“Why?” Boldt asked Daphne, still withholding any mention of what this second note represented-another fire, another victim.
“The fire or the note?” she asked.
“Is there a difference?”
“You bet there is.” She sipped the wine, though she didn’t seem to enjoy its taste. She looked a little less pretty all of a sudden, tired and under the same relentless pressure that Boldt found himself. Investigating a violent crime was one thing; anticipating and stopping such a crime, another thing entirely. With the arrival of the second note, their charge was to prevent a death. It was an undeserved burden-unwarranted in many ways-but inescapable. They had been here before, the two of them, and this went unmentioned as well, for lives had been lost; other lives changed forever, not the least of them their own.
She continued, “The first note, as we discussed, could have been anything from a cry for help to a poorly timed coincidence. This note changes all that. Remember,” she cautioned, “this is only an opinion, an educated guess.”
“I’m with you.”
“These quotations are warnings, Lou.” Boldt felt a chill. “Forget the cry for help. He’s going to strike for a second time. By mailing them, he dated both poems, don’t forget. If I’m right, that means the fire is today or tonight. It’s immediate. He’s not giving Garman any time to figure this out. He warns; he strikes-which means that by the time the card arrives, he has already targeted his victim, perhaps even rigged the house to burn.”
“Jesus!” Boldt expelled his breath. “With only one victim, we hardly have what could be considered a pattern.”
“It’s premeditated, and he’s enjoying it. But his intended victim may not be the resident, don’t forget,” she warned. “May not even be human. He may be after the work of a particular architect, the structure itself that he’s trying to ‘kill.’ More likely, it could be Garman he’s after. The pressure you’re feeling-that I’m feeling, for that matter-may be solely intended for Garman. He’s a fire inspector, Lou. His evidence puts arsonists in jail. Revenge is potent motivation.”
“Fidler is checking out Garman.”
“Well, that will help,” she said, knowing Fidler’s reputation for detail.
“I’ve got Bahan working the technical end, the chemistry of the arsons.” He sensed her unease. “What’s up?”
“Firemen,” she answered. “Fidler, Bahan, Garman, all of them. Cops are one step away from being the bad guys-we’ve discussed this before-far too many of us are in it for the power. Present company excepted, of course. Firemen are no better. Putting out a fire is only one step away from setting it. In fact, as we both know, firemen set structure fires all the time to train the new boys. They love torching places.” She met his skeptical expression. “I’m generalizing, admittedly, but I don’t think even the firemen would argue this point too hard. My point being, if we’re looking for an arsonist, we might not have to look very far.”
Boldt said inquisitively, “Who better than a fire inspector to go torching places and sending himself notes? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Anyone in turnouts, Lou. They all have the bug. How busy has this fire season been? How much budgetary pressure is on the department to start cutting costs? These things have to be answered. Who goes first if the cuts are made? He or she could be our torch.”
“She?” Boldt asked.
“Poison and fire, a girl’s best friends.”
“Prior convictions and current firemen. Quite a list. Anyone else?” Boldt felt an impending urgency; the second note was like a fuse burning inside him. “What about victims? How do we stop a second death?”
“How do we stop potential copycat fires?” she asked, avoiding an answer. Arsons were notorious for spawning copycats; it was something they all knew but no one wanted to discuss. “How do we ask the press to hold off to stop the chances of a copycat?” she asked rhetorically. “It can’t be done, Lou. Let’s hope we’ve got it wrong. Maybe there is no second fire. Maybe that first note wasn’t tied to Enwright. Who knows?” She added, “And if there is a second fire, a second victim, we don’t collapse under the weight, we don’t allow the city-or even the brass, for that matter-to run the investigation. It’s your case, Lou. Everyone should be grateful for that.”
Pep talks and compliments, they traded them often. She seemed to sense when he most needed them. Their friendship had started that way. That it had developed into a single night of frantic sex six years earlier was their business and theirs alone. He had a line of sarcasm on the tip of his tongue, but he withheld it-she meant well enough. But just the fact that she would attempt to pump him up troubled him. It meant she was as scared about a second fire, a second victim, as was he.
