Hellbound/L.M.Lewis
Chapter 5
He woke to the sound of the telephone ringing. It was two shades the wrong side of dawn. McCormick rolled over, blinked, reached for a phone that wasn't there, on a nightstand that wasn't his own, then remembered the previous day with a lurch of recollection.
The sound had stopped after only two rings, and now he heard Hardcastle's gravelly muttering—short questions being asked after a few moments of listening. It had to be Frank, and it was too early for anything further from the crime labs, so the call could only mean one thing.
Mark pulled himself up, and ran his fingers through his hair. He felt no better rested than he had before he'd gone to bed. It was still there, that sense of dread, mingled with an increasing desire to just have it over with.
But all those crime scenes, all those little plastic bags, and no solid leads yet.
He knew the judge was right. It was only a matter of time; the guy would screw up. Maybe he had already. Maybe the crucial fingerprint was already making its way through the system, waiting to be mated with a name.
Hardcastle was in the doorway, looking disheveled and grim. "Wanna have some breakfast before we go see the body?"
"You think that's a good idea?" Mark swung his feet out of bed and cocked his head. "Where'd they find him?"
"It's not Artie Kepler. Got us another one. Frank says this one's not missing any pieces."
00000
Mark drove; Hardcastle stared straight ahead, pretty fixedly. Their destination was a stretch of beach not even three miles from the estate. The body had been discovered by an early-morning dog walker, who'd almost stumbled into the pit that had been dug in the sand.
The proper place was easily spotted now. The lot above that part of the beach was occupied by several black and whites, and a smattering of other official vehicles, including one from the coroner's office. The lowly, uniformed guy who'd been stationed at the entrance to keep out the curious, started to wave them past before doing the usual double-take upon recognizing the judge.
Mark pulled in. He momentarily envied the people who would be shagged off, the ones who didn't know what was down there on the sand.
"How'd Frank find out so fast?" he murmured, as he climbed out of the Coyote.
Hardcastle was still sitting. There was none of his usual eagerness to get on with things this morning. He shrugged. "The word is out, I suppose. If it's weird and unusual, it's Harper's this week." He opened the door on his side with a sigh and got both feet on the pavement.
They spotted the lieutenant and he'd seen them as well. Parks was there, too, with a cluster of men not far down on the beach, in the dry sand above the area where footprints would have been left. The body was not in sight, but as they approached, they could see there was a mound of sand, flung up alongside a depression.
There were no 'good mornings' to be said, just stern, weary nods from Harper and Parks, and a few of the others. There was an evidence tech down alongside the body, but the rest were keeping off a short distance. Mark didn't blame them. Hardcastle had already conveyed the specifics to him on the way here.
Still, it wasn't quite enough preparation. Harper had nodded to the tech on their arrival. The man pulled back the blanket that had been laid over the body, not a standard crime scene item, it must've been something the murderer had done, a strange courtesy.
What was underneath was in no way as gruesome as the finds of the day before. The victim was lying face up, with the glassy-eyed look of the rigored dead. He was middle-aged, with touches of gray at the temples, now mixed with sand. His face was waxy pale, far paler than even the usual corpse.
The blanket was folded back now, off the upper body completely. This was where the disconnect from logic began. Mark knew, yet the mind tries to make things fit. He's got his clothes on backwards. Just a flash of thought, though he knew it wasn't true, because, in fact, it was the body that was on the wrong way.
The tech pulled down the collar, using one gloved finger, so that they could see the row of coarse stitches that ringed the man's neck. Not so bad, Mark thought. I've seen worse things. He kept his breathing slow and even.
"Any ID?" the judge asked.
Parks shook his head glumly. "Not so far. Not much blood. The decapitation must've occurred somewhere else. Might be that our guy got interrupted this time. Kinda looks to me like he was planning on burying this one."
Mark hesitated for a moment, saying nothing. Finally he just shook his head.
"But it's one of ours, isn't it?" The detective shrugged almost sheepishly. "Been kind of busy. An awful lot of stuff to coordinate. Didn't have time to pick up a copy of the book. Been letting Noman handle that end of it."
Mark looked around for a nervous moment. The psychologist was nowhere in sight. He felt his shoulders sink down; he hadn't even realized how tense he'd been.
"It's a pit, not a grave," he said quietly. "We're in the eighth circle and there are ten of these—Malebolgia—evil pits. This one is, ah . . . four?" He cast a sideward glance at the judge, who'd had the Longfellow translation out the evening before.
The judge might have spared a quick moment to survey the faces around them before he'd nodded his agreement. "Yeah, four. Fortunetellers. People who tried to predict the future."
"Their heads were fixed facing backwards," McCormick added. "But like I said, this is pit number four. We're missing three—panderers, flatterers, and, um, Simonists."
