The reluctant Ness was determined to show his face here because of recent newspaper criticism of him not having an interest in the blighted investigation and also because he wished to inform the National Guardsmen about the specific areas of social unrest. He had felt pushed into initially calling them in by the mayor in order to prevent a fully-fledged riot from taking place and was embarrassed that the volatile situation had developed into such a tinderbox. Each time the divers brought up another body part he wondered if this would be the spark that would ignite the angry crowd and it was almost a form of torture for the detectives knowing that Ness was there, seething with an unabated fury as the nearby disgruntled public disturbances where on full and glorious show for all to see. Merlyo, Zalewski and Gerber all knew that calling in the National Guard was incredibly difficult for Ness to do, not to mention embarrassing because of what the National Guardsmen themselves thought about his apparent loss of control within his own city.
The dishevelled and disgruntled Ness stood there in a furious stoic silence as the striking steel workers of the Flats rained down there unrelenting fury upon them all from the bridge above and the nearby street. The National Guardsmen struggled to contain the unruly growing mob as they pushed and heaved against the human wall of movable flesh, joyously cheering every time a guardsman fell onto his knees or cried out for assistance. Whilst upon the bridge they felt more bravely about throwing curse words at the small group of smartly dressed men for a variety of reasons such as the new labour reforms and the police’s inability to catch the Mad Butcher. Upon analysing Ness’s non movements Merlyo now understood why Gerber had been so eager to wade his way back through the uncompromisingly unforgiving sea of thick mud to get back to the safety of his homicide victim.
Standing amongst the chaos of the disgruntled public was now souring Ness’s already irritable mood as well as his destroying his beautifully crafted public image of being the all-powerful and untouchable safety director of Cleveland. Every time a projectile of any form would be thrown in their general area, it felt to him as though he was being slowly and painfully crucified by the angry public upon a sacrificial cross. When the unruly group then jeered and laughed at him in quick succession, he felt even more infuriated because he did not understand whom these people where to lecture him about the norms of a righteous society. To him they were all ignorant simpletons whom had no conception of what it was like to maintain a fully function and productive city. He did not see them as concerned families whom had rejected the new labour reforms due to the harshness it would create within their workplace and within their own bank accounts. To him their opinions where an irrelevance, a hindrance and a problem that needed to be trodden on with the utmost haste in order to prevent a social meltdown within the already unstable Flats area of Kingsbury Run.
An apprehensive Merlyo and Zalewski both grimmest every time a curse word was heard from the disgruntled mass and even looked at each other in alarm, depending on the selected crudeness of the chosen curse word. They both expected Ness to emotionally explode at any moment as the tinderbox of a man stood there whilst the angry protestors verbally attacked them all about their inept detective abilities. Then an unseen protestor bravely shouted from the unruly bridge crowd above “Hey Ness! How many parties you go to this week? And more to the point, how many woman did you bang?! Hahaha!” The abusive crowd then erupted into laugher and joyous applause as the brave heckler was swiftly led away by some of the National Guardsmen, whom where now surrounding the unruly rabble on the bridge.
An amused Zalewski covertly smiled under his hat as he looked at Merlyo, angling his hat so Ness could not see his hidden face. Merlyo face could easily be seen by Ness so he instinctively just raised his eyebrows in surprise at Zalewski’s amused face whilst Ness just silently stood there in the rain, his hands in his pockets and his lucky hat pulled down around his furious face. Ness then looked transfixed into the hazy distance as Gerber continued with his complex examination of his macabre collection of body parts. Ness squeezed his eyes so that he could get a better view of the gruesomely morbid site that lay within the just observable distance. He could just make out that there was a dismembered torso and a collection of several bodily parts by the preoccupied coroner which where all chaotically sprawled out across a dirty white sheet by the muddy riverbank.
He momentarily looked up to somehow alleviate the vocal accusatory voices that surrounded him and felt the soft and gentle rain upon his face and humid air gently caress his skin, like the first night he arrived in this god forsaken city. This familiarity offered him no comfort however as he then closed his eyes as he tried to refocus on his past achievements as the cities safety director, which usually imbued him with a new sense of energetic optimism. However nothing could alleviate his current unparalleled anxiety because earlier that morning Evaline and he had an argument which resulted in her hiding his opium pills case and his secret reserve supply and only now he was beginning to feel the undesired negative effects of their absence. He could now only release some of his unforgiving anxiety with his small flask of scotch which he always conveniently carried upon his person and so he finally broke his motionless stance, took out it out and had a swig.
As he tilted his water saturated and patched fedora hat backwards it immediately released its dribbling contents down his neck and onto his back, further hindering his fruitless attempts at controlling his slowly building agitation. As the cold water uncomfortably ran down his back, he looked at Merlyo’s concerned on looking face he could not help but immediately recoil in disgust because the more he got to know the man, the more he wanted to punch him in his perfectly round and smugly defiant face. Poppy rarely talked about her time with him and she was as secretive about the lonesome detective as she had been about her own past. This had at first annoyed the ever controlling Ness but he had got used to her secrets over time and understood now why she was where she was within his ever changing and turbulent love life.
