Crimson Joy

by Robert B. Parker

  "Yes." So he was telling her. "Yes. She teased me and talked about how little it was and how weak it was and she tried to make me do it, tried, you know, to make me hard, and I couldn't and she got mad and said I was insulting her and I better do it or she'd cut it off and I was a bigot 'cause she was black."

  "Terrifying," the shrink said.

  "And my father was off somewhere fucking some other whore and I couldn't get away."

  He struggled for breath. The sentences had been too long.

  "And," the shrink said.

  "And finally she threw me out of the room with no pants on and locked the door. And I had to wait there until my father came and took me home with his jacket wrapped around me. And some of the other whores saw me."

  "Did you talk about this with your father?"

  "He was mad at me for losing my pants. He said my mother would be mad at us."

  CHAPTER 22

  Belson came by Susan's place at eleven in the morning and gave me a thick folder that had everything he and Quirk had learned about all seven suspects.

  "Quirk says read it and think about it and then we should talk," Belson said. "You, me, Quirk, and Susan, if she will."

  "Okay, I'll do it today," I said. "What are you going to do?"

  "Go home, introduce myself to the wife and kids, and take a nap."

  "Before you do that," I said, "see if you can compare this voice to the one I gave you before."

  "Red call you again?"

  "Among others. You'll see which one I mean. It's the one that says he might still be out there."

  "I'll see if we can get an unofficial voiceprint even though I'm on vacation," Belson said. "I'll let you know."

  Belson left and I began to read. Most of them were notable for not being interesting. There were no arrest records among them. Iselin, the Eastern studies prof, had had a jam while instructing in a private boys' school. A student had complained that Iselin solicited him, but nothing seemed to come of it. Two years later Iselin finished his Ph.D. at Harvard and stayed on to teach. Larson, the cop, had applied for sick leave, pleading burn-out, and been told to seek counseling. All were married except Felton and Iselin. Iselin had never been married, and Felton was divorced. They'd already eliminated Larson, the cop, because his work record showed he'd been on duty and accountable during the time at least three of the murders had happened. Gagne, the Frenchman, was out too. He'd been in France visiting his family when the second murder took place during Harvard spring break. Of the five remaining, Felton, the security guard, jumped out. There were two college teachers, a medical intern, the owner of a gourmet food store, and a security guard. We could probably eliminate a couple of others if we could talk with them or their co-workers. We could establish if Charles, the intern, had been on duty during any of the murders, for instance. But then they'd know they were being gum shoed I liked Felton. I took his folder and read it again. There's only a little you can do in a short time without creating suspicion. He was forty-three years old, divorced, father deceased. Current address was Charlestown, but he had grown up in Swampscott. There was a Xerox of a page from his high school yearbook. His picture was there among others and his school activities were listed.

  "Son of a bitch," I said.

  Under his picture it said Track 3, 4. Didn't prove anything. That was twenty-five years ago. But still. I put down the file and got on the phone and talked with the AD at Swampscott High School.

  "Kid named Gordon Felton," I said. "Ran on your track team there in… it would be 1961 and 1962. What did he run?"

  The AD said, "Why do you want to know?"

  "Name's Arthur Daley," I said. "New England Sports Weekly. We're doing a retrospective. High school sports twenty-five years ago."

  "Hey, nice idea. Hang on, I can check on it in a minute. We got pictures and stuff back to the war."

  He was gone maybe five minutes while I listened to the sound of silence on the wires. What a great idea. It could replace Muzak.

  Then the AD came back on. "Mr. Daley. Yeah, Gordie Felton was a hurdler. Third in the state in the 440 high hurdles."

  "Thanks," I said.

  "You don't know where he is now, do you?"

  "Naw, I've only been here three years. I just got it out of the files."

  "Okay," I said. "Thanks for your help."

  We hung up. It still didn't prove anything. Because he could do it then didn't mean he could do it now. Still, a lot of men can't outrun me, and the guy that left the Red Rose could.

