The Anniversary
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months left. If she could just —
9
Happy Anniversary, Diane. I haven’t forgotten you.
10
A thought ricocheted through Diane’s mind, the present and 11
past colliding. She glanced at the date on her Cartier watch. To-12
day was April 6. If the letter came yesterday, as Kaylie said, that 13
meant it had arrived on April 5. It was a date that stuck in her 14
mind, a date she’d never forget. Odd how she’d been thinking of 15
him just before she made the connection. As if her subconscious, 16
leaping ahead, had already found the link.
17
April 5, five years ago.
18
The date of Steven Gage’s execution.
19
h
20
21
That night, Callie was relieved to find that Anna was in good 22
spirits. Between two helpings of roast chicken, she chattered 23
about Harry Potter, seeming to have entirely forgotten their 24
breakfast confrontation.
25
“Mommy, don’t you think Henry looks sort of like Harry Potter?”
26
“Yeah, I think he does.”
27
“Except he’s not a wizard.”
28
“You never know, Anna.”
29
“Mommy, if you went to Hogwarts, what house would you 30
want to be in? If you couldn’t be in Gryffindor?”
31
“But I want to be in Gryffindor,” Callie said playfully. That was 32
Harry’s house.
33
“But . . . you can’t. So which one?”
34
“Well . . .” Callie made a show of serious consideration. “I 35 S
wouldn’t want to be in Slytherin, of course.”
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Anna looked approving.
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“Maybe Ravenclaw. Isn’t that Cho’s house?”
1
“Uh-huh.”
2
“I could be friends with her.”
3
It was one of the nicest evenings they’d had in quite a while.
4
Not until she’d tucked Anna into bed did Callie realize how 5
tired she was. Lately, she’d had to put in overtime at the Wind-6
ham alumni office. The Fifth Reunion directory was overdue at 7
the printer’s, and with Debbie Slater on maternity leave, it was 8
just her and Martha. The student intern they’d managed to snag 9
wasn’t helping matters. Her name was Posy — Posy Kisch — but 10
they called her Kabuki Girl. She wore white pancake makeup 11
and red lipstick. This week her hair was green. On a good day she 12
called when she planned to skip work. Most days she didn’t 13
bother.
14
Regardless of how tired she felt, she had to get some reading 15
done. Leaving the dishes in the sink to soak, Callie went straight 16
to her desk. After months of trial and error, she’d found this was 17
the only way. She turned on her halogen desk lamp and pulled 18
out a syllabus. Now You See It, Now You Don’t: Unconscious Trans-19
ference and Mistaken Identity. Riffling through a stack of articles, 20
she found the one she needed.
21
As Callie’s eyes moved across the page, the world seemed to 22
fade away. They were studying memory, and the material intrigued 23
her. Eyewitness testimony, the author wrote, was heavily relied 24
on by juries. A single credible eyewitness could put a defendant 25
behind bars. And yet time and again, sworn witness accounts had 26
proven false. “In some instances victims lie, but many more are 27
simply mistaken. Far too little attention is paid to the vagaries of 28
memory.”
29
A tapping somewhere at the back of her mind, the past paying 30
a visit.
31
Things she remembered or thought she did.
32
Things she’d prefer to forget.
33
She finished the introductory section and moved on to the 34
rest, the case studies the author used to demonstrate his thesis. In S 35
the first, a ticket agent pointed to a sailor as the man who’d R 36
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robbed him at gunpoint. But the totally innocent sailor had an 2
alibi. It was later discovered that the sailor had bought tickets in 3
the past. It was simply because he looked familiar that he’d been 4
picked from the lineup. In a second example, a psychologist stood 5
accused of rape, again having been selected by the victim from a 6
lineup. But at the very moment the rape was occurring, the psy-7
chologist was live on TV. The explanation? The victim had been 8
watching the program when she was assaulted, and the memory 9
of what she’d seen on screen had apparently merged with the 10
rape. Another classic case of unconscious transference, a glitch 11
in memory.
12
Unconscious transference.
13
Callie wrote down the words. She stared at the phrase for an-14
other few moments, thinking through what she’d read.
15
Far too little attention is paid to the vagaries of memory . . .
16
Far too little attention. Maybe.
17
But sometimes far too much.
