Shudder (15 page)

Joshua walked for a half a mile, before reaching the gas station. It was an island radiating light and a promise of warmth, situated at a point that was at an equal distance from the city limits and from the two near branches of the sprawling suburbs.

He went inside, chose a soft porn gossip magazine from the stand and an orange juice in a fat glass bottle from the fridge, and seated himself on one of the high chairs at the coffee bar.

Sucking the juice through a multicolored straw, he leafed through the magazine for a minute, before seeing a black Hyundai jeep pull up at the small parking lot.

Right on time. Good.

One had to be serious with such things.

The driver's door opened and a well-built man with a short haircut came out. He strode with a confident bounce through the sliding doors, and after briefly scanning the gas station café, his gaze settled on Joshua. Joshua nodded slightly and closed his magazine.

“Good evening, Mister IT,” said the man as he neared. Joshua nodded again in answer to the polite query and stood up. They walked back to the black jeep.

The driver opened the back door and Joshua saw a balding, sweating man somewhere between fifty plus and sixty minus, in a red tweed jacket and blue pants. Joshua climbed in and sat by the man. The driver closed the door, climbed into his seat, and turned the ignition key.

Off they went, back to the nebula of lights, back into their city.

“Mister IT, an honor, an honor to meet you,” said the man, pumping Joshua's hand vigorously with his moist cold paw.

Joshua knew the man. It was the head of the health ministry, Mister Fischhof.

“Glad to make your acquaintance, Mister Doolittle,” he said softly, trying to ease the stress of this initial contact.

The man was obviously nervous, tense. A first-timer. A virgin, so to speak.

He will not be able to really believe that his dream has come true until the exact moment in which he indulges in it.

Even afterwards, even though his friends and comrades referred him, he will still need whole months before his unease about possible blackmail subsides.

Joshua was a professional. He made these tubs of shaking blubber with gay mustaches eat out of his hand. He opened the magazine purchased in the gas station and commented wittily on a gossip concerning the singer Doris.

Fischhof gratefully used the chance to jabber mechanically on celebrity topics as they drove towards Joshua's business.

Joshua felt the man unwind just a little, like a tense client with whom the dentist swaps jokes and comments on the weather before switching on the drill. Not that there would be any drill in this case.

Not unless the client himself wanted it, that is.

The house stood on a street lined with similar houses, an enclave of the upper middle class denizens of the capital. Only private security guards cruised slowly in their cars here.

There were no common criminals and no common policemen in this part of the city. Joshua told the driver where to park the jeep and less than five minutes later the customer, ‘Doolittle', and him, the young wizard, went up the steps, and into the house.

Joshua motioned to Fischhof to take residence at the visitor's couch, while he himself went to his room and quickly changed. The customer gave a high-pitched surprised laugh when Joshua appeared in his clown attire.

With a bow and a honk, Joshua gave the man an elegant yellow mask with an elastic band, to hide the upper section of his face, and led the now even more spooked customer up the stairs. On the second floor, Joshua took out his ring of keys and opened the brown wooden door.

The inside the door was not brown, it was light blue and green.

The whole room was painted in these colors and there were also charming additional details, like rainbows, teddy bears, ponies, and a few Tinker Bells waving fairy wands.

“Ho-ho. Ha-ha. Hello, children. Hello, my little treasures,” Joshua said in his clown voice and waved at the kids.

The kids waved back. They were four girls and four boys, all in fairly good condition—purchased two years ago.

They didn't talk much and couldn't follow long sentences. All had some ticks of the faces and the limbs. They still looked good enough to fulfill their function and they had learned all the basic tricks.

Joshua looked at the small beds lined up by the right hand wall. They looked in order, more or less. There were no dirty paper plates on the two small tables. The cleaning lady had been and gone, good.

“Children, this is Uncle Doolittle,” Joshua said, introducing the masked sweating statesman. “He will play with you, but not all of you. Say ‘hi.'”

“Hi, Uncle Doolittle,” the children said dutifully and one of the girls, little Dashenka, fluttered her eyelids exactly as she was taught. Fischhof was looking at little Petechka. Then he looked at Joshua with an obvious question in his eyes.

