Koontz, Dean R. - Mr. Murder

by Dean Koontz

  precisely grasping the detective's ludicrous interpretation of Marty's

  crime report, the source of his antagonism. She had the temper in the

  family, and since Marty was barely able to keep from striking the cop,

  he wondered what Paige's reaction would be when Lowbock made his idiotic

  suspicions explicit.

  "It must help a career to be profiled in People magazine," the detective

  continued. "And I guess when Mr. Murder himself becomes the target of a

  muy misterioso killer, then you'll get a lot more free publicity in the

  press, and just at a crucial turning point in your career."

  Paige jerked in her chair as if she'd been slapped.

  Her reaction drew Lowbock's attention. "Yes, Mrs. Stillwater?"

  "You can't actually believe . .."

  "Believe what, Mrs. Stillwater?"

  "Marty isn't a liar."

  "Have I said he is?"

  "He loathes publicity."

  "Then they must have been quite persistent at People."

  "Look at his neck, for Christ's sake! The redness, swelling, it'll be

  covered with bruises in a few hours. You can't believe he did that to

  himself."

  Maintaining a maddening pretense of objectivity, Lowbock said, "Is that

  what you believe, Mrs. Stillwater?"

  She spoke between clenched teeth, saying what Marty felt he couldn't

  allow himself to say, "You stupid ass."

  Raising his eyebrows and looking stricken, as if he couldn't imagine

  what he'd done to earn such enmity, Lowbock said, "Surely, Mrs.

  Stillwater, you realize there are people out there, a world of cynics,

  who might say that attempted strangulation is the safest form of assault

  to fake. I mean, stabbing yourself in the arm or leg would be a

  convincing touch, but there's always the danger of a slight

  miscalculation, a nicked artery, then suddenly you find yourself

  bleeding a lot more seriously than you'd intended. And as for

  selfinflicted gunshot wounds--well, the risk is even higher, what with

  the possibility that a bullet might ricochet off a bone and into deeper

  flesh, and there's always the danger of shock."

  Paige bolted to her feet so abruptly that she knocked over her chair.

  "Get out."

  Lowbock blinked at her, feigning innocence long past the point of

  diminishing returns. "Excuse me?"

  "Get out of my house," she demanded. "Now."

  Although Marty realized they were throwing away their last slim hope of

  winning over the detective and gaining police protection, he also got up

  from his chair, so angry that he was trembling. "My wife is right.

  I think you and your men better leave, Lieutenant."

  Remaining seated because to do so was a challenge to them, Cyrus Lowbock

  said, "You mean, leave before we finish our investigation?"

  "Yes," Marty said. "Finished or not."

  "Mr. Stillwater . . . Mrs. Stillwater . . . you do realize that it's

  against the law to file a false crime report?"

  "We haven't filed a false report," Marty said.

  Paige said, "The only fake in this room is you, Lieutenant. You do

  realize that it's against the law to impersonate a police officer?"

  It would have been satisfying to see Lowbock's face color with anger, to

  see his eyes narrow and his lips tighten at the insult, but his

  equanimity remained infuriatingly unshaken.

  As he got slowly to his feet, the detective said, "If the blood samples

  taken from the upstairs carpet are, say, only pig's blood or cow's blood

  or anything like that, the lab will be able to determine the exact

  species, of course."

  "I'm aware of the analytic powers of forensic science," Marty assured

  him.

  "Oh, yes, that's right, you're a mystery writer. According to People

  magazine, you do a great deal of research for your novels."

  Lowbock closed his notebook, clipped his pen to it.

  Marty waited.

  "In your various researches, Mr. Stillwater, have you learned how much

  blood is in the human body, say in a body approximately the size of your

  own?"

  "Five liters."

  "Ah. That's correct." Lowbock put the notebook on top of the plastic

  bag containing the leather case of lock picks. "At a guess, but an

  educated guess, I'd say there's somewhere between one and two liters of

  blood soaked into the upstairs carpet. Between twenty and forty percent

  of this look-alike's entire supply, and closer to forty unless I miss my

  guess. You know what I'd expect to find along with that much blood, Mr.

  Stillwater? I'd expect to find the body it came from, because it really

  does stretch the imagination to picture such a grievously wounded man

  being able to flee the scene."

  "I've already told you, I don't understand it either."

  "Muy misterioso," Paige said, investing those two words with a measure

  of scorn equal to the mockery with which the detective had spoken them

  earlier.

  Marty decided there was at least one good thing about this mess, the way

  Paige had not doubted him for an instant, even though reason and logic

  virtually demanded doubt, the way she stood beside him now, fierce and

  resolute. In all the years they had been together, he had never loved

  her more than at that moment.

