James Heneghan - Fit to kill

That was the solution. She needed to change her life. She was still young. She was attractive and healthy, with a good figure and good prospects for the future. All she needed to do was make it all happen.

She walked quickly, anxious to get off the dark street. She would take her People magazine to bed with her. There was an article about Sandra Bullock she was looking forward to reading.

Built as a traffic barrier to keep commuters out of the residential streets, the minipark at Nicola where it joined Pendrell had benches and a table with seats set among trees and ornamental shrubs. There were many of these tiny squares scattered about in the dense jungle of West End apartment blocks. Places where people could sit outside with their friends and neighbors among the rhododendrons and japonica in the spring and summer.

Tonight the little square was wet, deserted and cold. Thick with shadows and menace. The streetlight caused wet tree branches to glisten. The saturated air seemed full of risk. As Roseanne approached the square, she thought she heard heavy breathing. She stopped and looked about her. The street was deserted. She listened, but all she could hear was the faint hum of Denman Street traffic. This section was very dark, the light from the streetlamps dimmed by the limbs of naked trees. What little light there was glimmered palely yellow and weak, hardly able to penetrate the gloom.

She was less than a block away from home.

She started running past the square and knew suddenly that someone was behind her.

She ran faster, sprinting now, too scared to look behind.

Only half a block. She had to make it, or…

Roseanne felt her shoulder gripped from behind.

She screamed and fell to the ground. A rough hand jammed her jaw shut, and she felt and heard the crackle of duct tape as her attacker pressed and wrapped it tightly around her mouth, silencing her. She tried to twist away, kicking and thrashing about with all the strength of her strong legs. But he handcuffed her wrists behind her back and dragged her into the trees where he pinned her to the wet soil.

The man was very strong. He sat on her and mumbled madly as he pressed her face into the wet leaves and knifed the clothing from her trembling body.

The rain started again in the night. In the gray light of early morning, a jogger on his way to Stanley Park cut through the mini-park and stumbled over Roseanne’s bare legs sticking out from under a hydrangea bush.

In December, Vancouver’s West End folded its paws and crouched, drawing into itself, and watched almost constant rain and wind sweeping in from an inhospitable sea. It watched its forest neighbor toss its head wildly in winter storms. Watched and endured. And waited for the spring.

This December, the West End drew into itself even more than usual. A homicidal maniac was on the rampage. The shock of suddenly having to confront the grim reality of a serial killer was almost too much for it.

There had now been three killings-all women, all raped, all decapitated.

People stayed home. The evening streets were deserted. Even Robson, Denman and Davie, normally teeming with pedestrians, were sparsely populated. Store owners predicted that, unless shoppers changed their habits and shopped during the day, it would be their worst Christmas season ever.

Wexler got the official news at Cop Shop. The mood later at the Clarion was somber. An early jogger had discovered the naked, headless body of victim number three on Sunday morning. So far there was no id.

“Three weeks before Christmas,” said Wexler gloomily.

Casey said, “Peace on Earth.”

“And goodwill to all,” said Wexler.

“Especially women,” said Ozeroff, tears in her eyes.

Matty Kayle had been reading about Listeria and Clostridium botulinum and Escherichia coli. Such difficult words, but she was beginning to think that bacteria seemed her most natural allies. The natural solution might be the best solution.

Some of the other solutions, according to the book, like arsenic and strychnine, had too many drawbacks. Not the least of which was the danger of an autopsy and the discovery of a lethal poison in the body.

Having decided on the method, Matty resolved to execute her plan swiftly. Now was the time for action.

What had helped rouse Matty into action was Albert’s criticism yesterday of her cooking. It was Thursday evening. He had hurt her. If there was one thing she was proud of, it was her cooking. He had no right, after all these years of waiting on him hand and foot, to say suddenly that her cooking was like “something a dog might drag in off the street.”

His exact words.

Matty had to sit down. She couldn’t answer him. He had never criticized her cooking before. It had the effect on her of a personal attack. As if it were she herself who was flawed. All she could say was, “What?”

“This!” He pushed his plate away. The Greek moussaka casserole that had taken so long to prepare. His face was furrowed with anger, worm lips pink and wet, pouting and wriggling. “It’s inedible. I’m sick to death of foul recipes from foreign cookbooks. I mean, what in heaven’s name do you call this mess? Chinese dogshit? Japanese roadkill? What?”

“It’s Greek-”

“I thought as much. Foreign filth. Whatever happened to plain grilled chops with new potatoes? Or a nice piece of steak with chips? Boiled ham, cabbage and beets? Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding? You haven’t cooked a proper meal in more than a year.”

Matty had changed her style of cooking, she had to admit. But she thought he’d liked it. The articles in Canadian Woman stressed the importance of good nutrition. Less fat and more legumes and vegetables. Less meat, or even no meat at all, but tofu or beans instead.

She was so upset she cried.

This made Albert even angrier. He stood and hurled his plate over her head. Plate and food hit the wall with a crash.

She was terrified. She thought he would strike her. But he stomped off down to the basement. When she was finished crying, she set to cleaning the mess off the wall and floor.

Very well. If that was what he wanted, it was back to the grilled pork chops. Except this time she would leave the chops out on a plate in the oven where he wouldn’t see them and where they could breathe for a while, like wine, until they were ready.

Until her bacterial accomplices had brewed their poison.

During lunch at Hegel’s, Wexler filled Casey in.

“She was Roseanne Agostino, white, thirty-two, sales clerk at Eaton’s, unmarried. Lived alone in a studio walk-up on Broughton. On her way home from the fitness center when she met up with her killer. Same mo: handcuffed, raped, clothes missing, head missing.”

Casey shook his head. “How did the cops id her so fast?”

“Her folks live in New Westminster. They’d been calling her all weekend. When they hadn’t reached her by Monday night, they called the police. They made the id from childhood burn scars on her hands and arms.”

Ozeroff was unusually quiet.

They began to cobble together a lead story for their Thursday edition. Percy, in the meantime, had Ozeroff interview women in the shopping areas, asking their opinions about the murders. Whether they thought the police were doing their best to catch the killer. When all the stories were in the works, Percy went with Casey and Wexler’s “Terror in the Streets” headline over Duchesne’s murder simulation, a picture of a woman’s bare legs protruding from under a hydrangea bush. “It’s film noir,” Duchesne explained to Percy.

The papers hit the streets early Thursday morning, as usual. But what was unusual was how quickly they were all snatched up. By late afternoon, a harassed Brenda was madly fielding complaints at the front counter. Hoarsely explaining to irate callers that there were no further copies of the paper available.