“Just him?” Joshua asked. Fischhof nodded fervently.

“All right, do you want to do it here, or in a separate room?” The customer pondered for a moment, before choosing ‘Here', with a nervous lick of his lips.

“One last question,” Joshua said, “may I shoot a video? We sometimes combine both our businesses.”

Fischhof whipped around and looked Joshua straight in the eyes, breathing heavily, the lower part of his face turning crimson. “Of course. Of course. I will want a copy too. You can only film the first part, though. The second part is for me alone.”

Natalie woke up one minute before the alarm clock and got out of her bed with stiff determination. No more was the bed a soft warm nest, difficult to leave early in the morning. Now it was a treacherous and uninviting place, to be left behind as soon as possible.

Natalie dressed herself. For breakfast she had a small cup of coffee and a cigarette. Then she discovered to her chagrin that she felt intense apprehension just from standing near the front door.

She could not bring herself to open it.

She cringed at the mere thought.

Her heart started beating faster even when she only pulled the latch open.

She let the matter rest for now, retreated to the kitchen and smoked a second cigarette to compose herself.

Feeling slightly weaker physically, but more stable emotionally, she went to the door a second time and with only the shortest of hesitations strode over the threshold, and into her floor's corridor.

She couldn't face the creaky, diseased elevator today and scuttled down the stairs. Outside, a menacing, portentous autumn day loomed at her from all directions. She tried to ignore it as she walked to the boulevard and concentrated on the traffic, trying to pick out the right car.

She hailed a free cab, climbing inside she nodded to the vaguely familiar driver and said Jane's address.

That invitation for a morning brainstorm over coffee was the reason she went out a whole hour earlier. However, she was in fact grateful for that. At least she was out of her bed.

Beyond
their
reach. For now.

Before she focused her attention on the upcoming brainstorm session, or what was far more likely, a get-to-know-each-other gossip session, the cab already pulled up.

Natalie paid and extracted herself from the back seat and grimaced as the wind pinched her face. In this part of town it was stronger and somehow drier.

Jane did not live in a high-rise but in an old two-story house flanked by poplars and old-fashioned red brick apartment blocks.

Natalie walked up the stone steps and stopped at the door. She looked for a button to press to announce her arrival and noticed something unnerving.

The door was not locked.

“No, no, no,” muttered Natalie under her breath. The dread, which she had managed to keep in check so far now, swooped down on her, pushing at her frail frame and hunching her.

The narrow opening between the door and the door frame held a promise of something very bad. There was no sound coming from the house as far as she ascertained, and the lights were on.

An unexpected dizzy spell hit Natalie and propelled her forward. She stretched out her hand instinctively and tried to balance herself on the door. Under the pressure of the small hand the door swung open with the softest of creaks and Natalie stumbled inside into the corridor.

“Hello, Jane?” she asked, shaky and out of breath, as if she had run a marathon before getting to the house. There was no answer.

She slowly went forward, for some reason stepping very lightly and holding her breath.

The dim corridor in front of her had a big retro wooden cupboard on one side, complimented by a retro wooden coat hanger and the beginning of a staircase down at its end. Opposite to the cupboard were the entrances to two rooms.

The first one was a reading room. One whole wall was filled with shelves stacked with books, and there was a small wooden coffee table, and a padded easy chair just by the window.

Jane was not inside.

A tiny, delicate, white cup with dried coffee residue on its bottom, stood on the table and a book was lying open, face down. It was a bestselling detective romance about a worldwide conspiracy rooted in the murky past. ‘
Mesopotamia Factor'
.

Trying to control her misgivings, Natalie proceeded to the second room. It was the kitchen.

There were two leather gloves and a handbag on the table. Tiny droplets fell from the tap every two seconds. With a sudden growl, the refrigerator began vibrating.

Sweat breaking out on her forehead, Natalie reached the staircase and stopped.

She took a deep breath and opened her handbag, pricked herself on a pen, and felt her fingers close on her phone.

