Web of Lies (22 page)
Time to begin drawing.
You can do this, Annie. Forget that you’ve never done it for
a real case.
First up — facial contouring, a light connect-the-dots line from one tissue depth marker to the next. Marker number sixteen, the zygomatic arch, lying back from the cheekbones and close to the ears, is the widest area on the face. I began there and worked my way down the skull. Due to John Doe’s youth, I would draw all the contours as firm rather than soft and sagging.
A shape of one cheek formed, heading toward the mouth. Markers nineteen and twenty-one, above and below the second molars, would be good indicators for shading the cheek planes — to an extent. John Doe’s weight would also be a factor. The second cheek formed. The temples, and forehead.
Soon the frontal view outline was complete. I stared at it, biting my lip. Not too bad.
Now, over to the lateral board. Working back and forth would afford a better way of checking my work as it progressed. When I finished the outline, I plunged into the next challenge: the eyes.
Back to the frontal view. Carefully I positioned the eyeballs in the centers of their sockets. Switching to the profile board, I made sure the eyeballs showed the right amount of protrusion. Back and forth between the two perspectives I looked, drew, studied, drew some more. My concentration laser-focused, my worries about Neese and spiders and death threats fading. The eyes slowly formed, their skull cavity visible from the photo underneath. They were deep set and small. Almost beady.
I needed to add a sense of color, but there was no way to tell what hue John Doe’s eyes had been. I went for ambiguity, shading the irises more at the top near the lid, and less at the bottom in a reflected-light effect. That done, I turned to the brows. They were tricky. There were some structural indications as to their placement, but no hair had been found with the skull, so I couldn’t know their thickness and texture. I could only follow the general patterns of male eyebrows, making them heavier than a female’s, with less of an arch.
I stopped for a breather. Flexed my shoulders and neck. John Doe’s eyes, all the more compelling without the rest of his features, locked onto me with beseeching vengeance.
Look at us. We represent a name, an identity. Give us justice.
With God’s help I would.
Wait a minute.
I stared at them, entranced. These eyes were almost . . .
Oh no. Had I done this wrong? Had my work been influenced by memory?
I tore my gaze away.
Annie, don’t go there.
I could not think of that possibility, not now. I needed to draw with a fresh mind, creating based on what I saw.
I glanced at the time. Almost two in the morning.
I needed a drink.
Padding softly through the great room, I was aware of the grandfather clock ticking, the play of shadows from the single lit lamp. In the kitchen, water hissed into my glass. I turned toward the windows, uncomfortable with their empty stare upon my back. Still wondering about those eyes I’d just drawn. A streetlight illuminated the pavement between my house and Dave’s, the police car outside its umbra. I could see the vague outline of the officer inside. He wasn’t moving. Did he wonder at the lights so late in my office? Odd, but I didn’t even feel tired. No doubt I’d pay for the lack of sleep tomorrow.
Back in the office I prayed I would draw John Doe’s face right. I didn’t like my uneasiness about those eyes. Determined, I began work on the nose.
God, help me regain my focus.
The nasal cavity at its broadest point determines a nose’s width. From its bony contours, I sketched the general shape. For the soft tissue on top of bone, I consulted a formula. I drew, lifted the vellum sheets up to check the photographs, frowned at the skull, sketched some more. Time fuzzed as I concentrated. I heard nothing, felt nothing. Knew only the paper in front of me, and the nose that emerged. I didn’t dare look at other sections of the drawing except as indicators of how to complete this part. By the time I finished the nose, my fingers cramped from gripping the pencil. Sweat trickled under my armpits. Afraid to survey what I’d done, fearful of what the half face might tell me, I moved immediately to the mouth, calculating the approach I’d take.
Although John Doe’s teeth were crooked, he didn’t have unusual enough dentition to affect his profile, so the teeth didn’t need to show. I would draw the lips closed.
First, the frontal view.
Focus, Annie; just remember what you’ve learned.
The width is determined by measuring the six front teeth . . . the height, by noting the upper and lower teeth enamel. I worked on the profile, the front view, the profile again. Determining size, shape, lift of the lip corners. Back and forth, back and forth, sketching, erasing, redrawing.
