IHOP close to her hotel.

  Once seated at a two-top in the corner, she ordered pancakes (a short stack), a single scrambled egg, and hash browns (the IHOP hash browns were always delicious). While she waited for her food to come, she fired up her laptop and searched for Ralph Anderson’s telephone number. She didn’t find it, which was no huge surprise; police officers almost always unlisted their phones. She could almost certainly get it, even so – Bill had taught her all the tricks – and she wanted to talk to him, because she was sure they both had pieces of the puzzle the other lacked.

  ‘He’s Macy’s, I’m Gimbels,’ she said.

  ‘What was that, hon?’ It was the waitress, with her evening repast.

  ‘I was just saying how hungry I am,’ Holly said.

  ‘You better be, because this is a lot of chow.’ She set the plates down. ‘But you could use some feeding up, if you don’t mind me saying so. You’re too skinny.’

  ‘I had a friend who used to tell me that all the time,’ Holly said, and suddenly felt like crying. It was that phrase – I had a friend. Time had passed, and time probably did heal all wounds, but God, some of them healed so slowly. And the difference between I have and I had was such a gulf.

  She ate slowly, going heavy on the pancake syrup. It wasn’t the real deal, not maple, but it was tasty, just the same, and it was good to eat a meal where you sat down and took your time.

  By the time she finished, she had come to a reluctant decision. Calling Detective Anderson without informing Pelley was apt to get her fired when she wanted – it was Bill’s turn of phrase – to chase the case. More importantly, it would be unethical.

  The waitress came back to offer more coffee, and Holly agreed. You didn’t get free refills at Starbucks. And the IHOP coffee, while not gourmet, was good enough. Like the syrup. And like me, Holly thought. Her therapist said these moments of self-validation throughout the day were very important. I may not be Sherlock Holmes – or Tommy and Tuppence, for that matter – but I am good enough, and I know what I have to do. Mr Pelley may argue with me, and I hate arguments, but I’ll argue back if I have to. I’ll channel my inner Bill Hodges.

  She held that thought while she made the call. When Pelley answered, she said: ‘Terry Maitland didn’t kill the Peterson boy.’

  ‘What? Did you just say what I think you—’

  ‘Yes. I’ve discovered some very interesting things here in Dayton, Mr Pelley, but before I make my report, I need to talk to Detective Anderson. Do you have any objections?’

  Pelley didn’t give her the argument she had dreaded. ‘I’d have to talk to Howie Gold about that, and he’d have to clear it with Marcy. But I think it will be okay with both of them.’

  Holly relaxed and sipped her coffee. ‘That’s good. Clear it with them as fast as you can, please, and get me his number. I’d like to talk to him tonight.’

  ‘But why? What have you found out?’

  ‘Let me ask you a question. Do you know if anything unusual happened at the Heisman Memory Unit on the day Terry Maitland visited his father for the last time?’

  ‘Unusual like what?’

  This time Holly didn’t lead her witness. ‘Like anything. You may not know, but then again you might. If Terry said something to his wife when he got back to their hotel, for instance. Anything?’

  ‘No … unless you mean Terry bumping into an orderly when he went out. The orderly fell down because the floor was wet, but it was just a chance thing. Neither of them was hurt, or anything.’

  She clutched her phone so hard her knuckles creaked. ‘You never said anything like that before.’

  ‘I didn’t think it was important.’

  ‘That’s why I need to talk to Detective Anderson. There are missing pieces. You just gave me one. He may have more. Also, he can find things out that I can’t.’

  ‘Are you saying an excuse-me bump as Maitland was going out has relevance? If so, what is it?’

  ‘Let me talk to Detective Anderson first. Please.’

  There was a long pause, then Pelley said, ‘Let me see what I can do.’

  The waitress put down the check as Holly pocketed her phone. ‘That sounded intense.’

  Holly gave her a smile. ‘Thank you for such good service.’

  The waitress left. The check came to eighteen dollars and twenty cents. Holly left a five-dollar tip under her plate. This was quite a bit more than the recommended amount, but she was excited.

  10

  She had barely returned to her room when her cell rang. UNKNOWN CALLER, the screen said. ‘Hello? You’ve reached Holly Gibney, to whom am I speaking?’

  ‘This is Ralph Anderson. Alec Pelley gave me your number, Ms Gibney, and told me what you’re doing. My first question is, do you know what you’re doing?’

  ‘Yes.’ Holly had many worries, and she was a very doubtful person even after years of therapy, but of this much she was sure.

  ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh, well, maybe you do and maybe you don’t, I have no way of telling, do I?’

  ‘No,’ Holly agreed. ‘At least not as of this moment.’

  ‘Alec said you told him Terry Maitland didn’t kill Frank Peterson. He said you seemed very sure of it. I’m curious as to how you can make a statement like that when you’re in Dayton and the Peterson murder happened here in Flint City.’

