Carnage

by Maxime Chattam

  Lamar nodded. It seemed logical.

  ‘I finally got my hands on the forensic report late this morning. It came with a sealed packet, containing the bullet that went through the head of the “suicide victim”. I examined it myself. It’s a .44 Magnum. Which matches the Desert Eagle found in the gunman’s hand.’

  ‘Mike Simmons. His name was Mike Simmons. So that confirms it was suicide, then.’

  ‘That’s not what I said. Pay attention. There are two things you need to be aware of, Lieutenant. Firstly, that the Desert Eagle usually takes a .357 Magnum – the .44 is far less common. Even without having compared the gun barrel with the bullet, I can say with some certainty that it was indeed the weapon used to fire through the young man’s skull.’

  ‘And the other thing?’

  ‘The other thing is that according to the forensic report – and you’ll be able to confirm this, since you were at the scene – Mike Simmons was not wearing gloves. What do you make of that?’

  Lamar was growing tense.

  ‘Did you get any fingerprints off the Desert Eagle?’

  ‘I had to wait a while for forensics before I could compare. They’re the right ones. What I mean is, it’s Mike Simmons’s prints on the gun.’

  Lamar stepped back until he was perching on a corner of the desk.

  Mike Simmons had gone down into that dark room with the Desert Eagle, turned it on himself and fired, with his bare hands. But the clue that had been found inside the weapon proved that the last person to fire the semiautomatic was wearing leather gloves …

  ‘So, how do you explain that?’ pressed Gavensoort.

  ‘I’m not sure yet,’ mumbled Lamar, standing up straight. Then he added more confidently, ‘But I’ll get there.’

  By the time Lamar Gallineo was back at the wheel of his car, everything was covered in a thick white blanket, and it was even harder to see where he was going. At this rate, it would soon be impossible to see across the street.

  He pressed 2 on his cell phone and Doris’s number was dialled automatically.

  ‘Doris, it’s Lamar,’ he said. ‘Tell me something. When you were taking statements from the students yesterday, did they say anything about what Mike Simmons was wearing?’

  ‘Not really. I don’t think they were paying much attention to that. They were so freaked out by what was going on.’

  ‘Did anyone mention gloves? Was Simmons wearing gloves?’

  ‘I have no idea. You know, most of those kids were in shock. They didn’t even know who was shooting at them until he was named on TV!’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah, well, everything was happening so fast they couldn’t really tell. All they knew was that one of their classmates had turned up and started firing at them, so they panicked, obviously. In the end, we figured out his name after two boys recognised him by his big black parka. But, you know, in these situations everyone’s just trying to get away from the gunman, so they’re not exactly picking up on the little details! So if you want to find out if Simmons was wearing gloves you’d better talk to forensics.’

  The line was breaking up and he was struggling to hear Doris’s voice.

  ‘I’ve already read their report. It’s the eye-witness statements I’m interested in.’

  ‘I put a copy of my report on your desk at lunchtime. It’s all in there.’

  He thanked her and hung up before they were cut off.

  The whole business was getting stranger by the minute. He would need to go right back to the beginning and look at everything again.

  Anxious to get back to base, Lamar drove as fast as he safely could in the frozen conditions. Cars were crawling along with their headlights on.

  New York was being buried deeper and deeper under a thick coat of white powder.

  When Lamar arrived back at his desk with two warm cups of coffee, Doris was nowhere to be seen. He sat down and piled up all the paperwork in front of him. He separated out the toxicology and ballistics reports, the forensic findings and statements from all the police officers who had been at the scene.

  Lamar began with the ballistics report from the first massacre. Various comparisons had been made and notes taken about calibres of weapons, but nothing stood out.

  With Gavensoort’s words ringing in his ears, Lamar went on to the files relating to the crime scene at the park, where the body of the third suicide victim, Mike Simmons, had been found. No gloves had been picked up from the surrounding area.

