Stephen Cannell - Final Victim

Then he raised his kimono and grabbed his penis and slowly started to rock in silence, attempting to masturbate over his tools. But he did not get an erection. He remained limp and grew angry, yanking at himself with uncontrolled rage.

"I need music! Get fucking music!" he yelled at Bob Shiff, who ran quickly from the room. Karen heard him climb the metal ladder.

The Wind Minstrel moved slowly and picked up the Stryker oscillating bone saw. He plugged it in and turned it on. He held it over Karen, bringing it within inches of her face. The sawtoothed lateral blade growled ominously as it oscillated back and forth, vibrating the flesh on The Wind Minstrel's corpulent forearm.

Bob Shiff saw something on the edge of the porch and for a moment, in the pale moonlight, couldn't make out what it was. As he silently crept closer, he saw it was a man. Then he recognized him. It was the same cop who had come to the Loomis Theater and showed him Leonard's picture, the one who had attacked them this afternoon at the garage in East Miami and chased them. When he crept closer, he thought he could hear the man crying, sobbing softly as he sat on the porch. Bob Shiff moved slowly and deliberately back to the VW van, which was hidden in the middle of the dense underbrush, away from the house. He opened the door silently and retrieved the same bat he had used on Karen Dawson in the Bayfront Park toilet. He then moved back toward the house and looked again at the crying man. He was afraid to tell Leonard, because Leonard was strange. Lately anything could send him into a homicidal rage. Shiff decided it wouldn't be hard to get around behind the man if he went to the back of the house and came up on the far side, so that the man's back was to him. The grass there would muffle the sound of his approach.

It took Shiff almost three minutes before he was standing behind Lockwood. The cop was crying, his head bowed, not paying attention. Shiff silently brought the bat back and, with all of his might, he swung it…

Lockwood didn't know what warned him. Maybe it was his battle training in the Marines or an instinct from all the police work. Maybe it was moon shadows or a change in the sound of the keening insects. Maybe it was the ghost of Wyatt Earp-but he instinctively moved to his right seconds before he felt the stinging blow glance off his right shoulder. Bob Shiff saw him move and chased him with his swing. But it threw off his timing and he missed Lockwood's head by a fraction. Lockwood rolled on the ground to gain distance; he saw Shiff move toward him, bat raised high for a final strike. Lockwood was sprawled on the grass, his right leg under him, his right hand touching his left shoe. He was in a horrible position, unable to push off or gain leverage. He was two heartbeats from getting creamed.

Shiff moved in on him with the bat high over his head; then Lockwood snatched off his black loafer and, grabbing it with both hands in a two-handed shooting position, pointed it at Shiff. The moonlight glinted off the black patent leather and it froze Shiff momentarily.

"Drop it or you're dead, cocksucker!" Lockwood barked out an adrenaline-filled complete sentence and prayed this speedballing dust-bunny would go for the lame trick. In a bluff like this, attitude was everything. Then, miraculously, Shiff dropped the bat. "On stomach," Lockwood commanded. Shiff started to go to his knees but, from this position, he could see more clearly.

"It's a fucking shoe," he said in dismay and he lunged again for the bat.

Lockwood was now untangled and threw himself sideways, also grabbing for the wooden bat. The two of them struggled on the ground. In his weakened condition, Lockwood could not even control this tiny 120-pound heroin addict. He was slow and uncoordinated, and in seconds Shiff had the bat away from him. Lockwood lunged forward and awkwardly hit Shiff in the face with both hands. The blow rocked him back but didn't take him down. Lockwood now dove at him, trying to get his hands on Shift's throat. The two men went down in the wet grass, and then Lockwood rolled over the tire iron he had brought with him but had completely forgotten. Shiff pulled free and jumped up with the bat in his hand. Then, grinning, he moved in on Lockwood, who struggled up on his knees, the tire iron in his right hand hidden behind his back. Shiff swung the bat at Lockwood's head but didn't see the tire iron coming from his left. Lockwood ducked under the Louisville Slugger and followed through with the tire iron, hitting Bob Shiff in the side of the head.

The noise was sickening and Shiff went down like chopped cotton. He lay in the grass motionless. Lockwood leaned over him and took his pulse; it felt thin and uneven, and then it just stopped.

"Fuck 'em," Lockwood said, exhausted. He grabbed the tire iron and stood up, looking around. Where the hell had Shiff come from? he wondered. There was nothing out here. And then he saw a small break in the tall grass at the edge of the yard. It looked like it might be a footpath.

The Wind Minstrel had waited until past midnight to avoid God's wrath. But now, it was Monday morning and he could wait no longer.

Shirley had stopped his glorious erection. This messenger for Shirley, this look-alike, had destroyed his penile glory. He would kill her slowly to complete the Beast. He would take her head in a garbage bag back to his barge deep in the Manatee wetlands. He would assemble the Beast in the moonlight and pray to Satan for his miracle. Then he would wait for the Beast to speak and tell him how to avoid the Journey of Redemption. He looked at her, into her frightened eyes.

"Please don't. Please…" Karen said softly.

"Please don't. Please…" The Wind Minstrel mimicked. And then he put down the oscillating saw that he would eventually use to cut the spinal cord at the sixth cervical vertebra. He picked up the 10006 surgical scalpel and drew it once, seductively, across Karen's neck. Then he began his cut.

She screamed out in pain, as the scalpel sliced into her…

Lockwood was moving down the footpath but he couldn't see anything. It was then that he heard Karen's scream. He looked around but couldn't tell where it was coming from. The screaming continued as he stumbled toward the direction of the sound, until finally he was kneeling over a small vent tube with a metal Chinese rain hat over it at the foot of the garden. The pipe was only two inches in diameter but he could hear Karen's strangled cry for help coming from deep below. It was terrifying and ripped through his soul.

How the fuck I get down there? He started thrashing around looking for a way. Then he remembered Shirley's obit. Her father had been a Baptist minister who designed bomb shelters. If this was a bomb shelter, there had to be a trapdoor somewhere right above the vents. He got to his feet and quickly tried to find it. He could now hear the terrible screams coming right up through the ground below. They seemed to be coming right up under his feet! He found a metal hatch that was hinged to a concrete lip, a short distance off the footpath. He threw it back and looked down. Fifteen feet below, he could see light. The screaming was louder. He turned around and started to climb down the metal rungs of the ladder, still clutching the tire iron.

The Wind Minstrel had laid open a flap on Karen's neck but had missed her jugular vein because she had bucked violently on the table. He had hit her, knocking her dizzy, but she continued to fight him. He was just trying to make his second cut when he heard Bob Shiff coming back down the metal ladder.

"Hold her," he instructed. Then he turned and saw Lockwood standing in the small bomb shelter clutching the tire iron. He screamed and lunged at Lockwood, who swung the tire iron and missed completely. The tool hit the wall and flew out of his hand. Lockwood threw two slow, awkward punches that barely connected and did no damage; his coordination was way off. Then Leonard Land, with the scalpel still in his hand, grabbed him, threw him down, then landed on top of him, pinning him under his 367-pound frame.