“I see,” I said. Grace was walking a little bit ahead of us, nose to the ground.
“It’ll work! Just think about it! Me, a kid, catching a killer! It’ll be all over the news! It’ll be in the papers! I’ll be a hero! Maybe they’ll even make a radio show about me! Or a movie!”
“That could very well happen,” I said. “But I think you should investigate this the old fashioned way. Watch Doug very carefully. Write things down. Just…whatever you do…don’t go into his house by yourself. And for God’s sake, don’t break into his place!”
To the best of my knowledge, my little pep talk had an affect on Allison. She proceeded to take my advice. Over the next week, she watched Doug very casually. She reported his comings and goings to me. It was nothing unusual. To be truthful, the actions of everybody except for Susan and Jack was very normal. The Greene family had their jobs outside the home, their daughters attended high school and the oldest one dropped out to endure her pregnancy; Cathy went away to visit her parents one weekend and took the kids with her, leaving Jack by himself—he had me over to the house for a game of gin rummy one evening, and the following day he went out with a physician friend of his who came to pay a visit. Joyce usually came home late from her job, then went inside to talk to her cats. And Susan and James would laugh and carry on outside as if they were the only ones that existed.
And sometimes Susan would whack Allison around. I heard it from my house late at night. Twice I picked up the phone to call the police, and both times Ellen stopped me and told me what would happen if they came.
That October, the New Castle Butcher struck again.
It was one week into Allison’s self-imposed surveillance of Doug. The dismembered and decapitated body of a hobo was found in the woods, about fifty yards from the railroad tracks that wound through the area. The stretch of woods this latest victim was found in was commonly used as a trash heap, and was accessible through a dirt road from one of the secondary roads.
Once again, the town was buzzing with gossip when word got out. The victim’s head was not found with the body. There was no blood anywhere near the crime scene; in fact, the body was completely drained of blood. In short order, the Pennsylvania State Police were overrunning the town, and a detective from Cleveland came to visit, sniffing for a possible connection with their still-elusive killer. Despite the arrest of Frank Dolezal that summer, and his confession, this detective wasn’t so sure the case against him was that solid.
And it was in the midst of the investigation that the police came to call on me.
* * *
It was a week before Hallowe’en. I was upstairs in my study, working. I didn’t hear the knock on the front door, didn’t hear Ellen talking to the men at the front porch. She came upstairs and knocked lightly at the door before letting herself in. “Robert,” she said, a concerned look on her face. “There are some policemen here to see you.”
Curious, I went downstairs. Two uniformed officers greeted me in the living room. They introduced themselves as Officer Short and Officer Lee. Both were a good ten years older than me, big barrel-chested men. They got right to the point. “We received a complaint from your neighbor, Ms. Susan Kenyon, about your relationship with her daughter.”
I must admit, I didn’t know what they were talking about. “What about my relationship with Allison Kenyon?”
The officers were watching my behavior closely. “Why don’t we start things by you answering a few questions for us.”
That evening I lived a nightmare. To be accused of such a heinous crime…to be branded as guilty by the look in their eyes as they questioned me…I can still see it in my mind all these years later. Their tones were gruff, accusatory. They asked me about my evening routine, my relationship with Allison, what we did, where we walked, what we talked about. I told them the truth. Well, of course I left out the part about Allison believing Doug was really the New Castle Butcher, that Allen had procured the earlier victims for him to sustain his thirst for blood and that Doug was now forced to seek his own victims. To be honest, as strange a man Doug was, I had a hard time believing he’d be capable of these crimes, despite what I’d seen. I would have denied that we’d had problems with Susan, would have lied and said they were perfect neighbors just to get myself out of whatever mess they were trying to rope me into, but Ellen wouldn’t have it. The minute she heard what I was being accused of, she rushed to my defense.
“My Robert would never do that! We’ve done nothing but help that child while Susan does nothing but verbally and physically abuses her own daughter and mother!”
It was obvious after only ten minutes of questioning that whatever Susan Kenyon had accused me of was not true. “We have a record of all the calls from your home and your other neighbors about the situation at the Kenyon home,” Officer Lee said. “And we’re aware of the situation at that house.”
Ellen was having none of it. She was still angry. “And despite that, you still accused my husband of—”
Officer Lee cut her off. “We had to follow up, ma’am. With your husband’s past record, we had to.”
“My past record has nothing to do with crimes against children and you know it!” I shouted angrily.
The argument got heated there for a moment. It was Ellen and I against the law. I felt like I was eighteen again, on the wrong side of the law, arguing my innocence, this time for something I really didn’t do. “I bet if you poke into Susan Kenyon’s background, you’ll find she’s been tossed in the joint a time or two as well. She’s no princess, Officer. Believe me, she ain’t.”
“For what it’s worth, Miss Kenyon has no criminal record,” Officer Lee said. He fixed me with that patented cop stare. “But we are aware of the dynamics there and the severity of the complaints that have been raised. Despite that, Miss Kenyon made the call because she was concerned that her daughter spends a lot of time with you, and her behavior has changed drastically in the last few weeks.”
“Changed?” I asked, alarmed at this news. “How?”
