Night Mask (19 page)

Brownie cut his eyes. “You've been around Leo too long, Lani. He's corrupted you.” He looked at Brenda. “You stay away from down there. That bunch has got it in for you.”

“It was an accident, Sheriff,” she said innocently. “I swear it was. I would never, ever, do anything to cause harm to come to the good friends of law enforcement.”

Brownie fixed her with a very jaundiced look. “Did anybody ever tell you that you were full of hockey-poo.”

Brenda smiled. “Hockey-poo? No. But I've been told a lot of times that I was full of shit!”

Dealing with juveniles is a pain in the ass. Cops have to put up with irate parents, many of whom are simply too naive to believe that their wonderful, precious, darling kid could ever do anything wrong. There just has to be a mistake. Then one has the social workers to contend with. Then the liberal press feels compelled to stick their noses into it. And one must never, ever forget the lawyers (although many cops would certainly like to). And if there is shooting involved, it just gets worse and worse. All in all, it can turn into a great big mess. Most good cops will admit, albeit reluctantly, that the safeguards (at least most of them) are necessary to protect the innocent. But they sure as hell don't have to like them.

Brenda tossed the file folders on the long table and sat down, a disgusted look on her face.

“Two of the wounded kids had nothing to do with the killing club. They just wanted to be with their friends. Four others, thank God unharmed, also had nothing to do with the Ripper. But their parents and their lawyers say the kids suffered terrible traumas due to the shooting and the sight of their friends being gunned down by the police. About fifty million dollars apiece, and their traumas will be eased enough for them to resume normal lives.”

“I'm just overwhelmed with sympathy for them,” Leo said. “I suppose, since we were the ones who initiated the assault, that the four or us are prominently named in the suits?”

“Of course. The sad thing is they'll probably get some money out of the suit.”

“Show the jury pictures of the death pit,” Lani said.

“That probably won't be admissible as evidence, since the pit was uncovered after the shoot-out,” Ted said. “That's just a guess on my part.”

Leo had been studying the reports. He shook his head. “Not one of these kids come from what could be called poor families. Most of them are upper middle class. Only a few from broken homes. Many of them have their own cars and a nice allowance, and only a few of them actually do any work. I don't understand it.”

“They don't want for anything,” Brenda said. “If everything is handed to you, where is the desire to strive? Both parents work; can't spend much time with the kids, so they over compensate by handing the kids expensive things. The kids have too much free time without adult supervision.” She smiled. “That's what the shrinks will tell you.”

“Do you buy that?” Lani asked her.

“Hell, no! Both my parents worked long hours. We were certainly upper middle class. I was a latchkey kid before the word came into vogue. But I couldn't turn on the TV and see near-naked people doing weird things on music videos. Teachers could still discipline and teachers still taught . . . without being in fear of their lives. I went into my teens in the early seventies. Of course, those were the days before drive-by shootings and gunning down cops became the norm. My group didn't throw concrete blocks off of overpasses onto oncoming traffic for kicks. Political correctness had yet to come. But then, I always knew what I wanted to be. Ever since I was a little girl. I wanted to tote a gun and
walk tall!”
She laughed and stood up, doing a slow pirouette. Brenda Yee was about five feet, two inches tall, at best. That got a laugh from everybody.

Brownie shuck his head in the room. “A new will signed by Carla Upton has just been found in a hidden wall safe in her home.” He smiled, letting the suspense build a bit. “Everything goes to Stacy Ryan.”

* * *

“I knew nothing about any new will,” Stacy said to Brenda. “Please believe me. I knew nothing about it.”

In the other room, a technician was secretly monitoring her voice with the latest model of what is called a Psychological Stress Evaluator . . . the newer model was a machine that the general public did not know about and would not know about, if the authorities, both civilian and government, had anything to say about it. The findings were not admissible in court, but it gave the police a starting point. “She's lying,” the technician said.

“You're sure?” Lani asked.

“The machine is.”

“Do you know anything about any family called Longwood?” Brenda asked.

“No. Nothing. I mean, I've heard the name used. Probably in movies or books. But I don't know anyone named Longwood.”

“She's lying,” the technician said. “Her throat tightened up so close, I'm amazed she was able to speak.”

“You are sure of that?” Brenda pressed.

“Oh, I'm positive,” Stacy said.

“Lying,” the technician said. “And yes, I am sure.”

“Like the fellow wrote,” Leo muttered. “Curiouser and curiouser.”

Long after Stacy had left the building, the four cops sat behind closed doors and talked about this new development.

“Why fake the death?” Lani asked.