  Lamar flicked through the forensic report on Mike Simmons. The list of belongings found on his person included his clothing and the contents of his pockets. One detail in particular caught Lamar’s eye.

  There was a pair of gloves. Woollen gloves. Woollen! The glove that had been caught in the Desert Eagle’s trigger was made of leather.

  Something wasn’t right. Things were not as they seemed, Lamar was sure of it. He needed to pin down what else didn’t fit so that he could find a real lead to follow up.

  He went back over the eye-witness statements from the high school in Harlem. Nothing.

  Doris’s report. The kids had all panicked. Nothing in particular had stood out to them. No one had mentioned any gloves. Nor had they said they definitely hadn’t seen gloves on the gunman’s hands. Lamar sat back in his chair. It was cold, so most of the kids would have been wearing gloves.

  As Doris had said, many of the students hadn’t had any idea who was firing on them. Some described him as ‘a guy running really fast’, or ‘a dark shadow chasing around the school’. Several witnesses had confirmed that Simmons had pulled up his hood, making him an even more intimidating sight during the shootings. A faceless, anonymous being. The grim reaper, holding a gun where his scythe should have been.

  Lamar rested his chin on his hand. He went back over his files. He found the bundle of witness statements from the East Harlem Academy students. After several minutes of studying the same pages for the umpteenth time, he finally found what he was looking for.

  It was a description of the gunman, Russell Rod. He had been wearing a hood, pulled down over his face.

  At the back of his desk, Lamar dug out a copy of the Queens investigation. He went over the witness statements.

  Again, the gunman had been wearing a hood. The three boys had all used weapons from the same source. None of them had been in trouble before. They’d each fired on their classmates one morning, three teenagers in the space of three weeks. And they all wore hoods to disguise themselves, to look more mysterious, more frightening.

  This couldn’t just be a coincidence. Someone was pulling the strings, manipulating these boys.

  Lamar rubbed his temples. He couldn’t make sense of it all. Who could have had such an influence over these three quiet kids? They were all the same type: loners. Which made them easier targets.

  Who was it? Lamar clenched his fist. Who was it?

  He skimmed over his notes one last time. It was all becoming a blur.

  Names and ages of witnesses, their statements inside quotation marks.

  Lamar could see some of their faces.

  Their words were spread out in front of him.

  Then he remembered arriving at the scene of the first attack.

  The voices, shouting over one another, wailing. The other cops there with him.

  The initial run-down of what had happened.

  Voices … Lamar could still hear them all. Words …

  A police officer telling him, ‘And witnesses say they saw the gunman go inside. Then it went quiet for a minute or two before the gun was fired again, and then it was over.’

  He leapt up, grabbed his anorak and hurried down the corridor.

  7

  It was mid afternoon when Lamar walked into the hall of East Harlem Academy and headed towards the janitor’s room.

  Frank Quincey was inside, fixing a broken desk lamp.

  ‘Lieutenant … any news?’

  ‘I need some information on a student.’


  Quincey tilted his head back.

  ‘Ah, well, you’d better talk to McLogan about that, hadn’t you?’

  ‘I’d rather avoid the principal, actually. We don’t exactly see eye to eye.’

  Quincey made a face.

  ‘Hmm, could be tricky. What is it you’re after?’

  ‘I need to see one of the kids’ files.’

  Running his fingers through his close-cropped hair, Quincey thought for a minute.

  ‘OK, there might be a way. Come with me.’

  They walked through the building and entered an office off the library. A slightly plump woman was typing at her computer.

  ‘Leslee, could you help us a second? The detective needs to take a look at something.’

  Leslee looked up until finally her eyes alighted on the face of the man towering in front of her.

  ‘We need access to a student file right away,’ said Lamar.

  ‘You’ll need to see Mr McLogan about—’

  ‘He’s busy right now,’ he cut in, ‘and it can’t wait.’

  She shook her head to show she wasn’t happy with the idea, but Lamar could tell it was just for form’s sake.

  ‘So what’s this kid’s name?’ she asked in her shrill voice.

