New Title 1

by Carol Davis Luce

  Chapter 19

  Justin and Alex had driven the twelve miles from her house to his with only minimal conversation. It was five A.M. She was not a morning person.

  Although it was still dark, Alex sensed the sky was roiling with storm clouds. Wind rocked the car. As they cleared the city limits and drove along a deserted country road, sand and bits of sagebrush snapped at the windows.

  Justin went through the open gate onto his property. As the Corvette bumped along on the gravel driveway, Alex saw a white Volkswagen Rabbit parked at the east side of a one-story ranch house. A dark-haired woman paced behind the car.

  "Good, Capucci's already here," Justin said.

  "What did she say when you asked her to baby-sit a grown woman?”

  "She said, 'no problem.' Capucci takes her job seriously. Off duty as well as on.”

  Justin pulled in behind the Rabbit. Capucci walked back to meet them as they climbed from the car.

  "Looks like a Tonapah Low coming in the back door," Capucci said, looking to the north, her hair whipping about her face. "That usually means trouble."

  "Hurry, let's go in," Justin said, leaping up the steps. He opened the front door and ushered the two women inside. "Thanks for coming, Bev. I owe you one."

  "You owe me two, but who's counting."

  "I'm going to grab a quick shower. Bev, would you mind fixing coffee?" Justin called out as he headed down the hall. "Make yourselves at home, both of you."

  Alex followed Capucci into the kitchen. She watched as the other woman, seeming to know where everything was, busied herself making the coffee. She walked around the kitchen, taking in the rustic decor of used brick, sandstone tile, and hammered copper. Finally she moved toward the dining room. Leaning against the doorway, she looked into the living room and the long hallway Justin had gone down.

  It had been apparent to Alex the moment she'd walked into the house that it was a man's domain. Warm and comfortable, with heavy wood furniture and a lived-in look, the rooms were both messy and inviting. Plants flourished everywhere. No dinky knickknacks or frills, only functional accessories. Magazines and newspapers lay neatly stacked on the table in front of the couch and on the floor at the side of a large reclining chair. An apothecary jar, two-thirds full of unshelled sunflower seeds, sat on an oak table alongside the recliner. A pair of reading glasses leaned against the jar.

  Over the running water Capucci said, "I remember now. Last week, Rockridge Drive. You're the one whose house was broken into. What was it the intruder did? Listen in on your extension?"

  "That's right,” Alex said without turning. "He also killed my cat. Attempted to kill my other cat. Attacked me and then killed the woman whose house he was holing up in."

  Capucci shut off the water and stared down into the coffee pot. "Jus didn't tell me that."

  "Guess he didn't have time. It's all happening very fast."

  A few minutes later Justin came up to Alex. He silently pulled her into the dining room and, with his body, pressed her against the wall. He was dressed casually in slacks, sport shirt, and jacket. His hair was damp, and he smelled fresh and woodsy. He whispered in her ear, "If you get scared, don't hesitate to call the station. Ask for De Solo. He'll assist Capucci if you need him."

  "We'll be all right," she whispered back as he kissed her temple, stroked her throat.

  Capucci stepped into the dining room. "Coffee will be ready in--Oh, sorry," she said when she saw the two against the wall. She retreated into the kitchen.

  "Reno PD checked out the shed at Klump's house. No motorcycle. They're out looking at the airport now. If it's there they'll stick close to see if he comes back for it. If he does, they'll have him." Justin kissed Alex long and sweet. "I've got to go." He backed up. "I'll call."

  Alex nodded. She stayed where she was as Justin strode into the kitchen and said something to Capucci. A minute later she heard his pickup truck start up and pull away, tires crunching on the gravel drive. "Be careful, Justin,” she said quietly to herself.

  Dr. Clifton Penndulbury tapped a fingernail to the tortoiseshell frame of his eyeglasses as he listened to Justin Holmes. Justin wondered if the doctor's distracting habit carried over into his therapy sessions. Penndulbury reminded him of Woody Allen. An aging, meatier Woody Allen without a shred of humor.

