The Beginning

by Catherine Coulter

  Captain Brady gave Savich a dubious smile, but there was a gleam of hope in his tired eyes. “Let’s get to it,” he said, grabbed a huge folder from his desk, and walked to the door of his office. He yelled out, “Dubrosky! Mason! Get in the conference room on the double.” He turned back to them and said, “I hate these modular things. They put them in last year. You can’t see a soul, and chances are the guy you want is in the john.” He glanced at her. “Well, or the girl, er, female officer you want is in the women’s room.”

  Evidently neither Dubrosky nor Mason had gone to the john. They were already in the conference room, standing stiff and hostile, waiting for the FBI agents. Captain Brady was right about one thing—they weren’t happy campers. This was their turf, and the last thing they wanted was to have the FBI stick their noses into their business. Savich was polite and matter-of-fact. They looked at Sherlock, and she could see that they weren’t holding out for much help from her. Dubrosky said, “You don’t expect us to be your Watsons, do you, Sherlock?”

  “Not at all, Detective Dubrosky, unless either of you is a physician.”

  That brought her a grudging smile.

  She wanted to tell all of them, Savich included, that she now knew as much about this guy as they did, maybe even more than the Chicago cops, and she’d thought about him for as long as Savich had, but she kept her mouth closed. She wondered what Savich had up his sleeve. She’d only known him for seven hours, and she would have bet her last buck that he had a whole lot up that sleeve of his. It wouldn’t have surprised her if he had the guy’s name and address.

  They sat in the small conference room, all the files and photos spread over the top of the table. There was a photo of the crime scene faceup at her elbow. It was of Mrs. Lansky, the toaster cord still around her neck. She turned it facedown and looked over at Savich.

  He had what she already thought of as the FBI Look. He was studying Dubrosky in a still, thoughtful way. She wondered if he saw more than she did. Poor Dubrosky: he looked so tired he was beyond exhaustion, a man who wasn’t smiling, a man who looked as if he’d just lost his best friend. He was wired, probably on too much coffee. He couldn’t sit still. His brown suit was rumpled, his brown tie looked like a hangman’s noose. He had a thick five-o’clock shadow.

  Savich put his elbows on the table, looked directly at the man, and said, “Detective, were there any repairmen in the Lansky household within the past two months?”

  Dubrosky reared back, then rocked forward again, banging his fist on the table. “Do you think we’re fucking idiots? Of course we checked all that! There was a phone repair guy there three weeks ago, but we talked to him and it was legit. Anyway, the guy was at least fifty years old and had seven kids.”

  Savich just continued in that same calm voice, “How do you know there weren’t other repairmen?”

  “There were no records of any expenditures for any repairs in the Lanskys’ checkbook, no receipts of any kind, and none of the neighbors knew of anything needing repairs. We spoke to the family members, even the ones who live out of town—none of them knew anything about the Lanskys’ having any repairs on anything.”

  “And there were no strangers in the area the week before the murder? The day of the murder?”

  “Oh sure. There were pizza deliveries, a couple of Seventh-Day Adventists, a guy canvassing for a local political campaign,” said Mason, a younger man who was dressed in a very expensive blue suit and looked as tired as his partner. Savich imagined that when they took roles, Mason was the good cop and Dubrosky the bad cop. Mason looked guileless and naïve, which he probably hadn’t been for a very long time.

  Mason gave a defeated sigh, spreading his hands on the tabletop. “But nobody saw anyone at the Lansky house except a woman and her daughter going door-to-door selling Girl Scout cookies. That was one day before the murders. That doesn’t mean that UPS guys didn’t stop there a week ago, but no one will even admit that’s possible. It’s a small, close-knit neighborhood. You know, one of those neighborhoods where everybody minds everybody else’s business. The old lady who lives across the street from the Lanskys could even describe the woman and the little girl selling the cookies. I can’t imagine any stranger getting in there without that old gal noticing. I wanted to ask her if she kept a diary of all the comings and goings in the neighborhood, but Dubrosky said she might not be so happy if I did and she just might close right up on us.”

