The Angel Maker lbadm-2

by Ridley Pearson

  He resented being cornered by her. Yes, he knew that feeling.

  Yes, he had been forced to defend it on a dozen occasions; and no, there was no real sense to it. But this was her feeling, not his, he reminded himself; her case, her instincts, not his.

  "What evidence is there?" he asked coldly.

  She winced. "I'm not an investigator. I can't even take this to Shoswitz until I have something convincing. Hell he's Homicide. He may not want it even then: She's alive after all. What do I do? Where do I turn?"

  "The helpless female? I don't buy it."

  She glared. "This young woman was violated in the worst, most heinous sense. Some monster" monster was not a word that Daphne Matthews, the psychologist, often used-"cut her open, reached inside her, and removed an organ-a physical part of her! MY God! Phil Shoswitz may be committed more to the dead than the living, but you? After they stole her kidney, they burned her short-term memory with electroshock. Am I getting through? Maybe one of them raped her just for fun. Evidence? Do I need probable cause, Sergeant, in order to investigate, or just the suspicion that a crime has been committed?" She stared him down. "Will you help me or not?" she asked, adding, "if for no other reason than as a parent."

  He couldn't help but picture Miles-Einstein, the nickname belonging to his blond, curly haired son-involuntarily under the knife of such a butcher. She interrupted his thoughts. "The electroshock may have done permanent damage to her memory, not to mention her mind: She hears a constant barking."

  "I'm out of the business. I'm off the force. My badge is collecting dust in Shoswitz's drawer."

  "You're on extended leave."

  "That's just Phil's way of holding a carrot out to me, of keeping my chance at twenty alive. That's the way it reads on paper, Daffy, but in here?" he said, repeating her gesture of placing his hand on his chest. "In here, I'm a father and a hack pianist."

  He had never dared speak the words aloud, had seldom even thought them, for he wasn't one to lie, and he couldn't be sure this was the truth: "It's over." It felt sacrilegious to say such a thing. just hearing it spoken confirmed its falsehood. He felt a terrifying loss of control, as if hitting a patch of ice on a dangerous curve. it wasn't over, was it? Someone out there had torn the guts out of a young girl. What surprised him most of all was the way he took to it so quickly. He wanted whatever evidence she had. He wanted the pieces of the puzzle. He wanted to put a stop to it before it happened again. Cop instincts-she was counting on them. Perhaps it was because the victim was alive.

  A voice-a man's, big and thunderous-reverberated through the club. "Party's over, everyone. No more drinks. I'm going to have to ask you all to leave." Boldt looked over his shoulder expecting to see some drunk on the stage, but instead he saw a crew cut wearing a ten-year-old gray suit and scuffed wingtips with worn heels. A badge hung out of the breast pocket of the suit. Four or five clones of the man swept quickly into the club, fanning out to various responsibilities. It felt like a bank job to Boldt, an organized robbery. But when this guy announced, "Treasury Department," he realized what it was. The man continued, "These premises are being sealed." He repeated loudly over protests, "I'm going to have to ask you all to leave."

  "Your idea?" Boldt asked her, nodding toward the Tman. "Trying to pressure me into this?"

  She grimaced, looking past him toward the stage. One of the suits was screwing a padlock clasp into the piano's keyboard cover. Boldt could feel the screws biting into the wood as if they were drilling into his own flesh. He rose angrily, Daphne following. "What the hell?" Boldt hollered as he closed the distance. "That's a musical instrument, goddamn it!" The one with the big voice was smart enough to step aside. The assistant kept right on twisting the screwdriver. "Stop that! Now!"

  "Don't make any trouble, pal," the assistant cautioned.

  The screw chewed more deeply into the wood. "You don't do that to a musical instrument," Boldt repeated, wrapping one of his big hands around the boy's wrist. "You just don't do that."

  The agent threatened, "You want me to call the cops?"

  "I am a cop," Boldt declared. His eyes met Daphne's; she wasn't going to let him live that one down. Boldt released the man. "So am I," Daphne informed the agent, producing her identification. "I'd sure as hell like to see the warrant that authorizes the destruction of private property in the process of seizure. You want to show me that document, please, Agent-" she craned forward to read his nametag. — "-Campbell?"

