Prusik removed a vial from her lab coat and placed it on the table.
“The killer deliberately places carved stones inside his victims. It’s his marker. He’s saying, ‘She’s mine.’ I found this stone in the esophagus of one of his victims, Missy Hooper. I retrieved a nearly identical one from the body of another victim, Julie Heath.”
Katz twirled the vial above his face. “Looks something like a chess piece.” He held it closer to his eye, as if under a microscope.
Prusik took another vial from her pocket, this one containing a cruder stone figurine similar in height and size to the first.
“This other one is made of a local mineral called chert. I understand that it is commonly found in limestone formations, which form the bedrock of southern Indiana. It’s David Claremont’s handiwork—a pretty amazing parallel to the genuine article, don’t you think?”
“A very close match, indeed,” the doctor concurred.
“What’s more, last March five museum artifacts including this one and the one from Julie Heath were stolen from the Chicago Museum of Natural History. Oddly, around this same time period, David Claremont took a bus to Chicago without telling his parents, a very uncharacteristic act. Claims it was to get hobby supplies for stone carving.”
“You’re the anthropologist—what do you make of it?” Katz said.
“Ultraviolet light identification establishes that this stone is, in fact, one of those stolen from the museum. An encoded number is etched on its base, invisible to the human eye under normal light. It’s a highland New Guinea charm stone, which had been on display at the museum’s Oceania exhibit when the thefts occurred.”
Her pulse quickened. She combed her fingers through her hair. “No question some kind of advanced ritualistic behavior is at work, Doctor. I don’t believe the killer is the least bit interested in his victims’ souls, though.” She cleared her throat.
The bank of overhead lights suddenly glared harshly. Prusik felt the heat. Her ears filled with the sound of mud sucking at her back. She pressed two fingers to the inside of her wrist, checking her pulse: shallow and rapid. She couldn’t slow the beats.
“What seems to be the matter, Christine?” Katz asked, concerned.
“Nothing, I’m just a little tired.”
Katz stood. “Come, come, I’m not so stupid as to not recognize an anxiety reaction when I see one.” He rested his warm palm gently on her forearm. “Please, lie down on the sofa. I often take naps here when the world won’t leave me alone.”
Prusik didn’t resist. Katz’s fatherly concern helped ease her mind. She laid her head back against the leather armrest. The doctor draped a mohair shawl over her shoulders and dimmed the overhead lights.
“One of the virtues of our both being government employees is that we’re well acquainted with the stresses of working on nightmarish cases that won’t go away.”
Prusik held out a hand. “Dr. Katz?” He pulled a chair beside the couch and gently squeezed her hand.
“Whatever is on your mind I assure you won’t go any further than these walls. But then you already know that.”
She glanced back at the vial, at the charm stone that had been gripped in the killer’s hand, then shoved inside a still-warm throat.
“Highland New Guinea tribes carve stone figurines. They believe placing a stone image inside the dead is respectful of the ancestral spirits that live for an eternity.”
Prusik’s eyes remained fixed on the tiny bottle, her mind drifting back to the unending New Guinea heat. “But this charm stone is nothing but an object of death,” she said, her mind exploding with images of thick jungle greenery, brown waters, and the choking Papuan mud. “It’s meat he’s after, plain and simple.”
“I can tell you this much.” He shook his forefinger in a paternalistic scolding fashion. “Two things are distinctly at work. One is this peculiar case of yours. The other is your stress disorder.”
“Come on, Doctor.” Prusik shrugged. “I know the difference between the heebie-jeebies and the normal stresses of work.”
“For sure, you are strong, Christine. You are a forensic investigator, a professional scientist pursuing this killer with the same cunning and zeal with which he enjoys dispatching young women.”
Christine sat up, stung by the doctor’s brutal comparison. “I can’t…I can’t believe you said that.”
“Ah.” Katz smiled. “You don’t see yourself as possessing cunning and zeal? I’m sorry if my comparison upsets you, my dear. Let me just say that I know you are the perfect person to track down this killer.”
