Night Terror

by Chandler McGrew

  “I found it washed up in No Name Creek. It was in such good shape you could have aired up the tires and ridden it back to town.”

  “How did you know to look there?”

  Virgil picked up the files and returned them to their favorite resting place in his cabinet. “I got a tip.”

  “From who?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “I’m playing the D.A. again. You want me to work for you. Show me what you got.”

  Virgil sighed. “A woman named Babs St. Clair told me to look there.”

  “How did she know it would be there?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know? What the hell does that mean? What does she say?”

  “If you must know, the information came out during a séance, all right? Will you check on Audrey Bock’s background or not?”

  “A séance? What were you doing at a séance?”

  Virgil sighed. “Doris wanted it.” He leaned back in his chair and rubbed the bridge of his nose, hard.

  “That sounds pretty crazy, Virg.”

  “I know how it sounds. Will you check?”

  Mac nodded. “Any ideas where I should start?”

  “Start with a woman named Tara Beals.”

  Mac stared at him as though he had two heads.

  “What?” said Virgil. “You know her?”

  Mac took a moment answering. “I know of her. She’s a shrink, right?”

  “Yeah. Audrey Bock’s her niece. Apparently Tara took Audrey away from her mother, so there was probably abuse at home when she was a child. I want to know if it could have caused Audrey to, you know, do something crazy.”

  “I don’t know,” said Mac. “I got to be careful, Virg, or they’ll pull my license.”

  “I know that. Don’t get yourself over a barrel. Just see what you can find out. Okay?”

  “I’ll see what I can do,” said Mac, brightening. “You want I should bump off your killer before I leave?”

  Virgil smiled. “No, thank-you. The state might not be too pleased with that.”

  Mac shrugged and left without saying good-bye. He was always doing that. Sometimes he just seemed to go off on a tangent. But he could lock onto a case like a bulldog. Virgil hoped something like that would happen now. He needed someone to lock onto something.

  He watched through the window as Mac climbed into his blue sedan and drove away. Then he kicked his feet up onto his desk and tried to think of something, anything, that he’d missed over the past five years. He wanted the cases solved so bad he could taste it. So bad he was praying that Mac could speed things along, find another clue, anything to get the damned thing moving again before time ran out. But the more he cogitated about it, the less he thought he was going to live to see an end to it.

  He got up from his desk like an old dog after a long nap, stretching every muscle in his body, trying to get the damned thing to work the way it should, the way it had twenty years before. Finally he shouted down the hall to Birch to tell him he had an errand to run.

  There was nothing more to be found at No Name Creek, he knew that, but still Virgil was drawn back there. He pulled over on the shoulder, parking under the shade of a tall oak, sliding down the embankment and following the crushed grass trail the deputies had created during the search.

  The bike was gone now, safely tucked away in the evidence locker after having been gone over by a forensic specialist from Augusta who told Virgil exactly what he’d expected to hear. Too late to find anything of any value. Still, as he trudged down the middle of the dry creekbed toward the spot where the bike had lain for five long years, he couldn’t get the idea out of his head that the place was trying to tell him something. It kept calling to him in ways that he wouldn’t have responded to a week before. Now he wasn’t quite so quick to ignore a hunch, if that’s what this was. Only it didn’t feel like a hunch. It felt as though he was supposed to be here. Like he and the creek and the woods and the sky were all waiting for something to happen.

  Timmy Merrill had been here. At least he had been as close as the old bridge. And his bike had washed up on that spot right there. It was as though the boy had left a residue of himself, and Virgil kept rubbing up against it.

  You’re getting too wrapped up in this again. You’ve got to ease off. Let it go.

  Only he couldn’t do that. Partly because the case had been eating at him for so long. Partly because of the nature of the two cases that he knew were connected. And partly because they were his only reason to keep on breathing when he was away from home. If he didn’t focus on them, he focused on Doris, and he didn’t want to go there right now.

  He walked on past the crime tape, following the winding creek through the deep hardwood forest, listening to a rustling off to his right that he knew had to be another damned porcupine from the slow way it ambled through the brush. Porkies weren’t afraid of anything. They didn’t have much reason to be. Good thing it hadn’t been here when the hounds came through. They’d have gotten a mouthful of quills for their trouble.

  The sliver of water that meandered beside him was too small to be heard over the slight sound of the animal foraging, but Virgil could smell the clean dampness of it over the dusty dryness of the surrounding earth. It was good to get out of the cruiser for a while, even if it was on a wild-goose chase, and he wandered slowly another couple of hundred yards down the streambed.

  He glanced over his shoulder when a twig snapped behind him. Porcupines weren’t big enough to make noises like that. More likely a deer. He stopped in his tracks, waiting to see if it would slip out of the brush for a drink.

  But what was a deer doing moving around at midday? They were mostly hunkered down about now, waiting till dusk to forage. And now that he thought about it, the porcupine was up early too. He turned back up the creek, cocking his head to see around an overhanging limb just as the sound of gravel sliding over gravel carried to him. Deer didn’t make mistakes like that unless they were in one hell of a hurry.

