The Judas Child

by Carol O'Connell

  “But you’ve seen them, Ali. You even know what my cock tastes like.”

  Her face was quizzical, as if this might be a difficult memory to retrieve. “Oh, right. Tiny shriveled thing? It was horribly deformed, wasn’t it? You’d think a good surgeon—”

  “You should talk.” He touched her face gently, as if they were still lovers, one finger tracing the jagged line of her scar. It was such a familiar act, seconds passed before she thought to brush his hand away.

  He looked toward the ballroom doors, but Rouge Kendall was gone. “That cop you’re so tight with—the one with the red hair? I wonder what he’d think if he knew the story behind that scar.”

  “Like you do?”

  He grinned. “Worth a try.”

  “What are you doing here, Arnie? Did you get demoted from the task force on organized crime?”

  “The lieutenant governor is calling in all the big guns to find her daughter. When I worked the kiddie detail, I was the best there ever was. You should remember that.”

  Though she would recall that period best for all the booze he managed to consume, on and off duty. His next assignment did not require weeping with the parents of dead children, and his drinking had lessened dramatically. But by the time he had sobered up, Ali Cray was gone. She had walked away in the early days when he was too stupefied to prevent her from leaving him.

  “Did you find all my files useful, Ali? I noticed you quoted some of my figures in your handout sheets. And now you’re getting cozy with that BCI investigator. Still turning tricks for stats?”

  Oh, what a cheap shot. And he was searching his brain for another one, a better one—even cheaper.

  “Are you stalking me again, Arnie?”

  “Let’s say you’re never out of my thoughts, and you never will be.”

  She was staring over his shoulder.

  Arnie turned around to face the stage. “Well if it isn’t Senator Berman’s best boy—the governor.” New York State’s highest-ranking politician was standing behind the podium, fussing with his notes. The natural shape of the little man’s eyebrows made him appear perpetually frightened, an accident of nature and nothing to do with the close proximity of his creator and master, Senator Berman.

  “Look to the right, Ali. You see that old guy walking up the steps?” He pointed to the back of a well-dressed man with silver hair and a walking cane of carved rosewood. “You remember Julie, don’t you?”

  She strained to see over the heads of reporters. “That’s Julie Garret?”

  “Yeah. Now watch.”

  Julian Garret handed a glass of water to Senator Berman. The senator drank from the glass at the moment the governor began his opening remarks. A ripple effect of snorts and stifled laughter spread through the press corps, though the governor had said nothing funny. Senator Berman hastily handed the water glass back to Julian Garret, and then looked out over the sea of grinning reporters. He was not amused.

  Now Julian Garret was striding toward them, grandly swinging his walking stick. Some regarded the rosewood cane as an affectation of style, and they were right about that. The journalist wore the sober expression of a distinguished senior citizen, but when he flashed a broad grin for Ali Cray, he seemed more like a young boy with old hair. He held out one hand to Arnie Pyle, palm up, so the gesture would not be confused with the offer of a handshake. “Pay me.”

  The FBI agent handed the reporter a twenty-dollar bill. “I didn’t think you’d really do it, Julie.”

  In an aside to Ali, the elder man said, “Arnie said the governor couldn’t talk if—”

  “If the senator was drinking water.” Ali nodded, only wincing a little at the bad joke. “But you knew the senator was a world-class ventriloquist.” Ali linked her arm with the reporter’s, and he seemed charmed by this, but then he was always her biggest fan. “So, Julie, how come a political columnist turns out for a kidnapping?”

  “Politically, it’s a slow news week, love. But I can always depend on Senator Berman to make an ass of himself in three personal appearances out of three. Just a tidbit for the column.”

  “So you’re only here for the day?”

  “Well, Ali, that was the original plan.” Now Garret glanced at Arnie Pyle. “But things just got a wee bit more interesting. I might be in town for a while.” He handed her a card for the Makers Village Inn. “Call me. We’ll do lunch.”

  “Goodbye, Julie.” She never even glanced at Arnie Pyle as she walked away toward the great doors where the young red-haired cop was standing in conversation with Marsha Hubble.