Sometime during that process, a tiny voice within me began to whisper the truth.
I ignored it.
My work continued, the lips adopting a thin shape. After this would come the ears. Then the hair, although I would have to downplay its style, since I had no clue to go on.
Yes, you do, Annie. You know.
No, I don’t.
The whisper intensified. I pushed it aside. It nagged at me, daring me to stop, to look at John Doe’s face as a whole.
You’ll know when you see it all. You just don’t want to admit it.
I finished the mouth. Went straight to the ears. They would not look as I suspected. They
wouldn’t
. For a time I occupied my brain with recitation of my studies.
The ear sits behind the angle of the jaw . . . It’s usually at a backward angle of about fifteen degrees . . . Be careful not to draw them like they’re glued to the head . . . An ear is roughly equal in length to the nose . . .
I spoke under my breath, eyes glancing back and forth between the two drawing boards, my hand fashioning, shaping. With every ounce of will I considered the ears only, and the part of the skull that defined them. I would not look at the whole, because if I did . . . If I did, I would begin to draw from memory, from another face, another day and interview —
The ears birthed beneath my hand. I couldn’t help but notice their size. With each line of the pencil, the whispers echoed. My denials fell away. Abruptly I stepped back, staring at the finished face. I took in the lateral view first, putting off the inevitable. Then my eyes snapped to the frontal drawing.
It was him.
Exactly
him.
I dropped the pencil. Stood staring, breathing hard, a thousand questions ricocheting through my head. What did this mean? What about the drawing I’d given Milt? What about our reason for letting him take it? It didn’t fit anymore. Everything was wrong, all wrong, and I couldn’t make head nor tails of it.
If I’d known this twelve hours ago, I’d
never
have given that drawing to Milt Waking.
“Oh, God, what do I
do
?”
I turned toward my closed office door, heart skipping. I had to wake Jenna and Chelsea, no matter that it was four a.m. They’d have to know; we had to
talk
. I walked to the door, grabbed the knob —
My business line rang.
I turned to stare at the phone as if it were some UFO landed upon my desk.
A second ring.
Who . . .
I hurried to answer it, not bothering to check the ID. Even as I picked it up, I knew my voice would shake.
“H – hello?”
“Annie Kingston.”
The way he spoke my name. Grated, in a rough whisper, like Chelsea had described it. Every muscle in my throat clamped down.
“I know you’re listening, whether you answer or not.” He snickered. “This is Orwin Neese. I have a little surprise for you.”
N
o response. He could feel her fear creeping over the telephone wire. Like the dirt ants used to creep on his feet, scuffling over nerve endings. Now they were her nerves.
He gripped the phone, breathing open-mouthed in silent jubilation. “Still won’t talk, huh?”
Man, shut up and get on with it. What if they could somehow trace the call?
“Look out on your back deck. There’s a little jar sitting there.”
She gasped, sending a tremor of excitement up his spine. “A j – jar?” Her voice was reed-thin and hollow. “What . . .”
“Don’t worry, it’s not a bomb.” He poured out the words like syrup. “Nothing like that. Just a few hobo pals to keep you company.”
Silence.
“Orwin, why are you doing this to me? You need to turn yourself — ”
He slammed down the phone.
Swiveling around, he checked in all directions. Nobody in sight of the phone booth. Who would be way out here this time of night?
Pa-pa-pum-pum. He mouthed a beat, slapping his legs as he hustled back to his car.
All the way home he sang loudly with the radio.
The receiver clattered onto my desk. I bent over, pulling in breaths, heart thwacking. My mind yanked in multiple directions. I should snatch up the phone, call the policeman outside —
What if he was
dead
?
No, I needed to run to the back deck. What if Neese
had
left a bomb? Stephen’s bedroom was down there —
But what if Neese lurked in the shadows, waiting for me to slip outside? That would be stupid, Annie,
stupid
.
Seconds blurred. I fumbled for the phone.
Where’s the officer’s phone number, Annie? Where did you put it?
I flailed around the desk, pushing aside paper and stacked mail, rattling my penholder to the floor.
