D

by George Right

  Father will drag himself home by midnight, if not later. This depends on how much his and his buddies' money will allow. The only good aspect of being on welfare is the fact that father doesn't have enough money to drink as much as before. But his friends often treat him. Actually, his drunkenness was what cost him his job, though he blames "that fucking Jew," the manager Reichmann. Father's friends, of course, agree with him. It is even good if they managed to save enough money by Christmas in order to close down a bar properly. Then father will crawl home rather the worse for wear and will hit the sack immediately. But if, on a holiday, he can't get totally drunk, he will come home angry and will fight. Usually he fought with mother, but Angie also got her portion. At first during such nights the girl tried to hide under a bed or in a closet, but when father could not find her at once, he flew into an even worse rage, and when he finally reached her refuge, she got thrice as many blows as usual. So it was better to endure submissively some slaps on her face, standing barefoot on a cold floor and repeating "I'll never do it again, Daddy". What exactly she "will not do", Angie didn't know, and neither did he. For him, it was just as important to carry out the "education" ritual.

  Yes, the greatest Christmas gift for which Angie could hope was that her father would arrive home too drunk to fight and would sleep until the next afternoon. She didn't dare even think about receiving something else, like even the cheapest toy. Only once, when her parents seemed to be in good mood, had she given a hint at wanting a gift. Not at all in a form of the request–she simply had begun to talk about what gifts her schoolmates received. But mother, of course, understood the hint very well. "Shut your mouth, girl," she bellowed, "don't you know your father was shitcanned from his job and we're on welfare? We don't got enough money for food (mother weighed well over two hundred pounds even then, and now she was approaching three hundred), and you're dreaming about fancy toys! Do you think you're a fucking princess?"

  The princess. Angie had seen her in that big store downtown. Certainly, she couldn't buy anything there, even a cola drink from the vending machine. But she could wander there slowly for hours, examining the displays and shelves. What toys weren't there! There were electric cars possible to ride in and small motorcycles for children–not to mention walking robots and dinosaurs, and radio-controlled planes. But looking at boys' toys was no more than just curiosity. Angie indifferently passed by the section of video games and the boxes with plastic models for assembling, spent some time near teddy bears, thinking up names for them (after all it would be silly to call them all "Teddy"!). And then her heart sweetly faded. She entered the section called "Barbie's World".

  Here, there were Barbies for every fancy and taste, of all skin colors and occupations, in strict business suits and in flippant beach apparel, in evening dresses and in jeans, brides and young mums, teachers, stewardesses, even a mermaid with a fish tail and a Barbie in a wheelchair... But most of all Angie liked Barbie the Princess. Dressed in an airy, as if flying, white dress, with a small gold crown on her blond hair, the princess seemed an embodiment of all those light and joyful things about which, for Angie, it was silly even to dream. But she still couldn't stop dreaming. If... if only she could once leave the store, folding the cherished box to her breast...

  But even simply to stand here looking at the princess for too long was dangerous. The store security guard could approach and inquire, whether everything was alright with the girl and where her parents were. Angie was frightened to death that she would be taken to the police; she was sure that in this case her father would either beat her to death or maim her. Once she managed to convince the security guard that everything was great with her, and since then she avoided standing too long near the shelf. She tried to memorize how the princess looked, and then to go keeping this image before her eyes...

  "Little girl, hey there!"

  Angie shuddered in fright: it seemed to her that it was the security guard again. But in the next second she recovered from her dreams and understood that she was standing in the middle of a snowbound lane. And the person who addressed her was Santa Claus, arisen as if from nowhere. Dressed in a snow-powdery red jacket with white welt, a red cap with a white pompom, red trousers, boots and mittens. His face was also red (though, certainly, not as much as his clothing), with a broad white beard, and on his shoulder he held a bag–red of course, and obviously not empty.

  "Ho-ho-ho," said Santa Claus, smiling broadly in his white moustaches, "hi, little girl! Merry Christmas! Why are you backing away? Don't you know me?"

  "Sorry," Angie said quietly, "I've never seen you before."

  "What," white eyebrows frowned with astonishment, "you don't believe in Santa Claus?"

  "Mum says that Santa is... ""...is a fucking bullshit," the exact words almost escaped Angie's lips. "That he doesn't exist," she finished aloud.

  "Ho-ho-ho!" his eyebrows spread above. "Then who do you think am I, eh?"

  "I don't know," Angie muttered even more quietly. "Santa Claus came to our class. And Ricky, he's a big bully, pulled his beard. And Santa's beard was held on with a string."

  "Well, but I am real," Santa resolutely objected. "And my beard is real, too. If you don't believe me, you can touch it," he even bent down to make it easier for the little girl.

  Angie timidly stepped forward, then once again, and carefully touched the beard. Santa only smiled encouragingly, and she gently pulled. Having grown bolder, she tugged more strongly, and at last, spurred on by her own impudence, she jerked the beard sharply.

  "Ho-ho-ho!" Santa exclaimed louder and more abruptly than before. "What a strong girl you are! So, do you believe me now?

  "You are really real?" the girl whispered.

  "What do you think?"

