The Red Scream

by Mary Willis Walker

  Finally she grabbed a Coors Light, popped it open, and took it with her to her office.

  She stopped in the doorway and looked into the dark room in which she spent so much of her life sitting alone at the keyboard. She sipped the beer and watched the red light on her answering machine flickering in the darkness and the eerie bluish toasters flying across her computer screen. Since she always left the computer switched on, she used a program that darkened the screen after five minutes of no use. Tonight it was displaying her favorite screen-saver—winged toasters flapping across the blackened background, with an occasional piece of toast whizzing by. Talk about rabbit holes, she thought. This, right here, might be the strangest rabbit hole of all—a place where toasters flew and voices resided inside a box, a place where she spent her days alone writing what was called “true crime,” but some of it was not true.

  Maybe none of it was true.

  Without turning on the light, she sat down at the keyboard. For the first time, sitting at her desk, watching the toasters wing their way across the screen, she admitted it to herself: it was possible, it was just possible, that Louie didn’t murder Tiny McFarland. Liar though he was, he’d been pretty damned convincing. And Addie Dodgin, who was nobody’s fool, believed him.

  It was possible.

  And if Louie didn’t do it, then Sweating Blood was largely fiction. If Louie didn’t do it, then David Serrano and Alison McFarland must have been wrong or lying about seeing that car. If Louie didn’t do it, he was about to die for the one crime he did not commit. If Louie didn’t do it, then who the hell did?

  The trip to Fort Worth tomorrow was unlikely to produce anything. But now the doubt was planted in her mind. She knew from experience that, once planted, it was lodged there forever. Maybe it would turn out just like the first crime she ever researched—Vernon Cates’s murder. She’d worked night and day, followed every lead, however tenuous, and she’d gotten nowhere. That was the worst outcome of all—not to know.

  She straightened up in the chair and tapped the space bar to wake up the computer. Time to get to work. If she wrote the Bronk story well enough, Richard would not be able to resist it. But how was she going to write it? This morning it was all perfectly clear. Now she just didn’t know what the story was.

  She called up a new document with two key strokes. There on her full-page monitor was the computer version of the writer’s dreaded blank page—all backlit and ready to go. She typed two question marks so the screen wouldn’t look so empty, then stared at them and the blinking cursor.

  She could go ahead doggedly and write the story she’d intended all along: after ten years on death row a notorious serial killer finally receives society’s ultimate punishment. She’d describe his last words, the death chamber, the injection, the witnesses, the different reactions of everyone involved. Poignant interviews with the victim’s family, with law enforcement officials, and with a woman who befriended him in prison. Everybody with a different slant on capital punishment. A good story, one she’d been thinking about for years—the appropriate end to the Louie Bronk saga. That story she could write half-asleep.

  Or she could write the story of a writer who spent eleven years covering a serial killer and writing a book about him. Then, only days before the killer is to be executed, the writer discovers that the crime for which he has received a death sentence—the crime that was the focus of her book—was not committed by him. A story of delusion and failure. Yes, that could make a story, but she hoped to hell it wasn’t true.

  Or she could write the story of a family—a rich and powerful dysfunctional family—that was shattered by a random act of violence. The twist comes when years later it turns out that the family may have lied and is sheltering a killer. A real murder mystery, that story.

  Or she could write the inspirational story of a woman who befriended a doomed killer, who accepted him as no one else had ever done, and converted him to humanity as well as to Christianity. Just in time for his date with death. The story of Addie Dodgin might make interesting reading.

  Or—Lord, she was too tired to deal with all this uncertainty.

  She needed a bath and some serious sleep. She sat back in her chair and stretched her arms out in front of her, curving her back, which ached from the drive. It was too hard. She couldn’t do it right now. Richard Dutton was going to have to wait another day for the proposal, though this would be the first time in the eight years she’d worked for him that she hadn’t delivered what she promised right on time.

  As she stood, the phone rang. She looked down at it and thought about letting the answering machine take it. But she lost patience and picked up before the end of the third ring.

  The voice over the line said: “Yup. She was one of mine, sure was. See, I can have any woman I want. Any woman. She was there at this big, fancy house, all dressed in white, not a spot on her anywhere, carrying a bunch of flowers she’d picked. Yup. Just as easy to do the rich ones as them you pick up by the side of the road. Ain’t no difference when you get down to the basics.”

  Molly let out a long breath. “Grady. Don’t do that. You’re reading right from his confession, dammit.”

  “His very words, as quoted in your book. Just in case you find yourself softening toward him here in the final hours.”

  “I’m not softening. Far from it. But—”

  “But what?” he asked.

  “Tell me your news first. Then I’ll tell you mine.”

  “Okay. This is news of the bad variety. If I had any good news to go along with it, I’d ask which you wanted to hear first, but since I don’t, here it is: you got another note from your pen pal, and it’s pretty ugly.”

  Molly braced herself by leaning her hip hard against the desk. “Read it to me.”

