Bitter Instinct

by Robert W. Walker

  . And as for you—

  I'll break your neck;

  quick-kiss your swollen lips.

  You wont feel death,

  I promise.”

  Amniotic decadence

  twists their faces;

  an anguish life of rage

  crawls from the womb.

  A final sweet embrace,

  surrendering to temptation

  to die in the guarded

  of rusty buildings.

  This is the final excretion,

  and you can see it coming

  to the surface,

  a caduceus canker,

  the scepter of maleness—

  suspended in the alchemy

  of the prima materia.

  This is the beginning

  of Time.

  They never left,

  and neither did we.

  There is only one

  person here.”

  “Okay, so what the hell does it mean?” asked Parry, gar­nering a laugh from Jessica.

  “The poem is equating making love with death,” Kim replied. “At least, that's what I'm hearing.”

  “So it's not about someone murdering the sex partner?” asked Sturtevante, her eyes wide at Kim's words.

  “Not exactly,” Kim answered.

  “It's still damned grim,” said Parry, plopping into a chair.

  “It may be just this kind of so-called art that is motivat­ing the Killer Poet to murder,” Jessica suggested.

  “What are you saying?” asked Sturtevante, standing and pacing. “That the killer is motivated by these poets at the university? Or... or that he reads into their poems a mo­tive for killing?”

  Jessica calmly answered, “Either theory is a possibility.”

  “So take my pick?” Sturtevante shouted, losing her tem­per now. “What a defense for the accused. 'I read a book of poems, Your Honor, and it sent me over the edge,'“ the detective mocked, her voice rising shrilly, “and if you be­lieve that fairy tale...”

  “Fiction, novels, short stories, and movies have been known to influence people,” Jessica countered. “Whether we want to face it or not, an open society such as ours breeds killers and insanity, and often our literature and other cul­tural artifacts reflect this truth, and then the person raised on violence begins to act with violence.”

  “Criminals who decide to mimic what they see or read about,” said Kim, her steepled fingers twitching at her chin. “Over the years, we've seen many instances of young people doing just that. ”Jessica added, “We've all seen such cases in the news, after the fact, when it's too late. I'm merely suggesting—”

  “Suggestions, more suggestions and guesswork,” mut­tered Sturtevante, pacing now like a nervous cat. “Well, frankly, Dr. Coran, we in the PPD expected FBI involve­ment to bring great and swift results. Not a lot of specula­tion, and thus far all I've heard is bullshit spec—”

  “Leanne's just a little on edge today,” Parry began to apologize when Sturtevante glared at him and suddenly the doors burst open and in came Chief Aaron Roth with two men wearing three-piece, expensive-looking suits. It be­came immediately apparent to Jessica and the others why Sturtevante was on edge, as Parry had put it. Her superiors were on edge.

  No one in the complex chain of command, from detec­tive room to governor's mansion, was happy with the slow progress of the Poet Killer case.

  “Deputy Mayor Alsop,” Chief Roth began, introducing the man on his left. “And this is Senator Patrick Harmon, father of the late Anton Pierre.”

  Immediately upon being introduced, Senator Harmon placed a hand against Chief Roth's chest and said, “I'll take it from here, Aaron.” The tall, imposing senator, his gray-to-white hair long and striking, making him look like a nineteenth-century patriarch, almost shouted, “I want some fucking answers, and I want some fucking results. You people have been sitting on your asses longer than Snuffy Smith has been sitting in his rocker. Now, what in God's name do you have for me on the death—murder— of my child?”

  Beneath his bluster, Harmon was like any other father caught up in so horrific a circumstance. He had had to bury his own child; the natural order of his universe had been shaken to the core. He felt a rage and had nowhere to ex­press it. I demand to know what's being done!”

  Parry immediately took charge, standing, offering his hand and introducing first himself and the task-force lead­ership. Finishing with Kim, he added, “We've even put a psychic on the case. It's only a matter of time before we nail this bastard, sir. If you'd like to come with me, I can show you the mounting evidence we are assembling. Trust me, no one's resting on their rears or leaning on any walls here.”