  Angie felt tears well up in her eyes–tears of joy and offense simultaneously. "Then why... didn't you... come befo-ore..."

  "Well, well, sweetheart," Santa took her cap off and soothingly palmed her head. "No need to cry. I'm sorry I didn't come before. But, you see, there are so many children in the world and all of them need gifts! There's not enough time, I have to rely on my helpers, and sometimes they let me down. But look what I brought for you now!"

  He took the bag from his shoulder and for some time with a conspiratorial air dug inside it. And then he winked to Angie and took out...

  "Barbie the Princess!"

  "Barbie the Princess," confirmed Santa, handing over a box with the doll to the girl.

  "Now she's mine? Forever?" Angie couldn't believe in her happiness.

  "Certainly, forever. What gifts aren't given forever?"

  "Thanks, dear, sweet Santa!" She tried to embrace him without letting go of the doll.

  "And there's even more!" he interrupted her. "After all, I owe you gifts for seven years..."

  "For eight," Angie could have corrected, but didn't dare.

  "...so now you will get them all, too. But they're on my sleigh. You should come get your presents and feed my reindeer. Do you want to do that?"

  "Of course I do!" The girl began to jump with delight.

  "Then let’s go!" He turned and start walking on the virgin snow in the lane. Angie hastened at his heels, trying to step into the big pits of his footprints.

  Without reaching the exit to a street, Santa turned into a narrow alley and for a long time the girl saw nothing except concrete walls on both sides and the wide red back with a bag right ahead. Then the walls ended, and they came out to a small ravine; in summer a stream flowed on its bottom, but now only deep snow lay there. On the other side of the ravine, black-and-white trees froze in condensing darkness. Angie understood that they had reached the forest adjoining the border of the city.

  Santa began to descend resolutely into the ravine, and the girl had to follow him. It was not difficult to go down, but when they were clambering up, she quickly was out of breath and was even hot in her old jacket which was already small for her. Santa only darted a quick glance over his shoulder and continued to walk quickly
through the snow between trees.

  "Is it far?" Angie asked plaintively, barely keeping up with him.

  "No," he answered without turning to her, "we're almost there."

  "It's dark already," the girl said uncertainly.

  "Are you afraid of the dark?" he looked at her again. "Ah, you little scaredy-cat! I fly in the dark all night on Christmas Eve! By the way, I can take you for a ride in my sleigh over the city!"

  "Really?" Angie's doubts receded again.

  "Sure. Maybe I'll even allow you to drive the reindeer."

  Meanwhile they had already gone so deep into the woods that they would not have seen its border from here even in the daytime; now in the gloom it seemed all the more that the forest stretched for incalculable miles in every direction.

  "Why did you... leave the sleigh... so far away?" the girl asked, panting.

  "Well, after all we don't want someone to come across it and take all he gifts for himself! OK, we're almost there. That glade."

  The glade was surrounded by high fragile bush. Santa made a way with a crunch and the girl followed him, anticipating seeing the magic sleigh and Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Suddenly Santa stopped, and Angie almost ran into him.

  The glade was empty and covered by untouched snow.

  "Where is the sleigh?" the girl murmured.

  "It'll be here soon. Meanwhile, undress."

  "What?" Angie was shocked.

  "Undress. You're hot, aren't you?"

  She has indeed sweated and now willingly took off her jacket. Santa stretched out his mittened hand and took it from her.

  "Come on," he ordered.

  "What?" The girl felt fear again and involuntarily pressed the box with the princess to her chest.

  "Now!" Santa's voice became hoarse and sharp. "Take off your clothes!"

  "But..." Angie moved back, "I don't want..."

  "But you want the doll? You still want the doll, you ungrateful little bitch?!"

  "Take it!" Angie stretched the box out before her, continuing to move back. "Take it back, just let me go!"

  "Santa Claus gives gifts to good girls," the grinning mouth said, "and now you'll find out what he does to bad girls."

  "Help!" cried Angie, turning to run away. The brute hands seized her and threw her down in the snow.

  "It's him, no doubt," federal agent Douglas once again looked towards the glade where the crime lab team was already finishing its work. Nearby a pair of ambulance orderlies with a stretcher shifted from one foot to the other in the cold, expecting a command to take away the body. "The Snowman. Damn, we've been chasing this son of a bitch for three years already. Well, maybe this time we'll get something we can use."

  "Are you sure it's him, sir?" trainee John Rockston raised the collar of his uniform jacket and put his hands into pockets: he felt chilly, too. And he wasn't sure the only reason was the cold and not the impression of what he had seen. Textbooks and photos are one thing, but when you actually see this yourself for the first time... "Could be, just some local guy flipped his lid..."

  "A local wouldn't lead a victim so far," Douglas objected. "There are enough basements and empty warehouses in the city. But the Snowman needs snow. A lot of snow and open air. And all the other details... There are, of course, imitators of another's modus operandi. But the Snowman never made the headlines. Only some brief mentions in the local media. He's a bastard, but not a fool at all. He chooses a time when editors prefer cheerful and sweet-tearful materials, instead of bloody horrors. Americans don't like their holidays to be spoiled. And, as after New Year's Day the murders stop, the topic loses its urgency. Till next Christmas."

