THE DEAD SOUL: A Thriller

by M. William Phelps

  “I had Valerie watching him,” Dawn explained, holding Brendan. “Or I thought she was. Maybe I need to keep him on a leash, Jake!”

  Dawn wasn’t a bad mother. She was more liberal when it came to Brendan. If it were up to Jake, Brendan would still be riding in the front seat of the shopping carriage and tied to Dawn’s hip whenever they left the house. Dawn, on the other hand, wanted to teach the child that the world wasn’t a bad place. You couldn’t trust everyone. But you could certainly walk through life and not be afraid of every unfamiliar face you came in contact with. Jake was not a good judge of the real world. He lived inside that bubble of Boston’s criminal element. It corrupted his thinking. All cops thought this way to some extent.

  “He’s not a prisoner, Jake. I’m so mad at you right now.”

  Just then the soccer team ran up.

  “I have to go to see Dr. Kelsey, Dawn—” but she wouldn’t let him finish.

  “I’m sorry, Jake. I should not have trusted a thirteen-year-old. I know.”

  “Hey,” Jake grabbed hold of his wife, “it’s okay now.”

  Dawn shook. She went back and questioned every step of her morning. “I’m so sorry.” More tears. This was the effect Jake had on people. He could turn things around with a few words. Lay on the guilt subtly. Make Dawn feel like it was her fault.

  “Hey, listen, call your parents. I’ll be done early today”—Jake looked at his watch—“probably ‘roun’ three. Let’s go over there for dinner tonight, okay?” He knew that would make her feel better.

  The team stood in back of Dawn, a posse behind their leader. “Everything okay, Mrs. Cooper?” one of the kids asked.

  Dawn got herself together. Stood. “Yeah. Yes. Of course.”

  The team ran together back to the field. Dawn said she’d join them soon.

  “Brendan, you go with them.”

  “Okay, Mommy.”

  “Tyisha,” Dawn told her oldest player, “keep an eye on him for me.” She stared at the girl.

  “Sure thing, Mrs. Cooper.”

  “This coaching thing,” they walked toward Jake’s car, “is too much. Work is draining you, Dawn. Me, too. What do you say we drop it all and move to New Hampshire.”

  “Watching On Golden Pond again?” She paused. More serious and calm now, “Listen, Jake, you can never do that again.”

  Jake kissed Dawn on the lips. Jumped into his car. Dawn stared at him. “I don’t even know why I don’t stay mad at you, Jake Cooper.”

  “Because I’m the Sundance Man,” Jake said, mounting his sunglasses, “Boston’s finest superhero.” Dawn could see her reflection in those big blowfly mirror lenses. Alice Cooper-like, black mascara streaked down the channels of her eyes.

  “Just don’t forget about your dinner idea for tonight,” Dawn reminded her husband. “Once I call mom, she’ll hold us to it. We’ll have to show up—or you’ll have more in common with that priest of yours than you think.”

  Jake took off. The comment reminded him that he needed to get over to St. Paul’s within the next few days and see Father John about that problem with the deacon. He owed the priest that much.

  17

  Saturday, September 6 – 9:11 A.M.

  The sun was blurry, as if positioned behind stained glass. The sky a soft, varicose-vein blue. It had turned uncomfortably humid after a chilly start. Still, this was the type of morning in late summer you take without complaining. Jake parked on Franklin Street in Chelsea, next to a dangerously slanted telephone pole and white-brick retaining wall that looked to be falling over. Up ahead were ramshackle brick tenement buildings across the street from a dozen three-deckers. Blues had a name for the neighborhood—“Welfare Row.”

  Jake spied Dr. Kelsey as he walked around the corner of the U-Haul rental truck. It was situated at the base of a hill in front of the Miguel Village housing project. The pathologist stood on the tailgate. Handed out boxes and bags of food. Winter hats. Mittens and scarves. All donated by a local church.

