Robert Walker - Grave Instinct

“ You're dealing with local judges. We'll get our top echelon at Quantico on it,” J.T. assured Strand.

“ Owens, can you drive me to the airport?” Jessica asked.

“ Of course.” She detected a note of happy anticipation in his two-word response.

“ I've got to hook up with Eriq Santiva and meet this guy Cahil, face-to-face.”

“ Wish I had ten minutes alone with him,” commented Strand. “Or at very least help in his interrogation, but I'm not feeling so well, and doctors tell me I need another operation, so I'll be sticking close to home.”

“ Sorry to hear it. Your insights have been extremely helpful, Max.”

“ Just get the confession, Dr. Coran.”

“ Do you think you can get a confession out of him?” asked Owens.

“ With this in my possession”-she held up the formaldehyde-filled vial in which the tissue found in Cahil's refrigerator floated-”we might have the leverage needed to shock him into confessing, yes.” Making certain the cap was properly tightened, she placed it again inside her medical bag.

“ Are you sure you can take that without it having been put through the chain of evidence process?” asked Owens.

“ For once, the kid's right,” added Strand. “You break chain of evidence nowadays and you'll get an O.J. result.”

“ I know you're right, Strand, but I need something to scale and gut this guy with, and this… this is perfect. So, since we conducted the search and seizure under a federal warrant, I'm officially declaring all evidence goes directly to Quantico. That makes our lab there responsible for the chain of custody. We'll take everything but the dog and cat remains, and should a body be located here, you guys can process it and ship it to Quantico.”

“ Leaving us with an animal-cruelty case against Cahil?” asked Owens. “Thanks a heap.”

Strand held back a laugh. “Let Fromme choke on that.”

“ Exactly.” Jessica did laugh.

“ A wise move, Dr. Coran. Do an old detective a favor. Put that bastard away forever this time, will you?”

“ I'll certainly do my best.”

After Jessica Coran got on a flight, leaving New Jersey and the “estate of Rheil” as J.T. had jokingly referred to Cahil's house, Owens and his men canvassed the place another time, while J.T. packed the computer for shipment. Meanwhile, Max Strand oversaw the grid out back to determine if any fresh graves had been dug. Enlisted to help were cadaver dogs. As the dogs worked, Strand wondered again if dogs and other animals had this Island of Rheil in their heads. He asked Owens what he thought of the notion, but Owens said he'd just as soon not give it any more thought.

Strand felt a pull, a kind of fixation on the question. If animals did not, it might prove interesting; if they did, it might prove there could be some credence to the whole idea of where the soul resided, and if not in this small cross of tissue, then where?

With the search turning up nothing untoward in the backyard, Strand said his goodbyes to everyone and walked to his car. Earlier, when Owens was busy and J.T. was occupied, Strand had taken one of the cat brains from the refrigerator. He now drove off with it beneath a coat on the passenger seat beside him. When he got to Ash Pine Park, only blocks away, he stopped the car and got out. He reached in and took hold of the cat brain. Discarding the foil wrapping, Strand held the fist-sized walnut-shaped organ over a water fountain, thawing it under the water. He next pulled out his Swiss Army knife and began hacking away at the little brain. He easily opened up the two hemispheres and began searching for the Rheil tissue inside the medulla ob-longata. These many years of chasing Daryl had left him with some knowledge of where to cut.

He had for many years now monitored Daryl's website. He knew what the man's religion was; and he knew it to be insane. Still, he searched for the island of tissue in the animal brain, curious and wondering.

It was not a pretty autopsy, he told himself as he now cut deeper into the medulla oblongata and a tiny piece of material fell out and into the dirt and grass at Strand's foot. He tossed the rest of the dead brain into the bushes.

Slowly, reluctantly, fighting gravity the entire time, Strand went to his knees over where that small bit had fallen, attempting to find it in the grass, but the thing acted as if alive, hiding, camouflaged in the dry, brittle grass.

Then he saw it, but it wasn't large like the human one, only a fraction of the size. He reached for the thing, and a part of his brain said, Consume it… consume it.

He thought about it, thought how it would taste, how it would feel going down, what it might do to him, whether mad Daryl's claims were true or not. He wondered if it had magical powers or was as magical as one of the blades of grass. Either way, he knew that if he consumed it, the act itself would hold sway over him for the rest of his life. “It's only an animal part,” he said aloud as the wind whipped by and he heard the flutter of trees overhead. The park, an unsavory, broken down piece of real estate the city had for years vowed to clean up, was home to many transients on any given night. Strand searched about himself for his own safety. No one nearby, no one watching him. He didn't see the two figures crouching behind his car.

Strand now held the slippery item in two fingers and was about to consume it when the lead pipe came crashing down into his skull.

Two human vultures living in the seedy park had jumped Strand, leaving him bleeding to death as they tore into his pockets. One wanted to take the car, but the other located his ID and threw it at his companion, shouting, “My God, Danny, we've killed a freakin' cop! Forget the car. We gotta run, now!”

Quantico, Virginia Same morning

Jessica, having returned to Quantico, knew she had to immediately log in the evidence she had placed into a vial from Cahil's Morristown home. She hoped after seeing to the chain of evidence protocol that she might take a moment to drop by her office, look over the mail and say some hellos.

Chief Eriq Santiva met her on the helicopter pad when the FBI chopper landed. It was still early in the morning, and she had gotten little sleep on the chopper, and here he stood, obviously anxious for her to meet with Daryl Thomas Cahil. “Jessica, you look tired. Are you all right? Personally, I couldn't sleep on a chopper if my life depended on it. Was your detour to Morristown helpful?” came Eriq's* volley of questions. “Why isn't Strand with you? He wanted to be here for the kill.” He had watched her climb tiredly from the chopper, her bag at her side. She immediately informed Eriq, “I have to log in evidence gathered at the crime scene in Georgia and at the Morristown location. Did the tire and shoe print casts arrive? Any news from Combs on the victims computer habits?” She finished with a yawn, realizing neither one of them had answers for the other, and then added, “My suitcase is in the chopper.”

“ It's taken care of, Jess. How'd it go in Morristown?” He took hold of her medical bag.

“ That can't be out of my possession, Eriq,” she argued.

“ Can't be out of your sight, and it won't be until we get it inventoried.”

They found the rooftop door and started down a flight of stairs to the elevator.

“ Actually, it went quite well in both Philly and Morristown,” she informed him. “We learned that Cahil has been operating a website since before leaving prison. One that advocates cannibalizing brains.”

“ Wait a minute, are you telling me that while behind bars, while in an asylum for the criminally insane, that Deitze allowed him to start up a website?”

“ Began as a question-answer thing, information on the workings of the brain-his brain in particular. The brain's magical power and magnificence, all that. People asking him about his crime and him responding, all with Jack Deitze's consent.”