The Headsman

by James Neal Harvey

  Her boots and her ski jacket were in the back hall closet. She got them out and put them on, then took her car keys from the hook next to the door.

  Her grandmother looked at her. “Where you off to?”

  “Just out,” Karen said. “For a breath of air. Do you need anything?”

  “Nope. Did my shopping yesterday.”

  “Okay, back soon.” She went out the back door and down the snowy steps to the driveway.

  2

  Karen’s car was a gray Escort, bought at dealer cost from Boggs Ford. She took a broom out of the trunk and, after sweeping off the snow, got into the car and drove out to the address she’d seen in the paper. The roads had been cleared, and driving was no problem.

  The house was the type that was sometimes called an expanded cape, meaning one story with rooms added in what had been the attic. It had green shingle siding and white trim and needed paint. There was an apple tree in the side yard with a tire swing hanging from one of its lower limbs, and a couple of junky cars were parked in the driveway.

  The drive had been plowed out, and mounds of fresh snow were heaped on both sides. Pulling into it took all the courage she could muster. She parked her car behind the others and made her way to the house, following a shoveled path. When she got to the front door she hesitated, instinct telling her to turn around, go back to the car and get out of here, mind her own business. But as much as she wanted to, she didn’t do it. She knocked on the door.

  The woman who opened it probably wasn’t much older than Karen, but she already had that worn look you saw on wives who had borne too many children too fast and had worked too hard and worried too much and knew the future didn’t hold a lot to look forward to. She had on a cotton dress with a ratty sweater over it and her brown hair was tied in a bun. A tiny, half-naked child with a pacifier in its mouth was clinging to her leg and staring up at their visitor. The child appeared to be a boy, but it was hard to tell.

  “Are you Mrs. Mariski?”

  “Yes.”

  “My name is Karen Wilson. I—wanted to talk to you about your son. The one who’s missing?”

  “What about him?”

  “I think maybe I—” She had been about to say, “know where he is,” but she couldn’t put it that way. And besides, she wasn’t sure. “May I come in?”

  The woman moved aside, and Karen stepped past her, into the living room. Newspapers littered the shabby furniture, and toys and assorted debris lay on the floor. There was a bicycle leaning against one wall and the TV set had crayon streaks on the face of the tube. Another child, this one a girl a few years older than the little boy, came into the room, looked at Karen in surprise and ran out again.

  Mrs. Mariski closed the front door. She picked a pile of papers off a chair and added them to the heap on a table. “Sit down,” she said. “Take your coat?”

  “No, thank you.” Karen sank onto the chair and unzipped her jacket.

  Mrs. Mariski pushed more papers aside on the sofa and sat on it, the child still clutching her leg. “What about Michael?”

  Karen had thought about how she’d handle this, but now she couldn’t get the words out. Or at least have them make sense without her sounding like some kind of a nut. Which was probably how she’d be seen anyway. She took a deep breath. “I’m really sorry about your son. But I think I might be able to help find him.”

  “How?”

  “I—have some ideas as to what might have happened to him.”

  “What kind of ideas?”

  “Did he ever go skating after school?”

  “Oh, lord. We went all over that with the police. Right now he don’t even have skates. He had a pair, but he outgrew them. And he never cared much about skating anyhow.”

  “Is there a pond near here?”

  It might have been the intensity in Karen’s voice. Whatever it was, Mrs. Mariski glanced at her curiously. Then she turned her head toward the rear of the house and yelled, “Phil? Come in here, will you?”

  She turned back to Karen. “I want my husband to hear this.”

  A moment later a man came into the room. He was dark-skinned, with receding black hair. There was a beard shadow on his jaw, and he was dressed in blue work pants and a gray shirt. Mrs. Mariski introduced him to Karen and he sat down beside his wife on the sofa.

  “She says she knows something about Michael,” Mrs. Mariski said.

  Philip Mariski looked at Karen. “You know where he is?” The way he asked the question made it sound aggressive.

  “No. That is, I just thought—maybe I could help.”

  His expression turned to one of suspicion. “What makes you think so?”

  “I—intuition, maybe.”

  “You from around here?”

  “I work at Boggs Ford,” Karen said, knowing how irrelevant that sounded. But she wouldn’t try to explain what had led her to come here; that would only make it worse. “I was asking Mrs. Mariski if your son ever went skating.”

  “I told her Michael don’t have skates,” Mrs. Mariski said.

  Mariski cocked his head as he looked at Karen. “Okay, so what’s the point?”

  “Is there a pond near here?”

  “No.”

  Karen’s heart sank. You damned fool, she berated herself.

  “There’s Kretchmer’s,” Mrs. Mariski said.

  Her husband glanced at her impatiently. “That’s a couple miles away.”

  “Did he ever go over there?” Karen asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Mariski said.

  “Do you know the pond well?” she persisted.

  “Yeah, I guess so. I know where it is, been by it enough times. But if you think he was fooling around over there, forget it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because old man Kretchmer’s been known to chase kids with a shotgun. Michael wouldn’t go anywhere near the place.”

  Karen again felt foolish. But she’d come this far, and maybe there was a chance. “So you know what it looks like?”