  The senator looked around the room, gritted his teeth, and finally nodded. “Yes, I expect you are doing all you can.”

  “All that is humanly possible,” added Parry.

  The senator's entire body told them that he had relented. “Doing all that is humanly possible, yes, and I will take you up on your invitation—Agent Parry, is it?”

  Parry's strong suit, Jessica recalled, had always been dealing with the bereaved family members, never an easy task. Now, much to everyone's comfort, the FBI agent led the distraught father away. Parry, who had handled both situation and man with great sensitivity and care, had earned back some points with Jessica.

  When they were gone, Chief Roth stood aside, rather ag­itatedly, to hear a brief “pep talk” from the deputy mayor, whose final clich6—”I hope you all good hunting”—fell flat.

  Then Chief Roth, his bulldog face turning stony, said, “Senator Harmon is not the only one ready to throw you people to the dogs. I had another father in my office late yesterday. It was Maurice Deneau's father, a local alder­man and minister, who collapsed under the strain right there in my office. Paramedics rushed him to St. Stephen's; he's expected to recover, but the man's a basket case; so depressed that he's under a suicide watch. His family's going through a double hell now.” We're getting closer every hour, every day.” Kim told them what they wanted to hear. “I am seeing more details; each vision I have of the killer brings me more words and symbols to puzzle out and piece together.”

  Jessica helped Kim calm Chief Roth and Deputy Mayor Alsop, both fathers themselves, with assurances that the agents themselves did not wholly believe.

  A telephone call came an hour later; another body had surfaced, discovered this time in the first stages of decom­position. Over the weekend both Leare and Locke had been in Houston, there had been a murder after all, but the body had gone undetected. Jessica steeled herself as she walked into the now familiar “cozy” death scene, a set of props and surroundings created between lovers, between victim and killer, or so it seemed, down to the leftover Pinot Noir, the candles, and soft music.

  Time had taken its toll on the crime scene. Candles had burned out, spilling wax like small pools of lava over sur­faces. This young woman's body had been discovered by her mother, who, after numerous attempts to reach her daughter by phone, had driven to her apartment and quietly let herself in; the hysterical woman now sat sobbing in a neighbor's apartment down the hall, a cluster of building residents standing about her in a protective circle.

  It proved to be a carbon-copy murder scene, and it took little time to determine that the MO was that of the Poet Killer. Victim facedown on living-room floor, this time a pillow under her head, a soft down comforter pulled to her waist, a blatant message left by her killer, penned once again in angry red-to-ocher-burnished ink that made the words appear to be written in dried blood.

  The only difference with this victim was the more ad­vanced stage of decomposition; decay had caused some of the killer's penned words to sink inward, as it were, creat­ing puckering slash like wounds in the skin. This time, the victim's skin had to be pulled tight on either side, held by forceps, in order for the poetic lines to be completely made out. Rigor mortis had set in days before and had long since released its grip on the corpse.

  “Same MO,
same setup,” muttered Parry, just to hear himself speak.

  “It's definitely the work of the Poet,” Sturtevante agreed.

  “The body gently posed for all eternity, and the victim is familiar as well. She is all the others, all the others are her,” added Kim Desinor.

  After a cursory examination of the body, Jessica stepped aside for Kim to “read” it, but Kim's examination fell short. “Getting nothing; emptiness, save for those words again: rampage... quark, preflight, and outing... At least I... I think it's outing.”

  Jessica then began collecting the minutiae of evidence left by the killer, searching in particular for the tearstained evidence. Under her magnifying glass, she found it. Using an adhesive, she collected the sample and placed it in a vial, labeling it and carefully putting it away.

