Thief of Souls

by Ann Benson

  And then at the hospital, they’d take him away from us, because the doctors would want to restrict contact for medical reasons, and then of course Sheila Carmichael would show up with a never-ending list of reasons why we couldn’t ask him any more questions. Though he had bled profusely, his vital signs had been brought under control and he was receiving fluids, so Durand was judged not to be in immediate danger of dying from his wound, though his backhand would probably never be the same again, not that it mattered. There are no tennis courts in prison—probably not in hell either.

  He was, according to all those in the ambulance, quite lucid during the ride and responded to Frazee’s threats with crisp, vulgar invective. There was no longer any need for him to hide the beast that dwelled within him. All disguises were off; he was the naked, nasty Wilbur Durand, who enjoyed his last moments of freedom with abandon, expounding in great detail on the pleasures of pedophilic sodomy and the thrill of evisceration.

  Frazee couldn’t wait to tell me about it. “Durand was screaming and shouting about how his sister was going to get him out and then he was going to find every one of our kids and pull the guts out of them, and then—God. I can’t even repeat the things he was saying he would do to them. Just being in his presence made me feel sick.”

  And then he told me about the “incident,” one that would become part of the internal lore of our division. “The second we got out of the ambulance, one of the patrols let loose on Durand with his fists.”

  I was so happy to hear that.

  “But there were two of them. We can’t remember which one smacked him.” Neither man included any information on the alleged beating in the reports they themselves wrote later about the ambulance ride, though Durand complained repeatedly that he’d been the victim of police brutality.

  As soon as he was stabilized after the completion of his amputation, Wilbur Durand was taken to an isolated room equipped for the treatment of violent criminals and secured to the metal bed with leg cuffs and one arm cuff. Lacking his right arm, there was little chance that even a man of his magical talents could manage an escape. Additional detectives from our division, who had followed the ambulance on the way to the hospital, joined Spence Frazee as he questioned Durand on the matter of the whereabouts of the other children who had been taken over the course of his spree.

  Wilbur refused to speak.

  I wondered how Moskal could say that Sheila Carmichael maintained a low profile in Boston—she was positively large when she swooped down on Los Angeles like the new Johnnie Cochran. But, then, this case was not going to be about the man’s guilt or innocence, since that was predetermined—it would be one giant exercise in public relations. The only remaining question, that of the punishment, would be answered as much in the court of public opinion as in the hearts and souls of twelve average citizens.

  I started to read up on her. It was not as frustrating to dig into Sheila Carmichael as it had been with her brother Wil Durand—there were plenty of bios, lots of quotes, and a whole slew of articles she’d written for legal journals. The woman had I want to be a judge written all over her. Maybe her brother’s penchant for mutilating little boys would put a hex on that. Please God.

  She was famed within legal circles for taking on defendants for whom no one would reasonably have sympathy. This was just such a case—her brother had been caught in the act of attempting to murder a child after he had already assaulted that child sexually. He committed a portion of that crime while someone who cared about this child, myself, who just happened to be a veteran police officer, watched. He had taped the act in its entirety, which had been legally confiscated as evidence. The most bleeding-heart jury would find him guilty. Not to mention that a body of evidence pointing to his involvement in a number of other disappearances had been accumulated through prior investigation and would probably be deemed admissible.

  It was one of the most solid legal cases against a perpetrator I had seen in my career as a cop, and it was a reasonable speculation that if Wilbur had not had a sister who was an attorney, he would have been hard-pressed to find one who would be willing to take him on. Money was not the issue—the real problem was the negative karma of being associated with a criminal the likes of Wilbur Durand. It would be so hard to overcome that few reputable attorneys wanted to be associated with it. Because I, a cop, had more than a passing connection with one of the victims, there might be professional repercussions for an attorney; cooperation from the police department would no longer be assured. Of course, no one would come out and say this—we are supposed to rise above the desire for retribution. But paperwork would become harder to get, calls would be delayed, evidence would disappear for the clients of any in-town lawyer who took on Wil Durand.

  Sales and rentals of Durand’s films tripled overnight when the truth about how some of them were made finally came out. Critics elaborated on their unsettling and brilliant realism. It all made me want to puke. My nausea was compounded by the stunning public-relations campaign that Sheila Carmichael arranged for her brother. The gory details of his childhood were revealed in a depth that Kelly McGrath could never have contemplated. Stories about Uncle Sean, the abuse by his grandfather, his mother’s alcoholism and mental illness. I could hear the shirts rending in Southie all the way in California. But all the players were dead, so who would protest?

  The morning after we took him, Wilbur Durand was arraigned in his hospital bed and charged with one count of attempted murder of a juvenile in concert with the act of sexual molestation—physical examination revealed that Jeff had been sodomized prior to receiving his other physical injuries—and two counts of attempted murder of a police officer. He was also charged with the felony kidnapping of Nathan Leeds and a number of other young boys, even though their bodies had not been found, and when the evidence was analyzed, probably the murder of Earl Jackson. It was deemed by all involved with the indictments that there was sufficient physical evidence to move forward without them.