  The journalist was watching Ali’s retreat with a keen appreciation for a beautiful backside. “I see you’re still on the lady’s shit list. Well good for Ali. She can do a lot better. And what’re you doing here, Arnie? Hoping that idiot on the stage will accidentally confess to assisting mob interests?”

  “Could happen. But I had no idea those pinheads were coming.”

  “Oh, right.”

  “Off the record, Julie?”

  “Why not.”

  “The kid’s mother invited them—the biggest death penalty advocates in the country. I guess Mrs. Hubble didn’t think the perp had enough incentive to kill her kid.”

  “Can’t you control the mother?”

  “No, Julie. The amateurs are running the show today.”

  “So where’s the mob angle?”

  “Haven’t got one. I’m here to find the kid.”

  “Of course you are.” And by his amiable tone, the reporter seemed quite at home with base lies, perhaps regarding them as social pleasantries—preludes to dirtier acts and better news stories. “Let me guess, Arnie. If I get it right, I get the exclusive. Deal?”

  “Shoot.”

  “Everybody knows the lady politician’s in deep trouble with Berman. He told the governor to unload her, but she hangs on. When you consider how dirty this state is, how vicious the political machinery can be—her career should be dead by now. Obviously, she’s got a bargaining chip—maybe a solid tie to mob campaign contributions?”

  “So you figure this for a mob snatch? Give me a break, old man.”

  “Too risky, Arnie? Or too Hollywood? For your purposes, it only matters what Marsha thinks. So she’s cracking open a little more every day, grieving for her only child—all that pressure. And all along the way, you’re right next to her, dropping hints, whispering in her ear. The mob connection is burned into her brain by the time her daughter turns up dead. And they usually die, don’t they, Arnie? You can almost count on it, can’t you? Then you bend over the child’s corpse and ask the mother, very politely, if she wants to turn state’s evidence to get even.”

  “Ah, Julie, you must think I’m one evil son of a bitch.”

  “And consequently, the best man for the job. I expect a phone call when you pull it off.”

  Rouge held up the glossy poster Marsha Hubble had designed. “But, ma’am, it’s too much information. Here, take a look at this one.” He handed her the flyer Becca Green had given him. “Sadie’s father made it.”

  The lieutenant governor stared at it for a moment, and then she smiled. “You’re absolutely right. It’s better—it’s wonderful. Harry Green’s a damn poet, and he only had the one word to work with.”

  A small, nervous woman in a severe gray suit stood beside the lieutenant governor, her pen suspended in midair, awaiting the politician’s next words. Marsha Hubble placed the sheet of paper on the aide’s clipboard, as if this person were a living table. “Have someone run off a thousand of these. I want every single flyer replaced by three o’clock.”

  The nervous woman’s head was still bobbing like a windup toy as she hurried off down the hall, disappearing into a side room.

  Marsha Hubble turned back to Rouge. “Anything else?”

  He had been prepared for an argument. Now it occurred to him that the lieutenant governor was as gullible as the general public. She believed what she read in the papers and accepted him as a State Police wunde
rkind.

  “Yes, ma’am. I’d like to see Gwen’s room. I realize it’s already been—”

  “Of course.” She spoke to Rouge, but she was staring at Ali, who had just joined them at the foot of the staircase.

  “I’m sorry,” Rouge said. “This is—”

  “I’m Ali Cray, Mrs. Hubble.” She put her hand out to the lieutenant governor. “I’m sorry if that’s not the correct form of address for—”

  “Call me Marsha. I know who you are, Dr. Cray. But you’re certainly not what I expected. So young for a Ph.D.”

  Yet, by the look on Marsha Hubble’s face, this was far from a disappointment. She obviously set great store by prodigies. Rouge was not surprised that she didn’t seem to notice Ali’s scar, for the lieutenant governor managed to block out entire human beings, like the FBI man standing next to her, politely waiting for his turn to speak.

  “Gwen’s room is this way,” she said, shepherding Rouge and Ali up the stairs and leaving the waiting man to stand alone looking foolish.

