AHMM, Jan-Feb 2006

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Bates was still studying the picture. “No chance there's a box of these still around the station?"

  "Not that I've seen in years.” He headed back to the sports department.

  Sergeant Bates smiled as he heard the sounds from the next room. “What are they doing, watching American football?"

  Beth shrugged. “I guess so.” Then she remembered her reason for phoning Bates. She showed him the film clip of the first Boxing Day victim after he'd arrested her.

  "Yeah, I remember her. She told us at the time she'd come here to attend the university. It wasn't till after she was killed that we found out she was a runaway, if you can call a nineteen year old a runaway. Legally we couldn't force her to return to Thunder Bay."

  "What about these other girls?"

  "They were legitimate students. It was just a crazy college stunt. Durban hung around with them for a while but never attended classes."

  "She must have been living somewhere, perhaps with her killer."

  "That's what we thought, but we could never prove it. Then after the second killing we decided it wasn't a sex thing at all. Larry Amsterdam was a two-bit hoodlum who served a year in prison for assault and robbery. You've probably got a tape of that too somewhere. I was in on the arrest."

  "What about last year's victim? Wasn't he a gay activist?"

  "Earl Sydney? Nice guy. He had a gift shop down on Queens Quay and was president of the small business council. He wasn't that much of an activist, though."

  "Was he living with someone?"

  "No, he lived alone. All three of the victims did, near as we can tell."

  "Did you ever arrest him?"

  Bates was puzzled by her question. “No. Why do you ask?"

  "I hadn't realized the first two victims were people you'd arrested. Could there be a pattern there?"

  He laughed at the thought. “What sort of pattern would that be?"

  Beth shrugged. “Enemies of society, in the eyes of the killer. A girl who went topless, an ex-convict, a gay man."

  But Bates wasn't buying it. “Someone like that wouldn't wait a year between victims."

  "There could be a copy-cat killer with his own motives."

  "All three were the work of the same killer. We never released details of the dismemberments, but they were all done the same way."

  A cheer went up in the sports department and Beth said, “Maybe we've seen the end of it. Maybe there'll be no Boxing Day killer this year. Here it is after one o'clock and nothing's happened yet."

  Sergeant Bates grunted and prepared to leave. “How late are you working today?"

  "Till four—unless a big story breaks. I started at seven this morning."

  "Suppose I come by at four to pick you up."

  "Pick me up? I have my own car."

  "I know. Maybe we could have a drink for the holidays."

  Those words were about the last thing she expected to hear from Matt Bates. They'd had a friendly enough relationship over the past three years, but it was a business relationship only—the press and the police. Now, suddenly, he seemed to be inviting her out on a date.

  "I ... I don't know."

  "Sure, why not?"

  "All right,” she agreed. “There's a little place in the Distillery District that'll be open today.” She wrote down the address for him.

  "Great! I'll see you there at four.” He paused at the newsroom door. “If you go out on an assignment this afternoon, call me. Okay?"

  "What?” she asked, not certain she'd heard correctly. But by that time he was gone.

  Beth strolled into the sports department to watch the game. The station was showing an old Christmas movie and she couldn't blame them for choosing football instead. Walker and Merritt and LeFavre were all grouped around the TV monitor tuned to the Buffalo station, and she saw that Foxy O'Dwyer had joined them. All seemed convinced that nothing was going to happen this year. The killings were over.

  She remembered her questions to Bates about the third victim and decided to check the files. It would have been done a year ago, of course, and surely any arrest would have been noted. There was only one file film for Earl Sydney, in the spring of 2003, addressing a luncheon of the small business council. Seeing it again, she remembered that the station had run it at the time of his murder. She shut off the monitor and went back to the football game.

  It was nearly three o'clock when Glen Walker took a call and told her, “Beth, there's a truck skidded and overturned on the QEW in Mississauga, just past the Dixie Road exit. Take Foxy along and get some footage for six o'clock."

  O'Dwyer grumbled and got to his feet. “I'd rather watch the end of the game. Come on, Beth. We can take the van."

