The Colonel snickered after I mentioned Caroline’s name.
“I really felt that I could trust Dr. Aldridge completely, and I opened up to her about everything. I suppose it was easy for you to get her notes and papers on me.”
“It was easy enough,” the Colonel replied.
“It was also shrewd of you to lure me into this trap by threatening my wife with that little note of yours. As you already know, I do have a soft spot in my heart for my wife and the baby she’s now carrying.” I sighed. “A moment of emotional vulnerability, I’m afraid, a weakness of mine.”
He silently nodded his head as I continued to stare at him. He continued holding his favorite shiny handgun.
“Colonel, I can’t help but admire what an ingenious idea it was for you to be in charge of the entire Shadow Stalker investigation from the beginning, to be the ultimate authority in how the case would continue, and aware of every detail. It was smart to run the entire investigative operation from the inside. That way, of course, you could monitor and control every aspect of what was going on, removing at your discretion anything that would threaten to expose your true identity.”
“Like some octopus, I had my arms on every level of power in the Bureau. From that central location, I could easily control the whole operation. It was entertaining for me to watch those bumbling investigative fools of mine trying to discover my identity.”
“It was just as I expected,” I said in a calm and modulated voice. “Colonel, it was you who went into each underground rail station to drop off your little ‘surprise’ package. Being in charge of the whole operation, it would be a simple matter for you to steal all the plastic explosives needed to carry out your evil plans. The police and other law enforcement officials would never think to question what you were doing.”
The Colonel nodded his head. The silent monster standing before me took a bow, smiling with glistening white teeth.
“It was you, Colonel, who remotely detonated the bombs that killed dozens of innocent people.”
He again nodded his head affirmatively.
“Finally, you doctored up those surveillance videotapes, removing every trace of your heinous crimes. The tapes you gave me to observe for weeks on end were useless because you weren’t seen on them at all. In fact, nothing of any use was on them. Isn’t that right, Colonel Richards?”
“That’s right, Jimboy, right on all counts. You must admit that it was a masterful job of deception.”
I looked into his grim and snickering face. “I was right about your arrogance. You felt so smug being in control of everything, every little detail. You knew that you could perpetrate these atrocities and never get caught.”
“Well, yes,” the Colonel replied. “I was in complete control of everything right from the start. You never had a chance to discover my secret identity until now.”
“Tell me, why did you hurt all of those innocent people? Why did they all have to die?”
The Colonel’s upper lip began to twitch again. He looked at me with a hard mask of hatred with scary red eyes. “Humanity sickens me. I often ride the train to work, and to watch those stinking and ugly people crowded into those filthy trains, just packed like sardines in a can makes me sick. All of them running around like rats and cockroaches in those underground tunnels. It was a disgusting thing to watch. I was born into a family of class and great wealth, and most importantly, good breeding.”
“So why did you kill them?”
The Colonel looked at me and laughed. “Let’s just say that I felt it was my civic duty to get rid of some of those useless people.”
I glared at him with hatred in my heart. “Two of my friends, Rose Burtchell and Jim Stockwell, were murdered by you, and you’ve got the nerve to stand there and tell me they were useless people?”
“Forget that. Let’s dispense with the chitchat. It’s time for you to meet your maker. Send my regards.” His eyes narrowed as he cocked the gun and pointed it directly at my heart. I stepped back several yards.
“Colonel,” I said in a calm and deliberate voice, “before you pull that trigger, I have a confession to make.”
“Make it fast,” he snapped.
“I was wrong in thinking that you’re my intellectual equal. You’re just a foolish man,” I said.
“I’m not only your intellectual equal—I’m your superior!” the enraged Colonel shouted. “How incredibly stupid of you to imprison your own lover as the Shadow Stalker killer.” He laughed and laughed and laughed until the tears freely rolled down his reddened face. He slowly regained his composure. “You know, I never believed any of my colleagues when they told me that you were some kind of genius. You’re just a big fool with an inflated ego. A fool, I might add, who will soon be dead.” The Colonel’s boisterous laughter echoed in the large room.
“Really, Colonel,” I said. “You should’ve killed me at the T5 bomb site when you had the chance.”
He wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes and face. “What are you talking about?”
“Oh well, let me tell you,” I chimed in. “I know you were watching me in my investigation at the T5 bomb site. I saw you.”
“That’s impossible!”
“I saw you watching me with a pair of binoculars. You could have killed me there with impunity, so why didn’t you? It doesn’t matter now anyway. You’ll soon discover that I haven’t walked into this trap of yours. I came here today to serve justice and put you in jail for these evil crimes.”
“What?” The Colonel’s face was awash in teary-eyed laughter. “You came here to serve justice and put me in jail. You must be a bigger fool than I give you credit for.” The Colonel continued his sad histrionics, filling the room with loud laughter. He had to catch his breath to speak. “You came here without a gun to serve justice. That’s nonsense. And you came here alone to take me to jail. You really are a piece of work.”
The old fool sobered up and poured himself some whiskey. He kept watch over me with his gun cocked at the ready.