  Captain Brady said, “You know, Agent Savich, this whole business about the guy coming to the house, getting in under false pretenses, actually coming into the kitchen, checking before he whacked the families to make sure they had a toaster and a low-set big gas oven didn’t really occur to anyone until you told Bud Hollis in St. Louis to check into it. He’s the one who got us talking to every neighbor within a two-block radius. Like Mason said, there wasn’t any stranger, even a florist delivery to the Lansky house. Everyone is positive. And none of the neighbors seem weird. And we did look for weird when we interviewed, just in case.”

  Savich knew this of course, and Captain Brady knew that he knew it, but he wanted the detectives to think along with him. He accepted a cup of coffee from Mason that was thicker than Saudi oil. “You are all familiar with the profile done by the FBI after the first murders in Des Moines. It said that the killer was a young man between the ages of twenty and thirty, a loner, and that he lived in the neighborhood or not too far away, probably with his parents or with a sibling. Also he had a long-standing hatred or grudge or both toward the family in Des Moines, very possibly unknown by the family or friends of the family. Unfortunately this didn’t seem to pan out.”

  Dubrosky said as he tapped a pen on the wooden tabletop, “The Des Moines cops wasted hours and hours going off on that tangent. They dragged in every man in a three-block radius of the house, but there wasn’t a single dweeb who could possibly fit the profile. Then it turned out the Toaster wasn’t just a little-time killer, he’s now a serial killer. Thank God we didn’t waste our time going through that exercise. You people aren’t infallible.” Dubrosky liked that. He looked jovial now. “No, this time you were so far off track that you couldn’t even see the train. Like the captain said, we did talk to all the neighbors. Not a weirdo in the bunch.”

  “Actually, on this case, we’re not off track at all,” Savich said. “Believe me, it’s astounding how often the profiles are right on the money.” He was silent a moment, then said, “Now, everyone agrees that the same guy murdered all three families. It makes sense that he had to visit each of the houses to ensure there were both a toaster and a classic full-size stove/oven combo that sat on the kitchen floor. And not an electric stove, a gas one. There were delivery people all over the neighborhoods in both Des Moines and in St. Louis, but the truth is no one is really certain of anything. By the time they acted on the profile theory of the killer living in the neighborhood, there wasn’t much certainty anymore about any repairs or deliveries. Nobody remembered seeing anybody.”

  “Good summary, Savich,” said Dubrosky.

  “Bear with me, Detective.” He looked at the cup of coffee but didn’t drink any. “This stuff looks so potent, I bet it breeds little cups of coffee.”

  There was one small smile, from Sherlock.

  Savich said, “You guys have done hours of legwork here and you did it immediately. You’ve proven that there wasn’t a repairperson or a salesman or even a guy whose car broke down and wanted to phone a garage near the Lansky house. So then we come back to the basic question. How then did he get into the Lansky house? Into the kitchen specifically so he could make certain they had all the props he needed?”

  Dubrosky made a big show of looking at his watch. “Look, Savich, we thought of all that. We found out that all the houses were older, not just here, but also in Des Moines and St. Louis. To me it means that chances are excellent that you’d have a big low gas oven in the kitchens. And who wouldn’t have a toaster? This is all nonsense. Our perp is a transient. He’s nuts. N
one of the shrinks agree on why he did this. Maybe God told him to strangle every mother with the toaster cord. Maybe God told him that kids are evil, that he was the evil witch out of Hansel and Gretel. Who knows why he’s whacking families? Like I said, the yahoo’s crazy and he’s traveling across the U.S., probably killing at whim, no rhyme or reason.”

  Mason said, “Buck’s right. We don’t know why no one saw him in the Lansky neighborhood, why a single dog didn’t bark, but maybe he disguised himself as the postman or as that old woman who lives across the street from the Lanskys. In any case, he got lucky. But we’ll find him; we’ve got to. Of course with our luck, he’s long gone from Chicago. We’ll hear about him again when he murders a family in Kansas.”

  And that was truly what they believed, Sherlock thought. It was clear on all their faces. They believed the guy was long gone from Chicago, that they didn’t have a prayer of ever getting him.