  I read all the folders again except Larson and Gagne, and read them again and then put them down and stood and walked around Susan's place, looking out the windows, checking the refrigerator, looking out the windows on the other side. The refrigerator had a head of cauliflower, some broccoli, two Diet Cokes, and a package of Chinese noodles. Bon app tit.

  Hawk showed up at one with tuna fish subs, everything but onions, and a large bag of Cape Cod potato chips.

  "I wish we'd catch the bastard," Hawk said. "I'm getting rock-jolly sitting around here every day."

  He was wearing a brown Harris tweed sport coat and a blue oxford-weave button-down shirt with no tie and three buttons open. His jeans were starched and ironed and he had on mahogany cowboy boots.

  "What are you today," I said, "a Harvard cowboy?"

  "Eclectic," Hawk said, and began unrolling one of the subs. We ate at Susan's island, leaning over the unwrapped paper to keep from slopping on the counter.

  "One of the guys on the list used to be a hurdler in high school," I said. "Was third in the state in his senior year."

  "Must have been a while back or he'd a been a brother," Hawk said.

  "Nineteen sixty-two," I said.

  Hawk nodded. "Don't mean a hell of a lot," he said.

  "He's a security guard," I said.

  "Maybe wish he were a cop?" Hawk said.

  "Might even claim to be," I said.

  "How she doing?" Hawk said. When he talked "she" he always meant Susan.

  "She thinks she has an idea who our man might be," I said, "but she can't be sure."

  "So she sit and listen to him and nod and let him talk and she don't know for sure he won't stick a handgun in her and pull the trigger."

  Hawk said.

  "Which is why she has one of us baby-sitting twenty four hours a day," I said. "She's getting sort of rock-jolly too."

  Hawk nodded. "Time to review the evidence again?"

  "Yeah. The hurdler has an ex-wife," I said. "Maybe I'll go talk with her."

  "Take my picture along," Hawk said. "Tell her she can meet me if she cooperate."

  "And if she doesn't," I said, "she meets you twice."

  CHAPTER 23

  Mimi Felton lived in a condo in a vast assemblage of town houses clustered around a man-made pond in Concord. That morning on the phone she told me that she worked the makeup counter at Bloomingdale's and didn't go to work until four. I got there at 2:10 and she answered my knock wearing a white ribbed-cotton halter and black jeans, which she must have zipped lying down. She was barefoot. She had a lot of blond hair combed so as to show me she had a lot of blond hair. She had rings on eight fingers, and her earrings dangled like Christmas ornaments from her ears.

  "Hi," she said. "Mr. Spenser, come in."

  She had a lot of good makeup expertly applied and false eyelashes. Her nails, finger and toe, were painted some tone of dark purple. Her bare midriff was firm and tan and flat.

  "So you're a detective?"

  "Yes," I said. "I need you to tell me what you can about Gordon Felt on."

  "Could I see your badge, or license, or whatever they give you," she said. She had a little-girl voice that stopped just this side of lisping. I showed her my license.

  "Why do you want to know about Gordie?" she said.

  "Routine," I said. "Since he works for a security firm, the bonding company occasionally runs a check on the employees they're bonding."

  "That's like insurance," she said in her
little voice. It was the kind of voice that went with a curtsy.

  "Yeah."

  "Well, you look like you could bond anyone you wanted, Mr. Spenser."

  "Sure," I said. "What happened to cause your divorce, Mrs. Felton?"

  "Here, sit down," she said, and we walked into her small living room.

  There were avant-garde art prints on the walls, and all the colors were lavender and gray. The little picture window gave us a glimpse of the artificial pond. She sat on a chair made of lavender canvas on a triangular black iron frame. There were two others grouped around a massive Mediterranean coffee table that must have come from the house in Swampscott.

  "I'll stand, thanks. What about the divorce?"

  "Gordie," she said. "Gordie, Gordie, Gordie…"

  "That was it?" I said.

  "What?"

  "How come you got divorced?" I said.

  She shook her head. "He was such a little boy," she said. "Always acting so macho and being such a sissy."

