The messages had been withheld from the media and public to weed out those who exorcised God knows what past horrors by confessing to every bizarre killing. No one admitted killing street-corner dope boys, but let a woman be found steeped in savagery and the wild-eyed confessors lined the block.
'Meaning and purpose if you're balls-to-the-wall nuts,' Harry said. I sat on an elevated grave and Harry sat beside me. He sighed and looked up and studied the clouds or the treetops. When he turned back to me his eyes held a sadness and concern I hadn't seen in a long time.
'I've been worrying about you, bro.'
I stiffened. 'You mean the thing with Ava? I'm concerned about her, sure, but it's not '
'Not that. You're not doing anything on your own, are you? On the headless cases?'
I jumped up. 'What the hell would I do on my own, Harry?'
His eyes searched my face. 'Like independent research. I know you get wild hairs sometimes.'
'Do you think I'd hold something back, Harry, is that it?' My voice came out clenched. I heard guilt beneath the anger.
His voice was calm, reasoning. 'I didn't say that, I was just wondering if you were doing any blue-sky. During the Adrian days it was like you were calling some psychic hotline, y'know. The shrinks and profile types saying the fire over the victim's eyes was a form of hiding, that Adrian knew the vies. Then suddenly like out of air you get the idea it was a bonding mechanism.'
'It was a chance idea that panned out, nothing but serendip '
Harry cut me off with a lifted finger. 'Next, you decide all the victims were chosen by proximity to another fire in their recent pasts.
It turns out true. You suggest shadowing the fire department, checking scenes of potential arson, trying to find a guy scoping out his next vie. We do and bingo! you see that guy with the hair-pulling deal, what was that called?'
I looked away, hating how the Adrian case and its flotsam kept floating into today, bumping my ass.
'Carson, what was that hair stuff? Yanking it out?'
'Trichollomania, dammit.'
'Yeah. You saw that guy at the fire pulling out his hair like he's shredding a rotten sweater. And there he is, Joel Adrian.'
I fought the compulsion to walk away. 'I was there, Harry. I remember it.'
'Maybe there's other stuff you don't remember. Or don't want to.'
My attempt at laughter broke before leaving my lips. It came out as a croak. 'You think I'm getting senile? That it?'
'What I remember most is after the case. You laying in the hospital with that breakdown and '
I rushed toward him, hands jabbing the time-out signal. 'Hold it, whoa … stop. No it wasn't, dammit.'
Harry looked up with innocent puzzlement. 'Wasn't what?'
'A breakdown, dammit. It was stress and lack of sleep. Nothing else, nothing mental.'
'Did I say mental breakdown? I don't think I did. I meant physical breakdown, exhaustion. Like you said, stress, hurrying and worrying, lack of winks. I do recall the word depression'
'Lack of sleep combined with stress can mimic chronic depression.'
'All I know is you could barely walk or talk for about a month.'
I stood and looked at my watch without noting the time. 'Maybe we can make something out of this day. Do some work.' My voice came out angrier than I'd expected.
Harry put his hands on his knees and pushed slowly erect, like hoisting a bag of concrete on his shoulders. 'All I'm saying, Cars, is you did a helluva job on the Adrian case, but it did a helluva job on you too.
Just keep me in your loop, let me know what you're thinking. It's always good to bounce stuff off your partner, right?' He pointed to his head. 'Gets lonely in here sometimes, Cars. People make fast decisions, don't let anyone in on them.'
'Whatever you want, Harry.' I said it over my shoulder, a dozen feet gone and moving away, wondering what in hell that had been all about.
A 3:00 a.m. shooting at a notorious after-hours hangout left two dead and five injured. While the shooting wasn't in itself notable, the twenty-year-old daughter of an activist minister was one of the injured, preliminary findings revealing she may have received her thigh wound in practice of the world's oldest profession. The media was in full-court press, the detectives' room chaos, cops running in and out, people yelling, phones ringing as snitches peddled useless lies and the media tried the back doors.
We retreated to a closet-sized meeting room and spread files and photos across the tiny table. Neither of us visited Nelson's apartment or had a decent chance to study the inventory of his personal belongings, so we buried ourselves in the notes of the assigned detectives. The inventory wasn't large, but we sifted sand for the nuggets linking Nelson and personals ads, since they'd connected Deschamps to Talmadge.
'Here's something,' Harry said, jabbing his page. 'Page three, item twenty-seven: 'One silver metal (aluminum?) file box in closet.
Personal papers. Insurance forms. Check stubs and financial records.
Correspondence. Newspaper clippings.' Newspaper clippings? I wonder what paper? Be interesting if it was the News Beat 'I'll get the car,' I said.
Nelson had lived in an apartment complex not far from Brookley Airport.
The long common hall smelled of grease-cooked food. The rug had patches of mildew, or maybe mange. Someone at the far end of the hall had 'Whip It' on the stereo. Harry and I followed the manager, Briscoe Shelton, to a brown door with the number 8-B scribed on it with Magic Marker. Shelton was a skinny, rusted-out redneck in his mid-fifties who smelled of cigarettes and WD-40.
He wore stained painter's pants and a sleeveless T-shirt that had once been white. A heavy chain jangled from his belt to his back pocket.
When he flipped the chain a rattling clot of keys popped from his pants and landed in his hand. You could tell he'd spent hours practicing the move. Harry verified the scene tape was intact, then sliced through with a penknife.
'I never liked the little sonofabitch, y'know,' Shelton testified as he poked at the lock with key after key. 'Never paid his rent on time, but always managed to get it in just before I could legally evict the smartass.'
'Did he have any regular guests, Mr. Shelton?' I asked.
'He had a damn parade through here. Men, women, boys, girls, and some whatchamacallits I couldn't say what they were, y'know?'
'Anyone stand out?'
'There was the chunky girl with the vanilla-pudding face and Minnie Mouse voice. Spent a lot of time here a couple months back. Real lovey dovey at first, then later a lot of yelling and shit.'
Given the time frame and the description, I figured that was Terri Losidor. Shelton held the clot of keys in front of his face and squinted at it, separating a key from the rest. 'And there was one guy I remember cuz he was so different from the riffraff and perverts.
Older guy, compared to the rest of the circus. Always came at night.
He'd pull up at the far end of the building and hustle in like he had fire in his britches. After a while they'd come out and take off and sometimes I wouldn't see smartass for a few days, y'know.'
'When was this?' Tasked.
A key fit and the door swung open. Hot, stale air poured out like trapped memories. Harry's run to the AC probably made the folks downstairs think the roof was caving in.
'Maybe two months back. Sniffed around regular for a month or so, then I didn't see him no more. Didn't mean he weren't here, just means I didn't see him. I don't spy on my people. Even perverts.'
Shelton stayed by the door as Harry and I scoped the place out. 'You get done be sure and pull the door. How long's it gonna be 'fore I can rent the fucking place?'
'I don't know, Mr. Shelton. Perhaps a week until we release it,' I said.
Shelton screwed up his pasty face. 'That means a month 'fore I can rent, y'know.'
'Why's that, sir?' Harry asked.
Shelton showed us yellow teeth. 'Cuz it's gonna take least three weeks to air the stink of faggot outta here.'
