“Mommy?” Teresa asked as they got into the police motor boat.
“Sweetie?”
“Why isn’t Daddy coming with us?”
“He has to help the police.”
“Is that lady going to hurt Daddy?” Teresa asked.
“No,” Carly said, not knowing whether or not she might be lying to her own daughter.
55
A man who looked like an young sailor turned middle-aged fast sat on the cot in the other cell.
He had blond hair, in a buzz cut to the sides, longish from there. He looked like a poster-child for steroid abuse. His Hawaiian shirt was soaked with blood.
“Cobra, you have a visitor,” Oscar said. He pointed to a chair for Trey to sit in. Then, to Trey, he said, “I’m going back to my computer to pull some things up. You need me, just yell. But yell loud.”
56
The cop on the boat was named Erskine. He had a longish face—like a hound dog, Carly thought. He was sweetly goofy, trying to make jokes with the policewoman who was piloting the boat. He flirted innocently enough with Carly, but she was in no mood for such nonsense. She felt numb inside, and the only heat within her was anger at Trey for not coming with them. Mark, wrapped in the blanket, was tucked against Teresa’s arm.
“Excuse me,” she said, as the boat got underway. “How long will it take to get to Long Beach?”
Erskine smiled. “Well, the ocean’s calm tonight, so it won’t be bad. It might take as much as three hours. Four, if it gets choppy. You ever get sea-sick?”
“Sometimes,” Carly said. She wrapped her arm around Teresa to help keep her warm.
The policewoman sitting in the pilot’s chair was more business-like. She kept her face forward, and serenely guided the boat. Carly appreciated the fact that she hadn’t tried to make small talk with them. She tried to watch the stars, but something of a fog was drifting in—the sky had been clear minutes before. This was what summer tended to be like near the coast. She hoped it wouldn’t get any colder. The temperature could be seventy during the day, but then drop to a chilly sixty on the water at night. Carly closed her eyes, keeping her arm around her daughter and son.
Erskine made a few inane comments to the policewoman, which Carly couldn’t hear. She was so furious with Trey for staying behind, the word divorce crossed her mind for a second. In her mind she smashed plates on the linoleum tile in their kitchen at home. In her mind, she was the most loving and understanding wife possible. Neither extreme was true.
And then she thought: He’s doing the best he can. He’s doing what he believes in.
The other thought, too:
Don’t get hurt, Trey. Don’t get hurt. Let the cops catch this woman, shoot her down, throw a net over her, whatever...don’t get yourself in trouble.
Erskine said to the policewoman, “So, what’s it like working on an island? Not a lot of action.” He was from San Pedro, brought out three hours earlier, only to turn around again. He glanced at her badge. “Stouffer. Like the frozen dinners.”
“Paula,” she said, shooting him a nasty look. Erskine was taken aback for a second. She had seemed like a looker to him until he noticed her mean little eyes. They were almost squinty, and he always thought women were somehow tainted if they had squinty little eyes. Then, the look vanished from her face. Her eyes widened, doe-like. She was a babe again. “What’s it like on the mainland?” She asked.
“Oh, I don’t know. I don’t do much work in the harbor or anything. Mainly burglaries. Stolen cars. The usual.”
The policewoman said nothing.
“I’m sure I saw you at the academy,” Erskine said. “I never forget a face.” Paula Stouffer half-smiled. “I’ve lectured at various academies.”
“On what? Island hopping?” He was trying to make a joke, but it died in his mouth. He knew how feeble it sounded. “That killer back there was some doozy. Did you see the blood on the walls?”
Paula Stouffer nodded. “Listen, can you steer for a minute? I want to get a smoke from my bag.”
Erskine nodded. “Sure. I love piloting these babies.” He kept his eyes straight forward. It was pitch black, the sun having set just a brief while ago, but there was always an incipient light along the horizon where the mainland began.
He felt the policewoman’s hand on his shoulder, and he grinned, feeling like maybe he was going to get lucky tonight.
Her grip on his shoulder got stronger, sharper.