“So she can collect the money and estate, and still keep her sweetie around for fun and games,” Brenda replied.

Ted looked very pained at that.

“And then to torture her and skin her alive,” Leo added.

“Jesus!” Ted said.

“And keep the face in preservative forever and ever,” Lani said.

“I'm going to the bathroom,” Ted said, standing up and walking out of the room.

When the door had closed, Brenda said, “He's as cool as any person I have ever seen in a shoot-out or hostage situation. He handles stress well, but not the gay community. He is absolutely opposed to that lifestyle.”

“And you?” Leo paused in the poured of a cup of coffee.

Brenda shrugged. “I like men, period. I got me a regular feller back home. I tolerate gays. How about you guys?”

Lani said, “Like you, I tolerate them.”

Leo sat down at the table. “I don't condone their lifestyle. But as long as they keep it to themselves, I can live with it. Just don't flaunt it in my face, or teach my kids that it's all right.”

Brenda smiled. “We live and work in a hell of a state to feel the way we do, don't we?”

Ted threw open the door, startling everybody. “Another body, gang. Let's roll!”

* * *

This one had been placed in a seat in the center of the auditorium of a local theater. The theater manager had discovered the body just before opening up for a Saturday matinee. The opening was going to be delayed for a while.

The Ripper was developing a very macabre sense of humor. The feature movie for that weekend was the updated version of
Jack the Ripper;
a soft drink container had been fitted into one stiff hand, a box of popcorn in the other. The victim had been skinned. It was Carla Upton.

“Very funny,” Leo said. “Real neat touch on the Ripper's part.”

“Get that horrible-looking body out of my theater!” the manager yelled, hopping from one foot to the other in the aisle. “I've already thrown up twice, for god's sake.”

“Shut up,” Leo told him. “I hear something.” Then they all heard it. A very faint sound of bells. Tiny bells. “It's coming from the stage.” He pointed a finger at the manager. “You stay here. Go count your money, or something”

“I demand to be allowed into this theater!” the shrill voice of Agnes Peters could be heard from the lobby. “You goddamn bullyboy! You fascist pig. Oppressor of the minorities.”

“Lady,” the cop's voice came to them. “Take a look at my face. If I got any blacker, I could star in Tarzan movies. Don't accuse me of oppressing the minorities.”

“Big ugly ape!” Agnes yelled.

“My mammy thinks I'm cute.”

“Gene Clark,” Lani said to the group. “Agnes will never get past him.”

“He's got a wild sense of humor,” Ted said.

“Yeah,” Lani said. “He got exasperated at his wife a couple of years ago. She couldn't decide what he should wear to a costume ball the sheriff's department was putting on for charity. He told her if she came home with one more costume from the rental shop, he was going to stick a broomhandle up his ass and go as a Fudgesicle.”

Brenda could not contain her laughter, and even Ted chuckled. It was defensive laughter. Gallows humor. Something to ease the strain of a terrible job.

The humor faded as the cops stepped between the curtain and the screen. A young woman was hanging there—or what was left of her. The naked and mutilated body was hanging upside down. It was swaying gently in the rush of air from a big air-conditioning vent. Tiny little bells had been tied on each finger. As the body swayed, the bells tinkled. She had been skinned. But she was still recognizable. Sue Hale.

“Oh, hell!” the anguished voice of Gene Clark ripped the silence. “The bitch kneed me in the nuts. She's got a camera. Stop her.”

The theater manager stepped in front of Agnes on the gently sloping aisle and Agnes ran slap over him, knocking him sprawling, rolling ass over elbows down the aisle. A uniform grabbed at her, and she socked him with her purse.

She came to a halt at the floodlighted scene of what was left of Carla Upton. “Whoops!” Agnes said, then lost her lunch, the vomit spraying another uniform who had the misfortune to approach her.

“Jesus Christ, Lady!” he hollered, frantically backing up and digging in his pocket for a handkerchief.

“Fuck you, pig,” Agnes said, whipping out her camera and taking a few shots of Carla.

The projectionist had come in through the back door and didn't have the foggiest notion what the hell was going on down on the floor. “Hey, Albert! Where are you?” he yelled to the manager, who was just then getting groggily to his feet, down near the stage. There was a big bump on his head where he'd impacted with several seat frames on his way down. “Let's see if that jerk fixed the curtains.”

He hit the switch and the curtains parted.

What was left of Sue Hale swayed to the sound of tiny bells.

Agnes let out a squall that would have put Cochise to shame. Then she did a little dance in the aisle and passed out.