"What the hell is a Simonist?" Harper grimaced.
"Not in the penal code, Frank," the judge said wearily. "It's someone who sells church favors. Okay," he took a breath and shook his head, "pimps, maybe. But I don't think Romney had much of an angle in the prostitution racket—that would've been small potatoes for a guy like him. And our killer might've dug up a flatterer or two, always plenty of those around a crime boss, but simony? I dunno, that'd be a helluva stretch. I was kinda wondering what he could do with that one myself, last night."
"He is undoubtedly under a great deal of psychological stress at the moment."
The four men turned almost simultaneously to the voice from just behind them. Noman stood there, frowning. His approach had gone unnoticed in the discussion.
"This alteration in a preconceived pattern would be very troubling to a mind such as we are dealing with." Noman's tone verged on the pedantic. He stepped up closer to the edge of the pit and peered in. "He has failed, to some degree." He glanced aside at the judge and added, "It must've cost him a great deal of thought."
Hardcastle looked at him with poorly concealed disgust. "Does this mean he'll quit?"
Noman had gone back to studying the pit and its contents. He barely spared a half shrug. "Hard to say. Sometimes the pattern becomes more important than the original purpose, and even one which is flawed may demand completion."
"Well, I don't know how the heck we're going to second guess him from here on out—too many directions to go in," Hardcastle added. He studiously turned to address Harper and Parks, his back to Noman. "Our best bet has to be cracking one of the ones that's already occurred, before he can pile on any more. Maybe an ID on this guy—"
"At least we've got some finger prints to work with," Park said dryly.
The judge nodded and took a step back, jostling Noman slightly but paying him no other heed. Mark was more circumspect, edging around him. Frank followed, too, after getting a quick jerk of the chin from Hardcastle.
The three of them were almost back to the lot before the judge spoke again.
"What I called you about last night, you come up with anything?"
"He's got a list of credentials as long as your arm." Frank was staring off across the lot toward a newly-arrived van with a local TV station's call letters emblazoned on it. His expression was one of deep annoyance. He broke off from that and turned back the more immediate matter with a casual shrug. "He's freelance, not full time. Thank God for that. But he's done work for the LAPD before."
"Yeah, okay," Hardcastle said impatiently. "We already knew that. What I want to know is could the guy be double-dipping on this one? Maybe he's taking a payoff from someone else to stir up all this dust. He got any debts? Any ties to the mob, or to someone that I've inconvenienced?"
Frank frowned. "Come on, Milt, it's been less than twelve hours since you asked me to check on him, and I've got seven unsolved murders on my hands . . . hell, maybe ten. Now you want me to dig even deeper on this guy? We've got limited resources here, and they're already stretched a little thin. Maybe that'd be something you and Mark could handle."
Hardcastle gave that a moment's thought and a slightly more understanding nod. "Yeah, you've got a point. I suppose I just didn't want to make it look like some kind of vendetta, that's all—not that it matters if the guy's dirty."
"Knock yourself out, Milt. I know Parks'll thank you if you find something." Frank was staring at the TV crew, now almost unpacked and looking around for prey.
Noman arrived back up from the beach, appearing preoccupied but available. Harper said 'dammit' under his breath and started to run an interception. It was a moment too late; the reporter had pounced and the psychologist, looking momentarily flustered and surprisingly unwilling, was cornered.
"Just great," Harper sighed, then glanced sideward. "Listen, the only reason nobody's listening to him so far, is that Parks can't stand the man and I know he's nuts. If this jumps the wall, someone higher up may want Mark brought in for questioning . . . hell, maybe even you, too."
"Me? Come on, Frank—"
"Me, on the other hand," Mark muttered, "no big shock there."
All three men were now looking in Noman's direction. The man had obviously been drawn out by the reporter; he was gesturing toward the beach and appeared to be speaking in an animated manner.
Hardcastle grunted once, as if he'd seen enough and said, "We're outta here." He glanced at his watch and then at Frank. "You had breakfast yet?"
Mark paled, but Harper just shook his head sadly and said, "Nah, but it's gonna have to be a Danish and coffee for me. Might have the preliminary report on your package later this morning—I think the pathologist was calling it a 'limited autopsy'."
00000
Breakfast was not a big success. Food got eaten but Mark didn't think his was going to digest very well. He was up on his feet almost before Hardcastle had tucked into a second piece of toast. Ferrying dishes to the sink was a poor cover for pacing.
The judge gave him an irritated look. "Can you just siddown for a few minutes?"
Mark shook his head no very definitively. "I was thinking maybe a drive. That might help. I mean, unless you have an idea. Something to do."
"A 'drive,' huh?" The judge said. "You sure that doesn't constitute 'flight to avoid arrest'?" His smile was probably meant to imply humor.