  Parry and Sturtevante had been searching about the room, Parry again going for the books. He held up a copy of Locke's poems. “It was on her shelf,” he said, opening the volume to a marker. “She appears to have been reading a poem entitled 'The Stage Is Set.' “ He began to read:

  The Enochian world

  is made of gritty

  tectonics of mind,

  pressed against

  the choking smokestack

  of our lonely city,

  a place of diastrophic shifts

  thought masquerading as

  landmasses

  that grind into

  one another.

  There, at the hazy altar

  of ruined pavement,

  vested in soot,

  the twin lovers

  to be wed;

  purity and iniquity.

  They stand in pools

  of nervous devils,

  clutching one another

  with vows of betrothal,

  caught in the tactile rush

  of Thorazine bedlam.

  They are the lost children

  elected to host

  the supraliminal.

  On the marker, Jessica read the name and address of the bookstore where the victim had purchased this auto­graphed copy of the book—Darkest Expectations. Also on the marker was a scribbled note, which the victim had ap­parently written as a reminder to herself. Purchase Leare's work next, it read.

  From the look of the apartment, Jessica imagined that the victim could ill afford to purchase both books at the same time, but then Kim entered from the bathroom, car­rying a copy of Leare's book.

  “It all keeps going back to Locke and Leare and that bookstore,” said Jessica. “Somehow I believe their work is connected to the killings.”

  “What are you saying?” asked Sturtevante. “You have no proof of that. None whatever.”

  I believe that somehow Locke, Leare, or both are con­nected to the killings, or at the very least, their poetry is somehow inextricably mixed with the reasoning behind the killing spree.”

  Kim supported Jessica. “Such phrases as Enochian world in Locke's poem—that refers to occultism and an­cient rites and conversations with God or his agents, an­gels?”

  “Vladoc spoke of it,” said Sturtevante. “But Leare was out of the city all weekend, and Locke with her. Neither of them could possibly have had anything to do with this.”

  Jessica felt a sense of relief coming from Sturtevante. Had she begun to suspect her friend Donatella Leare?

  “Yes, so they say,” Jessica commented.

  “They were both out of the city all weekend, and according to your own findings, the victim died Saturday night,” coun­tered Sturtevante. “And as for Locke's reference to Enoch, Donatella tells me that many poets are familiar with ancient religions and magical practices. Hell, that Dr. Burrwith guy, his poetry alludes to the Four Quarters all the time. Vladoc told me that that's part of the Enochian belief system, too. It's more widespread among artists and writers than you would imagine.”

  “Vladoc did make some brief mention of strange belief systems,” said Kim. “I think I remember that.”

  “They both left the city on a flight for Houston, or so we are told,” Jessica said, thinking aloud. “But suppose one or the other faked the flight out of here, not getting on that plane, asking the other to cover for him or her?”

  Jessica stepped out and down the hallway to talk to the mother. Sturtevante followed. The woman said she was Rowena Metzger, wife of Phillip K. Metzger. Sturtevante knew what this meant, so she explained for Jessica's sake. “Only the most powerful business leader in the city.”

  “Cinthia, our daughter, absolutely rejected her father's and my lifestyle and all that we offered her. This began after she started at the university.”

  “University of Philadelphia?” asked Jessica.

  The mother nodded, still sobbing. Finally, she added, “She wanted so to become an artist and poet. Now... my God... nooooo!” The wailing moan ripped at Jessica's heart.

  'Take her to St. Behan's Hospital,” Sturtevante told a nearby medic as she helped Mrs. Metzger to her feet. “She will need something to calm her down until her husband can be located.”

  When the sobbing woman was led away, Sturtevante said to Jessica, “The Metzgers, Phillip and Rowena there, regularly appear on the society pages.”

  “And now they're front-page news.”

  Jessica and Sturtevante returned to the death room to find Kim Desinor attempting a second reading of the body. “It's teasing, something being held out of reach,” Kim muttered, when suddenly Phillip Metzger, a tall, barrel-chested, white-haired man, charged in bull-like. He had become another of the walking wounded—another victim.

