For I Have Sinned a Cate Harlow Private Investigation

by Kristen Houghton

  In my business I’ve learned to give the clients what they want. I’ve stopped trying to convince them that they’re wasting their money on something their hearts tell them is what they need to know. If they want proof of a spouse cheating, I’ll give them that proof. If they want to find someone or learn about a skeleton in a family closet, I can provide that too.

  People pay PIs well because they think that we have some natural psychic ability about situations, but that’s just wishful thinking. A good P.I. is simply a damn good observer. Going into a case I don’t know any more than what I’ve been told by my clients. But the thing that separates me from them is that what their eyes and ears didn’t catch, mine will. I watch people all the time and I can tell them things about themselves their own mothers probably don’t know. Being a successful P.I. has less to do with anything psychic and a whole lot more to do with observation and rational thought.

  To say I’m good at my job is an understatement. It’s not vanity; it’s a fact. I can get into a lot of places that other PIs can’t. Maybe it’s my looks. I don’t look threatening. I’m five, five, athletic and blonde. Not a dumb blonde, either. I speak softly and listen carefully. People tell me things they wouldn’t mention to someone who looks tough and street-smart. Let’s say that they do underestimate me and I am very good at what I do.

  My former profession lacked excitement. I was a forensic law linguist who got tired of simply translating the law into lay terms and decided to change my daily routine from sitting at a desk or in a courtroom to actually going out and trying to help people who had need of a good legal investigator.

  As I said, looks can be deceiving. I usually wear my hair pulled back into a ponytail and my green eyes are always hidden by sunglasses—even when it’s dark I’m a bit near-sighted but that’s my secret. When people can’t see your eyes they don’t know what you’re thinking and that’s good.

  I’ve got a decent enough body from playing a mean game of tennis, which means that if I feel outnumbered by “the bad guys” I have a better than average chance of running away on legs used to chasing a ball up and down a court. And while I can dress the part that best suits my needs for a particular job, for every day work I prefer jeans, a velour hoodie, and top-of-the-line sneakers. My one weakness in clothes is that silky, girly lingerie goes on under the jeans and hoodie. I spend a lot of money on panties and bras.

  It makes me smile when I see an actress playing a detective on TV wearing heels and chasing down criminals. Seriously, if you’ve got to run you better be wearing shoes that won’t trip you up or have you end up with a broken ankle.

  I’m pretty low maintenance most days, but I’ve been known to dress up for a case; three-inch heels, short skirts, and smoky-eyed make-up make me a totally different lady in upscale areas. Or a hooker, depending on what part I’m playing for a case. Lady of disguises—that’s me.

  I’m kind to animals, have two cats and we all live in a nice, neat, old brownstone sparsely, but I think nicely, furnished. Again, low maintenance is key here. I’m also lucky to have a parking space right in front of the brownstone, which is carefully guarded by my neighbor who only charges me fifteen bucks a week for her services. I’m not all that sociable but I do have a few really good friends who know me and accept me for who, and what, I am. My closest friend is New Orleans transplant Melissa who doesn’t seem to have a job, is perpetually taking classes in whatever interests her, and has some well-heeled male clients. Melissa’s a solid source of much-needed girl-power for me.

  ****

  So as I’m driving, I’m thinking about my client and her lost brother. He left his house on a warm spring day to go to the library and vanished. No one at the library that day had any recollection of seeing him. Someone would have noticed him because, according to his sister, he spent a lot of time there, especially on school breaks.

  Ten years is a long time, and my initial thought, one that I gently voiced to her, was that he’s dead. I don’t like having to bring bad news to my clients, something that I’ve had to do way too often. I had to be honest with her, though. All she said to that statement was that she knew that he was alive, at least as short a time as a week ago.

  A letter had been left in her mailbox telling her to pray for him. No date, no time, no envelope she tells me; just plain white paper with a few lines scribbled on it. She hands it to me.

  “Do you see the underlined question and the answer following it?” Marie asks eagerly, willing me to understand their significance. “It’s a line from Peter Pan; it’s something Peter says to Wendy about birds. That’s how I know this is really from my brother! We used it all the time and it was our secret code.”

  I don’t say anything as she continues talking.

  “It’s not the first time I’ve gotten one of these. Since my parents died, at least twice a year, I’ll find one in my mailbox. It’s his handwriting; no mistake. Usually he just says not to forget him. He’s never asked me to pray for him before though. That scares me. Josh doesn’t believe in God.”

  “Was there ever a letter from Joshua when your parents were alive? Because if there wasn’t, maybe someone is playing a cruel joke on you.”

  “No, no letters, no contact but…”

  “Yes?”

  “You might think I’m crazy but, well, there were times when I sensed that Joshua was nearby, as if he were watching me, protecting me somehow. I don’t know, maybe some people might say it was wishful thinking or say that I wanted him back so badly that I was imagining I felt him, but I really did feel that he was somehow nearby. And I know the letters are from my brother. I know it. It’s not just that I know his handwriting. In the letters, he always mentions that quote from Peter Pan, a code that only he and I know and used. No one, not even my parents knew what it was.” She looks at me with those sad eyes. “Can you help me?”