“She avoids talking to her mother and grandmother,” Officer Lee continued. “She’s moody. She shuts herself up in her room when they stay with Linda, refuses to talk. Her appetite is bad. Miss Kenyon is concerned. She thinks you’ve been…well, you know.”
Of course I knew. That unspoken implication was loud and clear. These days, child molestation is talked about more openly, but back then it was something people didn’t talk about. It was a grave thing, to be sure, and if it was reported to the police, they took it seriously. Back then, however, it was hardly ever reported. “Have you talked to Allison?” I asked.
Officer Short nodded. “Yes, we did. We questioned her separately, away from her mother. She denied that you hurt her in any way, much less forced yourself on her.” He shrugged. “It was hard to read her. Officer Lee and I both felt she was hiding something. We thought she was trying to cover up for you.”
“Oh for God’s sakes!” Ellen exclaimed, throwing her hands up in despair. “That is about the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard!”
I could tell that Officer Lee and Officer Short didn’t buy my innocence one hundred percent. The doubt was obvious in their gaze, which never left me. I refused to back down and met their gaze with a grim determination of my own. “Allison denies it, I deny it, it didn’t happen,” I growled. “You want to investigate crimes against a child, haul her worthless mother in. She’s just trying to get back at me for a confrontation we had this past summer anyway. That’s all this is, a pathetic attempt at a warning for her to not mess with her and let her continue yelling her foul mouth off at all times of the day, and to turn a blind eye when she slaps and punches her daughter and mother silly. You want to know why they won’t press charges? Because they’re scared! They know that the moment Susan gets out of jail, they’ll be hurt a hell of a lot worse.”
“You can’t know that, Mr. Brennan,” Officer Lee said.
“No, I don’t know that, but I feel it.” I regarded bo
th officers calmly, my gut churning. Maybe this was my chance to say my piece on the situation. “Susan’s behavior is destructive and dangerous. She drinks herself into a stupor every night, and if she’s in a mood, her daughter and mother suffer for it. Ellen and I have heard her verbally abuse them, physically strike them, and downright terrorize them. Every time the police are called, neither Linda nor Allison press charges because they’re afraid of what will happen to them. It’s the same fear a battered wife feels when she refuses to press charges against her abusive husband. What makes this worse are the people Susan takes company with. I’ve seen the friends she brings home, and they’re no better than her.”
“Pretty much like the gang you used to hang around with, Mr. Brennan?” Officer Lee said.
I gave him a piercing glare and ignored the comment. “These mugs are worse. And that child is living in that kind of environment!”
“I take it she doesn’t go to school?” Officer Lee asked.
“No, she doesn’t,” I said. Ellen and I traded a glance. “When we moved in, Linda told us Allison was pulled out of school to work the carnie circuit with her mother. They travel around a lot, even during the off season.”
Officer Lee and Short nodded. “I don’t think I’m out of line by giving you a piece of advice, Mr. Brennan,” Officer Short said. “This is a serious accusation. In accordance with the law, had Allison verified her mother’s accusations, we’d be placing you in handcuffs by now. Do you understand?”
I nodded, my heart pounding. I was beginning to feel the release of adrenalin from knowing I had been spared a horrendous trip to the New Castle jail and a possible long prison sentence, not to mention the worse fate that would await me there. I’ve taken enough short trips inside to know what happens to men who have their way with little girls. “Yes, I do.”
“Allison didn’t entirely convince me that something was going on between the two of you,” Officer Short said. “She denied her mother’s accusations pretty vehemently. But Officer Lee and myself detected that she was hiding something.”
“I don’t know what that would be,” I said. For the life of me, this stumped me. There was nothing secret about what Allison and I had been doing—all we did was walk Grace around town. What was there to hide? Did she not want to talk about her sneaking around Doug Tinker’s home? That she had confided her theory to me?
“When we asked her what the two of you talked about, she clammed up pretty tight,” Officer Lee said. “When she finally did talk, she gave vague answers. It was clear she didn’t want to talk about the nature of your conversations. She admitted she accompanies you on a lot of walks through town, which you verified. You ask me, your relationship with her is rather close.”
I said nothing. There was nothing I could say. They were absolutely correct. If Susan had gotten to Allison prior to making her horrendous accusations against me and been successful in persuading her to back up her charges, I’d be in very deep trouble. It would not matter if I could gather enough supporters to bolster my side. The circumstantial evidence was very much against me. True, nobody would have seen anything inappropriate; but the right persuasion could have made people see things differently. And the outcome would not be in my favor.
Much like they hadn’t been in favor for Allen Tinker five years ago.
I thought about this as I listened to Officer Short. “I suggest you steer clear of Allison Kenyon.” He put his cap on. “Mind your own business. If things get bad over there, call us. But if I were you, I wouldn’t let that girl accompany you on walks through the neighborhood again. I also would not let her on your property again, even to play with your dog.”
“Yes, Officers,” I said. They were right. Things would have to change drastically.
