Familiar yet still troubling images began to flicker in my head like the projected films I’d seen at Koster and Bial’s theater with Mary Palmer: each of the dead boys, trussed and cut to pieces; the long, terrible knife that had done that cutting; the remains of the butchered cat at Mrs. Piedmont’s; Beecham’s bleak flat in Five Points, and the oven in which he claimed to have cooked the “tender ass” of Giorgio Santorelli; Joseph’s lifeless body; and finally a picture of the killer himself, formed out of all the clues and theories we’d collected during our investigation, yet still, for all our work, no more than a vague silhouette. The infinite black sky and innumerable stars above the reservoir offered no comfort or refuge from these horrific visions, and civilization, as I once again glanced down toward the streets of the city, seemed terribly far away. Each of our careful footsteps tapped home the message that we had come to a lawless place of death, a place where the hopeful invention of fearful man that I clutched in my hand would likely prove a feeble defense, and where the answers to greater mysteries than those we’d spent the last dozen weeks trying to unravel would be made plain with brutal finality. Despite all these anxious thoughts, however, I never once considered turning back. Perhaps Laszlo’s conviction that we were going to end this business on those walls that night was infectious; whatever the reason, I didn’t leave his side, even though I knew, as certainly as I’ve ever known anything, that we stood an excellent chance of never returning to the streets below.
We heard the sobbing before we saw the boy. There were no lights on the promenade, only the moon to guide us, and as we turned onto the Fortieth Street side of the pathway a one-story stone structure that had been built atop the walls to house the reservoir’s control mechanisms loomed up spectrally in the distance. The sobs— high-pitched, desperate, and yet somehow muffled—seemed to be coming from somewhere near it. When we’d gotten to a point some forty-five feet from the structure, I caught a vague glimpse of human flesh glowing in the moonlight. We took a few steps closer, and then I made out plainly the figure of a naked young boy on his knees. His hands had been bound behind his back, causing his head to rest on the stone surface of the promenade, and his feet were similarly tied. A gag had been wrapped around his head, holding his painted mouth open at a painful angle. His face was glistening with tears; but he was alive, and, just as surprisingly, he was alone.
Reflexively, I took a quick step forward, intending to help the unfortunate youth. Kreizler grabbed my arm and held me back, whispering urgently, “No, John! That is exactly what he intends for you to do.”
“What?” I whispered back. “But how do you know he’s—”
Kreizler nodded, his eyes directing me toward the top of the control house.
Rising just above the roof of the thing and reflecting the soft light of the moon was the same balding head that I’d seen above Stephenson’s Black and Tan the night that Cyrus was attacked. I felt my heart jump, but quickly sucked in air and tried to stay calm.
“Does he see us?” I whispered to Kreizler.
Laszlo’s eyes had gone thin, but he betrayed no other reaction to the scene. “Undoubtedly. The question is, does he know
An answer came immediately: the head disappeared, the way an animal in the wild will do—completely and with astonishing speed. By now the bound boy had caught sight of us, and his stifled sobbing had changed to more emphatic sounds that, though incomprehensible as words, were plainly appeals for help. Another picture of Joseph appeared in my head, doubling my already driving desire to go and help this next intended victim. But Kreizler kept his grip on my arm.
“Wait, John,” he whispered. “Wait.” There was a small doorway leading from the promenade into the control house, and Kreizler pointed at it. “I was here this morning. There are only two ways out of that structure—back onto the promenade or down a flight of stairs to the street. If he doesn’t appear…”
Another full minute went by with no sign of life either in the doorway or on the roof of the control house. Kreizler looked very puzzled. “Is it possible he’s run?”
“Maybe the risk of actually getting caught was too much for him,” I answered.
Kreizler weighed that, then studied the still-pleading boy. “All right,” he finally decided. “We’ll approach, but very slowly. And keep that revolver handy.”
The first few steps we took down that stretch of the promenade were stiff and difficult, as if our bodies knew and were rejecting the danger that our minds had decided to accept. But after we’d covered ten feet or so without catching a glimpse of our antagonist we began to move more freely, and I became more convinced that Beecham had, in fact, been more intimidated by the prospect of capture than he had expected to be and fled to the street. I felt a sudden, powerful feeling of joy at the thought that we were actually going to prevent a killing, and allowed myself a small smile—
Hubris, as they say. Just as self-congratulation allowed my grip on the revolver to weaken ever so slightly, a dark form vaulted over the iron fence on the outer (or street) side of the promenade and laid a stunning blow across my jaw. I heard a thunderous crunching sound, which I now realize was made by the bones in my neck as my head snapped around, and then all was darkness.
I couldn’t have been unconscious for very long, since the shadows thrown by the moon had not advanced significantly when I woke up; nonetheless, my head felt groggier than if I’d been asleep for days. As my vision cleared I became aware of several pains, some sharp and some dull, but all acute. There was my jaw, of course, and my neck. My wrists were burning, and my shoulders ached mightily; but the single most piercing discomfort came from under my tongue. I groaned as I tried to dislodge something from that area, then spat at the ground, producing one of my canine teeth, along with what seemed a quart of blood and saliva. My head felt like a solid block of Pittsburgh steel, and I couldn’t lift it more than a few inches. Eventually I realized that this was due to more than the blow I’d received: my wrists were tied behind me to the top of the iron fence on the inner side of the promenade, and my ankles were similarly bound to the bottom of the iron divider, causing my head and upper body to hang out painfully over the stone pathway. Lying beneath my face on that surface was the Colt revolver I’d been holding.
I groaned again and kept trying to lift my head, finally succeeding just enough to be able to turn and catch sight of Kreizler. He was similarly bound, though he seemed quite conscious and unharmed. He gave me a smile.
“Are you back, John?” he said.
“Uhhh,” was all I was able to say in response. “Where’s…”
With effort Kreizler nodded toward the control house.
The bound boy lay where we’d first seen him, though by now his urgent cries had reverted to fearful whimpers. Before him stood an enormous figure clad in unremarkable black clothing, whose back was to Kreizler and me. The man was slowly removing his garments and placing them neatly to one side of the promenade. In a few minutes he was entirely naked, revealing more than six feet of powerful muscles. He stepped forward to the boy—who, judging by the adult lines that were just beginning to show in the face and body, must’ve been about twelve—and picked his painted head up by the hair.
“Crying?” the man said, in a low, emotionless voice. “A boy like you
The man released the boy’s head and then turned to face Kreizler and me. His anterior musculature was as fully developed as his posterior—from the shoulders down he was a remarkable physical specimen. I strained my neck to look up at his face, furrowing my brow as I did. I don’t know precisely what I was expecting, but I certainly wasn’t prepared for the banality of those features. There was something of Adam Dury in the way the skin was pulled tightly over the man’s skull, as well as in the thinness of his hair. The eyes, too, were like his brother’s, too small for the big, bony head in which they sat. The right side of the face drooped a bit, though it wasn’t at that moment spasming, and the big jaw was set firmly; but all in all it was a common sort of face, one that exhibited no hint of the terrible turmoil that boiled without respite deep within the large head. He looked rather as though the construction of this horrendous scene was not altogether different from counting heads for the census.
That fact, I suddenly realized, was the most frightening thing I’d yet learned about John Beecham. In a very businesslike manner he bent down and took his enormous knife from out of his clothes, then walked over to where Kreizler and I were hanging. His chiseled body bore very little hair, allowing it to reflect the light of the moon
