"What did she say?" Maxine asked him, when he got off the phone sat across from her..
"The autopsy didn't reveal anything new." He told her.
"What now?"
"Keep on ….working, and hope for a big lead."
A very loud boom, halted their conversation.
"Get down!" Max ordered as he tackled Maxine and almost threw her to the ground; glass shattered, voices screamed, fires started. Cautiously, he got up.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah….."Looking pale, Maxine managed to suppress her fear. "We'd better put out the fires"
Heat, smoke, crackled glass, and burning flesh thickened the atmosphere like humidity.
"You three! Help me with the fires!" Max called out to three young guys, students from nearby Harvard celebrating the end of an important exam. "Maxine! Go help the injured!"
Frantically, Max, the three young men, and a few others tried to put out the flames with fire extinguishers, baking powder, water, thick material, whatever they could think of and find,
"Heeelp me!" a women screamed, and ran around; her head peering out flames all over her body, save for her face. In a panic, someone roughly turned the extinguisher on her. "Aaaaaaaaaa!" The force on her skin, made the pain worse.
"Stop that! Are you insane?" Maxine reprimanded the person. "She's not a piece of furniture!"
The fires, kept on; heat closed in on them all.
"Max! We got the injured out! We should all evacuate!" Maxine told him.
"No! " he refused with several coughs. "You all can go….I'm going to save this place if it's the last thing I do!" For him, giving up now would be a sign that he had lost.
"Give me that!" Maxine yelled, grabbing a fire extinguisher from Max.
"No!"
"She's right!" a patron said, helping her confiscate the fire extinguisher.
Minutes later, firefighters arrived, as did the paramedics.
"Get out! We'll take over from here!" a uniformed fire fighter, with full fire gear, from the black rubber boots, to the clear face protector ordered, accompanied by similarly dress companions.
Quickly, they all left the building, soot faced and coughing.
"Here you go…" a paramedic said to Maxine, holding an oxygen masked, connected to a small machine.
"I'm fine"
"What happened?" Jordan asked as she ran to her soot-faced father some time after the emergency personnel arrived. Her office had gotten the call about two D.O.A.s She was relieved to see her father alive.
"bomb." Both tried to ignore the smell of cooked human flesh.
"How are you doing?" Maxine asked, still not processing what happened.
"I'm alive" Max still quite hadn't accepted that night's events.
"Well, let's clean up…." She had the need to keep busy.
"Look, I'll be back as soon as I can, dad" Jordan told him just before leaving.
"Just help me figure out who did this!!" he commanded. "Maxine! Don't worry about cleaning!"
"I insist……." She lit a cigarette, and continued to sweep; it kept her mind off things.
"Max! Sorry about your bar! I just heard about it. Did you know that the word 'revenge is cool' was painted on one of your outside walls in small letters?"
"No……" the three looked at each other.
"Show us!" Maxine commanded him, they saw it. A police line protected that part of the wall, in small green painted letters.
"I asked for the works; fingerprints, handwriting analysis, you name it." Woody assured them. "I've assigned a detail to your house, and Maxine's hotel room."
"No one saw anything??" Max asked.
"No…."
"Any chance…this could be connected to the investigation?" Maxine asked.
"Not likely…..as an ex cop Max would have lots of enemies, and perp probably got the idea for the message from reading about the murders.
"Serial killers don't just up and radically change their style" Max added.
"Someone from the bomb squad is comin" Woody told then. "Let's see what she says.
Woody got their statements, while officers on the scene questioned other witnesses.
"I'll be back later" he told them.
Sometime later, someone from the bomb squad came, and did a preliminary investigation.
While they waited for the results, Max and Maxine did some salvage work.
"Gonna take a while to rebuild this place…….." he sighed looking through heaps of rubbish.
"I can imagine……"
"Hey dad!" Jordan came in.
"Please tell me you got something!" Max remarked grumpily.
"Two heart attacks….got something Woody?" she called her friend the minute she saw him.
"We're in the process of checking transaction records." He told them.
Two days later, Woody had the answer for the two, who were at Jordan's apartment, going over files while eating.
"What have ya got?" Jordan asked him. The three were having dinner. None of them had gotten much sleep lately.
" The bar was bombed by a rather diluted Molotov." Woody said. "Which, makes the case a bit more difficult."
"Yeah…." Max said "You don't need special equipment, just gasoline in a jar, topped with cotton or paper. Once ya light'm they're like grenades"
"How long do they take to explode?" Jordan asked, needing the information. This could tell her where, or through what trajectory the Molotov was thrown.
"It depends I guess……." Max told her.
