Minutes later, with the odor of petroleum and decay filling his nostrils and mouth, Lucas heard the distinctive whirring sound of U.S. helicopter gun ships, followed by gunfire. The U.S. Helicopter Cavalry raided the battlefield in a renewed offensive, chasing off the enemy before they could torch the bodies they intended to defile. When ground forces came near enough for Lucas to hear their talk, Lucas patiently waited for them to draw nearer. Choking on the overwhelming odors he'd been subjected to for so long now, Lucas shot a hand out from the wall of dead soldiers, grabbing hold of a live American cavalryman. The act startled the baby-faced kid and his companions where they stood, each reacting, raw-nerve fashion, weapons pointed, bodies shivering at the movement in Lucas's eyes. Finally realizing that the dead man was alive, a medic corporal barked out orders that made frozen men move. They finally dragged Stonecoat's battered body from the carnage of the death heap.
'And put out those damned cigarettes!' the medic added.
Now, here in his apartment, a world and decades away from Viet Nam, Lucas felt it all over again as he sliced away at the brown-paper wrapping of a package that annoyed his every sense-bringing back the enormous dismay and revulsion of war through odor alone. The Texas Cherokee detective tore open the awful 'gift' sent him. And there it was… staring back at him…a stack of pancake-shaped decaying pieces of flesh. Human or animal, it was hard to say. A sliced section of spleen, kidney, heart tissue, sliced as he had seen done in autopsy rooms, all mixed in a soupy wash of liquid residue. The decaying organ parts swam about inside a Styrofoam-lined little wood box, looking like a miniature coffin, definitely hand- fashioned.
'Son of a bitch!' Lucas tried to picture someone going to such an extreme effort to target him and to make him ill. Which of his enemies inside or outside of the department would take such pains? Who wanted to make him turn from his Native American red to a pale green? Who had access to autopsy room debris? 'Assistant M.E. Patterson? Detective Arnold 'The Itch' Feldman and his buddies?' Lucas asked the empty room. 'How big a jerk-off would it take to pull a stunt like this?
'No. Neither man would have the nerve. Then who,' he wondered aloud, 'and why?'
Lucas then noticed the note jammed between the wood outer box and the inner lining of Styrofoam. Using a pair of medical tweezers, he lifted the brown bile-stained note and opened it to reveal the cryptic message in a shaky hand. It read:
spleen on spleen,
cut true and clean,
kidney for kidney,
bake to a pie,
heart on heart,
piece by piece
I give you art,
food for thought,
and a final piece
for the feast
to grease the way to peace
Lucas studied the tight, pinched handwriting that reeked of agitation, but even as he reread the rhyme, he could get little meaning from it, save that perhaps the author wanted him to dine on the awful contents of the package, using such culinary words as grease, feast, bake, pie, cut, and food for thought. Perhaps a handwriting expert could gather more from the size of the letters, the loops and swirls that deviated from the center line, and the choice of words. However, Lucas's first impulse was to know how the package was delivered and by whom. He got on the phone and called down to the bar below his apartment. Jack Tebo lifted the receiver and barked, 'Tebo's!'
'It's me. Jack, Lucas.'
'Wha's up, Stoney? Want a six-pack sent up? A sandwich? Special tonight is-'
'No…I want to know if you got a good look at the guy who left that damnable package for me? Did you pay him any attention?'
'I didn't pay her too much attention, no. Rather plain- looking young woman…just got a passing glance at her. Tipped her a couple of bucks, like I said.'
'A woman? You saying it was a woman?'
'Had a childlike quality to her eyes, a kind of innocence in there.'
'How do you mean?'
'She was kinda vacant, you know, like a kid, but man, Stoney. She was curvaceous, my friend, sexy as they come. Small, but not anorexic, you know.'
'Childlike and sexy? Tebo, you could be arrested for that. How old was she?'
'My best guess, she'd have to be in her early twenties, but strange thing…'
'What strange thing?'
'What she was wearing.'
'Which was?'
'A uniform.'
'Delivery uniform? UPS? Shorts and shirt? What?'
'No, not exactly. She was in a plaid skirt with suspenders over a white blouse and little string tie.'
'Sounds like a schoolgirl's uniform…a Catholic schoolgirl's uniform.'
'Bingo, now you mention it. Skirt was just above the knees cut high. And man, did she fill out the blouse.'
'A cap? Did she wear a cap?'
'She was holding a cap in her hand, yeah. Why? What's got you all fired up? What was in the package? Was the kid 'spose to sing 'Happy Birthday' or do a strip tease for you, Stoney, or what?'
'Early twenties, huh? Little old for a convent girl,' muttered Lucas.
'What's got you in such a lather, amigo?'
'The return address and the contents don't exactly jive with one another.'
'Yeah, Eunice was curious about that, and she didn't like the look or the smell of the package, but you know Eunice, she just raised her shoulders and told me not to get involved in your affairs. Frankly, I'm curious myself.' He dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. 'Do you know this girl from the convent?'
'Convent girls aren't in their twenties. Jack, but even so, the answer is no.'
'Told Eunice it was none of our business what business you had with a girl from a convent school.'
'Jeeze, Tebo, I haven't one damned clue who the girl might be or why anyone from a Catholic school would be sending me disgusting shit through the mail.'
'What kinda shit're we talking about, Lucas?'
'Jack, the sender is anonymous, and the contents of the package… well, it's highly unusual.'
'Highly unusual?' he repeated.
'Especially for a young woman to be hauling around.'
Tebo grunted. 'Unusual how?'
'Come on up and see unusual for yourself.'
'Give me a few minutes…be right up. Haven't seen a good unusual for some time, bud.' Tebo imagined it must be sexy under things.
'I need a witness to this, Jack.'
'That bad, huh? Some bitch stalking you, huh?'
'I'm so glad my supposed love life affords you so many fantasies, Jack, but believe me, unless you are the pervert I suspect you are, you'll get no pleasure out of this business.' Lucas breathed too deeply, catching up the odors of the package in his nostrils and throat again. His mind wafted back to Nam, but he fought the memories. Choking, he added, 'So get up here, will you? I don't want to be alone with this thing any longer.'
Finally a serious note came out of Tebo. 'That bad, huh?'
'That bad, yes.'
CHAPTER 2
