"We haven't asked you anything," said Danny. "But I am now. Please hold out your hands."
The girl looked from Danny to Lindsay, then at Rothwell, who nodded to show that it was all right. She shook her head and held out her hands.
"You hurt me, my father sues," she said.
"Painless," said Lindsay.
"I know why you had me brought in here," Jean said. "You think Cyn and I are suspects because we're gay and Havel hit on me."
"Jean," Rothwell warned.
For someone who wasn't going to talk, Danny thought, she was providing a whole lot of information.
"And what did you do when he hit on you?" Danny asked.
"Looked at him cold."
She showed them the look. It was very icy indeed.
"Then I told him if he laid a hand on me again, I was going to scream 'rape.' And I also told him that if I got anything lower than the A I deserved, he'd be looking for another line of work."
"And what'd he do?"
"Ceased and desisted."
"Didn't threaten to 'out' you?" asked Lindsay.
The girl smiled. Nice smile. "Everybody knows we're gay. Even my family and Cyn's. They are, to use their words, 'cool with it.'"
"Are they?" asked Lindsay.
"No, but there's not much they can do and they live in hope that it will pass like the flu."
"Yesterday, ten to eleven in the morning?" asked Danny. "Where were you?"
"Spanish class. No lo creeo?"
"We'll check," said Danny.
When the girl had gone, James Tuvekian's two closest friends were examined. Neither showed signs of glass fragments in the palm.
The last three people called in were Bill Hexton and the other two security guards.
Epidermal samples were taken from everyone. No glass fragments anywhere.
"Looks like we'll have to do the whole school, Montana," said Danny, sitting back, hands behind his head.
"Maybe not," Lindsay answered, starting to pack the machine away.
There was something. Lindsay wasn't prepared to mention it, not till she got back to the lab. The palm of one of the hands they had looked at was puffy, slightly sore and had a slightly green residue. The other palm looked normal. She had taken a swab from the suspicious palm.
14
"WHAT HAVE WE GOT?"
The question was put by Mac Taylor, who leaned back against his desk. Stella and Hawkes sat in front of him. Flack leaned against the wall. They were all beyond tired.
"We've got someone watching his apartment," said Flack.
"He won't go back," said Mac.
"No," Flack agreed. He put his hand to his face. He needed a shave. He needed a shower, hot water beating against his aching back. He needed some sleep.
"Evidence?" asked Mac.
"The knife in Park's pocket is the same one used to kill Paul Sunderland," said Hawkes.
"Man has a lot of knives," said Flack.
"He made a mistake," said Hawkes. "There were traces of something interesting on the handle and in Park's pocket. Paint. Green. Fresh."
"How fresh?" asked Mac.
"Fragments are still pliable," said Hawkes. "He wasn't painting walls but he did lean against one that wasn't completely dry. Paint is a blend. High end. Expensive. Mixture of three colors. It comes out mostly green. I talked to the manufacturer. It's not used in homes much. Marketed to high-end office buildings, doctors' offices, law firms, places like that."
Hawkes had taken the paint chips to the paint store, which had computer color-matching software. They had taken the paint chip, placed it in front of a small detection window on the computer that then identified the proper formula to make that particular color. It took no more than a few seconds. The formula was displayed on the computer monitor. With the push of the "enter" button, the clerk at the computer could have created a gallon of paint that exactly matched the small chip Hawkes had supplied.
"The paint was purchased by Norah Opidian & Associates, Office Decorators," said Hawkes. "I called their number. Answering machine says they're closed, at a big office decorators' convention in Philadelphia."
"Keep trying," said Mac. "Call the convention hotel. See if you can find somebody who can help you find where that paint came from."
Mac pushed away from the desk, turned his head and looked out the window. The room went silent for a moment.
"Everything's connected," Mac said finally. "We have to find out how. He put the knife in Park's pocket at the Gun Hill station. What was he doing there? He doesn't live there and neither did any of the people he killed."
"He's not done killing," Stella said, rubbing her eyes.
"He's not done killing," Mac agreed.
Pulling her thoughts from Custus was more than difficult and Stella knew why now. It had come to her a few minutes ago when Mac was looking out the window. Custus reminded her of Tom O'Brien, the administrator at the orphanage when Stella was ten years old. O'Brien and Custus had the same Irish accent, the same wit, though Stella had not been able to really understand it when she was ten. One day Tom O'Brien had simply been gone and no one would say where. The rumor was that he had been caught touching one of the girls.
He had never touched Stella. Or had he? The image of a smiling Connor Custus came to her. Custus was reaching out to touch her.
"Stella?" said Mac. "You with us?"
"Yes, sorry. Yunkin may not be finished spelling," she said.
"The day is over," said Hawkes. "He wanted to get his brother's name carved into four child molesters."
"We're lucky his brother's name wasn't Anthony," said Flack.
No one laughed.
"But his brother had a last name," said Stella. "And there was one other person in Paul Sunder-land's therapy group."
"Ellen Janecek," said Flack.
"And his brother's first name could be repeated," said Stella. "There are a lot of child molesters out there."
