Tracking the Butcher

by William Joiner

  The lights from police cars cut through the dense fog as they flowed down the alley. The officers shined their spotlights on McBean and quickly drew their guns and had them trained on McBean before he got off the ground.

  “Roll over on your stomach,” Lieutenant Alvarez yelled. “Hands out to your side, legs spread.”

  The light from the squad cars shown on Elgie as he just barely walked over to Quinn and Lucas.

  “Here, Boss, let me help you,” Quinn said.

  “Sure, you can help,” Elgie said.

  “Lieutenant, are you all right?” Lucas asked.

  “Yes, I’m fine, Lucas. Maybe a little bit of a bruised arm, but that’s about it. I can tell you one thing; the brace doesn’t protect you when getting hit with a two-by-four. Then punching like I did didn’t help. That shit hurt! Thanks for the backup, Quinn.”

  “Not a problem, Boss, it’s the least I could do. How are you feeling?”

  “I’m feeling like I need to be back in the sling.”

  Lieutenant Alvarez put McBean in the back of his squad car and came over to speak to Elgie.

  “So, McBean was stupid enough to try to fight you. That was really dumb on his part. We got some information on you before you got here. I know you’re an expert at hand-to-hand combat. I heard you even trained the recruits at the police academy. He picked the wrong guy to mess with, bad arm and all.

  “Oh, sorry it took a while for us to get back here, but we wanted to be sure we had the whole block covered before we came down the alley. We figured if you encountered him, you three would handle the arrest. When we didn’t see anyone coming out of the alley, we decided to rush it in case you guys were in trouble. But I see I was right, you guys could handle it on your own.”

  As soon as they returned to the hotel, Elgie called Vanessa and Michelle.

  “Hi, Vanessa, how are you and Michelle?”

  “We’re doing fine. How’s San Francisco?”

  “Right now, it’s a little foggy and windy, but guess what?”

  “What? Did you catch the Butcher?”

  “Yes, we did.”

  “Wow, that’s great! Hold on, I’m going to tell Michelle.”

  Vanessa went into the bathroom and knocked on the adjoining door. Michelle, wheeling along her oxygen tank, opened the door.

  “Michelle, Elgie’s on the phone—they’ve caught McBean, the Butcher!”

  “That’s so great, I just don’t know what else to say, just that’s great! Is Elgie still on the phone?”

  “Yeah, he’s on the line waiting for me. You want to speak to him?”

  “Yeah, I sure do. I wanna tell him how great I think he is and how awesome he is, and how much I appreciate him catching the Butcher, and how relieved I am. Then I want to say how happy I am that we can finally go home. That’s so great!”

  Vanessa raised the phone to her ear.

  “Did you get all that, Elgie?” Vanessa said.

  “How could I miss it, she sounds so, I guess Lucas would say exuberant. I think that’s the best word for what she must be feeling.”

  “Michelle, Elgie heard everything you said, and he loved that you’re so excited. Now you can finally see your room. Did I tell you that there’s a private entrance? And if we need you for something we’ll call rather than knock. Oh, and there’s a private bathroom too.”

  “That’s really great! I can’t wait to get to your house.”

  “Actually, we can get packed and go to our house now.”

  “That’s great! I’ll get packed.”

  Michelle disappeared into her room to pack.

  “Okay, Elgie, I think that’s enough excitement. I want to get my stuff together and yours and head home. I can pick you up from the airport if you want.”

  “That’s not necessary, we’ll be bringing McBean with us, and we’ll be picked up at the airport by Lieutenant Gray and at least two black and whites. We can expect to be bombarded by reporters when we arrive at LAX and again at LAPD headquarters. After that, I’ll be finished. They’ll process him in and transfer him to Los Angeles County Jail. You guys just go on home, I’ll be tied up for a while doing paperwork, and I suppose a press conference.”

  “Okay, Elgie, we’ll catch you on television, and we’ll see you when you get home.”