  “It’s a pond,” he said. “That’s all—a pond beside a pasture. Kretchmer uses it to water his cows.”

  “Would you show it to me? Drive over there with me?”

  Mariski continued to hold his dark eyes on her. He was quiet for a few seconds. “Look, lady. I don’t know you, and I don’t know why you’re here. Our son’s lost, and we been out of our minds worrying. We got everybody looking for him. Cops, Boy Scouts, you name it. If you’re guessing he fell in a pond, I think you’re wrong.” His voice rose. “But if you know something about where he is, for Christ’s sake, tell us.”

  The child holding onto Mrs. Mariski’s leg began to cry and she shushed him.

  “I don’t know,” Karen said. Her voice grew small. “I just think I might have an idea.”

  Before Mariski could respond, his wife said, “Go with her, Philip. She wants to see it, take her over there.”

  He looked as if he might let go with another outburst, but instead he abruptly stood up. “All right, you want to go, come on.”

  He put on a mackinaw and they went in Karen’s car, Mariski directing her along the narrow, freshly plowed roads. Except for telling her which way to turn, he said nothing. The sun was high now, its rays reflecting brilliantly from the drifts and the snow-blanketed fields.

  The pond was as he’d said, simply a small body of water in a low place beside rolling pasture land. Karen parked the Escort on the road and she and Mariski got out of the car.

  The pond was about fifty yards away, its surface glistening under a coat of white. At one end was a haphazardly built stone wall. Karen raised her hand to shield her eyes from the sun’s glare and peered up the slope on the far side of the pond.

  Standing on the crest, as she’d known it would be, was an old barn. Its snow-covered roof sagged, and its weathered sides showed traces of red paint. Part of the wall at one end had collapsed from rot.

  Karen looked at the barn and then back at the pond. She turned to Philip
Mariski. “I think,” she said, “you ought to tell the police to look in there.”

  3

  The photograph in the newspaper was a good likeness of Marcy Dickens, but her face in the picture only faintly resembled what it had looked like the last time he saw her. Here she was bright-eyed and happy, her mouth stretched in a dazzling smile, the set of her chin exuding confidence. A perfectly content, dumb little bitch.

  What he remembered were those same features twisted into a mask of fear. The eyes had bulged out then, so that he could see the whites all the way around the pupils. The lips had been drawn back, but to express horror, not joy. And the mouth had been wide open, to release the screams.

  The headsman studied the picture for a long time. It was pleasurable for him to look at it, because it helped him relive the moment when she had lain helpless on the floor at his feet and watched him raise the ax. It brought back the excitement, the sense of power, the thrill when steel met flesh, when that white throat became a burst of crimson.

  And then, finally, looking at it returned to him the exquisite sense of fulfillment.

  Later he used a razor blade to cut out the photograph. Not all of it; he sliced away only the head. Then he tacked the scrap of paper onto a board above the secret place where he kept the ax. He contemplated it, pleased by the way it looked against the old, hand-planed slab of chestnut.

  The photograph wasn’t as satisfying as the girl’s head itself would have been, but it would do for now. He’d had a good reason for leaving the head in her room after he’d executed her.

  It had had precisely the effect he’d wanted.

  4

  When Jud awakened, the first thing he was conscious of was the smell of bacon frying and coffee perking. The second was the sound of Linda Ronstadt coming from the radio in the kitchen. He got out of bed and stretched, then went to the bathroom. When he came out he put on his robe and followed his nose and his ears.

  Sally was at the stove, scrambling a pan of eggs. She was fully dressed, wearing the white blouse and the checked skirt she’d had on the day before. She looked up as he approached and smiled at the expression of disappointment on his face.

  He drew her into his arms. “Is it that obvious?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, you don’t have to be in such a damn hurry.”

  “Sorry, Chief. I’ve got work to do.”

  “Um.” He kissed her nose and sat down at the table. Usually when they’d spent the night together they’d have breakfast and then go back to bed for a time, especially on a Sunday. No matter how good it had been the night before, making love the following morning was even better. But here she was, all ready to go. He decided she was getting too ambitious.

  A minute later she set a plate of bacon, eggs and toast in front of him, along with a mug of coffee. She sat opposite him and raised her own mug. “Cheers.”

  “Aren’t you going to eat anything?”

  “I had a piece of toast.”

  He ground fresh pepper onto his eggs and took a bite, realizing as he did that he was ravenous. Which was nothing new; he was hungry most of the time, and breakfast was his favorite meal. Or one of them, anyway.

  The eggs were delicious. He looked at her. “That isn’t enough for you.”

  She sipped her coffee. “It is if I want to keep my figure.”

  That wasn’t something he wanted to argue about, and anyway, it was too early in the morning to think of a snappy rejoinder. “What’s all this work you’ve got?”

  “I have to write another piece for tomorrow’s edition.”

  “More about the headsman?”

  “More about the Dickens murder. But sure, I’ll refer to the headsman.”

  He groaned.

  Sally put her cup down. “Jud, there are a couple of things you just have to accept. As terrible as this case is, it’s also a great opportunity for me. I’ve tried to explain how I feel about it, and you said you understood.”

