The Secret Friend (26 page)

78

‘Walter Smith isn’t here,’ Darby said.

Dr Tobias looked over his bifocals. ‘What’s that?’

‘Walter Smith’s entire pharmaceutical history is listed in the pharmacy database but his name doesn’t appear in your patient database.’

The hospital director groaned as he got out of his chair. Darby handed him the printed sheets listing Walter Smith’s medications.

At the beginning of the year a physician named Dr Christopher Zackary had renewed Walter Smith’s prescription for Lycoprime. Walter Smith had been using the product for the past year and a half. He had used the Derma camouflage concealer steadily since the early eighties. The medical entries for Derma stopped in 1997, the time when it no longer required a prescription.

Tobias scanned the pages then set them aside and typed on the keyboard ‘Smith, Walter’. The search came up empty.

‘That’s not possible,’ Tobias said. ‘If he’s in the pharmacy database, then his patient file should be in our system.’

‘I’d like to see his paper file.’

‘Dr Zackary has most likely gone home for the day. Let me see if I can find someone to unlock his office.’

Darby leaned back in her chair, stretching as she stared up at the ceiling tiles. It was after 10 p.m.

Why was Walter Smith’s patient file missing? Was it some clerical oversight or computer glitch? A hospital of this size would have a system in place to perform weekly if not daily backups of its computer systems.

Her cell phone rang.

‘You were right,’ Bill Jordan said. ‘He came back to the chapel.’

Darby stood, almost knocking over the chair. ‘You’ve got him in custody?’

‘Not yet. Look, I don’t have much time, so let me give you a quick rundown. Quinn – he’s one of the guys I have stationed inside Sinclair – Quinn said someone entered the chapel about half an hour ago. The guy he saw, his face was all messed up, like it was burned. The guy decided to run. Shots were fired and the guy made it into a room located in the back, behind the pews. There’s a hole in the ceiling.’

Darby knew the room. She had seen it after she crawled through the vent.

‘Quinn and his partner, Brian Pierra, they swear they saw a ladder,’ Jordan said. ‘Next thing they know, the ladder is pulled up. Quinn fired a shot and got a brick thrown at his head.’

‘Can you cover all the exits?’

‘We’re covering all the exits we know about. Danvers PD is here and they’re pissed. One of Reed’s security guys heard the gunshots, panicked and called in the locals. I’ve got to go.’

‘I’m on my way.’

‘No, I want you to stay right where you are. This place is a goddamn zoo, and I’ve got a tactical nightmare on my hands. I’ll call you as soon as we have this guy in custody, I promise. Good work, Darby. You were right.’

And then Jordan was gone.

Darby wanted to run for her car, tear up Route One North and then what? Jordan’s men had SWAT experience. If she drove up to Danvers, what could she do? She couldn’t do anything.

She paced the cheap carpeting, surrounded by papers and steamed heat. She wanted to be there when they dragged this person out of the hospital. She wanted to see the face of the man who had shot Emma Hale and Judith Chen – and what about Hannah Givens? Was the college student still alive or was her body at the bottom of a river?

Darby was staring out the office window when Dr Tobias walked into the office. He handed her three bulky folders. Tobias checked his watch and excused himself to get coffee.

Darby leaned back on a desk and read the patient file.

Walter Smith had been admitted to Shriners during the early morning hours of 5 August 1980 with third-degree burns covering ninety per cent of his body. His mother, who had died in the blaze, had doused his bed in gasoline and set him on fire because he was ‘the son of the devil’. Walter Smith was eleven years old.

Walter had undergone psychiatric evaluation and been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. An orphan, with no access to medical insurance, Walter was refused acceptance at the McClean Hospital, famous for its treatment of mental illnesses. The Sinclair Mental Health Facility, a well-regarded psychiatric institution run by the state, offered the boy free treatment.

Darby looked back to the pharmacy records. Walter Smith had moved well over a dozen times during the past twenty years. His most recent address was in Rowley – two towns away from Danvers, where Sinclair was located.

She called Neil Joseph and gave him a quick rundown of Walter Smith.

‘The name isn’t appearing in any of our local cases,’ Neil said. ‘Do you have any other names for me?’

‘No.’ Darby told him what was going on with Sinclair.

Next she called Coop and relayed the same information. He was still searching through patient records.

‘What do you want me to do?’ he asked.

‘You might as well keep looking.’

Darby hung up and stared at the close-up photographs taken of the boy’s burned face. Was Walter Smith the man who had killed Emma Hale and Judith Chen? On paper, he looked like the perfect suspect. Was the man trapped inside Sinclair?

She checked the clock. 11:35 p.m. Forty minutes had passed since her conversation with Bill Jordan. Was Walter Smith in custody? Or were Jordan’s men still hunting for him? It was maddening to wonder.