  “Get away from her! Get away!” he cried out at them as if they were all ghouls, and as if he somehow believed the girl might be saved by his touch. He fell to his knees over his daughter, grabbed her up in his arms, and rocked and sobbed as uncontrollably as a hurt child.

  Sturtevante looked shaken, Jessica thought as the PPD de­tective moved her toward the door. “Can we talk privately?” the detective asked. “I need to talk to you alone... now.”

  Jessica did not argue; Sturtevante's voice had become at once tremulous and conspiratorial.

  SEVENTEEN

  If poisonous minerals, and of that tree whose fruit threw death on else immortal us, If lecherous goats, if serpents envious cannot be damned; alas, why should I be?

  —John Donne (1572-1631)

  They went to a small stairwell just down from the death room, and Leanne Sturtevante was pacing there like a caged tiger. “I don't know how to tell you this any way but straight out. Leare... Donatella... she is the Poet Killer. Leare—she has done this.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “She killed that kid down the hall!”

  “How do you know this?”

  “You were right. Donatella never left for Houston.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “I confronted her with it.”

  “Confronted her with it? When? Did you call her in for questioning? What?”

  “No, I arranged a meeting.”

  “A meeting?”

  “You don't understand.”

  “No, I don't. Enlighten me.”

  Leanne finally stopped pacing. “Donatella... she and I... we've known each other for several years, and she's become... well, obsessed of late.”

  Jessica finally felt the light bulb go on in her head. Leanne and Donatella were—or had been—lovers. “Ob­sessed? How? In what manner?”

  “She's been baiting me with these murders, playing me! Don't you get it? Ever since I broke it off with her, she's been obsessed, fixated on getting us back together. She knows I... I've complained volumes about how unfair the PPD is when it comes to giving women detectives a chance, and I fear... I believe she created this case for me!”

  This was beginning to sound to Jessica as if Leanne Sturtevante were the delusional one in the relationship. “She is arranging to help you in the department by killing all these kids?”

  “I know it sounds crazy! It is crazy. She's crazy. She fits
Vladoc's profile of the killer, and—”Have you any proof? Has she said anything, made any kind of confession?”

  “She got off that plane to Houston, like I suspected, Jessica.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “She pleaded with Locke to keep it to himself. She has become... desperate... since, since our breakup.”

  “So, she is a spurned lover, but she doesn't take her anger out on you. Instead she takes it out on these young people... in a bid to help your career? Some thoughtful lover she turned out to be...”

  “Cut it out. I broke it off a couple of months ago, and just after, the killings began... and I checked. She never boarded that plane. I confronted her with it, and she con­fessed, after she told me she had seen me somewhere in the company of a friend on a day when she was supposed to be in Houston.”

  “I see. So you put two and two together and—”

  “She never got on the plane, and now this kid is dead, and I'm telling you all of it equates to her as the killer.”

  “But what evidence do you have that she was involved in what's happened down the hall, Leanne?”

  “She's scary, always has been, and now all this. I'd been subconsciously denying that she had anything to do with it, but now... now I can't deny it any longer. I know the po­etry is hers. I've read enough of her crap to know she's the one who has penned the death verses.”

  “You've got to have more than your hunches and your emotional involvement in order to make an arrest.”

  “She lied about her whereabouts on the night when this young woman died. She tracked you down, didn't she? Found out you were working the case from another angle? Picked you out as one to watch and learn from so she can keep a step ahead of you.”

  “We still need more than your suspicions to make an ar­rest, Leanne. So far as I can tell, your hypothesis about Leare is as uncorroborated as Dean Plummer's against her old boyfriend, Burrwith.”

  “This isn't the same. Donatella calls herself the reincar­nated soul of the poets of the Romantic period. She be­lieves in all that kind of crap—past lives, karma, love that transcends time, you name it. And the fake alibi, that's sig­nificant; plenty enough for an arrest.”