She dialed Jane's number and waited. After a few seconds, a faraway pop melody began playing. It was coming from upstairs. No one picked it up. The upstairs floor did not creak under anyone's feet.

Natalie forced herself to put her left foot on the first step of the stairs. Then she put her right foot on the next step.

The melody upstairs stopped playing. From her own phone Natalie heard the beep of a voicemail switching on.

Her mouth set in a perfectly horizontal line and her hands clenched into small fists, she slowly walked up, reeled in by the center of her hypnotic terror, which she knew awaited her upstairs.

The layout of the second floor mirrored the first. The first doorway presented a view of the bathroom. A white bath and a sink with a small mirror box above it, the walls and floor covered by light yellow tiles.

The other room was the bedroom. A funny smell of rotting bananas and an unflushed toilet made Natalie's nostrils quiver as she pushed the white wooden door open. On the king-sized bed, lying on her back, with her knees pointing upwards, was a woman.

Her hands were tied to her ankles by thin rope, head covered by some transparent material. Behind it was a face, frozen in a death grimace, with yellowish and brownish stuff on the skin.

It was obviously Jane.

On the floor by the bed lay a leather mask with an unzipped mouth. A mannequin stood by the bed.

Madness.

Natalie averted her gaze and pointed it at her phone. She started dialing the police, but her hands shook violently and her phone clattered to the floor.

She stooped limply to pick it up and then a buzzing darkness flooded into her head, obscuring her vision. Suddenly something hard pushed at her shoulder blades. It was the floor.

It took endless minutes for the darkness to recede slowly and to evolve first into vague objects, and then back to the normal dimness of a half-lit house.

With a cold and slippery hand, she picked up her phone again and this time managed to call the police.

Dave entered the pathology basement of Merkell College. It was a chilly and understandably unfriendly place. A morgue is a morgue. A cold bluish light washed the whole gray tiled room, adding to the already depressive ambiance.

In this room with bleak walls and bleak lighting Dave saw two men with bleak expressions. One of them was Andy Fortham.

He was a denim guy and was covered with it from shoulder to ankle. His brown hair was short and slightly curly. His Pancho Villa mustache, in combination with his denim attire and his slightly cracked gaze, made him look like an aging patron of a gay S/M club.

From Andy's point of view, he looked like a true twentieth century rocker.

He was the proud father of two girls.

“Dave, glad you could make it,” he said and squeezed his hand, “this is doctor Mortensen.”

Mortensen nodded his bald head and also gave Dave's hand a squeeze with a cold hammy hand.

Thankfully Mortensen's apron did not have any fresh blood on it.

“So, what's going on?” asked Dave, looking at the two bodies lying on metal tables.

Andy moistened his lips, “Remember that woman who was found by her daughter, that was tied up on her bed, dead?”

Dave nodded, “Of course, how can I forget? Choked on her own crap, right?.”

“Right. Now we have two more bodies. The first incident was not an accident. Another serial killer for your files.”

“Oh great, that's all I needed.” Dave looked at Doctor Mortensen with a manly but pained expression. Mortensen walked over to the bodies, with either a laid back or a resigned stride, and the two men drifted over after him.

The doctor lifted the cover of the first victim. “This one is Jane Donovan. Fifty-six-years-old.”

A middle-aged woman was lying on her back, staring into nothing. The doctor had already kindly manipulated her facial muscles into a more fitting, more somber expression and had closed her eyes, but that didn't help much to take away the dreadful undertone of the whole situation.

“Cause of death: suffocation by cling film,” said Mortensen, “time of death: just hours ago, probably last night. She was found this morning by a co-worker who was to pick her up in the morning before work.”

“That's a crappy way to start the day,” muttered Andy.

Dave winced at the word ‘crappy'. “If it's cling film, why do we think it's the same killer?” he asked.

“Because she was found bound and had traces of her own feces in her stomach,” said Andy, “mixed, would you believe, with some bananas.” The doctor nodded in affirmation.

“I see.” Dave checked a shudder and tried to teeter nonchalantly on his heels, hands compulsively playing with pocket change. “What about the other one?”