  Kelsey looked a lot better out in the real world. She was dressed in jeans, a tanktop, white denim ball cap with a silver star made out of glitter on the front. She wore those white, nameless, nondescript tennis shoes made for housewives. Kelsey’s nails were Goth black. She had make-up on, a Bahaman blue rouge above her eyes (borderline circus clown), cherry red cheeks, rock star black eyeliner. Large silver and gold bracelets clanked on her wrists. A gold skull pendant hung from her neck.

  Nice touch, Jake thought, staring at the skeleton head.

  Kelsey spotted the detective. “Get your butt up here, Cooper. Help us out.”

  “I need to talk to you,” Jake yelled over the crowd, his hands cupped in a megaphone on the sides of his mouth. “Ray said you have something for me.”

  “Detective Cooper, this is Marilyn.” Kelsey could throw her voice. “Marilyn, Sundance Cooper.”

  Jake walked over, shook the woman’s strong, rough hand. She nodded without speaking.

  “Marilyn’s my sister.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  Marilyn wore her gray hair in a military buzz cut. She did not smile.

  “Don’t mind my sister,” Kelsey said, looking over at her. “Mad at the world—that woman.”

  Jake nodded as if to say he understood. “About those legs? Is it always this busy?”

  The poor were huddled around the back of the truck as though Doctors Without Borders backed up to some Third World country village to hand out medical supplies and sacks of rice.

  “This city is not into helping its people, Cooper. But that conversation is for another time.” Kelsey said something to her sister Jake couldn’t hear. Then jumped down off the tailgate, addressing Jake, “My car’s over there.”

  They reached Kelsey’s black Malibu. It was parked next to a red and yellow fire hydrant. They sat down inside. Kelsey took out her notes and read. Jake scoped out the inside of the vehicle. Clean. Tidy. He appreciated that.

  “Right … yes, here we are,” Kelsey said. She took off her librarian bifocals. Squinted one eye in thought. “I found what I believe to be the letter m underneath the ankle bone of the right leg.”

  “An m, you say?”

  “Yes. Not a tattoo or anything like that. It’s a crude marking of some sort, as if it was burned into the skin—after death—on purpose.”

  A cipher?

  Jake had a hard time with this notion. “Wait a minute, Doctor. Whose legs are we talking about here?”

  “The new set. The set you found under the Taylor kid’s bed?”

  “You mean in her closet?”

  “Right, sorry,” she said, checking her notes again. “The Taylor closet.”

  “Yes, whose legs are those? Matikas said something about them not being the Taylor kid’s. Are they Lisa Marie Taylor’s legs or not?”

  “Those legs are definitely not from your Lisa Marie. Who names their kid after a Presley, anyway?” The doctor shook her head.

  “I’ll ask the dad about the name next time I see him. Whose legs are they, then?”

  “I need to run a few more tests, but I am ninety-nine percent certain, you can bet on this one, Cooper, that”—she winked—“those legs belong to the same DNA donor we pulled off the Taylor kid’s face.”

  Alyssa Bettencourt. Jake saw all that blood on Lisa’s face at the crime scene. It did not belong to her. Whoever beat her, slathered someone else’s blood on her face and pummeled the girl after she was already dead.

  “Go on.”

  “Beyond the prelim blood tests I ran, I know the legs had been previously frozen, likely in the same locale as the Taylor body. I found the same ice crystal residue. We determine this by analyzing the frozen air particles left behind. Sort of in the same fashion archeologists check layers of the Arctic for carbons. You know what I mean.”

  “I guess, yeah.” Jake didn’t care about science. He sat back. Considered the barbarity of these crimes. Took a breath. “Thanks, Doctor.” He stepped out of the Malibu. Level
ed his iPhone, hit speaker.

  After one buzz: “The Verizon customer you are trying to reach is out of a serviceable area.”

  Simmons.

  At the beep: “Dickie, call me when you have service back.”

  Kelsey tapped Jake on the back. “That’s all for now. I’ll have more soon. Gotta run. I need to get back to my sister and the civic duty she takes so much pride in. Not enough to be a lesbian, you know. She has to save the world, too.”

  “Yep, sure …” Jake hung up the line.

