by Roy Johansen
“Right. You won't find a match in that photocopyfor every murder, but I've found them in other versions of the legend. Whoever this killer was, he was emulating the Rakkan story.”
“What about the other towns?” Howe said. “Have you checked to see if—”
“Yes,” Henderson cut in.”At least three other cities in the past five years have had murders that somewhat match the Rakkan legend. We've been in contact with the FBI, and they're now running them through the VICAP program.”
Howe leaned back in his chair.”No offense, Bailey, by why in hell didn't someone figure this out before?”
Joe shrugged. “Maybe because the legend has Rakkan changing his M.O. in each town. We had nothing to link them together. In most of these cities, there wasn't even anything to link the individual murders to each other.”
A tall, long-faced detective spoke from the other side of the room.”We got ourselves a tapestry maker.”
Henderson nodded. “That's what it looks like. The killer thinks of each murder as another thread in a grand tapestry that can take years, or even a lifetime, to complete. He thinks of himself as an artist.”
Carla wrinkled her brow. “So why was this sicko carving the name into Bailey's dining room table?”
Joe shrugged. “Maybe he got tired of waiting for us to make the connection.”
“Maybe it wasn't the killer at all,” Carla said. “Maybe it was someone who wanted to tip us off.”
“Someone like his late wife?” Howe said sarcastically.
Carla shrugged.
haddenfield, Donna, and Paul stood in Central City Park, a triangular slab of concrete near the busy Five Points area. It was eight-fifteen A.M., and the park was populated with office workers grabbing their final precious moments of freedom.
Haddenfield wore the same grim expression as he'd had all night. Donna and Paul were getting panicky, and he needed to calm them before they did something stupid. “You know, Gary wasn't happy with the way this assignment has gone. It's possible that he just skipped out.”
Donna shook her head. “Not without telling us. Something happened to him.”
“It's a no-brainer,” Paul said.”It was that guy he was tailing. We never should have let him go.”
“Gary knew what he was doing.”
“Bullshit!” Donna said. “We should have gone straight to the goddamned police. Instead, we jerked around all night. Give me one reason why I shouldn't take those videotapes and go straight to the cops.”
“I'm telling you that you can't. That's all the reason that you need.”
“Do better.”
“I'll get some people on it, but we can't go to the police,” Haddenfield said.
Paul stepped forward.”What people?”
“Extremely qualified people.”
“If something happens to me, I certainly hope you'll try harder than this,” Donna said.
Haddenfield breathed deeply. He needed to get hold of that bastard Dylan, but so far he'd been as elusive as Gary. In the meantime, he couldn't letthese punks push him around. “As of now, Gary is not your problem. We have a job to do. Let's go.”
After the task-force meeting adjourned Joe left the station and walked to the Java Joint for a cup of coffee to go. He took it outside and tried to clear his head.
He couldn't.
Christ. That voice had sounded so much like Angela's.
Can't let it rattle him. Gotta hold it together, not only for himself, but for Nikki.
An antiques store display window caught his eye. There, surrounded by small knickknacks, was a statue he'd been admiringfor months. Called “Lillian,” it was a beautiful woman with bobbed hair and '20s-era flapper clothing. It had always reminded him of Angela the summer after Nikki was born, when she'd cut her hair short.
Probably the best summer of his life.
He'd considered buying the statue, but it cost a small fortune. And he tried to keep himself from living in the past.
Yeah, sure. Then why in hell had he stopped here for coffee? Maybe a subconscious desire to make contact with Angela again?
What the hell. He wasn't ready to indulge in self-analysis right now.
He turned and headed back to his car.
Thirty minutes later Joe climbed the front steps of the narrow two-story home in the Morningside neighborhood, only a few blocks from Piedmont Park. He hesitated before ringing the doorbell. He should have called first, but he probably wouldn't have been welcome in any case. How long had it been? Four, maybe five months?
A succession of locks clicked, and the door swung open. Suzanne Morrison stared at him in surprise.
“I'm sorry,” he said. “I know this is kind of crazy, but—”
“I'm busy,” she said coolly.
“I can wait.”
“You'll be waiting a long time, because I'm just getting started. I have an entire family here. Come back tomorrow, or better yet, call.”
She tried to push the door closed, but he held it open with his palm. “Please. You're the only person on earth I can talk to right now.”
Maybe it was due to the desperate tone in his voice, but her face slightly softened.
“I can wait in my car until you're finished.”
She hesitated, then stepped aside.”You can sit in if you'd like, as long as you promise not to wear your Spirit Basher hat.”
“I promise.”
“If I see a flashlight or a pair of infrared goggles, you're out of here. These people don't need to be distracted by your routine.”
“That's not why I'm here, Suzanne.”
“Okay, then.”
She opened the door wide and led him up a narrow flight of stairs to a sitting room facing the frontbay windows. Three women and two men sat in a circle in the center of the room. There was no table.
“This is Joe Bailey,” she said to the group. “He's here just to watch. Does anyone have any objections to him being here?”
They shook their heads. Suzanne picked up a chair from the corner of the room and pulled it into the circle. She and Joe sat down.
