T. Wright - The Devouring

He took her hand; she resisted a little, then gave in. "It's not as simple as that, Joan. You of all people should know that. And I don't look into anyone's head. Whatever I see comes to me unsolicited, and most of what I see-God, most of it is best left unseen! You'd be surprised how many of our thoughts are …" He searched for the right word.

"Nasty?" Joan offered.

He smiled. "I was going to say 'inappropriate.' It's the academic in me, I guess. `Nasty' is better." A short pause. "This … thing I'm looking at now is nasty." Another pause. "I tried to talk to him, Joan. He's right in the middle of it-"

"Who? Captain Lucas?"

Ryerson nodded. "Yes. Captain Lucas. Yesterday morning, he threw me out of his office. Then I went looking for him this morning-" He stopped.

"Rye?" Joan coaxed. "What's wrong?"

Ryerson said nothing.

"Rye, please."

"I don't know. I don't know. Something's not right here."

"Something's not right where ? What in the hell are you talking about."

"Here, Joan." He looked earnestly at her. "In this house."

"Jesus, Rye-you're scaring the hell out of me.

"Yes, I know. I'm sorry." He shook his head; he was clearly agitated. "Joan, you've got to leave here, you've got to leave this house."

~ * ~

In the Buffalo Police Department Records Division

Glen Coffman said, "What was that shriek I heard? It sounded like someone goosed you."

Irene Sabitch looked over at him, a huge smile on her face. "I got it, Glen."

"Well, for heaven's sake, don't give it to me."

"I got into those damned files. I found the user number and I got into them. I asked myself, now, what number would I use if I were Captain Lucas. And I answered myself, hell, there could be any of a number of different combinations, but the most likely combination would probably reflect my ego. My birth date, my shield number, my telephone number. So I got hold of all the numbers associated with him-at least all the numbers I could find, and I've been inputting them for the last two days." She paused.

"And?" Glen coaxed.

"And, at last, I got it. Two-one-five, that's the date of the Curtis murder/suicide. February fifteenth. So, two one five point LUC, for Lucas. It wasn't very inventive, but I guess that was the beauty of it-someone like me nosing about would probably discard the obvious. And I did, until the un obvious didn't work."

Glenn said nothing for a moment; he was surprised. Then, "Congratulations; you may yet learn to be a computer operator." He got up, studied her monitor a moment, then looked confusedly at her. "Well, c'mon, where is it, where's the readout?"

"That's it," she said.

"That's it? That's the whole thing?" He was looking at three sets of numbers, one on top of the other. They read:

5556892

843

28910

"That's it," Irene said. "Every file contains only those three numbers. My guess was that this one"-she pointed at the top number-"was a phone number."

"Try it," Glen said.

"I did. I had the computer check it." She paused.

"Well, go on," Glen said impatiently. "What is this, suspense night in Records Division? What did the computer say?"

"It said that that was the number for Greyhound Package Express, on Peacock Street, ten years ago."

At 1:15 that afternoon, two bodies, a male and a female, were discovered at the home of Frank and Lilian Janus. The bodies were discovered by the couple's housekeeper, Mrs. Glassman, who spent no time examining them and had to be sedated when the authorities arrived a half hour later. Captain Jack Lucas, Detective Guy Mallory, and Detective Andrew Spurling were among those on the scene.

Captain Lucas bent over the female; she was on her back, and was dressed in a pink vest, pink skirt, and white Naturalizers. There was no clear evidence of the cause of death, although from her open mouth and eyes, her dilated pupils, and the pale light blue cast of her skin, she clearly was dead. Lucas said, "Where are the lab boys, dammit? I want to get this one turned over."

Mallory, who was kneeling near Frank

Janus, said, "Hey, this guy's been shaved." Detective Spurling stood by quietly, taking notes. Mallory said to him, "You okay, Andy?”

Spurling continued taking notes.

"Andy?" Mallory coaxed.

He looked up, smiled a little. "Yeah? What's the problem?"

"Are you all right?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"No reason; I guess you look a little … removed."

"Double shift," Spurling explained. "I can handle it."

Lucas called, "Mallory, come here."

Mallory went over to Captain Lucas. Lucas asked, "If I got the name right, this is the woman who was attacked on Baldridge Street."

Mallory looked over at a uniformed cop standing near the doorway. "What's the name here, McGuire?" he asked.

McGuire answered, "Janus," spelled it, nodded at the body on the bed. "Her name was Lilian." He nodded at the body on the floor. "His was Frank. They were married, they had three kids, all in school. The two youngest are due home soon, I think."

Mallory turned back to Lucas. "She's the one, Captain."

Lucas straightened. "Help me turn her, Guy."

Mallory balked. "Don't you think we should wait for-"

"Help me turn her, goddammit."

Mallory sighed, came forward, stood next to Lucas, and together they turned the body of the female just enough that they could get a good look at her back. It was all but nonexistent. Where a wide flat plane of skin should have been, there was a gaping hole; at the edges of the hole were the broken and splintered ends of ribs, and within the hole a random jumble of internal organs. Covering these splintered bones and jumbled organs, softly reflecting the glow of the ceiling light, was the same creamy substance that had covered Laurie Drake. “Jesus Christ!" Mallory breathed, and covered his nose against the bittersweet smell of it.

Lucas said calmly, "Well, there's your cause of death, Mallory," and they let the body down.

Mallory said, "But where are the bandages, Captain?"

"What's that, a joke?" Lucas growled.

Mallory shook his head. "No," he said, "I'm sorry. You don't understand. The woman who was attacked on Baldridge Street had the entire side of her face ripped away." He nodded at the body on the bed. "And there's nothing wrong with her face, Captain."

~ * ~

Benny Bloom was very concerned. "What do you mean, Carlotta's in the psychiatric wing? I just talked to her yesterday."

The nurse who had taken Nurse Scotti's place was a chunky, gray-haired woman of sixty who affected a gentle and motherly bedside manner that Benny found annoying. She answered, "Nurse Scotti will be fit as a fiddle before you know it, Benny." She gave him her version of a sly grin. "It seems you've developed something of a crush on our pretty nurse. Ah, Benny, boys your age-"

"What's wrong with her?" Benny cut in, taking her by surprise-few people ever interrupted her sweet pontifications.

Her sly grin changed to a motherly, caring smile as she cooed, "Benny, Benny, your pretty nurse just needs a little rest; and so do you."

Benny shot back, "No, I don't," swung his feet over the bed to the floor, and went on brusquely. "Where is she? Where's the psychiatric wing?"

The chunky nurse's caring smile stuck on her face; she put her unusually strong hands on Benny's chest and tried to push him firmly but gently back onto the bed. "Ah, Benny," she cooed, "please be a good boy-"

And with his free right arm-his left was swathed in bandages-he gave her a mammoth shove that sent her stumbling backward toward the doorway, a sudden look of surprise and fear on her face. But she missed the doorway by an inch; her right side slammed into the wall, her head flew back, whiplash style, connected solidly with the metal doorjamb, and for a few moments she stood nearly motionless, arms quivering, mouth open, that look of surprise and fear mingling now with a look of motherly concern, as if her child had just shaken his fist at her or told her he was going to run away. "Ah, Benny," she managed, "look what you've done now." And she slid to the floor so she was in a sitting position, legs wide, arms at her sides, palms up, fingers curled, eyes and mouth open.