  ‘Because there was a similar crime here, at the same time Maitland was here. Not a boy killed, but two little girls. Same basic MO: rape and mutilation. The man the police arrested claimed to have been staying with his mother in a town thirty miles away, and she corroborated that,
but he was also seen in Trotwood, the suburb where the little girls were abducted. There’s surveillance footage of him. Does this sound familiar?’

  ‘Familiar but not surprising. Most killers toss up some kind of alibi once they’re caught. You might not know that from your work collaring bail-jumpers, Ms Gibney – Alec told me what your firm mostly does – but surely you know it from TV.’

  ‘This man was an orderly at the Heisman Memory Unit, and although he was supposed to be on vacation, he was there at least once during the same week that Mr Maitland was there visiting his father. On the occasion of Mr Maitland’s last visit – April 26th, this would have been – these two supposed killers actually bumped into each other. And I mean that literally.’

  ‘Are you shitting me?’ Anderson nearly shouted.

  ‘I am not. This is what my old partner at Finders Keepers would have called an authentic no-shit situation. Is your interest piqued?’

  ‘Did Pelley tell you the orderly scraped Maitland when he fell down? Reached out and grabbed for him and nicked his arm?’

  Holly was silent. She was thinking about the movie she had packed in her carry-on. She wasn’t in the habit of self-congratulation – just the opposite – but it now seemed like an act of intuitive genius. Only had she ever doubted there was something far out of the ordinary about the Maitland case? She had not. Mostly because of her association with the monstrous Brady Wilson Hartsfield. A thing like that tended to widen your perspective quite a bit.

  ‘And that wasn’t the only cut.’ He sounded like he was talking to himself. ‘There was another one. But down here. After Frank Peterson was murdered.’

  Here was another missing piece.

  ‘Tell me, Detective. Tell me tell me tell me!’

  ‘I think … not over the phone. Can you fly down here? We should sit down and talk. You, me, Alec Pelley, Howie Gold, and a State Police detective who’s also been working the case. And maybe Marcy, Her, too.’

  ‘I think that’s a good idea, but I’ll have to discuss it with my client, Mr Pelley.’

  ‘Talk to Howie Gold instead. I’ll give you his number.’

  ‘Protocol—’

  ‘Howie employs Alec, so protocol isn’t an issue.’

  Holly mulled this over. ‘Can you get in touch with the Dayton Police Department, and the Montgomery County district attorney? I can’t find out all I want to know about the murders of the Howard girls and about Heath Holmes – that’s the orderly’s name – but I think you could.’

  ‘Is this guy’s trial still pending? If it is, they probably won’t want to give out a whole lot of infor—’

  ‘Mr Holmes is dead.’ She paused. ‘Just like Terry Maitland.’

  ‘Jesus,’ he muttered. ‘How weird can this get?’

  ‘Weirder,’ she said. Another thing of which she had no doubt.

  ‘Weirder,’ he repeated. ‘Maggots in the cantaloupe.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Nothing. Call Mr Gold, okay?’

  ‘I still think I had better call Mr Pelley first. Just to be sure.’

  ‘If you really think so. And Ms Gibney … I guess maybe you do know your business.’

  That made her smile.

  11

  Holly got the green light from Mr Pelley and called Howie Gold at once, now pacing a worry-track on the cheap hotel carpet and obsessively punching at her Fitbit to read her pulse. Yes, Mr Gold thought it would be a good idea if she flew down, and no, she didn’t need to fly coach. ‘Book business class,’ he said. ‘More legroom.’

  ‘All right.’ She felt giddy. ‘I will.’

  ‘You really don’t believe Terry killed the Peterson boy?’

  ‘No more than I think Heath Holmes killed those two girls,’ she said. ‘I think it was someone else. I think it was an outsider.’

  VISITS

  July 25th

  1

  Detective Jack Hoskins of the Flint City PD woke up at two AM on that Wednesday morning in triple misery: he had a hangover, he had a sunburn, and he needed to take a shit. It’s what I get for eating at Los Tres Molinos, he thought … but had he eaten there? He was pretty sure he had – enchiladas stuffed with pork and that spicy cheese – but wasn’t positive. It might have been Hacienda. Last night was hazy.

  Have to cut back on the vodka. Vacation is over.

  Yes, and over early. Because their shitty little department currently had just one working detective. Sometimes life was a bitch. Often, even.

  He got out of bed, wincing at the single hard thud in his head when his feet hit the floor and rubbing at the burn on the back of his neck. He shucked his shorts, grabbed the newspaper off the nightstand, and plodded to the bathroom to take care of his business. Ensconced on the toilet, waiting for the semi-liquid gush that always came six hours or so after he ate Mexican food (would he never learn?), he opened the Call and rattled his way to the comics, the only part of the local paper that was worth a damn.