  “Okay. By the way, it was stuck to some more pages from your book, thirteen pages this time. Candice Hargrave.” Molly pictured the autopsy photos of the willowy dark-haired teenager with her slender throat slit so deep her head was nearly severed.

  Grady read in a monotone:

  “Lady writer, here’s my rhyme:

  I can find you anytime.

  You may think that you can stay

  All detached, above the fray.

  If you think life’s like a book

  Better take a second look.

  You’re a cinch—an easy mark,

  your eyes wide open in the dark.

  So as you witness Louie’s death,

  Think about your own last breath.

  Tell me this, since you know it all—

  when will the master poet call?

  Molly’s breath stuck in her throat. It was fear, the hot, raw, abject kind that made her want to cower in a corner. She hated it. She leaned over the desk to switch on the lamp, but stopped herself and straightened up. She was not going to give in. “Well, the verse may be improving a little,” she said. “Eyes wide open in the dark—that’s pretty good. I wonder how he knows.”

  “Molly, I’ve got a patrol car passing your house every half hour. If I weren’t on tonight, I’d come stay with you.”

  “You’re assuming I’d let you.”

  “Just for protective purposes, of course.”

  “Protective! You—the worst shot in the history of the Austin Police Department.”

  “I qualified once again this year,” he said. “Now tell me what you started to say before, about Louie Bronk.”

  “Grady, it may just be that I’m tired, but—” She looked down at the computer screen, blank except for the two question marks. “I’m worried. There may have been a big mistake.”

  There was a silence over the line. Then he said in his take-charge, official voice, “I want to hear everything, absolutely everything.”

  “Hold on a minute.” Molly carried the cordless phone with her to the small sofa. She leaned over and repositioned the pillows so one would be under her knees and another under her neck. Then she lay down and wedged the phone between the pillow and her ear.
Sometimes it was better to talk about difficult subjects lying down; the change in posture sort of tilted the world so you could get a different angle on things.

  “Okay,” she said. “I just wanted to get comfortable.”

  Then she told him everything—beginning with Louie’s claim of innocence and ending with her reluctant promise to him to apply her pit bull nature to the fullest in Fort Worth. As she talked, she pictured the man at the other end of the line—listening intensely the way he did, nodding his head and encouraging her to go on. Talking with Grady Traynor, she remembered, had always been easy: he really listened and was willing to play with the possibilities.

  “So,” she said, “here I am in my dark office trying to write my boss a proposal for the final Louie Bronk story. But I can’t do it because I don’t know what the story is.”

  “Molly,” Grady said, “if you really think there’s a chance this story of Bronk’s could be true, it has repercussions for our two murders. It would take some doing, but I could justify calling Fort Worth right now and asking them to send some uniforms out to look for the car in the morning.”

  Molly thought about it. Then she could sleep late and stay at home all morning drinking coffee and writing the proposal. But no. She could do this better than some bored cop. And she’d promised Louie. Experience had shown her time and time again that it was better to do things herself.

  “Thanks, Grady, but I better do it myself.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t.”

  “Well, I need to. I promised.”

  “Molly, I don’t think it’s safe. Let me take care of it.”

  “No. And I wouldn’t have told you if I thought you’d bully me.”

  “Well, how about this? I could send someone up there with you, or get you an escort in Fort Worth, a cop who knows that area, just to drive you around.”

  “No. Thanks.”

  “Still the loner,” he said.

  “I’ve never been worth a damn at delegating.”

  “Or at teamwork.”

  She sighed. “Or at teamwork.”

  “Will you call me from Fort Worth?”

  “Okay.”

  “No matter what?”

  “Yes.”

  “Molly, the more I get into it, the more I wonder about Charlie and that earlier murder. Did you know that Tiny McFarland was the one who had the money in the family and Charlie inherited millions from her? Up till then he’d been small potatoes. It was the bucks he inherited from her that allowed him to build a big business.”

  “Of course I knew that. It was all in my book.”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said. “That’s where I got it actually.”

  She thought for a minute and said, “Since I owe you some info, here’s a gift that fits right into your theory. I bet you didn’t know that Tiny slept around. Alison says her mother was chronically unfaithful. That was not in the book because I didn’t know it until yesterday.”

  “No. I didn’t know that. Thanks for telling me. But that was not the case with Georgia; everyone agrees it was a loving marriage, that they were devoted to one another. And faithful—that does happen occasionally, you know.”

  “Have you got anything back on David Serrano?” she asked, ignoring the barb.

  “The ME thinks he preceded Georgia McFarland in death by about five or six hours, but it’s just an estimate. He was killed with his own .38 caliber Smith & Wesson, registered to him. Not a print anywhere on it. Definitely not the same weapon that killed Georgia.”

  “What about your inquiries down in Brownsville?”

  “Interesting. Makes me doubt my initial theory about Serrano. He’s got no record. Matter of fact, he was a leading citizen. Very rich. But it came from legitimate business—funeral homes, just like he told you. He had a license for the gun. They’d had some bad business at one of his operations, so he took a security guard course and got a license.”

  “You working on a new theory?” she asked.