She added, in a frail voice that confirmed his concern, “No one wants a second victim. I’m not suggesting that.”
Boldt had dealt with a peer of Daphne’s, a forensic psychiatrist from the East brought in to profile an earlier case. The man had once told Boldt, “The more they kill, the more we learn, the greater the chance we’ll catch them.” It had been one of those hard pieces of truth that Boldt wanted nothing to do with, yet it had lingered in the back of his mind. The psychiatrist was a strange man, but his message simple: An investigator could not afford to allow an increasing body count to kill the investigation over guilt and grief; he had to rise to the challenge and gather as much additional evidence as possible. He had to persevere.
“We can put the fire department on alert,” Boldt suggested, trying to find something to do other than sit around and wait for another body to burn. “We can contact the Marshal Fives-the Arson Task Force-and ask them to pump their sources for information. This guy isn’t operating in a void.”
She offered, “We’ve had a few calls from psychics wanting to sell us information. I haven’t followed up, but I’d like to.”
Boldt winced. He had no room for psychics in his cases. “Not for me,” he reminded her.
“I’d like to run with them. At least a follow-up.”
“Your stuff, not mine.”
“Don’t start with me,” she cautioned. “They may have something to offer. We take tips from junkies, Lou! Are you trying to tell me a psychic is less believable than a junkie?”
“You handle the psychics,” he quipped. “I’ll take the junkies.”
She fumed, exhaling heavily. Daphne rarely lost her cool. They sat in silence.
She focused on the glass of wine, her long fingers running up and down the stem. She changed the subject, asking, “Did you catch the sound bite they ran in the news. Shoswitz threatening the arsonist?”
“I caught it. They ran it on PLU.” Shoswitz was the lieutenant. He was terrible with the press, but there was no stopping him.
“He may have baited him, Lou: ‘Madman … nut case.’ He even mentioned you by name.”
“Lead detectives are often mentioned,” he reminded her, unconcerned.
“In ongoing cases? It’s wrong. I wish he wouldn’t do that.”
“The lieutenant dances to his own drums.”
Boldt’s pager sounded. He and Daphne exchanged looks. There was danger in hers. They both knew it was a fire before Boldt ever made the phone call.
10
The brunette with the thin waist and the tight skirt was in the kitchen cleaning up from the popcorn, and Ben knew that she had to come through the living room to reach Jack, who was already waiting in the bedroom. She was a new one, brown hair pulled back with a hair band, less makeup than the others, thinner than most of the women he dragged back with him. Ben liked her. She had rented the video with him in mind. The movie was a little sappy, but Ben enjoyed what passed as a normal evening at home. Typically, the only normal things in his life were school and-after school-Emily.
He wondered what better way to welcome her than to share his cherished death pose with her. He didn’t let just anybody see it.
He positioned himself in the guy’s favorite chair, one of the ones with a handle t
hat leaned way back and lifted your knees, and he hung his head over the arm, so that he stretched his neck and the blood ran into his face, turning it a bright red. Then he popped out his glass eye, carefully cupped it in his hand, and opened both his eyes in a deadman’s stare that he fixed on the bookshelf across the room.
A minute later he heard the water stop and her footsteps approaching, and he spread his arms out so they were floppy, and he held in his breath so that his chest stopped moving.
Her scream was loud enough that a neighbor called the police, and to make matters worse she peed in her pants, making a big dark stain in the crotch of her jeans. Jack had hold of Ben before Ben could settle her down, and all at once there was that unmistakable sound of his belt singing out of the loops, and Ben felt his world invert and then the belt started connecting with his butt and he thought maybe he’d be sick to his stomach. The girl, Jane? June? April? — Ben suddenly couldn’t remember-screamed even louder for the guy to stop, but that belt kept coming like a whip, and when the girl ran from the house the guy turned the belt around so that the buckle became part of the punishment. Somewhere in the ensuing nightmare, Ben threw up on the fancy chair, which only brought the belt down harder.