"What about the message on the wall?" Maxine asked.
"No fingerprints, and it was done with plain old spray paint."
"So it takes no training to use a Molotov?" the social worker needed to make sure she had the facts straight.
"Not really" Woody said. "Though of course you need great reflexes and aim."
"This guy knew something about chemistry, and didn't intend to kill dad." Jordan countered. "He made just the right mixture to just blow part of the place up, rather than the whole block.."
"You can't make a Molotov that strong." Wood commented in disbelief.
"With the right mixture yeah."
"Like with plane fuel?" Woody's mental wheels started up.
"Wouldn't that be hard to come by?" Maxine liked feeling that they were all onto something.
"It wouldn't have to be stolen from a major airport" Max explained. "Have you checked out cases where Molotovs were used?"
"I've got people on that" Woody told him. "But not any so far in this state anyway. The closest we got was a case involving some dumb high school kids, getting injured in the process of making one for the 'Senior Prank'."
"Puts TPing in its proper perspective doesn't it?" Jordan remarked wryly.
"So Maxine….have you dealt a lot disturbed kids, who like fires, or bombs?"
"I've handled my share of juvenile arsonists."
"Any one…stick in your mind?" Wood continued. "Like say, a kid who set fire to cats?". Perhaps an old case had come to haunt Maxine, retelling the story about the kids made him think of exploring this possibility again.
"A few. One child I met was so disturbed that he claimed that a leprechaun sat on his shoulder, telling him to burn things." She told them. "With great difficulty I was able to put him in a state juvenile psychiatric ward…"
"Arsonists don't do Malotovs." Max informed Woody, knowing where the latter was trying to go.
. "Look, I think Dad's place was bombed by someone who took advantage of these serial murders…..so that we'd blame it on the same perp thinking that he is putting us off guard by throwing a grenade and spraying half-assed copy-cat note.." Jordan figured, sipping some coffee.
" So you're theory is that the message on Max's wall is a hoax of a hoax?" Woody ascertained.
"Yep."
"I could buy that" Max thought aloud.
"I suppose I could too" Maxine croaked, cigarette in hand.
"So…..here is the scenario" Woody started to narrate. "He siphons gas from somewhere, puts some in a jar, puts some paper or cotton on it, goes to a nearby ally, lights it …and you know the rest. The most likely type of fuel he'd use would be the gas in his car. Max, you told me that you've had disputes in the bar, but not that serious?"
"Yeah." The bar owner told him. "Sometimes I get hotheads who get mad when I refuse to sell'm booze because they don't have the proper I.D, but it's more likely that they'd either rough me up, vandalize the bar, or set a fire to it the regular way. I doubt most of 'em would even know what a Molotov was."
"Maybe one of these guys knows his military history" Woody countered.
"Frankly, I can't believe that you don't need training to use this weapon." Maxine opinionated. "The fumes coming from the jar are certain to cause an explosion once you lit the match" She had figured this from her knowledge that gas leaks in homes can cause explosions with just the smallest spark or fire.
"Actually. I just remembered: you put a rag, not paper into the jar." Max told them. "and it has to stay dry until the moment of impact"
"Someone's been watching the History Channel" Jordan teased.
Meanwhile, back in Connecticut, Maxine's three adult children, Amy, Peter, and Vincent, as well as Gillian, her daughter-in-law, sat in the living room, pale and distraught, disagreeing on whether Maxine should be notified right away about her dog. All looked pale, though Peter kept his calm better than the others.
"Mom has the right to know!" Vincent argued. His blue eyes flashed with impatience. "She loved that dog!"
The basset hound had been beheaded, branded by a hot iron stabbed several times, and full of stumps where legs had been. Amy, to her horror, had found the dog on the lawn after two days of vainly searching for the canine. While waiting for his partner to finish throwing up on the lawn, the young women, in her CT humane society shirt, chased off crows and swarms of flies off the corpse, already reeking with the smell of decomposition. The police had ordered them not to touch it. A couple of officers took pictures of the scene, putting the yellow 'police line' tape around the dog.
"I'm am sorry to disturb you. I'm Detective Jones." a woman said, flashing a police badge as she came in.
"You're here about a dog??" Peter, asked incredulously, surprised to see a plain clothes officer.
"Today, it's the family pet, tomorrow, it could be Judge Gray or one of you." She explained. "We'll need to do an autopsy."
"They do that on animals?" Peter asked.
"Yeah, mostly they are done on cows, chickens and such to check for diseases, but given the….odd nature of this crime, vets from the CT Humane Society have agreed to do it. "They'll be asking your vet for the dog's medical files. A vet should be coming here soon."
