The Owlhoot

by J. T. Edson

  ‘Want to take a look before I start, Alice?’ the cameraman asked.

  ‘It’d be best,’ the girl replied, although her every instinct wanted a negative answer. Looking at bodies went with accepting a badge in the Sheriff’s Office and working on an investigation team.

  ‘That gal’s not got to look at the—them, has she?’ McGeary asked Vaughn, watching Brad plug the spotlight’s cord into the Oldsmobile’s dashboard and join Alice by the Plymouth.

  ‘That “gal’s” a mighty smart peace officer,’ the fingerprint expert explained. ‘She’ll do what she has to.’

  ‘It doesn’t seem right,’ Alexander growled.

  ‘Nothing about a homicide ever seems right,’ Vaughn replied, opening his notebook. ‘We all hate them, but when they happen we have to do what’s necessary.’

  Advancing slowly, Alive and Brad studied the ground at their feet in the glow of powerful light. Once again they saw that the springy grass would not offer clear footprints. Almost reluctantly Brad swung the beam to the bodies. He illuminated the soldier first. Face down, the back showed the hideous tearing where the heavy caliber bullet had mushroomed during its passage through the human tissue and burst out.

  ‘Looks like he emptied the soldier’s wallet before he left,’ Brad gritted. ‘Nobody could be that bad off!’

  ‘He shouldn’t be, the number of hits he’s made since he started,’ Alice answered. ‘Put it on the girl.’

  Looking at the female victim’s bare legs and feet, Alice moved closer. She knelt quickly, raised the hem of the short skirt and lowered it again. Standing up, she looked at the two hunters.

  ‘Did you take her shoes off, Mr. Alexander?’

  ‘Nope,’ the man replied. ‘I thought she’d kicked them off before we came.’

  ‘It could be,’ Brad said, glancing at the smaller entry hole of the girl’s wound, then moving the light from the body.

  ‘Huh huh,’ Alice grunted. ‘She’s not wearing panties—’

  ‘And the last girl was stripped naked,’ Brad finished for her. ‘Hell, Alice, the bastard couldn’t be that loco!’

  ‘I’m ready when you are,’ Heilman called before the girl could reply.

  ‘Start when you like, Sam,’ Alice offered. ‘We’ll ask the M.E. what he reckons, Brad.’

  Working slowly, methodically checking the result of each exposure before going on to the next, Heilman built up his scene-of-crime photographs. Brad and Alice did not stand around watching him. Reaching into the car, the girl removed the female victim’s handbag and opened it. While his partner wrote down the victim’s address, from a letter in the bag, Brad checked the two hunters’ firearms. They waved aside his explanation, stating that they would do much more than merely let the big blond check their guns if it helped catch the stinking son-of-a-bitch who had killed those two kids. Brad did not believe that the two men had shot the couple, but routine demanded that he kept the possibility in mind.

  Before the ambulance carrying the medical examiner’s party arrived, Alice had been in touch with Central Control and learned that the Owlhoot’s other female victim had not been sexually assaulted. Which was small consolation when the first male victim might not recover from the brutal pistol-whipping and kicks he had received.

  ‘Is there any visible evidence for me to avoid, Miss Fayde?’ the medical examiner asked, as he joined the girl on the ambulance’s arrival.

  ‘Not that we’ve seen,’ Alice answered and sucked in a breath before making the request that he checked on whether the girl had been raped.

  ‘Do you think she may have been?’ the M.E. inquired, making a wry face.

  ‘It’s a possibility,’ Alice admitted. ‘Her shoes have been taken off, which he’d’ve had to do if he’d stripped a pair of tights from her. With that mini, she would’ve been wearing tights, or at least briefs.’

  ‘I’ll see if there are traces,’ the M.E. promised. ‘But you may have to wait for the autopsy to know for sure.’

  ‘I understand,’ Alice said. ‘She was still alive when those two hunters found her.’

  ‘Did she say anything?’

  ‘That the Owlhoot had done it. If there was nothing they could have done for her, I’d like you to tell them so.’

  ‘I’ll do that,’ the M.E. agreed and moved forward to begin his preliminary examination. On his return, he found that Brad had joined Alice and said, ‘The soldier’s death was practically instantaneous, something over an hour ago.’

