Ashes, Ashes

by Charles Atkins

  ‘Carla,’ Barrett whispered, ‘I have business cards in my jacket pocket, but I can’t get to them. See if you can reach in and get one.’

  ‘If he sees us …’ Carla said, as she repositioned herself closer to Barrett.

  Barrett leaned forward, allowing her blazer to gape open. Carla’s restrained hands fumbled inside the lining, her fingers feeling for the small state-issue business cards.

  ‘I got it,’ she said, clasping a single card between her fingers.

  Barrett looked up and scanned the woods for Glash. ‘Drop it.’

  ‘It’s too bright,’ Carla said, as the too-white card glowed in the moonlight.

  Barrett repositioned her bound feet to cover the card.

  ‘Now what?’ Carla asked.

  Barrett heard movement, and then Glash appeared in the clearing. He was holding a metal box the size of a carry-on suitcase.

  ‘Richard,’ Barrett whispered, ‘I have to urinate. It’s been hours. I’ve been trying to hold it in and I don’t want to soil myself.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I should have thought of that.’ He threw the shovel into the back of the van, and put the box on the passenger’s seat. Then, without saying anything, he reached in and grabbed hold of her legs.

  He had caught her by surprise, and she struggled to keep her rubber-soled shoe over the business card. As he pulled her out the back and scooped her up, the card fluttered to the ground. She prayed he wouldn’t see it. If he did, he’d immediately know that she was trying to leave a trail – or at least a clue. He carried her to the edge of the woods, put her down on a large rock and proceeded to rip the duct tape from her pant legs. ‘Don’t try to run away,’ he said. ‘Your hands are restrained. You won’t succeed and then I’ll have to kill her.’

  ‘I won’t run,’ Barrett said, and realized that she really did need to pee.

  He walked behind her, wrapped his arms around her waist and unzipped her pants and pulled them down. There was nothing sexual, even when he grabbed her cotton panties and pushed them down to her ankles. He stepped back, never taking his eyes off her.

  She thought to ask him to turn around, but knew that might be pushing her luck. She squatted and emptied her bladder on the leaf-covered ground. Her calves ached, but it felt good finally being able to move her legs. When done, she stood up and he dressed her.

  ‘Walk back to the vehicle,’ he ordered. ‘It’s easier that way.’

  Her heart pounded as she headed back, her eyes fixed on the business card that glowed silver in the moonlight. Trying to keep her body between Glash and the card, she realized how risky this was. At the rear of the minivan, she put her foot over the card. ‘Can you help me up?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’ He bent to scoop her up, and as he did she kicked the card gently under the vehicle.

  ‘Thank you,’ Barrett said, wanting to keep his eyes off the ground.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ he answered automatically, and looked at Carla. ‘Your turn. I’ll take you to urinate.’

  Barrett tried to calm herself as she waited for Glash to return. She was relieved that he’d not tied her legs again. She thought about trying to make a break for it, but knew that if she did, it wasn’t just her own life she’d jeopardize; Glash would make good on his threat and kill Carla.

  He returned, roughly dumping Carla back inside. He grabbed her by the back of the neck and pulled back her navy blazer. He did the same with her white blouse, as though he were reading the labels.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Carla asked, as he pulled back the fabric and seemed to dig into her neck.

  He didn’t answer. ‘Who made your jacket?’ he asked, looking at Barrett.

  ‘Donna Karan,’ she said, wondering what interest Glash had in their outfits.

  ‘And your shirt?’

  ‘It’s Ralph Lauren, oxford cloth.’

  ‘It looks like a man’s shirt,’ he said.

  ‘It is, I like the fabric and I bring them to my tailor to get them fitted.’

  ‘What about your shoes?’ He looked at Carla and then back at Barrett.

  He continued making them itemize their clothing and their sizes. When he was satisfied, he slammed the doors.

  The two women looked at each other in the dark as they waited for him to get back in the vehicle. Instead they heard him talking. ‘What the hell was that all about?’ Carla said.

  ‘Not a clue,’ Barrett said, straining to hear what he was saying.

