Once, only once a long time ago, did she abruptly stop as the man was about to come. She was much younger then and just fooling around; not quite ready, she wanted to wait a bit. He reared up and hit her; he went totally berserk for a few seconds and would have killed her. His hands were around her throat, strangling her, when he came to his senses. That’s when she first saw the incredible power of the animal during those few moments. She had never been so turned on in her life, and as she nursed a swollen jaw and bruised throat she knew that from then on she needed the power of the animal, needed to hold that power in her hands, needed to watch the animal revert to savagery. Only then could she become part of that savage power herself.
Afterward she chose her men carefully. She would sleep with a man more than once only if his penis was big enough for both her cupped hands and he was animalistic in bed. She had no use for passive men or those who came quietly with nothing but smiles on their faces. Through trial and error she found that aggressive men were best for her, successfully aggressive men who viewed the world as a jungle and themselves as predators.
Derek Lavery was her kind of man, but he was also her kind of boss. She liked the job and the pay and she had no desire to become anyone’s mistress. She was much too independent for that. Since there were always enough men to satisfy her wants, she didn’t feel any particular loss in not seeing Lavery’s face in bed. But if she ever quit or something happened—
Lavery glanced at his watch again; it was 9:05. They were late as usual. He could be in at eight o’clock to talk to New York but they couldn’t even make it by nine. He felt the world was against him.
New York. The thought made him shudder. He had been there enough times to know he didn’t like it. New York didn’t have the spaciousness or the friendliness of the West. People there lived tightly packed together, they had little sense of privacy or ownership. Worse, the place was full of foreigners who took everything and gave nothing. No—whatever else New York was, it wasn’t the good life. That was as clear to him as his secretary’s bra.
He thought of the moneymen on the magazine; all of them lived in New York or its suburbs, right up to the publisher. He didn’t like any of them. Now he liked them even less for their reaction to the Chessman piece. Not the story itself but the bad timing, what with Vincent Mungo and Senator Stoner. In the two weeks since the new Mungo killing Stoner’s name was being heard across the state. His campaign to restore capital punishment was picking up steam, and everywhere he spoke he held the Chessman story up to ridicule and scorn. He linked Mungo to Chessman as a sort of symbolic son, a legatee of Chessman’s alleged criminal mind and murderous mentality. The senator’s tough stance and his clever linkage between the dead and the living were beginning to turn people toward the death penalty.
In a way Lavery admired Stoner, at least for his game plan. It was really brilliant. Tie the past to the present, the known to the unknown, trade on people’s fears, throw in a touch of dramatics, and the result was one senator going statewide. Maybe even nationwide if he kept rolling. The issue was a good one and there was no telling how far he would be able to ride it. And Vincent Mungo was helping greatly.
An hour earlier Lavery had told New York that he was doing a story on Mungo that would scream for the death penalty. They were relieved. The New York papers had printed news of Stoner’s campaign, mentioning the Chessman article in Newstime. Even network television had carried items about the senator’s increasing impact.
What he told them was at least partially true. He intended to do a story on Vincent Mungo, one that would demand death. That’s the way the game was played: on a good issue like capital punishment, hit both sides hard. Mungo was current, and Stoner’s tying him to Chessman made it perfect. Even New York saw that and wished him luck.
The only problem was the angle; he didn’t have one yet. Mungo had been at large for six weeks and had killed two people, maybe more. He was still free. Those were facts, not angles. There was no way to prove gross negligence by hospital officials at Willows, and no point in taking on the sheriff’s office for failing to capture him.
Downstairs, Ding waddled into the building and quickly ducked in a darkened elevator. The lobby man, who knew him well, snapped on the light and shut the doors.
“What time the boss get here?”
“I came at eight. He was already in.” The man glanced at Ding. “Must be important, eh?”
“His girl in yet?”
“Miss Charm? About ten minutes ago.”
Ding smiled. “Why do you call her that?”
“What?”
“Miss Charm.”
“She got big tits, ain’t she?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “That means she’s trouble.”
Ding studied him a moment.
“You should be a writer,” he said finally as the elevator stopped.
“You think so?” said the lobby man, interested now.
“Sure thing,” Ding said on the way out. “You see people for what they really are.” He turned around. “And you know how to bury the truth.” He toddled down the hall, shaking his head. “That’s all you need,” he muttered softly. “All you really need in this game.”
Inside he adjusted his eyes to the sunlight flooding the penthouse office. He always thought what the place needed were a few myna birds flying around. And maybe a small beach at one end, with breaking waves and bare women. Then the other end could have some gambling tables—blackjack, baccarat, craps. Nothing pretentious. In the middle would be a bar where a bevy of big-breasted beauties sat around waiting for action. Ding had been with Lavery a long time and knew him well. What he didn’t know was what the hell the bastard wanted at nine in the morning.
He looked toward the bar. It was bereft of beauties. In fact it wasn’t exactly a bar at all; seemed to be more of a large desk. Behind it Lavery sat scowling, as usual. Ding blamed it all on the Barclay Lounger, something about it turned his boss into a scowler.
