The Cruelest Cut (5 page)

Jack entered the autopsy room again to find Carmodi, Liddell, and two crime scene techs leaning over the table near Timmy Ryan's head.

“Check this out,” Liddell said and moved aside.

At the bottom of the table, one of the crime scene techs was unfolding a wadded-up piece of paper.

Liddell said, “Carmodi found it stuffed in the kid's throat.”

The tech finished unfolding the paper, and they could see there was something written on it.

“Shit!” Carmodi exclaimed softly. The crime scene techs began snapping digital photos excitedly.

“What is it, Doc?” Jack asked. It seemed everyone in the room knew something that he didn't.

Liddell leaned toward Jack and said in a whisper, “We found one of these notes last week, Jack.”

Liddell had been back to work for several weeks, and had kept Jack up to date on some of what was happening, but he didn't remember being told anything about a murder where a note was left at the scene. He hadn't been much interested in what was going on while he was recuperating at home, but now he wished he'd kept up.

“Crayon,” one of the crime scene techs said. “Just like the last one.”

The note was scrawled in red crayon in what looked like a child's handwriting. Jack read the note:

 

he caught fishes
in other mens ditches

they pay for your sins

 

“What the hell does that mean?” Jack asked. No one seemed to have a clue.

 

Maddy Brooks threw her ruined shoes at the trash can in her office. She was furious. Not only did she ruin a pair of expensive shoes, but that incompetent, damned detective had shut her out of the story.

Who the hell does Murphy think he is?

She was imagining ways to make his life miserable when she noticed the two envelopes that still lay on her desk. In her haste to get to the murder scene at the river, she had not thought them important. She tore open the newest one and pulled out the note inside.

Once again, in a childlike scrawl, in red crayon, was written:

 

he caught fishes
in other mens ditches

they pay for your sins

 

Really!
she thought angrily.
Enough is enough. If these yokels think they can scare me into quitting, they don't know who they're messing with.

She debated the merit of going to the station manager, but realized that she didn't have any evidence as to who was leaving the notes. And if she started asking who had left them on her desk, it would just make her look panicky, and that would never do.

She decided to wait and watch. But right now she needed a smoke.

 

Eddie awakened with a start. His pillow was damp, and his long hair clung to his face. His eyes hurt, and his throat felt strained, like he'd been screaming. He sat up on the edge of the couch where he had fallen asleep and shielded his eyes from the sunlight that bled through the mostly missing window blinds of his motel room.

From the room next to his someone was banging loudly on the wall. A raspy voice accompanied the banging. “Shut the fuck up over there! I'm trying to sleep!”

“I oughta kill that bastard,” Eddie said through clenched teeth, then yelled at the wall, “Shut up, ya rat fuck!” He slammed his hand against the wall hard enough to rattle the windows.

Sitting across from him, his brother shook his head sadly. “How many times I gotta tell you, bro? Complaining don't get the job done.”

Eddie jumped up from the couch and grabbing the huge corn knife, headed for the door.

“I'll get the fuckin' job done, all right,” he said as he swung the thirty-inch blade of the corn knife around in the air. “I'll cut him a new asshole.”

Bobby didn't move from the bed where he was reclined, head cradled in his hands, with a huge smile playing across his face.

“What?” Eddie asked. Then he looked in the cracked mirror behind the couch, and saw what Bobby was grinning about. Eddie's damp hair stood out in all directions, he was naked, and in his hand was the antique harvesting knife he'd stolen from behind a junk store.

Bobby started to chuckle, and Eddie had to admit he was quite a sight.

“Guess I'll just cut the shit heel's tires later,” Eddie said and sat back down on the couch. He held the knife at arm's length, checking it out. He'd always liked knives, maybe not as much as Bobby, but even Bobby would have to admit this was the “mother of all knives.”

The thirty-inch hammered-iron blade was a quarter of an inch thick at the back and razor sharp along the wickedly curved blade. The long wood handle was at a forty-five-degree angle to the blade and, like a scythe, was designed to swing with one or both hands to harvest corn.