  “Let me tell you about the magic of computers, gentlemen,” Savich said and smiled. “They do things a whole lot faster than we can. But what’s important is what you put into them. It’s a matter of picking the right data to go into the mixer before you turn it on to do its thing.” He leaned down and picked up his laptop and turned it on. He hit buttons, made the little machine bleep, and all in all, ignored the rest of them.

  “I’ve got to go home, Captain,” Dubrosky said. “I’ve got gas, I need a shower or my wife won’t even kiss me, and my kids have forgotten what I look like.”

  “We’re all bushed, Buck. Just be patient. Let’s see what Agent Savich’s got.”

  Sherlock realized then that Savich was putting on a little show for them. He had the pages he wanted to show them in his briefcase. But he was going to call up neat-looking stuff on the screen and make them all look at it before he gave them any hard copy. In the next minute, Savich turned the computer around and said, “Take a look at this, Detectives, Captain Brady.”

  SIX

  The three men crowded around the small laptop. It was Detective Dubrosky who said suddenly, “Nah, I don’t believe this. It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Yes, it does.” Savich handed out a piece of paper to each of them. Sherlock didn’t even glance at the paper. She knew what was on it. In that moment, Savich looked over at her. He grinned. He didn’t know how she knew, but he knew that she’d figured it out.

  “You tell them, Sherlock.”

  They were all staring at her now. He’d put her on the spot. But he’d seen the knowledge in her eyes. How, she didn’t know. He was giving her a chance to shine.

  She cleared her throat. “The FBI Profilers were right. It’s a local neighborhood guy who hated the Lansky family. He killed the families in Des Moines and St. Louis because he wanted to practice before he killed the people he hated. He wanted to get it perfect when it most mattered to him. So, the families in Des Moines and St. Louis were random choices. He undoubtedly drove around until he found the family that met his requirements. Then he killed them.”

  Captain Brady whistled. “My God, you think the profile is correct, but it was meant only for the Lanskys?”

  “That’s right,” Savich said. “The other two families were his dress rehearsal.” He turned to Dubrosky and Mason. “I wanted you to be completely certain that there was no stranger around the Lansky household before the killings. Are you both certain?”

  “Yes,” Mason said. “As certain as we can be.”

  “Then we go to the Lansky neighborhood and pick up the guy who will fit the profile. He screwed up and now we’ll nail him. The computer hit on three possibles, all within walking distance of the Lanskys’ house. My money’s on Russell Bent. He fits the profile better than the others. Given how well the profile fits this guy and given no strangers, the chances are really good that this wasn’t another dress rehearsal. Also, Russell Bent lives with his sister and her husband. She is exactly two years older than he is.”

  “I don’t understand, Agent Savich,” Captain Brady said, sitting forward. “What do you mean she’s two years older?”

  “The boy and girl in all three families,” Lacey said. “The girl was twelve and the boy was ten.”

  “Jesus,” Captain Brady said.

  “Why didn’t you just tell us?” Dubrosky was mad. He felt that Savich had made him look like a fool.

  “As I said,” Savich said as he rose from his chair, “I wanted you to be certain that no stranger had been near the Lansky home. It was always possible that the guy was having a third dress rehearsal. But he wasn’t. This time it was the real thing for him. I wasn’t really holding out on you. I just got everything in the computer this morning, once Captain Brady had sent me all your reports. Without the reports I wouldn’t have gotten a thing. You would have come back to this. It’s just that I always believed the profile and I had the computer.”

  RUSSELL Bent lived six houses away from the Lanskys’ with his sister and her husband and one young son. Bent was twenty-seven years old, didn’t date, didn’t have many friends, but was pleasant to everyone. He worked as a maintenance man at a large office on Milwaukee Avenue. His only passion was coaching Little League.

  The detectives had already spoken to Russell Bent, his sister, and her husband as part of their neighborhood canvassing. They’d never considered him a possible suspect. They were looking for a transient, a serial killer, some hot-eyed madman, not a local, certainly not a shy young guy who was really polite to them.

  “One hundred dollars, Sherlock, says they’ll break him in twenty minutes,” Savich said, grinning down at her.