  Picking up the notebook and the evidence bag, Lowbock said, "If the

  blood upstairs proves to be human blood, that raises all sorts of other

  questions that would require us to finish the investigation whether or

  not you'd prefer to be rid of us. Actually, whatever the lab results,

  you'll be hearing from me again."

  "We'd simply adore seeing you again," Paige said, the edge gone from her

  voice, as if suddenly she ceased to see Lowbock as a threat and could

  not help but view him as a comic figure.

  Marty found her attitude infecting him, and he realized that with him,

  as with her, this sudden dark hilarity was a reaction to the unbearable

  tension of the past hour. He said, "By all means, drop by again."

  "We'll make a nice pot of tea," Paige said.

  "And scones."

  "Crumpets."

  "Tea cakes."

  "And by all means, bring the wife," Paige said. "We're quite

  broad-minded. We'd love to meet her even if she is of another species."

  Marty was aware that Paige was perilously close to laughing out loud,

  because he was close to it himself, and he knew their behavior was

  childish, but he required all of his self-control not to continue making

  fun of Lowbock all the way out the front door, driving him backward with

  jokes the way that Professor Von Helsing might force Count Dracula to

  retreat by brandishing a crucifix at him.

  Strangely, the detective was disconcerted by their frivolity as he had

  never been by their anger or by their earnest insistence that the

  intruder had been real. Visible self-doubt took hold of him, and he

  looked as if he might suggest they sit down and start over again.

  But self-doubt was a weakness unfamiliar to him, and he could not

  sustain it for long.

  Uncertainty quickly gave way to his familiar smug expression, and he

  said, "We'll be taking the look-alike's Heckler and Koch, as well as

  your guns, of course, un
til you can produce the paperwork that I

  requested."

  For a terrible moment, Marty was sure that they had found the Beretta in

  the kitchen cupboard and the Mossberg shotgun under the bed upstairs, as

  well as the other weapons, and were going to leave him defenseless.

  But Lowbock listed the guns and mentioned only three, "The Smith and

  Wesson, the Korth thirty-eight, and the M16."

  Marty tried not to let his relief show.

  Paige distracted Lowbock by saying, "Lieutenant, are you ever going to

  get the fuck out of here?"

  The detective finally could not prevent his face from tightening with

  anger. "You can certainly hurry me along, Mrs. Stillwater, if you would

  repeat your request in the presence of two other officers."

  "Always worrying about those lawsuits," Marty said.

  Paige said, "Happy to oblige, Lieutenant. Would you like me to phrase

  the request in the same language I just used?"

  Never before had Marty heard her use the F-word except in the most

  intimate circumstances--which meant, though masked by her light tone of

  voice and frivolous manner, her anger was as strong as ever. That was

  good. After the police left, she would need the anger to get her

  through the night ahead. Anger would help keep fear at bay.

  When he closes his eyes and tries to picture the pain, he can see it as

  a filigree of fire. A beautifully luminous lacework, white-hot with

  shadings of red and yellow, stretches from the base of his throbbing

  neck across his back, encircling his sides, looping and knotting

  intricately across his chest and abdomen as well.

  By visualizing the pain, he has a better sense of whether his condition

  is improving or deteriorating. Actually, his only concern is how fast

  he is improving. He has been wounded on other occasions, though never

  this grievously, and knows what to expect, continued deterioration would

  be a wholly new and alarming experience for him.

  The pain had been vicious during the minute or two after he'd been shot.

  He had felt as if a monstrous fetus had come awake within him and was

  burrowing its way out.

  Fortunately, he has a singularly high tolerance for pain. He also draws

  courage from the knowledge that the agony will swiftly subside to a less

  crippling level.

  By the time he staggers through the rear door of the house and heads for

  the Honda, the bleeding stops completely, and his hunger pangs become

  more terrible than the pain of his wounds. His stomach knots, loosens

  with a spasm, but immediately knots again, violently clench that can

  seize the nourishment he so desperately needs.

  Driving away from his house through gray torrents at the height of the

  storm, he becomes so achingly ravenous that he begins to shake with

  deprivation. They are not mere tremors of need but wracking shudders

  that clack his teeth together. His twitching hands beat a palsied

  tattoo upon the steering wheel, and he is barely able to hold it firmly

  enough to control the vehicle. Fits of dry wheezing convulse him, hot

  flashes alternate with chills, and the sweat gushing from him is colder

  than the rain that still soaks his hair and clothes.