“Save it for Murphy,” Bobby said.

Eddie put the knife down and slumped back on the couch. He was tired. The one thing he'd never had trouble with in his life was sleeping, at least until now. Booze, even drugs, didn't help anymore. He pulled his knees up under his chin, wrapped his arms around his legs, and began rocking. Pieces of memories flashed in his mind, sparking raw emotions. The waking nightmares were all too familiar now.
An old church building, stairs, a locked door, a boy shoved over an altar, a splash of blood dripping onto a wooden floor, screaming, screaming, screaming…

“Hey, snap out of it, bro.” Bobby's voice brought Eddie back. Bobby was sitting at the foot of the bed, a sad look on his face. “You were thinking about the preacher, weren't you?” Bobby was referring to their deceased father. He had been a self-professed preacher of sorts.

Eddie nodded, not trusting his voice. He was too big to cry, and too proud to let his brother see how close he was to doing just that.

“I told you how to make the dreams go away, Eddie,” Bobby said. “Complaining don't get the job done.”

Eddie hated it when his brother said that. “Complaining don't get the job done, Eddie. Sorry don't get the job done, Eddie.” Those were the preacher's words. Nothing ever seemed to get the job done where his father was concerned.

“What do you want me to do?” Eddie asked.

Bobby looked at the corn knife, and Eddie felt a shiver of excitement.

“Who?”

“Get the book and I'll show you,” Bobby answered.

 

Maddy Brooks looked around before sneaking out the back door of the television station. She wedged a Popsicle stick between the door latch and the strike plate so the door wouldn't lock, made sure the coast was clear, and then took out a pack of smokes. The last thing she needed was for the station manager to catch her smoking near the building. Actually, she didn't want anyone to see. Evansville had passed a nonsmoking ordinance that forbade smoking in or within one hundred feet of an occupied structure. Of course, the two-faced assholes at city hall had made an exception for the Blue Star Casino and for most taverns. When it came to politicians, money always spoke louder than words.

And the thought of someone being allowed to smoke in the confined spaces of the riverboat, while she had to sneak off to light up, made her angry. You'd think her job as news anchor for Channel Six would give her a few privileges. Like being able to smoke in her office.
Like Bob Sampson
.
I can smell smoke in his office all the time.

But Bob Sampson was a man, and as such, was immune from the same rules as women at the station. She wondered briefly if Sampson was the one leaving the notes on her desk, but quickly dismissed the idea. Sampson was a dickless little shit. He wouldn't have the nerve to do something like that.

Maddy sucked the smoke deep into her lungs and held it. What she wouldn't give for a joint right now. But smoking cigarettes outside the back door, and smoking dope outside the back door, were two different things. She smiled at the thought of getting caught smoking a doobie, and just then the back door crashed open.

“Maddy?”

The party crasher was Lois, the television station's secretary. Lois Hensley was short, paunchy, wrinkled, and an annoying little twit that Maddy knew was trying to get her fired. Lois had been with the station almost twenty years before Maddy had been hired.

“Yes, Lois.” There was no hint of annoyance in her voice. She hated Lois, but she respected the power that Lois had with the station manager. Maybe Lois had never been a reporter, but she was not someone you wanted to piss off. She knew more about the operation of the station than God,
and
she was the mayor's mother.

“I found this taped to the front door.” Lois handed Maddy an envelope with Maddy's name scrawled on the outside in red crayon.

“Is this a joke, Lois?” Maddy asked before remembering that Lois was dispossessed of a sense of humor. “Sorry, Lois. Who left it?”

Lois looked haughtily at Maddy. “I did say I found it taped to the front door, didn't I?” She turned to leave, and then, as if she had just remembered, Lois said, “Oh yeah, there was another of those silly notes, and I put it in your mail slot.”

“When was that, Lois?” Maddy asked. She could barely contain her agitation, and Lois seemed to be enjoying herself.

“Well, it didn't look important. I really don't remember. Yesterday, today, I really don't remember.”

