The Calling (8 page)

'Has Ident finished?' Hazel asked PC
Matthiessen.

'I don't know if they could ever finish, but yeah,
it's been photographed and swept. We were just
waiting for you to bag him.'

'Bag him then and get him out of here. Where's
the ambulance?'

'There's a guy in the alley. We figured we'd
probably want to take him out through the back.'

'Good idea.'

Greene snapped off his gloves with disgust and
tossed them into the hall. 'Dare I ask if anyone saw
anything?'

'We spoke to some of the neighbours, and no
one knows anything. But we haven't done a
canvass yet.'

'And who notified you guys?'

'PC Degraaf took a call before lunch. He says
Ulmer had a homecare appointment at eleven, but
he didn't answer the door.'

'Who was the caller?'

'We could find that out for you.'

'You didn't ask?' said Greene, incredulously.

'He said Ulmer sometimes slept through his
appointments.'

'But he called the police, this man? If this was a
normal occurrence, why would he call you?'

Matthiessen shuffled his feet a little. 'I don't
know. Maybe he didn't want to have to circle back
and check on Ulmer again. We sent a car out at
three.'

Greene was shaking his head in disbelief. 'You
didn't want to interrupt his nap, I guess.'

'Do we have a recording of this call?' said Hazel.

The officer looked down. 'Sorry, Chief. We're
not in the habit of doing that. And it was so
fast ...'

'Who's your commanding?'

Matthiessen leaned back a little and looked
through the door. They all turned, but there was no
one there. 'We're between commandings,' he said.
'Our skip retired last year. Seventy-four years old.
East Central promised us a new guy by the end of
the summer, but you know how things are.'

She certainly did. Was the OPS planning on
leaving every detachment north of Toronto rudder-less?
There were great savings to be had in places
where the population wasn't large enough to make
a noise. 'So it's you and Degraaf.'

'We have a couple of volunteers.'

'Good Lord,' said Hazel. 'You couldn't break up a
barfight here.'

Matthiessen looked sheepish. 'Luckily, things are
mainly peaceful hereabouts. This isn't Ottawa,
y'know.'

'Well, whatever, let's get this guy out of here
now.'

'Yes, Ma'am.' He seemed to be happy to leave
the room. She turned to Wingate, who was still
standing over the bed. Greene had already gone
downstairs.

'So where's the love in this one, Wingate?'

'Appearances are misleading.'

'Uh-huh.'

DC Wingate leaned in closer. 'Do you think the
blood's different colours?'

Hazel looked from where she was. 'Do you?'

'Arterial and venous blood look different. The
oxygen in venous blood makes it look redder.
Arterial blood is darker. Compare the blood on his
head to the blood on his hands.'

She looked closely. It did appear as if the blood
on Ulmer's hands was brighter. 'It's one for Spere.
Mention it to him.' Two officers with a black body
bag appeared in the doorway. Hazel ushered them
in, and Wingate stood back as they laid the bag
beside the body.

'What do you think he doesn't want us to
notice?' he said.

'Why do you think he's trying to communicate
with anyone?'

'He's trying to make these killings look like
something they aren't.'

One of the baggers started pulling the zipper up.
'One last look?' he asked. Ulmer lay in it stiffly, his
chest nearly blue and a line of blood under his skin
where it had pooled. It was like a chalk outline in
purple.

'I think we're done here,' said Hazel.

The officer closed the bag over Ulmer's
destroyed head. 'No one asked me,' he said, 'but
this guy, whoever did this, was pretty fucking angry.
Psycho or not, he wasn't in any kind of control of
himself.'

'I'm pretty sure you're wrong about that,' said
DC Wingate.

They found Greene on the front lawn, sucking on
one of Spere's cigarettes. The streetlights had come
on since they'd gone into the house. Glowing
circles lay over the road. 'Ten years without a
smoke,' Greene said, turning the burning ember to
himself and staring at it. Spere held out the pack
to them and they declined.

'So, again,' said Hazel, 'the victim opens the
door, lets the killer in. Right? No sign of a struggle.
The killer probably
carries
the victim upstairs and
puts him in bed. Ulmer lets him.'

'Maybe these people are signing on for one kind
of death, but they're getting another,' said Greene.
'Or getting the one they want, and then the killer
is either letting loose because he can, or because he
thinks he won't get caught if the murders aren't
connectable.'

