“I'm glad to hear it's not just me.”
“Nope, she's one of a kind, all right. I can't quite tell what it means, but she's certainly not your average woman.”
“But is she a murderer?”
“That's the question. I could read her a dozen different ways, and they'd all make sense. It's almost like she's a blank canvas upon which we can project whatever we want to think about her.”
“That could be dangerous.”
“For her, and for us.”
“I just hope the daughter isn't the same way. I don't think I could survive another one of them.”
* * *
Tory Hobbes was not her mother's daughter, not at all the steely, stoic creature she was born from. Unlike her mother, Tory was a free spirit, who let the winds of life push her in whatever direction they chose, not questioning where fate was taking her. Living for the moment was all that mattered to her, and she had set out to squeeze as much experience as possible from the time she had. Nothing was too crazy to try, no thought too mad to consider.
Detective Knox sat across the table from her, watching her fidget and twitch with the impatience of someone with too much living to do. Sitting still made her nervous, and that was comforting to him. This was familiar, what he expected.
“How are you feeling? You look nervous.”
“How am I supposed to be feeling? My father's dead, and I'm sitting in this drab little box. Just this room is enough to bring me down.”
Knox had never thought about the décor before, he never thought it an important detail. But hearing her comment, he couldn't help but be drawn to the oppressive beige that surrounded him, the aggressive blandness that absorbed and hid any sense of life within the walls. They did not reflect the reality of the circumstances the people sitting in that room were dealing with, and perhaps, he thought, they forced people into the wrong frame of mind to be cooperative.
“I understand this is a difficult time for you, but we need to ask you some questions.”
“Whatever. Let's just get it over with.”
“How would you describe your relationship with your father?”
Tory tilted her head to one side, as if shaking the dust off the gears as her mind struggled to move the pieces. She hadn't given much thought to how to describe her life. Giving freely of herself was easy, but prying details about anyone else from her was a different story. It was something Detective Knox could appreciate.
“Don't all kids have difficult relationships with their parents at my age?”
“You tell me.”
Frustration was building in her, not because of what she might say, but because she was feeling the itch to escape. She needed to be doing things, not talking about them. There was a whole world out there calling to her to act, and while she understood why she had to endure the interview, that didn't mean she had to be happy about it.
“I don't know what you want me to say. I can sit here and tell you everything was just fine between us, that we sat on a rainbow every afternoon and ate unicorn hearts, but you'd get as sick of the lie as I would.”
“So why not just tell me the truth?”
“No one wants to hear the truth.”
Knox found the remark funny, because it was, in a strange way, the truth. People, he had found, wanted to hear their own beliefs reaffirmed far more than they wanted to know what really happened. The truth could be an inconvenient reminder of their own fallibility, and while it sounded great in theory, in practice it was an elixir that stirred with the violent concoction of emotions we carry inside.
“That may be true, but tell me anyway.”
“Fine. The truth is that my father and I didn't get along. We hadn't for a very long time. He could never accept that I wasn't his little girl anymore, and he made no secret of the fact that I was an embarrassment to him, not that I cared. I wasn't about to start living my life to please him, so I'm not going to apologize for making myself happy first and foremost.”
“Nor should you.”
“Thank you. Anyway, he kept trying to get me to change my ways. He would threaten to cut off my inheritance, he'd lock me out of the house when I did something that really offended him, and he even tried to arrange a marriage for me. Who does that these days?”
“It sounds like your relationship was volatile.”
“Believe me, there were times I would have beaten him with a tire iron . . . if I hadn't been locked out of the house. But we're family, so once emotions cool down, you get over it.”
“So you didn't want your father dead last night?”
“Wait, are you thinking I might have killed him?”
Knox watched her closely, looking for a tell. Her disgust at the thought of killing her father looked real, but it registered more slowly than he would have expected. This may have been significant, or it could have been a side-effect of the hangover she was fighting to hide. He filed the information away, thinking it might make sense once the details began filling in.
“It sounds like you have a motive.”
“Maybe, but I also have an alibi.”
“And what's that?”
“I was working all last night.”
“And what do you do?”
“I'm a dancer.”
“Where do you dance? We'll need to verify your story.”
Her face changed, her shoulders slumping as the words made their way down her tongue. She wasn't embarrassed by what she did, but she knew judgment was always coming from the other side of the conversation. She was tired of being told what was good for her.
“I dance at the Electric Club. Yes, I'm a stripper.”
“You don't need to defend yourself.”
“No I don't. I'm an artist, I bare my soul.”
“You do know your soul isn't found under your clothes, don't you?”
“Do you enjoy dicking around with people in the midst of their grief?”
“My apologies.”
“See, there's your problem. You're never supposed to apologize for being who you are. If my father could have realized that, we wouldn't be sitting here with you thinking I might be responsible for his death.”
“People can be responsible without committing the act.”
