The Calling (10 page)

'What do you think that means?' asked Greene.

'It could mean that it doesn't matter to the killer
whether we see that sign or not,' said Spere.

'Great,' said Greene, and he made a gesture as if
to throw his notebook over his shoulder.

'All right, that's Delia, unless anyone has anything
else to add.' Hazel drew a circle around the
facts as she'd written them down in short form on
the easel. No one spoke as she wrote 'Michael
Ulmer' on the other half of the sheet. 'Ray?'

'Okay, so Ulmer. Less than forty-eight hours later,
most likely around noon on Sunday 14 November.
A call was placed to the Chamberlain Community
Policing office around eleven. The caller identified
himself as a homecare nurse. We're going to have to
go with Chamberlain's superior policing skills on
that one and take it at face value unless anyone
wants to propose a reason the killer called in his own
crime.'

'Forty-five minutes before the time of death?' said
Spere. 'Sounds a little daring.'

'That's what I think,' said Greene. 'So: white
male, twenty-nine, multiple sclerosis sufferer. Was
apparently killed by blunt-force trauma to the head,
emphasis on
force
. Forensics found teeth embedded
in the victim's pillow. Both hands were severely
traumatized in a similar fashion, but there was no
evidence of venipuncture, and it would seem, from
what we saw at the crime scene, that there was no
shortage of blood supply in the victim's body. East
Central OPS is sharing jurisdiction with us on this
one, and we sent Ulmer to Mayfair to keep Jack
Deacon in the loop. We're waiting for pathology to
be faxed up to see if there was anything in his
stomach similar to what was in Mrs Chandler's. The
victim here was almost certainly carried upstairs to a
master bedroom that, apart from the murder,
appeared to be unused.'

'Forensics?'

'Same as the Chandler murder,' said Spere, 'but
without the carpet scuff. One item of interest is that
despite the amount of blood, it's limited to the
murder site. The killer would have had to clean himself
up, but there's no blood on the carpet in the
master bedroom, or in the closest bathroom. He's
very meticulous. I think he's only
appearing
to make
a mess.'

'Deacon isn't done with the body, but we know
what we know about its physical condition. Let's
sum up.' Hazel circled Ulmer's column and now she
drew a line under it all. 'Ident practically bagged
both houses, but nothing points anywhere conclusive
so far, correct, Howard?'

'My guys brought Mrs Chandler's computer in this
morning,' said Spere. 'There's nothing. Some emails
to and from an old girl in Florida – weather and gardens,
that sort of thing. A couple of web receipts
from the drugstore – she knew how to renew her prescriptions
online. Very little else. There was virtually
nothing of interest in her web history.'

'What would that be, Howard? A web history.'

'Just a way to go back over the places you've
visited on the Internet over a period of time. What
we found out was that she learned how to make
parmesan rice last Monday on a recipe site, on
Tuesday she Googled "Merle Haggard", and
As the
World Turns
, and two Wednesdays before her death,
she bought a duvet cover on Bidnow.com.'

Wingate seemed surprised. 'So was this an assisted
suicide or not?'

Spere cast him a look. 'You think buying a duvet
cover is evidence one way or the other?'

'I think so,' said the young detective. 'If she knew
this person was coming to visit her with the purpose
of helping her to end her life, then why would she be
buying
anything
online?'

'Good point,' said Hazel. 'She lets this man in, but
she has no idea what's going to happen to her?'

'Or she's actually not expecting him,' said Spere.

'Let's reiterate: no signs of a struggle,' said Greene.

'Right. But he's sedated her with belladonna.'

'He broke her finger,' said Wingate. They all
looked at him, and then at Hazel.

'Go on, James,' she said.

'Okay,' he said nervously. He directed his
comments at the others. 'He broke Delia Chandler's
finger to ensure she was anaesthetized. It was
snapped cleanly in two, and it wasn't an accident.
Deacon says in his report that it had definitely
happened while she was still alive because there was
swelling around the break, and that means that her
heart was still beating. So the killer used it to test if
she was ready. There was an agreement between
them, and this was part of it. He's invited, and the
victims know what will happen to them when he
arrives.'