'Two violent murders two days apart within
three hundred kilometres of each other?'

'Maybe he knows something about the state of
policing in this part of the province,' said Greene.
'Such as it is.' He crushed his cigarette underfoot.
'Christ, they've got two rooks here playing house
and writing parking tickets.'

Hazel cast a glance at Wingate, whose eyes were
directed straight into the grass. 'Well, you've got
your proximity now, James.'

'What does that mean?' said Spere.

'Serial killers,' said Wingate quietly, as if he was
in pain, 'they work territories.'

'So do milkmen,' said Greene. 'Anyway, I'll tell
you one thing we do know. If this is the same guy,
he's heading east.'

Wednesday, 17 November, 8:30 a.m.

Simon climbed out of the river and onto the bank,
reaching for a white towel he'd draped over a
boulder. The sun in its oblique angle didn't offer
much heat, but after he'd towelled off, he stood on
the sandy riverside and with his eyes closed faced the
light until he could feel it reach inside him and scour
what the rushing water could not reach.

He'd pitched camp near the eastern border of
Quebec the previous morning. Here, in these forests,
he could replenish some of his supplies, despite the
lateness of the season. The eastern provinces were a
better source for some of the mosses and lichens he
could not find in such abundance out west. Club
moss and Asclepias. He scoured the forest floor for
seedpods, herbs and fungus. The evening before he'd
had the marvellous luck of discovering a cluster of
Laetiporus cincinnatus
, the mushroom foolishly called
'chicken of the woods' by those who could not liken
a food to itself, and although he did not usually eat
fungi, he had been losing weight lately from his
exertions, and needed to give his stomach something
to work on. He'd cooked the huge bracket of
mushrooms on an open fire, and delighted in the
firm flesh redolent of the forest.

Soon he would be close to the ocean again – it
had been nearly two months since he'd left the
Pacific on his journey – and he would allow himself
the indulgence of fish once he reached the shores of
the Atlantic. He ate flesh once a year (secretly, as his
brother would not approve), and in the time he'd
spent in the wilds outside of Port Hardy, high up on
Vancouver Island, he had allowed himself to indulge
only during the coho migration, capturing a sow
partway to her breeding grounds and eating her raw,
bones, eggs and all, on the riverbank. He liked to
feel the power of the animal in him at these times,
ravishing himself on the blind, unquestioning faith
these creatures showed in the cycles of their lives,
returning to die where they were born, not conscious
of their paths but committed to them, the way the
ocean is magnetized to the moon. In the week after
these feasts, he could feel their flesh coursing
through his, leaping in his blood, tidal.

He'd passed through to this part of Quebec without
stopping. He'd had requests in French from
various parts of the province, but despite his grounding
in the romantic tongues, his French was poor.
Clear communication was of the utmost importance
in this endeavour, and he could not risk misspeaking,
or failing to understand. So he had ignored all
but one request from Quebec, this one from a small
town high up on the St Lawrence River called
Havre-Saint-Pierre. It had taken him a day and a
half to drive through Quebec, keeping to the 117
and the 113 through Chibougamau until the highway
brought him back down toward the St
Lawrence. He'd had a premonition of being sighted
somehow, knowing that his stop in Humber Cottage
was perhaps not a wise one: he'd been called to
attend to his willing supplicants, not to those in random
need, and God knew there were many who
would benefit from his ministrations. Still, he was a
man on a merciful mission, and if God should send
him a child in need of transformation, he could not
refuse. He was glad of his opportunities, but he did
not want to be stopped before his work was done.

And his Great Work was nearly complete. There
were four men and women at the end of this mighty
chain waiting to play their small role in it. How he
loved them for their patience, their willingness.
He would not fail any of them; had not failed to this
point.

He looked back on his and his brother's years in
Port Hardy, and although they seemed at the time to
be years of turmoil and doubt, now that time in his
life seemed encased in something. Its shape was
crystalline, light-catching, and the kernel of himself
that had been made by those years glowed within it,
something whole. He realized this crystal was his
battery: this image of himself, which contained the
force of his brother's being, powered him now,
allowed him to move forward across the country
nearly sleepless and barely provended, a starving,
wide-awake prophet. When he came to the end of
his path, in Newfoundland less than ten days from
now, he would make the final gesture of his quest
and that crystal would burst open and spread his
light among the stars.