After they left, it felt like a tremendous sense of pressure had been taken off me. I sank into the sofa, feeling relieved. Ellen sat beside me, her features a mask of worry and anger. “What are we going to do?” she admonished, wringing her hands together in a fit of desperation.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m going to have to…well…Allison is not going to be able to come over and play with Grace, that’s for sure. And no more letting her come with me on walks. That’s over. Finished.”
“This is just so horrible!”
We talked about it more that night. I felt guilt from all ends; from Ellen for exposing myself to this type of accusation, but most of all from Allison in the sense that her mother’s tactic had worked. I would no longer be able to help her. Susan Kenyon had driven away the only support her daughter had, and that was Ellen and myself. The girl would be left on her own, to sink and drown in the cesspool that was Susan Kenyon’s world of drunks and degenerates, the flotsam and jetsam that came in and out of her life.
Chapter Six:
Shopping for Death
In the weeks that followed, whenever I left the house to take Grace for a walk, Allison would immediately go inside Linda’s house if she were outside. I did my best to ignore the Kenyon family as I moved forward in my life, continuing my work as a pulp writer. As if sensing her move against me had been successful, Susan Kenyon displayed an annoying sense of bravado in our presence. When James was over, the two of them appeared to go out of their way to provoke a reaction from us, even going so far as to initiating a physical altercation with Allison. That altercation led to Allison fleeing the house in tears, tearing off down the street. Ellen and I could only sit in our living room in shocked silence, the sounds of Susan and James laughing echoing from next door. I thought Allison would take this opportunity to run away for good or, at the very least, run to the police station and report the incident. Neither happened.
One night in early November, I was in the garage working on the car. I owned a 1930 Model A Tudor Ford, and I enjoyed tinkering with it. Jack Henderson was with me. He was leaning against the workbench, and the two of us were chatting idly about our families, our work, and the latest in the news. It was raining outside, and Ellen and Grace were in the house. I was humming a Tommy Dorsey tune when I heard the side door to the garage open, followed by Allison’s voice. “Mr. Brennan?”
I quickly got up, bracing myself for something, anything. Allison was standing by the side door, looking nervous. Jack remained where he was by my workbench. I hadn’t told him yet about the accusations Susan had levied against me; I was still embarrassed and angry about that. “Yes, Allison, what do you want?”
“I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry for everything,” Allison said. It looked like she’d been crying earlier. Her eyes were red, her cheeks damp.
“That’s okay,” I said. “But you know it isn’t a good idea for you to be here.”
“My mother’s passed out,” Allison said. “She’s so bad now, she does that every day. Just passes out in her room, sometimes on the floor, in all that junk and trash.” Allison’s face screwed up in disgust. “You should see her room. It’s a pigsty! My grammy never cleans it when we’re gone!”
“I’m sure it is,” I said. I cast a quick glance at Jack, who was noting all this with curiosity. I looked over at Allison, nodding at her. “But I still think you need to get going.”
Allison looked down at the floor for a moment. When she looked back up at me, I could see she was starting to cry again. “Every time I try to run away from my mother, she catches me. Her and James…I hate him. He has a thing for Germany now. Says Hitler is doing the right thing. I hate him so much!”
“What does your mother and James do to you?” Jack asked.
Allison told us. What she revealed was horrendous. Unspeakable. She spoke of unbelievable torture endured at the hands of her mother and James. Beatings. Being tied up, gagged, her bonds fastened with pulleys and chains and dangled from the ceiling in Linda’s basement, as well as the dingy rooms of back alley torture chambers where other perverts watched with mounting pleasure. I could go on, but you should have sufficient imagination to get the complete picture. I didn’t think such things existed, but they did
. They did to her what was depicted on the covers of some of the shudder pulps I wrote for. They hurt her in such ways that they would never leave visible marks on her. During her narrative, she pulled up her shirt a little bit to show us a jagged, healing scar that zigzagged across her torso. I sucked in my breath at the site of it. The thought of the elusive New Castle Butcher came to mind. Was James the vicious killer detectives had been searching for all along?
“Does James spend a lot of time in Cleveland?”
“Sometimes,” Allison admitted. “He and my mother go there a lot. They like to drink in the bars there.
“He’s homeless?” Jack asked. He was rubbing his chin, as if contemplating everything.
“Yes, sir,” Allison said.
“What about Linda, your grandmother?” I asked. I was trying to put everything together, wondering if what I was thinking was possible.
Allison looked like she was going to cry again. “My grammy…she doesn’t do anything because…she’s afraid!” She cried softly, and told me more of what had been going on. How her mother kept her tied up most days in Linda’s basement; how she rented her out to some of she and James’ carnie friends; how Allison tried to escape one time and made it as far as the New Castle town limits before the police picked her up. “My mother called the police, told them I’d beat my grandmother up.” She looked at me and Jack, her eyes seeming to say, you’ve got to believe me! “Of course I didn’t do it! My mother did that herself! Then she blamed me for it and my mother…she had my Grammy so scared she…my Grammy is just crazy now. She doesn’t know what to believe. She actually thinks I beat on her, that I’m in on all this with my mother! She thinks she deserves all this for what she did, leaving my grandfather all those years ago, tearing the family apart.”Another burst of heavy sobs.
Jack and I exchanged another glance again.
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