Slowly Christine rose to her feet. The doctor followed her out into the hallway. “If it means anything, I would be more than glad to attest to your thoroughness and the logic of your reasoning should it come down to Thorne’s questioning your judgment.” He clasped both her hands in his and squeezed. “And you are the perfect person to track down this killer. Both of us know that. But please”—he squeezed her hands again—“please be careful, Christine.”
Prusik thanked the doctor and returned to her office, once again taking the stairs rather than the elevator; no need to run into Thorne or anyone else she didn’t want to make small talk with. She needed time to think, time that she didn’t have. She was unable to shake the idea that Claremont had a twin: a lurker whose soul was in no way identical to his tormented brother’s. Their paths had very much divided, and puzzling as it truly was, the killer’s grisly actions were dismantling the life of his innocent twin brother.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Tears caused by the wind streaked down Prusik’s cheeks. She pressed the remote key fob, and the dark government sedan whistled back to indicate that it was locked.
Her appointment was at nine o’clock sharp, in fifteen minutes. Brian Eisen and Paul Higgins had done good work. Hilda Claremont had confirmed that she and her husband had adopted David in Chicago when he was eleven months old. Typing David Claremont’s name into an “All State Court” index file search of birth records had turned up the Chicago adoption agency that had the complete files.
A sharp gust of wind mussed her hair as she crossed the street toward a building with the bronze entry of an art deco design bordered by a bold geometric pattern that repeated along the molding inside the front hallway. She fingered her hair back into place. James Branson, the president of the Loving Home Agency, was too booked to see her on such short notice. He’d passed her along to a Joan Peters, his custodian of records.
Pushing open the outer door released a great suction of air, ruffling her hair again. “Damn it,” she muttered.
“Blustery day, ain’t it?” The security guard chuckled. HANSEN SECURITY was stitched above his breast pocket.
Prusik scanned the wall directory behind the guard’s desk. “The Loving Home Agency still on the fourteenth floor?”
The guard leaned over the counter, “Yes, ma’am. Right through there,” he said, pointing to a bank of elevators.
She was in a good mood. Thorne’s keeping her in charge of forensics meant she had time to pursue this information on Claremont’s past. When the elevator doors opened on fourteen, the custodian of records of the Loving Home Agency was waiting there for her.
“Ms. Prusik? I’m Joan Peters. Mr. Branson wanted to make sure you didn’t have to wait.” She walked briskly down the corridor ahead of Prusik. “He’s so particular about his clients.” She dropped her voice. “He didn’t want anyone to think—well, you know, being you’re a policewoman—how it might look. You understand.” She crinkled her nose, gave Prusik a well-practiced smile.
“No, I don’t understand.” Prusik returned the smile. “Unless Mr. Branson has something to hide?”
“Oh, nothing like that, I assure you. It’s just that with all the stresses adoption brings, we try to relax our clients as much as possible.”
“And police trouble isn’t part of the equation,” Prusik said bluntly.
“Well, no. It isn’t.”
Peters l
ed her past a posh office, its door ajar. A young couple seated on a crimson couch gazed expectantly at a large catalogue of babies. A leaded crystal chandelier hung low in the center of the room. The Liberace effect rubbed Prusik wrong. So did the baby catalogue.
The custodian inserted a key and pushed her shoulder against a door marked PRIVATE. “It’s so musty in here. I apologize.”
“How are they organized?” Prusik stepped past Peters and began to walk down a narrow canyon of stacked bankers boxes.
“Crowder Agency records I can’t help you much with. My employer purchased the business before I started. I’m afraid most of the files were simply dumped in here as is.”
“I don’t see any dates on these covers,” Prusik said. She pulled out a box.
“What’s here is here, Ms. Prusik. I’ve come in here maybe once or twice in the last year. An older child looking for a natural parent, something like that. If you ask me, adoptees make too big a fuss trying to find their biologicals.”