He squeezed into a normal chair, which was two sizes too small for him. He tried to scowl back but his face just didn’t work that way. Whatever he did with it came out fat smiles. He sat there smiling.
Lavery took the cigar out of his mouth. “Nice to see you,” he growled.
“Nice to be back.”
“Where were you?”
“Sleeping.”
Lavery reached for the ashtray. “Maybe you sleep too much.” Missed it. “Ever think of that?”
“All the time.”
“And?”
“That’s what makes me fall asleep.”
Lavery gave up. He knew better than to cross words with Ding; the man had that crazy kind of head that saw paranoid humor in everything. He was not aggressive, had no drive or ambition to make it big and didn’t seem to care about real success. The kind he, Lavery, had carved out for himself. They had started together on a local California newspaper, both having grown up in the same area. Lavery rose right from the beginning; he had the balls and the brains and he knew how to wheel and deal. As he jumped higher and higher—night editor, city editor, managing editor, magazine offers, always moving up—he took Ding along because he was a good legman and writer. He knew what to do with words. And what he didn’t know hadn’t been written yet.
Lavery liked that, it was his first good thought of the day. He wanted to write it down. On the desk were two lamps, a pair of tennis shoes, plants—all dead—telephones, tape recorders, a purple elephant, a red garter, handcuffs, a tape measure and a million other items of necessity. But no pad or pen. He went back to scowling. This was not going to be his day at all. Hopefully it would soon be over, and the sooner the better. Only ten or twelve hours to go. He sat back, defeated.
“We got problems,” he said, turning to Ding.
AMOS FINCH had arisen on the previous morning at his usual time of six o’clock. With a wistful sigh of remembered pleasure he allowed the blond graduate student in his bed to continue her sleep. Standing over her he gazed at the tousled he
ad, the shapely arched back as she slept in the fetal position, her legs jackknifed, her arms curved downward. She looked so tiny, a child’s body with a woman’s sexuality. He liked smaller women, found them to be the most passionate and open to sexual variety. Their small breasts and buttocks made him feel boyish again and wandering once more through the fertile fields of his Midwest youth. A half dozen times he had bedded down with midgets, enjoying each experience immensely. His secret ambition was to sleep with a dwarf.
Studying her nude form against the pink sheets, he was overcome with erotic desire and hurriedly returned to bed. He gently straightened her legs and turned her over onto her stomach. As he pressed hard against her from the rear she cooed softly, still half asleep. Her body was warm and moist and deliciously sweet-smelling to him. He slipped easily inside of her, driven on by her murmured oohs and umms. In his growing excitement he decided that his work could wait a few hours, perhaps even until delivery of the day’s mail. He was expecting a letter.
BIG JIM OATES had a dream. He was running for governor on a lawand-order platform. The race was close and came up a tie at the wire. Both sides waited as the last voter in California slowly walked toward them, thousands of silent people lining the approach. Oates watched intently as the figure gradually came into focus. It was a man of average size and dark features. His steps on the carpeted floor began to boom as he drew closer. There was something familiar about him, something Oates couldn’t quite catch. The man pressed forward, step by booming step, until the noise was shattering. Suddenly Oates saw him clearly. That face! He recognized it now, it was the face of the devil himself. Vincent Mungo! Oates quickly pulled his service revolver and shot Mungo six times at point-blank range. Mungo didn’t even notice. He continued his slow, steady gait until he was at the head of the crowd, which closed behind him. Standing silently in front of the political opponents, he waited a moment before turning to Oates. He drew closer, their faces now only inches apart. Oates saw the insanity in Mungo’s eyes. He saw something else too. He saw that he had lost. “You lose,” Mungo said softly. He turned to the other man, they shook hands. As they walked away together, arm in political arm, Oates fired six shots into them, then six more, and again and again and again …
He awoke in a sweat, his eyes blinking. A nightmare, it was only a goddam nightmare! He glanced at the electric clock by the bed: 4:10 A.M. Groaning, he looked over at his wife asleep in the other twin bed. Only her head was visible over the flowered sheet in the air-conditioned room. His eyes rested on the head, graying now but once the color of wheat, a dark gold in the summer sky. He had loved the color of her hair, just as he had come to love her, and when they married he promised her that he would make something of himself, someone of whom she could be proud. She told him she was already proud of him beyond anything else imaginable, and from that moment on he loved her with a tenderness he knew would last unto death. Whatever he had to do in his professional life, whatever good or evil was forced upon him, whatever women he would take for sex urges, she would always be his loved one, the woman in his private heart.
Through an uncle’s political connections he had become a deputy in the California Sheriff’s Office. His blustery manner and affable ways served him well in the police business. Especially valuable was his ability to deal on the political level, which had moved him up the ranks until he commanded his own sections in several locales before coming to Forest City. The latest move was exceptionally good for him; it was not that far from Sacramento and the real power. Inordinately ambitious, the years had whetted his appetite for public office.
He glanced again at the clock. Still only 4:11. The hour of the wolf. The hour when more people died and more babies were born than any other. He didn’t know why but he knew it was true. Every cop knew that. The hour of the wolf. Vincent Mungo was the wolf right now, and his hour would soon be over. Hopefully.