  “Always.” He yawned into the phone. “But let’s talk about something else for a change. You said you’re in your dark office. It sounds like you’re lying down. Are you?”

  “Uh-huh,” she said, letting her head fall back onto the pillow.

  “Are you dressed?” he asked, lowering his voice.

  She smiled. “I should have realized by the way you started out that this was going to be an obscene phone call.”

  “What a good idea. From what I hear, the way it’s done is for me to tell you in vivid detail what I’d like to do to you. Should I do that, Molly?”

  She hesitated; there was no question where all this was going to end up if she didn’t stop it now. It would be a big mistake to encourage him.

  “All right,” she said. “Tell me.”

  “I’d start by finishing the headache cure I began the other night. You know how I hate to leave things unfinished. And a thorough headache cure neglects no part of the body. But I’d want you to get all comfortable first, out of your binding clothes and into a nice loose T-shirt like you used to wear to bed.”

  “I still do,” she said.

  “Mmmmm. White ones you can see through?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Good. Then we’d put on some nice slow dance music. Something from the old days—Johnny Mathis or Sinatra. Remember how slow we used to dance, Molly?” His voice had dropped even lower, to a growl. “I know you’re tired, so while we dance you could lean against me, and I’d start pressing nice and firm with my thumbs all the way down your spine so that—”

  Molly’s fax machine rang once and then began its shrill electronic buzzing.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “Just my fax.”

  “Well, we’d certainly turn that damn thing off first,” he said. “Anyway, then I’d—” He stopped talking into the phone; Molly could hear several men’s voices at his end. Then he spoke into the phone again. “I wish I could come show you now but I’m working and my chief is right here. Unfortunately, he’s a man who doesn’t understand spontaneity. How about tomorrow?”

  “If I’m back from Fort Worth.”

  “Call me. I can see I need some more practice on this obscene calling business. And, Molly, please, please be careful.”

  After they hung up she lay in the dark for a while thinking about dancing with Grady Traynor and wondering how the years had slipped away without her noticing.

  Then she got up and walked over to the fax machine. A single curled-up sheet on her agent’s familiar letterhead had slid out. It said, “Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but the Japanese are withdrawing the offer for translation rights to Sweating Blood. They say the New York Times article today made them nervous and they are going to pass it up. Best, Jonathan.”

  Twenty thousand down the drain. Damn.

  She let the paper fall to the floor. She didn’t have the heart or energy for a reply right now. It could wait until she got back from Fort Worth.

  On her way to bed, she stopped at the foot of the stairs, turned, and did something she’d never done before. She checked the front door and then the back one, even though she was certain she’d already locked and bolted them.

  The next morning Molly caught the eight o’clock Southwest flight to the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. A forty-minute flight, it just gave her enough time to drink two cups of coffee and speculate about how she might get the magazine to pick up the expense of her airfare and car rental. Just before they landed, she glanced over the New York Times. At least there was nothing more about Louie Bronk.

  The Budget Rent A Car smelled like someone had thrown up in it not too long ago, but she didn’t want to take the time to exchange it, so she rolled down the window and turned the air-conditioning on high.

  She put on her sunglasses, glanced down at her map, and drove south out of the immense airport complex, resigned to a long haul. She remembered other trips to the Dallas area when she’d felt she’d been caught in one of Dante’s circles of hell, condemned to driv
ing for all eternity. The metropolitan area was huge, endless, even by Texas standards.

  She drove west toward Fort Worth, then south on 820, delighted with the sparse traffic of a Saturday morning. She spotted her exit after only thirty minutes. That could be a good omen for the day.

  The first order of business was to find the junkyard Louie had described, if it still existed—if it ever had existed—and then search for the car itself. Preferably before it got much hotter; it was already humid and eighty-four degrees at quarter to ten and climbing for the nineties. Then, whether she found anything or not, she’d try the auto painting places in the area Louie had described. She hoped to be finished in time for a late lunch someplace with excellent air-conditioning and a menu that had things like pasta and steamed vegetables. And wine. Yes, it was Saturday. Wine was a fine idea, a reward for going through the motions on this.

  She turned off the highway at the Rosedale exit. With a sinking heart she surveyed the decaying, graffitied warehouses, the clusters of black teenagers hanging out in garbage-strewn alleys, the weedy parking lots, and cracked curbs. Well, if you had to pick the most appropriate place in the world for a serial killer to junk an old bloodstained car, it would be this very area of Fort Worth.

  The stretch of Rosedale just west of the highway seemed to be devoted to the seriously disabled automobile—wrecking yards, auto body shops, service stations, used car lots. The shiny new cars sold and driven in the downtown area must get banished out here to the perimeter for their old age and death.

  She drove for a few miles, then turned around and slowly headed back toward the highway, studying the possibilities on the right side of the road. They all started with “A”—ABC Auto Salvage, A-One Auto Parts, Aaron’s Automotive Recycling Center. The one closest to the highway was All Okay Body Parts. That fit the name pattern Louie remembered and it was close to the highway. She’d start there.