  ‘It’d’ve taken him at least that long to leave his first hit, scout the next turn-off and come on here,’ Brad remarked. ‘How about the girl?’

  ‘She died about half an hour ago,’ the M.E. replied. ‘By the time she was found, only a miracle could have saved her. Nothing they could have done would’ve helped.’ He paused, then went on, ‘She hadn’t been raped that I could see.’

  ‘That’s one consolation for her folks,’ Alice sighed. ‘Not much, but something. Is there anything to help us, doctor?’

  ‘In both cases the bullet passed straight through and the powder burning was far more extensive than any I’ve ever seen.’

  ‘Mind if I take a look before you move them, doc?’ Brad asked.

  ‘Feel free,’ the M.E. answered. ‘If the Owlhoot hit here and at the next track but one, he might have found another couple in between.’

  ‘We thought of that,’ Alice replied. ‘The sheriff sent out a team to check. They’ve not reported in, so I’m willing to bet there wasn’t a car on the second turn-off.’

  While Alice spoke to the medical examiner, Brad approached the male body. Face up now, the worst horror of the injury no longer showed. The big blond was not prompted by idle curiosity, nor a morbid desire to look at a corpse. Attracted by the M.E.’s comment, he wanted to look more closely at the wounds. One glance told him all he needed to know and, in fact, had suspected since studying the girl’s wound.

  ‘Black powder,’ Brad said, returning to Alice’s side. ‘No charge of smokeless would do it. Figures, though. A lot of blank-poppers use black powder. It’s cheaper than smokeless, not so powerful, and it sure looks spectacular when you touch it off.’

  ‘I’ll send you a more thorough report as soon as I can,’ the M.E. said.

  ‘Let Ben get their fingerprints before you take them in, doctor,’ Alice requested. ‘It’ll save time if he can check them against any he finds on the car or the soldier’s wallet.’

  Although Vaughn did his work thoroughly, he failed to raise a fingerprint that did not belong to the girl or the soldier. Nor did Alice and Brad’s examination of the surrounding area produce evidence to who had done the killing. At last Alice told the male peace officers that they might as well return to the city. Knowing that Alice faced the unpleasant task of informing the victims’ parents, Heilman suggested that he and Vaughn drove the Plymouth to the D.P.S. Building while she and Brad attended to it. Alexander and McGeary declared that they had lost all their zest for hunting that night. So the jeep followed the deputy car and Plymouth in the wake of the ambulance which carried off the bodies.

  Shortly before two o’clock in the morning Alice and Brad returned to the Sheriff’s Office. The squad-room was dark and deserted, but a light showed through the partly open door to the Watch Commander’s office. Going in, they found McCall seated at his desk. Although the First Deputy had removed his coat and tie, he still wore his hat. For all the expression his face showed, he might just have logged on watch as the two deputies entered.

  To both Brad and McCall, Alice showed signs of the emotional strain she had been through while completing a task that every peace officer hated. Breaking the news of death to the next-of-kin never came easily and less so in the tragic circumstances of the night. Brad knew that he could not have handled the two sets of parents as well as Alice had, but he had also felt the tension boiling inside his partner during the ride to the D.P.S. Building.

  ‘How’d it go?’ McCall inquired, looking up from the report he had b
een reading.

  ‘Lousy. How else?’ Alice snapped.

  ‘And there’s nothing to show it was the Owlhoot?’ McCall went on.

  ‘Only the M.O. being right,’ Brad admitted. ‘There’s nothing to even hint that the two hunters had done it.’

  ‘They’ll still have to be checked out,’ McCall warned.

  ‘It was the Owlhoot!’ Alice spat furiously. ‘And while we’ve been sitting on our butts with that blasted “psycho-tail”, he’s killed two people at least.’

  Coming to his feet, McCall slapped both palms hard on the desk’s top. He leaned forward, features craggier than ever, and growled, ‘I know you’re a good badge and’ve cracked some tough ones, but you’re not alone in that. Some of us were pulling the baddies in before you joined the Bureau of Women Officers.’