He prayed beside his tent in the thick forest north
of Havre-Saint-Pierre. He laid out his photographs
on the flamelit grass, putting them in order, fifteen
figures, with four to go. Nineteen in all, the particles
of a wholeness that could not be made without these
orisons, these petitioners. He thanked the Almighty
for allowing him to reach this day.

He worried that these last men and women might
have weakened during their wait. He had already
lost two on the way, an elderly man in Canmore, and
a woman in Wawa. These he had replaced with the
only two people on his waiting list.

He spent a full day and night in the woods,
replenishing his strength and resting. In the days, he
ate, bathed and prayed. At night, he could hear the
life of the forest around him, creatures aware of his
presence, but not frightened of him, not threatened.
He listened to the myriad scurryings around his tent,
the sound of a watchful stillness from the branches
above him, and he felt contained in it, another
animal in a sanctuary of its own making.

After dressing and taking down his tent, he went
into Havre-Saint-Pierre and checked for mail at the
main postal station. It was Wednesday, 17
November, at eight o'clock in the morning. He
found a letter of confirmation from Mrs Iagnemma,
saying that she would like to see him as arranged.
But
not
as arranged, as she stated that her daughter,
a Miss Cecilia Iagnemma, would be present to assist
him and to give him her support. Simon had been
especially careful to choose his hosts from among
the many men and women who fit a certain profile.
First and foremost, they would live alone. Second,
they were to understand that the process they were
involved in was to take place in utmost secrecy. It
was no secret between himself and his hosts that
what they were engaged in was illegal in every lawbook
but God's: if he were to be stopped, their
participation would be for nothing. Telling anyone
about him, or worse, involving anyone else in his
plans, was grounds for dissolving the arrangement.
Once, at the very beginning (it had been his third
appointment), he'd arrived at an apartment and
seen two sets of shoes of different sizes on the mat
outside the door. He'd simply turned on his heel and
left (although he returned later, unannounced
and somewhat displeased, and proceeded without
ceremony). But now at least Mrs Iagnemma had
prepared him. She had not really asked permission,
but she had told him honestly what she was
planning. It allowed him to consider his options.
And given that he had only three more stops after
this one, it struck him as wise to go with what was
being given him.

He was to see the woman in six hours, but however
much he disliked deviating from his plans, he
would go now. He followed the directions to her
house on a hillside beyond the town. It was a
humble cabin surrounded by Jack pine, and as he
approached it, a thin finger of woodsmoke came
from the chimney.

'I'm early,' he said when she came to the door, and
she looked behind him to see if anyone had accompanied
him. Seeing no one, she opened the door for
him anyway. She was a woman of about sixty, her
entire aspect a wash of white: white hair, white
terrycloth robe, the skin of her face like onionskin.
She bent over to write something down on a pad she
was carrying.

You got my letter?

'I did. And I've come out to ask you to reconsider,'
he said, standing in her hallway, his hat in his
hand. He had left his kit in the car. 'I cannot do
what you ask of me; there can't be a witness.'

Mrs Iagnemma gestured for him to come into the
house proper. Throat cancer had left her without a
larynx or much of her tongue. There was a semipermanent
port in the base of her throat where
liquid nourishment could be taken. She was a
borderline case for him: her disease had violated
her so profoundly that her doctors had removed her
speaking parts, and she was no longer complete.
He'd justified his visit to her by considering that her
voice would be raised in a different way than
medicine could imagine. Her tonguelessness was
prelude to a miracle. But he'd known he was tempting
fate by coming to this woman, and his fears had
been grounded: she'd broken their agreement and
forced him off his schedule. He was not happy. She
brought him into the kitchen and put a kettle on to
boil. The house was not as tidy as he liked; he would
have very little time to clean once she was finished,
and he had to ensure he was well out of the area
before her daughter arrived at two o'clock. However,
if Cecilia Iagnemma showed before he was finished,
he'd already decided what he would have to do.
Gladys Iagnemma sat across from him at the table
and began writing on one of the pads of paper that
seemed to litter every flat surface in the house.

You look as I thought you would.

'A little severe?'

Kind
, she wrote. She pulled the pad back and continued.
I don't want to be alone when this happens. My
daughter understands. You will be safe even if she's here.

'I can't, Gladys. This is a private thing. Between
you, me and the Lord. No one else is invited. I'll
understand if you don't want to go ahead. I can find
someone else.'