Suzanne spoke to a gray-haired woman in her sixties. “Patricia, why don't you tell me something about your daughter?”
Patricia moistened her lips. “I'm hoping to speak to Nadia. She died when she was ten years old. This was over twenty years ago, but I've been thinking about her a lot lately.”
As the woman continued, Suzanne nodded compassionately. Joe had seen half a dozen other sÉances that Suzanne had conducted, and they'd all begun in the same manner. Her M. O. was different from most modern-day mediums, who asked hundreds of questions and constantly refined the line of inquiry to reflect the answers given. This form of cold reading was surprisingly effective, especially for “psychic” television hosts who had the luxury of editing out their numerous wrong guesses.
Suzanne said very little, however, revealing just a few morsels of information before going into the body of her presentation. She closed her eyes. “Okay, I am now going to speak to my friend. She was taken at a very young age too, but she speaks to me and helps me communicate to those who have passed to the other side.”
joe glanced at the others. If they were even slightly skeptical, they hid it well.
Suzanne tilted back her head. “Daphne, I have some nice people here. They miss their daughter, just like your parents miss you. Can you help them?” She cocked her head toward the older woman. “Think about Nadia. Remember her. Feel her. That's the surest way to bring her back here.” The guests appeared to be following Suzanne's advice. Some closed their eyes, others just smiled contentedly. Suzanne drew a sharp breath.”She's here.”
“Nadia?” the elderly woman asked.
“Yes. Daphne says that Nadia's having trouble remembering what it was like here.”
The woman wrinkled her brow. “She's forgotten us?”
“No. But the experience of being human is just a dim memory to her. Since you've last seen her, she's seen wonderful places and done amaz
ing things. But she'd never leave behind her love for you.”
One of the men cleared his throat. “Can she see us?”
“No. Anything I can hear, Daphne can hear. She then passes it on to Nadia.”
“I understand.” A tear fell down the woman's cheek.”Tell Nadia I'm sorry.”
“She wants to know for what?”
“I now know that the man who owned our house …He did things to her. Like he did to my other daughters.”
Joe glanced at the two thirtyish women, obviously Nadia's sisters. Tears ran down their faces.
The floorboards beneath them creaked and groaned even though everyone in the room was still.
Suzanne tensed.”Nadia remembers. Mr. Robertson said he'd hurt you if she ever told anyone.”
“That's what he told us all,” one of the sisters whispered.
The floor groaned louder. The floor slats were wriggling, Joe realized. Was there someone on the lower level, pushing up on the boards?
One of the slats broke free and the end curled back, inch by inch, until it was almost two feet over the other boards. Joe saw nothing pushing or pulling the wood slat. It then snapped back to the floor as if some unseen force had abruptly let go of the end. The sound startled the sÉance participants, but they scarcely had a chance to catch their breaths before a dozen other wood slats wriggled and curled upward.
Suzanne spoke over the sound of the other floor panels snapping back.”It's still very emotional for Nadia. It was an unhappy time for her.”
Snap. Snap.
Suzanne's eyes were still closed.”She felt so alone.”
Joe crossed his legs, swinging his left foot over one of the rising slats. There was nothing over it.
Incredible.
The woman sobbed. “I'm sorry, Nadia. I'm so, so sorry.”
“She doesn't blame you,” Suzanne said. “And she's the one who's sorry. Sorry that she couldn't be strong for you.”
Snap.
“How could she be?” the woman said. “She was only a little girl…. Ten years old.”
Suzanne's lips tightened. She was obviously hearing something that disturbed her.”Nadia couldn't live in your world anymore.”
Patricia shook her head. “It wasn't an accident, was it?”
“No.”
“Mother of God,” Patricia whispered. “For years, I've thought she stumbled into that quarry pool. There were other kids playing there. But after I found out what she was going through, I was afraid …”
Suzanne nodded.”It was too much pain for her.”
“Tell her that the bastard went to jail. Tell her that he died a miserable death there.”
Joe was startled by a popping sound outside the window. Everyone turned. The top edges of the window screens had broken loose.
“Sweet Jesus,” the man said under his breath.
As they watched, the screens'aluminum frames curled outward and twisted over.
Suzanne opened her eyes, but she did not look back at the window. “Your daughter doesn't realize that she's causing these things. It just happens sometimes, especially when we discuss things that affected them emotionally.”
Patricia stared in horror at the bending, twisting screen. “I love you, Nadia,” she whispered, tears streaming down her face.”I hope you've found peace there, the peace you couldn't have with us.”
Suzanne smiled. “She has. She says that you have no idea, Mamacita.”
The woman stared at Suzanne in amazement. “She used to call me that. She had a Spanish friend who called her mother Mamacita, and she picked up on it.”
The window screens stopped moving.
“She wants you all to remember the past but not to live in it,” Suzanne said. “She loves you. That's the one thing that hasn't changed since she was here. She says that will never change.”
“I thought you were better than that,”Joe said after Suzanne said her good-byes to the family. They had stayed almost a half hour after the sÉance's end, drinking tea and reminiscing about Nadia.
“What are you talking about?” Suzanne locked the front door.