  “Come see me on Monday. I’ll should have more detail.”

  “One question, Doctor.”

  “What is it, Cooper? I really need to get back.”

  “Sure. But that marking inside Lisa’s mouth, the one you thought wasn’t a bite mark or a skin defect, what type of shape is that in?”

  The doctor went back into the car, rummaged through the photographs, stopping on a close-up. “Look for yourself.”

  Jake took the color photo in hand, stared at it in puzzlement. “I don’t see anything.”

  “You’ve got it upside down.” It was hard to interpret if you didn’t know what you were looking at. The skin, after a good washing, was a whitish pink, like chewed gum. The marking, all blown up like this in the photo, looked as if it could be anything.

  Kelsey straightened the photo.

  There it was in plain view.

  “An i?”

  “Yes. The letter i. Appears someone is sending you a message, Detective.”

  “Can I have this photo? You have one of the m on the ankle I can take, too?”

  She handed it to him.

  In his mind, Jake Cooper put the two letters together: “i-m.”

  I-M.

  I’m … what?

  18

  Saturday, September 6 – 9:58 A.M.

  Lisa Marie’s killer parked the 1972 American Motors Post Office Jeep he had bought at auction in a space nearest to the 1st Street entrance. How long had been since he attended Mass inside this European-looking stone construction here in the old Southie neighborhood? Let’s see … well, this was the first time since he left Bainbridge, where this same godforsaken establishment, St. Paul’s Church, had shipped him off to. In Maine, the sisters had made him go to Mass. So the last time he actually sat in the pew and wanted to be there, praising Jesus and the Holy Spirit, kneeling and standing and believing in the gift of grace, it was here, in this church. In fact, the day before he had eavesdropped and overheard Deacon Patrick O’Keefe and Father John O’Brien decide his fate.

  “Bainbridge is the right place for him, John,” the deacon explained to the priest. “It’s not a bad place. We’ve had successes come out of there. Kids we’ve sent. Southie is not a place a kid can survive on his own. Look at the suicide rate. Anyway, this child will become a problem. Both his parents are not coming back. We know they’re dead.”

  “I understand, Patrick. But this child is different. I don’t think he can make it in that environment.”

  “Oh, come now, John. And living here is going to be better? This is not a decision for us to make. We cannot save everyone.”

  A flash of nostalgia passed through him as he walked through the large wooden double doors. He dipped in the holy water font. After pausing, thinking about it, he crossed himself. Time stood still. That statue of Mary, the blue and white shawl hanging off her young shoulders, was a bit worn, but still greeted him as he walked underneath. The gold cross above the door into the nave, polished once a week by the sisters, had not aged a day. Just like that, he was sucked back into this world he had come from. He watched the altar boys rushing around, getting ready for Mass. Years past, he stood in the same narthex dreaming of wearing that red and white cassock, preparing the incense for the priest.

  Faith, the ultimate justifier.

  Strange to be on other side now, he thought, representing the Evil One.

  He lived alone in that lice- and cockroach-infested Dorchester Heights apartment after his hooker mother left him to fend for himself. He accepted it, though, attending school and Mass and reading the Gospels at night. Religiously. He was stealing food from the local stores, getting by until he was old enough to get a job and take care of himself. It was God’s plan, after all. His dad’s miserable life was cut short by a “hot shot,” a lethal dose of coke and heroin a dealer provides when he’s sick of a customer not paying. That was followed by Mom’s vanishing act. Why hadn’t Father John and Deacon O’Keefe allowed him to live alone? What was so bad about it? He was better off. By sending him north, hadn’t they intervened with God’s work?

  Sure they had.

  “Good morning, sir,” a guttural voice intoned. The mailman realized he had blacked out for a moment and lost track of where he was. He and Father John stood between the narthex and the nave. “Welcome to St. Paul’s.”

  Startled, he turned. “Thank you … good morning, Father.”

  “Do I know you? You seem familiar.”

  “No, Father. I was passing through town. I’m from the north, Malden, Somerville area. Heading home to the wife and family after a business trip. I wanted to stop and take in the Mass. I’ve heard of your work here.”

