Max Collins - Butcher's dozen

"I'll be in every Monday morning," Ness said, sitting with his back to his scarred rolltop desk that was against one wall of his roomy wood-and-pebbled-glass office at City Hall. "I'll sign whatever I have to sign from the week before, make a few phone calls to people we've had to put off, and then we'll go over whatever needs going over for the week ahead."

Chamberlin, who sat nearby with his back to one of the several conference tables that filled the central area of the room, nodded and said, "Other than that you'll be unavailable?"

"I may be in and out," Ness said, and shrugged, "but I'd say probably your best bet would be trying me at the boathouse, evenings. And even then it will be catch-as-catch-can."

"Understood," Chamberlin said with a confident twitch of a smile that made his small black mustache curl up at the ends. He was a tall, rangy man of thirty-seven with an oblong, sharp-featured face set off by a strong round jaw, his dark hair slicked back off a high forehead. Like Ness, he was impeccably dressed, wearing a three-piece suit and snappy tie.

Ness was saying, "If I haven't come up with anything in a month, well…"

"We should both start looking for other work, I'd imagine," Chamberlin finished wryly.

"Not a bad idea," Ness said with a half-smile. "I guess if my job goes down in flames, I take you with me. Sorry."

"Don't give that a thought," Chamberlin said with another twitch of a smile. "I'll land on my feet. Lawyers always do."

Ness was grateful for his friends attitude-and Chamberlin was more than just his assistant, was indeed a friend, who'd been handpicked by the safety director when his previous executive assistant had played politics. Oddly, the former holder of that position-John Flynt-physically resembled Chamberlin; they both had the look and manner of British military officers out of Kipling.

Chamberlin checked his watch. "I'd better be getting back to my own office-you have a meeting in a few minutes."

"I'd like you to stick around for that. I don't want you cut off from this investigation."

"Well, thanks. I'll just keep my mouth shut and listen."

"You do, and you're fired."

Before long, Ness's secretary, redheaded, bespectacled Wanda, an efficient, attractive young woman he'd stolen away from the Clerk of Public Service office, ushered in Curry and Merlo. Merlo's brown suit was typically rumpled, his face haggard, haunted. Boyish, bashful Curry seemed intimidated by the older man, staying behind him, deferring to his every breath.

"Sit down, gentlemen," Ness said, gesturing to one of the conference tables, and they did. Chamberlin joined them.

There was a discreet knock at the door, the one that opened on to the hall and said SAFETY DIRECTOR'S OFFICE backward on its pebbled-glass. This door was kept locked, and Ness used a key on his vest chain to open it.

Sam Wild, bow-tied and bright-eyed, shambled in, in his loose-limbed way. He grinned wolfishly at Ness, saying, "You usually don't wait on me hand and foot like this," as the safety director closed and locked the door behind him.

Ness turned to Merlo, Curry, and Chamberlin, their expressions reflecting displeasure at the intrusion, Merlo looking the most annoyed. "I asked Sam to stop by, and to slip in the side door, away from the office staff. I wanted him in on this.

Merlo thought for a moment, his professorly brow creasing, then said, "Director Ness, I don't think it's advisable to have the press present at what you've described as a 'key briefing.'"

Ness gestured for Wild to sit but remained standing himself. "As you all know, I've worked with Sam on several cases, and he's been very helpful. He practically cracked the cemetery-scam racket single-handedly. And he's covering the Safety Director's office full-time for the Plain Dealer — and now that this investigation is coming under the wing of this office, well, I think it's appropriate for him to be here."

"Don't worry, gents," Wild said as he propped a Lucky Strike between his lips, "I'm under strict orders from your chief here not to write anything up till you've got something solid."

"Eliot," Chamberlin said, eyes narrowing, "I really don't think we should be tipping our hand to the opposition."

"We won't be," Ness said. "But keep in mind that the 'opposition' is a homicidal maniac who has the city in a state of panic, under a reign of terror. Part of our function is public relations."

Merlo was wide-eyed. "Public relations?"

"Yes," Ness said calmly. "We need to assure our citizens that their police force is on top of the problem. Doing everything it can to remove this madman from their midst. Mr. Wild's function will be to be a part of the investigation-and his investigative skills are considerable-which will lend his eventual reporting an insider's depth and authority."

Chamberlin said, "You may alienate the other papers."

"I'm keeping that in mind," Ness said. "I'll be monitoring Sam's output, and we'll be holding periodic press conferences and issuing press releases."

Chamberlin shrugged and leaned back in his chair; Merlo had an expression of pained skepticism, while Curry-caught between Merlo and Ness, two men he respected-stayed blank.

"We have ten victims, gentlemen," Ness said. "Nine are white, all were apparently healthy, able-bodied individuals, in the prime of life-between twenty-five and forty-five years. Six are males. Six were found within two to eight days after death. One was not found for two months."

Ness sat on the edge of the conference table.

"There was, Coroner Gerber tells me, relatively little hacking of the tissues," Ness continued, "and relatively few hesitation marks-but the direction of what marks there were indicates we have a right-handed individual."

"Hey, that narrows the field," Wild said cheerfully.

Merlo glanced at him coldly.

"I have spent a good deal of time going over the files in this case," Ness said. "I feel the police have done good work-particularly you, Detective Merlo-but we need to explore new ways of going about this investigation. Any ideas?"

Curry cleared his throat and said, "I think we should assign shifts of men to guard the approaches to the Run and perhaps patrol it."

"Not a good use of manpower, I'm afraid," Ness said. "Of the last five corpses, only one has turned up at the Run."

"What new ideas do you have?" Merlo asked, doing his best to keep impatience out of his voice.

"Well," Ness said, smiling pleasantly, "let's look at the facts. We have most of the bodies turning up in a given area of the city; and we have dismemberments that experts agree show a certain surgical skill. I think somewhere within or very near the Kingsbury Run area there is a well-equipped 'surgery' or 'workshop' or 'laboratory.'"

"A laboratory, in Kingsbury Run?" Merlo said.

"Yes." Ness gestured openhandedly. "It has to be soundproofed, easily cleaned, and there must be storage facilities of some sort-probably refrigeration."

Chamberlin lifted an eyebrow. "There couldn't be many places like that in the Kingsbury Run area."

"If such a workshop exists," Curry said thoughtfully, "we should be able to find and identify it."

"How do we do that, exactly?" Merlo said. "You can't see this lab or workshop or whatever from the outside-and there are hundreds upon hundreds of buildings in that area. Homes, shacks, industrial buildings, warehouses, butcher shops…"

"You go inside," Ness said.

"Without search warrants?" Merlo asked.

Ness smiled smugly. "Have you forgotten I'm in charge of the fire department, as well as the police? That's a rundown ratty section of town-I think it would be prudent to send fire wardens down there to check for building violations. Don't you?"

Merlo began to smile, too. "Yes. Yes. Very good, Mr. Ness."