There!
I snatched up the small yellow sheet and punched in the number.
“Officer Shelton.”
In one breathless sentence I told the man what happened. He responded calmly, in control. I was to wait for him near the front door. He would call for backup. For all we knew, Neese was still in the area. I slammed down the receiver and darted through the great room, throwing back the door at the policeman’s swift rap. Meantime the household began to awaken amid the noise of my pounding feet. Jenna rushed from the hall and Chelsea appeared on the staircase. Shelton strode through the house and down the stairs to the rec room. I followed. Gun drawn, he ventured out the sliding door to the deck.
The commotion brought Stephen stumbling from his bedroom, clad only in boxer shorts, blinking in the light. One hand gripped his cell phone, ready to dial 911.
I huddled in the rec room, pulse skidding. Chelsea hung back, pinching the fabric of her pajama top, eyes wide. My sister grasped her own gun, ready for action. “Just let me at him! I find Neese around here, he’ll die young.”
The policeman stuck his head in the door. “I need a rag of some kind.”
I ran to fetch a washcloth from Stephen’s bathroom and thrust it into Shelton’s hand.
The policeman slipped inside, holding a small jar, the cloth protecting it from his fingerprints. He stopped to lock the sliding door. I wedged our sawed-off broom handle behind it.
Jenna took one look at the jar and hissed through her teeth. Stephen’s face twisted. “Oh
man
.”
Shelton held up Neese’s “present.” I frowned at it, fingers clenching, already knowing what I would see.
Spiders. Big ones. Their appendages almost rivaled the size of a daddy longlegs’. They scrambled and tumbled and rolled over each other in one nauseating, horrifying heap.
“Oh.” Shudder-fingers clamped onto my body and shook it. I wheeled away from the sight, brain screaming.
It’s all real, it’s real!
Not that I’d doubted Chelsea, but seeing the creatures here, bottled up and left for me, rocketed her visions into hard reality. If Neese left these spiders here, then he did have them, did collect them. The horror room
did
exist —
But what about the drawing I just finished?
Wait.
I stilled, hands at my cheeks, breath catching.
Hobos.
The projector in my head kicked on to the scene from Chelsea’s vision. The man
bending toward the floor. He caresses the narrow back of a large brown spider.
“This is a hobo spider. Lots of people mistake them for the brown recluse . . .”
“Chelsea.” I whirled to face her. “This morning, did the newspaper article say anything about what kind of spiders you saw in your vision?”
She swallowed hard, then shook her head.
I closed my eyes. “Then I don’t get it. This just doesn’t fit.”
“What doesn’t — wait!” Jenna hurled the word at Officer Shelton’s back as he headed for the stairs. “Don’t leave us down here!”
Just seeing my sister so rattled shook me all the more. Shelton hit the steps as he barked into his radio, replies squawking. We clambered after him. In the great room our erratic footfalls bounced around like pinballs against flippers.
“Police cars are on the way.” Shelton held the jar out from his body, as if spider jaws could bite through the glass. “They’ll be searching the forest back there. Neese clearly didn’t come by way of the street, which means he trekked in through the woods. Probably long gone, but we’ve got to make sure.”
How did Neese even know where I lived?
Jenna grabbed my arm. “Annie, what were you trying to say down there?”
“I — ”
“Mom!”
Kelly’s voice tumbled from the landing above us. I looked up to see her grabbing a banister, face full of fear. “What’s happening?”
Oh, God, why did she have to wake up?
I hurried up the circular stairs, knowing I would have to tell her. Refusing her questions would only scare her more. I pulled her close, easing hair from her eyes, and related the sordid tale as gently as I could. Only then — as I said the words — did the steel-fisted truth fully seize me. Forget swirling questions, the enigma of John Doe’s face. All that mattered was that Neese had been
here
. At my house. Close to me.
Close to my children.
Rage and panic clotted my throat. “Honey, go get dressed.” I turned away before Kelly could see my expression contort.
God, help!
We had to get out of the house, out of Grove Landing.
Now.
I would not face death again. And I surely wouldn’t leave my son and daughter in harm’s way.