Mark wasn't in the mood. He knew he sounded tense when he replied, "Not yet. Not till you know for sure that someone's on their way to arrest you. Right now it's still 'going for a drive up the coast,' and you might want to consider joining me."
"Would we be coming back?" Hardcastle asked, still smiling.
"That depends," Mark said flatly.
The judge looked surprised, but not utterly shocked. This time he said 'sit down' more firmly and Mark sank into his seat, compelled.
"Look, kiddo, I know you don't have as much faith in the system as—"
"I ought to?" McCormick interrupted aggravatedly.
The judge sighed. It was a fairly impressive show of patience for him. "You oughtta let me finish, ya know? I was gonna say 'as much faith as I have . . . and sometimes I wonder which one of us is more realistic."
Mark was stunned—it might have been his shocked silence that was misinterpreted.
"You aren't still worried about that 'snake' thing, are ya? I mean, why the heck would the killer go after you? You didn't have anything to do with the Donhavey case."
Mark gathered his thoughts and shook his head. "Nah," he laughed, brief and nervous, "the shrink scares me more than the snakes."
"He's hired to speculate, that's all. So that's what he does. None of it's proof."
"Yeah, shrinks don't need proof . . . and, besides, once everyone has made up their minds, they'll find whatever they need. You wait."
Hardcastle opened his mouth but Mark never heard the nature of his objection. It was cut short by a ring of the phone. They both twitched and turned this time. McCormick was on his feet first and had the receiver in his hand.
Frank greeted Mark's 'hello' with a dirge-like, "Well, it just keeps getting better and better."
"You found another one?"
"Nah, I got a heads-up from one of the guys processing the package. They got a set of partial prints off the container—it's Tupperware. You got any of that stuff out there?"
"Everybody's got Tupperware, Frank," Mark tried to keep the impatience out of his voice and wave Hardcastle back down into his seat at the same time. "Who's prints?"
"Lemme talk to him, Mark."
The tone was firm and insistent. McCormick let out a breath. Not that any of it was a big surprise, but the sheer, step-wise aggravation of the past few days was starting to wear on him. He handed the phone over to the judge, who was already on his feet and had been looking puzzled.
He got little more from Hardcastle's terse responses to whatever information Frank was offering. The conversation ended with little more than a grunted good-bye and a cryptic, 'See you in a bit.'
The judge hung the phone up and said nothing for a moment. Mark felt the tension thicken.
"Screw it," he finally said. "I knew I should've gone for a drive. Now it really is flight to avoid arrest."
"Huh?" Hardcastle blinked at him once. "What the hell are you talking about? I'm just gonna run down there and talk to them for a bit. Answer some questions, that's all. You stay here," he added sternly.
Mark stared in confusion.
"Well, they're my prints on the damn container," the judge pointed out. "And it was on my porch. Makes sense they'd want to talk to me."
A moment passed in which Mark looked flabbergasted, and then flustered. "Okay," he finally said, "I'll go along . . . moral support or something."
Hardcastle shook his head firmly. "They're not going to do anything but ask me a few questions."
Mark puzzled it out for a moment and then said, "Having me along is a liability, huh?"
"Not that." Hardcastle frowned as if he was searching for the right words. "Listen," he finally said, "all they want to do is talk to me right now. Sure enough, one of the things they're gonna ask me is who do I think might have had reason to want to set me up like this, and have access to something with my fingerprints on it—"
"And had a copy of the Cliff Notes handy?" Mark finished grimly.
"Yeah, and that." Hardcastle nodded. "And I'll do a little song and dance, but if you're standing right there, well, chances are you'll wind up in a holding cell, just so they'll know where you're at when they finally decide what questions they want to ask you. So, you stay here. That means here. Okay?"
Mark nodded silently.
"Or maybe in the gatehouse," the judge added after a moment's thought, "in case they want to stop by here and check things out."
"There weren't any signs of forced entry."
"I know. I think it might've come from the garage. I had a container like that in the tackle box. That would have had just my prints on it." He still appeared to be mulling it over as he headed for the front door. He was halfway out before he turned and said, one last time, "Here, okay? Don't make me go through the whole buck and wing with those guys and then find out you've done something that makes you look guilty as hell. All right?"
"I said I wouldn't."
"No, you didn't. You just nodded."
"Well, I won't. I'll stay here. I promise." He couldn't help it if the last part had come out a little sullen.
"Yeah," Hardcastle squinted at him, then looked satisfied, "and I'll be back in a hour or two."
"Sure."
00000
Mark stood in the driveway and watched the judge's departure and then, partly because he'd promised to, and partly because he couldn't think of a single other thing to do that made any more sense, he retreated to the gatehouse. He picked up the well-worn booklet and put it down several times. He wasn't sure what point there was to reading it again. Nothing from it had been useful so far. You opened your big mouth, went all clever, and it didn't do a bit of good. Made things worse.