  “So, Dr. Cray, do you make those fascinating criminal profiles? Can you really tell the color of the bastard’s eyes from the details of the crime?”

  “No, ma’am. No crystal balls.”

  “Not like the FBI, you mean? Good.”

  So the lady was disappointed in her federal lapdogs. How long would it be before Gwen’s mother became disenchanted with himself and Ali?

  As Mrs. Hubble neared the top of the stairs, she missed a step and Rouge caught her arm to break the fall. She was startled when she lifted her eyes to his—so close he could feel her breath on his cheek.

  “How clumsy of me. Thank you.”

  Now he saw her in the unguarded, unpublic moment, and he was revisiting his own mother in the early days of Susan’s disappearance—those same screaming eyes. So he had erred. Marsha Hubble was not rudely oblivious to those around her; she was simply very focused. It was all she could do to get sanely through the next minute, the next second.

  The politician’s professional smile was back in place as they followed her along the second-floor landing and into a large corner room flooded with light. The walls of Gwen Hubble’s bedroom held framed posters of rock groups and photographs of dogs. A standard black poodle lay across a down quilt on the four-poster bed. The dog wore a light blue ribbon on his head, and in a further humiliation, the coat was styled in traditional fuzzy balls of fur. Marsha Hubble must have read Rouge’s disdain of the breed by his expression, which said, It’s not a real dog.

  “Look past the poodle cut, Rouge. May I call you Rouge? He’s a very smart animal. Here, watch this.” She snapped her fingers, and the dog raised his head. “Harpo, bring me English.”

  The dog jumped off the bed and ran across the room toward two bright-colored notebooks lying flat on the desk and extending over the edge by a few inches. The dog grasped the green notebook and brought it to Gwen’s mother. A label for English class was pasted in the middle of the cover.

  “Good boy. Now, Harpo, bring me geography.”

  The dog returned to her with the yellow notebook in his teeth.

  “He only knows two subjects. My daughter won’t let him bite the science notebook. Gwen loves science. She wants to be a biologist.”

  A man’s voice came from the hall. “You’re supposed to give Harpo a treat when he does a trick.”

  John Stuben was standing in the doorway. The dog handler crossed over to a blue ceramic jar by the bed. He lifted the lid, pulled out a biscuit in the shape of a bone and threw it to the poodle.

  Rouge wondered if this man was not entirely too familiar with a little girl’s bedroom.

  As Gwen’s mother and Ali walked back into the hall, they passed by Agent Arnie Pyle. He was casually leaning against the door frame and staring at John Stuben. “Did you help the little girl train her dog?”

  “Yeah, I gave her pointers.” Stuben’s voice was angry. He had already been through hours of questioning, and apparently his hard feelings for the State Police extended to the FBI.

  “Must take a while to teach an animal tricks like that,” said Pyle.

  “Not if you know what you’re doing.” Stuben seemed somewhat mollified by a question in his area of expertise. “It only took twenty minutes to teach Harpo to fetch notebooks. Gwen’s really good with dogs. She taught him a lot of—”

  “She taught him? According to the rest of the staff—” Pyle took out a notebook and made a show of flipping through the pages. “Yeah, here it is. They tell me you spent a lot of time with Gwen—a lot of time. So you didn’t spend all those hours training the poodle?”

  “The kid likes to watch me work with the security dogs. What of it?” Stuben’s attitude was meant to be surly, but the girlish mouth was pouting now, defeating his attempt at male macho.

  Pyle was writing in the notebook, not looking up when he spoke to the man. “Giving her pointers—is that part of your job? Or maybe you did that on the side?”

  “On my own time. I like Gwen.”

  “I’ll bet you do.” Pyle looked up with a slow smile. “How much do you like her, Stuben? Pretty little kid. Is she a turn-on?”

  Stuben went after the fed, as though he meant to do some damage. Pyle seemed not to care, and he held his ground, appearing only mildly interested in the man speeding toward him. The dog trainer stopped short of his target, the immovable, unblinking FBI agent, and backed off a few steps.

  Stuben had already told the agent everything he wanted to know. Arnie Pyle was nodding, and Rouge could guess his thoughts.

