Kolchak The Night Strangler

by Matheson, Richard; Rice, Jeff

  But with all these recent changes, and even Bill Speidel’s “Underground Tour” (of which I was to learn much more, later on), Pioneer Square was still a place to avoid in the small hours of the morning.

  But Joyce Gabriel didn’t seem to know that.

  A groan coming from a nearby alley caused Joyce to stop and gaze to her right. What she saw made her blood run cold. There were two figures in the alley. One, a woman, was lying, partially hidden by some trash. The other, a man’s figure—or so she thought—was bent across the woman’s and was doing… something.

  Joyce took a hesitant step forward, trying to decide what to do.

  The man, clad in a dark overcoat and hat with the brim pulled down all the way, straightened suddenly and turned toward her. Joyce Gabriel’s eyes widened. She found herself screaming helplessly as he moved quickly toward her.

  And then she fainted.

  I got on the scene a very few minutes later. I’d heard the sirens while sitting in Louise’s dressing room in Omar’s Tent and wandered out to see what was up. When I arrived two ambulance attendants were examining the body of the woman who had not yet been identified. She was lying face down in a pile of trash. One of the men in white looked up at me. I flashed my press card.

  “Kolchak. Daily Chronicle.”

  He pointed a penlight at the base of her skull and held the dead woman’s hair away from the nape of her neck. There was that increasingly familiar little puncture mark and a drop of dried blood. The attendant looked up at me again. “Another one.” I shot a few pictures with a strobe-lit Minolta.

  Another one indeed. And Vincenzo couldn’t see any “link.”

  He and his helper rolled her over onto her back. I stared at her neck and grabbed the little flashlight away from him. There it was, just like the man at the morgue had said: a residue of what looked for all the world like decomposed flesh. God knows I’d seen enough of it on bodies found periodically in the desert around Las Vegas. I shot a few more pictures.

  I listened to the chatter among the attendants and cops and went looking for the witness, Joyce Gabriel, who was standing next to none other than Captain Schubert himself. He was questioning her personally. Now, obviously, even if Vincenzo couldn’t see the so-called “link,” things were pretty plain to everyone else if Schubert had been working hours like these and was not only in uniform, but riding with his graveyard shift instead of staying home in a nice, warm bed.

  The Gabriel woman, in near hysterics, was attractive, with auburn hair, and was being half supported, by Schubert.

  “I… I… just don’t know why he didn’t chase me after killing her. I didn’t look behind, though. I turned to run… and… I think I screamed… and… that’s all I remember.”

  “Kolchak. Daily Chronicle. I know you’re upset Miss… uh…”

  “The lady’s name is Gabriel, Mr. Kolchak, and if you don’t mind, I have a few questions of my own I’d like answered. This is a police investigation.”

  He shouldered me out of his way, taking Joyce by the arm, but not before she said, “Oh God! I hope I never see a face like that again!”

  As he took her across the street I heard her voice, growing fainter: “Like a dead man. A dead man!” And then she was sobbing and getting into a squad car.

  I was shivering, and not just because of the 39 degree temperature. Some of what I’d read in the Chronicle’s morgue was coming to life before my eyes. I just knew it! And, of course, I had my Vegas experience to go by, too. This seemed different, though. No wounds in the neck. Bodies hardly tapped for blood at all. Strangulation. Still, there was that disturbing pattern of killings in a series and a tendency by the police to hush it up.

  I made tracks back to Omar’s Tent and called in my story to a rewrite man from a pay phone next to the men’s room. I made the mistake of telling rewrite to alert Vincenzo. Then I called for a cab and had the cabbie take my film to the Chronicle.

  The headlines announced the capture of the “Sky-diving Highjacker” in Salt Lake City as well as the capture of yet another skyjacker in San Diego. It would seem not all the nuts were running around strangling young girls. Former President Johnson was resting “nicely and showing signs of definite improvement” after his most recent heart attack. FDR’s former Secretary of State, James F. Byrnes, was dead at 92.