  ‘Chris DeRoy – probably Christopher, I guess.’

  ‘DeRoy,’ she echoed, typing in the name. ‘Just a moment …’

  Lamar’s cell phone rang. Doris’s name flashed up on the screen.

  ‘Lamar, is everything OK? I heard you ran out of the office.’

  ‘Yeah, I’m at the high school in Harlem, checking something out.’

  ‘Oh yeah? What is it?’

  Lamar stepped out of the office and into the empty library so that he could talk freely without being overheard.

  ‘Something’s bugging me,’ he said mysteriously.

  ‘Well, go on, what?’

  Lamar took a deep breath, then launched in.

  ‘Something I remembered. When I arrived at the scene of the crime, the cops told me the killer was still there. Witnesses said he walked into a closet that could only be opened from outside. A couple of minutes went by before they heard a shot.’

  ‘OK … makes sense so far. After what he’d just done, Russell Rod probably needed a moment to get his head straight … before putting a gun to it.’

  ‘Except that we have a witness to the suicide, Chris DeRoy. He was so scared he shit himself. And he saw Russell shoot himself before the door closed!’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So the door didn’t take a couple of minutes to shut! It doesn’t add up. Either the witnesses got it wrong and there were only ten or so seconds before the gunshot, or else … DeRoy’s lying.’

  Through the window, the detective saw the principal charging towards him, on the warpath.

  ‘Lamar, I wouldn’t waste too much time over this,’ warned Doris. ‘In these kinds of traumatic events, our concept of time goes out the window. People get totally muddled—’

  Lamar jumped in.

  ‘Not to the point of confusing ten seconds with two minutes!’

  Quincey appeared in the doorway.

  ‘We’ve got something,’ he whispered.

  ‘Gotta go,’ he told Doris, hanging up.

  He hurried into the office.

  ‘Bingo! I’ve got a Christian DeRoy,’ announced Leslee.

  ‘That’ll be him,’ Lamar confirmed.

  ‘What is it you want to know?’

  Lamar nudged closer to get a better look at the screen, which seemed to make Leslee uneasy.

  The door was flung open and McLogan stormed in.

  ‘What the hell’s going on here, Lieutenant? I quite clearly told you that if you needed anything at all you were to come to me!’

  Lamar took his badge from his pocket.

  ‘See this? What this means is we both have a job to do. My job is to lead my inquiry the way I see fit. And yours, sir, is to leave me the hell alone so I can concentrate on arresting those responsible for this massacre.’

  McLogan’s face flushed bright red, in stark contrast to his white hair and grey moustache.

  ‘Don’t you dare talk to me like that!’ he shouted. ‘The person responsible for this killed himself! You have no reason to be here.’

  Lamar leant towards Leslee.

  ‘I need to know what class he’s in and where I can find him right now. Plus his address, while we’re at it.’

  Leslee looked wide-eyed back at him.

  ‘But, um … I … er …’

  ‘You don’t want to be getting into trouble with the police now, do you, Leslee?’ Lamar warned sternly.

  She gulped, her eyes flicking to and fro between Lamar and a seething McLogan.

  ‘May I remind you that fourteen people are dead,’ Lamar added, sticking the knife in.

  He could see the librarian’s eyes welling up.

  Leslee clicked open a folder entitled ‘Personal details’.

  ‘Here’s his address. 122nd Street, just around the corner.’

  Lamar made a note of it and was about to point to the ‘Student grade and assessments’ tab when something stopped him.

  The details underneath the heading ‘School record’ caused a shiver to run down his spine.

  Christian DeRoy had been to five different schools over the last few years, expelled from each of them for bad behaviour.

  The first high school on the list was the scene of the Queens attack.

  ‘Scroll down a bit, would you?’ he asked.

  The next was the school by the Williamsburg Bridge.

  ‘Is something wrong, Detective?’ Quincey asked anxiously, seeing the troubled look on Lamar’s face.

  Lamar pointed at the screen.

