by P J Parrish
He had called Alice from a pay phone as soon as he left Millie Reuben’s house and asked her to pull Donald Lee Becker’s medical records. Alice had refused, claiming confidentiality. Louis then told her he had found Millie Reuben and that she had the same burns Rebecca Gruber had.
“I still can’t give you those records, Louis,” Alice had said. “I just can’t. Please don’t ask again.”
“Then just pull his death certificate, Alice. Please.”
“You can get that from the public records.”
“No, I can’t. The state sealed it.”
With that, she had reluctantly agreed to get the death certificate, and they arranged to meet at the police station around three. It was ten after, but he didn’t see her car yet.
It was going to be hard, approaching Chief Dalum with all of this. There was now a definite link between Rebecca Gruber and Millie Reuben, and Dalum might even be willing to concede that Sharon Stottlemyer could be connected, despite the fact they would never prove she was burned or raped. From there, it wasn’t a big stretch to see that a former patient was the likely perpetrator. But Louis knew Dalum wouldn’t buy Becker—a dead man—as a viable suspect.
Louis wasn’t sure he did, either. Except for the one fact that in a case where nothing else made sense, Becker did. If Claudia’s body had gone missing, why couldn’t Becker’s?
Louis pushed open the car door and went inside the station. An officer near the front desk gave him a nod. “Chief’s down the way, getting a sandwich,” he said.
Louis hung his jacket on a hall tree and started for the coffeepot in the corner. He poured himself a cup and glanced at the clock. It was 3:20. Alice was probably having a hard time finding Becker’s folder in the crowded records room in E Building. He had made her promise to take a security guy with her. He hoped she had. Maybe he should have gone himself.
“Charlie’s been asking for you,” the officer said.
Louis glanced at the closed door to the cell block. “Mind if I go back?”
The officer shrugged and grabbed a set of keys from a drawer and took him back. Charlie was seated on the lower bunk, A Midsummer Night’s Dream open on his lap. He looked up when he heard footsteps and broke into a grin when he saw Louis.
“Hello, Mr. Kincaid.”
“Hello, Charlie.”
The officer opened the cell door and let Louis inside, then walked away without locking the door. On the top bunk, Louis saw a McDonald’s bag, and next to that, an unopened package of Hostess cupcakes. He guessed the cops were starting to consider Charlie more of a guest than a possible killer.
“Can we talk, Charlie?”
Charlie closed the book and stood up, setting it on the top bunk, beneath the McDonald’s bag. Then he faced Louis.
“Miss Alice is coming,” Charlie said.
“Yes, I know,” Louis said. “But can I ask you about something else?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do you know the name Donald Lee Becker?” Charlie’s face tightened and his eyes started to flick around the cell, finally dropping to the floor where they stayed. “I heard about him.”
“Did you ever see him up close? Ever talk to him?”
Charlie shook his head. “We were scared of him.”
“Who was?”
“All of us.”
Louis leaned against the bars. “I don’t blame you. Did you ever hear stories about him?”
“Stories?”
“Yes,” Louis asked. “Stories, like you read in books.
Heard about things he was doing. Stuff like that?”
“Donald Becker lives in E.”
“Yes, he did. Were you ever in E Building?”
Charlie sat down slowly, silent. Again, his head was down and he seemed to be drawing back into himself. Louis moved to sit next to him.
“Were you ever in E Building?” Louis asked again.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Louis said.
“I wasn’t supposed to be there.”
“You and a lot of other people, Charlie. It’s okay.”
Charlie rubbed his hands together, then stood up and walked a circle around the cell, his hands moving to his hair. He raked it, then seemed at a loss as to what to do with his hands and raked his hair again.
“I’ll be in trouble if Miss Alice knows. Please don’t tell her.”
“I’m sure she already knows, Charlie.”
Charlie stopped walking. “No,” he said. “She told me not to go in there. And I promised. I promised.”
Louis lifted a hand to calm him down. “Were you in E Building recently?”
“I promised. I promised.”
“Charlie, listen to me. When were you in E Building? Like just before you found Rebecca? After there were no more patients there?”
“I went in the window.”
Louis thought about the noise he had heard that day he was getting Claudia’s file, but Charlie was already in jail by then. But maybe Charlie had seen something or someone before that.
“Charlie, what do you do when you go inside E Building?” Louis asked.
“I talk to the people there,” Charlie said.
“What people?”
“The people in the walls,” Charlie said.
Louis stifled a sigh. “Do they talk back?” he asked.
Charlie was staring at him, like he had the other night, when he sensed Louis wasn’t believing him. Louis leaned forward on his knees.
“Do they talk back?” Louis repeated.
“No. Just noises.”
“What kind of noises?”
Charlie looked around the cell, then walked to the corner and tapped a water pipe with his knuckles.
Louis kept his expression even. “Have you ever seen the people?”
“No one sees them.”
“How do you know it’s people?”
“I smell them.”
Louis stared at Charlie, something starting to gnaw at his brain, and again it sounded crazy, but he had to ask.
“What do they smell like, Charlie?”
Charlie shifted his weight and looked around, as if he was trying to figure out how to answer Louis.