  ‘I need the coordinates,’ he said. ‘Good. This will be the last one before I become very famous. Now pay close attention, I have more details that you need.’ He listed all the items of clothing that the two women were wearing.

  ‘Who’s he talking to?’ Carla whispered.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘He has an accomplice?’

  ‘Has to,’ Barrett said, and then quickly asked, ‘That first pickup truck, was that yours?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So he just happened to find a parked vehicle with the key in the ignition and everything he’d need to take hostages in the back. Shit!’

  ‘So who is he working with?’

  ‘You were there this morning,’ Barrett said, ‘did you see anyone, anything at all?’

  ‘I don’t think … wait a minute, there was something,’ Carla said. ‘Lucinda pointed it out, a man on a motorcycle. Some kind of vintage bike that Lucinda’s fiancé wanted … a BMW. I just figured it was someone who worked at Croton, going home.’

  ‘Did you get a look at him?’ Barrett whispered.

  ‘He had a helmet on and leathers.’

  ‘Can you be sure it was a man?’

  ‘No,’ Carla admitted, ‘but he – or she – seemed pretty tall.’

  ‘Ssh!’ Barrett warned as Glash opened the driver’s door.

  He got in and looked back. ‘Have you two figured out what comes next?’

  There was something different in his tone that made Barrett think of a small child wanting his mother’s attention. Hoping to appease him, Barrett played along. ‘Well, Richard, you’ve done something that had to do with Jane Saunders, you’ve just picked up something from Dr Albert’s …’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘very good … now what will I do?’

  ‘That leaves Allison Tessavian. You intend to do something related to her case.’

  ‘Yes, but can you figure out what? I want to see how smart you are.’

  ‘Something that will make you famous,’ Barrett said, realizing that Glash’s fascination wasn’t just with murder and murderers as she’d previously thought, but with the fame that came with high-profile cases.

  ‘More famous,’ he corrected. ‘I’m a little famous now; more famous in the morning; more famous than that in the afternoon. Who’s the most famous murderer of all time?’ he asked abruptly.

  ‘I’m not certain,’ she said, suddenly taut with fear.

  ‘Guess,’ he ordered.

  ‘Cain from the Bible, Charles Manson … Adolph Hitler …’

  ‘Good,’ he said, satisfied. ‘They’re all very famous. But they’re not the biggest killer of all time. You know who is?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t,’ she said, relieved to hear him turn the key and start the engine.

  ‘It’s God,’ he said. ‘He kills everyone. Everyone dies.’

  ‘Yes,’ Barrett said.

  ‘You know,’ he said, ‘God tells man to kill each other.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s true,’ Barrett said, realizing too late that disagreeing with Richard was not smart.

  ‘It is!’ he shouted, and twisted back in his seat. ‘God tells man to go to war!’ His face was contorted and spittle flew out with his words. ‘He tells him to stone the whore. God wants man to kill. He wants me to kill. It’s all in the Bible. It’s a fact, Dr Conyors, that people kill for God. God is very famous, isn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, Richard,’ she said, hoping to calm him down, knowing that one of his rages could easily lead to their deaths.
<
br />   ‘I’m going to be as famous as God …’ He was breathing heavily and staring back at them.

  She met his gaze. Seconds stretched. He didn’t blink; neither did she. She felt frozen and sick; knowing her every move was being evaluated. Any careless word or action could be the one that brought about her death or Carla’s.

  Abruptly he spoke: ‘Now shut up and go to sleep … now!’

  She and Carla sank to the floor, their legs tangled in the blue tarp. Barrett could feel Richard watching them. She’d never felt so vulnerable and so frightened; with them bound and on the floor, he could do anything. She met Carla’s gaze, the lawyer’s eyes glittered in the dark. The two women held their breath and waited. Finally, the vehicle began to move.