  She remembered her four o'clock date with Matt Bates. He'd said to phone him if she went out on assignment, but she figured she'd be back in time. “I've got an appointment after work. I'd better take my own car."

  She followed O'Dwyer out of the Broadcast Centre parking lot, in the shadow of CN Tower, and onto the Gardiner Expressway, which became Queen Elizabeth Way. The expressway was noted for its heavy traffic, bound for Hamilton, Buffalo, and Niagara Falls, but on Boxing Day it was surprisingly light. They encountered only minor delays on the way to the accident. The sunny day had turned cloudy, though, and as their vehicles approached the overturned truck a light snow was falling. O'Dwyer raised the tower of their transmitter and Beth checked her makeup in the car mirror. Then she got the clip-on mike from the truck and found a likely police officer to interview. The driver of the truck and been taken to the hospital in an ambulance but his injuries did not appear severe.

  Even on a slow news day the story didn't rate more than a few minutes. She thanked the officer and gave the mike back to Foxy. Her car was parked just behind the news van and as she opened the door he called to her. “Looks like your tire's flat, Beth."

  Indeed it was. She cursed silently and reached for her cell phone. “I suppose most of the garages are closed today too."

  "Do you have a spare?"

  "Sure, but I'm not up to changing it myself in this weather."

  He smiled at her. “I can do it. Wait in the van, out of the cold."

  "Thanks, Foxy. You're a doll."

  He followed her into the van. “I'll need the key to your trunk."

  She turned to hand it to him and a stark white odor seemed to blot out her vision. She had a fleeting memory of a childhood hospital stay, and then nothing.

  Beth awoke gradually, trying to focus on what had happened. She realized at once that she was unable to move or speak. Her wrists and ankles were tied, and a piece of tape covered her mouth. She was lying on a rough blanket of some sort, and when she opened her eyes she could see the outlines of a dimly lit garage. A window was covered with a burlap sack, but she knew it was after dark.

  Then Foxy O'Dwyer came into view. “You're awake. I didn't want you to wake up, but don't worry. I'll give you another dose so you'll sleep through it all."

  She grunted and tried to speak through the tape, but only panicked noises came from her. Then she caught sight of a half dozen boxes of various sizes, piled on top of one another. Fully awake now, she tried to roll away from him.

  He grabbed onto her leg and held her. “I didn't want it to be you, really I didn't! I spent the whole year hoping someone else would turn up. But there was nobody. A sacrifice had to be made, and you were the only one. Every year, on the day after Christmas, to keep the terrorists away. And it's worked, hasn't it? You'll be the fourth, and there'll be two more, if I can find them."

  He was mad, insane, and he was going to kill her. Six, why six? And why her? She saw him take up the cloth again and douse it with chloroform. “I'm sorry, Beth,” he said and stepped toward her. “Real sorry."

  She kicked out at him, forcing him back for just an instant. Then the burlap-covered window exploded inward and a familiar voice shouted, “Police! Hands up!"

  O'Dwyer cursed and dove toward her, and Matt Bates fired a single
shot to bring him down.

  It was ten o'clock that night before Beth saw Matt Bates again. They'd checked her out at the hospital and were sending her home when he appeared at the door of the examining room.

  "What happened?” she asked at once. “Is he alive?"

  "Just barely, crazy as a loon. He made a statement. I guess you'd call it a confession."

  "How'd you know? How'd you find me?"

  "I had a hunch the killer might have you targeted. When I found that matchbook from your station I wondered if one of your co-workers might be the Boxing Day killer. The matches hadn't been available for years, but a station employee might have had some. And I noticed, as you did, that each of the victims had been seen on your TV news prior to their deaths. If you were the target, the fire might have been set to lure you out there. The killer would know you'd be sent for a fire report while everyone else was off. But with your cameraman along there'd be no chance to get at you. Not unless Foxy himself was the killer. When you didn't show up at four o'clock I checked with the station and found that you and Foxy were on assignment. I found your car with the flat tire, conveniently caused by Foxy, and figured out what had happened. I raced out to his house and found the station van in the driveway. I heard his voice from inside the garage and smashed in the window."

