Outsider

by Stephen King

  I think you were here. Not in the vault, but close by. Where you could smell tears when the wind was right. Where you could hear the laughter of the men or boys who pushed over Heath Holmes’s stone and then likely urinated on his grave.

  In spite of the day’s heat, Holly felt cold. Given more time, she might have investigated those empty places. There was no danger; the outsider was long gone from Ohio. Very likely gone from Flint City, too.

  She snapped four pictures: the train station, the boxcars, the factory, the deserted car wash. She reviewed them and decided they would do. They’d have to. She had a plane to catch.

  Yes, and people to convince.

  If she could, that was. She felt very small and lonely just now. It was easy to imagine laughter and ridicule; thinking of such things came naturally to her. But she would try. She had to. For the murdered children, yes – Frank Peterson and the Howard girls and all the ones who had come before them – but also for Terry Maitland and Heath Holmes. A person did what a person could.

  She had one more stop to make. Luckily, it was on her way.

  2

  An old man sitting on a bench in Trotwood Community Park was happy to give her directions to the place where the bodies of ‘those poor gals’ had been found. It wasn’t far, he said, and she would know it when she got there.

  She did.

  Holly pulled over, got out, and gazed at a ravine which mourners – and thrill-seekers masquerading as mourners – had attempted to turn into a shrine. There were glittery cards upon which words like SORROW and HEAVEN predominated. There were balloons, some deflating, some fresh and new, even though Amber and Jolene Howard had been discovered here three months earlier. There was a statue of Mary, which some wag had decorated with a mustache. There was a teddy bear that made Holly shudder. Its plump brown body was covered with mold.

  She raised her iPad, took a picture.

  There was no whiff of that smell she had gotten (or imagined she’d gotten) at the cemetery, but she had no doubt the outsider would have visited this place at some point after the bodies of Amber and Jolene had been discovered, sampling the grief of the pilgrims to this makeshift shrine like a fine old Burgundy. Also the excitement of those – not many, but a few, there were always a few – who came to meditate on what it might be like to do such things as had been done to the Howard girls, and listen to their screams.

  Yes, you came, but not too soon. Not until you could do so without attracting unwanted attention, the way you did on the day Frank Peterson’s brother shot Terry Maitland.

  ‘Only that time you couldn’t resist, could you?’ Holly murmured. ‘It would have been like a starving man trying to resist a Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings.’

  A minivan pulled in ahead of Holly’s Prius. On one side of the bumper was a sticker reading MOM’S TAXI. The one on the other side read I BELIEVE IN THE 2ND AMENDMENT, AND I VOTE. The woman who got out was well-dressed, plump, pretty, in her thirties. She was holding a bouquet of flowers. She knelt, put them beside a wooden cross with LITTLE GIRLS on one arm and WITH JESUS on the other. Then she stood up.

  ‘So sad, isn’t it?’ she said to Holly.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m a Christian, but I’m glad the man who did it is dead. Glad. And I’m glad he’s in hell. Is that awful of me?’

  ‘He’s not in hell,’ Holly said.

  The woman recoiled as if she had been slapped.

  ‘He brings hell.’

  Holly drove to Dayton Airport. She was running a bit behind, but resisted the urge to exceed the speed limit. Laws were laws for a reason.

  3

  Having to fly on the commuter planes (Tin Can Airways was what Bill had called them) had its advantages. For one, the final leg put her down at Kiowa Airfield in Flint County, saving her a seventy-mile drive from Cap City. Leapfrog travel also gave her a chance to continue her researches. During her brief layovers between flights, she used airport Wi-Fi to download as much information as she could, and as fast as she could. During the flights themselves she read what she had downloaded, scrolling fast and concentrating fiercely, barely hearing the dismayed yelps when her second flight, a thirty-seat turboprop, hit an air pocket and dropped like an elevator.

  She arrived at her destination only five minutes late, and by putting on a burst of speed, was first to Hertz, earning a dirty look from the overburdened salesman type she beat out with a final sprint. On the way into town, seeing how close she was shaving it, she gave in to temptation and broke the speed limit. But only by five miles an hour.