“Like cigarettes?” Louis asked.
Charlie pulled his lips into a thin line and gave Louis a quick nod. “No smoking in E. No smoking allowed.”
Louis heard the clang of a door and a few seconds later, Alice appeared at the bars. She carried a thick folder, held closed by a rubber band, and a basket covered with a white napkin. He could smell hot food—chicken maybe—and he knew she had brought Charlie dinner.
Louis pushed open the door and Alice came in. Charlie was smiling, his eyes on the basket.
“You brought the apple babies,” Charlie said.
“I brought chicken, Charlie,” Alice said.
Alice set the basket on the lower bunk and looked at Louis as she dug into the folder and withdrew a single, folded paper. She held it out.
“Becker’s death certificate,” she said.
Louis took it and opened it. It had Becker’s name on it, and was dated March 22, 1980. Cause of death was emphysema.
“Charlie,” Alice said suddenly, “what are you doing?”
Charlie was bent over the food basket, and he had strewn the chicken, silverware, and napkins across the bunk.
“Charlie,” Alice said sharply.
“Where are the apple babies?” he said, looking at Alice.
“What are you talking about, Charlie?” Louis asked.
“The apple babies!”
“Charlie, calm down,” Alice said.
“The changeling child needs the apple babies to go home,” Charlie said. He was staring at the empty basket, tears welling in his eyes. Alice moved to him, placing a hand on his shoulder.
“You are going home,” she said softly. “Pretty soon. I promise you.”
Charlie crossed his arms over his chest and walked to the corner, leaning his head against the w
all. Louis could hear him mumbling something about the apple babies.
“I need to talk with Chief Dalum,” Louis said.
Alice nodded, and Louis thought she’d stay with Charlie, but she walked with Louis halfway down the corridor.
“I could lose my license for giving you Becker’s death certificate,” Alice said. “Please be discreet.”
“I will,” Louis said. He glanced at the fat folder still in her hand. “Is that his complete hospital file?”
She nodded, clutching it to her chest.
“Why did you bring all his records?”
Alice sighed. “If you do go ahead and exhume Becker and his casket is empty, then it’s not going to be hard for Chief Dalum to get a subpoena for these,” she said. “I thought I’d save myself a trip back to E Building.”
“Strange vibrations inside that building,” Louis said.
“It’s just the old pipes and things like loose gratings and falling glass.”
Louis didn’t argue with her. He knew she felt the same weird presence inside E Building that he and Charlie had. She just wasn’t ready to admit it.
Dalum was staring at him, but Louis couldn’t read his look. He had just spent the last ten minutes telling Dalum about Millie Reuben and her stories of rape and burns, and how that all connected to Rebecca Gruber. And maybe to Sharon Stottlemyer.
“And this Millie Reuben said a patient raped her? Back in 1964? Hell, Louis, the man would have to be, what, sixty something now?”
“Not necessarily,” Louis said. “Not if he went in when he was in his early twenties. He’d still be in his forties.”
Dalum gave a deep sigh and dropped down into his chair. “So we’re looking at a patient who raped and burned Millie Reuben and was maybe caught or not caught because of that, but then was released at some point and now, more than twenty years later, is back here killing women and leaving their bodies on the grounds.”
Louis nodded.
Dalum came back to his desk. “So we’re looking at a patient probably released within the last few years.”
“Or one who escaped.”
Dalum’s brow went up. “Becker? You’ve been talking to that reporter.”
“I know it sounds crazy.”
Dalum gave a long stare, then shrugged. “I’m not so sure I know what crazy is anymore, Louis. I’ll hear you out.”
“Okay,” Louis began. “Becker’s M.O. was to strangle his victims by crushing their necks. Just like Sharon Stottlemyer and Rebecca Gruber. He also left his victims naked in shallow graves.”
“Did he burn them?”
“We don’t know. The bodies were too decomposed.”
“Maybe he told something to his doctor,” Dalum said. “Have you seen his medical records?”
“Alice has them,” Louis said. “But we can’t look at them without a subpoena. And no judge is going to give us one with a dead guy as a suspect.”
“Anything else you know about this guy?” Dalum asked.
“Delp claims Becker’s been seen back around his hometown, but that’s probably just rumor. But we do know he was a smoker.” Louis set Becker’s death certificate on the desk. “This is his death certificate. He supposedly died of emphysema.”
Dalum was looking at the death certificate.
“There’s something else, too,” Louis said. “Do you remember what I told you last week, when I was in E Building getting Claudia’s medical records, that I heard a noise?”
“Yeah.”
“There was something I didn’t tell you. I thought it was my imagination until a few minutes ago when I talked to Charlie.”
“Go on.”
“I smelled cigarette smoke. Charlie told me he smells people in that building, too. Becker was housed in E Building.”
“You’re thinking he’s living out there somewhere?”
“Yes.”
“We looked everywhere, Louis. We checked every building. Every closet, every rat hole. You saw the garbage out there and we have no way of telling what was left by salvage crews or vandals—or if someone was living in there.”