He snuck one last peek at the part about thieves and snakes. He consoled himself with Hardcastle's opinion that victims would have to have some connection to Romney and the original crime.
It wasn't quite an hour, certainly faster than he'd expected, when he heard sounds from outside. Back already? No wonder the man still had faith in the system. They must've only asked him if he knew anything about how somebody's critical parts had wound up on his front doorstep—a quick 'no' and that was that.
Mark got up from the couch and headed for the gatehouse door, intending to register some gripes about 'equal in the eyes of the law'. He had one hand on the knob and was already starting to turn it, when he heard a tentative knock—definitely not Hardcastle's style. Opening it he saw Dr. Noman, right hand already poised to knock again, his left elbow tucked into his side, holding the familiar Romney file in place.
He simply stared at the man, who was smiling back, also tentatively.
"No one answered at the other house." The psychologist gestured over his shoulder. "I wanted to return this to the judge." He patted the file with his free hand. "I think I've gotten as much out of it as I could."
Mark frowned at that, but started to reach for it. "I can tell him you were here."
"Oh, he is out." Noman looked regretful, easing back and tucking the file in a little tighter. "I was hoping I could have a word with him."
McCormick's frown deepened "About what?" he asked, almost without thinking.
"Well, he seemed a bit angry this morning. I wanted to apologize."
Mark felt his jaw go slack. He pulled it up again, gritting his teeth slightly.
"Apologize? You practically accused him of being a serial killer. You did accuse me of it. I'm not sure 'apologize' is gonna cut it."
Noman was frowning now, too. "I may have been a bit hasty. You can understand my suspicions, can't you?"
Mark shook his head.
"Hmm, well, standing apart from it, you might. I would say Milton Hardcastle's personal approach to justice is astonishingly unique. He does seem to operate . . . oh dear, I don't want to use the term 'outside the law'—"
"Good." McCormick was coming close to grinding some enamel down. "I'd avoid that argument when you apologize to him."
Noman cleared his throat slightly. "Right. Perhaps it would be more precise to say he is a law unto himself. But I see now, that he is held in high respect by others in the law enforcement community. They seem united in their conviction that he could not be responsible for these crimes."
"So," Mark said in weary anger, "is it back to me, then?"
Noman squinted slightly, then said, "No, I believe I was wrong about that, too. I would like to think I am a good judge of character." He smiled in what appeared to be humorous self-deprecation. "Your repulsion by the acts that have been perpetrated the past few days, it did not seem to me to have been feigned."
"It wasn't." McCormick let out a long breath, "So . . . who, then? Any ideas at all?"
"Yes," Noman nodded almost eagerly. "I think I might have some."
Mark pinched his nose, shook his head, and gestured the man through the door. Noman looked around curiously as he walked into the room, like a man who made a bad habit of observation.
He put the file down on the coffee table, and took a seat primly on the far end of the sofa, his eyes still scanning the room. McCormick sat as well. He wasn't all that eager to hear the shrink's latest theory, and was already getting a little tired of the company, but thought he oughtn't do anything to compromise the new good relations.
"So, who?" he asked again. "And don't tell me Parks or I'll—" He pulled up short. There was something in the look on Noman's face—utter astonishment. "No way," McCormick sputtered. "Look, I don't know the guy but—"
Noman's expression gradually softened to something more knowing and less startled.
"Did you know he's been working this case right from the Donhavey killing?" the psychologist said quietly. "He spent a huge amount of time on that one, and never any closer to the killer." Noman shook his head. "Or at least that is how it seemed. And who had better access to the cast of characters than he? Who could have demanded a meeting with any of them? He knew their whereabouts and had access to information about their movements."
Mark sat stock still, reviewing all the events from a new perspective.
"But," he finally shook his head, "the guy's not crazy. He's a damn police officer. This is just another case to him."
Noman shrugged. "Maybe so. Maybe not crazy at all. There have been certain hallmarks on this one, things that didn't quite fit. It is possible that the whole overlay of bizarre actions is merely smokescreen. It is possible that there was only one target, perhaps Romney himself, and the rest of this was just clutter, to hide the real motive."
"What motive? He's a cop; it's a job."
"All right, as I said, perhaps no madness at all. His original 'failure' on the Donhavey case might have been the consequences of bribery. Mr. Romney had considerable resources. He might have, in turn, sought a better return on his investment in Detective Parks, or Parks simply thought it was too dangerous, having the whole thing raked up again after the first suicide."
"Bainbridge really was a suicide, then?"
"It appears so to me."
"And the white sheets—"
"Sometimes a sheet is just a sheet," Noman said with a light shrug. "I'll admit it's a stretch for Parks to have seen the start of the pattern and built on it."