  Crunching through the snow, the chief of the city police approached them with a clipboard in his hand. His physiognomy was peevish and skeptical, as always when he was speaking with feds. Douglas tried to ignore it and inquired in a efficient tone:

  "So, have you identified the victim?"

  "Yes," the police chief nodded. He held the clipboard before himself, but didn't look at it. "Angelica Lawrence, 9. Disappeared two days ago. From, as they say, a problem family. The father is an alcoholic, on welfare, the mother's not much better... Typical white trash. They didn't even notify the police that their daughter was missing. The girl went to school normally, but it's vacation now... it's pure luck that a local man came across her before everything here was covered with snow."

  "That's it," Douglas turned to the trainee, "a typical victim of the Snowman. Most often they are children with problems at home or at school. Actually, that's no surprise. Who else would walk alone during the holidays instead of being with family and friends?"

  "Don't be so sure, sir," the trainee objected, "I liked to wander alone when I was a kid. And not because of any problems. It was just better for thinking."

  "There are, of course, exceptions," Douglas agreed. "Of the eight victims, two were from completely normal families and had no problems with other children."

  "Known to us," the trainee specified.

  "What?"

  "We know about only eight victims, sir. We don't know how many victims could still be lying somewhere under the snow."

  "Yes, but there hardly could be many more victims. With his modus operandi, he simply wouldn't have had time... unless he started to kill earlier than two years ago. Did you have enough time to read the case materials?"

  "Yes, sir," John understood that Douglas was testing him and began to narrate accurately and passionlessly, as at an exam: "The murders begin before Christmas and end not later than New Year's Day. Most often he chooses a new town every time–not so small that any new person or car would attract attention, but also not so big that it would be the difficult to find a lonely open place. Sometimes he commits two murders in a single town–probably if he is sure that the disappearance of the first victim hasn't caused an alarm. The victim is always white, age from seven to eleven; gender is not significant to the Snowman. He gets the victim to some place where there is a lot of snow. Apparently, children go with him voluntarily. Then he forces the victim to strip off all clothing and shoes, ties the victim's hands and, possibly, tapes his or her mouth. In this condition he makes the victim walk up and down through the snow and rolls him or her in snowdrifts for a while–not less a half hour. Obviously, it turns him on. Then he rapes the victim. Then kills, knifing about dozen times. The exact number and places of wounds vary. He doesn't leave any inscriptions or other 'hallmarks.' He always takes away with him the victim's clothing and other things."

  "It all matches, doesn't it?" Douglas nodded to the police chief.

  "Exactly," the latter confirmed. "Probably this bastard is also a fetishist."

  "Modern psychiatry reckons a considerable share of sadists among fetishists," noticed Rockston. "For those guys, not just suffering in general, but concrete attributes are important. Snow or the victim's blood may be examples of this. But I'm not sure that he carries the victim's things away for that reason. Probably, he's just afraid that we'll find trace evidence on them. He's very careful. We still don't know his blood and sperm types."

  "Do you mean he uses a condom?" the police chief asked.

  "Exactly, or, maybe a foreign object, even a dildo. Is it possible to buy such a thing in your town?"

  "Most likely, he carries everything he needs with him, avoiding being seen in local shops," Douglas interjected.

  "By the way, why necessarily 'he?'" the police chief narrowed his eyes. "Couldn't that freaking dildo have been used by a woman?"

  Federal agents looked at him respectfully, despite his tone.

  "We considered such a possibility," the senior agent confirmed. "In favor of it being a woman is how easily our criminal manages to entice children. Serial molesters sometimes fail with clever kids who, remembering the admonitions of adults, not only refuse to go with the molester, but also immediately run home or to the nearest policeman and describe the bad guy. But the Snowman hasn't had a single screwup like that. And, also, many adults still w
arn children only about men, forgetting about women. But, still, it's not likely to be a woman. You saw the footprints, chief. The shoe size is definitely not female. Certainly, it is possible to wear oversized boots in order to fool us, but a woman in such giant boots risks drawing attention, and to run in such clodhoppers if something goes wrong would be difficult as well. Besides, our criminal's weight is about 220 pounds, and the force of his knife strikes demonstrate a lot of physical strength. All this is, of course, not proof, but still essential arguments against a female perpetrator."

  The police chief shrugged his shoulders with irritation, probably, going to say something like "if you're so smart, why is the freaking asshole still out there?" But at this moment the chief of criminalists approached.

  "We've almost finished," he informed. "I ordered the body to be loaded into the van."

  "Anything interesting yet?" Douglas inquired.

  "We'll see in the lab," the expert shrugged. "Till now, everything as usual. No torn off buttons, scraps of clothes, and so on. The girl didn't cut her nails for a long time, so it may be possible to find something under them, but there's not much hope. It's the standard scenario: at first the victim is too frightened and obediently follows the guy's orders, hoping to buy her life this way. And when she finally understands that she has nothing to lose, she is already tied and is helpless. He, of course, has taken the rope with him again, as well as the tape he used on the victim's mouth."