  Alice stiffened like an alley-cat faced by a hound dog. ‘If you’re not satisfied with my work—!’ she blazed.

  Walking slowly around the desk, McCall lifted one of the chairs from where it stood partially concealed by a filing cabinet. Alice’s words came to an end as she watched him place it opposite his seat and indicate it. The unprecedented gesture took the wind out of her sails and she sank almost unbelievingly on to the chair. At her side, Brad stared from Alice to the First Deputy. Then a grin came to the big blond’s face as realization of McCall’s motives hit him.

  ‘Any time I’m not satisfied with your work, lass,’ McCall said as he resumed his seat without including Brad in the amnesty, ‘I’ll come right out and tell you. What I wanted was for you to get this Owlhoot business in its true perspective. You and Brad’re a good team, that’s why we put you on the “psycho-tail” instead of asking the city for detectives. If you’d been left to handle the Owlhoot case, you could only have done what’s being done. Nailing Sandwich and the Zingel gal was important, it had to be done. The only pity is that it couldn’t’ve been done quicker. But even if it had, the chances are that you and Brad would have been prowling to the west or south of the city tonight.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Alice sighed. ‘Even with rolling stake-outs all around the city, there’d be enough holes for him to slip through and make a hit, but not to play with the girl—’

  ‘Maybe time enough for that even,’ McCall interrupted.

  ‘P.R. could have played the thing bigger—!’ Alice began.

  ‘And that might’ve sparked off his ego so that he had to go out and live up to his reputation,’ the First Deputy pointed out. ‘They played it cool so as to avoid starting a panic, or giving folks the notion to tote a gun along when they went necking.’

  ‘They might have stopped using the turn-offs for necking.’

  ‘That smart folks’d never be, Alice. And if they had, the Owlhoot might’ve started making his hits in the city limits. Which’d’ve been a damned sight more dangerous than having him out on the piney woods.’

  ‘Yes,’ Alice admitted ruefully.

  ‘What leads do you have on him?’

  ‘None as such. Brad and I think he may be the hombre who visited the Fast Draw Club, licked Kochek to the shot and started the members on the Berns-Martin “Speed” holster bit. Did R. & I. kick back anything?’

  ‘Negative. We’re still waiting for I.C.B. to come through.’

  ‘We’ll have to look some of those other yahoos with the “Speed” rigs over this afternoon, Alice,’ Brad remarked. ‘And see if the feller who makes them has sold any to men who don’t belong to the Fast Draw Club.’

  ‘It might get you somewhere,’ McCall put in. ‘Thing being, if it doesn’t where do we go? Brad, head along to the sheriff’s office and ask him if he wants to come in on this. And, was somebody to volunteer, I’d say somebody ought to make us some coffee.’

  ‘I can take a hint,’ Alice smiled. ‘Although I reckon you only want me out of here so that you can hide the chair again.’

  ‘Wouldn’t do any good,’ McCall sighed. ‘The sheriff’ll be coming and he pampers you deputies too much for that.’

  While Alice went to the men’s locker room and made coffee, Brad delivered McCall’s message. On his return with the sheriff, the big blond learned what had happened to Joan Hilton and Sam Cuchilo. One of the R.P. cars dispatched to help the deputies had come across a Ford sedan parked on the opposite side of the car-wrecking lot. It had been empty, except for two large suitcases and these, when opened, had proved to contain the loot from the Euro-Tex robbery.

  ‘Seems Sandwich and Zingel planned to run her convertible in among the heaps to be wrecked.’ McCall was saying when Alice entered carrying a loaded tray. ‘They hoped that nobody would notice the cut in the fence, or blame the local kids for it. With luck, the convertible would’ve stood for days, or might even been put through the crusher without being noticed. And while we were looking for it, they’d be headed for the border in the Ford.’

  ‘Who roughed Joan up?’ Alice inquired as she started to pour out the coffee.

  ‘The Zingel gal,’ McCall answered.

  ‘A runt like her?’ Alice gasped.

  ‘It took two matrons to put that “runt” into the iso-cell [xxiii] upstairs,’ Jack Tragg pointed out. ‘And it was her, not Sandwich, who knifed the guard. That was one mean little gal.’