“No drink for your guest? Go ahead and drink up, you bastard, for soon you’ll know what it feels like to be behind bars for your crimes,” I said.
Soon the evil Colonel regained his sinister composure and looked me right in the face. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” he said in a clear and confident voice. I looked at the smug Colonel standing there holding his favorite shiny handgun and smiling.
I stared at him as I was ready to bring down the hammer. “Unlike you, Colonel Richards, I try not to be smug, conceited or arrogant. It’s quite true that on occasion I do get miserably frustrated with the stupidity of others, but I wasn’t fooled one bit by your trying to bait me into coming over here by threatening my wife. It was just part of my plan to capture you, that’s all.”
“What are you talking about?”
I looked at him inquisitively and spoke softly. “I take it you read my ad in the classified section of the newspaper. I know you like reading those ads.”
“Yes, I read it.”
“I thought that little note would grab your attention. I knew the word ‘gotcha’ was one of your favorite expressions. I suppose after reading it you decided to set this trap to bait me.”
He kept watching me and smiling. “Maybe.”
“You see, Colonel Richards, I knew you were the Shadow Stalker before Caroline was released from jail. That’s why I approached you shortly before her release and asked to leave the Bureau. I wanted to prepare my trap for capturing you. The element of surprise was mine from the beginning.” The Colonel stared in amazement, stunned. His eyes rolled around in his head like the oxygen had just been completely sucked out of his brain. His face turned ghost white, and I could see tiny cracks in his confidence appear in that frightened expression of his.
“You’re good, Colonel, maybe even brilliant as a criminal mastermind, but I’m afraid you’re no genius. I must sadly confess, however, that distinction can sometimes be more of a curse than a blessing.” This man,
once emboldened and confident, now looked terribly frightened. He stared at me in total shock and disbelief as I continued talking.
“Last night, I took the opportunity to pay you a visit in the middle of the night when you were sound asleep. I must say that your snoring did rattle the rafters of this large house, and I did find that offensive. I came to your house to execute the finishing touches on my plan to capture you. Obviously, at that hour of the night, it wasn’t a social call, but it did allow me time to remove the real bullets from your favorite shiny hand gun and replace them with these custom-made blanks.” He saw the bullets I was holding in my hand. Fear and immediate desperation washed over the Colonel’s grim and hoary countenance. He fired the bullets from his gun directly at me. BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! The shots clearly rang out as he emptied his gun.
“You see, Colonel, I’m still standing!”
His frightened white face turned into a deep rose madder. He looked at me with venomous rage and hate in his eyes and yelled out. “You son of a bitch!” he screamed. He grabbed a nearby fire poker from the hearth and lunged at me. I made a quick move to dodge his attack. Other than compromising the value of a few treasured antiques, his energetic effort was all in vain. The police had broken into the house and subdued the Colonel on the floor. I had instructed several police officers to wait outside the house in hiding ready to break in on my signal, which was the Colonel’s firing of the blanks from his gun.
The evil Colonel, still struggling on the floor, looked up at me livid with rage at being defeated. “I should’ve killed you when I had the chance!”
I looked down at this crumpled heap of humanity sitting on the floor. Tired in having to repeat myself, I echoed my former sentiment: “I suppose you should have.” In full view of every officer present in the large room, I took out of my secret coat pocket the taped confession I just made and waved it around the room for all to see. There was a slight smirk on my face as the Colonel’s jaw dropped when he saw the tape recording. My miniaturized tape recorder was cleverly concealed in a heavily padded coat pocket. The Colonel’s pale and drawn face with frightened eyes told the tale. Now, remembering the promise I made to Caroline in jail, I bent over and deliberately looked the terrorist straight in the eye. “You see, Colonel Richards,” I told him, “in the end, arrogance defeats itself.” The police officers in the room cheered. The Shadow Stalker had finally been captured!
By now, the loquacious prisoner was shackled and had to be dragged from his home, kicking and screaming. It took several police officers to place him in the squad car. As the car with the real Shadow Stalker slowly rolled down the long driveway and off to jail, I felt relieved. I thought about how I had trusted my boss, and how he had been a friend to me. I was still shocked by the resolution of these killings and the fear that paralyzed the city for three years. The city this man terrorized was finally safe. After some serious conversation with Captain Goloft and his men, I wrapped things up and drove myself back to Highgate. It was late in the afternoon, and now I had an even greater matter of importance to finish.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
When I left the Colonel’s house and returned to Highgate, I was eager to tell Caroline the exciting news of my capture of the Shadow Stalker. As I entered the bright and spacious foyer of my home on Linden Way, I expected to be greeted by my wife with open arms. I was greeted by Caroline all right, but she was holding my service revolver and pointing the gun directly at me. I was shocked, but I really wasn’t surprised, given that the baby she was carrying wasn’t mine. I stared at her feeling deeply hurt and emotionally betrayed. How could she do this to me?
“You don’t seem surprised at all,” Caroline said in an uncharacteristic monotone.
“You’re the Colonel’s secret lover, right?”
“Yes,” she finally acknowledged.