  The man's face went crimson. He looked first at her then at Boldt, then over at his superior. "You want to see warrants, you'll have to talk to Agent Majorksi. I got a job to do here." "Leave it be," Boldt said definitively, grabbing his wrist again. Two screws had already violated the ebony.

  Across the room, bartender Mallory struggled with one of the agents in an effort to lock the cash register, but lost. The agent took the key from her. They had practiced this drill well or had performed it enough times to execute it flawlessly. Piece by piece, stage by stage, the agents took control in a matter of minutes, Confused patrons were herded toward the door, several chugging beers on the way. Another commotion-Bear's arrest-grabbed Boldt's attention as the agent started twisting that screwdriver again.

  The club owner was placed in handcuffs and read his rights. He glanced over at Boldt, shrugged, and smiled. "I should have hired H amp;R Block," Bear shouted over to Boldt. That was Bear: ever the comic. He threw a couple of one-liners at the agents who had him, but they didn't seem to appreciate the humor. "Drinks are on the house, fellas," he tried one last time as they escorted him toward the door. "Hey, Monk," he called out, using his nickname for Boldt, "I thought all you badgers were on the same team. Hey, Elliot Ness," he called to the gray suit, Majorski, "this here is Lou Boldt. The Lou Boldt of the Seattle Police Department! Have a heart!" He was ushered out of the building. "Louis Boldt?" Agent Majorski asked. "That's right," Boldt answered, surprised to hear his proper name come from the mouth of a stranger. These guys were as stiff as cardboard. "You mind calling this guy off? He's screwing a friend of mine."

  Daphne displayed her I.D. for the second time. "I'd like to see the warrant that permits him to do that."

  Majorski looked over her badge and photo. "Tommy," he said, stopping the one at the piano. "Why don't you help with the files?" Reluctantly, the rookie abandoned his task. Boldt and Daphne briefly exchanged looks of triumph.

  The euphoria was short-lived. Majorski consulted a typed list he withdrew from his coat pocket. "You'll be hearing from the IRS," he said to Boldt with a disturbing smugness. "I'd speak to my accountant if I were you." He moved off to reorganize his people. "My accountant?" Boldt responded desperately, the man not listening. Liz handled their tax returns.

  Daphne and Boldt were herded toward the door. "Just let me use you as a sounding board," Daphne pleaded, ever persistent. "I can bounce my ideas off you. Show you what I've got." She feared she had lost him, that her effort had been overshadowed by the raid, that all was for naught. She couldn't leave it as it was, she couldn't bear the thought of facing Shoswitz alone; she needed Boldt. "Daffy, I can sleep at night. My stomach is better than it's been in years. I take naps in the afternoon, with my little Einstein purring in his crib. I read books imagine that! Liz and I actually find time to speak a few complete sentences to each other.

  You know what you're asking?"

  "Please," she tried. II The way she said it. Boldt looked at her intently.

  As a sounding board, but that's all." "Sure," she said, unconvincingly. "That's all." He hated losing.

  Thursday February 2

  Sharon Shaffer, barely tall enough to see over the wheel even with a cushion under her, was driving her seven-year-old Ford Escort, Daphne in the passenger seat. Daphne lived on a houseboat at Gas Works Park; Sharon lived about a mile away on Linden, a block from the Freemont Baptist Church. They carpooled together whenever possible, mostly for the company. Following her meeting with Boldt at the hbrary, Daphne was going to spend the evenin
g at The Shelter and then ride home with Sharon.

  Crossing the colorful Freemont Bridge toward town, Daphne strained to see her marina but couldn't. With Lake Union to their left, they drove along Westlake, cluttered marinas gradually evolving into condos and corporate headquarters as they drew closer to town. Ninth Avenue was a no-man's land of struggling small businesses. Then it was the fast-food and franchised commercialism of Denny Way.

  A ferry horn sounded, dull and low, like the groan of a huge animal. Daphne's watch read three twenty-eight. The ferries represented a kind of freedom-island life. Isolation, escape.

  "Judging by yesterday's weather," Daphne said, "I'd say the groundhog drowned,""We're halfway through the rinse cycle," Sharon agreed. "Four more weeks of this at least."

  "Makes you really love the place, doesn't it?"

  "You look a little tired," Sharon said. "I spent the day poring over some autopsy files the medical examiner wanted me to see. It's exhausting."