Carly’s head drooped to the side, until it was completely leaning on Teresa’s. Teresa had fallen asleep, too.
Only Mark was awake.
Only Mark, wrapped in the blanket with his eyes wide, saw what happened to the policeman named Erskine. The dim green lights from the edges of the boat cast a shadow as the knife plunged into Erskine’s neck. The policewoman cut so sharply into Erskine’s throat, that his head fell almost completely backwards.
When the policewoman finished, she turned a key in the boat’s ignition. She stepped around her seat. She walked calmly over and leaned close to Mark.
She had handcuffs in one hand.
In the other, a fishing knife.
Mark saw her shadow face.
Mark gasped, “The lady.”
57
Trey Campbell sat down in the folding chair. The holding cell was gray. The bars were thick. Cobra had been finger-painting on the gray wall of his cell with his own feces. He’d painted a snake, complete with forked tongue.
And he’d painted a woman. Stick figure. Oval breasts. A halo around her head.
Cobra glanced over at him. Saw that he noticed his recent art. Seemed proud of it. He seemed so different than other human beings would be in the same situation. This man seemed as if he owned the world in which he existed.
Trey knew then. He could feel it the way he felt it about the psychos on his ward. The way he knew about the doorman when he’d been a little kid. Cobra was one of them. Trey felt that chill, and the slight confusion. The sense that there was something so different about Cobra that it verged on paranoia. Or a complete understanding at the subliminal level of another human being. Cobra was of the same species as Agnes—but not as smart.
“I like to draw,” Cobra said.
“Did you draw the word ‘beloved’ on the wall at that cottage?”
Cobra shook his head. “That’s a word. I don’t do words. I draw pictures. You like?” He tapped the wall with the snake. “It’s me and her. She’s righteous. She’s...” He seemed to burst with possible descriptions of her. Then, he said, “She’s everything.”
“Tell me about her,” Trey said. Faking calm, he placed his hands carefully on his knees and didn’t look Cobra directly in the eye, but just past his left ear. He didn’t want to get into mind-games with this guy.
Cobra grinned. He had a wide gap between his front teeth. When he spoke, his voice was gravelly. “She’s a goddess. She touched the face of the universe, man.” Then, leaning forward. “You got a cigarette?”
Trey shook his head. “I don’t smoke. Sorry.”
As if this were enough grounds for dismissal, Cobra leaned back on the cot. He crossed his arms behind his head and shut his eyes.
“Tell me about her.”
“Why should I? You can’t even get me a cigarette. You some lowlife rag picker trying to get me to confess? You can sit on it and rotate.”
Trey got up and walked out of the cell. As he did, Cobra called out, “I like Marlboro Lights 100 in a box!”
In the hall, he found a cigarette machine. He borrowed change from Oscar, and got the pack that Cobra wanted.
Trey brought the cigarettes into the holding cell area. He passed a cigarette and a book of matches in to Cobra. Cobra took them, touching Trey’s slightly trembling hand.
“Don’t be scared of me,” Cobra said. “I’m only the tool. She’s the operator, let me tell you. I could’ve sat out my days at the docks stealing from the till here and there. Nothing like this...” He lit the cigarette, and inhaled
deeply. “This...magnificence...this brilliance.”
“You mean Agnes?”
Cobra nodded. “Thank you for the cigarette. You are truly a compassionate man.” He said this with mock-refinement.
“Do you know where she is?”
Cobra grinned. He had a grin like a sideshow barker: sleazy and compelling at the same time. “You’re the one, ain’t you?”
Trey said nothing.
Cobra laughed. “You’re the one she’s looking for. Those kids we took out. They wasn’t. They was fun for her. She told me she was collecting lifetimes to give you. On a platter, buddy.”
“What do you mean?” Trey sat down in the chair by the cell. He leaned forward.
“Before I say anything, can you get me a good lawyer?”
“What?”