“Cut the crap, Ms. Peters,” Prusik said coolly from years of practice. “Unless I can enlist your help right now, I will bring my team in to move all these boxes back to my office. What would your clients think about that?”
The woman’s brow sharply creased. “You can’t do that. They’re confidential, protected by—”
“Ms. Peters, I don’t care what they’re protected by, and I’m not sure I care for your adoption agency, either. It looks to me like you’ve got people shopping by catalogue for babies out there, and that really pisses me off. Find me David Claremont’s file, or I’ll be back in twenty minutes with a warrant. My team will tear apart every single office, including Mr. Branson’s.”
The woman’s mouth formed a perfect circle. “You can’t do that!”
“Try me,” Prusik said, hoping her bluff wasn’t showing. Christine really did need Ms. Peters’s cooperation. “Look, this information is very important to an investigation we are conducting. I’m sorry if I gave you any misimpression that the FBI is the least bit interested in learning how you conduct business here in your agency.”
“Well, you don’t have to threaten me like that!” Peters knelt at Prusik’s feet and obediently pulled out a carton. “Everything we do here is one hundred percent legal.”
Prusik flipped open the top of the box and read Dennison, Driver, and Duke across the tabs. She pulled out the next box, landing it hard on the floor.
“Here are the Cs,” Prusik said.
Peters joined her. “Here, let me help you with that.”
“Thank you,” Prusik said, pleased by the woman’s newfound cooperative spirit.
Peters rapidly fingered through the files. A minute later she held out a yellowed folder.
“Lawrence and Hilda Claremont, did you say?”
“That’s the one.”
The application was written in a difficult-to-read script. Prusik scanned through it. “Is this the birth mother’s name, Bruna Holmquist?”
Peters stood shoulder to shoulder with Prusik, peering down at the form. “It seems so. Yes.”
“The space for the mother’s social security or identity number is blank,” Prusik said. “No address is given, either. How can an official record be filed like this?”
Peters raised her palms in conciliation, nodding. “I know, I know. Some adoption agencies have lax record-keeping habits. As I recall, lots of partials came from Crowder. Keep in mind, Crowder’s mothers were often in desperate straits.”
Prusik studied another official document. “The affidavit filed with the county court is stamped with the name of a Crowder Agency representative. The mother didn’t sign off on her child? How could that be?”
“I believe it was common practice for some agencies to petition on behalf of the natural mother. Foreign immigrants frequented the Crowder Agency. The mothers may not have known English that well, if at all.” Peters eyed Prusik nervously.
The remaining documents in Claremont’s file gave information about the prospective parents’ suitability, livelihood, income, and standing in the community. Prusik needed answers about Bruna Holmquist, and there was nothing here.
She brushed past Peters, heading straight for the office with the luxurious couch. The door was closed now. She knocked once, then entered without waiting and held out her badge to a man wearing a three-piece brown suit. He was seated beside the same couple she’d seen earlier. The suit had to be Branson. His glazed-over hairdo looked pressed into place.
“May I help you, miss?” Branson’s eyebrows rose, and his face went pinkish.
“Mr. Branson, Special Agent Christine Prusik with the FBI. I need to speak with you alone.” She paced her words no differently than if she were making an arrest. “Right now if you can, sir.”
His face flushed red. “Please excuse me?” he said to the couple, motioning them back to the waiting area outside his office.
“What’s the meaning of barging into my office like this, scaring the hell out of those dear people?” he said angrily, and then he lowered his voice. “Do you realize what they’ve been through? No, of course not.”
“Finished?” Prusik said. “When I spoke to you on the phone earlier, Mr. Branson, you assured me that you’d give this matter your personal attention. Perhaps you haven’t been following the news lately? Three girls in Indiana have been viciously murdered. There may be others. The murders have led me straight to your agency.”
Branson blanched.
Prusik eased her tone. “Now, look, I’m sorry I barged in on your private meeting. But I do need your assistance to locate information on a suspect. Do we understand each other?”