“Go get her camera,” Leo said. “And break the goddamn thing.” He walked to the edge of the stage and called for the manager. “You'd better post a notice at the box office. You're not going to be open this afternoon.” There was no answer. Leo's eyes searched the cavernous interior. He finally found the manager, passed out cold on the floor.

The bells on Sue's fingers tinkled softly as she swayed.

“Sarge, you really want me to break this camera?” a uniform called from the floor.

“No. Just expose the film. She's gonna write about this, but at least she won't have pictures.”

“She'll probably sue us,” Lani said.

Leo looked at his partner and smiled. “She'll have to get in line, won't she?”

* * *

Dick Hale was quite mad. But like so many insane people, he possessed an uncanny ability for rationalization ... in certain areas. He could function normally. He could survive and clean himself and prepare food. In other areas, he became more animal-like. Perhaps it is a throwback to a million years ago; perhaps we all retain some dark memory of that time, buried deep in some far reaches of our brain.

Dick had grown a beard and allowed his hair to become long. He had lost a great deal of weight. He looked and acted like a bum. Only someone who had known Dick Hale extremely well would have been able to recognize him in his current state. Dick Hale now lived in the shadow world of the homeless, and acted the part.

He had cached his weapons and ammunition in a safe place and carried only a small pistol with him when he ventured out of his resting place, to search for food near an abandoned city dump on the outskirts of La Barca. During the day he rested, at night he prowled.

Using a small portable radio he had stolen, Dick heard the news about his daughter. He did not care. He had heard on the same newscast about Carla Upton. He was delighted with that news. Reading a tossed-away newspaper, Dick learned that the Hancock County Sheriffs Department was being sued by dozens of parents and several reporters. The parents' children had suffered terrible traumas during the shoot-out at the old warehouses . . .

“Horseshit!” Dick said.

... and the reporters charged that they had been deliberately tear-gassed while doing their jobs.

“Horseshit!” Dick repeated.

Agnes Peters was going to sue the sheriff's department, charging police brutality and damage to her camera.

“Horseshit!” Dick said again. Then he smiled. Madness shone brightly in his eyes. A little bit of slobber appeared at the corners of his mouth. He began grunting incomprehensively.

Even though the coppers (Dick was a great fan of Bogart and Robinson gangster movies) were looking for him, Dick held no special rancor for the bulls. But he hated Agnes Peters, in the past often referring to her as a dyke (she wasn't) bitch (she was).

Now Dick had a plan. He'd help the flatfeet. Yeah, he could do that. He'd be one of the good guys.

Now if he could just remember where he hid his shotgun.

Those kids taken into custody knew very little about the leadership of the killing club. Sue Hale had been their go-between, and Sue had been forever silenced. And like the DJ back in Indiana, many of the kids were masochistic, enjoying both the giving and the receiving of pain. But these weren't tough street kids who operated under some code of silence; once one started blabbing, implicating others, those who had the finger pointed at them started pointing back. Two more pits were uncovered and that seemed to be all. But the death toll in and around La Barca had climbed to over two hundred men, women, and children.

“It's going to be years before this is over,” Ted said. “The attorneys for each kid has asked for separate trials. Since some of the kids are fourteen and fifteen years old, there probably won't even be a trial for them.”

“The latest will of Carla Upton is legal and will be upheld,” Brenda said. “Those who witnessed it said she was not under any duress, and was perfectly lucid and rational at the time. Stacy Ryan is a very rich young woman.”

“She is also a liar and probably a murderer and God only knows what else,” Leo said sourly. “The only problem is, we can't prove it.”

“We've backtracked her previous statements, Leo,” Lani said. “We don't have anything on her. She's clean.”

“She's got to have slipped up somewhere,” Leo muttered. “But she won't slip now. She's sure to know, or at least suspect, that we've got people on her like white on rice twenty-four hours a day. I just don't understand her. I first I thought she might be unknowingly manipulated by her brothers. But she lied when questioned about the Longwood name. The operator said it scared the crap out of her. She lied about having no knowledge of the new will. What the hell is her game?”

“Blood is thicker than water,” Lani said softly.

“What do you mean?” Leo asked.

“What we talked about back in New York . . . seems like years ago, now.”

“The supernatural, Lani? Aw, come on. I can't believe you're still hanging on to that ragged thread.”

“No, I mean it, Leo. What's been happening is just too weird to explain away using normal terms. Look, we've about exhausted all other avenues, right? So why not take a walk down another path for a while?”

“I don't believe in any of that crap!” Ted's words came quickly.