  “Yeah, I know. I just wish you’d tone down the part about the headsman.”

  “That may be how you feel, but there’s also another way of looking at it.”

  “Which is?”

  “Which is that the newspaper business is just like any other. If you want to succeed, you have to compete. Can you imagine a story about the murder that didn’t touch on that angle?”

  Grudgingly he admitted he couldn’t.

  “And can you imagine what the out-of-town papers will be doing with it?”

  “Yeah, I suppose I can.”

  “I promise you, they’ll make their coverage as lurid as possible. And those papers are all for sale here in Braddock too, right alongside our hard-charging little Express.”

  “So?”

  “So I’m going to do the best job I can. If I didn’t, Maxwell would put somebody else on it, or else he’d write the stuff himself. And I’ll give him that much—he knows how to sell newspapers.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s another reason why I dug out the clips on that old Donovan murder. I’ll bet my story is the only one that hits on it. And every bit of a competitive edge will help.”

  “All right,” he mumbled, “you made your point.” He shoveled more eggs into his mouth and spooned blackberry jam onto his toast.

  She watched him eat for a moment, and then stood up. “I’ve really got to go. I’ll try to call you later.”

  He got to his feet, wiping his mouth with a paper napkin. “See you tonight?”

  “I don’t think so. There’s too much going on.” She put on her coat and slung her bag over her shoulder.

  “Sally?”

  “Yes?”

  He stepped close and again put his arms around her. “Last night was great.”

  “Can I quote you?”

  He grinned. “On that, sure. But not on anything else.”

  She kissed him lightly. “Chief, you’re too much.”

  And then she was gone.

  5

  When he finished his breakfast he put his dishes into the dishwasher and turned it on. Then he went into the bathroom and shaved and showered. Less than ten minutes later he was dressed and the bed was made, a trick he’d learned in his army days. He strapped on his gunbelt and put on his jacket and cap and left the cottage.

  The fresh snow was several inches deep and his driveway hadn’t yet been plowed, although he had a standing deal with the Exxon station on Water Street to get to him first after a storm. For a moment he thought about using his own car, a Chevy Blazer that was parked in the shed. But there were snow tires on the cruiser, and after he’d swept off the car he had no trouble backing out. Obviously Sally had had no difficulty either. On the way to headquarters the town looked like a Christmas card, clean and white and with the tree branches bending under the new-fallen snow.

  When he entered the stationhouse he saw that Pearson and his corporal were already there, occupying the office Jud had turned over to them. A couple of uniformed state troopers were in with them as he passed, and so were two of the men Jud had lent them. He didn’t stop to chat; if the inspector needed anything Jud would hear about it soon enough. He went to the coffee urn in the locker room and poured himself a steaming cup, then walked to his own office.

  The usual stack of reports lay on his desk. He looked at the pile of paper with distaste and, after hanging his jacket and cap on a peg, sat down and leafed through the reports. These were carbons of officers’ handwritten write-ups of the previous day’s activities. The formal versions, typed into the computer by a clerk, would be printed and distributed later and Jud would never look at them. It was a part of the job he detested, knowing that if he did it all by the book he’d spend most of his time drowning in a sea of paper.

  He was always intensely interested to know what was going on, but he would much rather have gotten his information verbally from the cops involved. Which of course wasn’t always possible. So he scanned the carbons and grumbled, thinking to himself that if a small-town ope
ration like this was bad, what must a big one be like? After reading each report he jotted his initials on it and then dropped it into his out-box.

  The reports were predictable. On a stormy Saturday night you got the exact opposite of a clear one: fewer altercations in public places, more domestic disputes in private homes. And far more accidents on the roads. There had been plenty of those, most of them of the minor-damage-and-slight injury variety. One had been serious, however; a truck had turned over on Deer Hill and the driver’s legs had been crushed. But there had been nothing the police couldn’t handle. If there had been, he would have been called during the night.

  The door opened, and he looked up to see Joe Grady entering the office, carrying a load of Sunday newspapers. Grady was stocky and red-faced, and his heavy black brows made him look as if he were perpetually scowling. He’d made sergeant years before Jud joined the force, which undoubtedly had a lot to do with the resentment toward the chief he managed only partially to hide.

  Grady laid the newspapers on Jud’s desk. “You seen these?”

  “No.”

  “The shit really hit the fan. Look at this stuff.” Grady pointed to the one on top, the front page of the Braddock Express.

  Jud saw Sally’s byline almost as soon as he saw the headline. He read through the story quickly. Just as she’d told him, she’d played up the headsman angle heavily, and there were references to the Donovan case.

  Included in the stack were papers from other cities as well, including Syracuse, Albany and Binghamton. He didn’t read all the coverage, but he got enough from the headlines and the lead paragraphs to see that they’d treated the story pretty much the same way. Reporters must all be stamped out of the same mold, he thought. And then felt a twinge of guilt as Sally returned to his mind. Just as she’d predicted, hers was the only piece that referred to the old Donovan murder.

  He shoved the stack away and sat back in his chair, looking up at Grady. The shadow of an ironic smile was playing about the sergeant’s mouth. “Nothing turned up around the Dickens house?” Jud asked.