  "You're certain the man you're after is a patient of mine?"

  "Reasonably sure. I got his name, your name, and the name of this place from Thelma Klump before she died. The description she gave of her attacker was of a badly scarred man."

  "I see." The doctor leaned forward, made a steeple with his fingers, and cleared his throat. "You realize, of course, Sergeant Holmes, I don't have to tell you anything that went on within these walls between my patient and me. Privileged information.”

  Justin nodded.

  "It's common knowledge. William Hunter—that's his name by the way — committed a crime ten years ago and was declared insane. You can get that information at the Portland Star. But you say he has allegedly committed a crime since his release?"

  "Yes. And that was only to get to Mrs. Carlson. God only knows what he has in mind for her." Justin felt a wrenching in his stomach when he thought of Alex. Although she had tried to appear cool and calm, he'd sensed that she had been just short of terrified.

  "Can you tell me why he was incarcerated? It might help to shed some light on his motive for wanting to hurt Mrs. Carlson." Justin stared at Penndulbury. "Hate, revenge, jealousy? What?"

  "What's his relationship to this Alex Carlson?"

  "I don't know. There's a possibility he could be her father."

  "Impossible. Will is twenty-two—twenty-three at most."

  Justin mulled that over. "The names of his parents?"

  "Mother . . . Lora Hunter. Father unknown."

  "Lora? Alex's sister. Christ. The baby," Justin said. "Then William Bently— Alex and Lora's father—is Hunter's grandfather.”

  "Appears so."

  "Bently again. He's the connecting link. But how? Why?"

  "How did this woman—Klurnp was it?—how did she die?"

  "She was beaten and her house set on fire."

  The doctor sighed. He rose, stepped to a file cabinet and pulled out a fat folder. "William Hunter was committed in nineteen-seventy-seven, at the age of twelve, for arson and matricide.”

  "Gin," Beverly Capucci said, laying down her cards. "That's a game. Play another?"

  "Whose deal?" Alex said.

  "You sure you want to play? Your mind doesn't seem to be on the game."

  "I'll try not to make it so easy for you this time." Alex couldn't concentrate. She was bored stiff with the card game, yet there was nothing else to do. The wind, whipping the trees and blowing dirt across the pasture to the house, had knocked out the television reception.

  "Stop fretting. Relax. Even if that goofball is in town, he's not going to find you out here. And if he did—a big if—I'm ready for him." Capucci patted the service revolver on the table.

  "Maybe you ought to take it out of the holster."

  "We'll play to a hundred again," Capucci said. "How about a nickel a point? Loser's points deducted from the winner's."

  "Fine.” Alex smiled inwardly. Capucci was no dummy. She knew a good tap when she saw one. Like money in the bank. But what the hell, Alex thought blithely, with something at stake, she might be able to get her mind on the game.

  A soft thud against the house made both women jump. The gun was out of the holster and in Capucci's hand in a flash.

  "What was that?" Alex whispered.

  "I'll know in a minute." Capucci was on her feet, moving toward the kitchen with Alex close behind. On the wood siding by the back door she heard scratching.

  Capucci went to the window and, keeping to the side of it, looked out, then down. "Come have a look,” she said, lowering the gun.

  Alex glanced down to see two huge tumbleweeds, meshed together, bouncing forward, rebounding, then advancing again. They
looked as if they were trying to climb up the side of the house to the window.

  "There's your intruder. Look out there." Capucci pointed to an open expanse of land thick with tumbleweed. "There's a heap more where they came from, and they'll be a headin' this a way. Invasion of the giant tumbleweeds. Makes your blood run cold, don't it?"

  The telephone on the desk dinged. Penndulbury ignored it. He opened the file in front of him and silently read for several minutes. "Sergeant, let me begin by saying that we, the hospital staff here at Westgate, felt confident that Will was of sound mind. Rehabilitation complete. We wouldn't have released him otherwise.”

  "I'm not questioning your decision regarding his release, Doctor.”