'Then what about Ulmer?' said Spere. 'What was
it with breaking every bone in that man's hand? He
just wanted to be ultra-certain?'

'I don't know,' said Wingate.

Ray Greene was drawing an invisible circle on the
tabletop with his forefinger. 'I think maybe we're
being a little fast out of the blocks with all this. On
the
surface
, nothing really connects these two
killings except for the fact that they've happened
within a three-hour drive of each other. And right
now, all we have are surfaces to work with.'

'But Ulmer wasn't killed three hours after Delia,'
said Wingate. 'It was almost two days later.'

'So what?' said Greene. 'Listen, kid, I appreciate
that you'd like to make a good first impression, but
you've been here all of, what, twenty-one hours, and
frankly, I'm not sure I want to factor in all your cubscout
wild guesses about this guy's
agreements
with
the people he's slicing and bludgeoning to death.'
Hazel was staring at him. 'Okay?' he said to her.

'Detective Constable Wingate, what was the
point you were going to make about the delay
between the killings?'

Wingate turned to her. 'He's not just showing
up out of the blue, Inspector. He's keeping
appointments.'

There was a knock at the door and Cartwright
stuck her head in. 'I have Jack Deacon on the
phone. He wants to talk to you before he faxes his
report. That okay?'

'Conference him in,' said Hazel. She switched on
the receiver on the tabletop. It looked like a black
starfish with three arms. Presently, they heard
Deacon's voice.

'Let me guess – you guys are desperately trying to
find the connection between Ulmer and Chandler.'

Greene leaned toward the device. 'You should be
a detective, Jack.'

'Well, you can relax. Kind of. It
is
the same guy.
Ulmer's stomach was full of belladonna. I doubt he
felt a thing.'

'I guess that's good,' said Hazel. 'So what killed
him? Amatoxin?'

'No. None of that here. My guess is that it was the
blow to the head. Is Wingate there?'

'Here, sir.'

'That was a good notion you had about the blood,
son. It was Ulmer's blood on his head and neck, but
the fresher blood, the blood on his hands, it wasn't
his. Ulmer was B positive, but the blood on his
hands was mainly O.'

A chorus of voices called out to the doctor at
once.

'Do I still have your attention?' he said, and they
fell silent. 'It's a mixture of blood. I mean, from more
than one person. So I don't know whose it is.'

'What the hell,' said Greene. 'Are you certain?'

'I am.'

'Can you find out whose blood it is?'

'It's going to take a few days to unravel, I think. I
sent a sample down to the Toronto lab. They can
separate out the types and the DNA.'

'I want all the physical evidence associated with
the first scene taken down to Mayfair,' said Hazel.
'Jack?'

'Ma'am?'

'You're going to test all the bloodstains from the
Chandler site again.'

'I'll be waiting.' He rang off. Hazel stood over the
conferencing device, rubbing her forehead.

'What is it?' asked Greene.

She sighed heavily. 'I'm going to have to call
Mason now.'

'How's that going to go?'

'My guess is not well.' She shook the cobwebs
away and stood straight. 'James, you go to Mayfair
and get Delia's clothes out of evidence and take
them right to Jack Deacon. Ray, we need to talk to
Bob Chandler again. Unless you'd like to go with
DC Wingate to Mayfair.'

'No,' said Greene, quietly. 'I'll go see Bob.'

Mason's secretary kept her on hold for twelve
minutes. The average was fifteen. It failed to make
her feel optimistic. 'I have Commander Mason for
you,' said the secretary when she came back on. He
was one for pomp.

'Hazel?'

'Hello, Ian,' she said. 'I won't keep you long. I
need some more manpower up here. Maybe for a
month, maybe less.'

'Manpower?'

'A minimum of two detectives.'

'I thought you folks said "personpower" these
days. How's your mother?'

'She's well, thank you. Beth?'

'Terrific. Two detectives. Didn't I just send you
one?'

'Yes. And thank you. But it's not enough right
now.'