  4

  ‘That’s her. Got to be.’

  Howie Gold and Alec Pelley were standing outside the building where Howie kept his offices. Howie was pointing to a slim woman in a gray business suit and white blouse trotting up the sidewalk, a big totebag banging against one slim hip. Her hair was cut close to her small face, with graying bangs that stopped just short of her eyebrows. There was a touch of fading lipstick on her mouth, but she wore no other makeup. The sun was sinking, but what remained of the day was still hot, and a trickle of sweat ran down one of her cheeks.

  ‘Ms Gibney?’ Howie asked, stepping forward.

  ‘Yes,’ she panted. ‘Am I late?’

  ‘Two minutes early, actually,’ Alec said. ‘May I take your bag? It looks heavy.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said, looking from the stocky, balding lawyer to the investigator who had hired her. Pelley was at least six inches taller than his boss, with graying hair combed straight back, tonight dressed in tan slacks and a white shirt open at the neck. ‘Are the others here?’

  ‘Most,’ Alec said. ‘Detective Anderson – ah, speak of the devil.’

  Holly turned and saw three people approaching. One was a woman, holding the remains of her youthful good looks quite well into her middle age, although the circles under her eyes, only partially concealed by foundation and a bit of powder, suggested she might not have been sleeping well lately. To her left was a skinny, nervous-looking man with a cowlick coming loose from the back of his otherwise rigidly controlled hair. And on her right …

  Detective Anderson was a tall man with sloping shoulders and the beginnings of what would probably become a paunch if he didn’t start exercising more and watching what he ate. His head was slightly thrust forward, his eyes, bright blue, taking her in from top to bottom and stem to stern. It wasn’t Bill, of course it wasn’t, Bill was two years dead and never coming back. Also, this man was much younger than Bill had been when Holly first met him. It was the eager curiosity in his face that was the same. He was holding the woman’s hand, which suggested she was Mrs Anderson. Interesting that she should have come with him.

  There were introductions all around. The slender man with the cowlick, it turned out, was Flint County district attorney William (‘Please call me Bill’) Samuels.

  ‘Let’s go upstairs and get out of this heat,’ Howie said.

  Mrs Anderson – Jeanette – asked Holly if she had had a good flight, and Holly made the appropriate response. Then she turned to Howie and asked if there was perhaps audio-visual capability in the room they would be using. He told her there certainly was, and she was welcome to use it if she had material to present. When they stepped out of the elevator, Holly enquired about the women’s room. ‘I could use a minute or two. I came directly from the airport.’

  ‘Absolutely. End of the hall, turn left. Should be unlocked.’

  Holly was afraid Mrs Anderson would volunteer to go with her, but Jeanette didn’t. Which was good. Holly did have to pee (‘spend a penny,’ was how her mother always put it), but she had something more important in mind, a matter that could only be attended to in complete private.

  In the stall, with her skirt up and her bag between her sensible loafers, she closed her eyes. Mindful that tiled rooms like this were natural amplifiers, she prayed silently.

  This is Holly Gibney again, and I need help. You know I’m not good with strangers even one at a time, and tonight
I have six of them to deal with. Seven, if Mr Maitland’s widow is here. I’m not terrified, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was scared. Bill could do things like this, but I’m not him. Just help me to do it the way he would. Help me to understand their natural disbelief and not be afraid of it.

  She finished aloud, but in a whisper. ‘Please God, help me not to frack up.’ She paused, then added, ‘I’m not smoking.’

  5

  The meeting took place in Howard Gold’s conference room, and while it was smaller than the one on The Good Wife (Holly had watched all seven seasons, and had now moved on to the sequel), it was very nice. Tasteful pictures, polished mahogany table, leather chairs. Mrs Maitland had indeed come. She was sitting at Mr Gold’s right as Howie took his place at the head of the table and asked who was watching her girls.

  Marcy gave him a wan smile. ‘Lukesh and Chandra Patel volunteered. Their son was on Terry’s team. In fact, Baibir was on third base when …’ She looked at Detective Anderson. ‘When your men arrested him. Baibir was heartbroken. He didn’t understand.’