  I moved through all of this as best I could. My days could not be classified as “good” or “bad”; the new standard for my existence was “horrible” or “livable.” One of my better post-nightmare days was when the prosecutor was named; James Johannsen, who had brought my requests for warrants to the judge and argued so persuasively that they ought to be granted, was assigned the task of seeing that Wilbur Durand was punished to the limit of the law for his heinous acts. He was a tough, resilient former public defender whose sense of right and wrong made it impossible for him to continue defending scumbags for unforgivable crimes. He came over to the good side maybe eight years ago. Jim was every bit a match for Sheila Carmichael, who would still have had a rough road ahead of her even if the prosecutor was a wimp.

  Predictably, Sheila dove right into it. When Johannsen filed a motion for a chain-of-evidence blood sample to be drawn so a DNA comparison could be made, she immediately filed a brief with a counterargument based almost entirely on civil-rights issues. Johannsen’s request was eventually granted, but his triumph was overshadowed in the press by Sheila’s request for a bail hearing. The judge listened quietly to her argument that her brother had “strong ties to the Hollywood community” with a look of sheer disgust on his face. Johannsen, who knew that there was no possibility of bail, pointed out that Durand would have no trouble meeting a million-dollar amount. The cops who were present told me that when the judge denied bail, Sheila went into an immediate snit, at which point the judge walked out of court, leaving her to piss and moan to an empty bench.

  The DNA test was rushed through in a couple of days. It came back a positive match to the sample taken from Jeff. I brought Evan to visit him as often as possible, but it was so hard to look at him. The physical problems he faced were terrible. But the emotional problems might be worse. Evan was a loyal friend, a constant source of support. But the strain of it showed on him.

  “That was supposed to be me, wasn’t it?”

  I couldn’t entirely deny it, but th
ere was no way to be sure. “We just don’t know,” I told him. “Durand won’t say.” Evan’s guilt over the matter would probably not surface for some time, but Doc Erkinnen had told me to be vigilant for signs—withdrawal, sullenness, a desire to be alone. Preoccupation with things macabre. No more horror movies for my son; his own reality had usurped them all.

  Jeff would never eat another piece of fruit; his shortened digestive tract would deny him that pleasure. For a while, he would have to carry around a portable IV, because he needed a steady stream of antibiotics, the variety rotated regularly, to ward off the infection that was sure to arise from having his intestines exposed to the air. They’d had to cut out three feet, which had literally dried up, but his parents had agreed to let his doctors try to restore a section that had fared better.

  Someone’s bullet had gone right through his right kidney, and it had been removed in tatters. He had nearly bled out; cops had come in by the hundreds to donate blood for him. He had still almost died, despite several transfusions. So even if he recovered enough to move normally once again, he would never play football or soccer or any other sport where there was the remotest possibility that his remaining kidney might be damaged.

  Somehow, mostly thanks to Spence and Escobar, the police work involved in closing out the case moved forward. Warrants were easy to obtain at that point. They got another one for the house, but this time they had a better idea of what they were looking for. In one of Wilbur Durand’s stocking drawers, they found a single button.

  From Earl Jackson’s shirt. Durand was immediately charged with first-degree murder in the act of sexual molestation and kidnapping of a child. Off with his head.

  thirty-five

  What follows is the confession of Gilles de Rais, knight, Baron of Brittany, the accused, made voluntarily, under no constraint, and with all freedom of mind on the afternoon of Friday, October 21, 1440.

  On the subject of the abduction and death of many children, the libidinous, sodomitic, and unnatural vice, the cruel and horrible manner of killing, and at the same time the conjuring and invocation of devils, oblations, immolations, or sacrifices; the promises made or the obligations contracted with them by him or other things mentioned in the aforementioned articles; Milord Gilles de Rais, accused, voluntarily, freely, and grievously admitted that he had committed and detestably perpetrated on numerous children the crimes, offenses, and sins of homicide and sodomy. He confessed also that he had committed the invocations of demons, oblations, and immolations, and made promises and obligations to demons and did other things that he confessed recently in the presence of the said Lord President and other people.

  Interrogated by the said Reverend Father and President as to the place where and time when he began perpetrating the crimes of sodomy, he responded, in the Champtocé castle; he professed not to know when or in what year, but to have begun doing it near to the time his grandfather, Lord de la Suze, died.

  Item, interrogated by the Lord President as to who had persuaded him to the crimes, he replied that he perpetrated these acts according to his own imagination and idea, without anyone’s advice or instruction, and following his own feelings solely for his pleasure and carnal delight, and not with any other intention or to any other purpose.

