The Third Victim
Collin Wilcox
Monday Night
H
E STEPPED OUT OF
the shadows, raised his wrist, and checked the time. Twenty minutes after eleven. Her window had been dark for more than a half-hour. She was a sound sleeper. She went to bed early, got up early. Sometimes she cried out while she slept. Each morning, driving a shabby Chevrolet, she left the ground-floor flat with her small blond son. Each evening she returned, always carrying brown paper grocery sacks. When she walked she swung her hips and moved her shoulders, offering silent invitation. Everyone could see her harlot’s walk. Everyone knew.
He stepped back, to stand close beside the trunk of a sycamore tree. Motionless, he was invisible in the night. Even if they walked along the sidewalk, they’d never see him. Deep in the dark shadows, he was part of the night.
But few walked this late.
Tomorrow night, none would walk.
By tomorrow, in the whole city, only the brave would walk after dark. The brave, and himself. And the men with guns. Tomorrow night, the men with guns would prowl the darkness.
Would they bring dogs?
Once, he’d read, they’d used their dogs.
He turned to study the building: a shabby stucco structure, three stories high, one flat to each floor. The grounds were ill-kept, the buildings needed paint. It was a low-income neighborhood: a tree-shaded California ghetto built in the midst of the city’s affluence, offering shelter to students and the urban poor. In this area, each house directly adjoined the one next door, with no space between. Ragged lawns grew front and back. The grass was littered with children’s abandoned toys and sun-scorched advertising circulars.
Last night, he’d tried the back. The fences and attached buildings had formed a dangerous maze. Discovered, he would have been trapped. Tonight, he must try the front. Every day—every night—something new was required. He knew. He listened. He obeyed.
Last night, the fences had endangered him. Tonight, in front, the danger would be people. But soon he would have the key. With the key, he could enter the basement.
The key was the key to the key. Like a rose was a rose.
Still standing in deep shadow, he glanced once more up and down the quiet street. Most of the windows were darkened; most people slept. Turning back to the house, he drew from his pocket a pair of surgical gloves. As he began walking through the shadows, he slipped on the gloves. The shadows took him to the small front porch. In his right hand he held a thin metal probe. In his left hand he held a switch-blade knife. The knife was new.
Close by, a car door slammed. Voices burbled in the darkness, suddenly laughing, all together. He turned, watched, waited. They were students at play. Their sounds were always the same.
He transferred the knife to his teeth, gripped the doorknob with his left hand. With his right hand he inserted the spring steel probe in the doorjamb. He could feel the lock. One quick thrust and the lock sprung open. The door swung free—until it rattled against a night chain. In the darkness, he smiled. For the chain he could doubtless thank himself. Throughout the city, people were buying night chains. And guns. And dogs.
He dropped the probe into his pocket and took the knife in his right hand. He snapped open the blade, then slid the knife inside. Sliding across the floor, the knife made just enough noise in the silence.
Another car door slammed. Voices were close—dangerously close.
He rose quickly from his crouch to stand flattened against the stucco, listening. These new voices were quieter, older. He looked over his shoulder. If they came to this building, he would move silently into the shadows.
But they were going next door. Their voices died away.
He gripped the doorknob and softly drew the door closed.
For tonight, the time had come to go. He’d leave the knife for her. For them. Because he’d promised them a warning—all of them. This third time, he’d promised them a warning—her, and all the rest. Ipso.
A
S JOANNA POURED A
second cup of coffee, she heard the thud of the morning paper striking the door. She glanced at the kitchen clock as she rose from the table. The time was ten minutes after eight; the paper was late. Only fifteen minutes remained before she must leave. She walked down the hallway in her stockinged feet, opened the front door, and paused for a moment with the
Bulletin
in her hand, looking up into a cloudless sky. The day would be clear and warm: a chamber-of-commerce day, bright and golden. By noon, the beaches and oceanside concessions would be crowded with tourists.
As she swung the door shut, her stockinged foot scuffed a small, solid object, sending it skidding. Frowning, she glanced down. A dozen times a day she’d told Josh to keep his toys in his…
A switch-blade knife lay on the worn oak floor.
Was it a joke—someone’s idea of fun? Yanking the door open, she looked vainly for the early-morning prankster. She closed the door and locked it. Then she stooped, gingerly handling the lethal-looking knife. The blade wouldn’t go back into the handle. She pressed a button. Still the blade wouldn’t budge. Finally she folded the knife into the newspaper, to conceal it from her son.
Returning to the kitchen, she passed Josh’s door. The small blond head was immobilized before the TV screen. A lean, slavering cartoon cat chased a fat cartoon mouse across the screen. From a distance less than three feet, the blond head followed every movement of the homicidal cat and the saucy, succulent mouse.