"More of a stretch than me seeing it?" Mark asked quietly.
"No," Noman said with a light laugh. "That was definitely the biggest stretch."
"Believe me, if I ever notice anything like that again, I will close my eyes until it goes away."
"No doubt," the psychologist said thoughtfully. And then, after a moment, he added, "I'd like to hear how you came up with it."
He'd managed to sound merely curious, for a change, instead of outright offensive. Mark appreciated the conscious effort it must've taken him.
"Let's just say I grew up believing in Hell," he smiled thinly. "When I found out someone had written a description of it, I thought I ought to read it. Wasn't what I'd expected, though. I never got all the way through and a lot of it didn't make any sense. Still, some of the images were pretty vivid."
Noman nodded.
Mark, sighed and leaned forward, elbows on his knees. He thought the whole thing through one more time and finally said, "I dunno, it still seems pretty weird to me. Not that anybody doing something like this wouldn't be weird, but Parks?" He shook his head. "That's gonna be a tough sell." He straightened up and edged forward, moving to rise. Noman's voice cut him off.
"Look at the file. The page I put on top."
Mark frowned and reached for it, turning the cover back and staring down at the first page, which was an unfamiliar piece of paper with familiar handwriting on it. He reached for it. He'd only had the split second to recognize it as his own, not enough time to focus on the words, before a sharp blow took him by surprise.
00000
"Come on, now, I didn't hit you that hard."
The nudge to his leg was as insistent as the voice. McCormick tried to move away, and found he was wedged up against something hard and cold, with his arms in an awkward position.
You're sitting in the shower and you're handcuffed. The pieces drifted slowly into position but not the explanation for how he'd wound up there.
"Okay, this'll be a bit of a shock."
Noman. The last piece snapped into place and all that was left was the damn 'Why?'
Then it hit him, a drenching blast of cold water. His shirt and pants were no protection at all. He tried to scramble up but the damn handcuffs made it too awkward and he slipped back down.
After only a few minutes, though it seemed much longer, the water stopped. His eyes were open. There was a fuzzy figure, seen through drips and straggles of wet hair, and Noman's voice again, not unkindly, saying, "There now, that's a little better. It'll speed things up a bit."
This time he said it out loud. "Why?"
"First things first," the man said slowly, as if he wasn't sure McCormick was all the way back yet. "I have a gun here. You see?"
Mark squinted a little. He saw. It was being held with a surprising amount of confidence for a guy with a couple pages of academic credentials.
"Do as I say and you'll live a little longer."
Mark noted the qualification on the end of that statement, but the rapidly rising certainty that he was looking at the Inferno Killer, made the gun seem a bit tame.
"Maybe I'd prefer being shot," he said. "I really hate snakes."
"Snakes?" The man looked briefly puzzled. "Oh, snakes. Hell, no." He frowned thoughtfully. "Wish I'd thought of it though, but, no, too late for snakes. And where the heck would I have gotten them, anyway?" He shook his head and gestured with the gun.
Mark worked his way up the wall, slowly, leaning back against it until the spinning stopped. Nothing he could do about the shivering, even if he hadn't been doused in cold water he might've been doing that. He stepped out of the shower stall, hearing his shoes squelch on the tile.
"Why?" he said again, watching the other man step back out of reach.
"Maybe you should explain it to me."
"For Donhavey, I figure. You're his father?" Mark asked with weary certainty.
"That's really quite amazing. How do you do it?" The smile that blossomed on the other man's face was extraordinary—yet sad, too.
"Too weird, though. I mean, a guy like him, a junior mobster, having a shrink for a father."
"Oh, now you're being slow. And just when I was expecting better. Must've been the hit to the head."
"You're not Noman?" Mark frowned.
"Well," the other man said quietly, "I have to say, the name seemed very appropriate, but, no, I'm not him. He's been dead for a week and a half already. Fortunetellers, charlatans. I was secretly pleased to see you shared my opinion of them."
Light dawned, slow and inexorable. Mark grimaced. "The guy on the beach?"
"Precisely. Cold storage. I took all the shelves out of a refrigerator. The M.E. will figure that part out, most certainly. The identification may take a lot longer."
"Your credentials? Nobody questioned who you were?"
"It was a risk, I know, but it's a big department, the LAPD, and no one on this case had actually met Dr. Noman. As for all the paperwork—I'm a forger, by trade. Lock picking, a little light safecracking, all of that. Never anything violent before this. Never saw the reason for it. Didn't actually know I had it in me. Maybe I am mad. Maybe they drove me to it—what they did to my boy." He sighed and shook his head.
"And my name is . . . not important. I've never been arrested; my prints aren't on record anywhere."