“The other one was also found bound, and suffocated by her own feces, like the first victim.” Mortensen lifted the cover of the second victim. “Miya Hanski, twenty-two, found yesterday by roommate returning from home town.”

Dave felt very sick. The face and body of Miya Hanski were painfully familiar. He had kissed and used them mere days ago.

This was Georgette.

He had made love to Miya's alter ego, and now the real person lay in front of him, inanimate, cold, dead.

“Some abrasions on the inner side of the cheeks point to a metallic mouth-restraint being used, like with the first victim,” droned Mortensen.

“What is the time of death for Miya?” David's voice was hoarse. It didn't sound familiar at all.

“Last Saturday probably. Maybe Friday.”

“Jesus.” Dave covered his eyes with his hands for a second, as if washing with some invisible water. Then he opened his eyes again, straining to be serious and collected.

Andy looked at him. Dave met his gaze unsteadily and answered the unspoken question, “I had sex with this girl just a few days ago.”

Andy promptly reacted with a look of commiseration, “You knew her well?”

“Not really, it was a one night stand. We met at a swinger club. The Faceoff.”

“When was that?”

“Last Wednesday evening, I think.”

Andy edged closer and put his hand on Dave's shoulder. He gave a friendly squeeze, which men do to each other from time to time in order to show empathy.

Dave looked at the floor, trying to kick-start his brain into producing something useful, instead of just going to pieces. “I also saw her with some joker on Friday, in the same club.”

“What did he look like?”

“Just a second.” David tried to remember.
What did he call him back then? Mister…Mister Greenpants.
“Fashionable looking dude, had green pants and a black latex jacket, and I think he had red gloves.”

Andy mused, “If he poses as a guy with a latex fetish and never undresses and doesn't take his gloves off, that would explain why he leaves no trace of himself.”

“Is there no trace of him with these two cases as well?”

“Didn't look like it. The forensics from Byer and Schmidt are working on it right now. Hopefully they'll find something this time.”

Dave tried to concentrate.
Forget the taste of Georgette's skin for now, focus on the job at hand
.

His jaw muscles ached from the attempts of keeping his lips from quivering. He spoke in a deep, unemotional, manly tone. “So, we're dealing here with someone who likes to suffocate women. How does he meet them?” He answered his own question, “Georgette was a swinger. Perhaps the other two were also swingers. He meets them, and then they go to their places. How does he convince them to do that?”

“Probably feeds them some crap about...”

David's right cheek twitched. He pointed his bloodshot eyes at Andy, “Don't, don't say that man. Don't use that expression. Not here, not now.”

Andy spread his hands placatingly, with a guilty smile curving the sides of his mustache. “Sorry, of course, what was I thinking? I meant that there are many things you can say to bluff your way into someone's home. Like that you have roommates, or that you have a wife and kids at home, or something.”

“What if they also can't go home, and prefer to go to a hotel?”

“Then they probably stay alive.”

“Video clips,” said Doctor Mortensen, who had only listened until now.

“What?” David looked at the doctor uncomprehendingly.

“These swinger types...aren't they prone to make secret recording of their sex at home?”

Dave scowled. These moronic stereotypes were no help at all.

Andy was polite. He grinned and nodded. “That's a good idea, Doc. We'll check it out.”

Dave remembered the club again. “There must be records from the security cameras of the Faceoff Club too.”

“Yeah, right.” Andy displayed a positive, confident face. “We'll catch the bastard yet, he can't evade all the cameras in the world. He can't play with fate and win all the time. There must be at least a bit of spit somewhere which the Bayer boys will find.”

Dave knew Andy said this mainly for his sake. He gave him a grateful smile.

They squeezed hands with the good doctor again and left the college building.

The light filtering through the gray sky was not much warmer than the light in the morgue. The passing cars made Dave think of mechanized coffins.

Andy cleared his throat. “I sent you an email with info about a pedophile site that was found, we won't discuss it now...”

“No, I'm cool, tell me about it.”

“Well, a contact in the N.M.H. office found it. There are clips of a clown, I mean a real clown, with a red nose and everything, having sex with little boys and girls. Those are just two-minute samples. You can become a member and download the full movies.”