  His extraordinary metabolism gives him great strength, keeps his energy

  level high, frees him from the need to sleep every night, allows him to

  heal with miraculous rapidity, and is in general a cornucopia of

  physical blessings, but it also makes demands on him. Even on a normal

  day, he has an appetite formidable enough for two lumberjacks. When he

  denies himself sleep, when he is injured, or when any other unusual

  demands are made on his system, mere hunger soon becomes a ravenous

  craving, and craving escalates almost at once into a dire need for

  sustenance that drives all other thoughts from his mind and forces him

  into the rapacious consumption of whatever he can find.

  Although the interior of the Honda is adrift in empty food

  containers--wrappers and packages and bags of every description-there is

  no hid San Bernardino Mountains into the lowlands of Orange County, he

  feverishly consumed every crumb that remained. Now there are only dried

  smears of chocolate and mustard, thin films of glistening oil, grease,

  sprinkles of salt, none of it sufficiently fortifying to compensate for

  the energy needed to rummage for it in the darkness and lick it up.

  By the time he locates a fast-food restaurant with a drive-in window, at

  the center of his gut is an icy void into which he seems to be

  dissolving, growing hollower and hollower, colder and colder, as if his

  body is consuming itself to repair itself, catabolizing two cells for

  every one it creates. He almost bites his own hand in a frantic and

  despairing attempt to relieve the grueling pangs of starvation. He

  imagines tearing out chunks of his own flesh with his teeth and greedily

  swallowing, sucking down his own hot blood, anything to moderate his

  suffering--anything, no matter how repulsive it might be.

  But he restrains himself because, in the madness of his inhuman hunger,

  he is half convinced no flesh remains on his bones. He feels utterly

  hollow, more fragile than the thinnest spun-glass Christmas ornament,

  and believes he might dissolve into thousands of lifeless fragments the

  moment his teeth puncture his brittle skin and thereby shatter the

  illusion of substance.

  The restaurant is a McDonald's outlet. The tinny speaker of the

  intercom at the ordering post has been exposed to enough years of summer

  sun and winter chill that the greeting of the unseen clerk is quavery

  and static-riddled. Confident that his own strained and shaky voice

  won't sound unusual, the killer orders enough food to satisfy the staff

  of a small office, six cheeseburgers, Big Macs, fries, a couple of fish

  sandwiches, two chocolate milkshakes--and large Cokes because his racing

  metabolism, if not fueled, leads as swiftly to dehydration as He is in a

  long line of cars, and progression toward the pick-up window is

  aggravatingly slow. He has no choice but to wait, for with his

  blood-soaked clothes and bullet-torn shirt, he can't walk into a

  restaurant or convenience store and get what he needs unless he is

  willing to draw a lot of attention to himself.

  In fact, though blood vessels have been repaired, the two bullet wounds

  in his chest remain largely unhealed due to the shortage of fuel for

  anabolic processes. Those sucking holes, into which he can insert his

  thickest finger to a disturbing depth, would cause more comment than his

  bloody shirt.

  One of the slugs passed completely through him, out his back to the left

  of his spine. He knows the exit wound is larger than either of the

  holes in his chest. He feels the ragged lips of it spreading apart when

  he leans back against the car seat.

  He is fortunate that neither round pierced his heart. That might have

  stopped him for good. That and a brain-scrambling shot to the head are

  the only wounds he fears.

  When he reaches the cashier's window, he pays for the order with some of

  the money he took from Jack and Frannie in Oklahoma more
than

  twenty-four hours ago. The young woman at the cash register can see his

  arm as he holds the currency toward her, so he strives to repress the

  severe tremors that might prick her curiosity. He keeps his face

  averted, in the night and rain, she can't see his ravaged chest or the

  agony that contorts his pale features.

  At the pick-up window, his order comes in several white bags, which he

  piles on the littered seat beside him, successfully averting his face

  from this clerk as well. All of his willpower is required to restrain

  himself from ripping the bags asunder and tearing into the food

  immediately upon receipt of it. He retains enough clarity of mind to

  realize he must not cause a scene by blocking the take-out lane.

  He parks in the darkest corner of the restaurant lot, switches off the

  headlights and windshield wipers. His face looks so gaunt when he

  glimpses it in the rearview mirror that he knows he has lost several

  pounds in the past hour, his eyes are sunken and appear to be ringed

  with smudges of soot. He dims the instrument-panel lights as far as

  possible, but lets the engine run because, in his current debilitated

  condition, he needs to bask in the warm air from the heater vents.

  He is swaddled in shadows. The rain streaming down the glass shimmers

  with reflected light from neon signs, and it bends the night world into

  mutagenic forms, simultaneously screening him from prying eyes.