  "He was apologizing, Matt, as he got ready to kill me! He said he needed six people and this year he couldn't find anyone but me."

  "I realized it some time back, your connection with the three previous victims. He'd have taken you this morning at the fire scene if I hadn't happened along. I stuck close to you lately for that very reason."

  "He said it was a sacrifice to prevent more terrorism."

  "That's what it was in his crazed mind. One victim each year on Boxing Day, their names representing cities on each of the six inhabited continents. Durban from Africa, Amsterdam from Europe, Sydney from Australia."

  "My name!"

  "Of course. You were South America. Six continents, six victims, six boxes for the body parts.” He paused and then said, “Come on, I'll take you home."

  "Home, hell! Take me to the station. I'm the lead item on the eleven o'clock news!"

  An hour later she sat there with Hayes Merritt at her side and stared at the camera. “Good evening. This is Beth Valparaiso, reporting live on the capture of the Boxing Day killer."

  Copyright (c) 2006 Edward D. Hoch

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  Bad Weather by William J. Carroll, Jr.

  The body in the wall began to sag outward as the whole cave started to sink around me, so I didn't have time to pay it any final respects.

  All I did have time for was a mad, semi-panicky scramble to the cave opening—and I made it—the mud walls oozing together behind me—just in time to feel the hurricane hit like the hammer of God.

  Because this was, finally, the real Amanda—the real horrific deal—the night before being just a mild prelude—and I'd never seen anything like it.

  Flying sheets of water and mud and vegetation flailing around me. The wind so fierce I had to crawl or be carried away. And the noise so loud I wanted to cry.

  Some morning.

  It was two hours until sunrise, and I couldn't see a thing, having dropped my flashlight back in the cave, but the good news was that whoever shot me wouldn't be around.

  No one would.

  So, aside from the hurricane, I was safe.

  I slipped-slid down onto the rocks at the foot of the mud hill, where I got battered by the surging river, and fell I-don't-know-how-many-times, but somehow dragged myself around the headland to the swamp.

  Where the wind was a micron less fierce, but where I couldn't find the trail back to the highway, because not only could I not see, nothing was as it had been.

  So, with my head low, I stagger-walked in waist- to neck-deep water for what seemed like hours, until the water shallowed and I walked into a mangrove tree, a nasty curved branch jamming into my shoulder. That started it bleeding again, so I decided I was done for a while, and just hunkered down on the leeward side of the mangrove's trunk, closed my eyes, and waited.

  Not thinking I was too old for this, because I'd never been young enough; not thinking I should have had second thoughts about coming to look for the body with the hurricane hovering just off the North Carolina shore, because the damn thing must have changed direction.

  And not thinking about who might have shot me, as much as what to do about it.

  Not that it was much of a wound—just a groove in the skin below the shoulder, but it stung and kept me angry. Angry enough to want to do something about it.

  So, that's what occupied my thoughts until the storm passed and left me in a soft but persisting rain.

  Which, in the relative calm, is when I got out my cell and made two calls.

  The first, as I trudged back toward the highway, to the police, though I knew I wouldn't be a high priority on their list of things-to-do-when-a-hurricane-hits.

  And then, when I was finally sitting in my rented Explorer, which had been rolled off the road and into a ditch, I made the second, to Scotty McKey.

  Who'd started it all. Two days ago, at the Fort Bragg BOQ.

  I had just recently returned from a wasted TDY to Bosnia, and I was a day into a two weeks’ leave, which I was spending doing nothing whatever—and liking it. Scotty had left a message on my machine while I'd been away, and I'd intended to call him, but just hadn't gotten around to it.

  There was a new waitress at the Officers’ Club with whom I'd been semiflirting, and who for the moment had a lot of my attention. In fact, I'd been just about on my way to the club, with full-fledged flirting on my mind, and some wishful thinking for the days ahead, when Scotty called again.