He loved Edna, Evaline and Poppy all very deeply but in their own differently unique ways, each fulfilling a place within his ever complex private life which was totally unplanned for. Edna and he had drifted apart slowly over the years due to his work, his infidelity and her inability to provide him with a family had only solidified their demise but he still deeply cared for her regardless. Evaline was a talented, beautiful and intelligent woman whom he had grown rather fond of over the last few months since they accidentally met at a dinner party held by his friend the mayor. He had increasingly and affectionately started to call her his ‘Doll’ whilst in public and actually intended to marry her after his divorce with Edna had been finalised. He had been purposefully delaying the starting of divorce proceedings due to the unnecessary trauma it would cause Edna and because of the sustained attack by the unions upon his already besieged city. He was desperate to start a family now and as soon as possible, regardless of the political consequences that it may bring by divorcing his wife.
Poppy was the oddity within his “triad of relationships” in that she was, in his opinion, simply not marriage material and even though he still saw her secretly from time to time for a sexual rendezvous, he still unfairly perceived her as somewhat of a sexual object. This ill perception of her was not intentional on his part and he had not set out to behave in such an ungentlemanly manner towards her but it’s just how fate had dealt both their hands. He theorized that this was perhaps why they enjoyed each other’s company so much because there were no emotional strings attached to their secretly elicit love making sessions. He contemplated this flawed reasoning for a brief moment with an immense sadness because he missed the initial excitement and joy that each other’s company would naturally bring. Now life had cruelly changed this beautiful excitement and loving relationship into something far more unsavoury and lustfully physical, something that had no room for the tentative understanding of the others feelings and no desire to know the others unspoken secrets.
He then was dragged out
of his sad reminiscence by another abusive shout from the nearby crowd that the struggling Nation Guard where barley keeping under control. “Hay! Ness! Why don’t you lay off the partying and catch that Mad Butcher you lazy son of a bitch!” This shout was swiftly followed by some sniggering and a flying glass bottle that landed not that far away from a startled Zalewski, splashing some mud upon his newly pressed and black pinstripe trousers. The silent Ness then looked at Gerber in the distance, whom was barley visible through the constant haze of the down pouring rain, and debated if they should all move to his location to avoid the continual verbal assaults.
Whilst he looked at Gerber, pretending to debate the pros and cons of a hasty retreat from their current predicament, he pondered the unfortunate Poppy’s ultimate fate within his trilogy of love. He had always made a point to ask Evaline how her new bodyguard was performing, almost like a passing comment to covertly mask his continually unsated lust for her. He also wished to see how Evaline saw her and she had always stated the same thing about Poppy in that she really liked her, found her a pleasure to be with and thought of her as a friend rather than a bodyguard. This pleased him but also alarmed him because she was her paid bodyguard and not a friend and she was there to primarily protect her from the cruel Polizzi and his vengeful Mayfield Road Mob. Ness was instinctively doing what he had previously done so successfully back in Chicago with Edna, protecting his love from vengeful mafia goons.
He had not planned on using Poppy as her bodyguard but she was a well-trained, competent and most of all a trusted confident whom he could depend on and rely on in difficult times of need. She also had a remarkable record with her standard issue colt official police revolver which would make many of her unsuspecting male counterparts extremely jealous. However his main reason for pushing her into this trusted guardian position role was because of the man whom now stood before him. He needed to get her away from the Merlyo because he had been seething with jealously to find out from her guilty conscience that she had slept with him during the Great Lakes Exhibition. He had then felt compelled to promptly give her an ultimatum to either leave Merlyo and the department, never contact either of them again and work as his bodyguard or terminate their turbulent relationship forever.
Now he was unwittingly taking his emotional revenge upon her through their secret physical meetings and was making her suffer in the same way that she had so curly made him suffer by betraying him. This is why he would no longer sensually make love to her anymore because of the unforgivable pain of rejection that he had suffered due to her wander lust. There former love had now changed into something far more primal and he would aggressively have sex with her whilst Evaline was out socialising with her friends or even at public engagements, further exciting the revenge seeking Ness and metamorphosing there previously bland sex life into a wondrously addictive affair.
Knowing that she was his and his alone made him feel great but he also hated himself for feeling this way about someone whom he was once deeply emotionally attached to. More recently however whenever he had found himself with Evaline at a public engagement, he knew Poppy was nearby and within his sordidly troubled mind this excited him so much so that he would even lessen his intake of both opium and alcohol prior to that particular event. This was in order so that he would be able to successfully perform sexually as both drugs had the unfortunate properties of lessening ones sex drive. By doing this tactically he would still have his full animalistic attributes available to him when the time came and he could fully enjoy the aggressive sexual session within the secluded shadows.
He still loved Poppy tremendously and never had any intention of hurting her or for their love to have metamorphosed the way that it had into something that was more twistedly dark than it had originally been but this was the unforgiving reality in which they now both found themselves in. He had come to see Evaline as more how he used to initially see Poppy at the very beginning of their relationship, with the exception of all the accumulated shame and hidden pain. A positive spotlight now shown on Evaline but deep down he knew that this was a false representation, a mirage of perfection that all yearned for but could never obtain because as time wore mercilessly on, his perception of her would also change.
