“Baxter has officially classified these murders as normal sexual homicides,” Miles says, “if there is such a thing. All the murdered women were raped after they were dead.”
A short intake of breath from Drewe.
“There’s a ton of forensic evidence,” he goes on, consulting his printouts. “Bite marks in some cases, not others. The marks don’t match. In one case they may have been made by a woman. With a couple of victims there was severe skin mutilation. The weird thing is that semen samples were found and analyzed in every case, and with seven victims they’ve found semen from at least four different men. Sometimes near the victim, other times inside the vagina. They’re waiting on DNA tests now. To compare to mine, no doubt.”
The hair on my forearms is standing. “You mean four men raped each victim?”
“No, no. Four men spread over all seven cases. Though in two victims there were two different semen samples found.” Miles shakes his head at Drewe. “I know what you’re thinking-one sample from a boyfriend or husband, the other from the killer, right? Wrong. Both samples in each woman were the result of postmortem sex.”
“Good God,” I whisper.
Miles takes a sip of coffee. “The problem with physical evidence is that the Behavioral Science people basically use a connect-the-dots approach to murder. They have checklists for cops to fill out. Condition of the body. Restraints, no restraints. Type of weapon. Cause of death. Post-offense behavior. Antemortem rape or postmortem rape? Penetration or just masturbation? All these things produce vastly differing profiles.” Miles sounds almost saddened by the imperfection of the system. “A guy who knows the system can put a few extra dots at each crime scene and distort the picture. If he puts in enough dots-or takes them away-there’s no picture at all.”
“Like the radically different head wounds,” Drewe says. She pulls at the corner of her mouth with her forefinger. “What about the physician angle?”
Miles shuffles his papers. “The current Unit profile includes butchers, dentists, doctors, male nurses, taxidermists, veterinarians, even people who’ve worked in slaughterhouses. They figure somebody’s expanding his horizons in new and exciting ways-with help, of course.”
Drewe wrinkles her mouth in distaste. “Does anyone think just one man might be responsible for the crimes?”
“Yes, but that presupposes an individual of staggering abilities. He’d not only have to have medical skill and access to things like blood and semen, but also detailed knowledge of law enforcement methods, forensics, locks, security systems, not to mention psychology and computers. It’s hard to picture one man-particularly a serial killer-having that kind of ability.”
“Why? Wasn’t Ted Bundy a really smart guy?”
“Not really. I did a Nexis search on serial killers, and I learned a lot. Bundy looks clever compared to the mean of his group-serial killers-but put him on a scale with the general population and he was nothing special. We’re talking about a guy who dug up women he’d killed weeks before to have sex with their corpses. He got a lot of press because he looked halfway preppie and could convince women to trust him. The truth is, most serial killers are genetic debris.”
“Not Brahma,” I say. “You’ve read some of his stuff, haven’t you? He’s erudite as hell. And he can exploit insecurity like no one I’ve ever seen.”
Drewe looks at Miles. “You agree with that?”
“Yes. But I don’t think he’s a doctor. His computer skill level’s too high for that. Some doctors know computers, but not at the level I’m seeing.”
“So what do you think?” I ask. “You think he’s a hacker?”
“No. I think he might be a Real Programmer.”
This silences me.
“What’s that?” asks Drewe.
“What Miles used to be. At MIT. People the media call ‘hackers’ get to know operating systems like UNIX and DOS and VMS very well, their design quirks and flaws. But Real Programmers can
“The problem with that theory,” Miles interrupts, “is that a Real Programmer killing people doesn’t make sense. We’re talking about a dogmatically nonviolent personality type. His entire life is lived between silicon, metal, and bits. Someone who’s read
“You’re generalizing,” I tell him. “If this is a sexual thing, it doesn’t matter what his career is. You should know that better than anybody. Brahma doesn’t have control over what’s driving him. He could be a priest, for God’s sake.”
“I think he does have control,” Drewe says quietly. “Most of the time anyway.”
I suddenly recall Lenz telling me the same thing.
“Why?” asks Miles.
“Because the murders have an ultimate object,” she says. “The pineal gland. And because the killer has expended great effort to conceal that fact.”
“Keep going.”
“The fact that the women were raped throws me. But drop that from the equation for a minute. The pineal gland is the primary object because the killer takes it away with him. I mean, if his goal were merely to rape dead women, he could kill just about anybody and do that.”
“So…?”
“So the killer is a doctor.”
Miles looks disappointed. “Proof?”
“Occam’s razor,” Drewe counters. “It’s the simplest answer, therefore the most likely. You’re resisting it because you’re biased against doctors.”
“I am not.”
Drewe laughs. “The killer broke into your computer system and you don’t know how. Therefore, you assume he must be a member of the secret fraternity of the world’s smartest people-those who do what you do. But you’re shortchanging doctors.”
Miles’s face is red. “I think you’re wrong.”
“Why else should the killer hide the fact that he’s taking pineal glands? Unless it could somehow lead to him? And who does the pineal lead to? You said there were no cults known for taking the pineal. And in the one victim where there was no major head wound, the gland was removed using a standard neurosurgical approach that, despite the fantasies of the FBI, would not be the likely one chosen by a butcher or dentist.”
Drewe begins walking around the kitchen, seemingly propelled by the tide of her reasoning. “Look at the areas of expertise you mentioned. Postulate a brilliant surgeon and medicine is taken care of. Law enforcement is a technical undertaking usually handled by men from… what? The fiftieth to eightieth percentile of intelligence?”
Miles and I watch her with fascination. The logical ruthlessness of a smart woman can be chilling.
“Who better than a doctor could plant false biological evidence at crime scenes? He could get blood, urine, semen, stool samples, hair. Locks and security systems are child’s play compared to microsurgery. Human psychology? Again, an experienced physician. That leaves-”
“Computers,” Miles finishes.
Drewe stops beside the stove. “Yes. Now please listen, Miles. If I were to drop all my personal prejudices, I’d have to admit that a person like you, a computer genius, could have been a brilliant surgeon had he chosen that path. And because I believe that, I must believe the reverse could be true.”
He looks unconvinced. “I understand your reasoning, but you just don’t see that in real life.”
“I’ll tell you why you don’t see computer experts becoming surgeons. Because it requires a minimum of nine, sometimes eleven years of postgraduate training. The learning curve on computers is much shorter. You can jump in and begin working almost immediately, because if you screw up, you’ve only killed a machine or a program, not a person.”
Miles stares stubbornly at the table.
“But once you’re really seduced by computers,” she continues, “it’s too late for medicine. You’re into hardware and software, not wetware.”