When he had satisfied himself, Jack dropped Ben into the chair like a sack of potatoes, pushed his face into the vomit, and told him to clean up the mess or “face worse.” Ben was solid tears, but he hadn’t let out a peep-that was one of the rules.
Maybe the cops saved his life-he thought later-because the knock on the door, followed by the strong voices announcing themselves, forced Jack to send Ben to his room rather than let Ben be seen. He pulled the boy by the hair to where his sweating face nearly touched Ben’s tearstained cheeks, and he spoke in a dry, forced whisper. “Out of here. And not a sound!”
Ben could barely move, his butt was so raw, but he flew up those stairs nonetheless. He heard one of the cops say something about a complaint from a neighbor; the cops wanted a look around. “We gotta check something like this out,” the unfamiliar voice explained.
Ben understood his situation clear as day. One, in his condition he couldn’t let himself be discovered by the cops; Jack could get in big trouble, which would only mean more beatings. Two, the guy was sure to kill him once the cops were gone.
He opened his window and went out the familiar route, along the roof-quietly! — over to the tree off the kitchen, and down through the limbs. His butt was a source of blinding, nauseating pain. With a deep inhale of the cool night air, he felt free-the most amazing, most welcome feeling of all.
For the walk to Emily’s, Ben, slow on his feet and unable to run even if he had wanted to, stayed off Martin Luther King, sticking to back streets. He did not think of Seattle as a dangerous place, and he was not afraid of the dark, but his temporary disability from the whipping, and his blind eye, left him with an acute sense of vulnerability and uneasiness.
The air smelled faintly of the sea and strongly of bus fumes. The sky glowed vividly from the brightness of downtown. The constant hum of engines and the whine of tire rubber played out like a chorus of summer insects. A ferry horn bellowed. The city. The Seattle he would have known even blindfolded.
Emily’s house was dark, the neon window sign switched off, and he was loath to roust her, loath to admit on any level that his existence with the guy was untenable, that the time to offer evidence against the guy had long since passed. That the time had come. His fear was not of pain or reprimand but of being alone. Not of loneliness but aloneness. He felt sorry for himself. She had told him that for a time he would be in the care of the state, and nothing scared him more. She had told him she would rescue him from their care and provide for him and nourish him and love him, and though he trusted her intentions he remained skeptical of the process. Of the system. He feared desertion. His mother had run away without a word.
Briefly, the truth clanged inside his chest, as it did on occasion: His mother would never have left him behind.
He climbed the cedar tree, past the sitting limb, and up to the platform-six boards nailed between two old boughs, each capable of supporting a car. He had a more complete tree fort behind his own house, but this platform at Emily’s was a safer refuge given the trouble he’d caused. He lay down on the platform keenly aware of his wounds and curled himself into a ball, where he hugged himself until he fell fast asleep, pulled down into the drowsiness of a body and mind in need of repair. Of escape. Sucked down into a dream that turned nightmare: his own inescapable existence.
11
Behind the incessant pulse of emergency vehicle lights, Boldt and arson investigator Neil Bahan waited for the site to cool enough for them to walk it. Boldt had a borrowed helmet and turnout jacket. He wore his waterproof hiking boots.
They had been waiting four hours by the time the Marshal Five inspector entered the remains of 876 57th Street North. Accompanying him was Steven Garman, who had arrived by the second of the four alarms.
The ground was soggy beneath Boldt’s boots. The air smelled bitter, a mixture of the wet, smoldering materials and a taste of charcoal. Neil Bahan led Boldt through a gaping hole in the side of the building, saying, “Keep a close eye on your footing. I’ll keep watch overhead. If I tell you to duck or jump, don’t hesitate, just do it. That’s why you want to be looking down-you need to pick a good spot to move to.”