Regardless of this understanding he had begun spending more time with the socially astute Evaline, willing to flirt with her illusion of perfection and loving how knowledgeable she was on all topics. Her impressive intellect was only matched by her artistic ability and her undeniable beauty which would cause many men to yearn after her. Her shoulder length and stylishly bobbed brunette hair, gorgeous hazel eyes and cosmopolitan new age personality all added further to her alluringly fresh appeal. Her talented hands had even intimately sketched him on numerous occasions at her central Cleveland flat, his favourite being the one with him clutching his papers after work whilst sitting on the sofa, deep in thought.
A cold wind then dramatically dragged him from his comforting thoughts about his pleasantly artistic times with Evaline and forcibly focused his gaze back upon the distant Gerber, whom reappeared within his tired eyes like a phantom which brought with it unwanted revelations from the gloom. He was now back here in this bitterly cold and bleak reality, amongst the angry public and his imbecilic twin detectives whom could apparently not find one deranged madman within this warren of shanty homes. He reluctantly returned his gaze back towards the silent Merlyo as anger and resentment slowly built up within him upon seeing the detective’s face. Merlyo had unwittingly committed two acts of unforgivable treasonous aggression towards him by not only sleeping with his beloved Poppy but also by not solving these gruesome homicides, further hindering his promising career here in Cleveland.
All of a suddenly his furious thoughts about the scheming detective where rudely interrupted by dirty, rotten smelly egg that landed with tremendous force upon the back of Ness’s expensive, long and beige waterproof coat. He suddenly turned around and looked angrily at the disruptive crowds on the overlooking bridge above, whom appeared to love the fact that they had finally got a reaction for the safety director. The defiant protestors then verbally egged him on as they shouted even loader as he angrily starred back at them with such an undeniably controlled rage that even the National Guardsman curiously looked at him in alarm.
He knew that he would not be able to catch the daring culprit that had thrown the disgusting projectile at him, damaging his treasured coat that he had once worn whilst having his photograph taken with his friend the mayor. He particularly liked those initial photographs of himself newly arrived within Cleveland, his serious look of determination edged upon his triumphant face. His face no longer looked like that anymore and he was almost a stranger to himself within the mirror every morning whilst he shaved and now his beloved coat would also sadly never appear the same again.
He secretly cursed the passage of time to change all things before he then turned and gestured to the two on looking detectives to follow him through the extensive sea of mud towards the area where the dismembered body parts where all being diligently collected. The detectives were relieved because this area was now overrun by the throwing, unrelenting and angry crowds of disgruntled labourers whom had now fixated upon Ness and where giving him a torrid time. As Ness hesitantly watched his beloved new spectator shoes disappear under the tick mud, he grimaced as yet another member of the insolent protestors shouted at him from the bridge “You running home to your Mommy? Hahaha! You useless Chicken shit Safety Director! Go back to Chicago! We don’t want you here!”
All three hastily trudged through the rain and mud to get to the unseen macabre collection that awaited them in the prevailing ambient light. To Ness’s relief the abuse became less loud and frequent as all three slowly and staggeringly waded their way through the endless thick mud that had surrounded the riverbank and now themselves. After a few minutes of battling through the impregnable mud, all three caught the unmistakably characteristic odour of decomposition as they finally arrived a
t the horrid riverbank. The white back of the kneeling and preoccupied Gerber then slowly came into view as they all got closer and waded through the misty atmosphere of gloom and fruitless escapism.
The ghoulish coroner looked to be at home within his morbidly gothic surroundings as bones and dismembered bodyparts lay on the dirty sheet next to him whilst his trusty Gladstone bag sat awkwardly by his knee. He was intensely analysing his newly acquired macabre collection of maggot infested remains that greedily hung on to their putridly prized flesh. Ness was by now ignoring the distant drama of the shouting crowds that where behind him and focusing on the male torso in front of him until he noticed an alarming sight and vocalised his distress to both accompanying detectives “Jesus! Look, there’s no heart!”
Ness instinctively turned away from the grotesque sight of uncompromisingly horrific reality as both detectives peered in closer and indeed noticed that the male torso had a deep, jagged hole over the empty heart area. Ness instinctively put his handkerchief over his mouth as the two detectives looked at each other with concern, as if to silently confirm that this new disturbing development was indeed alarmingly true. The preoccupied Gerber then spoke whilst he continually analysed other dismembered body parts nearby, choosing not to move his head for fear of missing some important forensic detail “Yes! The chest had been violently ripped open, most probably whilst the victim was still alive and as you can see from the protruding intestines he’s also been violently eviscerated. I feel as that our unknown Mad Butcher has sunken to new depths of unspeakably depravity. I cannot find the heart and neither can my two searching colleagues which probably means it’s either been taken away by the killer or eaten by a lucky predator”
The Noir Evil Page 32