Mark noticed he had gloves on now as he backed away to the coffee table. The man reached down, eyes still kept carefully on McCormick. He lifted the sheet that was on top of the open file, and set it aside. He closed the rest and picked it up.
"I never got to read it," Mark said with a nod toward the piece of paper and a curiosity that was not all feigned.
"It's your confession."
"I thought you'd decided to hang it on Parks."
"No, that was all merely a ruse de guerre, sorry to say. Just a little extra sleight-of-hand to distract you. Very sorry—you're it. The easiest one to implicate, by far."
Mark frowned. "Not snakes, though, huh?" He was shivering in earnest. Then he jerked his chin again at the sheet of paper. "So what'd I say I did?"
"Everything."
"Not the Lindbergh kidnapping."
"No," the man smiled. "Not quite that far. Not Bainbridge, either. Just Shelia through Hardcastle."
Mark yanked his eyes up and fastened the man with a rigid look.
"Oh, him? Yes, but not yet. And I'm sorry about that, too, but it's necessary. He'll be pit number eight in the eighth circle. I like the symmetry of it, don't you?" His expression had taken on a strangely dreamy cast. "'False Counselors.' Seemed appropriate. That's what he been all along, hasn't he? Kibitzing on the case but never getting to the bottom of things."
"'Necessary?'" Mark said, still stuck on that first idea.
"Yes, the pattern. And it fits so well with you being the murderer." The man paused in thought and then looked quizzical. "You thought I'd kill you for having been a thief? That'd be a bit hypocritical on my part, wouldn't it?"
"But I was a thief; I'm not a murderer." McCormick heard a rising note of panicky disbelief in his voice. He couldn't help it.
"Sorry," the man murmured. "I'm committed. The pattern, see? I've got your confession all written out. Very nice job, too and I didn't have all that much to work off of." He glanced down at the paper but only for a fraction of a second, then his gaze was back on McCormick. "And it's so appropriate, you killing Hardcastle and then killing yourself—you know—that last inner part of the ninth circle, those who were violent toward benefactors. I swear, I didn't even know where it was heading myself. It's like destiny.
"Problem is the whole frozen lake concept, not easy to achieve in southern California. But, like you said, it's all a matter of creativity." He gestured again with the gun, this time toward the door.
Mark stumbled slightly, but moved when the gesture became a little sharper. He was still stuck a few ideas back.
"Pit eight?" He half-turned, looking over his shoulder at the man now behind him.
"Immolation. I know, been there already, and I hate to repeat what I did to that little weasel of a former assistant DA. He was on the take, you know, from Romney himself. But this one will be more spectacular. More fitting. A Viking funeral of sorts for the great Milton C." The man frowned. "Or is that mixing metaphors?"
Mark was outside, still shivering, now in the stiffing breeze. "When?" he asked.
"When he gets back," the man prodded with the gun. "Which will be soon, I imagine, unless the DA is even denser than I think. So we need to get on with things."
"How? The immolation, I mean." Mark took a slow look around at the front drive and saw nothing out of place. He took a couple steps forward, in the hopes of promoting an air of cooperation and information sharing.
"The devil's in the details," the man smiled thoughtfully. "You are a curious man, Mr. McCormick. What difference does it make? You'll be dead. If you're intent on ruining my plans, then you'll make me shoot you right now. Either way, it won't save him, just make me angry, and inclined to make you suffer a bit. Your death, as planned, is really quite painless. I harbor you no particular malice."
Mark squinted back at him.
"All right," the man shrugged. "I'll grant you that murdering someone always harbors a certain amount of malice. But it's the pattern, don't you see?"
And for a moment, Mark almost could. The man was mad.
He strained to listen for the returning truck. He wished he knew how long he'd been out after he'd been hit—long enough for the guy to haul him into the shower. Had it been five minutes? At least that. Okay, and this part, maybe another ten. It had to have been at least an hour since he left. And just how dense would the DA be? All he knew for certain was that there was no point provoking this man until the last possible moment.
"This way."
Another gesture with the gun. Mark walked across the lawn toward the back drive. He moved along, not too fast but at a rate that approximated passive resignation. He realized they were heading for the garage. It'll have to be before we get there.
He tried not to go visibly tense, the shivering made that easier. But this was the moment; two more steps and they'd turn the corner and be inside. He slowed a second, letting the man close the space between them. Then he pivoted and lunged backwards, made unexpectedly clumsy by his cold, stiff muscles and realizing he was far slower than he'd meant to be.
The man didn't even bother to get off a shot. It was the butt of the gun this time. And McCormick went down, carried partly by his own momentum.
00000
He had a brief and fragmented notion of being dragged and then propped, left temporarily to his own devices while something else was being done. He recognized the thing he was leaning against. It was the chest freezer Hardcastle had invested in for the proper storage of trout and steaks. They weren't being properly stored right now. He looked around blearily at the untidy piles of packages on the floor of the garage. A bucket sat there, too, in a puddle of water.