Both Bahan and Boldt carried strong flashlights, illuminating the wreckage. Boldt was surprised at how unrecognizable it was and said so. “There’s not much left to look at,” he commented, pointing down into the basement area where the two Marshal Fives were already at work.
“It was overhauled,” Bahan explained, sounding disappointed. “The firefighters basically tear the structure apart to be sure all the fire is caught. It’s good fire fighting, but we encourage the IC to hold off on any overhaul in suspicious fires, because it hurts the investigation. Thing is, a fire this hot, it creeps into all kinds of hidden spots. To make it safe, to keep it out, you basically have to overhaul it; it’s simply a matter of timing. We-the inspectors-would rather the overhaul came later. Let us in when it’s still hot but under control. Investigators have to look at everything before it moves, to stand much of a chance. By the time Marshal Five is through with this, they’ll have it cleaned down to the cellar’s slab pour. You could eat a meal off it, swear to God.”
The structure was a tangle of charred and smoldering lumber, bent aluminum window frames, toppled furniture, soggy carpet, and broken glass. Bahan and Boldt carefully dodged their way through the maze. Well over half the house was missing, a gaping round hole open to the sky above and the basement below, where Garman and the other Marshal Five rummaged through the remains. The fire had run like a pillar through this center section and had chewed whole sections of walls toward the back of the building. Bahan mumbled, “Never seen anything like this.” He added, reconsidering, “Except in the Enwright pictures.”
“Worse than most?” Boldt attempted to clarify.
“Not even close. Worse by a long shot.”
“What exactly should I look for?” Boldt asked.
“Most of it will probably be down there,” Bahan answered. “The cellar catches most of the debris. It falls into it like a cup: lumber, glass, tile, electrical conduit, insulation.” He shined his flashlight into the hole. Garman glanced up at them and went on about his work. “You see what’s missing?” Bahan asked Boldt. Pointing, he said, “Sinks. Toilets. Where are they? Same as Enwright. I’ll tell you where: They’re down there, melted flat, which means we’re looking at temps in excess of two or three thousand degrees Fahrenheit, which basically puts this baby into a class by itself. Add to that the fact that the adjacent structures did not catch fire-because the thing burned so frigging fast-and you have one confused fire inspector.”
“So the evidence is down there?” Boldt questioned.
“And not much of it at that. Most everything in this center core was vaporized.” Bahan repeated for the sake of e
mphasis, “Vaporized.”
A news helicopter flew overhead, training a blinding spotlight onto the structure. Bahan’s face was dirt-smudged and his eyes were bloodshot. The air smelled suddenly different, yet familiar, and Boldt glanced around anxiously.
“What is it?” Bahan asked, sensing Boldt’s agitation.
“It’s a body,” Boldt answered solemnly.
There was traffic noise and ambient two-way radio sounds and the occasional shudder of helicopter thunder. An angry dog barked in the distance.
Bahan dragged his forearm across his face, mopping sweat and smudging himself. “You sure about that?”
“I’m sure,” Boldt answered. Panic gripped him. The neighbors who had been interviewed could not swear that anyone had been inside at the time of the fire. “Maybe a pet. Maybe not a human.” Though he suspected it was. It was wafting up from below. Did only homicide cops know that smell? he wondered. He had no desire to be on hand when a cooked body was found. He’d seen one in autopsy. Once was enough.
He reached for Bahan’s arm and caught the man, saying, “If it’s all the same with you, someone should conduct a perimeter search before we lose it to contamination. Gum wrappers, Popsicle sticks, bottle caps, toothpicks, pieces of clothing-”
“I’m with you.” He pointed down. “The action is all down there, anyway. Area of origin was right in the center of the structure. They don’t want us in their way. It’ll be another hour or two at least.”
“We’ll each take a side and then swap.” Boldt felt on familiar ground as they cleared the structure and reached dirt and mud. “Eyes to the ground,” he instructed. “Eyes wide open.”
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