“Yes, yes we do, Ms. Prusik,” Branson said, flustered. “I had scheduled previous engagements, it’s true, but I don’t want any trouble. I don’t see what possible connection this agency could have with any murders.” He shook his head.
“Well, there is a connection. I have a suspect with a name, and he was adopted through your agency. You have records with missing names and missing information,” Prusik said. “What do you know about the Crowder Agency?”
“Owen Crowder and I didn’t know each other very well. He was much older, kept meticulous records on three-by-five cards. Before computers, you know.” Branson removed a drawer of a large oak cabinet that stood against the wall behind him and placed the rack of cards on his desk. “Two separate file systems—one with clients seeking adoption, the other the mums giving up children, of course,” he said, fingering through the tops of the cards, reading the names as he went.
“David Claremont’s DOB is on or about December tenth, nineteen eighty-seven,” Prusik added, leaning over Branson’s desk, watching the man carefully as he handled the cards, not trusting him. “The files Ms. Peters showed me were incomplete,” she said. “No social security numbers. No address of the mother or identity of the father or mention of there being any siblings.”
He shook his head. “As good as Crowder was at keeping track of things on these cards, he couldn’t always get cooperation from the mothers. He did a fair amount of business with immigrants, often a desperate bunch.”
“So he bought babies from illegals—is that what you’re saying, Mr. Branson?” Prusik stared him down.
He smiled nervously, backpedaling. “You mean the missing social security numbers? Look. It’s not good practice, but Crowder would have never knowingly harbored illegal aliens. In this business, a woman out of wedlock who gets in trouble is very likely to use an alias, especially if new to this country. Not in my agency, mind you, but foreign mothers frequently don’t give out their alien identity card information for fear it will get them deported.”
Branson removed another card tray that contained information on the adoptive parents. He came around to Prusik’s side of the desk and flicked through the yellowed cards. “Unfortunately, I haven’t the staff to computerize all these. I really should. So many people are looking for their biological parents these days.” He stopped and pulled out a card. “Here,
at the bottom, it says B. Holmquist is the birth mother.” He handed it to Prusik. “Not very much, I’m afraid.”
Prusik scanned the card. “There’s also a reference here to the birth mother’s own card, Mr. Branson. Right here.” She pointed.
Branson donned a pair of reading glasses. “Ah, so there is.” He shuffled through more oak drawers. The heavy wooden filing cabinet looked ancient; Prusik wondered if he’d inherited it, file cards and all, from Crowder. “Here are the H mums. Holmquist comma Bruna. You are so right—another card for the birth mother.”
Prusik studied the neat blue ink. Bruna Holmquist, age thirty-eight, white, from Oslo, Norway. Under the heading PREVIOUS CHILDREN BORN there was a smudge mark, an erasure. Something definitely had been scratched out. Again, no address was listed.
“What’s with this entry, Mr. Branson?” Prusik said, handing him the card.
The agency director stood silent, blinking down at the card.
“Have you any more cards you aren’t telling me about, Mr. Branson?”
Branson cleared his throat. “Let me check. I really had no idea about these particular cards.”
“The line before PREVIOUS CHILDREN is smudged,” Prusik pointed out. “Couldn’t it be referring to the fact that there was another child born, unreported? One with another Crowder three-by-five card somewhere else?”
“It’s possible, yes.” Agitated, he went back to the heavy oak file drawer and removed the cards immediately following Bruna Holmquist’s. Two of them were stuck together, and as he fingered them apart, one fell on the floor.
“What’s that?” Prusik pointed. “Something’s stapled to it?”
Branson picked it up. A lined note bearing the logo of St. Mary’s Hospital was stapled to a three-by-five card with “Holmquist, Bruna, card two of two” printed neatly across the top. The name and address of the now-defunct Crowder Agency and the words “8:00 p.m. sharp” were all that was written on the notepaper.
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