But of course, on Halloween night the park was practically amagnet for kids. There weren’t many of them now, but she was worried. If thetheory that was shaping in her mind was correct, the killer was also out heresomewhere. She didn’t want to leave those kids in the park alone.
Then she heard an adult male voice calling out in a scoldingtone. When she got closer to the activity, she saw that a bunch of kids hadbeen TP’ing a tree with toilet paper. A couple of cops were chewing them outabout it and taking down their names and telling them to get back home.
She breathed a little easier.
All the same, the police had blown their cover by producing theirbadges. Had they also scared away Riley’s prey?
She somehow doubted it.
She was sure that the so-called “Goatman” was nothing if notdetermined and audacious. If he considered this his territory, he would surelybe somewhere around here tonight.
She began to retrace the same steps she had followed the nightbefore last, returning to the bushes where she’d gotten her keenest feeling ofthe killer’s presence. Again, she sensed the possibility that he had crouchedhere watching the street. When he’d spotted the skeleton-costumed AllisonHillis, he’d somehow lured her to the spot where he’d been waiting.
But how did he lure her? she wondered.
Again, the possibility that he’d sung or whistled some sort of “goatsong” crossed her mind. But as she had the night before last, Riley decidedagainst that. The sound of singing or whistling from this bush would only havefreaked Allison out and sent her on her way.
So what had he done, then? How could the killer have caught thegirl’s attention and draw her directly to him?
A cry for help, she quickly realized.
Maybe he’d cried out in a way that provoked her sympathy and concern.Maybe he’d imitated a lost or frightened child.
Riley felt a tingle of near-certainty.
Yes, it must have been something like that.
The realization brought back an eerie sense of closeness with thekiller. She felt that he was cunning, with an exalted sense of himself and hisown importance—or at least of what he was trying to do. Bill’s research hadsuggested that the killer felt a supernatural, almost religious sense ofpurpose, a dark connection to the roots of myth and tragedy.
Riley breathed long and slowly, trying to hold onto the sense ofconnection while at the same time mulling over her evolving theory. Could allof the links she had discovered back at the police station have been purelyimaginary? Allison Hillis had been taken and killed near one end of this park.Could it be a coincidence that Yvonne Swenson’s husband was buried not far fromhere in a graveyard at the far end of the property—and that her husband’sbirthday had been on Halloween?
She knew very well that some apparent connections truly wereaccidental and meaningless. But she really had to follow up these leads and seewhere they took her.
A walking trail led from this area to the other end of the parkand that graveyard. She left the area where Allison was killed and began to followthat trail. It certainly felt to her that she might be following a route thatthe killer had taken. A possible scenario continued to develop in Riley’s mindas she made her way through the park
When she arrived at the edge of the cemetery, she looked out overthe graves that stretched eerily before her in the moonlight. It was an oldercemetery, with a variety of types of headstones, ranging from simple lowmarkers to stately columns. A few areas were in rows but others seemed to berandom groupings. Some statues among the graves almost looked like they couldcome to life on a night like this. She saw one drooping angel that appearedabout to lift her wings.
Riley heard a sound and sank back farther among the trees toavoid being seen. Then she saw a figure walking among the tombstones. It was ayoung woman, her eyes cast downward to see where she was going. Riley was aboutto warn her that she shouldn’t be out here when she saw another figurefollowing behind the woman. The second figure was wearing a demonic mask, a reddevil face with projecting horns. He was definitely closing in on the woman.
It could be the killer after a new victim.
Riley put her hand on her gun, about to step forward and confronthim. But even as she did, the young woman turned and saw her stalker.
“Ralphie,” she giggled. “You devil.”
The second figure pushed back his mask and the two kissedpassionately. For a moment Riley thought they were going to make love rightthere among the tombstones. Fortunately the man said, “C’mon, let’s gosomewhere more comfortable,” and they ran off hand-in-hand.
Riley relaxed, glad she hadn’t confronted the lovers at gunpointand spoiled their rendezvous. The graveyard seemed empty of living beings againnow, so she turned her attention back to her reason for being here. Rememberingthe chart she had studied, she soon located the grave she was looking for.Rather than walk out into the open where she would be visible to anyone nearby,she worked her way closer to it by edging her way along the trees that borderedthe cemetery. From where she stood, she could see that the spot had a statelydouble gravestone. She could even read the large carved letters:
TOGETHER FOREVER
But only one side of the double-wide stone was engraved withsmaller letters. She knew that must be for Russell Swenson, and that it must beengraved with the dates of his birth and death. The space beside it was blank.
Riley understood it perfectly. Like many devoted couples, Yvonneand Russell had intended to be buried together. The empty gravesite and markerwas reserved for Yvonne Swenson. In fact, sometime during the next few days,Yvonne’s mangled corpse would be buried right here alongside her husband’s—asad, ironic consolation for the horror of her own demise.
Riley got a different feeling now—less a sense of the killer thanof poor Yvonne.
In fact, she could almost feel Yvonne’s presence right now.
When Yvonne Swenson had been alive, Riley guessed that she’dalways visited her husband’s grave on his birthday—Halloween. Perhaps thekiller had found