  "Sounds disgusting."

  "I made some headway. I'm not sure Cindy Chapman is all alone in this."

  "Meaning?"

  "I need to run it all by a friend and see what he thinks," Daphne explained. "I don't like the sound of your voice."

  "I'm a little scared, that's all."

  "I don't think I could ever be a cop," Sharon said. She ruminated on this for a moment. "Three years ago, if someone had tried to tell me that someday one of my best friends would be a cop, and a forensic psychologist at that, I would have tagged them for the bird house-the loony bin. It's weird how things work out."

  "In your case, they've worked out rather nicely."

  "It'll happen to you," Sharon encouraged. "It's all in your attitude, and your attitude is improving. Something's working."

  "It's the therapy."

  "Whatever it is, it's good to see."

  "Have you ever worked with someone after you've had a thing with him?"

  Astonished, Sharon cried, "Did, you sleep with your therapist?

  "I "Not my therapist, dummy. just answer the question." Sharon stopped at a light and said, "On the street I slept with everyone. You'd sleep with someone because they had the coke that week. Coke whores. We were all coke whores." She drifted off for a moment. When she spoke again, the pain was gone from her voice. "But I know what you're asking about, and it did happen to me once. I slept a couple of times with a guy I met in A.A. Then it fizzled out. I'm not sure why. But we kept running into each other at all the meetings. It worked out okay, except that no matter what we talked about on the surface, there was always this sexual tension-at least for me-going on underneath, you know? I wasn't after him-nothing like that-but you don't forget the really good ones, and this guy was really tuned in, really good for me."

  "But you don't forget, do you?" Daphne asked, repeating her friend's comment. "I sure don't."

  "And it worked out?"

  "Depending on who you ask. He's got a woman now. I have The Shelter. But," and she laughed, "it's hard to curl up with The Shelter. And there are times … Well, you know. But you can't project. "One day at a time/ girl.

  "An attitude of gratitude."

  "Yeah, yeah. Don't preach," Daphne chided. "Sometimes I think I'm lucky I got so messed up on the streets. Without A.A. Well, you've heard all of this."

  "A number of times." Even three years into the program, Sharon was still on a sort of honeymoon. Sometimes it was all she could find to talk about. "Who's the guy?" Sharon asked. "Just that: a guy."

  "Don't give me that." She laughed. "If you slept with him, he's not just a guy, he's an endangered species."

  "Once.

  Only once. And I didn't even spend the night. It isn't the sex."

  "Those are the dangerous ones," Sharon said, turning the corner and pulling over to the curb. "Yeah, I know," agreed Daphne. She looked at her watch. Thirty minutes in which to do her research. "You're meeting someone here, aren't you?" Sharon asked. "Him," she stated. "I'll catch up with you later," Daphne reminded. She climbed out of the car, wondering why she felt so damned nervous.

  The Lakeview Animal Clinic veterinarian offices occupied the ground floor of a relatively new business complex facing Madison. The reception area had vinyl flooring in a brick pattern and long benches against each wall. In huge letters a sign read: Keep Animals Caged or Leashed At All Times. Dogs, to the left benches. Cats to the right. There were a few of each in the small room, the air electric with possible conflict.

  Pamela Chase, short and overweight, wore a yellow crew shirt with the words

  "Lakeview Animal Clinic" embroidered on her breast pocket. She inspected the form that belonged to the cat she was carrying. Camile hadn't eaten in three days. When she had managed to get food down, she vomited it back up. Camile, like so much of their work, was a referral-Dr. Elden Tegg was the one vet to whom the other vets turned.

  The examination room had a chart on the wall that diagramed the nerves, lenses, and muscles in a cat's eye. There was a large, framed color photograph of Puget Sound at dawn, a nuclear submarine just barely visible alongside a pod of surfacing Orca whales. The room had no window but did possess a large air grate in the ceiling. It smelled of rubbing alcohol and disinfectant.

  Camile wrestled to be free but lacked the energy for a prolonged struggle. She resigned herself to Pamela's hold.

  A moment later the door swung open and the veterinarian stepped inside. Dr. Elden Tegg, D.V.M., as his name plaque introduced him, stood close to six feet tall, in a wiry frame, with a dark complexion, brown eyes, and a black beard carefully trimmed. He wore a white lab coat, khaki pants, and brown leather walking shoes with rawhide trim. He had a protruding Adam's apple that bobbed as he spoke in a grating voice. His attention fixed immediately upon his patient.

