Andrew Vachss - Only Child

“I’m not blaming you, Cyn. I guess I’m agreeing with you. It’s all about power. And the movies have it, in spades.”

“Well, there isn’t a lot you could do about that, honey, is there?”

“We can find this Vision,” I told her.

“Vision?” the Prof scoffed, the next morning. “Motherfucker’s name should be ‘Invisible,’ hard as we’ve looked for him.”

“We don’t know the turf,” I said. “It’s not like any tracking we ever did.”

Cyn and Rejji sat quietly, together, listening. Michelle was off somewhere with the Mole. Terry was out working the teens.

“You think the children know, mahn?” Clarence.

“You know what, brother? I did think so. But now I don’t. Whoever he is, he rides the thermals, drops down whenever he sees something he wants, then skies away. I think the mistake we’ve been making is assuming he’s like other freaks—the kind we’re used to. You see what I’m saying?”

“Yeah, Schoolboy. You can always tell where they going by where they been. Not this boy.”

“Not this boy,” I agreed.

“Come on with it,” the Prof encouraged me. Like he’d been doing since I’d hit the prison yard that first time.

“It’s not a new thing, right?” I said. “Cameras. They’ve been used as everything from lures to kill-props since they were invented. When I was just a little kid, I remember hearing about this maggot. Glatman, I think his name was. He did it real simple. Just put an ad in the papers for photo models. He was smart. Worked L.A.—that’s a refugee camp for pretty girls from everyplace else. When a woman would answer his ad, he’d tell them he was on assignment from one of those ‘detective’ magazines they had back then. Needed some damsel-in-distress stuff...no nudity, just a little cleavage. And some ropes.

“The ones who went for it, he just drove them to the ‘location,’ out in the desert, tied them up, did what he did, then left them there, dead.”

“There’s always been that,” the Prof agreed. “Most of it’s not about murder. Sometimes, it’s just a scam to get a woman’s clothes off. And some cockless motherfuckers, they need the prop, you know? Remember when the Times Square joints used to have those ‘camera clubs,’ son? You could rent a camera from them, pose the girl the way you wanted. Only thing they wouldn’t let you in those rooms with was a roll of film.”

“Yeah.”

“But we don’t know what this Vision guy wants,” the Prof said, tapping one temple.

“Not yet we don’t,” I said. “But I’m sure of one thing. That camera of his, Prof, it’s no prop. He’s not faking. Whatever he wants, he wants it on tape.”

“Burke! Wait till you hear this!”

“Calm down, Cyn. What’s so—?”

“We went back to see Kori...the paddle girl...again,” Rejji said.

“Why?”

“Because Cyn always knows,” Rejji said. “And she was right .”

“You found out where this Vision...?”

“No,” Cyn said. “She really doesn’t know any more about that than she told us. But you know what she does know?”

“Cyn...”

“She knows about a guy who pays teenage girls to pose. Just like that Glatman freak you were telling us—”

“Bondage photos?” I asked her, listening hard now.

“No...” Cyn said reluctantly. “‘Naughty schoolgirl’ stuff.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Oh, you know, Burke. A cheerleader lifting up her skirt to show her panties, like that.”

“So what makes you think—”

“Well, he only uses actual schoolgirls. He has to see a birth certificate, a photo ID from school, and even a report card! He’s only into the real thing....”

“That’s a long ways from homicide.”

“But, come on, he might know something, right?” Cyn said, almost pleading with me.

“Tomorrow afternoon,” I promised her. “Now let me get some sleep.”

Ididn’t even try.

One of the channels had a story about this guy who killed his girlfriend and stuffed her into a trunk in his apartment. He was a well-connected rich boy, so they gave him bail. He jumped bond and made it out of the country. Ended up living in France. Living good, too. For years, the French wouldn’t extradite him, because he was facing the death penalty here, which went against their high moral principles. France is famous for protecting people from oppression. Ask Roman Polanski.

I heard the echo of Terry’s school conversation in my head. Movies are amazing.

And Cyn. Power power power.

“Not to be conceited, but I am, like, so cute, all my friends tell me I could be a model, except I’m not tall,” Michelle girl-gushed into the phone. “Is it, like, for real that you have a studio and everything?”

...

“Oh, wow ! I know where that is. That would be perfect. Only, it has to be after school, all right? Like right around this time? Not at—”

...

“Do you pay, like, by the hour?”

...

“Oooh! Really? How many hours could I—?”

...

“A gif? You want me to send you a...Oh, you mean, like, to see if I...”

...

“Couldn’t I just...?”

...

“Oh, okay. But I don’t have any really good pictures of myself. I mean, that’s what I wanted you to...”

...

“I’ll do it tonight! Just give me your addy....”

...

“Thanks! Buh-bye!”

“You did it perfect, honey,” I told Michelle.

“Swear to God, I closed my eyes, I thought you were seventeen,” Rejji praised her.

“But it’s no good, right?” Cyn said, catching my eye.

“I don’t think so, Cyn. You see what he’s doing, scamming girls into sending him pictures of themselves over the Inter-net, so they can ‘audition’ to be ‘models’ for him. He probably does have a little studio set up in his house. Maybe even actually pays a girl, every once in a while. It’s sleazy, but probably not even a crime. He didn’t ask you for nude shots, did he, Michelle?”

“No, baby. I gave it back to you, word-for-word. He wasn’t even suggesting anything. But, you know, some of those stupid girls, they’re going to go ahead and...”

“Sure,” I agreed, guessing their real reason was closer to the need-greed border than it was to stupidity.

“Couldn’t you at least go and talk to him?” Cyn said.

“There’s one thing that would qualify him,” I said to them all. “But I have to go back to the City and ask.”

Ilooked a question at Gateman as I came through the door. He shook his head. As good as the white-dragon tapestry in Mama’s window.

I went up to my place. My empty place.

It only took me a few minutes at the keyboard to get the answer. The Mole had scanned all of Wolfe’s paper on Vonni’s case into the hard drive of an IBM laptop, and Terry had shown me how to search the documents.

I cross-checked the info from Cyn—name, address, phone number. Nothing. Then I tried some keywords for the kind of thing he liked to do. Blank.

The man who scammed teenage girls into cyber-sending him naughty-cheerleader pictures had never been interviewed by the cops.

Late that night, alone in my place, I wanted the comfort of the blues. I cued up some Roy Buchanan, drifted along with “Drowning on Dry Land.” Rode all the way up to Chicago with Charlie Musselwhite, a bluesman who had made that same trip. Spent some time there with native son Paul Butterfield, then went back down to Texas for some of Delbert’s honkytonk.