“I do,” Brenda spoke very softly.

Ted looked at her. “You can't be serious!”

“Why not? Look, it would take a closed mind not to admit that there is a lot of weird shit going on in this world that nobody can explain away. I used to date an airline pilot. He told me that he's seen stuff up in the sky that he didn't know what the hell it was or where it came from. A lot of pilots have seen weird stuff. The airlines made them all shut up about it. They don't even enter it in the logs anymore. And I know that for a cold fact. Back here on the ground, I've personally witnessed psychics work, leading us to dead bodies. It caused goose bumps to rise up on my flesh. Things that go bump in the night are real, Ted. They've been documented, photographed, and filmed in action too many times to shrug off.”

“Nonsense!” Ted huffed.

“Screw you!” Brenda muttered.

“I looked up two words last night,” Lani said. “Pure, and evil. Pure: absolute. Evil: the force in
nature
that governs and gives rise to wickedness and sin. And do any of you know what the very last definition of evil is?” She looked around as they all shook their heads. “Satan.”

Leo did his best, but he could not suppress a shudder. Brenda rubbed at a sudden coldness on the back of her neck; her palms were clammy. Ted looked down at his bare forearms. They were covered with chill bumps.

“You remember the name of that psychic, Brenda?” Lani asked.

“I won't ever forget it. Anna Kokalis.”

“What are we looking for?” Leo asked.

“I don't know,” Lani admitted. “Let's talk to her and see if she will help us. What have we got to lose?”

“Credibility, for one thing,” Ted said, but he knew he was outvoted in this matter.

* * *

Agnes Peters parked her BMW in her garage and walked back to close the garage door. Just as her foot slipped on a small spot of oil, throwing her off balance, a shotgun roared from the darkness beside the house. Had she not slipped, the buckshot that tore a hole in the garage wall would have blown her head off. Agnes screamed and made a dash for the door. The shotgun roared again, the buckshot blowing out the back window of her car. Agnes fumbled for the key to unlock the side door. The shotgun boomed again. The buckshot missed her, but it did tear the side mirror off of her car and send tiny bits of glass and metal in her direction. Several pieces of glass and metal came to a stop, when they impacted and penetrated about an inch into Agnes's butt.

“Yowee!” Agnes shrieked, just as she unlocked the door and fell tumbling into the kitchen.

The shotgun boomed again, and blew the glass panels out of the side door. The glass and bits of wood sprayed Agnes just as she was crawling to her feet, putting several small cuts on one cheek. Agnes thought she was mortally wounded, she let out a squall that sounded very much like an angry grizzly and took off at a run for her bedroom.

Naturally, since Agnes believed in the confiscation of all privately owned firearms—except those in the hands of certain selected, highly intelligent, morally responsible, and very elitist people, such as herself—she owned a pistol. A big pistol. A Dirty Harry special. Which she had never fired. She ran to her bedroom, snatched up the .44 mag from her nightstand, assumed a two-handed shooting position, just like in the movies, pointed the muzzle in the general direction of the garage, and pulled the trigger.

The recoil numbed Agnes's arms from hands to elbows and knocked her flat on her butt on the carpet. The slug, traveling at about the same speed as an F–16 with afterburners roaring, rocketed down the hall, through the open side door, through a garage window, right through the house next door, and came to rest in the tiled shower stall of the home at the end of the block. Agnes got to her feet and fired four more times. She ruined a mixer in her kitchen, a microwave in the house next door, an outboard motor in another garage across the street, and blew out the side window, tore off the rear-view mirror, and punched a hole in the windshield of the car that was passing by, which happened to belong to a local Baptist minister.

“Jesus fucking Mary!” the minister hollered, momentarily reverting to his teenage years in St. Louis. He floored the pedal and ran up into the lawn of another homeowner, who had stepped out onto his porch to see what all the shooting was about. The homeowner had just enough time to leap for his life as the now out of control Toyota climbed the porch and entered his living room, coming to rest in his dining room.

“Son of a bitch!” the minister said.

Agnes, knocked against the wall of her bedroom by the recoil of the powerful handgun, was deaf as a post for several minutes, and her arms were numb clear up to her neck.

“Call the goddamn cops!” she squalled, putting such volume behind the words that the homeowner across the street, who was crawling out of the bushes by the side of the house, could plainly hear the plea.

But a patrolling unit from the La Barca PD had heard the shots and was pulling up just about the time Agnes, still clutching the .44 mag, staggered out onto her front porch.

“Drop the gun!” the officer yelled at her.