A search warrant would be needed to get inside Walter Smith’s Rowley home. That would take time.

Was Hannah Givens inside the Rowley house or was she being kept somewhere else? Did Walter Smith live with someone? A roommate or a girlfriend? If he did live with someone, this person might be able to provide additional information about him.

Darby made a copy of Smith’s medical files. She stuffed the pages inside her backpack and ran through the corridors, heading for the front door.

Walter looked around the motel parking lot. The police hadn’t followed him here – they hadn’t followed him through the access tunnel but they were all over the hospital. He had locked the gate behind him and was off and running through the woods when he heard sirens. A moment later, blinking blue and white lights pierced the darkness.

The police hadn’t found him but they had found Mary and she was gone, his Blessed Mother was
gone.

Sitting behind the wheel, his clothes soaked with sweat, Walter rocked back and forth, back and forth, telling himself he wasn’t going to cry.

He couldn’t hold it any longer. He let it out, sobbing like a little boy, his whole body shaking.

Can you hear me, Walter?

Mary’s voice was loud and clear. Walter stopped rocking, listened.

‘I can hear you.’

I want you to listen to me very carefully. I’m going to help you. Are you listening?

Walter wiped his face. ‘Yes.’

Mary explained what he needed to do.

‘I can’t,’ Walter said.

There’s no reason to be afraid. I’ll be with you at every step. You’re my special boy, and I love you so much. You can do this. Now drive home and get Hannah.

His Blessed Mother’s love strong inside his heart, Walter started the car.

79

Hannah sat on her bed, a statue of the Virgin Mary clutched between her hands.

Mom was the believer, the one who had pushed the family into Mass every Sunday and sacrificing during the season of Lent. Dad didn’t have much use for church. He confided in her once, when it was just the two of them: ‘You want good things to happen in your life, you’re not going to find it sitting on a pew. You’ve got to use that thing sitting between your ears.’

Still, Dad went along for the ride, paying the usual lip service – bow and stand, kneel, stand and bow, give thanks for all the wonderful things in your life, now go off and be good and don’t you
dare
question the Good Lord’s motivations. Hannah always felt caught in the middle – wanting to believe in some higher purpose or calling but not really buying into the whole invisible man in the sky thing watching everything you did, good and bad, and marking it in the appropriate columns.

The last time she prayed was the summer before college. Her cousin Cindy had a baby boy born with a heart defect. Little Billy lived in an incubator for six months and had undergone every type of procedure imaginable, including the installation of a pacemaker. A company made one specially to fit inside Billy’s tiny chest. Donations were raised, churches prayed for Billy’s recovery, and in the end God said no, sorry, Billy’s got to go. All part of God’s divine plan, the priest said.

Bullshit.

What part could an infant play in God’s mysterious divine plan? Why let Billy be born in the first place? Why would a loving God make an infant go through all that pain and suffering? And why would a caring God turn a deaf ear to the thousands of starving Jews in the concentration camps? To the Jews who were marched into the ovens and shot in the head as they stood over a mass grave? How did
that
fit into the Almighty’s divine plan?

Hannah didn’t know the answers, but she couldn’t deny that holding the statue brought some measure of comfort. The Blessed Mother of Jesus Christ kept the tears at bay and provided a sliver of hope.

Maybe there was a purpose to suffering, but if she was going to survive, Hannah knew she was going to have to use that thing between her ears.

The locks to her room clicked back and the door opened.

Hannah jumped off the bed and saw Walter holding the clothes she had worn the night she was kidnapped. The jeans and sweatshirt were neatly folded in his hands. A plastic shopping bag holding her boots was wrapped around his wrist.

Walter tossed the bag and clothes onto the floor. ‘Get dressed.’

Something was wrong. The makeup Walter used to hide his scars was smeared in several places. She saw thick, rubbery patches of crimson and brown coloured skin. His eyes were wet. Had he been crying?

‘Get dressed,’ Walter said again. His hair was dishevelled, sticking up at odd angles as though he had just climbed out of bed. He was wearing his coat.

‘Where are we going?’

‘I’m taking you home.’

Hannah was about to ask the question, stopped.
Don’t say anything. Just do what he says.

She had to ask. She needed to know. ‘Why are you letting me go?’

‘Mary said it’s the right thing to do.’

Hannah picked up her clothes. They smelled of fabric softener. Walter had cleaned them.

Walter didn’t leave the room. Hannah took the clothes behind the curtain hiding the toilet and changed quickly.

When she came out, Walter was holding a pair of handcuffs.

This time he didn’t ask her to turn around. He yanked her hands behind her back and handcuffed her. She didn’t fight him. When he wrapped a black blindfold over her eyes, she didn’t fight him. Walter grabbed her by the arm and quickly dragged her down the hallway as though the house was on fire.