  ‘Which class is Chris DeRoy in right now?’

  McLogan sighed loudly. ‘Your superiors are going to hear about this!’ he threatened.

  Leslee scanned through the file to find the student’s schedule. She opened her mouth to give the room number, but then froze.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Um, well, he’s not in class. We got a letter from a psychologist who’s been treating him since … since the tragedy three weeks ago,’ she read out, placing her hand against her heart. ‘Christian DeRoy is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and is still not well enough to attend classes.’

  She lifted her eyes from the screen when she heard a commotion, turning round in time to see the detective’s back as he sped out of the room.

  Lamar had broken into a sprint.

  8

  The Pontiac skidded about in the snow, the back of the vehicle slewing across the road, forcing Lamar to slow right down in order to regain control of the car.

  Snowflakes continued to fall by the million.

  The roads were by now entirely fleece-lined and every building wore a white cap. Lamar called Doris back.

  ‘Doris, I need your help,’ he said, trying to keep his voice steady. ‘Meet me at 158 East 122nd Street, quick as you can. I think I’ve found our man.’

  ‘Huh? What are you saying?’

  ‘The kid who was in the closet with Russell Rod. It’s him, Doris.’

  ‘Him what? Calm down and tell me what’s going on.’

  ‘He lied. He said he saw Russell Rod come in and shoot himself just before the door swung shut. It’s not true. DeRoy is a troubled kid, he’s been to five different schools and been expelled from all of them. And three of those schools are where the attacks have taken place! It was him – he was the gunman every time! Russell Rod, the boy from Queens and Mike Simmons, all of them were victims, not the killers!’

  ‘What? You mean he was the one … But how?’

  ‘The hood, Doris! All three gunmen were wearing hoods to hide their faces. The handful of witnesses who thought they recognised them based it on their clothes every time. But it was DeRoy wearing their clothes! That’s why the supposed gunmen shot themselves out of view of everyone else.’

  Lamar
braked suddenly, spotting a red light at the last minute. The Pontiac skidded off course again, sliding into the middle of the intersection. Two vans started honking their horns. Lamar carried on explaining his theory, while slowly reversing back behind the line.

  ‘Chris DeRoy may be crazy, but he’s smart too. He played the victim so he could mow down his classmates and teachers, then he snuck off to where the guy whose identity he’d stolen was waiting for him. They changed clothes, and then he shot him through the head.’

  ‘I guess that makes sense …’

  ‘Of course it does! The first time, at the Harlem high school, he arrived early in the morning with Russell Rod. He made him go into the closet while he went around shooting at everybody, wearing Russell’s clothes. When he was done, he went back into the closet and swapped the clothes back, which is why it was a couple of minutes before the gun went off.’

  ‘Machiavellian …’

  ‘Doris, come meet me as quick as you can. I don’t want to call the local cops. You never know how a kid like DeRoy might react if he sees a heap of police cars screeching up to his door.’

  ‘I’m on my way, Lamar.’

  The windscreen wipers cleared the layer of snow that was slowly building up on the Pontiac’s windscreen. For ten minutes, Lamar had been sitting outside the three-storey building where Chris DeRoy and his parents lived.

  Doris walked along the pavement towards him, accompanied by a stocky Puerto Rican-looking man sporting a bushy moustache. Lamar got out of the car to meet them.

  ‘D’Amato was twiddling his thumbs so I brought him along,’ explained Doris.

  ‘It’s the house across the road there. Doris, come with me, we’ll take the front door. D’Amato, you go round the back, in case he tries to get out that way. We’ll give you a couple of minutes to get in position.’

  D’Amato nodded and jogged away, leaving deep footprints along the snow-covered pavement.

  While they waited, Doris tried to pick holes in her colleague’s line of argument, though she had to admit it was pretty convincing.

  ‘How could Chris DeRoy have gotten Russell Rod to come to school early and follow him into this closet then later gotten Mike Simmons to follow him down to that underground room?’