Michael Connelly - The Poet

An agent on the outer rim raised his hand and Doran nodded at him.

"If there were three incidents of kapok fiber being recovered, why didn't we get a match on the VICAP computer if all cases were entered like you said?"

"Human error. In the first case, the Ortiz boy, kapok was indigenous to the area and dismissed. It wasn't put on the questionnaire. In the Albuquerque case, the fibers were not identified as kapok, the survey was not updated. An oversight. We missed the match. We only got that from the field office today. Only in the Denver case was the kapok seen as significant enough to include on the VICAP request."

There was a groan from several of the agents and I felt my own heart sink a bit. The possibility of confirming that there was a serial killer at work as early as the Albuquerque case had been missed. What if it hadn't been missed, I wondered. Maybe Sean would be alive.

"That brings us to the big question," Doran said. "How many killers have we got? One who does the first string and another who does the detectives? Or just one? One who does them all. For the moment, based primarily on the logistical improbabilities associated with two killers, we are pursuing a theory of linkage. Our assumption is that in each city the two deaths are linked."

"What's the pathology?" Smitty asked.

"We're only guessing now. The obvious one is that he sees killing the detective as a way of covering his tracks, ensuring his escape. But we have another theory as well. That is that the first homicide was committed by the offender in order to draw a homicide detective into the frame. In other words, the first kill is bait, presented in such a horrific fashion as to attract a homicide detective's obsession. We are assuming that the Poet then stalked each one of these officers and learned their habits and routines. That enabled him to get close and carry out the eventual murder without detection."

This silenced the room. I got the feeling that many of the agents, though surely veterans of numerous investigations of serial killings, had never before encountered a predator like the one they were calling the Poet.

"Of course," Brass said, "all we have is theory for the time being…"

Backus stood up.

"Thank you, Brass," he said, then addressing the room added, "Quickly now, because I want to do some profiling and get this wrapped up, Gordon, you had something for us."

"Yes, real quick," Thorson said, standing up and moving to an easel with a large drawing pad on it. "The map in your package is outdated because of the Baltimore connection. So if I can have your attention up here for a moment."

He quickly drew the outline of the United States with a thick black marker. Then, with a red marker, he began to draw the Poet's trail. Starting in Florida, which he had drawn proportionately small compared to the rest of the country, the line went up to Baltimore then over to Chicago then down to Dallas then up to Albuquerque and finally up further to Denver. He picked up the black marker again and wrote the dates of the killings in each of the cities.

"It's pretty self-explanatory," Thorson said. "Our man is heading west and he's obviously pissed off at homicide cops about something."

He raised his hand and waved it over the western half of the country he had drawn.

"We'll look for the next hits out here unless we get lucky and get him first."

Looking at the terminus of the red line Thorson had drawn gave me a strange feeling about what was ahead. Where was the Poet? Who was next?

"Why don't we just let him get to California, so he can be among his own kind? End of problem."

Everyone laughed at the joke from one of the agents seated in the outer rim. The humor emboldened Hazelton.

"Hey, Gordo," he said, reaching back to the easel and tapping a pencil on the small rendering of Florida. "I hope this map wasn't some kind of Freudian slip on your part."

That brought the loudest laughter of the meeting and Thorson's face reddened, though he smiled at the joke at his expense. I saw Rachel Walling's face light up with delight.

"Very funny, Hazel," Thorson loudly retorted. "Why don't you go back to analyzing the poems. You're good at that."

The laughter dried up quickly and I suspected that Thorson had taunted Hazelton with a barb that was more personal than witty.

"Okay, if I can continue," Thorson said, "FYI, tonight we'll be alerting all the FOs, particularly in the West, to be on watch for something like this. It would help us a lot if we could get an early notice on the next one and get our lab into one of the scenes. We'll have a go team ready. But right now we are relying on the locals for everything. Bob?"

Backus cleared his throat to continue the discussion.

"If nobody has anything else, we come to profiling. What can we say about this offender? I would like to put something on the alert Gordon sends out."

Then came a procession of throw-out observations, a lot of them free-form non sequiturs, some of them even bringing laughter. I could see there was a lot of camaraderie among the agents. There was also some strife, as exhibited by the play between Thorson and Walling and then Thorson and Hazelton. Nevertheless, I got the feeling that these people had sat around the table in this room doing this before. Sadly, many times before.

The profile that emerged would be of small use in catching the Poet. The generalities the agents threw into the ring were primarily interior descriptions. Anger. Isolation. Above-average education and intelligence. How do you identify these things among the masses, I thought. No chance.

Occasionally, Backus would step in and throw out a question to get the discussion back on course.

"If you subscribe to Brass's last theory, why homicide cops?"

"You answer that and you've got him in a box. That's the mystery. This poetry stuff is the diversion."

"Rich or poor?"

"He's got money. He has to. Wherever he goes, he's not staying long. No job-killing is his job."

"He's gotta have a bank account or rich parents, something. And he's got wheels and he needs money to put gas in the tank."

The session went on for another twenty minutes with Doran taking notes for the preliminary profile. Then Backus ended it and told everyone to take the rest of the night off before traveling in the morning.

As the meeting broke up, a few people came up to me and introduced themselves, expressed condolences for my brother and admiration for my investigation. But it was only a few and they included Hazelton and Doran. After a few minutes of this I was left alone and was looking about for Walling when Gordon Thorson approached. He held his hand out and after hesitating, I shook it.

"Didn't mean to give you a hard time," he said smiling warmly.

"That's okay. It was fine."

He had a tight grip and after the standard two-second shake I tried to pull away but he wouldn't let go. Instead, he pulled my hand toward him and leaned forward so that only I would hear what he had to say next.

"It's good that your brother isn't around to see this," he whispered. "If I did what you did to get on this case, I'd be ashamed. I couldn't live with myself."

He straightened up, always continuing the smile. I just looked at him and inexplicably nodded. He dropped my hand and stepped away. I felt humiliated in that I had not defended myself, I had stupidly just nodded my head.

"What was that about?"

I turned. It was Rachel Walling.

"Uh, nothing. He just… nothing."

"Whatever he said, forget it. He can be an asshole."

I nodded.

"Yeah, I was getting that idea."

"C'mon, let's go back to the Boardroom. I'm starved."

In the hallway she told me the travel plans.

"We're leaving early tomorrow. It's better if you stay here tonight instead of going all the way back to the Hilton. The visitor dorms mostly clear out on Fridays. We can put you in one of those and have the Hilton just clear your rooms and send your stuff to Denver. Will that be a problem?"