  But scant mention of the dead woman, one Claire Bisbee, a waitress at the Seven Seas Restaurant in… you guessed it! Pioneer Square. She had left a husband (who I later learned was in a state of “collapse” and “incommunicado”).

  Vincenzo was ready for me and got in his licks early.

  “Don’t say it. I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to hear anything from you. Calling me up at 2 a.m.!”

  “What about the deposits of rotted flesh around the necks of all three victims? You should have my photos by now.”

  Vincenzo was as receptive as a stone wall. “I said I didn’t wanna hear it. I don’t want to hear anything! And… it’s not official yet.”

  “Who the hell cares if its official? You and I both know…”

  “Look, goddamnit! I’ll buy the possibility that it’s the same man who strangled six women in 1952.”

  How charitable.

  “But a man, Kolchak. Not a goddamn corpse!”

  “That’s the way he’s been described. By an eyewitness! More than once!”

  “Out!”

  I was ready to do a little strangling of my own.

  “What the hell is this ‘Out! Out!’ routine you keep pushing? This is a newspaper, isn’t it? We are supposed to print news? Right, Vincenzo? News!! Suppression is not the name of the game! Or did you lose your guts in Vegas?”

  I thought he was going to slug me.

  “Basta! Va! Go! Stronzo! Va!”

  I gave him the Italian salute and returned to my desk, disgusted. I threw down my copy and lit up a cigar, when Janie, sitting a couple of desks away, bellowed “There!” and dramatically ripped some copy from her typewriter. She looked hopping mad. She came lumbering toward me and sat on the edge of my desk.

  “An open invitation to the killer. I intend to walk the streets of Pioneer Square every damn night from now on. Just let that s.o.b. try something cute with me… if he’s got the nerve!”

  As I have said in the past, my money would be on Janie. But in dead seriousness, the idea of one of my friends wandering around in the fog and mist didn’t seem like such a good one and I told her so.

  I watched her head into Vincenzo’s office and as I turned back to my desk, fumbling amongst my usual rat’s pile of papers for an ashtray, I noticed a note someone had left:

  Berry wants to see you down in the morgue.

  I found my little pixie holding a bound volume of Chronicle clippings like it was one of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

  “I’m giving this to you because you had the thoughtfulness to mention my name in your story about the 1952 strangulations.”

  “What is it, John?”

  “A burning curiosity impelled me to check back further in our records to see if possibly there might be other strangulations of a similar nature.”

  “And…”

  Proudly he thrust the book at me and together we walked it to a large table. I read the embossed cover: Feb 15—Apr 15, 1931.

  “You gotta be kidding.”

  Nineteen thirty-one?

  Here it was again. In black and white. March 29 through April 16. Six strangulations. Certain “bizarre” information repressed by the authorities… although a reporter named Jimmy Stacks, God bless him, had nosed around until he uncovered the “unofficial” information that some of the victims were missing some blood.

  The killer was never apprehended and, during this particular period—unfortunately—never spotted either.

  “The pattern is always the same, John. Women. Always women.”

  “Fascinating?”

  “That’s the word, Mr. B.”

  And again I found myself looking for patterns. I scribb
led on one of the margins. “Hmmm… 1972 to 1952… 20 years. 1952 to 1931. Twenty one years.”

  Berry picked up on that right away. “That’s right! I hadn’t noticed that! That’s most observant, Mr. Kolchak. Can you be thinking what I’m thinking?”

  “Right you are, Mr. B. Let’s have a look.”

  Berry scurried off and returned with two more volumes. The 1911 book had nothing of note. But the 1910 book was a positive revelation. This one looked like the rats had been gnawing on its edges. Its cover announced: March 1—May 15, 1910. I started flipping rapidly through it. It didn’t take long. Even in the rough-and-tumble years of Pioneer Square’s heyday murder was front-page news.

  The headline read:

  TERRIBLE MURDER OCCURS NEAR

  PIONEER SQUARE

  The dateline was Seattle, March 30.

  Berry looked at me and our eyes met. We were on the same wave length. “Mr. Berry?”

  “Mr. Kolchak.”

  “Shall we try for 1889 and/or 1890, Mr. B.?”

