Multiple Wounds

by Alan Russell

  Eurydice emerged on the other side of Oz. She was able to walk away unnoticed; the light that was Eris was there no more. Eurydice’s preoccupation made her invisible. She was thinking about a painting and a world without love. She didn’t hear the screaming going on around her, didn’t notice the flashing red and white lights, just trudged to her Bug deep in thoughts and memories.

  Cerberus welcomed her return, but with tempered enthusiasm. He knew this one tended to ignore him, offering few words and fewer pats. Still, she was responsive enough to recognize his needs. Grabbing his leash, she took him downstairs, opened the door, and said, “Go sniff. Go sniff.”

  Cerberus knew the euphemism and did as bid. She stepped out to the sidewalk and waited for him. The other personalities usually walked with Cerberus, or at least watched his progress, but she was preoccupied. “Sniffing” was incidental to what she really wanted the dog to do, but this was one time he obeyed her instructions. Cerberus fell upon a scent that demanded to be followed. He went further afoot than usual, all the way down the street and then around the corner, his nose seducing him from his post.

  Eurydice was good at waiting. She stood without moving, thinking about Detective Cheever and how he fit into the painting she was imagining and how he fit into her world.

  Something intruded into her dream world, something frightening. She jumped back, but not quite fast enough. She was running and screaming even before she felt the pain in her chest, but she didn’t slow down to examine her wound.

  Her cry awakened Cerberus. The hound of the underworld barked as he ran, and he ran as if he were racing to catch up to his hateful baying. He announced death, but when he came to her side there was only air at which to snap.

  The presence of the dog gave her the courage to stop running and look around. There was nothing to be seen. From around the corner she thought she heard an engine start and a car drive away, but she couldn’t be sure. She was in shock and her chest hurt. Eurydice reached for her heart, felt to see if it was broken anew, and came away with blood on her fingers. The dog sniffed around her, then started pushing her with his muzzle back toward the opened doorway.

  “Good dog,” she said, but Cerberus didn’t acknowledge this one’s rare praise.

  He was too busy guarding the doorway to hell.

  CHAPTER

  SEVENTEEN

  “Last night’s homicide has a lot of people on edge,” Cheever said. “I’m thinking maybe you ought to come in.”

  Cheever was leaning back on his chair, talking into the phone. Five stories below him he watched as a man walked into the Edutek building, a student training for that new life.

  “Why?” Dr. Denton asked.

  “You’re a witness. We want you safe.”

  “Slasher wouldn’t want to mess with me. I’d give him a taste of his own medicine.”

  The Slasher. After the second knifing homicide, the nickname was on everybody’s lips, “Might be, but a vacation from the streets couldn’t hurt.”

  “Like in jail?”

  “No. A room somewhere.”

  “Catered, man?”

  “We can set something up.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “You going to call me back later?”

  “The Man tells me to call him twice a day, I do what the Man says.”

  “Keep a low profile,” Cheever said.

  “There be any other kind?” the doctor asked.

  Dr. Denton had called Cheever as he had promised. To try to ensure that line of communication, Cheever had handed him twenty dollars the day before, but even without the money he thought it likely the doctor would call. Rewards have a way of piquing interest. The doctor was listening mighty close to everything being said on the street about the murders. He was dreaming about that money.

  The second homicide was boldly announced in that morning’s Union-Tribune’s headline: SLASHER STRIKES AGAIN! Willie Lamont was a homeless man who had been found with a slashed throat two blocks away from where Bonnie Gill had been murdered. Even so, the headline presumed much. Though the police media representative had gone on record as saying there were “some similarities” between the deaths of Bonnie Gill and Willie Lamont, no one had determined they had died at the hands of the same killer. Except the headline writer.

  Willie Lamont was fifteen years older than Bonnie Gill and had a well-documented fondness for alcohol. Cheever figured that someone with a knife might have relieved Willie of the bottle he usually went to bed with, or maybe some copycat killer had decided to look for a victim too out of it to fight back. The death of a Willie Lamont didn’t sell newspapers, unless you happened to tie it in with a serial killing.

  His phone rang again. “Detective Cheever.”

  “Detective, this is Rollo Adams.”

  First a call from the pauper, and then the prince. “Yes, Mr. Adams?”

  “I’m hearing a lot of squawking from the hen house this morning, Detective. Business owners and concerned citizens got their feathers ruffled.”

  And what the hell was he supposed to do about that? Cheever wondered. But he did what any designated interface does. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Some of these folks are talking up starting private patrols and taking back the streets.”

  “Historically,” Cheever said, “there have been very few homicides in the downtown area.”

  He couldn’t say the same thing about Barrio Logan or East San Diego, but it was doubtful Adams had any building projects planned for those areas.

  “You got a serial killer stalking the streets, son. People don’t give two hoots about historically.”

  “We don’t know if it’s a serial killer.”

  “You must know something.”

  “Not really. Another team is working the Willie Lamont homicide.”

  “That’s not exactly the kind of thing I was looking to reassure the nervous Nellies with. You got a witness maybe, or a suspect?”

  “Not that I’ve heard,” Cheever said.