  And the Lord President, being surprised that the accused would have accomplished the said offenses of his own accord and without anyone’s urging, asked the accused again to tell from what motives and with what intent he had the said children killed and had their cadavers burned, and why he gave his soul up to these heinous crimes, admonishing him to be willing to declare these things completely in order to relieve his conscience and unburden his tormented soul and to secure more thoroughly the favor of the most merciful and clement Redeemer. Whereupon the accused, indignant at being solicited and interrogated in this manner, spoke in the French tongue and said to Monsieur le President, “Hélas, Monseigneur, vous vous tormenter et moy aveques!” Alas, Monsignor, you torment yourself and me as well.

  To which the Lord President responded, also in French, “I do not torment myself in the least, but I am very surprised at what you have told me and simply cannot be satisfied with it. I want to know the absolute truth from you for the reasons I have already told you, many times.”

  To which the accused replied, “Truly there was no other cause nor intention nor end beyond what I’ve told you, which is enough to kill ten thousand men.”

  Thereafter, the Lord President ceased his interrogation of the accused and commanded that François Prelati be brought into the room. And Prelati was brought forth in person before Gilles, the accused, whereupon he and the said accused were interrogated together by the said Lord Bishop of Saint-Brieuc on the invocation of demons and the oblation of the blood and members of the said small children, and the places where they performed the invocations and the oblations, to which the accused and François had just confessed.

  Thereupon Gilles, the accused, and François, responded that the said François had performed several invocations of demons and of one named Barron specifically, by order of the accused, as much in his absence as in his presence, and moreover that the said accused admitted that he was present at two or three invocations, especially at the places of Tiffauges and Bourgneuf-en-Rais, but that he was never able to see or hear any demon, even though the accused had conveyed a note written and signed in his own hand to the same Barron by way of the said Prelati, by which Gilles promised to obey the demon’s orders, while retaining his soul, however, and his life. And that the accused promised the said demon Barron the hand, eyes, and heart of a child, which François was supposed to offer to him, but the aforementioned François did not do so.

  The Lord President then ordered the said François Prelati to be returned to the room where he was guarded. Whereupon the accused Gilles turned to François with tears and gasps and said to him in French, “Good-bye, François, my friend! Never again shall we meet in this world; I pray that God will grant you patience and understanding, and know well, provided you have patience and trust in God, that we will meet again in the great joy of Paradise. Pray to God for me, and I shall pray for you!”

  After saying which, he embraced this François, who was taken away immediately.

  Together my son and I shared one of the first copies of the transcript of Milord’s confession. It had been given to me by Jean de Malestroit, who, not having been present himself, likewise had one. Other copies were now furiously being made by a small army of conscripted scribes, who bent over their parchments and worked the letters on the page as fast as their fingers could fly.

  I sighed deeply as I read the dry, toneless words. I asked my son, “What can be meant by grievously in the description of his speech? Did he weep, as he did when I first spoke to him of these matters in the same room where this confession had been recorded? If so, it has not been described in these words.”

  He indicated with a shake of his head that he knew no better than I. “Mère, you must remember that these pages are not intended to convey the subtleties of his ordeal. They are intended to protect those who ordered his execution from the wrath of Milord’s family, and nothing more.”

  The indignation of his family was likely to be just as dry and toneless. René de la Suze would hardly weep for his brother, but he would tear his shirt and smear himself with ashes to regain the properties that Milord had frittered away in his debaucheries. Little Marie de Rais hardly knew her father, beyond what she had been told by her mother, who had many reasons to hate him. There in his sumptuous quarters, had Gilles de Rais finally broken down and let his deepest secrets out? I could almost hear his voice.

  “The child Gilles speaking again in these words. These things he did as a man were no different from the things he did in his early youth, only more grave in nature.”

  Jean rose up from his chair and stepped away from me. He walked toward the window and looked out into the courtyard for a few moments. His gaze seemed fixed, yet I knew from many years of lo
oking out that small window that there was little to hold one’s attention. Something within his own mind was engaging him.

  “I would know your thoughts, my son,” I said quietly.

  I heard him release all the air from his lungs and then take in a new, fresh breath, all very deliberately. He turned toward me with a troubled look on his face. “Mère,” he said, “Milord did many things of a very grave nature in his youth. You simply do not know all of them.”

  I tried to smile. “You have instructed me recently that boys keep many things from the women who care for them.”

  I heard shame in his voice when he said, “In this case, ’twas not only Milord who did so.”

  A knot began to form in my stomach. “Have you something to tell me, Jean?”

  “Yes, but not for myself, for my long-dead brother.”

  “Michel? What did he do that he kept from me?”

  Jean remained quiet for a moment, as if he could not find proper words for what he wished to tell me.

  “It was so many years ago,” I said. “There is nothing I could not forgive him, or you.”

  “It was not what he did, but what was done to him. Or attempted.”

  It was a few heartbeats before I began to understand. “Go on,” I whispered.

  “You know that there was something of a falling out between myself and Milord Gilles at one time, that I no longer wished to be in his company.”

  “Yes. Your paths became divergent, and your interests were very different from his. But I accepted this as just the natural way of—”