"The anniversary of his brother's death is over for this year," said Hawkes.
"He could be planning to spend another special day carving out a name for himself," said Flack. "His brother's birthday maybe."
"Birthday? When was Adam Yunkin's birthday?" asked Mac.
Flack took out his notebook, flipped through pages and stopped. He looked up and said, "Tomorrow."
"Irony," said Hawkes. "The kid kills himself the day before his birthday."
"Ironic, but maybe not a coincidence. Adam Yunkin didn't want to see sixteen," said Stella.
"It could be nothing," said Mac.
"Could be everything," said Stella.
"Gun Hill area," said Mac. "While Hawkes is looking for an office decorator, see if you can talk to someone at the Gun Hill precinct who can give us a lead on an office being painted Vineland Green."
"I'm on it," said Flack. "I know a couple of people in that precinct."
Mac heard something behind him. He looked over his shoulder at the window. It had begun to rain again.
* * *
Anne Havel made the call and asked to talk to whoever was in charge of investigating her husband's murder. She was put through to Danny Messer.
While she waited, she glanced out the living room window, ignoring her father-in-law, Waclaw, who sat numbly on the sofa.
The days of rain had taken her through many moods. At first, before Alvin had been murdered, she had welcomed the protective wall of the deluge that isolated her from the world. Even as a child she had welcomed the heavy, driving rain.
After three days, the isolation had ceased to be comforting and had become confining. The house was not big; three small bedrooms, living room, dining room, kitchen. The rain kept the children home and Waclaw had sat watching television, even though he didn't understand most of it, from morning till night.
The house had become a confining trap. And now, with the cruel return of the rain, it had suddenly struck her as a good place to end her life.
"Detective Messer," said Danny.
"This is Anne Havel."
"What can I do for you, Mrs. Havel?"
So much, she thought. Take that zombie of a man away. Sit with her children day and night for at least a week. Make the rain stop. Make it stop.
"My husband left a diary," she said. "It's in Polish. He was having an affair with someone at the school."
"Who?"
"He didn't write the name, only called the person 'Nogi,' 'Legs' in Polish."
"We'll need that diary."
"It's yours," she said, hanging up the phone and turning to her father-in-law. "Are you hungry?"
If Waclaw understood, he gave no sign.
Anne walked to the kitchen. She would do the easiest thing possible. She would make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. The girls would be fine with that. Waclaw wouldn't care.
She opened the refrigerator. No peanut butter.
* * *
Keith Yunkin sat in the comfortable, new office swivel chair. He had unpacked and assembled it the day before. It was the only piece of furniture in the office. The floor was polished wood and the walls freshly painted in what was supposed to be a restful green.
Other furniture would be moved in, possibly today. The office and the rest of the building, now that it was almost truly finished, would begin coming to life. Keith listened for the sound of movers and curious tenants. He would hear them coming down the hall when they started to come in. Now that the rain had begun to fall again they would almost certainly not be moving in today. Plenty of time to pick up his duffel bag, slide open the window and step out into the rain.
On his lap was a paper towel he had taken from a diner bathroom. On top of the towel was a half-finished sandwich, peanut butter and jelly. He was hungry. There was another sandwich in his duffle, an egg salad on rye. He would probably eat that too.
He couldn't stop thinking about Ellen Janecek. He had to complete the cycle. Everyone in the group would have to pay for Adam's death. He had chosen Sunderland's group randomly. It was a place to start, a symbolic place, a statement. After he had killed her, he would call the Times, the Post, the local news. He would tell them what he had done. He would give them details. Molesters would learn about the murders and live in terror thinking they might be next. Even if he was caught, they would sit behind locked doors in fear of someone else doing as he had done.
The boy that the blank-eyed pretty Ellen Janecek had seduced was almost two years younger than Adam when his brother died. Better to be seduced by a pretty young woman than raped by a bear-faced middle-aged man, if that could be considered a choice.
It would have been better if he had been able to complete the ritual within the twenty-four hours of the anniversary of his brother's death. But he could do it today. Lots of time today. He couldn't wait too long. He couldn't kill on his brother's birthday. That wasn't a day for revenge. It was a day to honor a short life.
He had to kill Ellen Janecek. The police would be watching, but he had to do it. His task was unfinished. He couldn't leave it that way. For the sake of Adam's memory, he couldn't leave it that way.
He didn't know what he would carve into her soft white flesh. He knew it would come to him at the moment he needed to know. He was inspired by his brother's memory, his parents' agony and his own rage. It would come to him, but first he had to find a way to get to Ellen Janecek.
* * *
French green clay is used for external cosmetic treatments by practitioners of alternative medicine. French green clay belongs to a subcategory of clay minerals known as illite clays. Rock quarries in southern France had a monopoly on its production till deposits were identified in China, Montana and Wyoming. The clay is green because it comes from a combination of iron oxides and decomposed plant matter, mostly kelp seaweed and other algae. Other components include montmorillonite, dolomite, magnesium, calcium, potassium, manganese, phosphorus, zinc, aluminum, silicon, copper, selenium and cobalt. Water removed. Clay sun-dried. French green clay stimulates skin and removes impurities from epidermis. Clay absorbs impurities from the skin cells, causes dead cells to slough off and stimulates flow of blood to epidermis. As clay dries on skin, it causes pores to tighten.