  "He reports to me in person twice a month," Penndulbury went on as though Justin hadn't spoken. "He was here, sitting where you are sitting, yesterday between four and five."

  "Then he's flying back and forth from Portland to Reno.”

  "Perhaps. I just know he reports to me every other Saturday. He'd committed one violent act as a child. Ten years later, we were as satisfied as anyone can be that he was able to differentiate between fantasy and fact. That he was cognizant of his act. Four years ago he finally came to terms with the nightmare of his mother's death.

  "Nightmare . . ." The doctor leaned back in his chair, rocked lightly, and tapped at his glasses. "The horrors of the unconscious mind. Until three years ago, my patient was haunted by frequent, recurring nightmares. Violent, self-inflicted punishment resulted from his night journeys into hell.”

  "The scars on his face and hands that Klump mentioned, they were self-inflicted? His mother didn't beat —"

  "No. To my knowledge his mother never raised a hand to him. He clawed and bit himself time and again. In the beginning of his incarceration, we found it necessary to restrain him a good part of the time — for his own safety."

  "Why did he hate his mother?"

  "On the contrary, Sergeant Holmes, he loved her. Will told me he loved her more than life itself. You see, she was all he had . . . and he was all she had.

  "They lived on a farm twenty miles from Portland. In the twelve years they lived on Hanson's farm, the mother never left the house."

  "Why?"

  "My guess would be agoraphobia— fear of open spaces—complicated by the fear of being alone. Who's to say? The what ifs and maybes are not important. What we do know is for the first twelve years of her son's life she managed to imprison him in that house with her."

  "How?"

  "Simple. She passed her terror on to him. We now know that one can be controlled and made to do—to believe — anything, if one is conditioned long enough and thoroughly enough. Remember the Jonestown mass suicide?" Justin nodded. "She began to condition him as an infant. He lived in constant terror that some horrible thing or things beyond the confines of their house would one day devour him."

  "What in God's name did she terrorize him with?"

  "They had no radio or television, but she had at her disposal a wealth of reading material. There were enough books on reptiles, mythical monsters, and God's most formidable creatures to educate a little boy and feed his fear for many, many years."

  Penndulbury shook his head slowly. "Monsters, dragons, I don't know what all. Only Will knows what horrors lived under his house."

  "Incredible. But why kill the mother if he loved her and she was all he had?"

  "Ahhh, but he didn't kill her. In his mind the monsters did. His mother had told him that they couldn't get in. And that they would both be safe as long as they didn't go outside.”

  Justin's expression showed confusion.

  "Somehow, after twelve years, the creatures found a way in. His mother was sick. Dying. She'd been abusing her body with alcohol for years. Drinking from guilt, perhaps, or fear that William would one day learn the truth. After all, the boy, though gullible, was very bright. He was also becoming a man."

  "Mrs. Carlson seemed to think the man calling her was well educated."

  "Will's education was rather well balanced. Each day his mother diligently put him through the three R's. The horror stories came at night."

  "I'm having a hard time following you. She was all he had. She was dying. Instead of trying to help her, he finishes her off. Is that what you're saying?"

  The doctor reached across his desk and took hold of a tape cassette. He held it up. "What you're about to hear is a seventeen-year-old, under hypnosis, reliving a most frightening 'experience."

  Without another word Penndulbury slid the cartridge into the recorder. Activated it. Justin leaned forward, turned his ear to the hissing coming from the speaker. The doctor's voice issued forth.

  "How old are you now, Will?"

  "Twelve and a half." The voice was young. Prepubescent.

  "Where are you?"

  "Inside the house. Always inside the house."

  "Yes, but where in the house?"

  "In her room. In a corner. I'm scared."

  "Why are you afraid?"

  "Something bad . . . very bad is going to happen."

  "Tell me everything you see and hear. Tell me everything as it happens.”

  "My tummy is growling."

  "Are you hungry?"

  "My tummy's hungry.”

  "How long have you been in the corner?"

  "Three, maybe four days. I don't know anymore."

  "Where is your mother?"