  Lisa Marie’s killer wanted to hit himself in the head with his palm. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Way too much information.

  Father John O’Brien didn’t pester the stranger. “Well, I do hope you enjoy Mass this morning, sir, and do join us again.” The priest bowed. His hands palm-to-palm in front of himself. Eyes closed.

  Kneeling, the music began. The mailman watched as a procession—Deacon Patrick O’Keefe, Father John and the two altar servers—made that slow, devout walk down the center aisle of the nave. He had carried that same gold cross through that same aisle a thousand times. He dreamed back then of going to the seminary. He imagined himself dressed in friar’s brown garb, shaved head, bowing and praying all day long, saying rosaries until his throat was like sandpaper.

  Then the Teacher came into his life—the man who changed his outlook about growing up without parents in an orphanage. He was also, later on, the same man who took his soul and gutted it, before explaining to him that life was about choices. You had to follow your heart until you found your true calling. The seminary maybe wasn’t for him. That was the day the doubt began. Spiritual desires seen through a mature lens, said the Teacher. He pronounced the word matt-turr, like a Brit.

  As he stood in the pew, the organist played. He watched God’s chosen few walk toward the chancel. Father John kissed the altar. Sat down off to the right, in the south transept. The deacon sat beside him. As they did this, Lisa Marie’s killer couldn’t stop the thoughts and images this place evoked. He had no idea the horror of his past would be so magnified by just being in here. Yet it made him feel comfortable.

  He saw the bandana go over his mouth. He couldn’t scream.

  Evil, he believed, was the main theme of Revelation.

  Stop it … shut up …

  He wanted to cut himself. Just a little slit along the thigh. Draw some blood. Oh, to do it here, in this church. How magisterial that would feel. How freeing. How satanic.

  Cathartic bliss—a pressure valve let loose.

  Don’t make me do this.

  Deacon Patrick O’Keefe stood at the pulpit in the north transept and read the from the Scriptures. When he finished, he cleared his throat and gave the homily. Off to the right Father John O’Brien sat in the chair with the big pointed back, a relic given to St. Paul’s by an outgoing bishop.

  The gospel reading was Matthew 5:1-12. The Sermon on the Mount. The Beatitudes. Jesus’ rules for living.

  How appropriate.

  Looking on, the mailman realized how long he had been away. Deacon O’Keefe looked old. Sagging skin. Gelled eyes, dripping a slimy clear fluid. The man walked with a slight curve in his back and had to a-hem several times before he found the right inflection to announce the Word.

  The mailman thought of the article he pinned to his wall earlier th
at morning back at home. How the Boston archdiocese had uncovered an affair. O’Keefe confessed to Monsignor Belini, who confronted him with the matter. “I have a daughter, Your Excellency,” Deacon said. But they allowed him continue in his ministry.

  Pathetic.

  After reading the final beatitude, O’Keefe concluded with a simple bit of hypocritical advice: “To open your heart to the grace of our Lord, to partake in this reading and live these laws Jesus left to us,” he stabbed his bony finger into the page, “is a peace you will not be able to find anywhere else.”

  The mailman smiled at the deacon, who looked at him several times.

  A eureka moment hit Lisa Marie’s and Alyssa Bettencourt’s killer as the deacon concluded his homily. His next target was there before him. She had been within reach the entire time. “My fellow believers in Christ,” the deacon shouted, “I need to say something on a personal note. Something that ushers into my heart such a grand sense of fulfillment and love.” He smiled. “My daughter, please stand, Mary.” In the front pew, a young woman in a white sweater, her hair tied back in a matching bow, hesitated. Then stood and turned to face the congregation. “My lovely daughter, Mary, has decided to pursue a vocation in the Church. She is heading north, to Vermont, to study the Doctors of the Church at St. Faustina’s College.”

  Mary took a bow as the parish erupted into applause.

  The mailman stood and made single claps, slowly, out in front of himself—a trained seal. Mary cried and bowed, over and over. Embarrassed, she didn’t know what to do.