“I know. It's the story of my life.”
* * *
Detective Knox walked away from this second interview more bewildered than before. The picture being painted of the Hobbes family was confusing, and shed little light on the unfortunate ending to George Hobbes' life. He hadn't expected a confession to pour out of anyone's mouth, but speaking to the family gave him no insight into the man at the center of the mystery. George Hobbes remained a shadow unconnected to a man, a specter talked about as though he never really existed.
It would have been easier, Knox thought, if that was the case. The ordeal would be more tolerable for everyone involved if they had dreamed the entire sordid nightmare. What Knox knew was that despite the lack of anything resembling a clue as to the mechanics of the murder, George Hobbes was as real as any of them, and he could not be so easily written out of their stories.
Detective Lane was also confused. He struggled to understand how a family could be so unflinching in their apathy towards a man's death. Even if they hated him, most people would try to put on an act of contrition, so as to take the prying eyes off of themselves. It was surely telling that they didn't care about how they were perceived, but Lane didn’t know what this meant. At least, he thought, Knox was also no closer to uncovering the truth. As long as they were both in the dark, he felt reassured that there was little he could do.
“That's two down, Knox. One more to go.”
“I wonder what we're going to get this time.”
“With our luck, another psychopath.”
Detective Lane pressed down with more force, cutting off his oxygen just long enough for his mind to clear, resetting the apparatus. Maybe, he thought, it would all make sense if he could shut down and look at what he knew through fresh
eyes. It was a futile hope, he knew, but one he patronized himself with regardless. He realized it was better to indulge himself in the unlikely event of a miracle occurring, as there really was no down side.
“All I know is I'm not sure how many more of these people I can talk to. There's something about all of them that is a little bit disturbing.”
“I think I know what you mean. You don't feel like you're talking to a human being.”
“Exactly.”
“Maybe that's the answer. The murder is so puzzling because it was committed by an alien, or a robot, or a demon.”
“As crazy as that sounds, I'd listen to anything that made sense.”
“Yeah. Well, let's get this over with.”
* * *
Emerson Hobbes was the prototypical child of privilege, overly confident, with an unwarranted sense of entitlement. Somewhere in his mind, he was convinced he was better than other people through no doing of his own, but simply by being who he was. To temper these thoughts, he didn't view it as his responsibility to cower to the resentment that came along with his bravado. If other people thought he was an arrogant prick, he took it as a compliment. No amount of criticism could dispel his self-belief.
Detective Knox sized him up, dreading the conversation he was about to have. Men like Emerson Hobbes were infuriating to deal with, as there was nothing redeeming about them. At least, Knox thought, talking to a psychopath would reveal bits of human psychology you rarely get a chance to experience up close. There was interesting material to be mined from people who are irrevocably broken or malformed in some manner. Men like Emerson Hobbes were merely crashing bores.
“Do we really have to have this conversation?”
Knox was already swallowing bile. He preferred to speak first, controlling the conversation, not out of a need for power, but as a way to limit his exposure to toxic personalities. By taking charge, he could ask yes or no questions, and not have to fight the urge to speak his mind.
“Yes, we really have to have this conversation. It's standard procedure when, you know, there's a murder to investigate.”
“You don't really need to solve it. We're all better off, so what's the harm in letting it slide?”
Normally, Detective Knox would have taken those words as proof of innocence, because no suspect would be so stupid as to ask to be let off the hook. Emerson Hobbes, however, was one of those people so caught up in his own importance that he may very well have believed murder was not a crime if he himself committed it.
“The harm is that if we don't catch the killer, you might be the next dead body I'm standing over. You wouldn't want that, would you?”
“Do you think I'm in danger?”
“It's too early to say. If you want to take the gamble, you can walk out right now. I'm not going to stop you.”
For the first time, a small crack appeared in Emerson Hobbes' persona. Despite his ability to slough off the usual slings and arrows, the idea that he might be the next victim of violence cut through his armor. The smile he had slathered on narrowed, his eyes no longer shining with mischievous wonder.
“When you put it that way, I see the merit of helping.”
“Good. Let's start by you telling me about your relationship with your father.”
“There's not much to say. I didn't see very much of him after the last time we fought. He couldn't come around to seeing things my way, and he threw me out until I learned to live by his rules.”
“That sounds frustrating.”
“It cramped my style a bit, I'll admit, but I always land on my feet. A guy like me can always find a warm bed to sleep in, if you get my drift.”
“You couldn't have enjoyed being a kept man.”
“I was no such thing.”
Knox had struck a nerve. The insinuation was the first sign of hesitation he had seen, and was at least a small drop of enjoyment he was glad to have wrung from an insufferable interview. At the very least, he thought, he was able to land a jab, if not draw blood.
“Have it your way, but that’s what it sounded like.”
“I was just doing what I needed to until my father gave me the money I deserved.”