  “Anybody there?” he called.

  More gravel, but no answer. He slid his hand over the butt of his pistol, unsnapping the strap. He thought he heard footsteps up the creek, but they were furtive sounds and he might have been mistaken.

  “Hello!” he shouted.

  Still no answer. It had to be his imagination running away with him. But just in case, he unholstered his pistol and took it off safety. Then he started—one silent step at a time—back the way he had come, staring up the creek but shooting glances to his left and right. He hadn’t really been paying too much attention to his surroundings before, walking unimpeded down the dry bed. Now the creek seemed like an open sluice with no cover at all. He felt like a lone bowling pin at the end of an alley.

  Why would anyone else be out here today? The investigation of the crime scene was officially ended. There was no equipment for anyone to return for. Maybe it was a gawker come to see what all the excitement had been about and they hadn’t expected to run into him. But then why did they come out here while his cruiser was sitting big as daylight on the road? The thought that maybe someone had come out here for that very reason made him tighten his fingers around the pistol grip.

  Virgil wasn’t foolish enough to believe he had no enemies. Over the years he had put a number of people away. Some were still in. Many weren’t. But it wasn’t something that he lost sleep over, or no more sleep than most cops lost. Very few criminals were stupid enough to try to take revenge on a cop and the ones he could think of were still safely in the pen. As he eased around a sharp outcrop of exposed bedrock, he heard footsteps echoing away up the creek.

  “Stop!” he shouted, breaking into a run.

  Even though the creek wasn’t steep here, it was still an uphill slog, and the loose gravel wasn’t the best footing. To top it off, by the time he reached the next bend he realized for the thousandth time how out of shape he was. He hadn’t run more than fifty yards and his face was already sheened wit
h sweat and his throat burned. He slowed to a walk, clutching at a stitch in his side with his free hand. He was almost to the crime scene again when a car door slammed and a powerful engine roared off up the road. He tried to figure if he could make it out of the creek before the car disappeared, but he knew it was a hopeless race. Instead, he turned back, glancing around for footprints.

  He retraced the entire length of his hike, but the dry gravel gave up nothing. On the way back out he stopped in front of the cruiser, staring off toward Arcos, the direction the car had taken, wondering what the hell had just happened.

  He got home before five that day for a change and didn’t get out of the house again for four days. But he didn’t have much time to think about the missing boys or his mysterious visitor on the creek. Doris’s drugs weren’t dulling the pain the way they had and she was throwing up more than she was keeping down. Sometime in the middle of the first night, Doc Burton stopped by with a prescription, a shake of her head, a hug for Virgil, and then he was alone with Doris again.

  Finally the spell broke like a fever, and she seemed to spring back a little. Enough that she insisted he get out and get some air. As usual, he hated to argue with her, but still he hid for a couple of hours downstairs—waiting to see if she’d call for him—before slipping out.

  Birch had Monday off and Stan, the oldest man besides Virgil in the department, was holding down the fort. Stan glanced up at him from beneath wild gray paintbrush brows when Virgil walked in. “How you doin’, Virg? Doris okay?”

  Virgil nodded. “Yeah, Stan, she’s feeling better. How’re our prisoners?”

  Stan chuckled. “Our license dodger is sleeping.” He frowned. “Our local wife murderer requested a Bible. I didn’t know he could read.”

  Virgil smirked. “Neither did I. Did you get him one?”

  “Yeah. One of the Gideon Bibles from the back room.” They couldn’t leave them in the cells the way the Gideons wanted or the prisoners used the tissue-thin pages as rolling paper for cigarettes. As it was, there wasn’t one complete Bible in the lot.

  “Did Mac call while I’ve been gone?” asked Virgil.

  “Mac Douglass?”

  Virgil nodded and Stan glanced at a notepad, shaking his head.

  “I’ll be in my office,” said Virgil.

  He dropped into his chair and picked up the phone. The secretary who answered told him Mac was out for the day, but she’d have him call as soon as she heard from him. Virgil tapped out a rhythm with his fingertips on the glass top of his desk. He picked up the phone and speed-dialed the state troopers in Augusta, asking to be put through to Charlie Southern, who was only as southern as the south side of what he called Bahston.

  “You want the information when, Virg?” asked Charlie after Virgil gave him the lowdown. “Yesterday, probably?”

  “If possible.”

  “We’re kinda busy right now.”

  “I just need to know where she lived before Ouachita County and what her maiden name was. Any other info you can give me would be nice, though.”

  “I’m sure. Like what?”

  “I’d like to know if she was ever diagnosed with any mental problems, maybe institutionalized. I asked Mac to check for me but I haven’t heard back from him.”

  There was a moment of silence on the line. “Mac Douglass?”

  “Yeah. What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing. It’s just that Mac’s had it kinda rough lately. I used to see him all the time. Now he don’t come around that often.”

  “What happened?”

  “You knew he and I were partners, back in the eighties, right.”

  “No, I didn’t know that.”

  “Mmm. I never told anyone, but Mac retired because he was having problems.”

  “What kind of problems?”

  Silence.