  “If you don’t mind my suggesting this, you might be better off bringing the letter to the police. Do you want to do that? You might be wasting your money on a private investigator when the police are more than ready to help. I can call a friend down at headquarters if you like.”

  “Ms. Harlow, I know what you charge and I have the money to pay you, believe me. I don’t see it as wasting my money. I’d rather hire you to try to find my brother than go to the police again. I have been to the police many times. They take my statement, they listen to me, and then they inevitably, very kindly, tell me to try to go on with my life. Go on with my life, as if that were a possibility! I was fourteen when my brother disappeared. We’re what you call Irish twins, only ten months apart. We were so close. His disappearance destroyed my family. Not knowing what has happened to someone you love takes a terrible toll on those left behind. My mother had a debilitating stroke a year after Josh went missing and she died when I was eighteen. My father simply stopped living when mom died; he lost two people he loved so very much and it broke him, it just broke his spirit. Eleven months later I buried him next to mom.

  “Look, I’m not blaming the police. They were so good to us right after… you know. And they worked so hard. But after a while what can they do? They say it’s what’s called a, a …”

  “Cold case file,” I offer. “Did they tell you that the case remains open?”

  “Yes, I know they say it remains open but it is not something that is currently on their minds. They have other cases, new cases. The old cases, well, there’s just so much they can do with them. I’m asking for your help. I saw you on the Morning News show last month, a missing person case. You found that young woman. I thought if you could find someone who was kidnapped twenty-two years ago, then maybe you could help me.”

  I nod and remember. The Reynolds case; it had garnered some real media attention. I had been able to locate a twenty-two year old young woman who had been stolen from a hospital nursery when she was three days. The case had been referred to me by a paralegal for whom I had done some free surveillance work. It had taken me eight months of intense research and fo
llowing obscure leads to find her. Reuniting the woman with her birth parents had made me a mini-celebrity.

  “Alright, Marie. I’ll take the case. The first thing I’ll do is search the shelters and addiction clinics around your area and here in the city as well. Then I’ll get the police file from the main archives here in the city. We’ll go on from there and see what can be found.”

  I asked Marie McElroy a few more questions and requested a picture of her brother. She wrote me a retainer check, asked only that I tell her the truth about what I found out, and left. Catherine Harlow, Private Investigations had a new client.

  ****

  I drive an SUV, a Ford Edge to be exact. It’s just big enough for my needs and it makes me feel safer on the highways when I’m competing with eighteen-wheelers. Being in a smaller car next to a tractor-trailer makes me feel like an ant about to be squished.

  Pulling up to the morgue I see Will standing there with a bag from Timothy’s. Yay! Coffee!

  “Here it is Cate, just the way you like it. Drink up before you go in, okay? It’s a messy one.” Will takes the lid off the cup carefully before handing it to me.

  “Worse than the other one I told you about last year?” I say grabbing the cup and appreciatively inhaling the smell before I sip.

  “Not worse, no, but still foul. He hasn’t been cleaned up yet. My request.”

  We stand there leaning against the wall; drinking coffee while Will fills me in on where the body was found. To see us together you’d never know that the last year of our marriage we barely spoke to each other. That was after months of screaming at one another and detailing each other’s shortcomings. It even included a rowdy fight which ended with him telling me I didn’t know how to be a wife, and me punching him hard in the jaw.

  Will wanted a real wife, and that meant a woman who wasn’t, as he was so fond of telling me, domestically challenged. He liked and respected the fact that I had a career; I was still a forensic law linguist back then, thinking about going after my dream of becoming a private investigator.

  But he also needed someone who was a gourmet cook and kept a spotless house. That was not on my life’s agenda. In the throes of lust and love of that first year, I did try to be what I knew he wanted. But two months into our second year, even the hot sex wasn’t enough to stop the resentment I felt at doing what I hated. I’m domestically challenged by choice. I wanted him to accept me as such.

  The marriage took a fatal hit the night I came home early to the wonderful smell of chicken cacciatore cooking and Will and his patrol partner, Debbie, drinking wine in our living room. I watched her refill his empty wine glass from my Baccarat crystal decanter, the one my elderly, wealthy aunt had given me for a bridal shower gift. They were laughing over some private little exchange and they looked so intimate and cozy; so much more like a couple than Will and me.

  They both got up when they saw me standing there, and Will explained that he had asked his partner to come over for dinner because there had been a transmitter break in her neighborhood earlier the night before and her apartment building was without electricity. A lame excuse. The kicker was that he then demanded to know why I was home so early, as if I was somehow to blame for walking into my own home and finding them drinking wine out of our wedding crystal. Even though I knew in my heart that nothing had happened yet, I also knew that it was only a matter of time until something did happen. . I didn’t want to be the injured spouse in a divorce hearing. That little scene ended a marriage that never should’ve happened.

  ****

  “Catherine.” Giles says my name like it’s the beginning of a song, soft and low; he’s one of the few people who sometimes call me Catherine. I’ve known Giles for a couple of years, but we’ve only been seriously dating for two months. He glances at Will and they nod at each.

  “Will.”

  “Giles.”