Walter helped her up the stairs. Hannah took the steps one at a time, heart pumping with fear, the handcuffs biting into her wrist. Why was he rushing? Something was wrong. Hannah couldn’t see, couldn’t make out any shapes. She was trapped in the dark.

The stairs ended. Hannah stepped into the kitchen. Walter held onto her arm and led her down what felt like a narrow hallway. She kept bumping into walls.

Walter told her to stop. She did. He grabbed her by the shoulders and then moved her to the left and told her to take three steps forward. She did.

Walter was breathing hard. ‘I’m going to take off your handcuffs and then help you put on your jacket,’ he said. ‘After your jacket is on, I’m going to cuff you again.’

Coat on and zippered, the handcuffs back in place, Walter put his hands on her shoulders and moved her to the right. Something hard bumped up against the tips of her boots.

He slipped something inside her jacket pocket.

There was a long moment of silence. She heard him sniffle and clear his throat several times.

Was he crying?

‘You’re so beautiful, Hannah.’

He
was
crying.

‘You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met,’ Walter said. ‘I love you so much.’

In some strange, bizarre way, she wanted to thank him for his kindness – to tell him he was doing the right thing. She wanted to say she wouldn’t tell anyone about him or what had happened, cross her heart and hope to die, swear on a stack of bibles, whatever he wanted. But she didn’t want to risk breaking whatever spell he was under by saying something that might cause him to change his mind. ‘Stay still,’ Walter said. ‘Don’t move.’

80

With Emma and Judith, Walter fired one shot in the back of their head and quickly pushed them over the bathtub before their legs buckled. He never stayed inside the bathroom – seeing their bodies thrashing inside the tub, limbs kicking, hearing the gurgling sounds they made as their brain died… it was too upsetting. He went to the closet to pray to Mary, waiting for them to bleed out, Mary reassuring him that they hadn’t felt anything. What he was witnessing was their bodies dying. The body didn’t matter. It was just a vessel for the soul, and the soul was what mattered.

The difficult part done and out of the way, he came back to the bathroom and turned on the shower to rinse away the blood. Then he made a sign of the cross on their foreheads with their blood, baptizing them as he prayed, and transferred the bodies to the plastic tarp lying on the floor. The pocket holding the statue was then sewn shut – Mary needed to stay with them until their souls were finally released three days later – and before he dumped them into the water to be baptized all over again, he prayed again.

When he arrived home, he cleaned the shower and floors with bleach, wiping everything up with the towels, and then he’d go to the closet again to pray.

Tonight would be different.

Hannah Givens stood facing the shower wall. No plastic tarp under her feet. No towels or bottles of bleach to clean out the tub. The statue was in her pocket but there was no need to sew it shut. Mary didn’t want him to deliver Hannah into the water. After he shot Hannah, he was to place the gun against his temple or the roof of his mouth and pull the trigger. Those were Mary’s instructions.

Walter brought the handgun up and pointed it at the back of Hannah’s head. His hand was shaking. He couldn’t stop crying. Mary spoke to him.

Don’t be afraid. I’m here with you.

I’m scared.

It’s painless. You won’t feel a thing, I promise.

Help me.

Remember when I took you into my arms for the first time and pulled you close to my heart?

Yes.

You were surrounded by my love. I took the pain away. Do you remember?

He did.

Do you feel my love for you, Walter?

Yes.

You’ll forever be surrounded by my love. Now do it.

He couldn’t pull the trigger.

Your mother is here with me. Emma and Judith are excited to see you. They love you, Walter. Deliver Hannah to me and then come and join us.

The doorbell rang.

Hannah’s head turned to the sound. Lightning quick, Walter wrapped his arm around her throat, the good hand coming up, pressing the muzzle of the gun against her head.

‘Say one word and I’ll kill you.’

The doorbell rang again.

Who was at the door? Had his new neighbour Gloria Lister come back with another one of her pies?

You’re my special boy, Walter. I love you.

The bathroom door was open. The lights were on, as were the kitchen lights.

Come home to me. It’s time.

The doorbell rang again, followed by a knock on the door. Hannah was crying, shivering against him.

‘Shut up.’

I love you, Walter.

It was hard to hear Mary over Hannah’s bawling.

‘Shut up.’

Pull the trigger.

Hannah didn’t stop. He placed his good hand over her mouth.

There’s no reason to be afraid, Walter. Can you feel my love? Can you feel –

Hannah bit his thumb.

Walter screamed and Hannah pushed him backwards. He hit the bathroom vanity, the back of his head shattering the mirror. Hannah twisted her head side-to-side like a rabid dog, tearing skin from his hand, and Walter kept screaming as the gun dropped into the sink.