18
She’d like to know more about these witnesses, so confident 19
and unyielding. Was there a personality type especially prone to 20
making such mistakes? Or how about another type, who con-21
stantly doubts herself? Who knows exactly what she’s seen yet re-22
fuses to acknowledge it? She herself would fall in this second 23
group, of that she was sure. Asked to identify someone, she would 24
be plagued with doubts. However confident she might feel, a 25
small part of her would wonder. She thought of a girl named 26
Laura Seton, recalled her haunted eyes, pictured her on the stand 27
at trial, pointing at Steven Gage. She thought of Sharon Adams, 28
Dahlia Schuyler’s friend. Even at the time, she’d reflexively won-29
dered how you knew for sure. Wasn’t there always that shade of 30
doubt that whispered you might be wrong?
31
Over the years, she’d taught herself to push certain facts aside.
32
It was a skill she’d carefully cultivated, a tool she’d used to sur-33
vive. First she’d done it for her daughter; later, for herself. For 34
years, the habit had served her well, and she’d never questioned 35 S
it. Only now did it occur to her that the strategy had its draw-36 R
backs. The note she’d found in the door last night, she’d pushed 4 4
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it from her mind. Now she forced herself to take it out of the desk 1
drawer where she’d stowed it.
2
H
appy Anniversary, Rosamund. I haven’t forgotten you.
3
Callie picked up a spiral notebook and turned to an empty 4
page. Licking her lips, she stared at its blankness, thinking where 5
to begin.
6
Who could have left the note?
7
That was the obvious question.
8
It had to be someone who knew where she was, someone de-9
termined to find her.
10
Through the window over her desk, Callie stared into the 11
night at the delicate black-lace tree limbs arced against the sky.
12
Across the street, a single light burned in a second-floor window, 13
while Bernie Creighton’s black Mercedes loomed in the shad-14
owed driveway. She’d already checked the doors and windows.
15
Set the household alarm. And yet, when the wind rustled 16
through the leaves, she imagined she saw someone.
17
Impulsively, Callie got up and reached toward the window to 18
yank down the bamboo shade. It fell with an explosive clatter, 19
blocking out the night. She took a deep breath and sat back 20
down, willing herself to calm. Again, she turned to the blank 21
white page with its pale blue lines. It wasn’t just a question of 22
who, it was also a question of why. Why would someone have 23
done this, left this note in her door? What would be the purpose?
24
What would they hope to gain?
25
Money, maybe. Blackmail.
26
Or possibly revenge.
27
For an instant, the thought danced through her mind, sharp 28
and bright with danger. Then, firmly, she told herself that it 29
wasn’t, couldn’t be, true. Steven Gage was dead.
30
Unless . . .
31
A new thought pushed through her brain, horrifying in its logic.
32
He could have planned it before. He could have set it up.
33
The idea was like an electric charge, surging through her body.
34
The moment it occurred to her, she knew that it was true. At S 35
first, she felt as if she’d lost her breath. Her thoughts flew in all di-R 36
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rections. Then, slowly her mind began to clear, leaving her with 2
questions.
3
Who would he have recruited?
4
Who would have agreed?
5
The response was almost immediate: She thought of Lester 6
Crain.
7
What had happened with Steven Gage and Lester Crain had 8
been the ultimate outrage, a final insult to the grieving families 9
left behind by both of their victims. Crain, a rapist and murderer, 10
was a scrawny, tough-talking punk. He was just seventeen when 11
he committed the murder for which he was sentenced to die, the 12
gruesome torture-killing of a runaway teenage girl. After repeat-13
edly raping his victim, Crain strung her from the ceiling, tore off 14
her nipples with a pair of pliers, and injected her vagina with 15
bleach. By the time he finished with her, what was left was barely 16
human. But the source of Crain’s notoriety wasn’t just his crime.
17
It stemmed from the cassette tape he’d kept of his victim’s ago-18
nized screams.
19
Gage and Crain met on Tennessee’s death row and quickly 20
forged an alliance. Gage was already a living legend; Crain be-21
came his disciple. The incredible course of events that followed 22
began in the prison library, where Gage had honed his legal skills 23
as a practicing jailhouse lawyer. With Gage’s help Crain won a 24
new trial, convincing a judge that the torture tape heard by the 25
jury had been obtained in an unconstitutional search. Later, at a 26
press conference, Crain gleefully announced that he owed this 27
second chance to Steven Gage. He’d do his best, he promised, to 28
repay the favor someday.
