John Verdon - Think of a Number

“I don’t buy that ‘bait’ shit,” he said, wrinkling his nose as if the word bait smelled bad.

Gurney smiled. “It’s partly true.”

“What’s the other part?”

“I’m not sure.”

“You come here to be a freaking hero?”

“I don’t think so. I have a feeling my being here may help.”

“Yeah? What if I don’t share that feeling?”

“It’s your show, Lieutenant. You want me to go home, I’ll go home.”

Nardo gave him another long, cynical stare. In the end he appeared to change his mind, at least tentatively. “The Four Roses bottle is part of the MO?”

Gurney nodded.

Nardo took a deep breath. He looked as if his whole body ached. Or as if the whole world ached. “Okay, Detective. Maybe you better tell me everything you haven’t told me.”

Gurney talked about the backwards snow prints, the poems, the unnatural voice on the phone, the two unsettling number tricks, the alcoholic backgrounds of the victims, their mental torture, the hostile challenges to the police, the “REDRUM” graffiti on the wall and the “Mr. and Mrs. Scylla” sign-in at The Laurels, the high intelligence and hubris of the killer. He continued to provide details from the three killings he was familiar with until Nardo’s attention span looked like it might be reaching its breaking point. Then he concluded with what he considered most important:

“He wants to prove two things. First, that he has the power to control and punish drunks. Second, that the police are impotent fools. His crimes are intentionally constructed like elaborate games, brain teasers. He’s brilliant, obsessive, meticulous. So far he hasn’t left behind a single inadvertent fingerprint, hair, speck of saliva, clothing fiber, or unplanned footprint. He hasn’t made any mistakes that we’ve discovered. The fact is, we know very little about him, his methods, or his motives that he hasn’t chosen to reveal to us. With one possible exception.”

Nardo raised a weary but curious eyebrow.

“A certain Dr. Holdenfield, who wrote the state-of-the-art study of serial murder, believes he’s reached a critical stage in the process and is about to launch some sort of climactic event.”

Nardo’s jaw muscles rippled. He spoke with fierce restraint. “Which would make my slaughtered friend on the back porch a warm-up act?”

It wasn’t the kind of question one could, or should, answer. The two men sat in silence until a slight sound, perhaps the sound of an irregular breath, drew their attention simultaneously to the doorway. Incongruously for such a surreptitious arrival, it was the NFL-size hulk who’d earlier been guarding the driveway. He looked like he was having a tooth drilled.

Nardo could see what was coming. “What, Tommy?”

“They’ve located Gary’s wife.”

“Oh, Christ. Okay. Where is she?”

“On her way home from the town garage. She drives the Head Start school bus.”

“Right. Right. Oh, fuck. I should go myself, but I can’t leave here now. Where the fuck is the chief? Anybody find him yet?”

“He’s in Cancún.”

“I know he’s in freaking Cancún. I mean, why the fuck doesn’t he check his messages?” Nardo took a long breath and closed his eyes. “Hacker and Picardo-they were probably closest to the family. Isn’t Picardo the wife’s cousin or something? Send Hacker and Picardo. Christ. But tell Hacker to come see me first.”

The gigantic young cop went as quietly as he’d come.

Nardo took another long breath. He began speaking as though he’d been kicked in the head and hoped that speaking would help him clear his mind. “So you’re telling me they were all alcoholics. Well, Gary Sissek wasn’t an alcoholic, so what does that mean?”

“He was a cop. Maybe that was enough. Or maybe he got in the way of a planned attack on Dermott. Or maybe there’s some other connection.”

“What other connection?”

“I don’t know.”

The back door slammed, sharp footsteps approached, and a wiry man in plainclothes appeared at the door. “You wanted to see me?”

“Sorry to do this to you, but I need you and Picardo to-”

“I know.”

“Right. Well. Keep the information simple. Simple as you can. ‘Fatally stabbed while protecting the intended victim of an attack. Died a hero.’ Something like that. Jesus fucking Christ! What I mean is, no awful details, no pool of blood. You understand what I’m trying to say? The details can come later if they have to. But for now…”

“I understand, sir.”

“Right. Look, I’m sorry I can’t do it myself. I really can’t leave. Tell her I’ll come by the house tonight.”

“Yes, sir.” The man paused at the doorway until it was clear that Nardo had nothing more to say, then marched back the way he came and closed the rear door behind him, this time more quietly.

Again Nardo forced his attention back to his conversation with Gurney. “Am I missing something, or is your understanding of this case pretty much theoretical? I mean, correct me if I’m wrong, but I didn’t hear anything about a list of suspects-in fact, no concrete leads to pursue at all, is that right?”

“More or less.”

“And that shitload of physical evidence-envelopes, notepaper, red ink, boots, broken bottles, footprints, taped phone calls, cell-tower transmission records, returned checks, even messages written in skin oil from this freaking lunatic’s fingertips-none of that led anywhere?”

“That’s one way of looking at it.”

Nardo shook his head in a manner that was getting to be a habit. “Bottom line, you don’t know who you’re looking for or how to find him.”

Gurney smiled. “So maybe that’s why I’m here.”

“Why is that?”

“Because I have no idea where else to go.”

It was a simple admission of a simple fact. The intellectual satisfaction of figuring out the tactical details of the killer’s MO was little more than a distraction from the lack of progress on the central issue so plainly articulated by Nardo. Gurney had to face the fact that despite his eureka insights into the peripheral mysteries of the case, he was almost as far from identifying and capturing his man as he’d been on the morning Mark Mellery brought him those first baffling notes and asked for his help.

There was a small shift in Nardo’s expression, a relaxation of its sharp edge.

“We’ve never had a murder in Wycherly,” he said. “Not a real one, anyway. Couple of manslaughter plead-outs, couple of vehicular homicides, one questionable hunting accident. Never had a killing here that didn’t involve at least one completely intoxicated asshole. At least not in the past twenty-four years.”

“That how long you’ve been on the job?”

“Yep. Only guy in the department longer than me is… was… Gary. He was just shy of twenty-five. His wife wanted him out at twenty, but he figured if he stayed another five… Damn!” Nardo wiped his eyes. “We don’t lose many guys in the line of duty,” he said, as though his tears needed a rational explanation.

Gurney was tempted to say he knew what it was like to lose a colleague. He’d lost two in one bust gone bad. Instead he just nodded in sympathy.

After a minute or so, Nardo cleared his throat. “You have any interest in talking to Dermott?”

“Matter of fact, yes. I just don’t want to get in your way.”

“You won’t,” said Nardo roughly-making up, Gurney supposed, for his moment of weakness. Then he added in a more normal tone, “You’ve spoken to this guy on the phone, right?”

“Right.”

“So he knows who you are.”