  "She's calling to me from her bed. I don't want to go over there."

  "Why?"

  "Doesn't look like my mother. All puffy. Her skin's the color of . . . of chicken fat.”

  "Do you go to her?"

  Pause. "Her hand feels hot . . . spongy. She's looking at the ceiling. Her mouth is opening and closing, but nothing comes out. I'm scared. I know if I look up at the ceiling I'll see that man.”

  "Which man is that?"

  "The one in the hooded cape. The one with the skeleton fingers."

  "What's happening now, Will?"

  "Trying to talk to me. Can't hear her. Don't want to get too close. Stinks. She stinks . . . like rotten garbage.”

  "Will, try to hear what she is saying. Try very hard.”

  "She's saying Mr. Waincock will know what to do when he gets here. She says she loves me. She says she doesn't want me to hate her.”

  "Why would you hate her?"

  After a long time the hissing from the recorder was replaced by a soft whiny voice. "She says she lied.”

  "About what?"

  "About the house. The things living underneath. Everything." Silence. Then, "She says he won't be coming for us now. She says he's dead. He's dead. Ohhhwww."

  "Who's dead?"

  A scream.

  "What is it, Will? What do you see? What do you feel?"

  "It's so bright." Another scream.

  "Will?"

  "Pain . . . in my eye. It hurts so bad. It hurts to see. Oh God, I don't want to see. I can hear them coming .. . coming for us."

  "What? What's coming?"

  "She said she lied about them. But she didn't lie. Can't she hear them? Can't she see them? How'd they get inside? Oh, oh God. No. Oh, Momma, Ooooh, no no no!"

  Penndulbury switched off the recorder. "There's nothing more. Will had to be physically restrained then. At that point, in her room, while frantically trying to save his mother's life, he was actually killing her with his bare hands.

  "Something finally snapped in the boy's head," the doctor went on. "After he beat and kicked his already dying mother to death, he set her on fire in her bed. The medical examiner reported finding over a hundred bites, savage, animalistic bites deep enough to be detected in what was left of the charred, shriveled flesh. Human bites.”

  Justin could only stare. He didn't trust himself to speak. Somewhere in the state of Oregon was a madman. And that madman wanted Alex. His stomach knotted fiercely. If anything were to happen to her . . .

  "In his apparent rage at his mother," Penndulbury said, closing the file, "
he became one of the very creatures she had used to terrify and control him for all those years.”

  After a long pause Justin spoke. "Why did he set her on fire?"

  "Fire was the only weapon he had. All creatures are afraid of fire. And though he would never confess to deliberately killing his mother, he did openly admit to torching the bed after she was dead. To kill the monsters.”

  "This is a private institution. Who paid for his care?"

  "Lora Hunter's father.”

  "But he died when his grandson was only three or four."

  "The money was drawn from a trust fund set up by Bently for William the day he was born. The trust was turned over to him on his release from Westgate."

  “Why would Bently set up a trust fund for his grandson? I was under the impression he had disowned his daughter."

  "I know nothing about his association with his daughter and grandson.”

  "Did anyone visit the boy?"

  "No family came to see Will. No one inquired about him—except Harley Waincock."

  "Who is this Waincock?"

  "He was the only person to go out to the farm. Owns the general store in Haller. He delivered groceries, mail-order items, liquor once a week to the Hunters. Ironically, Will works for Waincock now. And what's even more ironic is he lives on the farm again."

  "Hunter went back to that house after what happened? After all those years of terror?"

  "It's not unusual. He felt it imperative to his mental health that he meet the demons head-on. Stand up to them. Vanquish them once and for all."

  "And what if he fails? What if they take control of him again? What if it's Alex they want this time?" Justin was thinking aloud. "What did she do to him?"

  "That I can't help you with, Sergeant. He never mentioned an Alexandra Carlson. As far as I know, before his release from Westgate the only human contact he'd had was with his mother and Wain-cock. Of course, Will had town privileges for over two years before his release. His behavior off the grounds was exemplary."

  "It's less than a two-hour flight to Reno."