“I’m an accomplice to murder. I know that. I’ll be happy to turn evidence against her, but only if I got me a good lawyer. One who’s gonna make sure she never gets out again. I know her now. It only took me a day, but I know her inside and out. She’s that way. Can you pass me that pack?” He asked, his hand out in supplication. “I like to chain-smoke.”
Trey passed the cigarette pack to Cobra. Again, Cobra’s hand grazed the underside of his palm.
Cobra quickly lit one cigarette off the first. He stubbed out the last of the first cigarette, and began smoking the next. The room was filling with smoke.
“I can’t do much with regards to lawyers,” Trey said.
“Oh,” Cobra puffed on the cigarette. “I guess I got nothing to say to you, in that case.”
He swiveled around on the cot, and lay down.
“She’s going to get you anyway,” Trey said, standing from the chair. He walked towards the door.
As he touched the door knob, Cobra made a sputtering cough. “What?” He cried out. “Whatju say?”
Trey turned, leaning back against the door. “She’s going to get you. Because you know her. She gets everyone who sees her in action. When she was caught last time, she had entire file cabinets with description of people who knew about her, and their families, and anyone who had ever come in contact with them. She was going to systematically operate on each of them. Even if it took several lifetimes. I may not be able to get you a lawyer, Cobra, but I can be a pretty decent witness. I know her. I know that she’s the one who went for the girl’s eyes and face. And I know why. I know that it was her, not you, who cut off the boy’s penis and killed him. You were just the—what would you call it?—the tough guy who scared those kids. You played with them after they were dead. You were the one who didn’t know how far she’d go.”
“Hell,” he said, his voice raspy with smoke. “I didn’t even know she was gonna kill’em. I thought we was just gonna rough’em up and have some fun with ‘em. I like blood and all, but not the way she did.”
“So,” Trey said. “Where is she?”
Cobra cursed and kicked the toilet. “She really screwed me.”
“Yeah she did. Royally.”
When the man in the cell had calmed down some, he said, “I thought we was just gonna, you know, have fun and scare those kids. She told me she was after you ‘cause of that whole past lifetime crap. I held that boy...” Cobra began bawling like a baby. While he cried, he still managed to smoke. Trey knew the tears were fake. Cobra was a sociopath. Cobra couldn’t even understand that what he had just participated in, the murders of Jenny and her boyfriend, was wrong. He would think the mistake was in getting caught. If his tears were at all real, it was because he was caught, not because of remorse.
Trey went back to the folding chair and sat down. “Where is Agnes Hatcher?”
Cobra wiped his eyes, shuddering with tears. He took a long drag off a fresh cigarette. “Do you know about time and space? I mean, how she thinks about it? She sounds like friggin’ Einstein, you ask me. She talks about some kind of continuing thing...”
“A time and space continuum,” Trey said.
“Yeah. You do know her. The intersection, she said, of time and space. She collected all these things, you know, bits of hearts and lungs and livers, I thought she was some kind of cannibal, but she didn’t want to eat them. She told me they were for the path. The crossroads of time and space. They were the fuel to the path. She talked like she’d been there. Like she knew where she was going. It was wild,” he said this as if it were some wonderful trip. “You want to know where she is?” He asked, rhetorically. “I mean, you’re never gonna find her. I tried to tell the other cops, but they weren’t like you...they were morons. You want me to tell you? I can tell you, but you won’t get it unless you know her. Unless you know her real well. She told me only one man was gonna understand it. Where she was going.” He snorted and laughed, a big hyena laugh. “You’re the one, ain’t you? You’re the love of her life, I can tell. She told me all about you. What you to do did before. Seems like you should be inside here and me out there. How many women, mister? Ten, twelve? Slicing and dicing. Doin’ things to them that no man oughta do. But you wanna know something? She let me do her, mister. She put out for me.”
Trey listen dispassionately. “I understand she attacked you, too.” Instinctively, Cobra clutched his crotch.
Trey said, “It’s because of what she let you do to her. If she remains free, Cobra, she’s going to finish that job. I know her. She’s a machine. She never starts something without finishing it. So tell me where she is.”
Cobra, looking frightened for the first time in the cell, told everything he knew.