  They’re professionals. I try not to think about the fact that both men have seen me nude. I wonder if they’re thinking the same thing.

  “Good, now that you’re both here we can take a look. I haven’t unloaded the body yet as per your request, Will. He’s still bagged. Just did some preliminary checking. It’s interesting. Let’s go have a look and see what we can see.”

  I gulp my coffee and toss the empty cup in a trash bin then follow Giles and Will inside. Personally, I never get over seeing a corpse. You would think that after a while in my profession you’d become immune; not so with me. There’s always the very brief startle factor. No matter how badly damaged the body, it still seems as if it will come back to life again, like some modern Frankenstein. Stupid I know, but that’s always my momentary reaction. After that I get down to business and hunt for evidence.

  The morgue is cold and too white with harsh lighting that hurts my eyes. Giles unzips the body bag and he and his assistant move the body, naked except for a priest’s black and white collar, over onto the slab. I step forward. The death-released smells of urine, defecation, and fear-sweat hit us. It is a brutal murder. There’s lots of anger here and it looks very personal. The eyes are open with terror as if the victim knew that he was going to die in a horrible way. Ligature marks on his wrists, waist, and ankles, tell me he was restrained before death and a deep stabbing slice to the carotid shows me how he died. The killer, I am sure, wanted him to know what was coming.

  “Well? Post-mortem like before?” asks Will gesturing to what is inside the dead man's mouth.

  Giles looks down to where the male genitalia should be but isn’t and then uses his gloved hand and a large tweezer-like instrument to remove the fleshy object, the man’s penis, which was jammed into the mouth.

  “Yes. The M.E. from Westchester County, where you found that body last year, Cate, sent over the report on the first victim and the details match what was done here too.”

  They roll the body over onto the stomach and Giles says, “Sodomizing was done several times while the victim was still alive and done with enough force to cause anal tearing and internal damage. It looks like it might be the same murderer or murderers since everything has been done in precisely the exact manner. Looks like a sharp surgical tool was used.”

  I examine the body front and back, check the marks on the wrists and ankles, and note that everything, down to the last detail, is exactly the same as with the other murder. A naked man in his late sixties, early seventies, dressed only in a priest’s collar, had been brutally sodomized with a large blunt instrument while he was alive. After having his throat slit, the same blade was used to remove his penis, which was then placed deep inside his mouth. This was an angry killing.

  “Okay, Will.” I say. “This looks the same as the other one last year. I gave you my thoughts on that one. Let’s see what else we have here.”

  I stifle a yawn. The kick from the coffee is starting to wear off. Will looks at Giles and nods.

  “Read the message and tell me what you think of it, Cate.”

  Reaching over, Giles turns the white priest collar inside out. Carefully and neatly printed across it in black marker are the words, “Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate”.

  “It’s from The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri,” I say after reading it out loud. “L’Inferno, the first part of Dante’s 14th-century poem.”

  “Yes,” says Giles, eyes lighting up in recognition. “Right. The author, Dante, imagines himself going on a journey through Hell, Purgatory, and then Heaven. He’s guided by the Roman poet Virgil. Great epic poem. A touch of heartfelt love there too. Virgil was sent by Béatrice, the love of Dante's life, to help guide him safely through it all.”

  He turns to me. “You read it in the original language right, Catherine? I remember you telling me that.”

  I nod. He smiles at me over the body, which is kind of creepy but I smile back.

  “And what exactly do the words signify?” Will is getting impatient and looks totally pissed at Giles. God forbid Giles and I should share a memory. “Want to clue me in on what it me
ans or do you two want to continue going down the memory lane of epic poetry?”

  “Oh, sure,” I snap back to the fact that I’m standing in a morgue. I can’t help feeling surprised and strangely happy that Giles remembered me telling him that little bit of trivia. I take a breath and become professional again.

  “The words, okay. They’re from the part of the story just before Dante passes through the gate of Hell. There’s an inscription written on the gate for all sinners to read. The Devil, it seems, wants them to fully understand their plight:

  “ ‘Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate’.”

  “Uh-huh. Which means?”

  “ ‘Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.’”

  Chapter 2

  The killer’s message is obvious to all three of us. Abandon all hope, there’s no way out, “The person who did this is no dummy, Will. Those words were written by someone who knows the classical Latin as well as ancient history. They have a meaning and it appears as if the meaning is sadistic.”

  Dante may have written the words in his poem, but the idea behind them was pretty common knowledge during his time. Anyone imprisoned and sentenced to any one of the numerous horrible deaths during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries knew there was no hope..

  Prisons were made up of dirt floor cells in dungeons below ground with only small windows high up out of reach. The prisoner was shackled to an iron oval hammered deep inside a stonewall. Torture and mutilation of prisoners were common during the Holy Roman Empire The Catholic Church was notorious for the most awful tortures. The Hell Dante wrote about was conceived from what he knew happened inside those prisons run by the Church.

  “The real message of those insidious acts was to instill fear and terror into the minds of the people,” I tell Will.

  “So what you’re saying is that we're dealing with someone who knows the history of torture and is sending a message from ancient poetry to terrify people? A scholarly killer?”