  “Indubitably, Mr. K.”

  • • •

  Back in Vincenzo’s office I stood triumphant while Vincenzo remained as stubborn as ever.

  “I absolutely refuse to read it.”

  But he read my notes anyway. I was beginning to have some faint hopes for Vincenzo. He had what looked like the very first faint stirrings of… curiosity, a trait he’d never exhibited before. I’d always wondered how anyone so uninterested in the world around him and people in general became a newsman. Probably because he couldn’t lie convincingly enough to become a politician.

  “Five identical sets of murders every 21 years since 1889? Identical?”

  “In every detail save that this time it is only the twentieth year. There seems to be that one break in the pattern. Maybe the killer’s in a hurry this time.”

  “Identical. Now you look, Kolchak…”

  “No you look Vincenzo. There may be more than five sets of six-victim killings. The Chronicle’s records only go back to 1873 when it was founded. I’m on my way to check the library…”

  “Wait a second. Let’s not…”

  “Read the eyewitness description in 1910. Never mind,” I cut him off. “I’ll quote it. ‘He had the face of a dead man… skull bones … ’”

  “Just you hold it right there, Kolchak! Do you really and truly expect me to print a story about… about…” He choked on the words.

  “… a corpse who’s been strangling women for the past 83 years?”

  I just smiled at him and rocked back on my heels.

  “You can’t deny facts, Vincenzo. Published facts. Eyewitness accounts. Right there in the Chronicle. Written by one Jimmy Stacks and predecessors. Employed by the Chronicle. Paid with Mr. Crossbinder’s own ill-gotten gains.”

  I pointed to my copy. “There’s your story, Vincenzo. Interesting. Provocative. The only question is: Are you grown up enough for…”

  “Out!!”

  Chapter Seven

  Monday, April 10, 1972

  It was beautiful. Just beautiful! I opened my apartment door and there was the Daily Chronicle. Headline, in 96-point Bodoni Bold:

  THIRD WATERFRONT SLAYING

  Six Murders Every 21 Years

  Since March, 1889

  And a big fat “By Carl Kolchak.” Everything. Just as I had written it, with no deletions. And with the extra added attraction of a truly nasty-looking artist’s rendition of Joyce Gabriel’s accounting of what the killer looked like: flesh flaking off his face; teeth long and irregular; the cartilage of the nose protruding through drum-tight flesh; and eyes peeking out like baleful fires from beneath a skull-like brow devoid of eyebrows. What hair that could be seen was thin and white under the turned-down brim of his hat.

  It was all just lovely. It had knocked a story on the first sustained B-52 bomb raids over North Vietnam since 1968 to one side of the bottom half of the front page.

  The obit column listed give names: Claire Bisbee, 29, the killer’s latest victim; Hugh Moreland, 70, a former Seattle auto dealer (Puyallup area); Dr. William Cook, 87, who’d been a local GP for 37 years and had arrived the year of the Great Fire; Thomas Cotner, 20 of Winthrop; and Robert Miller, 15 (address unknown), who were both killed in separate auto accidents.

  Another day had begun. Things were looking up. Even the weather prediction was for higher temperatures… 55 degrees and only partly cloudy skies.

  I stumbled out to the hallway pay phone and called Louise to set up a lunch date. She suggested the Space Needle, which was fine with me. I’d never been up there and it was a good chance to get a look at the town.

  I hummed to myself all through the shower and shave and my one-shot Scotch breakfast. Then I went to the office to kiss Vincenzo on both cheeks.

  Things were really crackling when I got there and Vincenzo was nowhere around. All I could learn from one of my new colleagues was that he’d been called up to the “old man’s” office and that it didn’t bode well. Once again I had taken up residence inside a pressure cooker.

  Just before lunchtime he showed up and motioned me to join him in his office. He was drinking milk from his ever-present quart carton. A sure sign of trouble.

  “I knew it! I knew it!” He was holding a badly wrinkled copy of “our” paper. He slammed it down on his desk, took another gulp of milk, burped, and picked up a note. His face was livid.

