appeared, had terrorized this hamlet from the day he was bom.
And so now, here they stood, Deputy Frizzell, his thumbs in his waistband, buried below his protruding stomach, and J. T., looking out of place from his Ralph Lauren glasses to his expensive leather shoes, marking him as a visitor from Mars, standing before the platform porch of the place where Abominable practiced being abominable the most-on his own family.
Now more young people, large burly men and boys, spilled from the doorways of the house, over the porch and into the yard, all wanting to know why their deputy cousin and uncle had come in the company of this obvious outlander. What had happened and what was going on telegraphed from every hang-mouth face.
Deputy Frizzell explained the situation bluntly and without fanfare. The news garnered no tears, but it did get a pair of whoops and yahoos and curses. One of the boys said, “Damned glad to hear it, Dr. Thorpe. Thank you.” The implication being, “You can go now,” J. T. thought.
Another of the sons asked, “But why'd you come all this way to tell us about it when you coulda' just phoned it in?”
“Did he ever make it to Utah? That where he died?” asked another of the younger boys who'd missed the earlier conversation about the mysterious death in New Jersey that had led J. T. to their doorstep.
One of the older siblings, a girl holding firm to a baby, brought her little brother up-to-date with a few choice words: “Don't be stupid, Kyle.”
J. T. added, “You see, the body went unidentified, and it took a great deal of detective work, using his tattoo art, to trace it-your father-”
“Gran-pap,” corrected the younger boy.
“Yes, of course, pardon.”
“You think he was murdered up there in New Jersey?” asked the young woman with the child in her arms as she stepped forward, the baby cooing mam-mam-mam! in her ear.
“Matter of fact, yes.”
“How was he kilt?” asked the older woman who hadn't budged from her porch chair.
“Are you Mrs. Sanocre?” J.T. asked.
“That'd be me.”
“We need to talk.”
“About?”
“Arrangements, return of Mr. Sanocre's remains.”
“We don't want his cussed remains here,” said one of the youngest boys.
“He were the Devil,” said the young girl with the babe in her arms. “Ever'body knows-sit!”
J. T. saw it flicker in her eyes, the hatred, yes, but also the truth. “You killed him, yourself, didn't you, young lady. I read you like a book.” She done nothing of the kind!” defended one strong-armed fellow instantly at her side who didn't have the same coloring or hair shade as the others.
“Your husband, Miss Sanocre?” asked J. T. of the man. “Yes.” 'Tell me, son. You own any of these dogs?” asked J.T.
“What's going on?” asked Mrs. Sanocre from the porch chair.
“That bastard broke my mama's legs, both of 'em, just outta meanness and evil. If he got killed, it was God put him dead, not us,” said the young girl.
“Do you have access to a rabies venom, sir?” J. T. asked the man at her side.
“All right… All right, I did it. I killed that Devil, and I did it on my own. None of these folks here had anythin' to do with it.”
“No, no, July!” shouted the daughter. “I ain't allowin' you take this on your head alone!”
“Shut up, Cassie! You know I done it alone, all on my own!”
The others were abuzz, some of them clearly confused, and the old woman shouted, “What're you all talkin' about?”
The daughter went to her maltreated, malnourished mother to comfort her, cooing that everything would be put right. The mother accepted her daughter's words as if they'd been spoken by an angel or God.
Deputy Frizzell said, “Cassie, July, I think we have a long night of talkin' to do down in Diamondback at the jailhouse. Come on.”
Cassie handed off her child without a misstep or a tear, and she and July voluntarily found the rear of the squad car. Their deputy cousin did not handcuff them. Others in the family gave out threatening gestures, lifted voices, and banged on the car, but they did allow Deputy Frizzell to pull off with Cassie and July in custody.
Deputy Frizzell began to read the pair their rights.
It came off as simple as that. All they needed to see was an FBI expert in their front yard telling them that he knew they had done it, and the entire elaborate scheme fell away like a house of flimsy cards.
When the full story came to light, three others in the family, two of whom had raced off to become fugitives, were implicated in the conspiracy to kill Maxwell Sanocre, all of them his children, all full-grown adults. They had conspired to murder him in New Jersey where they sent him on a supposed reunion with his high school buddies. Before he ever got to the “reunion,” however, he was fooled into visiting the junkyard for “great used Harley parts.” There he was murdered by the rabid dogs which his daughter, married to a veterinary apprentice, had masterminded. “The beauty part,” Cassie at one point in the interrogation said in chilling matter-of-fact manner, “was that we used his own damned, vicious pit bulls to get him. He made them dogs evil, same as he wanted to make all his children evil. Somebody had to put an end to him and his dogs. The rabies was for the dogs as much as him, and we figured since he was wanted in New Jersey, he'd die before he took hisself to a doctor, even if he could get over that junkyard fence. He was the Devil his-self. No matter what you think, Dr. Thorpe, we done the right thing…”One son, a daughter, and a son-in-law, each of whom passionately hated the old man, were held over for trial, while two others remained at large. Clearly, Sanocre's wife, with little sense left, did not understand this sudden disintegration of her family, but she clearly laid it at her dead husband's feet. Perhaps, if the jury found any sympathetic thread in all this so as to understand the terrorizing and traumatizing abuse that even to J. T., an outsider, appeared rampant, then daughter and sons might find some mercy with the court.
J. T. wanted out of Diamondback as quickly as possible, and so he flew back to New Orleans, where he took some time to relax, see the sights and recoup before even thinking of flying on to Quantico, Virginia. From New Orleans, he dialed London, in hope of reaching Jessica to tell her that he'd wrapped up the case of the Missing Person known to them as Horace the Tattoo Man.
Proud of himself, pleased at his handling of the case, bursting to tell Jessica the news, he called the York Hotel only to find her not in, and in converting the time, he wondered where she might be at 6 p.m. British dme, for when he tried Scotland Yard, she could not be found there, either. He couldn't opt to leave her E-mail because his terminal awaited his return to Quandco. He hated being out of touch, and gave some thought to that laptop he'd been thinking of purchasing.
His next call caught Eriq Santiva between meetings. Santiva gave him great praise at having so efficiently worked the case. “And all on your own,” the chief added. “Enjoy New Orleans! Take whatever time you like.”
They spoke briefly about Jessica's case in London, neither of them having heard from Jessica in some time now. Each promised to keep the other informed should they hear from Coran in London.
Sunday Evening, October 1, Scotland Yard
Jessica and Sharpe, skirting the peripheral corridors of Scotland Yard, found their way into the bowels of the building where Sharpe introduced Jessica to Ralph Crider, telling her that Crider knew more about film and film enhancement than anyone on the planet. Jessica left her film with Crider, who promised to have it developed and blown up to enlarge the map and scale models she'd taken pictures of at the RIBA. She lamented having had no time to take “normal pictures” here in London.
They carried on, as Richard called it, now past the computer archives to an archive predating the computer age, where hard-copy materials and microfiche remained housed in boxes and on shelves.
Still struck by the strangeness of the two “orphaned” twins named Houghton, Jessica insisted on searching the Yard's data banks on them, to see what might turn up. She again said to Richard, “I just know I recall something about a case dealing with a pair of twins from Gloucester.”
They gained entry to the file rooms using Sharpe's identification. Soon their eyes marked the speeding trail of a microfiche tape machine, as the dates she was most interested in, the years between 1950 and 1960, sped by in a newspaper history on the microfiche. The whining of the machine sounded like a miniature siren wail as the tape