Maddy tried to control her temper. She'd love to slap silly Lois—well, silly.
So, it wasn't someone playing a joke on me,
she thought. Lois would never take any part in an attempt at humor or playing a joke on anyone. And there was no one in the building who would dare involve Lois in something for fear it would come back on them.

She took the note and said, “Thanks, Lois.” Lois gave her a smug grin and turned to go back inside, then turned back again, long enough to say, “You know there is no smoking near the building, Maddy.”

Maddy dropped the cigarette on the concrete. “Bitch,” she snarled as the door shut behind the older woman. Then she had a thought and pulled the door open.

“Lois, did you leave some other notes on my desk? Notes like this one?” Maddy asked, hoping that Lois had noticed something that might help her learn who was doing this.

“If you got notes, I'm probably the one that left them,” Lois answered nastily. “That's my job.”

Maddy barely heard the response. Her mind was trying to wrap itself around something just out of her reach. She opened the note Lois had just given her.
Oh my God!
she thought.

In her bare feet, she rushed down the hallway, stopping just long enough at her own office to collect the other two notes, then straight to the station manager's office. They would need the station's legal counsel.

 

The recaps of the day's events were as disappointing as they were time consuming. Marlin Pope, as chief of police, had made them go through every detail of the case from beginning to end at least a dozen times. Captain Franklin had asked both the forensic pathologist and the coroner to be present at the meeting, but Carmodi was unable to attend. Lilly Caskins was there representing the coroner.

Liddell leaned in to whisper in Jack's ear. “I wonder where Double Dick is.”

Jack shrugged. “In hell, I hope,” he said, causing Liddell to chuckle a little too loudly.

“Do you have something to add, Detective?” Chief Pope asked.

Liddell turned red. “I was just noticing that Deputy Chief Dick was not present, sir.”

Lilly Caskins guffawed. She had overheard Jack's response and couldn't agree more. She hated the deputy chief for reasons unrelated to anything to do with the police department. Her job as chief deputy coroner gave her an inside ear to the current political arena, and she had heard some things regarding Dick that she was not happy about. The very idea of him becoming chief of police sickened her. She respected Marlin Pope, but more than that, she respected the position of chief of police. A man like Richard Dick would fuck up everything he touched.

Pope waited until Caskins got herself under control, then cleared his throat and said, “Now, if we can continue. I need to know what our plan of action is. Captain?”

Franklin looked at Jack and Liddell before beginning. “Summarizing all this, we have two sets of murders that may, or may not, be connected by notes left at the scenes—more particularly, left on the bodies of the victims. No progress was made on the Lewis case, and now we have a killing on the riverfront, where a note, similar to the one left on the body of Anne Lewis, was discovered shoved down the throat of this boy, Timmy Ryan. Crime Scene can tell us that the wounds in both cases were caused by a large, heavy, sharp instrument, like a machete, and that in both cases the bodies were moved after death. No witnesses in either case. No suspects. Nothing so far on the neighborhood canvassing, and in the case of Timmy Ryan, we have been unable to locate a next of kin. Is that about right?” Franklin asked Jack and Liddell.

Jack answered. “We also have no connection between the victims—outside of cryptic notes written in red crayon, that is.”

Chief Pope looked around the room until his gaze rested on Captain Franklin. “What I want to know is how in the hell did I not know about the first note? The one left on Anne Lewis's body.”

“It was lying on the floor when crime scene and detectives arrived, Chief,” Franklin explained. “Apparently the cleaning woman that found the bodies called for an ambulance, and by the time dispatch figured out what was going on, the ambulance crew had moved the note and covered the victims with sheets.”

Chief Pope ran a hand down his face. He knew all that, but he also knew after reading part of the files, that the first detective on the scene was Detective Jansen, and that Jansen probably screwed the pooch, so to speak.

And so the meeting went into the late hours of the evening, until finally, everyone was told to go home and get some rest. Fresh minds see fresh details. They would start again before the sun was up. Then they would meticulously go over every report, recanvass every neighborhood, reexamine every speck of physical evidence, re-interview everyone, and with any luck, find a next of kin for Timmy Ryan.