No time to process the implication before he was hauled upright. Lurching unsteadily against a wave of nausea, he felt himself pushed forward, off his feet. There was a sudden shock of cold water that made him thrash. His eyes were open again.
"Stop it," the man's tone was harsh. He had him by the front of the collar and was holding him down. It was maybe two feet of water, no more, standing in the bottom of the empty freezer. Mark couldn't help it, gun or not, the urge to get free of the cold was too intense.
"All right then, I didn't want this to be so hard." He heard the scolding tone "It's supposed to be a relatively pleasant way to die."
Maybe the guy was right, Mark thought. The sharp bite had already gone out of the water, and in its place was a numbness that, in spots, already resembled a strangely seductive warmth. One tiny part of his brain was still ticking over, though, and that part knew he'd have to take the handcuffs off at some point.
McCormick closed his eyes, let his head fall back slowly, and tried to go limp. It wasn't all that hard; the shivering had already stopped. And he'll have to put the gun down to get at the cuffs; he can't leave those on you. It was a long, hard thought and he was especially proud of it.
But he'd better hurry up.
A distant, annoying sound and the hand gripping his collar, which had become barely noticeable amid the numbness, suddenly let loose. Mark forced his eyes open, and saw the dim shadows on the ceiling of the garage suddenly plunged into close-at-hand darkness.
Dammit, you forgot to take off the cuffs.
He tried to sit up, and struck his head against the inside of the lid and slipped back down. The panic was slow and not too pressing. It doesn't have a latch. Just . . . stand up. He tried to get his legs under him in the narrow and slippery space. Then he tried to remember why he was trying to do that. The whole thing seemed pretty damn unnecessary.
More noises, very distant. Might have been some shouting, and then a louder sound that brought him upright again, slower this time, but the urgency was back. Immolation. He couldn't feel his feet or lower legs, but he thought they were more or less underneath him. He also couldn't tell if he was pushing, but now there was a crack of piercing light, shining down from just above him, and the noises were much louder.
Gunfire.
But that looked to be about the best he could do for the moment. He took a deeper breath; that helped some. Then he hollered. No use there, it was more like a mumble and had coincided with another couple of rounds. He got up on what he thought were his knees, wedged his head and shoulders out past the lid, gave one last, unfeeling push, and fell unceremoniously onto the floor of the garage.
Voices this time, closer at hand. His name being called out and not too patiently.
"He's gotta be around somewhere. Look, the damn car's still here."
The cavalry.
His 'over here' came out sounding like he had a mouthful of marbles but it didn't matter. Hardcastle had already seen the mess and shouted the same thing, a lot clearer and presumably at Harper. Then he was down, at his side, fussing with the handcuffs and propping him up.
"I s-said I'd stay p-put." Mark muttered.
The words still sounded like mush, but he was shivering again, which he thought might be a good sign. The judge had managed to get his own jacket off and wrapped around his shoulders. The sitting up part didn't work without ongoing support.
"This isn't what I had in mind." Hardcastle's look of alarm was poorly concealed by the gruff tone. He'd obviously put together a quick and ugly picture of what had happened.
Frank had arrived. "Got an ambulance coming for the other guy." He did the quickest of visual assessments before he stripped off his jacket as well, and handed it down to the judge. "I'll have 'em make it two."
"J-just need to w-warm up," Mark protested. This time the words, though still thick, were more intelligible.
"And get your head examined," Hardcastle added, having found at least one of the lumps. "Come on," he looked up at Harper, "help me get him inside."
Harper was on one side, and Hardcastle on the other. He was hefted to his feet, which still weren't sending back any signals. Mark didn't even waste any mumbles fending them off. They headed out the garage door and to the left—the steps apparently looking too challenging.
They were already on the front drive and turning left again when Mark balked, and muttered, "N-no." He paused, shaking his head stiffly. Then he started talking again, this time striving for more clarity. "It's b-booby-trapped."
His tone must've conveyed more than the words. The judge stopped pulling. Mark saw a black and white in the drive with a couple of officers. One of them was stooped over someone lying sprawled on the drive. More vehicles were coming in.
"Gotta get 'em all b-back from the door—f-fire-bomb. Ask him." He nodded toward the figure on the ground.
"Not in much shape to explain things," Harper said dryly. And then, to Milt, "You can manage him?" He disengaged from his left-sided support. "I'll get the cordon up and call the bomb squad."
Hardcastle nodded and they changed direction for the gatehouse.
00000
Dry clothes. That was the first order of business according to Hardcase, and he didn't seem much satisfied with Mark's progress on the buttons. He was badgered, stripped, handed a towel, which he couldn't get his fingers to close around, badgered some more, and finally tugged and pulled into some sweats.
