Warren Murphy: Brain Drain

"Your people forgot to pick up something."

"What?"

"Look at the skulls."

The brains had been scraped out. "It was such a mess in there," said Waldman.

"Yeah. But where are the brains?"

"They must be here," said Waldman.

"Your people get everything?" asked the coroner.

"Yeah. We're even cleaning up now."

"Well, the brains are missing."

"They've got to be here somewhere. What about those bags full of gook?" asked Waldman.

"The gook, as you call it, includes everything but the brains."

"Then that organ of the deceased bodies was transported from the premises of the homicide by the perpetrator," said Waldman.

"That's right, Inspector," said the coroner. "Somebody took the brains."

At the press conference Inspector Waldman had to tell a Daily News reporter three times that the organs of the deceased that were missing were not the organs that the reporter thought they were. "Brains, if you really want to know," said Waldman.

"Shit," said the Daily News reporter. "There goes a great story. Not that this isn't good. But it could have been great."

Waldman went home to his Brooklyn apartment without having dinner. Thinking about the homicide, he had trouble sleeping. He had thought he had seen it all, but this was beyond… beyond… beyond what? Not reason really. Reason had patterns. Someone, obviously with power tools, had taken apart human beings. That was a pattern. And the removal of the brains, no matter how disgusting, was a pattern. The arms in the walls, but not the legs, were part of the pattern. And so were the trunks of the bodies.

It must have taken a good two hours to whack out the crevices in the ceiling and the walls and to insert the bodies properly. But where were the tools? And if it did take two hours or even an hour, why was there only one set of bloody footprints when he had entered. The rookie cop had taken one look at the doorway and been escorted up by a detective. The first doctors to arrive had just looked inside the room and made a blanket pronouncement of death.

Only the coroner's footprints were on the stairs when Waldman went in. How had the killer or killers left without leaving bloody footprints?

"Hey, Jake, come to bed," said Waldman's wife.

Waldman looked at his watch. It was 2:30 A.M.

"At this hour, Ethel?"

"I mean to sleep," said his wife. "I can't sleep without you near me."

So Inspector Jake Waldman slid under the quilt with his wife, felt her snuggle to him, and stared at the ceiling.

Assuming the homicides were rational, because of the pattern, what was the reason for the pattern? Arms in walls and bodies in ceilings. Brains removed.

"Hey, Jake," said Mrs. Waldman.

"What?"

"If you're not going to sleep, get out of bed."

"Make up your mind," said Waldman.

"Go to sleep," said Ethel.

"I am. I'm thinking."

"Stop thinking and go to sleep."

"How do you stop thinking?"

"You drop dead already."

Jake Waldman sucked the last small fragment of salt from his right lower molar.

In the morning, Ethel Waldman noticed that her husband didn't touch the bagels, only picked at the lox with onions and eggs, and hardly bothered to sip his cup of tea.

"There's something wrong with the food already?" she asked.

"No. I'm thinking."

"Still thinking? You were thinking last night. How long are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking."

"You don't like my eggs."

"No. I like your eggs."

"You like my eggs so much you're letting them turn to stone."

"It's not your eggs. I'm thinking."

"There's another woman," said Ethel Waldman.

"Woman, shwoman, what other woman?" asked Waldman.

"I knew it. There's someone else," said Ethel Waldman. "Someone who doesn't ruin her nails cooking for you or get wrinkles worrying about how to make you happy. Some little street chippie with cheap perfume and a young set of boobs who doesn't care beans about you like I care. I know."

"What are you talking about?"

"I hope you and that cheap tart you're running around with are very happy. Get out of here. Get out of here."

"C'mon, Ethel, I got problems."

"Get out of here, animal. Go to your whore. Go to your whore."

"I've got work. I'll see you tonight, Ethel."

"Get out. Out, animal."

And in the hallway of the fifth floor of their apartment building, Jake Waldman heard his wife yell out to the world:

"Lock up your daughters, everyone. The whore-master's on the loose."

At the division headquarters, there was a phone call waiting for Inspector Waldman. It was Ethel. She would do anything to patch up their marriage.

They should try again. Like adults. She would forget the incident with the actress.

"What actress? What incident?"

"Jake. If we're trying again, let's at least be honest."

"All right, all right," said Waldman, who had been through this before.

"Was she a famous actress?"

"Ethel!"

And that held the family problems for the day. The mayor's office wanted a special report and the commissioner's office wanted a special report and some agency in Washington wanted some kind of report for a special study and a psychologist from Wayne State University wanted to talk to Waldman, so Inspector Waldman hauled the lowest grade detective he saw first and gave him an assignment.

"Keep those dingbats off my back," he said.

The police photographers had come up with something interesting. Perhaps Waldman had missed it during the rush to finish up the on-the-scene work. But could he make out a certain poster on the wall through the lines of blood? Right under that arm there?

"Hmmmm," said Waldman.

"What do you think?" asked the photographer.

"I think I'm going back to that basement. Thank you."

"Crazy, huh?" said the photographer.

"No. Reasonable," said Waldman.

There were knots of people around the basement apartment, both attracted but kept at a distance by the police barricades. The rookie had apparently recovered well because he looked professional and bored standing in front of the iron steps leading to the basement.

"I told you it was nothing, kid," commented Waldman going down the steps.

"Yeah, nothing," said the rookie cockily.

"You'll be picking up eyeballs in plyofilm bags in no time and thinking nothing of it, kid," said Waldman, noticing the rookie double over and run toward the curb. Funny kid.

The basement room now smelled like a sharp commercial disinfectant. The rug was gone and the floor was scrubbed, but much of the brown stain could not be scrubbed away. It had soaked into the wooden floor. That was strange. Basement apartments usually had cement floors. Waldman hadn't noticed the construction before because of the blood. Funny how much new blood was like oil, a slippery coating when first spilled.

Waldman took the photograph out of the manila envelope, tearing off the little silver snap that went through the hole in the flap. The disinfectant rose beyond smell. It was a taste now. Like swallowing a mothball.

The glossy photograph reflected the harsh light from the bulb overhead. The room felt surprisingly cool, even for a basement. He looked at the photograph, then looked at the wall. The wall posters had been scraped during the cleaning process and now were only barely discernible strips.

But he had the photograph. And between the photograph and the small strips left on the wall, he saw it. On the wall there had been a surrealistic poster of a room. And from the walls of that room hung arms. And in the ceilings were trunks of bodies. And looking at the photograph of what the poster had been and at the remnants of the poster now, Inspector Waldman saw that the room had been made into a replica of this mad poster. Almost exactly in proportion to the picture. It was an imitation of the picture. He stepped back on the creaking floor. An exact, proportional, almost slavish imitation. He felt something about this, and his instinct told him it was important. What was it?