  Pamela Chase passed him the cat as he nodded. He had exceptionally long fingers, immaculately clean hands, perfectly manicured nails, and he wore a gold wedding ring.

  He studied the cat thoughtfully, squeezing, probing. He looked into her eyes and glanced quickly into her ears. "Loss of appetite and vomiting," Pamela Chase informed him. He grunted an acknowledgment. "They sent pictures along." Tegg returned the cat to his assistant and approached the light board, turning it on and studying the X-rays. "Well," he asked in a professorial tone, "did you have a look at these?"

  She answered, "I was thinking we should try a milk shake," referring to a barium upper G.I. "Have I told you how fortunate I am to have you?" he asked She glowed with the compliment.

  "Let's sedate her," he said, "shall we?"

  Fifteen minutes later, she reentered carrying both the cat and the new X-rays. Tegg slapped the large negatives into the clamps on the light box, studied them carefully, and signaled Pamela over to him. She responded without thought. "Here's what the others missed," he said confidently, running one of his clean fingernails over a section of the X-ray. "See here, and here?" he asked. "It's not what you see," he advised, "it's what you don't see, which might explain how it was missed so easily. just a ghost, see?"

  "Yes, now I do."

  "There's some kind of obstruction in the stomach. Maybe a fur-ball, but I doubt it. Let's try an endoscopy and have a look." Pamela Chase prepared all the necessary equipment for the procedure and stood alongside him like a corporal at the side of a general. He inserted the black eel of plastic tubing down the cat's throat. The tiny fiber optic camera inside the animal's stomach sent back black-and-white pictures to the small SONY television that Tegg studied. "The problem with something plastic like this is that the veterinarian cannot feel it in the exam, cannot see it clearly in an X-ray, and yet to this poor creature it feels like her tummy is full all the time. She tries to crap, but the stomach rejects it. Probably picked it up off the floor," On the screen, under his direction, a small set of pinchers moved like jaws. Tegg deftly maneuvered them to apprehend the foreign object. A moment later he extruded the endoscopy tube from the cat.

  A small piece of soft plastic-a swimmer's ear plug-fell into th
e stainless steel dish that Pamela held.

  Tegg stated clinically, "That should do it. Send along the usual instructions regarding the anesthesia. Also some buffers to help out with the abrasion to the stomach lining. If the vomiting continues, they should reschedule immediately."

  He moved toward the door. "What's next?" he asked her. "You haven't taken a break all day," she said. "What's next?" he repeated. "A toy poodle," she advised, checking a list. "Blood in the urine."

  "Are we set up for surgery?" he asked. "All set," she replied. "Give me five minutes," he told her. Then he added sincerely, "I hate toy poodles."

  The downtown branch of Seattle's public library is two blocks from the Public Safety building, the police department's central offices. it is overshadowed by an intriguing skyline sprouting new glass and steel in amounts that ten years earlier would have seemed inconceivable. The Big Money had hit Seattle in the mid-80's, bringing with it a renewed downtown, renovations, public transit, and the ubiquitous shopping centers. The thirty- and forty-story towers competed for the best view of breathtaking Elliott Bay and Puget Sound to the west and the majesty of glacier-capped Mount Rainier to the southeast. By city standards, Seattle's downtown is remarkably small, contained to the south by the Kingdome and to the north by the Seattle Center, a holdover from the 1962 World's Fair. To the west is the green-marble estuary with its gray ferries and black freighters; to the east, downtown is stopped by Interstate 5, Pill Hill and Seattle College. Downtown is surrounded for miles by rolling hills blanketed in two-story clapboard homes and communities like Ballard, Ravenna, Northgate and Richmond Highlands. It is a city of water: the Sound, lakes, canals and rivers. For Boldt's taste, the city's growth and expansion was happening too quickly, seemed too uncontrolled. Seattle was learning life the hard way: theft, drugs, organized crime and shrinking budgets. Its art, culture and traditions kept it vital and unique: its music, dance, fine arts; its fishing, sailing, and Native American history; its festivals and celebrations; its libraries, museums, theaters and public market.