  So John Stuben has no physical courage—not with men. Perhaps with ten-year-old girls?

  But Rouge could think of other scenarios. John Stuben had already lost everything once. His savings had gone for lawsuits, and his kennel had been shut down. He was not a young man. While it might be very satisfying to deck a fed, there was a price. He would lose everything; he would have to begin all over again.

  This man might only be tired.

  The room smelled of antiseptic layered over the earthier smell of death. A body lay on a stainless-steel table near the far wall. Half the skull was missing, neatly sawed off with the carpenter’s tools of County Medical Examiner Howard Chainy. But Rouge’s attention was fixed on the item in the doctor’s hand.

  The medical examiner seemed in good humor. “I don’t mind, Rouge.” He held up the firm dark fungus so like a large, misshapen mushroom in its texture. “It’s certainly fresher than the average customer, and one might even call it fragrant.” Dr. Chainy placed the fungus on a small steel tray on his desk. He sat down and perused a selection of scalpels. After slicing off a thin section, he set it on a slide under the microscope and looked into the eyepiece for a moment. “Well, I can see a few critters moving around, and a lot of dead ones. That might fix the time and temperature. But I can’t tell you anything about the dirt particles.”

  “We don’t need that,” said Rouge. “The dirt samples went to a soil expert at the university.”

  “And they don’t have a botanist on the faculty?”

  “The captain says he has a local man coming in. He doesn’t want any press leaks on this.”

  “So he told me—three times.” Chainy adjusted his lens as he peered through the eyepiece. “Wouldn’t it be simpler to just hand everything over to the FBI? They have the world’s best forensic lab—one-stop shopping.”

  “It’s not their case yet,” said Captain Costello’s voice as he walked up behind them.

  Dr. Chainy jumped. “Jesus, Leonard. Give a man some warning.” He bent over his scope again. “So I hear you’re playing keepaway with the feds.”

  “I don’t remember inviting them to the party.” Costello handed a sheaf of faxes to Rouge. “That’s the analysis from the university. The soil in the lining—”

  He broke off as the door swung open, and a thin old man with gold-rimmed glasses appeared beside a uniformed escort. Costello nodded a dismissal to the state trooper, and now the white-haired civili
an stood alone on the threshold, hesitating, unsure of his coming or going. Rouge was shocked to recognize Dr. Mortimer Cray. The reclusive psychiatrist was not a common sight around town, and years had passed since they had seen one another. The changes in the old man were great. He was still well dressed, but not well fed, too slender to be in good health. Rouge remembered him with more authority in the way he carried himself. Just now, the old man moved like a thief, taking tentative steps into the room, testing the atmosphere.

  “Dr. Cray?” Costello moved toward him.

  The psychiatrist nodded as the captain extended his hand in a greeting. Mortimer Cray shook the hand gingerly, as though it might conceal a weapon.

  “I’m Captain Costello. This is one of my investigators, Rouge Kendall.”

  The old man nodded to Rouge, as though meeting him for the first time.

  “Thanks for coming over so quickly,” said Costello. “I have a problem, Dr. Cray. You’re a psychiatrist, right? No problems with keeping secrets?”

  Did Dr. Cray seem a little paler now? He did, and wary too, for the man’s eyes were darting from face to face in hopes of discovering something. Rouge looked at his captain and realized that Costello had also picked up on this and found it interesting.

  The captain’s attitude altered slightly, eyes narrowing, smile broadening. “It’s about the missing girls, sir. I think you can give us information.”

  A good shot by Costello. Mortimer Cray’s arms were limp at his side, but his hands were not still; they opened and closed like the mouths of air-stranded fish. And the psychiatrist’s stance was just a hair off balance.

  Rouge knew the police made some people a little shaky under the best of circumstances; it might be only that. But the rich walked about with lawyers in their pockets, and they never seemed so rattled as the poor. This man was stiffening now. Bracing for a blow?

  Costello held out the plastic bag bearing the remains of the dark fungus clotted with soil. “We found a jacket that belonged to one of the kids, and this was in the torn lining. Your niece tells me you’re a closet botanist.”