“Ending with a reassuring message about how they should live their lives? You've never gone in for that kind of thing before.”
“It's what that woman's daughter said. I'm sorry if you thought she was being overly sentimental, but maybe you can discuss it with Nadia in fifty or sixty years.”
“It just sounded like the second-rate psychics who put up their shingles in Little Five Points.”
“I agree. But as much as I don't want to be lumped into that category, I'm not going to sit here and censor a ghost.” Suzanne quickly moved up the stairway. “I have to check out the damage. Come on, make yourself useful.”
They returned to the second-story sitting room, where Suzanne kicked at a few of the loose floor slats. “This has happened before. A little carpenter's glue and the floor will be fine.”
Joe gestured down.”May I?”
“Sure.”
He lifted the end of a loose panel, one that he'd seen curling into the air. There was no evidence of tampering, and its dark underside was smooth.
She smiled. “I'll bet you were just dying to bring your spirit kit in here.”
Her smile was simply radiant, Joe thought. She wasn't at all nervous about him inspecting the scene, especially impressive since his presence there had been a surprise. He shrugged. “I promised you that I wouldn't be wearing my Spirit Basher hat.”
“Yes, you were admirably restrained. Was this the fifth sÉance of mine you've seen?”
“Sixth. Plus three others that the university 'spook squad'videotaped.”
“They prefer to be called parapsychologists.”
“I'm sure they do.”
Suzanne glanced out the window. “Oh Lord. Help me get those screens inside.”
Joe threw open the window and grabbed one of the twisted screens. He ran his hand along the frame, feeling for a piece of wire or anything that may have pulled it down. Nothing. He laid it on the sitting-room floor and retrieved the other one. No signs of tampering there either.
Suzanne tried to straighten the frame, pressing it with the heels of her hands as she spoke.”Okay, Spirit Basher. If you were to duplicate this with trickery, how would you do it?”
Joe shrugged. “I'd brush the aluminum frame with a sodium hydroxide compound to soften it. I'd tie eight feet of heavy-duty clear fishing line to each ofthe upper corners and let the ends hang down. After your guests were inside, I'd have someone on the street below tie the lines to metal rods. They'd pull the top of the screen away from the window, and the weakened frame would bend and twist pretty much any way they wanted it to.”
“Well, if you know where I can get any of that sodium hydroxide compound, I'd sure like to know. Maybe I could use it to bend these things back into shape. I'm going to lose money on this deal.”
“You're still charging for your sÉances?”
“As long as I try to make a living as a classical music composer, I'll probably be charging for this. This takes a lot of time and energy for me.”
“Not to mention all the time you spend visiting other spiritualists.”
“You know why I do that,” she said.
Yes, he knew. Suzanne claimed to be searching for another spiritualist who shared her unique gift. She'd been made to feel like a freak for most of her life, and she wanted to find someone else who could do the amazing things she did. She armed herself with an immense knowledge of paranormal fraud techniques, not to use them herself, she maintained, but to identify those who would try to deceive her.
Suzanne picked up the bent screens and leaned them against the wall. “I'll work on these later. So, why did you come here? Did that family ask you to drop in?”
“No, nothing like that.”
“Then, why? I don't hear from you in four months, and you come here now?”
“I'm sorry about that. I should've gotten in touch sooner.”
“You were under
no obligation.”
“Sure I was. We were …involved. That meant something to me.”
“Funny way of showing it.”
“I know. I'm sorry.”
She straightened the chairs. “I always knew it was a risk. I'm the only spiritualist you've never been able to debunk, and I think that intrigued you at first. Later it just got frustrating and you couldn't handle it.”
“I couldn't handle it, but not for the reason you think.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah. You did change my perspective on things, Suzanne, but I don't want to go into it right now. I'm sorry if I hurt you.”
“Hey, don't worry about me. I think you overestimate the power of your charm. I have missed Nikki though.”
“She still talks about you.”
Suzanne looked away. “Why are you here, Joe? Did you come to apologize?”
“Yes. But I also need your help.”
“With what?”
“Have you heard about what happened to Monica Gaines?”
“Everybody has.”
“I was assigned to accompany her to the crime scenes when she was in town.”
“I'm sure she loved that.”
Joe brought Suzanne up to speed on Monica's eerieimpressions, the strange voices, and the fiery attack at her hotel.
Suzanne's eyes narrowed.”Any theories yet?”
“I'm working on the combustion, but I'm especially interested in the voices right now.”
Suzanne studied Joe's expression. “You're wound pretty tight. Are you all right?”
He let out a long breath. “I heard a voice last night. It sounded exactly like Angela.”
Are you serious?”
“Yes. Nikki told me she heard it a couple nights ago.”
Suzanne considered this.”Amplification?”
“None that I could find. No trace of speakers or magnetic coil.”
“Ductwork?”
“One vent, and it was behind me. No way it came from there.”
“Jesus. No wonder you're shaken up.”
“Yeah, it's kind of knocked me for a loop.”
“And Nikki?”
“Very upset. She thinks that Angela is trying to warn me.”
“Warn you of what?”
“Of the supposed evil spirits, I guess. And then there's the redecorating.”