"My mom is helping to investigate a murder case. Could this be related?" Peter asked, worried.
"What kind of case?"
"Some social workers have been murdered in a close succession in Boston."
"Serial killers usually don't regress from humans to animal victims." The detective told him. "So the odds are low."
"What if it's like a warning?"
"The SH on the animal's body could stand for the name of someone in one of your mother's cases. We'll get in touch with her supervisor."
Soon, the vet, Dr. Anderson arrived. She had a private practice, but did a shift now and then at the CT humane society clinic. The sight of the dog made her queasy, but she swallowed hard and put on some plastic surgical gloves.
"Detective Jones" She greeted the vet. "Thanks for coming. The dog was owned by a federal Judge. Can ya tell me anything?"
"There seems to be no blood , cauterization, or bruising." The vet took a good look, getting down on her knees. "I'd say the amputations were done post mortem The same goes for the stab wounds and the…beheading."
"How long ago did the dog die?"
"At least two days."
"Is there any way to get a model name or manufacturer on the iron branding?"
"I wouldn't know, sorry. However, I'll take the dog to my private practice and get some tissue samples to run tests.
"What killed the dog then?" Jones put her finger on her right cheek in confusion. In similar cases she's heard of or been on, the animal would be tortured or mutilated while still alive. Anderson felt puzzled as well.
"Some sort of poison, probably. I'll need do the autopsy. She passed out gloves to the two volunteers. "Follow my car, it's the red Sedan."
"I'll send someone over there to brush for fingerprints" Jones told the vet. "Make sure you give one of the officers the address of your practice. Anything else you can tell me?"
"All the mutilation was done by a large knife….as opposed to a saw."
Quietly, Jones went to see the family.
"The vet has done a preliminary exam." She announced.
"And..?" Peter interupted awkward silence.
"The mutilation of your dog, happened most after he died." Jones said grimly, though secretly relieved and grateful, that for a change, she was talking to a family about the death of a dog, not a loved one.
"Oh my God!" Vincent exclaimed.
"Who would do such a thing???" Gillian wondered aloud.
"Estimated time of death was two days ago. The vet will take the dog to her private practice for the full autopsy."
"No! We don't want Socrates to be cut up like that!" Amy argued, belatedly started to react to things.
"But Judge Gray….." the detective tried to argue.
"Mandatory autopsy laws do not apply to animals...unless…..it involves a disease or something." Amy countered rather lamely.
"For the…." Peter protested.
"The dog is considered state's evidence, the same way a burnt car is…..." Jones rejoined.
"Mom would what to know what happened to her dog!" Peter barked.
"You'll get the dog back after the autopsy and various tests are done." The detective promised, then left discreetly.
"I suggest that I go over there and tell her" Amy suggested. "I was the one who was supposed to take care of him." Guilt started to affect her.
"How could you know that some pycho would kidnap and kill him?" Peter countered, trying to comfort her.
Back in Boston, Woody excused himself, as did Jordan, whose work beeper went off.
"Smoking isn't going to calm you" Max advised once the others left.
"Whatever" she coughed.
"What something to drink?"
"Sure"
He poured them both a drink.
"There ya go."
"Seems like this will turn into yet another cold case" Maxine brooded cynically.
"Don't get discouraged just yet."
"I hate those" she groaned. "having co-workers who've only been on the job for five minutes doesn't make them any easier to solve."
"I hated that too: running my ideas with some rookie detective who thinks he's hot stuff and wants everything done by the book."
"Sounds like a typical day at work for me." She puffed on her cigarette "My supervisor is young enough to be my son; See, I was retired, but they called me back."
"I was fired" Max said simply. "My rule breaking caught up with me."
The phone interrupted them.
"I'll get it" he ran to get the phone.
"Hello?" a tentative male voice answered. "I'd like to speak to Maxine Gray: this is her son, Peter."
"Sure…here she is." Max told him, then whispered to Maxine. "It's your son, Peter."
"Yes?" She greeted him brusquely
"Mom….it's about Socrates."
"Did he get lost? I was starting to suspect something when I asked your sister about taking him to the vet, yesterday."
"He…was lost."
"Has he been found?"
"Yes, but…." Peter took a deep breath, his siblings and wife stared at him. "Someone got to him first"
"He was kidnapped?" She knew were this was going.
"Yeah and the next time we saw him….he was…….gone." Peter had decided to tell his mother now because he figured that the police would try to contact her soon about the dog.
Maxine turned pale, hanging up the phone.
"We're going to Connecticut." She told the former detective. "My dog's been killed."
TBC