Dalum rose slowly and walked to the frosted window. The office was quiet. Louis spotted the drunken cop decanter on Dalem’s desk and thought about grabbing a shot. But the roads were still slick and he had that long drive back to Plymouth. It was already getting dark. Maybe he would grab a motel room here somewhere.
Dalum turned. “Well, we don’t need a court order and we already have a backhoe sitting out there doing nothing,” he said. “I guess no one’s going to care if we dig up Becker a few weeks earlier than we planned.”
“Tomorrow?” Louis asked.
Dalum gave a short nod. “Best to do it quickly. We’ll start at dawn.”
Louis stood up. “Dawn?”
“I think a little secrecy is warranted until we know for sure,” Dalum said. “If Becker is in that grave, I’d just as soon the state investigators didn’t get wind of what we were thinking here today.”
“I understand.”
“You got some dental records or something we can use for a comparison?” Dalum asked.
“I know someone who probably does.”
Dalum shook his head slowly. “One thing we didn’t mention. If Rebecca’s killer is the same guy who raped Millie Reuben in 1964, that clears Charlie.”
“Yes, it does,” Louis said.
“I guess I’m going to have to release him, but I’m a little reluctant until I know for sure all these rapes were by the same guy.”
“I know.”
“Plus, I don’t where he’d go. The hospital will be closed soon,” Dalum said, pulling on his jacket. “I guess we can let him stay here a few more days.”
“Good idea.”
Dalum gave another nod and took a long breath, his eyes swinging up to the clock on the wall. “I’m heading home early,” he said. “Why don’t you come along and Dee will fix us some dinner? You look like hell.”
“Sounds great.”
“You want to stay the night at my place?” Dalum asked. “We’ve got a fold-out sofa you can use.”
“That would be nice,” Louis said. “Save me a long drive in the morning.”
Louis followed Dalum to the outer office and was almost to the door when he remembered Alice was still in the cell block. He asked Dalum to wait a second and walked back.
Charlie and Alice were seated on the lower bunk, eating the chicken. A uniformed officer stood at the end of the corridor, wiping his mouth with a napkin.
Louis motioned Alice to the bars. When she neared, he spoke softly so Charlie could not hear them.
“There’s a good chance we’re real close to clearing Charlie,” Louis said.
Alice’s face brightened and he realized it was the first time in days he had seen her smile. “Thank you,” she said.
“You might start thinking about what we can do with him when we do clear him and the hospital shuts down completely.”
“I have thought about it,” she said. “I’m going to ask him if he wants to come stay with me.”
Louis couldn’t help but stare and he knew she saw the concern. “You look surprised, Louis,” she said.
“I am.”
“Charlie’s not dangerous,” she said. “And I’ve lived alone for almost ten years. I think we’d be good company for each other.”
“Well,” Louis managed, “if that’s what you think best.”
Alice still had that small smile on her lips. “I’ve spent my whole life working with people like Charlie. They don’t scare me. In fact, I’ve found I can learn a lot from people who see the world through a different prism.”
Louis glanced at Charlie. He had felt something similar the other night, when he was reading to Charlie, and he had seen the same guileless smile on Charlie’s face when he had walked in a few minutes ago. But the image of Charlie carrying Rebecca from the woods was there, too.
He started to ask her not to take Charlie home until they knew for sure, but s
he had turned away from him and was sitting down next to Charlie on the bunk.
Alice was trying to explain to him that one day soon there would be no hospital and he needed to understand some things. Charlie was still talking about the apple babies and how he wanted to go home.
Louis walked back to the office, their voices a soft echo in the concrete corridor.
CHAPTER 24
The air was raw, the sky a solid wash of white, and the grass crisp with a light sprinkle of snow that had begun falling just before dawn.
Louis looked at his watch. Seven-fifteen.
They had been here about twenty minutes, arriving just as the darkness was fading to a ghostly white dawn. During that time, Louis had walked the cemetery as he had the first night he left Charlie, the night he went in search of the crying graves. Like that night, he had heard nothing.
But standing in the darkness had given him time to think and imagine. He knew it was his mind playing with him, but he found himself wondering what the killer was doing right now. Had he spent the night inside one of the empty buildings? Was he out there in the trees watching them now? Had he already picked out his next victim?
Last night, Louis and Dalum had discussed putting an officer out here full time until the place closed down completely and Alice and all other workers were gone. Dalum had told him he had already asked the state police, but that they didn’t deem it necessary at this point. After all, they said, there was a security team at the hospital. And they themselves had the case under control. They were researching other women who had been reported missed over the last year. And they even had a few suspects, they told Dalum.
Louis guessed not one of them was named Becker.
He heard the grind of a backhoe and he turned to see it rumbling toward him. Spera was propped high on the driver’s seat, wrapped in a red flannel jacket, a wool cap pulled down over his head.
Spera drove the machine up close, then cut the engine. He hopped down off the seat and walked to Louis and Dalum, his gaze lifting to the flakes drifting from the sky.
“We better get this over with,” Spera said.
Louis pulled out his copy of the grave log Spera had given him. Spera did the same.
“I want to make sure there’s no mistake here,” Spera said. “I got him listed in number 6888.”