“I knew it. By the way the Colonel snickered at me when I mentioned your name, it was hard to miss that. Bravo, Caroline, you had me almost completely fooled until the very end.”
Caroline looked at me derisively. “Almost, James,” she said and then laughed. She paused to take a bow for her stunning performance.
“So, you were the mastermind behind the subway bombings, the shadow behind the stalker. You were the brilliant mind behind the scenes pulling the strings.”
“Yes.”
“Bravo, my dear, it was just as I expected. I always knew that you were brilliant, and I’ve always felt that you were my intellectual equal, unlike that pompous old fool Colonel Richards.”
She stared at me with that strange look of adoration and hate. “That’s right, but don’t get carried away and flatter yourself too much,” she said.
I looked at her with indifference. “So, how long have you been carrying the Colonel’s baby?”
“How did you know the baby was his?”
“Never mind. Just answer the damn question!”
She looked at me and laughed. “James, you have a whole lot of spunk in you for someone standing directly in the line of fire. But if you must know, I learned I was pregnant with the Colonel’s baby several months ago. This was around the time we reconnected and started up again. I wanted you to think that the baby was yours. I needed that emotional advantage over you.”
As I continued staring at her holding the gun, I wondered if this was a dream. I was betrayed by the Colonel, and now Caroline. I sighed. “Tell me, did you ever really love me?”
“At one time I loved you very much. When we first met over five years ago, I was deeply in love with you. But when you left the country after our breakup, I turned to the Colonel.”
“Around the time your parents were killed?”
“Yes,” she said, “it was around that time. Anyway, the Colonel fell in love with me. He wanted to get rid of you because he knew you loved me as well. You must have told him about our love affair. I’m afraid he wanted me all to himself. That’s why he arranged that sabbatical shortly after you were transferred to the Bureau. It was out of his love for me.”
“So, that’s the reason the old goat wanted me out of the picture.” I kept looking at her, feeling hurt and heartbroken. “Now I know what you were doing. You involved yourself with the Colonel and used his substantial power at the Bureau to kill people. Working in concert with him at those underground rail stations, you murdered dozens of innocent people out of rage and hatred. You sought revenge on the world for the tragic and unexpected deaths of your parents in that terrorist train bombing.”
“Colonel Richards was the perfect person to complete my objectives. He could accomplish for me what I didn’t have the stomach to do myself. The Colonel is a brute and a monster, and after a while, I couldn’t stand him. I was afraid he’d kill me if I left or ratted him out. Now the old fool will be executed for the Shadow Stalker killings, and I’ll finally be free.”
“Brilliant. I see what you were thinking. I suppose since I’m the only witness against you, I’ll need to die as well.”
“Unfortunately, yes. I’m deeply sorry for that.” She paused for a moment, almost in momentary flashback of all the good times we’d shared. She seemed a little sad standing there, but quickly recovered. “I came here today to kill you. I’m afraid I can’t leave any witness to testify against me. I used you to get rid of the Colonel and free myself from jail. I had to borrow your genius to escape the trap I’d created for myself.”
I looked at her with secret admiration for this woman I loved.
“James, what you don’t know is that I have a younger brother waiting for me in Switzerland.”
“I thought you were an only child like me. I don’t remember you ever mentioning that you had a brother.”
“That’s right, I never mentioned Daniel to you in all the time we were together. Daniel and I were very close growing up. He was my baby brother and I took care of him for many years. Well, now you know the truth, and I need to leave you and this country forever. My plane leaves in less than two hours.”
I felt angry abou
t the way I’d been used by this woman. “Caroline, I’m the only witness who can connect you with these killings. Do you still plan to kill me?”
She stared at me with resolute determination. “Yes.”
“What about our love?” I shouted. “The tender love I bared open my heart and soul to you with?”
Caroline continued staring at me in angry silence, holding my gun with both hands.
“For all the time I knew and loved you, I only asked that you return my love as graciously as I gave it.”
She looked at me hard and retorted in anger. “Don’t be a fool. We can never get back what we once had together.”
I looked at her with the anguish of a fully realized broken heart. She was right, and I was wrong to think otherwise. “So, now you’ll kill me, and Colonel Richards will hang for the Shadow Stalker killings. And you will have survived it all, free to return to your brother in Switzerland and hide from authorities, living in freedom.”
Caroline looked at me with a meanness that after all these years I never knew she possessed. “That’s exactly the way it’s going to be.” I felt sorry for her. The pain in my heart from her betrayal was killing me, but I wouldn’t let it show. I was too proud for that.
“You really had me fooled. I honestly believed that you loved me. I thought the bond between us was strong and unbreakable. It never occurred to me that I was being played for a fool.”
“When we first met after all this time, I just wanted to use you to get rid of Colonel Richards—that’s all. But then things changed. I started getting caught up in my old feelings for you. The more time we spent in the city, the more I fell for you and wanted you back. After a while I wanted to marry you, but I thought about what that would mean. I had to cut myself off from those feelings. Allowing myself to fall in love with you again would’ve destroyed me.”
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