And that clay was what Lindsay found in one of the epidermal surface specimens taken from the people at the Wallen School.
French green clay, easily and inexpensively purchased at most health food stores, supposedly has curative powers when ingested. It is simply one kind of processed dirt, but Lindsay knew that people all over the world ate dirt, believed it was even a staple for health. The practice went back at least to medieval times.
In addition to being eaten, French green could be applied to the skin to bring up impurities. It might also bring up fragments of glass.
Lindsay needed a volunteer to spray glass fragments on and into his skin and then see if French green clay would pull the fragments out. There was only one readily available volunteer: Lindsay Monroe.
If it worked, she and Danny would have a suspect.
* * *
Stella got the call just before noon. She recognized the voice.
"I just talked to the arson investigator," Devlin said. "He confirmed what you found. Professionally placed explosives."
"Good," said Stella.
She was wearing her lab coat and gloves and sitting in front of a microscope examining a minute fragment of debris from the bomb site. Hawkes had gone to the DNA lab. He was now standing in the doorway, motioning to Stella.
She held up a hand, indicating that he should wait while she took the call.
"There's more," Devlin said. "Our investigator checked on the insurance. Doohan had a two-hundred-thousand-dollar policy on Doohan's. He could have sold the place for six times that much."
"Maybe he needed money fast," she said.
"An insurance company fast? He could have sold the bar today, cash, for four hundred thousand."
"It doesn't make sense," she said.
"No," said Devlin. "It doesn't. Unless your talkative man in with the broken ankle is lying to you."
Hawkes stood in the doorway, arms folded, looking at her.
"I should be hearing this from your arson investigator," Stella said.
"I asked him if I could make the call," said Devlin. "Ulterior motive. Dinner and a movie. You pick the movie. I pick the place we eat."
"When?" she asked.
"Tuesday or Sunday," he said. "My nights off."
"Two questions," she said.
"Sure."
"Are you married?"
"No. Never even been close. What else. My father was a fireman. So is my brother. I have a sister, lives in Teaneck, has three kids. I'm a practicing Catholic and will remain so till I get it right. I've been a fireman for seven years. Joined the day I finished college. NYU, pre-law. I'm a Yankees and Knicks fan. That's it. Life story."
"That could have waited," she said, looking at Hawkes who was yawning.
"Saves time," he said. "I don't mean it saves time so we can- "
"Understood," said Stella. "Devlin, I'm older than you by at least four years."
"How do you know?" he asked.
"I'm good at estimating ages. Part of my job, though I usually do it on dead people."
"It's part of your intrigue," he said with a laugh she liked. "I mean the age difference, not your working with the dead. I work with the dead a lot too. Gives us something in common."
"Dinner and morbid conversation?" she asked.
"Your life story?"
"Tuesday night maybe," she said. "I'll find a comedy, something with Will Ferrell or Owen Wilson."
"Sounds good. You like Greek food, right?"
"I like to eat," she said.
"Give me an address and I'll pick you up at seven."
"I'll pick a place and meet you there," she said.
"Deal," Devlin said.
She hung up and walked over to Hawkes.
"Houston," he said. "We've got a problem."
That was all he said on the walk
down the hall to the DNA lab where Jane Parsons was waiting for them.
"Two of your building explosion victims are related," Jane said. "Identical twins, as you know, are the only people who have the exact same DNA, but close relatives- siblings, parents, even first cousins- have enough markers to confirm a relationship."
"Enough to go to court with?" asked Stella.
"We could," said Jane, "but a decent defense attorney can always create doubt. So this is just for you."
"The cook, Malcom Cheswith," said Hawkes. "He's related to Connor Custus."
Jane nodded her agreement.
Stella was too weary to be stunned, but not too weary to be very curious.
"It's all relative," said Stella.
"What is?" asked Jane.
"That's what Custus said to me in the hospital. Said it three times. He was playing with me."
"Let's go talk to Custus," said Hawkes.
"Let's," said Stella.
As they headed for the door, deep thunder rolled outside and lightning cracked somewhere not far away and the rain came down.
Stella was confident that she would come up with the right questions for Custus. What she wasn't confident of was what she would wear on Tuesday night for her date with Devlin. That would depend on whether or not the rain stopped by then. Like so many others in the five boroughs, she was beginning to think that the deluge might not end for a long, long time.
* * *
To say that the pain was great would be unfair to the pain that was monumental, epic, even awe inspiring. He had felt pain many times before, a few which came close to this moment as he got out of the hospital bed.
The trick was to keep the weight, all weight, off his right ankle. No mean trick, but he was accustomed to performing tricks.
A greater trick would be to find something to wear. He could hardly escape from the hospital hopping on one leg in a white and blue striped gown that tied in the back and showed his sunny backside.
He had spun a tale, but the threads were thin and would no doubt be torn apart by the doctor named Hawkes and the detective named Stella.
Deluge Page 16