  Ten

  Hobbs watched as Houssman got patted down prior to entering the maximum security Bedford Hills Correctional Facility. It was 8 A.M. and already he could tell it was going to be another scorcher. Why the old guy continued to wear his long gray trenchcoat Hobbs had no idea. He suspected it had something to do with why every time they passed a restroom Houssman would disappear. The one time Hobbs had needed to relieve himself he’d found Houssman at the sink, washing his hands for what seemed a very long time. Maybe the coat was a barrier between him and … whatever he needed to wash off his hands. Obsessive quirks aside, Hobbs was glad he’d let Houssman tag along. He now understood why Barrett – goddamn her – held him in such high regard. George had exhibited a brilliant way of throwing out multiple possibilities as they’d scoured Glash’s prison records and examined the murder scene at the Saunders’ house. His first comment when they’d viewed Lucinda Peters’ scalped corpse was, ‘He’s been wanting to do that since he was four.’

  ‘Your point?’ Hobbs had asked, his gut twisting over this poor woman’s murder, not even ten minutes from Croton. Glash was losing no time in getting started.

  ‘It’s characteristic of Asperger’s,’ Houssman had instructed, not taking his eyes off the young woman’s mutilated head. ‘They’re highly obsessional and once fixated, they can’t let it go. It’s the reason Glash is so dangerous: everyone who he believes has hurt him, he’ll go after. It doesn’t matter how many years or decades have passed. That’s why I have no doubt he’ll come for me. But that’s not what worries me.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘His way to get revenge is to hurt and to kill the families of all those who’ve hurt him. When he comes for me, if he’s not caught and killed, he’ll go after my children and my grandchildren.’ Houssman swallowed hard. ‘What’s odd here,’ he continued, ‘is that he’s twice attempted to scalp and kill the same woman. She was our next-door neighbor’s youngest – Mary Sullivan – although that might not be her name anymore.’ He turned to Hobbs. ‘We need to find her, but why did he murder this poor young thing using the method reserved for Mary …? Oh,’ he said softly. ‘I hadn’t seen that …’

  Hobbs looked in the direction of the dead woman. His eye caught on the torn skin of her ring finger. ‘He’s taken her ring.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why would he do that?’ Hobbs asked, not able to take his mind off Barrett and the peril she faced, scared sick about the significance of the ring; it hadn’t been that long ago that another killer had gone after her with twisted fantasies of marriage and kids.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Houssman said, ‘but there will be a reason.’

  It had been an exhausting and frustrating night. Glash had eluded the authorities, and despite a vast network of roadblocks throughout Westchester and Putnam County, he’d not been spotted. With the police scanner on, Hobbs and Houssman had spent the early morning snatching a couple of hours of upright and nightmare-filled sleep in the Crown Vic parked outside the Bedford Hills facility. Every few minutes Hobbs would startle awake, his mind racing with horrific images – Glash’s drawings, the blood on the walls, Saunders’ gaping neck. To calm himself, he’d focus on Barrett; remember the feel of her in his arms, the taste of her lips. He would rescue her and she would love him. But then the other thoughts came: What if she’s already dead? Each long minute was a kind of agony, the urge to go after her, the desperation at not knowing which way to head. ‘You have to wait, Hobbs,’ he’d tell himself. ‘Close your eyes, try to sleep.’ And around and around, until dawn began to break.

  When Houssman awoke, he commented, ‘My ankles are swollen.’ With a groan he bent down and pressed a finger into the puffy flesh over his black stretch sock. ‘Dependent edema. You get any sleep?’ he asked.

  ‘Not much.’ And they’d watched the clock, waiting for 8 A.M., the earliest Hobbs had been able to pull to get inside the prison.

  Now, at the security checkpoint, it was Hobbs’s turn. He unholstered his steel-gray Glock, exchanged it for a receipt, and spread his arms and legs for the pat-down and wave with the metal-detector wand.

  ‘They were in the same cell block at Green Haven for over three years,’ Houssman remarked, referring to Dr Clarence Albert, as he waited for Hobbs. ‘If the two of them connected, they’d have plenty in common.’

  ‘Like?’ Hobbs asked, as the guards buzzed them through the first of the security gates.

  ‘Clarence Albert, depending on your view, falls somewhere between a condition called delusional disorder, paranoid type, and paranoid schizophrenia. I was asked to consult as an expert witness for the defense about five years ago. His lawyers wanted to try an insanity defense. They weren’t happy with what I found, so they ended up paying for my time and hiring another expert.’