  ‘I wouldn’t’ve given much for Sandwich’s chances once they’d got below the border,’ McCall commented. ‘I bet she’d’ve left him in a ditch some place.’

  ‘Thing now being, how do we get the Owlhoot?’ Jack put in as Alice finished pouring the coffee and sat down. ‘If he’s not a professional, it won’t be easy.’

  A point which the listening deputies did not need elaborating upon. Only on rare occasions did a regular, full-time criminal manage to keep his activities a secret. Sooner or later news would leak out, to be heard by a stool-pigeon and passed on to a peace officer. In the case of a part-time crook with no criminal associates, that could not happen. Sure the underworld would be interested in him, but, like the law enforcement officers, its members did not know where to start looking for him. To make the task more difficult, the Owlhoot took only money. So he had no loot to dispose of and could not be traced when he tried to do so through a pawnshop or second-hand store.

  ‘Maybe this double killing will scare him off,’ McCall suggested. ‘Or at least lay low for a spell.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Alice objected. ‘Hell, look at the chances he’s taken already. Up to tonight I might have believed that he was doing it because he needed money in the worst kind of way, but not anymore.’

  ‘I’ll go with you on that,’ Jack agreed. ‘After I heard about the killings, I went over to Central Receiving and saw the girl he’d had strip off. Got to her before they put her under complete sedation. From what she said, all the Owlhoot did after he’d pistol-whipped her boyfriend was follow her around touching her up. And this with the car’s interior lights on, within a quarter of a mile of the main Hoseville road. No sir. Even if he started doing it for the money, he’s playing for kicks now.’

  ‘As far as we know, he hadn’t raped the girl he killed,’ Alice said. ‘Just took off her tights and carried them away with him.’

  ‘Maybe she wasn’t wearing tights,’ McCall remarked.

  ‘With that dress, she’d have to be, them or panties,’ Alice insisted. ‘She had tights on when she left home. I managed to get that much from her parents when I asked them what she’d been wearing when she left that evening.’

  ‘You’ve had a hell of a night, Alice,’ Jack said gently. ‘If you’d like to log off now, we’ll start again—’

  ‘Not until I know what you’re aiming to do about nailing the Owlhoot,’ the girl stated and Brad, for one, knew the futility of arguing with her on the matter.

  Yielding to the inevitable, McCall announced, ‘First thing to consider is will the killings make him quit?’

  ‘I’d say “no”,’ Brad declared.

  ‘And me,’ Alice went on. ‘Assuming he’s doing it for kicks, what could be more exciting than
having killed twice and be going after more victims with the law hide-bound and all out to nail him.’

  ‘That being the case,’ McCall continued. ‘Where will he hit next?’

  ‘He always works in wooded country, not more than a mile from a main road,’ Brad stated. ‘That cuts out the north-west, it’s all open range. Same applies to the east, and he’d have to circle Lake Rockabye to reach that area.’

  ‘If it comes to a point,’ Alice put in, studying the map of the county on the wall, ‘he’s left with the three areas that he’s worked so far.’

  ‘That’s still a whole heap of ground to cover,’ McCall pointed out.

  ‘If we only knew which area he’d go for next—’ Alice began.

  ‘It doesn’t matter which one he hits next,’ Jack Tragg interrupted and, gentle though they had been spoken, the words slammed all the deputies’ attention to him.

  ‘Why?’ Alice could not prevent herself asking the question, although she guessed at the answer fantastic as it at first seemed.

  ‘Because we’re going to blanket all three areas with undercover cars,’ Jack explained, confirming Alice’s supposition. ‘Rolling stake-outs will move off any private citizens they find necking. So if the Owlhoot makes another hit, he’ll be trying it against two armed peace officers.’

  Fifteen

  ‘Damn it all, Brad,’ Alice Fayde said angrily, looking at the darkened car they approached on a turn-off from the State Auto Road. ‘After all P.R.’s warnings they’re still coming out here to neck.’

  The time was nine-thirty on Saturday night and the deputies were taking part in the greatest all-out operation ever launched by the Rockabye County law enforcement agencies against a single criminal.