  He was squinting at the tiny dialogue balloons in Get Fuzzy when he heard the shower curtain rattle. He looked up and saw a shadow behind the printed daisies. His heart leaped into his throat, walloping. Someone was standing in his tub. An intruder, and not just some stoned junkie thief who’d wriggled through the bathroom window and taken refuge in the only place available when he saw the bedroom light come on. No. This was the same someone who had been standing behind him at that fucking abandoned barn out in Canning Township. He knew it as surely as he knew his own name. That encounter (if it had been an encounter) refused to leave his mind, and it was almost as if he had been expecting this … return.

  You know that’s bullshit. You thought you saw a man in the barn, but when you put the light on the guy, he turned out to be nothing but a piece of busted farm equipment. Now you think there’s a man in your tub, but what looks like his head is just the shower head and what looks like his arm is nothing but your long-handled back-scrubber stuck through the grab handle on the wall. The rattling sound you heard was either a draft or just in your head.

  He closed his eyes. Opened them again and stared at the shower curtain with its stupid plastic flowers, the kind of shower curtain only an ex-wife could love. Now that he was fully awake, reality reasserted itself. Just the shower head, just the grab handle with the back-scrubber stuck through it. He was an idiot. A hungover idiot, the worst kind. He—

  The shower curtain rattled again. It rattled because what he had wanted to believe was his back-scrubber now grew shadowy fingers and reached out to touch the plastic. The shower head turned and seemed to stare at him through the translucent curtain. The newspaper fell from Hoskins’s relaxing fingers and landed on the tiles with a soft flap. His head was thudding and thudding. The back of his neck was burning and burning. His bowels relaxed, and the small bathroom was filled with the smell of what Jack was suddenly sure had been his last meal. The hand was reaching for the edge of the curtain. In a second – two, at the most – it would be pulled back and he would be looking at something so horrible it would make his worst nightmare seem like a sweet daydream.

  ‘No,’ he whispered. ‘No.’ He tried to get up from the toilet, but his legs wouldn’t support him and his considerable bottom thumped back onto the ring. ‘Please, no. Don’t.’

  A hand crept around the edge of the curtain, but instead of pulling it back, the fingers only folded around it. Tattooed on those fingers was a word: CANT.

  ‘Jack.’

  He couldn’t reply. He sat naked on the toilet with the last of his shit still dripping and plopping into the bowl, his heart a runaway engine in his chest. He felt that soon it would rip right out of him, and his last sight on earth would be of it lying on the tiles, splattering blood on his ankles and the comics section of the Flint City Call with its final twitching beats.

  ‘That’s not a sunburn, Jack.’

  He wanted to faint. To just collapse off the toilet, and if he gave himself a concussion on the tile floor, even fractured his skull, so what? At least
he would be out of this. But consciousness stubbornly remained. The shadowy figure in the tub remained. The fingers on the curtain remained: CANT, in fading blue letters.

  ‘Touch the back of your neck, Jack. If you don’t want me to pull back this curtain and show myself, do it now.’

  Hoskins raised a hand and pressed it to the nape of his neck. His body’s reaction was immediate: terrifying bolts of pain which ran up to his temples and down to his shoulders. He looked at his hand and saw it was smeared with blood.

  ‘You’ve got cancer,’ the figure behind the curtain informed him. ‘It’s in your lymph glands, and your throat, and your sinuses. It’s in your eyes, Jack. It’s eating into your eyes. Soon you’ll be able to see it, little gray knobs of malignant cancer cells swimming around in your vision. Do you know when you got it?’

  Of course he knew. When this creature had touched him out there in Canning Township. When it had caressed him.

  ‘I gave it to you, but I can take it back. Would you like me to take it back?’

  ‘Yes,’ Jack whispered. He began to cry. ‘Take it back. Please take it back.’

  ‘Will you do something if I ask you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You won’t hesitate?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘I believe you. And you won’t give me any reason not to believe you, will you?’

  ‘No! No!’

  ‘Good. Now clean yourself up. You stink.’

  The CANT hand withdrew, but the shape behind the shower curtain was still staring at him. Not a man, after all. Something far worse than the worst man who had ever lived. Hoskins reached for the toilet paper, aware as he did so that he was tilting sideways off the seat and that the world was simultaneously dimming and dwindling. And that was good. He fell, but there was no pain. He was unconscious before he hit the floor.

  2

  Jeannie Anderson woke at four that morning, with her usual wee-hours full bladder. Ordinarily she would have used their bathroom, but Ralph had been sleeping badly ever since Terry Maitland had been shot, and tonight he had been particularly restless. She got out of bed and made her way to the bathroom at the end of the hall, the one past the door to Derek’s room. She considered flushing after relieving herself and decided even that might wake him. It could wait until morning.