The Anniversary Man (10 page)

Karen Langley called the coroner′s office, sweet-talked Gerrard and got the scoop on the dead girls.

She called John Costello. He was quiet for some time.

′John?′ she prompted.

′The caliber. They were shot, right? I need to know what caliber.′

′God knows, I didn′t ask. Why?′

Again, Costello was quiet for some time. Karen Langley could hear him breathing through the earpiece.

′Can you find out, Karen? The caliber of gun they were shot with? Can you find out if it was a .25?′

′I don′t know, John . . . I′ll call Gerrard back.′

′Yes, if you could do that. That would be good.′

Karen hung up, frowning. Costello was a strange and remarkable man, no doubt about it. Extraordinarily bright, an exceptional memory, an encyclopedia of facts, most of them dark and disturbing. She knew of his history, had read the ′Hammer of God′ articles, and though she had asked him about it one time, he said little and made it obvious he didn′t wish to discuss it further. Regardless, twenty-some years in the newspaper business and she′d never had a researcher like John Costello. She didn′t want to lose him, so she hadn′t pushed the point.

She called Hal Gerrard. He was unavailable but she got Ivens.

′I can′t tell you that, Karen . . . confidential, you know?′

′I need to know if it was a .25, Lewis, that′s all.′

Lewis Ivens was silent. He was thinking. And when he spoke there was something in his voice that Langley recognized. ′You want to know if they were shot with a .25 caliber?′

′Yes, a .25.′

Once again Ivens was silent for a few moments.

′If I guessed they were shot with a .25 would I be incorrect?′ Langley asked.

Ivens inhaled, exhaled slowly. ′If you guessed that they were shot with a .25 I wouldn′t have any problem with that,′ he replied.

′I appreciate that, Lewis, I really do.′

′Nothing to appreciate,′ he said. ′We didn′t speak today. I don′t know you. We′ve never met.′

′I′m sorry . . . I guess I got a wrong number,′ Langley replied, and hung up.

She picked up the phone again, dialed Costello′s extension.

′A .25,′ she said matter-of-factly.

′And there were two of them? Teenage girls, right?′

′As far as I know, yes.′

′Okay, okay, okay . . . leave this with me. I might have something for you in a few days.′

′Like what? What we got here?′

′Something—Nothing. I don′t know yet. Before I can be sure I have to find another one.′

′Another what, John? Find another what?′

′Leave it with me . . . I′ll let you know if it comes to anything. If I tell you now you′re just gonna get excited and be a pain in the ass.′

′Fuck you, John Costello—′

′Hey, that′s just un-fucking necessary,′ he said, and she could hear him laughing as he hung up.

A
little after one p.m., Monday, June 12th, 2006, the bodies of fifteen- year-old Ashley Nicole Burch and sixteen-year-old Lisa Madigan Briley were formally identified in the County Coroner′s Office by Deputy Coroner Hal Gerrard. Lewis Ivens was present, as was Jeff Turner, lead Crime Scene Analyst from the Grant murder case. There was no similarity between the cases - Turner was not present for any reason other than that he knew Ivens personally. That afternoon they were scheduled to attend a seminar given by a Dr Philip Roper from the Scientific Investigations Division, Support Services Bureau, on Undocumented Origin Bullet Recovery: Lands, Grooves, Riflings, Striations. They left together at one-twenty, bought coffee at Starbucks, drove west in Ivens′ car. Hal Gerrard called Detective Richard Lucas of the Ninth Precinct, he of the brief telephone conversation with Max Webster.

′Got your girls here,′ Gerrard told him. ′Reports done, as much as you need right now. Two shots each, point blank, from a .25 caliber . . . Putting the bullets through the system, but you know how these things are, right?′

Lucas asked if someone had been to tell the parents.

′Not a clue . . . your territory, my friend, and you′re welcome to it.′

Lucas asked about drugs.

′Alcohol, a good deal of it. They′d have been walking sideways I think, but no drugs.′

They said their farewells, and the call ended.

