“Not at all.” I don’t know why, but there was no sense of urgency in me. I knew the killer’s next message was somewhere in that computer, just waiting for Xyla to open it up. But I wasn’t in any hurry to see it.
“Crystal Beth was my sister,” Trixie said, snapping me out of wherever I’d gone to.
I just looked at her, waiting.
“This. . . guy. The one Xyla got you to. You think he killed them?”
“Who?”
“Whoever killed Crystal Beth. He kills fag-bashers, right?”
“Yeah. There’s no guarantee he’ll ever get the right ones. He hits at random.”
“So why do you want him?” she asked, stepping closer to me. A shadow changed behind her. Rusty. The big guy who was always drawing. He didn’t say a word, just bowed slightly. I returned it. And finally got it—I’d have to say the right thing to this woman if I wanted Xyla to open another message.
“Some people. . . some gay people. . . they hired me to reach out to him. See if he needed any help. Getting away, I mean.”
“And you were willing to do that?”
“I’m trying to find whoever killed Crystal Beth,” I told her. “And maybe he’s the path.”
“Yeah. Okay. I mean, I’m no serial-killer groupie but. . . I mean, it’s not like he’s killing kids or anything. Everyone knows how
Her face was a study in repose, brown eyes alive but calm. And right then I knew. Xyla was slicker than the killer thought. And, somehow, she’d read his damn messages too.
I didn’t say anything.
Xyla swept into the room. Trixie and Rusty backed away.
“Ready to have your look?” Xyla asked, so upbeat and innocent.
“Sure,” I told her.
The following morning, it was time for the next phase of the operation. Again telling Zoe that I would be making a call from outside, I simply went upstairs and activated the staged sequence in the computer with the “contact-target” command. Within minutes, a call would be placed to the subject’s home. Whether picked up by an answering machine or a person, I was reasonably confident that it would be recorded. The digitized paste-up was ready to send, one of a menu of choices available to me telephonically via button-sequence selection. As the target had indicated compliance via the newspaper ad, I was able to proceed to the next step without the annoying game-playing that sometimes results when the target’s response is placed other than as precisely directed.
When the phone was answered at the target’s home, the following message would come across the line:
Thank you for your cooperation. If you wish proof of the child’s health and safety, please so indicate by affixing a piece of *red* material to the flagpole in front of your residence. This may be an object of clothing, a scrap of cloth. . . anything at all, so long as it is unmistakably red. As soon as we observe this, we will prepare and transmit the appropriate proof.
There is an element of bluff—and, thus, of chance—in all operations. Requiring the target to attach a piece of red material to the flagpole in front of their house is a classic example. Certainly, I was aware of the flagpole. Now was the time to balance the value of instilling the belief that they were under constant observation against the risk of revealing the somewhat mechanized nature of my contact systems. Restated: I would necessarily assume that they would, indeed, attach the red material, and act as if that were a fact. If I was correct in my assumption, it would exacerbate their sense of being under observation. . . and increase my safety by decreasing their willingness to participate in any law-enforcement exercise designed to ensnare me. However, if they refused (or were unable) to attach the material and I sent the promised proof anyway, it would surely disclose that they were *not* under active surveillance, threatening the credibility of my entire presentation to date.
Although not given to introspection, I do understand that my exercises contain an element not purely intellectual. That is, the intellectual portion is *reduction* of risk. But were I able to eliminate *all* risk, my art would be truly completed and any repetition thereof utterly banal and meaningless. Were I ever to achieve perfection, I would cease at the apex.
Downstairs again, I found the child wearing some sort of coveralls, busily engaged in cleaning the kitchen area.
“Did you call them?” she asked by way of greeting.
“I did.”
“Did they say anything?”
“I would have no way of knowing, child. It was a one-way conversation. Remember? I explained how it worked.”
“Oh. I didn’t know you did that for all the. . . phone calls. Just maybe for the first one.”
“No. In fact, I will never actually speak to. . . the people.”
“What people?”
“Whoever your parents designate to act for them. Sometimes, the parents have. . . difficulty in dealing with the emotional stress of the situation, and they have others act for them.”
“Like the police?”
“That is the most likely.”
“My father won’t do that,” the child said. Not smugly, but with clear assurance.
I did not pursue the matter. Although the child seemed far too clever to be deceived about her father’s actual occupation—he is listed as the owner of a waste-removal firm in the business directory—there was no point in providing her with the information known to me.
“Do you want to help me make a film, Zoe?” I asked instead.
“Like a movie?”
“Somewhat. Actually, it’s a videotape. You see that equipment over there? In the corner?”
“Yes. I saw it before. We have that too.”
“In your house?”
“Yes.”
“For surveillance?”
“I don’t know. What’s. . . surveillance?”