“And?”

Andy picked at some gravel with the toe of his shoe. “Well, so far we can't break into the security of the site and see what the addresses of the clients are, or who's hosting it. The chap from the N.M.H. said he has a programmer contact who maybe will give him some software to try and break in. Quietly. All we can do is hope this program doesn't get detected and scare off the bad guys.”

Dave looked at the cracked, discolored pavement below his feet, and also flicked at a tiny piece of gravel with his shoe. “Christ. A clown with kids. A maniac killing women with shit. Decades of Season Girls with no result except detectives dying off. A little sex robot killing other little sex robots.” He looked an Andy, “You got a cigarette?”

Andy reacted automatically to this request and patted one pocket before checking himself and frowning at Dave. “I thought you didn't smoke,” he said, searching the detective's eyes.

“I don't,” Dave said in a queer, detached voice, “but now may be the time to start, by the look of things.”

Andy leaned forward, patting him on both shoulders. “Look, just go back to your office, have a beer or two on the way and try to relax. We'll figure this all out step by step.”

“Yeah, you're right,” Dave said, mainly out of courtesy and tried to hide his feelings.

“I'll see you tomorrow evening, to get that toy-basher,” Andy insisted, still searching Dave's face.

“Yeah.” Dave obliged with a bleak smile. “See you tomorrow, man.”

* * * *

Back in his office, Dave looked at the printouts from the
Twinker-Belles
site.

Then he thought about the two bodies in the college morgue.

Then he received an email with the details concerning all three bodies.

The roommate who had found Miya Hanski was Robert Hink, nineteen, working in the same mall with her. The co-worker who had found Jane Donovan was Natalie Martorino, twenty-six, employed in ‘Spectrum Sociology and PR'.

Dave stood right up, again masking an upsurge of feelings with a thoughtful face, and walked over to the window.

The autumn wind pushed small, dark clouds with urgency below the immobile gray lid that was the sky. Buildings looked sad and fragile. Pedestrians looked furtive and uncomfortable.

What a day. What a week. What a world. This was the last straw. Poor Natalie of all people having to find the body.

Dave picked up his phone to call her, and then decided against it. Now was probably not a good time. She would have called him already by now if she needed him.

He sat down again. A rational part of his mind brought out another disturbing angle. If out of three bodies left by the shit-strangler one was of a woman with whom he had sex just days ago and another was a woman who worked with Natalie, suspicions would arise if someone added two and two.

Perhaps someone would think that he and Natalie were working as a tandem of maniac killers. The evening in which Georgette was killed, his alibi was only Natalie herself.
Damn, damn, damn.

He hoped she had a good alibi for the night Jane was killed.

* * * *

When he returned home in the evening, he had no appetite and no desire to do anything. He simply lay limp on his sofa and slowly guzzled beer. He thought again of Georgette and Jane.

Both were women whom he would have liked to have sex with. It was simple chance that he had only had sex with one of them. Judging by the photo of the first victim, Sarah, she would also have made a great one night stand.

Apparently, both he and the killer had the same taste in women. Nothing too classy, rather the opposite.

Girls who were young and therefore wanted to please, and were easy to make do things. Women who were plain, and therefore wanted to please, and were easy to make do things. Women who were old and therefore wanted to please, and were easy to make do things.

Dave's lunch suddenly appeared to be at the threshold of his throat. He jumped off the sofa and ran to the toilet.

After flushing the vomit and cleansing his mouth from the acrid taste, he returned to his couch. He lay down, pale, trembling, and very depressed.

He and the killer chose the same types of women. Women whose buttons were easy to push.

Young insecure provincials, plain looking housewife-clerk types, and old-timers who refused to admit that they were not girls anymore and were ready to prove the contrary by any means.

“God,” he said aloud and tried to hide the world from himself by means of a pillow put on his face. That only reminded him of the cling film by which Jane was killed.

There was only one thing to do.

He got up again and with a slight stoop shuffled slowly to the kitchen, where he opened another beer.