"It'll do for now," the judge said, looking less than fully satisfied and still ready to pack him off in an ambulance.
Mark tried to make his nod visible through the shaking, tried to get his fingers to bend, tried not to stumble on his now-burning feet as he was ushered to the sofa.
"M-my confession," he pointed, with all five fingers at once, to the piece of paper on the coffee table. "I n-never got to read it." Then he frowned as Hardcastle settled him sideways, onto a comforter that had been hastily scavenged from the bed—more covers on top. "Hey, how'ja wind up b-back here with Frank?"
"Oh, that?" The judge made some space for himself at the foot-end of the sofa and sat down, looking a little winded after all the bustle. He leaned over and studied the note without touching it. "Well," he looked up after a few moments, "you were certainly a busy guy."
"Here, Frank," Mark repeated insistently.
"Ah," Hardcastle sat up again. "Well, turns out Noman had prints on file."
Mark's frown turned more puzzled. "He s-said he didn't."
"No, I mean the real Noman. He got himself busted in some kinda protest over at Berkeley back in the sixties. Got lucky, turned up a quick match for the body."
Mark's frown looked absolutely baffled by this time. "N-nobody matches prints th-that fast."
"Well, might've been because Harper was feeling a little guilty. When he went back to the station this morning he started doing some more digging on Noman—the real one—found the 'record', not a whole hell of a lot of record, never kept him from being hired as a consultant, but it included his booking shots. They were seventeen years old and the guy had a lot more hair, but Frank didn't think they were a match for this Noman.
"He showed it to Parks. Parks headed over to Noman's listed address. He found . . . my God, what he found. Artie Kepler, for one thing, in a fridge."
Hardcastle paused on that thought, looking down at the note very fixedly. He finally let out a sigh and cast a quick glance sideward.
"And there were more photos there. One was pretty current and it definitely wasn't our Noman; it was the guy on the beach. So, as soon as we heard that, I called here—"
"No answer, huh? I must've been in the shower."
"Yeah," the judge shook his head. "So we headed over here, me and Frank."
"Not an APB?" Mark asked, only half-joking.
Hardcastle shrugged. "Well, that too."
Mark's expression went a little stiff, but he managed to hang onto his thin smile. "Guess you had to hedge your bet."
"For Noman's car, not for yours," Hardcastle said a bit righteously. "But I still didn't think he'd go after you. You hadn't been involved with the Donhavey case."
"No," McCormick shuddered, "but neither had the real Noman, right? And I'd annoyed him. All that being clever pissed the hell out of him. Anyway," he finally relaxed into the blankets, "it was the pattern. That's what he said. I guess he'd finally run out of real victims and just needed two more to sort-of round things out."
There was the rapidly approaching sound of more sirens. Hardcastle got up to look. "Bomb squad," he said casually, after a moment.
"Good thing you have understanding neighbors," Mark said dryly.
The judge shrugged. "Helps to have a large lot." He frowned, watching for a moment more, then finally returning to the sofa. He sat down at the far end again. They both sat there for a few minutes, listening tensely for sounds of miscalculation.
After a decent interval of silence, Hardcastle let out a cautious breath and said, "I think we should go fishing."
McCormick thought about that for a moment. "Oh, you wanna restock the freezer, huh? Can I finish thawing out first?"
The older man snorted.
"Okay," Mark grudged. "Fishing. Something dull. I can handle dull for a while."
A solid rap on the door barely preceded Frank poking his head in. "Got it. Pretty straightforward they say—a couple of buckets of gasoline and an ignition source rigged to the front door. Your hallway still smells like a filling station. They're ventilating the place and doing a secondary sweep. Still need the ambulance? The bomb guys want to keep the area clear for a little while longer."
Mark's 'no' and Hardcastle's 'yes' were nearly simultaneous.
"I'm pretty thawed out already," McCormick protested, then abruptly changed tacks, "Hey, Frank, you wanna go fishing?"
This got him a briefly confused look and then a weary shake of the head. "Hah, see, that's the difference. I've got a week of paperwork on this one. You two get to take off. Must be nice."
"Oh," Mark said, "yeah."
"Hey," Frank stepped a little further into the room, "don't suppose the guy gave you a name, anything like that?"
"No," Mark shook his head. "Said it wasn't important. He still won't say?"
Frank glanced over his shoulder for a moment and then back. "No," he replied very fixedly.
Mark suddenly realized he hadn't heard any other ambulance sirens. He wondered who'd done the shooting and, almost at once, decided it had probably been a group project.
But this is it. It's over. This is the end of it.
"I think you ought to come fishing with us," he said firmly. "We can wait till you're done with all the reports."