Ryder looked at Dan and Axel and shrugged. “Not sure about all the murders, but there was an eyewitness to one. Except that was when you were Neil Browne. Most recently, you were Brian Denholm, but he’s dead and you stole his ID, and there’s a whole cast and crew from a movie who will swear to that.”
Dan thought Ryder’s words gave Browne concern, though he tried not to show it. Maybe he hadn’t known law enforcement had found the bodies of the dead man and woman he and Jennie had presumably killed, and from whom Neil and Jennie had taken their latest identities. Dan leaned forward, glancing at Axel and Ryder and then smiling at Neil Browne.
“Well, let’s see... I think there’s a lot we can prove. You were armed and attempting murder in the bar. That’s enough for them to hold you here for arraignment. And no judge is going to allow bail for a man who might be the Axeman’s Protégé. That will give us plenty of time to gather what we need to charge you with... Wow! I’m not even sure how many murders.”
“You can hold me. You can’t prove anything against me,” he said with a shrug.
“Well, actually, we can,” Axel said.
Neil Browne shook his head. “No, no, you don’t understand. The Axeman comes, and the Axeman goes. He’s immortal, created the last on the Sixth Day, given ultimate power. Some call him a demon, and some...well, some say that he is God! Let’s face it, fellows, people need God to be a good god. The old Hebrews had it right. God created us in his image—on the Sixth Day. But everyone seems to take God all wrong. I mean, he has a temper and a sense of humor. He gets mad, and he gets playful, and he likes jazz... He really likes jazz. So, you see, demons and gods, all the same thing. Superior beings, and most people just want to believe in goodness and kindness and respect for one’s fellow man because they’re weak! They are not survivors. The Axeman—a demon, or perhaps a god bored out of his mind, and you must figure, he’s vengeful and playful and loves blood. He demands sacrifice. And six! The count of six.”
“Jennie was one of your six, right?” Dan asked pleasantly.
At last there was a flicker of emotion in the man’s eyes.
“Jennie went on. She will be rewarded. Only a shell was cast aside.”
“Yeah, well, you see,” Ryder said, sitting back and crossing his arms over his chest, “we mere mortals see that as murder.”
Browne shrugged.
Axel leaned in. “We need to know about the rest of your six, Mr. Browne.”
The man grinned. “Dr. Browne, remember?”
“Doctor of what?” Ryder asked.
“Does it matter?” Browne asked. “I had the ID.”
“Did you kill a Dr. Browne to get it?” Ryder asked.
Browne smiled broadly, displaying a crooked smile that might have often been taken as charming.
“No, made that one with a little help from an ex-con in Mississippi,” he said.
“What is your real name?” Axel asked.
Browne started to laugh. “Ah, how brilliant! Neither the cops nor the famed FBI knows who I am. Well, of course not. I’m immortal, I come and go as I please. You’ll see! My name is Demon, but you wouldn’t understand that. So just call me Browne. Dr. Browne.”
“So, this six... There’s the one you refer to as he. Then there was Jennie... Were the couple you killed in Baton Rouge originally part of the six?” Dan asked.
“Hey, those guys are rising up in immortality, sacrificing pretty decent mortal shells to rise up to be superpowers!” Browne said.
“So they were. But they’re dead—”
“Immortal,” Browne corrected.
“Gone, and Jennie’s gone. So that’s minus three. And that leaves you, the man you call he, and one more. Unless you did get Nathan Lawrence to join with you,” Dan said.
“Nathan Lawrence,” Browne said thoughtfully. “No, he was not deserving, I’m afraid. Sad little guy. So much power. Money is power, you know, especially when mixed with immortality.”
Ryder turned to Dan and muttered, “We’re talking to a complete maniac.”
“But he does know what’s going on,” Axel said quietly.
“But I’m not telling!” Browne said, and his smile deepened.
There was a tap at the door. Dan saw Special Agent Andre Broussard through the small paned window high up on the door.
Axel stood. “Excuse me,” he said.
“I understand you’re not afraid to die, that you’re immortal,” Dan said to Browne. “But shedding this skin isn’t easy. I think you were ordered to send Jennie on to her immortality, but what you did was hack her head just about in two. Must have hurt like a son of a bitch. And she must have been so surprised...shocked, even.”
He thought he might have finally gotten through to the man, despite Browne’s efforts to display minimal emotion.
Dan went on. “Lethal injection is supposed to be the most humane way to execute murderers... Well, I’ve been in the viewing room for a lethal injection. It isn’t pretty. The body jerks and spasms as the organs fail and... Well, like I said, not pretty.”
“He will come for me, long before we reach that point. I mean, if you can even get anything on me. Really. Besides...well, whatever it is you can get me on for last night. People are going to doubt I could have killed anyone.”
Dan kept his own face impassive, yet he feared he knew exactly what Browne meant.
There must have been another victim during the night. The big man in the black coat and the slouch hat had probably struck again. There was something to the number six. If different killers were at work,