  “It’s for certain that none of them looks the least bit tired now,” she said. “Do we watch them?”

  “No, let’s go to Captain Brady’s office. I don’t want to cramp their style. You know, I bet you that Bent would have killed one more family, in another state, just to confuse everyone thoroughly. Then he wouldn’t have killed again.”

  “You know, I’ve been wondering why he had to kill the kids like that.”

  “Well, I’ve given it a lot of thought, talked to the Profilers and a couple of shrinks. Why did Bent murder these families with two kids, specifically a boy and a girl, and in each case, the kids were two years apart, no more, no less? I guess he was killing himself and his sister.”

  She stared at him, shivering. “But why? No, don’t tell me. You did some checking on Mr. Bent.”

  “Yep. I told Dubrosky and Mason all about it in the john. They’re going to show off now in front of Captain Brady.”

  “I wish I could have been there.”

  “Well, probably not. Mason got so excited that he puked. He hadn’t eaten anything all day and he’d drunk a gallon of that atomic bomb coffee.”

  She raised her hand. “No, don’t tell me. Let me think about this, sir.”

  She followed him down the hall and into Captain Brady’s office. He lay down on the sofa. It was too short and hard as a rock, but he wouldn’t have traded it for anything at the moment. He was coming down. He closed his eyes and saw that pathetic Russell Bent. They’d gotten him. They’d won this time. For the moment it made him forget about the monsters who were still out there killing, the monsters that he and his people had spent hours trying to find, and had failed. But this time they’d gotten the monster. They’d won.

  “The mother must have done something.”

  He cocked open an eye. Sherlock was standing over him, a shock of her red hair falling over to cover the side of her face. He watched her tuck the swatch of hair behind her ear. Nice hair and lots of it. Her eyes were a soft summer blue, a pretty color. “Yes,” he said, “Mrs. Bent definitely did something.”

  “I don’t think Mr. Bent did anything. The three fathers Russell Bent shot were clean kills. No, wait, after they were dead, Bent shot them in the stomach.”

  “The quick death was probably because to Bent, the father didn’t count, he wasn’t an object of the bone-deep hatred. The belly shot was probably because he thought the father was weak, he was inef
fectual, he wasn’t a man.”

  “What did Mrs. Bent do to Russell and his sister?”

  “To punish Russell and his sister, or more likely, for the kicks it gave her, Mrs. Bent gagged them both, tied their arms behind them, and locked them in the trunk of the car or in a closet or other terrifying closed-in places. Once they nearly died from carbon monoxide poisoning. The mother didn’t take care of them, obviously; she left them to scrounge food for themselves. Social Services didn’t get them away from her until they were ten and twelve years old. Some timing, huh?”

  “How did you find out this stuff so quickly?”

  “I got on the phone before we left to pick up Russell Bent. I even got Social Services down to check their files. It was all there.”

  “So the toaster cord is a sort of a payback for what she didn’t do? Beating her face was retribution?”

  “Yeah, maybe. A payback for all eternity.”

  “And he must have come to believe that even though his mother was a dreadful person, he and his sister still deserved death, only they hadn’t died, they’d survived, so it had to be other children just like them?”

  “That doesn’t make much sense, does it? But it’s got to have something to do with Russell Bent feeling worthless, like he didn’t deserve to live.”

  “But why did he pick the Lansky family?”

  “I don’t know. No one reported any gossip about the family, nothing about physical abuse, or the mother neglecting the children. No unexplained injuries with the kids winding up in the emergency room. But you can take it to the bank that Russell Bent thought the two Lansky kids were enough like him and his sister to merit dying. He thought the mother was enough like his own mother to deserve death. Why exactly did he have to gas the children? God only knows. Your explanation is as good as any. Brady will find out, though, with the help of the psychiatrists.”

  “Russell Bent coached Little League. The Lansky boy was in Little League. Maybe the Lansky boy got close to Bent; just maybe the Lansky boy told Russell that his mother was horrible.” She shrugged. “It really won’t matter. You know what they’ll do, sir. They’ll dress it all up in psychobabble. Do you know what happened to the Bents’ parents?”