Lucas called up one of the female officers from the duty roster, sent her over to collect the reports and the victims′ addresses, waited for her to return and then told her to accompany him. The addresses were on the same block of the Chelsea Houses off Ninth Avenue at Chelsea Park.

As was always the case with such daytime visits, the fathers were working and it was left to the mothers to receive the bad news and answer the questions. Ashley Burch had told her folks that she was staying over with Lisa Briley; Lisa Briley had informed her parents that she′d be sleeping at Ashley′s. It was an old trick, but the old ones were the best ones. They had evidently dressed up like hookers, gone to EndZone, drank a skinful, and then . . . well, they′d collided with someone, and that someone proved to be the last person they′d ever see.

Lucas called for another female officer from the Ninth, had one stay with each of the respective mothers until the fathers were contacted and had returned home from work. He made his way over to EndZone, showed them pictures of the girls, went through the routine, leaned on the manager, made a noise about serving under-age girls. It went nowhere. The place had been heaving with people, hit capacity at sixteen hundred. It had been a good night.

Lucas left empty-handed.

Nothing happened for two days.

 

Eight p.m., evening of Wednesday June 14th, an anonymous caller asked to speak with the officer investigating the death of the two girls found on the previous Monday. Fortunately Lucas was at his desk. He took the call personally.

′I think my lover is a murderer,′ the caller told him.

′Who is this?′ he asked. ′Who am I speaking to?′

′Just listen,′ she said, ′or I′ll hang up.′

′I′m listening,′ Lucas replied, and motioned for one of his colleagues to hit the record button on the control box.

′What I′m trying to do is to ascertain whether or not the individual I know, who happens to be my lover, did in fact do this. He said he did. My name is Betsy.′

′Betsy?′ Lucas asked.

′Did I say Betsy? No, my name is Claudia.′

′This is very good of you,′ Lucas said. ′We really appreciate your help. Can you tell us the name of your lover?′

′No, I can′t do that.′

′Can you tell us anything at all, Claudia?′

′I can tell you he has curly brown hair and blue eyes. His Christian name is John, and he′s forty-one years old. I′ve found a duffel bag in his car full of bloody blankets and paper towels and his clothes.′

′Okay, okay, this is very good . . . can you tell us his name, Claudia?′

′He tells me he fired four shots,′ the caller went on, seemingly oblivious to Lucas′s question. ′He tells me he fired four shots. Two in one girl′s head and virtually blew her head away. One shot in the head and one shot in the chest of the other girl. He used a .25 caliber pistol. Does that jibe with what you′ve got?′

′Yes, yes it does . . . this is definitely of great assistance to us, Claudia . . . but we really need to know this man′s name. If you can give us his name I′m sure it will insure that no-one else is hurt—′

The line went dead.

An hour later Richard Lucas requested a print-out of every applicant for a .25 caliber gun in the last year. He ran a search on every known violent offender aged forty-one with curly brown hair and blue eyes who lived within the New York city limits.

Richard Lucas, with the very best intention in the world, instigated an operation that would consume the better part of three-hundred man hours over the subsequent three days.

All for nothing.

There were no leads that resulted in any forward progress.

 

The following day, standing by the water cooler on the ground floor of the New York City Herald building, John Costello glanced at The New York Times squib of June 13th regarding the Burch and Briley killings; the squib he had circled in red and underlined three times.

In his small office on the second floor he cut out the column and pinned it beside that of Mia Grant. He attached a Post-It beneath the column and wrote June 12 Clark, Bundy, Murray - Sunset Slayer and again added four question marks.

He stepped away, raised his hand to the back of his head and smoothed down his hair. He counted the words in each article, and then he counted them again.

He could feel the narrow scar beneath the hairline above his neck.

He could feel the quiet urgency of his own frightened heart.

O
f Ashley Burch and Lisa Briley, Ray Irving knew nothing. They were Richard Lucas′s case - different precinct, different MO. Irving was pragmatic, methodical, prone to momentary flashes of genius, but these - as he aged - grew fewer and farther between.