“Or until he was dead.”
“So not only do I have to put up with your smears, now you're accusing me of killing my own father for his money.”
“It is a motive, isn't it?”
“Probably, but the joke's on you. I've got the best alibi you could ever hear.”
“I'm listening.”
“I was sitting downstairs in a cell. I got picked up for drunk driving, and I spent the whole night sobering up on a metal bench because no one would come bail me out.”
“And now you know why.”
Chapter 8
The Sacrament Of Caffeine
Detective Knox let out a sigh of relief, having dispatched his responsibilities. His interviews tested what little patience he had, which was not buoyed by the glints of useful information hiding in a small vein along the wall separating him from the truth. These efforts were always difficult, but became infuriating when the cat and mouse game was missing a player. Batting around a deceased foe was not Knox's idea of fun, though it was what he felt he was doing, spinning his wheels in search of anything to give him traction on the case.
Knox ignored his partner as he left the interrogation room, walking straight into the waiting arms of his warm addiction. Coffee, he hoped, would be able to calm the whirling dervish he kept bottled up inside. Reason was a powerful tool, but one not always equipped for the job. When problems made no sense, not being able to sidestep conventional thinking and find a new approach was a dangerous position to be in. Neglect had atrophied the creative side of Detective Knox's mind, and he realized it had been a mistake not to feed that beast every so often, if only to keep the muscles ready in case they were ever needed.
Detective Lane was impatient. He wanted to blurt out every thought running through his mind, but he knew better than to interrupt the sacrament of caffeine, though he couldn't help but manifest his displeasure by twitching his fingers. Knox took note, and slowed down accordingly. It was petty, but he couldn’t resist seizing the opportunity.
“If you're not going to say anything, I will.”
Lane broke the ice, his voice almost cracking as it finally escaped. Silence would get them nowhere, and for all he knew, his partner was testing his mettle. As he heard how his words sounded, he began to hope that was the case.
“Fine. What are you thinking?”
Relieved, Detective Lane found his confidence, and regained his standing. The details of the case tangled in his mind, knotted information so entwined he struggled to see how anyone could unravel it. Perhaps, he thought, the only way of straightening the pieces was to sever them, and reassemble the lines as he saw fit.
“I'm thinking that we've just interviewed the three most likely suspects, and we're not an inch closer to understanding what happened than when we started.”
“No, we're not.”
“Doesn't that bother you?”
“Of course it does, but you can't expect the answer to fall into your lap. There is an explanation for all of this, and we're going to find it, but you can't rush it.”
Detective Knox didn't believe a word of this. He needed to calm the panic that was evident in Lane, and the rest of the department, in the face of an insurmountable challenge. Knox had seen enough to know that not every riddle had a solution, that there was a very real chance that the killer would get away with murder, and they would remain forever haunted by the one that got away.
It was too early for Knox to make that call, but in the back of his mind he knew it was possible. Bracing for failure wasn't the same thing as expecting it, though they each fractured and fragmented the dim light of hope.
“I'm not talking about rushing, I just want to know that we have a lead, any lead, to start with. I don't see one.”
“I agree with you. We're staring at a whole lot of nothing righ
t now.”
“We have three suspects, all of whom I can see wanting the victim dead, but they all have air-tight alibis. No one who didn't know that house could have done it, but no one with the knowledge could have been there.”
“You're the one who got so excited when you saw the scene. This is exactly what you wanted.”
Detective Lane didn't need to be reminded of the grin he had worn, the Cheshire scar of a man who didn't know what abyss he was jumping into. Had he an inkling that they would have nothing to work with, his reaction would have been far less ebullient at the time. Remembering the child-like glee he felt, now that it had time to erode, it burned him from the inside out.
“Since you know better than I do, why don't you tell me what we're going to do about this mess?”
“First of all, we're not going to panic. You can't think when you panic, and if you can't think, you can't do your job. Secondly, we're going to talk to the coroner to see if there's anything about the body that can help us. If there is, we follow the evidence. If there isn't, we have to knock out one of the walls so we can think outside the box.”
“I like the box. It’s cozy in here.”
“I like it too. I'm hoping we can stay.”
* * *
Dr. Michael Morse was not what Detective Knox, nor anyone else, would have expected from someone who spent his life surrounded by the dead. He was a soft-spoken, good-natured man, who would have flourished in the job of mall Santa, if he were older and morbidly obese. The juxtaposition of him and the flayed bodies piled on his operating tables was a sight that made little sense, no matter how many times Knox ventured into the catacombs for information.
Detective Knox's first sight, as he opened the door, was an image he thought could only exist in the blackest of comedies. Dr. Morse knelt atop the table, over the body, his entire head stuck inside the hollowed cavity that was once its chest. A circle of yellow danced on the stretched skin, a flashlight searching out some hidden ore.
DARK CITY a gripping detective mystery Page 4