  Rollo sighed in exasperation. “You’re not giving me a polite way to say cow paddy, Detective.”

  Tough—cow paddy, Cheever thought. “You can tell everyone that we’ve increased patrols and will have a much more visible presence on the downtown streets.”

  “Tad late to be closing the barn doors.”

  Cheever wasn’t in the mood for Rollo’s country wisdom. “Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Adams?” He resisted speaking with a twang.

  “I’d appreciate you bringing me up to speed if there are any developments,” Rollo said. “I got some irons in the fire that have gotten pissed on pretty heavily lately. Any good news to mollify the natives would be welcome.”

  Rollo had that unique ability to use words like “pissed on” and “mollify” in the same breath. Cheever wondered if he had the talent to pull off the Ritz and the grits at the same time, decided he didn’t, and concluded with a simple, “Will do.”

  CHEEVER SPENT MOST of the morning helping the Kid set up an undercover team. The Kid was in charge of planting an overt victim all but carrying a sign saying “Knife Me” in the area where Bonnie Gill and Willie Lamont had been murdered. Cheever had rehearsed the operation with the Kid and his recruits until he was satisfied, but his help hadn’t ended there. Cheever also assisted Diaz and Hayes; they had been assigned to see if Gill and Lamont had known each other, or if their deaths could be connected in any way. From what could be determined, the answers were no and no.

  The same answer, he realized, as to whether his helping the other detectives was necessary. What he was really doing was trying to avoid the personality of Caitlin. Though he had called Helen’s loft twice that morning, each time he had only waited a few rings for her to answer. His promise from the day before had been hanging over him, clouding his day. He had been looking for any excuse to not visit her, had hoped something in the case would click so that he could avoid her. Besides, he told himself, she probably didn’t even rememb
er their agreement from the day before. Since Helen and Holly didn’t share co-consciousness with the other personalities, Cheever tried to convince himself that he was justified in assuming their proposed beach trip was off. But when Cheever found himself ready to volunteer to help Falconi with some record checking, he reconsidered his behavior and knew he had to drive over to her place just to be sure. He needed to face up to her, and maybe his demons, at the same time.

  Cheever signed himself out on the work board. Helen Troy’s loft was less than a five-minute drive away. If she wasn’t there, he’d catch lunch. Maybe he’d even call Rachel and see if she was free to talk and eat. He had questions to ask her, after all. Cheever drove down Broadway, turned north on Seventh Avenue, and then had to overcome his impulse to keep driving. There was a reason Helen hadn’t answered his calls. She was out front waiting, embodying every parent’s guilt of broken promises. Zinc oxide covered her nose. She had on a one-piece bathing suit that looked big on her, like all such suits look big on little children, and on her face was the classic expression of a child expectantly waiting; guileless, certain, but slightly anxious.

  She looked like she still believed that good always triumphed over evil, that Santa Claus made it to every house on earth, and that parents always came through for their children. He might have been late, but she still believed he would come. With just one look he knew she would have waited for him all day. Cheever parked the car and started across the street toward her. She didn’t see him at first, didn’t spot him until he was halfway across the street.

  “Daddy!”

  “Stay there!” He stifled his urge to yell other advice: don’t run into traffic; watch out for the strangers walking by; there’s no need to cry. I’m here.

  She offered him a big hug, reaching up as children always do, even though there wasn’t all that much difference in their heights.

  “I waited a long time,” she said, a slight accusation in her words.

  “I was delayed.”

  “Can we go right now, Daddy?”

  He nodded, picked up her small bag of possessions that he could see included a sand shovel and a change of clothes. She reached out a trusting hand, and he took it with the slightest hesitation. They crossed the street to his car, Caitlin chattering away. “Do you think the water will be warm? I went to the ocean once, but it was sooo cold. Do you see those birds? I can walk like that. They’re happy, aren’t they? Do you have any bread to give them, Daddy?” He enjoyed listening to her talk. She managed to bring a freshness even to pigeons and the tired streets.

  Cheever debated on which beach to take her to, then decided on Coronado’s North Beach. He wasn’t thinking so much about scenery as safety. He wanted a wide, sandy beach, somewhere safe for Caitlin to play. San Diegans are very proud of their beaches. With 120 miles of ocean and bayfront in the county, it seems like every neighborhood has christened its stretch of water. Near to where Cheever lived were some nice beaches like Stonesteps and Moonlight and Boneyard and Swami’s, but he rarely visited them, and when he did he rarely even wet his feet. Mea culpa, he thought, a blame he didn’t extend only to beaches.

  “Where are we going, Daddy?”

  “Coronado Island.”

  Cheever thought about correcting himself, but didn’t. Coronado wasn’t quite an island, but that was how all San Diegans referred to it anyway. They took the Coronado Bridge over, and when they descended to land, he played the tour guide a little, announcing that they were driving along Orange Avenue. Caitlin was quick to point out the street wasn’t orange.

  “You’re right,” Cheever said. “But there were orange trees here once.”

  Or that’s what he had been told. The orange trees had been there before his time. For whatever reasons, they had been replaced by other varieties of trees. Now there were mostly palms and cypress and pines along the street. And stores. Plenty of those. Cheever turned northwest just before the Hotel del Coronado, one of San Diego’s venerable landmarks, and found a place to park along the street.