58
On the boat at sea, Carly opened her eyes when she heard her son speak.
“The lady,” Mark said, over and over.
Carly looked up at the policewoman. Carly kissed Mark on the forehead. He’s getting better. He’ll be fine. This nightmare will be over soon. "That's right, Marky. The police lady.” The mist of fog, like a thin veil, drifted across the boat.
“The lady,” Mark said again. Carly was about to say something to the policewoman, to ask why the boat had stopped, when she saw the large knife in the woman’s hands.
The kind of knife that she herself had used a few times to help Trey gut and clean the fish they’d caught.
The policewoman held it against Mark’s throat.
“You’re Agnes Hatcher,” Carly gasped. She didn’t want to move, for fear of what this madwoman would do to her son.
“And you’re the whore who stole my Jack from me,” Agnes Hatcher said. “I can smell him all over you.”
59
Trey felt like he was moving through molasses, from the cell area to the door. He heard Cobra’s cynical laughter, and tasted the smoke in the air. He pushed through the door to the corridor which led to the offices of the police station. He passed a middle-aged man sitting at a desk, scribbling notes down from a phone call. He walked swiftly to Oscar’s office, knocking on the door.
Through the glass, Oscar glanced up from his computer. He signaled for Trey to enter.
Trey opened the door and said, triumphantly, “I know where she is. She’s at the caves. It’s because of the connection to the word Whitechapel. It’s a sign to her of where time and space will intersect. Where our karma will be resolved.”
“Capila Blanca,” Oscar said without hesitation. “Maybe that’s it. Glad our Cobra talked to somebody. None of my boys could get through to him. Anything else?”
“He said she’s keeping souvenirs.”
“Body parts? Organs?” Trey nodded.
It was 9 p.m.
60
“You stay here,” Oscar said, rising, grabbing his jacket from the coat rack. “Watch TV. or talk to Dinah out front. I’ll get ten men and some motor boats over there. We’d go up to the other end of the cliffs, but I already have men out on the road setting up blocks. I doubt she’d have had time to go that way. For all I know, she knows her way around in a boat. And if she’s there, I don’t want her finding you. How’d you get our friend in the cell to tell you this?”
“I�
�ve worked with sociopaths for years,” Trey said. “I understood him.”
Oscar lip-farted at this, as if Trey were just some bleeding heart.
“You’ll never find her without me,” Trey said.
Oscar turned, and pointed at him. “You think too much of yourself. You need some rest. There’s a couch out front. Use it.”
Trey felt stunned by the authoritative command from him.
Several minutes later, he went to sit on the green couch in the front office. Dinah, the dispatch officer, listened to the police band, which she kept on low volume. She smiled occasionally when Trey looked her way, but kept her head down.
He watched the silent television. There was no news about the murders. He wondered how sensational a murder had to be to make the news.
He closed his eyes. He wished he’d gone with Carly. He wasn’t needed here. Whether or not Agnes Hatcher was after him, he didn’t need to be there for her. He should be there for his family.
He imagined Carly playing with Mark out at the swimming pool. Teresa, diving off the far edge.
Mark afraid of his own reflection which lurked at the bottom of the pool.
Without wanting to, Trey Campbell fell asleep.
He dreamed.
A chess game in hell, between he and Agnes Hatcher. All around them, fire.
She was picking her queen up and moving it towards his knight.
“You can’t win like that,” he said.
Agnes Hatcher grinned. Her teeth were blood-stained. “I don’t have a strategy,” she said. “Do you, Mr. Campbell? Mr. Campbell?” she asked, her voice melting into another voice, lighter, sweeter...
Trey awoke when he heard his name being called.
It was Dinah. “Mr. Campbell?”
His eyes fluttered open. He oriented himself to the room. The front office of the Catalina police station. He sat up. His back was all sweaty from lying against the leather couch. He wiped at his neck.
Criminally Insane: The Series (Bad Karma, Red Angel, Night Cage Omnibus) (The Criminally Insane Series) Page 15