  “Permit me to read you a brief memorandum. Quote:

  ‘Any repetition of this morning’s front page assault on the minds and sensibilities of our readers will result in the instant dismissal of all responsible persons.”

  • • •

  “Unquote. Signed… Guess who?”

  I ventured an answer. “God?”

  “You’re almost right.”

  He began muttering to himself. “How could I let this happen to me again? How could I?”

  Vincenzo feeling sorry for himself was a disgusting sight. Besides, now that I had gotten him to progress this far I couldn’t let him backslide without a fight.

  “Now just hold on, Vincenzo. We wasted an awful lot of time in Las Vegas fighting tooth and nail against the obvious. Vampires don’t exist! Everyone kept saying it! And women kept right on dying! Let’s not play that stupid game again! Besides,” I grinned, “if I do say so myself, it’s a great story.”

  “It’s a goddamn piece of toilet paper, is what it is! Fabricated! Filled with screwball speculations!!”

  “Speculations!? How the hell can you…”

  He cut me off again. “Give me facts, Kolchak. Facts! Or stay the hell away from me. Capiche?”

  “What the hell’s the matter with you, Tony? Going soft in the belly or something?”

  He must have been because immediately he grabbed his stomach and doubled over in obvious pain.

  “If you’d scream a little more you wouldn’t have that ulcer.”

  “Bastardo! Stupido! Out! Get OUT!”

  Things had returned to normal. In a way it was almost like coming home again. Vincenzo slapped his forehead.

  “And I went out of my way to hire this… this… Vincenzo, sei un cretino!”

  I left him growling in his mother tongue and caught a cab to the Space Needle. At least on the Seattle Daily Chronicle there was a small expense account for such niceties. I intended to take advantage of it.

  As Louise and I rode the elevator up to the Space Needle restaurant I couldn’t help blurting out my feelings.

  “It’s like déjà vu, I swear it is. Every detail of it! Multiple murders. A weird-looking, way-out killer. Vincenzo on my neck. The owner-publisher down on my copy. Facts being soft-pedaled to prevent a panic, I tell you, Louise, I have been this way before.”

  Louise shifted uncomfortably as the others in the elevator stared at me. But my big mouth just kept flapping.

  “You don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?” And, of course, she didn’t. We had been busy with other things and I didn’t wand to blow ou
r burgeoning relationship with anything that would lead her to think I was missing some of my marbles.

  “When I was working for Vincenzo in Las Vegas last year, I covered a series of murders that turned out to have been committed by a vampire… a real one! You know—out of the coffin at night and go for the jugular.”

  “Carl, shut up, will you please?” Louise was actually embarrassed. It had been a long time since I had met a woman who could be a woman and still get embarrassed.

  “Okay. Okay. Have it your own way. If you don’t want to listen, fine and dandy. You don’t want to believe? Okay.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Nobody believed it at first. But finally they had to. Except that after it was over, they clamped down on the story and kept me from reporting what I’d seen by hanging a murder rap over my head—I’d pounded a wooden stake through the sonofabitch’s heart, you see…”

  The elevator stopped, the doors opened, and Louise shoved me out into the restaurant. The other passengers crowded past us and openly stared at me. I did my best to look innocent. I turned to Louise who looked disgusted.

  “What do you think?”

  “I think those people will remember this elevator ride for the rest of their lives. I had no idea was riding this elevator with a certified looney. And a stake-wielding killer to boot.” She grinned and dug me in the ribs.

  I watched the view outside as Seattle slowly revolved below. The restaurant turns very slowly but continuously. “I’m beginning to wonder if maybe it isn’t them… but me.”

  “Come on, Carl. We came here to have lunch and enjoy the view.”

  “No! There’s something crazy going on here. There’s no getting away from it. Six women strangled every 21 years since 1889—except for this most recent series which is a year short of the pattern period. Vagaries of a madman’s mind? Some new development? Or someone new trying to duplicate the pattern? No! While common sense tells me I’m nuts, deep in my gut I know every one of them was strangled by the same man. But what kind of man? Some character more than a century old? A guy who looks like a corpse?