  The next morning Elgie, Quinn, and Lucas headed back to Los Angeles with their prisoner. He would go on trial for the murders in Los Angeles and the murder in San Francisco. Once he was booked into the county jail, McBean asked to speak to Elgie. He went to the jail and met with him in one of the interview rooms.

  “What is it you want, McBean?”

  “I want to tell you where the other bodies are buried. I also want to tell you about some other killings. You know about twenty-three murders, sorry, twenty-eight. I forgot about the five I strangled in Hollywood. There are ten more buried, that makes thirty-eight. Oh, I forgot there is the one in San Francisco which makes thirty-nine. That only leaves eleven to make fifty. Guess what, I killed another eleven you know nothing about, and I didn’t bury those. Unlike the ones I strangled and dumped in Hollywood. I spread these victims out all over the city, and no one knows because I killed them in different ways, so no one knew they were connected. I strangled some, stabbed others, but not the same way I stabbed my last victims.

  “You see, I wouldn’t have let you catch me if I hadn’t reached my goal. All I had to do was kill in San Francisco, go to Seattle and kill one, then Cleveland and kill one, and on like that. I had fun killing those first eleven, and I dumped them away from where I got them. You see, I studied before I started killing. I learned about geographic profiling, so I made sure to distribute them around in different places. Some close to where I lived. Close to where I worked but always, I went hunting away from my living and working areas. I was killing before I became a police officer.

  “Everything I’ve done has been so I could kill and get away with it. I became a cop so I would have the inside track on investigations and it gave me the perfect cover. I somehow fucked up when it came to you. I probably should have waited to make myself known, but I was planning my debut with Michelle Chambers. That was when I would kill with notoriety. You really made that possible by giving me a name. So, thank you for that.”

  “You should also thank me for catching you,” Elgie said. “Now you can have the notoriety and claim it—at least for a while. After your trial or you plead guilty, you’ll be locked away and forgotten.”

  “No, I won’t. I’m the most prolific serial killer in the history of the United States. They still talk about the Green River Killer. They still talk about BTK, and they’ll continue to make movies and write books about me. You’ll probably write a book, won’t you? You should, you’re the man that caught the Butcher. You’re famous thanks to me. You’ll be asked to go on the Today Show and every other talk show, and you’ll be asked to write a book, and if you can’t write, they’ll put you with a ghostwriter. He’ll write the book for you. You just tell him what to put in it. Then they’ll put your name on it. Wouldn’t you like that? Of course, you would everyone wants to be famous. Me, I want to be—and always have wanted to be—infamous. Since I was a child, I always wanted to kill women. Oh, I forgot I killed that man too, just for fun. So, what do you want from me? I know you must want something. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have come.”

  “I didn’t come wanting anything, but now I want you to make a list of these eleven you claim you killed. Tell me where you picked them up, what you did to them, and where did you dump the bodies. Also, give me a map of where you buried the ten you say you killed. I also want you to allocute but not in open court. The court will be closed to the public. The only ones allowed will be the families of your victims, and they’ll make impact statements. If you go to trial, you will be found guilty, and you will get the death penalty.”

  “Alright, Lieutenant, I’ll do what you said, see, I’m cooperative. I’ll go ahead and make the map and list for you right now.” McBean cont
inued to talk as he made the list and drew the map. “Remember what I told you, I’ll be infamous; you should go ahead and get your piece of the pie while it’s still warm.

  “I’ll make it a good book. I’ll tell you all about my childhood and what I was thinking when I contacted you. I’ll even tell you about what I said in confession. You could be famous and make Quinn and Lucas famous too. They were instrumental in you catching me. They can become famous too if you go ahead and do your part. Think about it and think about your wife. She deserves some attention. Here’s the list, hold on a minute, and I’ll give you the map.

  “The other buried bodies are in Griffith Park too. They’re near the observatory. Just take this road to this next crossroad, and the bodies start ten feet in from the road. There you are—all done. I’m assuming that you’ll be back to see me to get your book started. So, until then, have a wonderful day.”

  THE END

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