  Anderson crossed his arms and said nothing. His wife put a hand on his shoulder and murmured something no one else was meant to hear. Anderson nodded.

  ‘I’m going to call this meeting to order,’ Mr Gold said. ‘I have no agenda, but perhaps our visitor would like to begin. This is Holly Gibney, a private detective Alec hired to investigate the Dayton end of this business, assuming the two cases really are connected. That’s one of the things we’re here to determine, if possible.’

  ‘I’m not a private detective,’ Holly demurred. ‘My partner, Peter Huntley, is the one with the private investigator’s license. What our company mostly does is repo work and skip-tracing. We do take on an occasional criminal investigation where we’re unlikely to be scolded by the police. We’ve had good luck with missing pets, for instance.’

  That sounded lame, and she felt blood heating her face.

  ‘Ms Gibney is being a trifle too modest,’ Alec said. ‘I believe you were involved with running a violent fugitive named Morris Bellamy to earth.’

  ‘That was my partner’s case,’ Holly said. ‘My first partner. Bill Hodges. He’s since passed away, Mr Pelley – Alec – as you know.’

  ‘Yes,’ Alec said. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

  The Latino man Detective Anderson had introduced as Yunel Sablo of the State Police now cleared his throat. ‘I believe,’ he said, ‘that you and Mr Hodges were also involved in a case of mass vehicular homicide and intended terrorism. A young man named Hartsfield. And that you, Ms Gibney, were personally responsible for stopping him before he could cause an explosion in a crowded auditorium. One that might have killed thousands of young people.’

  A murmur went around the table. Holly felt her face growing hotter. She would have liked to tell them that she had failed, that she had only halted Brady’s homicidal ambitions for awhile, that he had come back to cause yet more deaths before being stopped for good, but this was neither the time nor the place.

  Lieutenant Sablo wasn’t finished. ‘I think you received a commendation from the city?’

  ‘There were actually three of us who got commendations, but all it amounted to was a gold key and a bus pass good for ten years.’ She looked around at them, unhappily aware that she was still blushing like a sixteen-year-old. ‘That was a long time ago. As for this case, I’d rather save my report for last. And my conclusions.’

  ‘Like the final chapter in one of those old British drawing-room mysteries,’ Mr Gold said, smiling. ‘We all tell what we know, then you stand up and astound us with an explanation of who done it, and how.’

  ‘Good luck with that,’ Bill Samuels said. ‘Just thinking about the Peterson case makes my head hurt.’

  ‘I believe we have most of the pieces,’ Holly said, ‘but I don’t believe they’re all out on the table, even now. What I keep remembering – I’m sure you’ll think it’s silly – is that old saying about how Macy’s doesn’t tell Gimbels. But now Macy’s and Gimbels are both here—’

  ‘Not to mention Saks, Nordstrom’s, and Needless Markup,’ Howie said. Then, seeing Holly’s expression: ‘I’m not joshing you, Ms Gibney, I’m agreeing with you. Everything on the table. Who starts?’

  ‘Yune should,’ Anderson said. ‘Since I’m on administrative leave.’

  Yune put a briefcase on the table and took out his laptop. ‘Mr Gold, can you show me how to use the projection gadget?’

  Howie obliged, and Holly watched closely, so she would know how to do it herself when her turn came. Once the right cords were connected, Howie dimmed the lights a bit.

  ‘Okay,’ Yune said. ‘Apologies to you, Ms Gibney, if I’m beating you to some of the stuff you found out while you were in Dayton.’

  ‘Perfectly all right,’ Holly said.

  ‘I spoke with Captain Bill Darwin of the Dayton Police Department, and Sergeant George Highsmith of the Trotwood PD. When I told them we had a similar case, possibly connected by a stolen van that had been near both their crime scene and ours, they were willing to help, and thanks to the magic of telecommunication, I should have it all right here. If this gadget works, that is.’

  Yune’s desktop appeared on the screen. He clicked on a file marked HOLMES. The first image was that of a man in an orange county jail jumpsuit. He had short-cropped auburn hair and beard stubble on his cheeks. His eyes were slightly squinted, giving him a look that could have been sinister or simply stunned at the sudden turn his life had taken. Holly had seen the mug shot on the front page of the Dayton Daily News, April 30th issue.