'See?' said Mason. 'Give an inch?' Ian Mason was
the worst kind of police bureaucrat: capricious and
jolly about it. In the early days, he seemed to delight
in denying any and all requests. His standard rejoinder
was
is it really a rainy day
? If you could prove there
was a need that could not be dealt with in any other
way but by spending money, you had a chance. But
the best way to deal with Mason, Hazel had found
over the years, was to appeal to his vanity. If his
name could, in some way, be attached to a positive
outcome, he was much more likely to acquiesce.
Although 'likely' was a relative term.

'You've got twenty people up there already,
Hazel.'

'Twelve, Ian, and only two detectives, not including
myself, and I have the whole detachment to look
after.'

'That's plenty. What on earth could you need two
more
good men for?'

'Commander, have you not heard what's happened
up here?'

'Yes, of course I have. A nice lady with terminal
cancer died.'

'Was murdered.'

'Yes.'

'And now there's a second one. In Chamberlain.'

She heard him moving some paper around.
Probably he was signing something without reading
it. 'Chamberlain's in Renfrew, Hazel. You're in
Westmuir. Are you asking me to staff you so you can
go digging in another county's dirt?'

'We believe these murders are connected. In fact,
we have growing proof that they are, and that the
killer ...'

She heard him breathing into the pause. 'Oh,
do
say it, Detective Inspector.'

'We have reason to believe we have a serial killer
on our hands.'

Now Mason laughed. 'I love it,' he said. 'In a land
without murder, two deaths within a thousand kilometres
is obviously the work of a serial killer. You
know what they call two murders close together in
Toronto? The morning shift.'

She counted to five in her head. 'You could take
control of this, Ian,' she said quietly. 'You're retiring
in a year. You could put your mark on something
like this; leave on a high note. Help us crack an
important case.'

'Are you going to use the stick next?'

'Please, Ian. I wouldn't ask if—'

'Ah, the mantra of the small-town police chief.
You wouldn't ask if you could think of another way.'
She remained silent. If she said anything else now,
his answer would be an instant no. But she knew,
even though her reference to his ego needs was a
craven one, he'd heard the upside. Playing
Mason well was no guarantee of success, but
playing him poorly ensured that you'd leave
empty-handed. 'My retirement is actually six
months away, Hazel. But I think you know that.'

'I must have forgotten.'

'I'm going to fly my plane and hunt moose. That's
the plan.'

'It sounds great, Ian. Are we going to go ahead
with this? A couple more hands?'

'Hazel,' he said, 'you've got a serial killer up there
like I have a tail.' Her heart sank. 'But I'll see what I
can do.'

Greene drove to Bob Chandler's office on Pearl
Street. His law firm was in one of the offices at the
back of the new strip mall behind the town.
Everyone hated this development: box stores and
sprawling parking lots lurking behind the main strip.
At least it wasn't visible from town. He pulled up in
front of the squat building where Chandler's small
firm did business and buzzed him. Chandler said he'd
come down.

The two of them sat on the side veranda of Alma
May's, a stately old house on the main drag turned
into a greasy spoon. It was almost too cold to sit outside,
but Bob Chandler didn't want people listening
in on any conversation he was having with the
police. He looked at the name on the piece of paper
Greene had passed him and said he didn't recognize
it.

'She never told you about a friend in Florida?'

'I didn't even know she was on the Internet. I
mean, me and Gail hooked her up because we
thought if she was interested ... but she never
mentioned it. I figured she was using the computer
as a paperweight.'

'No, she was set up,' said Greene. 'She knew email
and she could surf the web.'

'First your kids are a mystery to you, and then your
parents,' he said.

'There are early adopters and late adopters, and
then there's us. Hazel's done the same thing for her
mother. She could spend the whole day on
her laptop.'

Bob put his spoon back into his coffee and stirred
it needlessly. 'How is Mrs Micallef?'

'She's fine.'

'I guess she probably wasn't totally heartbroken to
hear. About what happened.'

'You'd have to ask Hazel.' He stirred his coffee. 'So
you don't know how your mum might have known
this Rhonda woman in Hallandale, huh?'

'She's never been to Florida,' Bob Chandler said.
'She must have met her online somehow.' He looked
at the name again. 'Can I see the emails?'