  ‘Yeah, keep going till you get the answer you want,’ Hobbs commented, as they followed their escort to a service elevator.

  ‘Exactly. A hired gun, but I don’t do that. I had no doubt the man was mentally ill and that his paranoia, and belief that the company he worked for and the government were actively conspiring against him, were largely responsible for his actions. But that doesn’t buy you an insanity plea. He wanted people to suffer. He wanted to make them sick in an extraordinarily cruel way. He knew it was criminal; he didn’t care.’

  ‘So how are they alike?’ Hobbs asked, as they were escorted down cement-walled corridors to the prison’s behavioral health unit.

  ‘How aren’t they?’ Houssman began. ‘Their IQs are both high in the genius range. They both believe large sectors of society have deliberately harmed them. They’ve both killed, and like Glash, if Albert were ever released there is no doubt that he would kill again.’

  They were led through a final locked steel door and into a cellblock that had been retrofitted with a nurse’s’ station and a small central medication room.

  They were asked by a young Latino man in a white uniform to sign in. He then led them to Clarence Albert’s cell.

  Hobbs got his first glimpse of the prisoner through the small wire-mesh window as the nurse let them in. Albert was seated bolt upright on his bed staring at the door. His long, graying hair was slicked back over his scalp, bald patches visible between the oily strands. He was dressed in brown pajamas and wore wire-rimmed glasses that had a thick wad of surgical tape across the bridge.

  ‘Thank you for agreeing to meet with us,’ Hobbs began. He extended his hand to Albert. The microbiologist looked at it, but did not shake it.

  ‘I was supposed to be moved yesterday. I was supposed to go to a hospital,’ Albert complained in a wheezing, asthmatic voice. ‘They say that some of the rooms in Croton have windows.’ He looked around his eight-by-four room with its cot, sink, toilet, portable television and radio and small bookcase crammed with textbooks and dog-eared science journals.

  ‘The governor canceled the transfer,’ Houssman said.

  ‘Because of Richard Glash,’ Albert stated. It wasn’t a question.

  ‘Yes,’ Houssman replied. ‘That’s why we’re here. You know him.’

  ‘I knew him,’ Albert replied warily. ‘What has that got to do with anything?’ He looked down at the linoleum-tiled floor, as though he were trying to conceal the smile spreading
across his thin lips. ‘Has he done something … I mean, other than escape?’

  ‘You’ve seen the news,’ Houssman stated, as Hobbs watched, letting the older man steer the interview.

  ‘Yes, but that doesn’t tell me much, does it?’ Albert replied. ‘You’re here and you think I know something. That I can help you catch Richard Glash.’

  ‘Correct,’ Hobbs said, feeling his anger start to surge. ‘But I’m wondering if we’re wrong and this isn’t a waste of time.’

  ‘I’m sure it is,’ Albert agreed. ‘Just a big waste of time. My time, your time.’ His eyes shot up to the corner of the room, and he stared intently. ‘Their time.’

  ‘Who are you talking about?’ Hobbs asked, his patience stretched thin, not in the mood for this guy to squirrel out.

  ‘Don’t pretend you don’t know. You’re all part of it. But you can’t see everything.’

  Houssman interjected. ‘Dr Albert, we don’t have time for that right now. I’m prepared to give you information you won’t have heard on the news. Information that you’ll want to know.’

  Albert perked. ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Richard Glash has killed four people that we know of since his escape. Two marshals, a legal aide and John J. Saunders.’

  ‘How did the aide die?’ Albert asked, his eyes bright, seemingly greedy for the gory details.

  ‘Shot and then scalped,’ Houssman replied, meeting Albert’s gaze.

  ‘Scalped … interesting …’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You know why, Doctor. Or is that the game we’re playing? You want me to tell you what you already know? Seems like a waste. We’ve both seen Richard’s drawings. He’s quite a talented fellow. I think you would do well to not underestimate him.’

  ‘Were you two friends?’ Hobbs asked, his fists balled, and the knuckles cracked.

  ‘One doesn’t make friends in here. We were acquaintances. I found his company interesting. We’d play chess. I miss that. He’s the only person who ever beat me at chess. We were well matched.’