“Josh. Honey. Back
up.
”
By conditioned response, without missing a cat-and-mouse movement, he hunched his stool back less than a foot.
“
More.
You’ll ruin your eyes, Josh.”
This time, shoulders heaving as he sighed deeply, he got halfway to his feet, gripped the stool, and moved back three steps. Now the blue-jeaned bottom plopped down decisively on the small red stool. Another foot would be gained only by arbitration. She shook her head, smiling faintly.
In the kitchen, she carefully slipped the knife from the newspaper. Looking around, frowning, she decided to put the knife on a high cupboard shelf. Then she opened the paper.
FOURTH TAROT LETTER,
the lead headline blared. And beneath it:
KILLER WARNS HIS THIRD VICTIM.
Again checking the time, she propped the paper against the sugar bowl. Only seven minutes remained. Ten at the most. By eight thirty they must be in the car, on their way to Josh’s day-care center.
Sipping her coffee, conscious of a small shudder of soap-opera dread, she read the madman’s letter:
This will be the third. I know who she is, but she does not know me. I am still not sorry. There is no law above me. Nothing. She must be warned. But I must go on. So I am warning her. She must wait for me.
TAROT
She read the killer’s letter a second time, then slowly shook her head, frowning thoughtfully. What kind of a monster would methodically stalk a woman, planning her murder? Was it a sexual thing? Sadism, gone wild? Or was it something else?
What kind of a weapon did Tarot use?
A switch-blade knife?
At the thought, she sharply shook her head, flinching. She had no time for hysteria. No strength, either. Someone had dropped a knife through her mail slot. That was all.
All?
She drew a long, slow breath. Arms braced wide against the table, she closed her eyes, fighting for the next moment’s peace. Because the next moment, she knew, gave promise of the moment following. Some survived. Some didn’t.
Opening her eyes, she scanned the murderer’s letter. It was a paste-up, using cut-out type from newspapers and magazines. With an artist’s eye, she assessed the paste-up technique. Whoever Tarot was, he was meticulous. The lines were neatly aligned, the characters carefully spaced. The signature was in big, bold caps. She remembered the same signature from his previous letters. Had he used the same type?
Tarot,
he’d signed himself.
Signifying what?
In the past two months, she knew, Tarot had murdered two women, one in May, one in June. It was now July.
She must wait for me.
As if they had an appointment together, Tarot and his victim. As if they were destined to meet.
Did
they have an appointment, the murderer and his victim? Was their meeting preordained? Somewhere she’d read that the victim inexorably seeks out his own murderer.
She scanned the news story, reviewing the now-familiar details as she drank her coffee: Marie Strauss, thirtyish, a well-off suburban Santa Barbara housewife, had been murdered while she slept. The victim’s eight-year-old daughter had been sleeping in the next bedroom. The victim’s husband had been out of town on business, above suspicion. There had been no clues. A week later, the
Bulletin
had received the first Tarot letter, boasting of the murder, daring the police to find him. A wave of panic had swept the town, then slowly subsided. But two weeks later, a second letter had arrived, this time warning Tarot’s second victim—as this letter, today, warned the third. Within a few days after the publication of the second letter, a woman named Grace Hawley was found murdered. She’d been a waitress who’d worked at a truckers’ café She’d been murdered while she slept. A week had passed, and the third Tarot letter had arrived, boasting of the murder, saying there would be more.
She must be warned,
he’d written.
How?
With a switch-blade knife, thrust through a mail slot?
Again she scanned the story, this time searching for the means of murder. The first victim had been strangled.
The second had been slashed to death.
Again she fought for calm—slowly, stubbornly, doggedly. She must sort it out. Apply logic.
Think.
Did Tarot mean that he would warn his victim? Or did he mean that this morning’s letter was her warning? The difference, to the victim, could be fatal.
Who had delivered the switch-blade knife?
A prankster?
Or Tarot?
The odds, she knew—the mathematical odds—overwhelmingly favored the prankster. Yet, within days, someone else might die. Tarot might claim his third victim. Would she be a woman living with her child, like the first victim? Would she be a woman without a man, like the second victim?
On either count, she could qualify.
There is no law above me. Nothing.
Was “megalomania” the word? “Paranoia”? “Schizophrenia”? All three? Could Tarot’s madness be seen in his face? Would his depravity show? Or would his face be blank, his expression guileless, his eyes innocent?
What would it be like, to unknowingly paint Tarot’s portrait—without realizing his true identity? A good artist captures the soul, not merely the face. Would Tarot’s corrupted soul materialize on canvas, like Dorian Gray’s? Could one artist capture the corruption’s secret essence, while another saw only the face’s mask?