Ray Irving was a detective by nature, intensely curious, ever-questioning, but familiar enough with the reality of the world within which he lived to understand that some things would always and forever remain unanswered. Perhaps unanswerable.

Nietzsche said that whoever fought monsters should see to it that in the process he did not himself become a monster. He said that when one looked into the abyss, the abyss would look right back.

Irving had walked the edges of the abyss for some years. His footsteps had been measured, even predictable, and though he had worn a track around the perimeter he nevertheless sensed that the perimeter was growing smaller. He neared the center of something with each new case. He recognized more of the madness with each killing, each instance of unmitigated brutality perpetrated by one human being against another. Sometimes, despite all he had witnessed, he found himself still staggered by the sheer inventiveness applied to the demise and destruction of identity and individual. And he had learned that irrationality could not be rationalized. As with addiction, the power of necessity was greater than any loyalty or agreement. Those who killed in anger were one thing; those who committed murder in the throes of passion were a specific breed. Those motivated by a desire to kill did not in fact exist: it was not desire, but compulsion. Compulsion was greater than love, than family, than any promise or vow made to oneself or another. Here were individuals who killed because they had to kill. It was not desire, it was obligation.

So much of his life he bore witness to events that opposed the natural order of things. Parents buried their children. People confessed, held out their bloody hands, and then walked free to kill again. Truth did not set men free. Legal technicalities were the route to salvation these days. Such things should never have been, but they were.

Ray Irving believed that he might go to his grave understanding some small measure of what he had seen, but he would never understand all of it. Understanding all of it was just not possible.

A month had passed since the death of Mia Grant. He had never known her, therefore did not miss her. Deborah Wiltshire, however, he did miss, and missed her in a different way than before. She had been dead for seven months, and though there were small reminders of her presence, her personality, left in Irving′s apartment - a ceramic hair straightener, a pair of flat-soled shoes with the right toe worn through - he perceived these things with a sense of balance and perspective that had come with time. At first he had been unable to move them because of what they represented; they had remained simply because they were all that was left of her. Now, with more than half a year gone, he saw these objects as constant reminders of the person she had been, the progress he himself had made, the quiet sense of closure they symbolized. Deborah Wiltshire, the unacknowledged love of his life, was gone. The only irony, strangely, was that she had not been murdered. Seemed to Irving - perhaps from some small and narrow strain of darkness he carried within himself, the shadow from the abyss that had gained entry even as he peered down into its depth - that the only fitting way for her to die would have been something such as that. He was a homicide detective, and if whoever or whatever was responsible for the karma of his life had been really thinking with the program, then they would have had the woman murdered. That would have been fitting. That would have been appropriate. But no - no such thing. Her life had been stolen away quietly, silently almost, a progressive deterioration of minutes, each one shorter than the next as she fought with something she couldn′t even see. And then she was extinguished. She did not gutter. She blew out. She did not disappear by imperceptible degrees, a water-color painting that faded with time. She simply vanished.

And Ray Irving was left with an emotion he could neither appreciate nor comprehend. It was neither loneliness nor self-pity. It was emptiness. Emptiness that could not be filled. He remembered something from Hemingway about losing things. If you lost things, whether good or bad, it left an emptiness. If it was a bad thing the emptiness filled up by itself; if it was a good thing you had to find something better or the emptiness would remain forever. Something like that. It made sense to Irving, though he could neither define nor imagine what might be better than Deborah Wiltshire.

The emptiness, if indeed that′s what it was, would remain.

He went about his business, he ate at Carnegie′s, he peered into the darkness and held a handkerchief to his face. He witnessed the way in which lives were randomly smashed. He asked many questions but received answers to only a few. He closed each day by standing at his apartment window and watching the world fall into silence.

Morning of July 29th the world came to find him. It came in colors, with cheerleaders and bandstands, with decorated floats and brass bands, with Sousa marches and baton twirlers. It came with the face of a clown. The Murray Hill end of East 39th and Third. Had it been east of Second, it would have fallen outside Irving′s jurisdiction, but no, the world wanted him to visit with James Wolfe.