She seemed to collapse into herself a little. From
the looks of her, had she lived a little farther away
and been his second-last, or last visit, she'd already
be dead.

Okay
, she wrote.
But I want to write her a note. I'll
write it, and then we can start.

He reached across the table and gripped her
writing hand, and she looked up at him and smiled
wanly. 'You do that, then,' he said, keeping his
expression steady. 'I'll get my things, and you can put
down what you want to say.'

She nodded gratefully and tears fell down her
cheeks. She lowered her head and began writing; he
saw her write the words
My beloved Cecilia
, and
he left her to it. Out in the car, he opened the hatch
and took his bag out. His movements were abrupt.

He tugged on the fridge door and checked the cable.
He had not been pressed for time during any of his
visits before now, and he would need the better part
of two hours after Mrs Iagnemma gave herself to him
to finish up. The arrangement was quite unsatisfactory,
and if the daughter showed early, he
would have a mess on his hands. He went back into
the house and saw the woman crouched over her
writing. The kettle was steaming now. Never had he
foregone mercy, but if any of his supplicants had
earned a rough dispatch, Gladys Iagnemma was the
one. 'I must ask you again, Gladys: do you wish to go
forward?'

She pushed what she was doing aside and wrote
Yes
, then pulled the unfinished letter back toward
her. 'You can consider yourself fortunate that I'm
willing to go through with this at all,' he said. The
kettle whistled and Simon lifted it off the element
and raised it over Mrs Iagnemma's head. She'd
turned at the sound of the water boiling and lifted
her eyes upward in time to witness the stream of
boiling water coming down over her. In panic, she
ducked forward and Simon poured the steaming
liquid into the woman's white hair and down the
back of her neck. Her scalp went instantly livid, as if
a nest of eels had burst to life on her head, and Mrs
Iagnemma reared up and flew over the back of her
chair. She hit the floor with a bang – he could hear
the hoarse susurrations emanating from her broken
mouth – and he kicked her over onto her back and
held her down against the cupboards with a foot on
her chest. He poured the water over the port at the
base of her throat. 'Do you know what an agreement
is, Gladys?' She writhed beneath his foot, a pink,
steaming foam cascading out of her mouth and
nostrils. Within a minute, she was dead. The flesh
around the circular port was cooked to a translucent
pink.

He was going to need ice now if he was going to
get his work done. He replaced the kettle on the
stovetop and struggled to get Mrs Iagnemma's body
back into the chair. Her eyes were still open and
would not close: the thin muscles already hardening.
There was a single tray of ice in the freezer, and he
cracked and freed the twelve cubes from it and
packed five of them into her mouth. The heat there
began to melt the ice instantly, and he replaced the
shrinking cubes with fresh ones until he could feel
her jaw begin to stiffen. He scrabbled around in his
kit and took out a piece of paper and consulted it.
Her mouth was already rounded a little: he put his
thumb behind her lower teeth and drew her jaw
downward. Cool water coursed over his knuckles.
Her jaw wanted to spring up, but he held it firmly
until the muscles in her mandible accommodated
him. With his other hand, he pushed the stub of her
tongue back and upward in her mouth. He could feel
the muscles firming up beneath his hands, as if he
were sculpting her, and indeed he was, he was
changing her at the moment of her death into a
work of art.

It took ninety minutes, but at last she stayed in
the position he'd placed her in. He photographed
her with the Polaroid and waited to see her face
emerge from the vague darkness within the white
frame, her frightened, egg-white eyes drifting
through the fog toward him. Fixed now, forever, in
his gaze.

Back in the car, after quickly cleaning up and
drawing her blood, he keyed the lock on the little
bar fridge and opened its door. He'd lined one of the
shelves with camphor pucks to mask the smell –
even refrigerated, blood began to reek after a while.
Just the same, he'd learned not to hold his breath:
the priest does not look away at the moment of
supreme sacrifice. He brought out one of the jars,
opened it, and filled his nose and lungs with the
scent of decay. He dipped his chalice into it. He took
the cup into the house, where Mrs Iagnemma sat in
permanent peace, and he tipped the contents of the
chalice over her burned head. 'I bless you,' he said to
her. Black, brackish blood coated her face and slowly
trickled down the front of her terrycloth robe. 'You
are in the choir now, Gladys Iagnemma, welcome.'