  "Like what?" I said.

  "Well, he wouldn't go anywhere alone, without me," she said.

  "How about the macho stuff?" I said.

  "He used to carry a gun. He wanted to be a policeman, but I don't think he ever really applied for a police job. He always talked about it. He was like a police groupie, you know. Had the scanner radio, and hung around the cops in Swampscott when we were married. And anytime he'd hear some crime, something on the scanner, he'd get in the car and go to the scene, he was weird."

  "Family?" I said.

  "We never had children," Mimi said.

  "How about his family?" I said.

  "How come you're not writing all this down?" she said.

  I tapped my temple. "Once it's in the computer," I said, "it's there for eternity."

  She nodded. "His father's dead," she said. "His mother's still alive.

  Lives in Swampscott." Mimi shook her head.

  "Why the head shake?" I said.

  "God, he hates her," she said.

  "His mother?"

  "Yes," Mimi shook her head again, and smiled without any pleasure.

  "Blackie's a piece of work," she said.

  "Blackie?"

  "Gordie's mother."

  "Why is she called Blackie?" I said. "Her maiden name: Rose Mary Black," Mimi said. "Everybody always called her Blackie."

  "Jesus Christ," I said.

  CHAPTER 24

  "It's Felton," I said.

  Susan and Hawk and I sat at Susan's counter on Saturday morning, drinking coffee and eating whole-wheat bagels that Hawk had picked up at Fromaggio on his way over.

  On the counter was an 8 1/2 X 11 brown manila envelope that Hawk had got from Belson before he made the bagel run. It contained a voiceprint matchup of the two phone messages and a tape of both messages side by side.

  Susan took ajar of cherry preserves from the refrigerator under the counter and put it out with the cream cheese. She spread a vaporously thin layer of cream cheese on a small piece of bagel she'd broken off.

  She dabbed a minuscule of preserve on it and took a small bite.

  "It is, Susan," Hawk said.

  "Yes," Susan said when she swallowed her morsel of bagel. "It probably is."

  I stirred a spoonful of sugar into my second cup of coffee.

  "It explains the symbolism," I said. "The red rose, the black women.

  Rose Mary Black, aka Blackie."

  Susan carefully sliced a bagel in two and put both halves in her imported German toaster, which was wide enough to contain two bagel slices. She slid the toast lever down.

  "I knew her first name was Rose," Susan said. "But he never mentioned his mother's last name."

  "Isn't that unusual?" I said.

  "Not really, many patients talk of 'my wife," 'my mother," 'my father' particularly parents, whom the patient has never really thought of by their name."

  The toaster popped and Susan took the bagels out and put them on Hawk's plate.

  "And he was having trouble with her, wasn't he?" I said.

  Susan watched Hawk put cream cheese on his bagel. Like everything else Hawk did, it was done without wasted motion, without mistake, and there was exactly the right amount. When Hawk ate pizza he never got any on his tie.

  "If he was in the grip of some sort of unresolved rage at his mother."

  Susan said, "and his mother's name was Rose Mary Black, and there were other factors that I know, a man might in fact express that rage in a deflected manner on people who could appropriately symbolize Rose Mary Black."

  "Like black women," Hawk said, "and leave a rose."

  "Yes," Susan said, "and if the object of his rage was infinitely powerful, the rage would be overlaid with fear. And if the rage and fear were sexually inspired and sexually expressed, it might have to be in a kind of surrogation."

  "You mean, he might have to tie them up and rape them with a gun," I said.

  "Yes," Susan said. She was drinking her coffee, holding the mug in both hands, watching me over the rim.

  "Does Felton fit that kind of a profile?" I said.

  Susan continued to look at me over the rim of her cup. She sipped a little decaffeinated coffee. She had a faux art clock that ran on a battery, on the coffee table in the living room, and its ticking was loud and metronomic. Hawk poured some more coffee into his cup and then added some to mine.

  I looked at Susan. She looked at me and then closed her eyes.