29
That part was bad enough, but it wasn’t close to the end.
30
While awaiting his second trial, Lester Crain escaped from 31
prison. The uproar provoked by Crain’s flight didn’t let up for 32
months. In addition to the Tennessee murder, he was a suspect in 33
other crimes. Two brutal Texas rape-murders. Another in south 34
Florida. Fueling the fear were experts’ predictions that Crain 35 S
would kill again. Sexual psychopaths like Crain, they said, didn’t 36 R
simply stop.
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For months, then years, the nation waited for Crain to pop up 1
somewhere. But as time passed, it seemed more and more likely 2
that one of three things must have happened. Lester Crain could 3
have died or become incapacitated. The third possibility was that 4
he’d managed to flee the country. Crain had spent several dis-5
solute years prowling the Texas border, living with his alcoholic 6
father outside El Paso. The hardest part would have been making 7
it from Tennessee to Texas. But if Crain had somehow reached 8
the border, he could easily have slipped across.
9
All of this was far in the past, seven, eight years ago. But if 10
Crain was alive, he had to be somewhere. Could he be here, in 11
Merritt?
12
Abruptly, Callie stood up, adrenaline flooding her body. She 13
had an overpowering urge to speak to another person. Rick was 14
probably asleep by now, but she couldn’t stop herself. Her hand 15
curled around the phone as she punched in his number. After four 16
rings, the machine picked up, and she heard his recorded voice.
17
She almost left a message, then changed her mind and hung up.
18
The box was high on a closet shelf, behind a row of shoes.
19
She climbed onto a step stool and reached up to take it down.
20
Sitting on the bedroom floor, she placed the box between her 21
legs. It looked like one of the dozens of boxes she kept in her 22
Windham office, a simple white container for the storage of file 23
folders. For a moment she stared at the cardboard lid, covered 24
with a layer of dust. She thought fleetingly of Pandora and that 25
other mythical box. But keeping the lid on her own box wouldn’t 26
keep her safe. The thing she feared was out there somewhere. It 27
couldn’t be contained.
28
The contents of the box were tightly packed: File folders.
29
Notebooks. Snapshots. She carefully pulled out items and placed 30
them on the floor. A file of yellowed newspaper clippings. A 31
small blue spiral notebook. Her stomach clenched at the sight of 32
letters in a strong sloping hand. She sat for a moment staring, al-33
most afraid t
o touch them.
34
The box was almost empty when she found what she was lookS 35
ing for. As she pulled out the book, she averted her eyes from the R 36
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picture on the cover. She didn’t want to see his face. Not now. At 2
least not yet. She saw that the binding was coming loose, shrink-3
ing away from the pages. Careful not to loosen them, she flipped 4
to the title page.
5
6
The Vanishing Man: The Secret Life of Serial Sex Killer Steven Gage 7
By Diane Massey
8
9
Slowly, she turned to the first chapter, the familiar opening 10
lines.
11
12
In the months before his arrest in Nashville, Tennessee, Steven Gage 13
roamed the country. There was something frenzied in his travels, which 14
often took place at a moment’s notice for no apparent reason. From 15
Boston to San Francisco to Miami, then back to Boston again. From 16
Nashville to Phoenix to Burlington. From Charlotte to Indianapolis.
17
When the evidence was pieced together — the gasoline receipts purchased 18
with stolen credit cards, the plane tickets bought under assumed names —
19
it would turn out that he covered more than 30,000 miles in those final 20
desperate six months. And everywhere he went, women died . . .
21
22
Minutes passed. Callie read on, her eyes skating over the 23
pages. Each line, each word, each image, cast her into the past.
24
25
Looking back, it would seem astonishing that he could have escaped de-26
tection. He drove his own car, often used his own name, moved easily in 27
the daylight. Later, some would speculate that he’d actually wished to be 28
caught. And yet, for at least a decade, Gage killed with impunity. Even 29
witnesses he’d spoken to were hard-pressed to describe him. All agreed that 30
he was tall, handsome, but no one could say much more. Good-looking 31
yet eminently forgettable, the perfect disguise for a killer. He didn’t need to 32
wear a mask. His own face served that function. He glided into his victims’
33
worlds, taking them with him when he left. Even when the bodies were 34
found, he left no trace of himself. No hair. No fibers. No fingerprints.
35 S
They called him the Vanishing Man.
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