  November is San Diego’s answer to the theory that God is dead. The days are balmy, and the nights are one-blanket cool. The tourists have gone into low profile and paradise isn’t only something to be read about in Genesis. The slightest hint of fog remained along the coast, wisps that would give up the ghost within the half hour. The sun was pleasantly warm, peaking out in the low seventies, and the wide beach was almost deserted, with no more than fifty people lounging in a half-mile radius. Cheever was glad for that, didn’t want to deal with the curious stares drawn by a twenty-five-year-old woman acting like a child. Or a man old enough to be a grandpa trying to play the daddy.

  She ran forward with coltish strides, a child in a woman’s body, her feet kicking up sand. Her shrieks were high pitched, her laughter unrehearsed.

  “Come on, Daddy,” she said impatiently.

  Cheever took off his shoes and rolled up his pant cuffs. He knew he should be questioning her, probing into the murder of Bonnie Gill, but it felt so good to just be with her. If he closed off a part of his mind, if he shaded his eyes, he could almost go back twenty years when his hair was dark and his little girl was alive.

  He showed her how to look for the small holes in the sand, dug up sand crabs for her inspection, and dumped some into her hands. She shrieked with pleasure and with fear, then began to inexpertly dig her own holes. When that passion died, she took to running in and out of the waves. She pretended she was an airplane, her arms pushed back, her feet splashing along the white water. She chased birds and played with dogs (the owners didn’t notice her young girl’s voice because they were so used to baby-talking their own animals), and built a sand castle that was long on imagination and short on structure. Cheever tried to help her, but she was critical of his assistance, so he let her do her own building. He hoped they’d be gone before the high tide collected her handiwork.

  Naval planes passed overhead, taking off and landing at the nearby Naval Air Station North Island. Cheever suggested a walk to Seal Beach, and Caitlin enthusiastically agreed. They walked south toward the Naval Amphibious Base. He knew the beach was closed to the public, but sometimes from the civilian side you could still see the SEALs training. Cheever had watched a few of their intense workouts, groups of men being pressed to run and swim, being pushed to the breaking point, and he told Caitlin how at the SEAL training beach the men were often subjected to combat conditions, with live ordnance and barbed wire. When she heard that, when she learned that the SEALs he was referring to weren’t the flippered type, but were, in fact, human (though they liked to claim otherwise), she immediately wanted to go back to “their beach.”

  It was a good decision on her part. They both returned tired. When Cheever dropped to the sand, Caitlin was just behind him. She chose his lap as her resting spot. Her suit was wet and sandy, but he didn’t deny her the seat she wanted, though at first he was embarrassed. Anyone walking by them would have thought he was a lecherous older man trying to make time with a young woman. And how could he explain anyway? Who would believe or understand that when she was with him, and talking like she was his little girl, it was as if he were traveling through time? For the moment, he was thirty-two and she was five, and the most natural thing in the world was that she should be sitting on his lap.

  “Daddy?”

  “Yes, sweetie.”

  “What happens when you die?”

  “You go to heaven.” It was the only answer he could give her. Parents don’t tell their little children about the possibility of a permanent death that means never seeing them again or, worse, of hell.

  “Are you going to die?”

  He thought about the actuarial tables for cops again and told what was likely another white lie. “Someday. But not any time soon.”

  “Am I going to die?”

  “Everybody eventually dies. But you won’t die for a very, very long time.”

  She accepted his answers without demur. He watched her sitting there thinki
ng. “What’s all this talk of dying?” he asked.

  “Don’t know,” said Caitlin, her answer traveling up the musical scale, followed by, “I’m hungry.”

  “What do you want to eat?”

  “Pizza!”

  She took an outdoor shower, and Cheever convinced Caitlin she was old enough to change by herself in a restroom. Afterward, they walked back to the car. Cheever had noticed an upscale pizza parlor nearby, the kind where cheese is called “fromage” and where getting tomato sauce is the exception rather than the rule. He debated about having Helen stay in the car and his going to get takeout, but even though she was twenty-five, Cheever still didn’t feel right about leaving her by herself. He decided they should dine together, though he hoped they could get a table by themselves.

  That proved to be wishful thinking. The restaurant was crowded and they were told there was an expected fifteen-minute wait. He suggested to Caitlin that they go elsewhere, but in a plaintive voice she said no, and Cheever accepted her wishes. A family came in behind them, a mother and father and two little children. Caitlin was shy of the kids at first, observing them from the corner of her eyes, but then she started playing with them. It reminded Cheever of the time he’d seen a young Great Dane frolicking with a puppy Pomeranian, kindred minds unmindful of their dimorphism.

  “She loves kids,” Cheever said. She is a kid, he thought.

  They were finally seated in a booth where Caitlin was diverted by a mirror next to her. She made faces, gestured with her hands, and kept turning back to look at herself. What does she see, Cheever wondered?

  “Let’s play a game,” he said.

  “What game?”

  “It’s called, ‘Describe Yourself,’” he said. “You have to look in the mirror and answer my questions. Okay?”