  Virgil understood. Cops could have marital problems. They could have money problems. They could even have gambling problems. Mental problems they didn’t talk about, because they didn’t have them.

  “What happened?”

  “He started going off on people. His temper got very out of control. And then there were a couple of times when he just kind of shut down. Like nothing was getting in. I saw him like that once and it was kind of scary. I thought he’d had a stroke. Then he just kind of like clicked and he was the old Mac again. He saw someone about it, but that didn’t work. They had to hospitalize him for a while. Not a regular hospital. You know,” said Charlie. “He seemed okay and then he got worse again.”

  “Worse how?”

  “Couldn’t sleep, having nightmares, I don’t know what else. He wouldn’t talk to me or anyone else and he wouldn’t go back for treatment, so finally he had to leave. There wasn’t much choice. But I’ve always wondered if retiring was good for him.”

  “Mac once told me that retiring from the force was the best thing that ever happened to him.”

  “I could be wrong. Hang on, I’m going to put you on hold; one of our computer geeks just walked in. I can probably get a couple of answers for you from him.”

  Virgil listened to the dull buzz on the line. Apparently the state troopers couldn’t afford canned music. When Charlie came back on the line, he had a number and name.

  “Audrey Remont. She lived with her aunt, Tara Beals, outside of Augusta.”

  “What about her parents?”

  “Mmm. Says here her aunt got custody in 1971. Mother’s name was Martha Remont. Father deceased. Mother lived in Audesto, California. Sixty-one Pine Crest Drive. You want the phone number?”

  “No. It must have passed through a dozen hands by now. Thanks. Do you have any record of charges against Audrey Remont or Audrey Bock?”

  Charlie took a couple of minutes before coming back on the line. “Nothing here.”

  “Thanks again.”

  “If you see Mac, tell him I said hi.”

  Virgil hung up and got the number of the attorney general for California. After passing through a dozen different offices, he finally spoke to an assistant prosecutor, who told him that the information he was requesting was confidential and not available even to a law officer.

  “Even if I could find out about the woman’s medical history, I couldn’t tell you,” said the man.

  Virgil had suspected as much, but brother officers were prone to stretch the rules now and then. Anyway, he had other fish to fry. “Then maybe you can tell me if the lady in question was ever charged with any crimes in your state.”

  “That I can help you with.”

  “Great,” said Virgil, before discovering that he was being routed to yet another office. The woman there took some time reestablishing his credentials before explaining that he had been connected to the wrong office and transferring him again. Finally a young voice—man or woman, Virgil couldn’t tell—took the information about Audrey and returned in a matter of minutes to tell Virgil that there were no records of any charges ever being pressed against Audrey or Martha Remont.

  Virgil had a hunch. “How about Tara Beals?”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t have her social security. But could you run a check on just the name?”

  “Is she any relation to the psychiatrist?”

  Virgil stared at the phone. “She is the psychiatrist.”

  “Cool.”

  “You know who she is?”

  “Yeah, dude. Tara Beals wrote the book on self-hypnosis. Man, it’s the best. You really don’t know who she is?”

  “Not really. Could you check for me?”

  “For charges? For Tara Beals? Man, are you serious?Was Martha Remont a patient of hers?”

  “Sister. Check for me?”

  “Yeah, okay. Give me a sec.”

  This time he got music. When the boy-slash-girl came back, he sounded surprised. “She was charged with trespassing, but then later the complainant dropped the charges.”

  “Who was that?”

  “Weird.”

  “Who?”
/>   “Martha Remont. Her sister.”

  It sounded like Martha was trying to keep Tara away from Audrey. Why? Because she didn’t want the abuse exposed? Did she file the charges to protect Audrey’s father or some unknown boyfriend who was doing the abusing?

  “Tell me more about Tara Beals,” said Virgil.

  “A friend turned me on to her books two years ago,” said the voice. “They changed my life. You should read them.”

  “But what about Tara herself?”

  “I don’t know. She’s one of those recluses, you know. No picture on the cover, no bio except her credentials.”

  “And those are?”

  “I can’t remember them all. Seemed like she must have graduated from every highfalutin school in the East.”

  Virgil thanked the person and hung up. When he discovered that Tara’s phone was unlisted, he called Charlie again.

  “You’re working overtime today,” said Charlie.

  “The number?”

  Charlie gave it to him and he dialed the number, but before the second ring he hung up and pulled out his reverse reference phone book. Tara Beals, Old Route 137, Augusta. He called a friend at the post office who made some calls and got him instructions on how to find the house. It was a two-hour ride but he had no trouble finding the driveway, even though the name on the old mailbox was so weathered it was almost unreadable. Beals was emblazoned in brass letters on the wrought-iron gate. He wasn’t too surprised to find a call box in the stone pilaster. Tara answered on the third ring with her name instead of “hello,” and Virgil introduced himself.

  “What can I do for you, Sheriff?” Her voice sounded like warm honey, and he remembered her from the first days after Zach’s disappearance. She’d been a striking woman.

  “I’d like to come up and talk, if you don’t mind. I’m wondering what you can tell me about Audrey’s past,” he said.