  "Yes," she said. "He fits it better than you can know." I said, "We've got a tape that Belson did a voiceprint on. One's the guy that called and said he was Red Rose and challenged me. The other came after the Jimmy Winston fiasco. Voiceprint says they're the same."

  Susan nodded. "I'll listen," she said.

  I went to her stereo and put the tape in. Susan listened with her chin in her hand. I played the two conversations three times.

  Susan still sat with her chin in her hand, staring at the tape machine.

  Hawk and I waited. Susan blew her breath out in a short burst.

  "It sounds like him," she said. "No certainty, it could be someone else, but it could be him."

  I took the tape out of the stereo. Hawk sat in repose, stool tipped back, balanced lightly with his elbows against the edge of the counter.

  I was pretty sure he didn't really need the counter.

  Susan took her chin from her hand. "I too know it's him," she said.

  "But there's nothing I can say in terms of courtroom-type evidence.

  Because these crimes fit a man with his pathologies, it doesn't mean he committed them. I've had many men with similar pathologies that are able to master them."

  "What makes the difference?" Hawk said.

  "I don't know," Susan said. "Character, influences of other people in their lives, degree of Oedipal manipulation on the mother's part, intelligence of the patient, will to succeed in the therapy, blind chance." Susan smiled. "All of the above."

  "How 'bout divine intervention," Hawk said.

  "Wouldn't it be pretty," Susan said.

  Hawk smiled at her with warmth that no one ever got.

  "He's the one," I said.

  "Yes," Hawk said.

  "Yes," Susan said.

  "And we can't prove it," I said.

  "The voiceprint?" Susan said.

  "Just proves that the same guy called me twice. Doesn't prove he's Red Rose. Doesn't prove the guy they've got for it isn't Red Rose. Even if you could identify the voice without equivocation, it wouldn't prove he was Red Rose."

  "Equivocation," Hawk said.

  "Keep hanging around with me," I said to Hawk. "Listen and learn."

  "My appointment book will show that Felton was there the day that you chased him," Susan said.

  "So were, what, seven other people?" I said.

  She nodded.

  "What about the murders?" Hawk said.

  "The murders?" Susan said.

  "Compare the dates of his therapy with the dates of the murder
s," I said.

  "Why?"

  "See what happen," Hawk said. "We know the fish in there, we casting around trying to find where."

  "I'll get my book," Susan said.

  She left us and went down to the office.

  Hawk said, "We can't prove this guy did it, but we know he did. Sooner or later we got to do something."

  "I know," I said.

  Susan came back with her appointment book.

  "What are the murder dates?" she said.

  I knew them by heart and told her.

  She wrote them down in her attractive and completely unreadable hand. It was graceful and composed of well integrated linear sweeps, which had great surface charm and no intelligibility. Susan's handwriting was so bad that often she couldn't read it herself when she went back to it later.

  She leafed through her appointment book while Hawk and I cleared the counter and rinsed the cups and put them in the dishwasher. I capped the cherry preserves and put the top back on the cream cheese container and put them in the refrigerator. Hawk was washing his hands and face at the sink and drying them on a paper towel.

  "Sonovabitch," Susan said.

  Hawk and I turned and looked at her.

  "Felton normally comes twice a week," Susan said. "The days vary, but the twice a week doesn't. All the murders except the first were on the day after an appointment."

  "When did he start therapy?" I said.

  "Two weeks after the first one," Susan said.

  The room was quiet. The wet hum of the dishwasher was all there was to listen to.

  "Something in the sessions must have set him off," Susan said.

  I could feel the faint tremor in the floor as the dishwasher went about its business.

  "Doesn't have to mean that," Hawk said.

  "I know," Susan said. She was entirely Dr. Silverman now, thinking about human behavior. "But the coincidence is startling."

  "What would have done it?" I said.

  Susan shook her head. She walked to the window and stared down at Saturday morning on Linnaean Street. We were quiet. Hawk settled back onto his stool, I stood with my back to the sink, leaning against it.

  Susan turned finally and looked at us.