Agnes dropped the .44 mag. On her foot. Breaking two toes. “Don't shoot me, you pig son of a bitch!” she screamed at the confused officer. “I'm the one being shot at!” Agnes sat down on the steps, both hands holding her injured foot. “You goddamn ignorant ape!” she yelled at the cop, just as two more city units came screaming up.

Sgt. Gene Clark, who was working the second shift that week, jumped out and took a look at Agnes. “Oh, shit!” he muttered. He pointed to an officer. “You see what's wrong with her,” he ordered.

“Thanks a lot,” the cop said.

Agnes shifted position on the porch, putting weight on the shot-up cheek. She hollered and jumped to her feet. “I'm wounded, goddamn it! Call an ambulance!”

“Where?” Gene yelled.

“In my ass, you pig bastard!”

“Shot her right in the brains,” Gene muttered.

“I heard that, you Gestapo son of a bitch!” Agnes shrieked. “I'll sue you!”

“Will somebody get this goddamn car out of my house!” the homeowner yelled.

By the time the police got everything sorted out, Dick Hale was long gone.

* * *

“I wish I could have seen it,” Lani said to Leo the next morning. “I'd have given a hundred dollars to see Agnes Peters get shot in the ass.”

“That's not the half of it,” Brenda said, sitting down. “Sergeant Clark arrested her for possession of an unregistered handgun. Seems she didn't have a permit for it. Now she's screaming about living in a police state.”

“She just can't seem to get her priorities in order,” Leo said, unable to hide his glee at Agnes Peters getting shot in the ass.

“You think it was Dick Hale?” Ted asked the group.

“Oh, sure,” Lani said. “He's hated Agnes for years. They've despised each other since high school.”

“Too bad Dick can't stumble up on the Longwood boys with his trusty shotgun,” Leo said wistfully.

“Don't let the press hear you say that,” Brenda warned.

“Heaven forbid!” Leo looked upward. “Not those purveyors of truth and justice. As they see it,” he added very drily.

“Don't let them hear you say that, either,” Ted said.

The phone rang and Lani picked up. A second later she muttered, “Jesus!” and hit the record button on the cassette recorder attached to the phone. She listened without saying a word. She slowly replaced the phone in the cradle and rewound the tape. “Listen to this,” she said.

The voice was electronically altered, and they could not tell if it was male or female. But the message pushing through the tiny speaker was very clear.

A second voice was added. It said in a singsong voice: You'll hear from me again!”

They could all clearly hear the piano music playing in the background. It was “Mary Had A Little Lamb.”

* * *

“So what do you propose we do?” Brownie asked, leaning back in his chair. “Declare martial law, call out the national guard, and order a dusk-to-dawn curfew?”

“That'd be the last thing I'd want,” Lani said. “Even if it were possible. The Ripper would just pull back and wait us out.”

“Stacy Ryan?” the sheriff asked.

“Calm and cool and making no bobbles. She gets up, goes to work, has lunch at her desk, and goes home and stays,” Brenda said. “Her phones are tapped at home and work. We've got people on her twenty-four hours a day. We know everything she does and much of what she says. She has made no calls from any pay phones. She has had no visitors at her home since surveillance began.”

“The judge was very unhappy signing that phone-tap order,” Brownie reminded the four cops. “We don't have one shred of court-admissible evidence against Stacy Ryan. If we don't have something concrete in a few days, he'll rescind that order.” He held up his hand in advance of the vocal objections he knew were coming. “I'm just telling you all the way it is. I think Stacy Ryan is guilty as hell. I think she's involved in this mess up to her neck. Now go out and prove it.”

Walking down the hall after leaving Brownie's office, Lani muttered, “Go out and prove it. What the hell's he think we've been trying to do all summer?”

“He's taking all the heat on this,” Leo said. “The press is on his ass, the public is on his ass, the DA is on his ass, the governor is on his ass. I'm surprised Brownie hasn't lost his cool and punched someone.”

“The attorney general is on our asses, too,” Brenda said glumly.

“Hard!” Ted added. “After the chewing I got this morning from Sacramento, I'm just very thankful I still have the seat in my pants.”

Brenda looked to see and Ted sighed.

“We can't sweat those kids any harder,” Lani said. “Juvenile is pissed off now. Mommy and daddy's little darlings have been complaining about the interrogations. Their attorneys said we've got all we're going to get from them.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. “Because of their tender age, the DA is cutting deals left and right. Some of those little monsters will be back on the street in two to three years. What am I saying? Hell,
some
of them are back on the streets
now!”

But if Dick Hale had his way, they wouldn't be for long.