Oates quietly propped himself up on the pillow, folded his arms behind his head. If he couldn’t sleep he’d just lie there in the dark with his thoughts. He often did that; a fitful sleeper, he spent many moments awake. Over the years such times frequently were the most peaceful of his day. He was equally familiar with the hour of the devil and the gun. But he was a bit unnerved that his nightmare about Vincent Mungo would come during the hour of the wolf. To a realistic man superstitious in many ways, it was not a good sign.
He had returned from Los Angeles on August 8 sadly emptyhanded. Mungo had disappeared again, vanished without a trace after committing the fearful murder. Despite one of the most intensive manhunts ever conducted in the Los Angeles area, despite almost 100,000 law-enforcement officers throughout the state searching everywhere, despite the tentative entrance of the FBI into the case on the assumption that he had crossed state lines in unlawful flight to avoid prosecution, Vincent Mungo was nowhere to be found.
He was a devil, Oates reluctantly conceded, a devil in disguise. Whatever his disguise was, it had to be one of the greatest ever seen. Or not seen. In almost thirty years of police work Oates had never known anyone with so little fool so many for so long. If he had his way, Mungo would get a gold medal just before they shot the son of a bitch. Or hanged him or gassed him. That he would be killed one way or another was a certainty. It was all just a matter of time. Of that Oates was dead sure. He was also sure that if he got there first Mungo was dead. One look at the girl’s savaged body had been enough. Mungo was a real-life monster and had to be destroyed.
The sheriff stared into the darkness of the bedroom, thinking thoughts of legal murder. Five days in Los Angeles had been more than enough for him. The people were different from those in the northern half of the state, more frenetic and insecure, given more to fads and surface feelings. Even though well treated, he was glad to get away. He didn’t believe he would enjoy working in the southern part of the state, though he had lived there for a few years as a youngster. Sacramento would do just fine. All the political power he could ever want was right there.
He remembered an article he had read about capital punishment, and he wondered how a good magazine like Newstime could print that garbage. They had really made a big mistake; about the only thing they got right was Chessman’s name and age.
He had been around at the time and he knew a little about the case, though he hadn’t been personally involved. He knew, for example, that Chessman wasn’t identified by just two women, as stated in the article, but by a half dozen people as their assailant and robber. He knew that Chessman was a punk car thief and gunsel as a teenager. From friends, guards at San Quentin and Folsom, he knew that Chessman remained a punk throughout his early prison years and even after the big rap sent him to death row. But most of all he knew Chessman had been guilty of the crimes that got him gas. He was captured in a stolen car with a flashing red light similar to those used by police. The car was identified by witnesses. He was identified by witnesses. And not in one or two instances but in a whole series of crimes. That was enough for Oates. Everything afterward was just legal games.
He knew one more thing not mentioned in the article. Chessman was married at age nineteen to a lovely girl with silky hair and a nice smile. Oates had once had a crush on her when he was himself a youngster and living in Glendale.
Again he eyed the clock. Ten more minutes and the hour would be over. No more wolf He wished his problems would be over as easily. Vincent Mungo. Bang. No more Mungo.
He primed the pillow and eased his head down. In six hours he had a meeting with the police and public-safety officials in Sacramento. Was that right? He checked himself. August 10, 11 A.M. Yep! Just six hours away. The clock was set for 7:30.
As he drifted into sleep he wondered if he would ever get to see Vincent Mungo after all.
WHILE THE sheriff’s plane was holding to a course due north at 22,000 feet on the bright clear morning of August 8, a sleek black Lincoln Continental pulled to a stop in front of a neon-and-chrome diner in Fresno. The chauffeur, after a few words with his passenger in the
rear, slid from behind the wheel and headed for the diner. Inside he spoke to the cashier; he was polite but firm. A moment later Don Solis came forward. The chauffeur told him a man wanted to see him outside. Would he go along?
Solis looked the man over. He recognized the eyes, unyielding, disinterested, yet noting everything. He had been like that once, not quite that good. Nowhere near that good, as a matter of fact. The man was dangerous and not to be crossed. He followed him outside.
Business was light at that hour and few cars occupied the parking area. They headed for the limousine, where the chauffeur opened the rear door for him. Not knowing what to expect, Solis tensed himself As he bent to look in, his eyes widened and his mouth sprang open in amazement …
GEORGE D. LITTLE lived for his family and his business, in that order, A man of few passions, he doted on his sprightly wife and three lovely daughters and provided them with a big house in the best section of town, a ranch with fine horses to ride, cars, clothing, travel. To give them this kind of life he sold death. Specifically, funerals. He owned one of the biggest mortuaries in the state, taking over from his father before him. He knew the business well, knew all about dead bodies, and where the money was in caskets and flowers and private services. Over the years he made a good living at it, and better than good, and they got it all.
His wife often thought him a bit of a bore and much too logically sane but she loved him for his kindness and generosity, and she gave him what he needed, or at least deserved, in companionship and in the bedroom. Out of it came three daughters. He had wanted sons to carry on the business but he soon grew to love the sound of females in the house. They brightened his life considerably, and by the time they were young ladies he adored them. They could do no wrong.
By Reason of Insanity Page 21