  "Virginiak, you cretin,” he said, when I answered, “don't you ever return your calls?"

  "Hey, Scotty, what's happening?"

  "How're you doing pal?"

  "I'm doing fine, Scotty,” I said. “How are you?"

  "I've done better."

  "Where are you, man?"

  "New place near Raleigh,” he told me. “Cormier Memorial."

  "Oh yeah?"

  "Yeah,” he said. “Been here a couple years now."

  I felt like sudden death.

  "It's a dump, actually,” he went on, “but it's country, and better than most, you know?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "Reason I called,” he said, “I wonder if you could drop down to see me."

  "Sure,” I said. “I'm on leave right now, as a matter of fact. How about next week?"

  "Look,” he said, after a small hesitation. “I think you'd better come now. I don't know how I'm gonna be, you know? I have good weeks and bad.” He laughed. “I may not even be around next week."

  "You heading back west?"

  "No,” he told me with reluctance. “I'm kinda sick, you know?"

  Oh Jesus, I thought.

  "So,” he said. “What do you think?"

  What could I think? What else could I do?

  I told him I'd be there first thing in the morning.

  Which pretty much bollixed up my vague plans, but in a way it was the price of my being alive today, or being in one fully functioning piece, at least, so I paid it.

  Made an early night of it, got up at dawn, gassed my rented Explorer, and then headed down toward Raleigh.

  Remembering Scotty McKey—Captain Robert R. McKey—and Honduras, 1984.

  We'd been stationed at a forward staging area, supporting Contra forces in Nicaragua. A mission that was a waste of material, time, and lives that embarrasses me now to even think about—but, we were there.

  Scotty was a veteran chopper pilot, and myself an area security officer. We'd spent some long drinking nights together in sundry Tegucigalpa bars and had gotten to be pretty good friends.

  As good as friends became in the Army, anyway.

  But then, on a routine supply mission on which I'd gone as courier for some sensitive
material, we took a partial hit from a SAM in the tail rotor and spent a miserable twenty minutes trying to get back across the border.

  With the cockpit smoked up and the aircraft wobbling all over the place, it was a miracle Scotty kept the thing in the air as long as he did.

  All the way, in fact, to the Rios Coco—where he had the kicker and me drop into the river; but with no open ground on which to land and no way of landing the thing safely anyway, Scotty tried just letting the aircraft down into the water—but the thing spun away from him at the last minute. The aircraft hit a rock, the main rotor breaking free and hard-dumping the chopper upside down on the river bank.

  Breaking Scotty's back, and leaving him with a life without legs.

  Because of other various related medical problems, he'd spent his life in a number of VA hospitals over the years. Though I'd visited with him from time to time, it never felt like I'd done enough.

  I made it down to Raleigh the next day as promised and found Cormier Memorial easily enough, getting to the old ramshackle institution around noon. As VA nursing facilities went, I suppose, Cormier was better than most, but I can think of better places to be.

  An ancient, wooden, rambling facility, it looked more like an old high school campus than a hospital.

  I parked in a lot that was adjacent to an overgrown baseball field, nodded hello to some vets on wheels sitting on a shaded porch by the entrance, and after a bit of ducking in and out of corridors, found the critical care ward where Scotty McKey was bedded.

  And, he didn't look the same.

  Not at all.

  When I first met Scotty McKey, he'd been in his thirties, and owned a large, well-sculpted body that had that male-model look to it. Six three or four, about a hundred and ninety pounds, tight skin the color of chestnuts. He sported a short afro back then and a big, ever-ready smile that he used a lot, with his dark eyes glittering, as he laughed a deep, infectious laugh over anything at all.

  That had been in 1984.

  Flash forward to 1991 to a VA hospital outside San Diego. Now in his early forties and wheelchair bound, with a huge upper body and withered little legs. His smile had been the same and his eyes still glittered. Only the laugh had lost some of its timbre.