  ‘This is Heath James Holmes,’ Yune said. ‘Thirty-four. Arrested for the murders of Amber and Jolene Howard. I have crime scene pictures of the girls, but won’t show them to you. You wouldn’t sleep. The mutilations are the worst I’ve ever seen.’

  Silence from the seven people watching. Jeannie was clutching her husband’s arm. Marcy was staring at Holmes’s photo as if mesmerized, with a hand over her mouth.

  ‘Other than a minor juvenile bust for joyriding in a stolen car and a couple of speeding tickets, Holmes’s record is squeaky clean. His twice-yearly work evaluations, first at Kindred Hospital and then at the Heisman Memory Unit, are excellent. Co-workers and patients spoke highly of him. There are comments like always friendly and genuinely caring and goes the extra mile.’

  ‘People said all those things about Terry,’ Marcy murmured.

  ‘Means nothing,’ Samuels protested. ‘People said the same things about Ted Bundy.’

  Yune continued. ‘Holmes told co-workers he planned to spend his one-week vacation with his mother in Regis, a small town thirty miles north of Dayton and Trotwood. Midway through his vacation week, the bodies of the Howard girls were discovered by a postman on his delivery rounds. The guy saw a huge flock of crows congregated at a ravine about a mile from the Howard home, and stopped to investigate. Given what he found, he probably wishes he hadn’t.’

  He clicked, and two little blond girls replaced Heath Holmes’s squint and stubble. The photo had been taken at a carnival or an amusement park; Holly could see a Tilt-a-Whirl in the background. Amber and Jolene were smiling and holding up cones of cotton candy like prizes.

  ‘No victim-blaming here, but the Howard girls were a handful. Alcoholic mother, father not in the picture, low-income home in a lousy neighborhood. The school had them tabbed as “at-risk students”, and they had skipped out on several occasions. Which they did on Monday, April 23rd, at about ten in the morning. It was Amber’s free period, and Jolene said she had to use the bathroom, so they probably planned it in advance.’

  ‘Escape from Alcatraz,’ Bill Samuels said.

  Nobody laughed.

  Yune continued. ‘They were seen shortly before noon in a little beer-and-grocery about five blocks from the school. This is a still, taken from the store’s surveillance camera.’

  The black-and-white image was crisp and clear – like something out of an old film n
oir, Holly thought. She stared at the two towheads, one with a couple of sodas and the other with a couple of candybars. They were dressed in jeans and tees. Neither looked pleased; the girl with the candybars was pointing, her mouth wide open and her brow furrowed.

  ‘The clerk knew they were supposed to be in school and wouldn’t sell to them,’ Yune said.

  ‘No kidding,’ Howie said. ‘You can almost hear the older one giving him hell.’

  ‘True,’ Yune said, ‘but that’s not the interesting part. Check out the upper right corner of the picture. On the sidewalk and looking in the window. Here, I’ll zoom it a little.’

  Marcy murmured something very softly. It might have been Christ.

  ‘It’s him, isn’t it?’ Samuels said. ‘It’s Holmes. Watching them.’

  Yune nodded. ‘That clerk was the last person to report seeing Amber and Jolene alive. But at least one more camera picked them up.’

  He clicked, and another photo from another surveillance camera came up on the screen at the front of the conference room. This one had its electronic eye trained on an island of gas pumps. The time-code in the corner said 12:19 PM, April 23rd. Holly thought this must be the photo her nurse informant had mentioned. Candy Wilson had guessed that the vehicle in it was probably Holmes’s truck, a Chevy Tahoe that was ‘all fancied up,’ but she had been wrong. The picture showed Heath Holmes in mid-stride, returning to a panel truck with DAYTON LANDSCAPING & POOLS printed on the side. His gas presumably paid for, he was returning to the vehicle with a soda in each hand. Leaning out the driver’s side window to take them was Amber, the older of the two Howard girls.

  ‘When was that truck stolen?’ Ralph asked.

  ‘April 14th,’ Yune said.