Текст книги "The Gift of Death"

Автор книги: Sam Ripley

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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

59

Perhaps he should have been a writer, a novelist. Perhaps he had missed his true vocation. What fun one could have planning the story, shaping the plot, creating characters – and, most satisfying of all, killing off the ones who didn’t deserve to live.

Maybe once all this over, he could take it up. Attend a few classes. Or perhaps try his hand at screenwriting. After all, he was in the world capital of the entertainment business. But he got the feeling those executives wouldn’t like the kind of stories he wanted to tell. Hollywood was full of decadent types, anyway. Faggots. Drug-takers. Dissipated degenerates who polluted the minds of the young with their sick fantasies.

Maybe he could do some good there after all. That world really did need to be taught a lesson. Some folk could benefit from his wisdom.

But he was running away with himself now. He had to concentrate on the matter in hand. He had set up a situation and had to follow it through. There was no point wasting such a good opportunity, was there? He smiled to himself as he relished the scenes that had yet to be played out. Anticipation was always more fulfilling than the final result, he always thought. And what would happen next? The thought was a delicious one. Why couldn’t his fellow men exist on the same spiritual plane as he? Why did they have to be always dragged down by the world of the senses? There were not many who were as strong as him. Independent of thought, able to live without the pleasures of the everyday, only interested in the higher good.

Yes, what would happen next?

He had set the sinner loose to be hunted. Either by the police or by one of his disciples. After cutting off two of his fingertips he had ordered him to take them into the headquarters of the LAPD at the Parker center, downtown. After that he was free to go. But he told him not to go back to his house in Chatsworth. He warned him that the cops would come looking for him.

It was such an easy scene to direct. And the actor did not have much of a choice about his stage directions. It was either go through with the plan or have his brains blown out. And how pleasing it was for him that he had chosen the former option. How boring that would have been if he had had to shoot him. That would not have been interesting at all.

After he had given him his instructions he had given him two thousand dollars in cash, enough for a couple of weeks in a cheap motel. On handing it over the man had asked him a question.

‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘Why are you doing this?’

‘Ryan – do you mind if I address you by your first name?’

Gleason shrugged his shoulders.

‘Their’s not to make reply,’ he replied. The lines came from a poem his mother had taught him.

‘What? Who are you? Why do you always wear that thing over your face?’

‘Their’s not to reason why.’

‘What is it anyway – a ski mask?’

‘Their’s but to do and die.’

He opened the door for him to leave. As he watched Gleason step out into the sunlight he said under his breath.

‘Into the valley of death.’

Like he said he should always have been a writer.

60

Susan Gable stared at the letter and thought of her daughter. Sara-Jane had been dead for seven months now, but the passing of time hadn’t made it any easier to bear. If anything it was harder than ever.

Last week it would have been Sara-Jane’s second birthday. She had even bought her a cute puppy, a cuddly toy called Biscuit, and had got as far as the check out before she remembered that Sara-Jane wasn’t around to enjoy it. She had just put the gift down, along with the rest of her shopping, and walked out of the store quietly. By the time she had got back to her car she was sobbing hysterically. She had driven home through a veil of tears. She had let herself into the empty house. She had gone into her bedroom and opened the drawer where she kept some of Sara-Jane’s things. A lock of her dark hair. A photograph of her taken soon after her birth. A couple of her romper suits that she had brought up to her face and which still smelt of her. Or was she imagining that?

She reread the letter again for what must have been the tenth or eleventh time. Could she take it seriously? The fact that she had not thrown it in the trash when she first received it meant something, she supposed. She had typed the name, Carl Reckard, into Google, but nothing came up apart from an entry about a West Virginian insurance salesman and some genealogical information about a German family. She had typed in the address in the Fernando Valley into the search engine and saw the layout of the street. One day she had driven past it – just out of curiosity, she told herself, nothing more than that – and had seen that the house had been cordoned off by the cops. She had slowed right down, had thought about asking one of the officers guarding the police seal what had happened there. But when one of the cops stared straight at her, almost as if he recognised her, she put her foot on the gas and sped off.

Perhaps the cops had got this guy. But surely she would have heard something. She scoured the news and the internet, including the LAPD’s own web site, but nothing came up.

She placed the letter on the table and decided to call Joe. Perhaps he had some information. She took out her cell from her purse and dialled his number, her hands shaking. The last time she had spoken to him she had called him a fucking bastard. She had told him she blamed him for the death of their daughter. If he hadn’t have wanted to fuck her that night her little Sara-Jane would still be alive. They had been having the same argument for months now. In the end he couldn’t take it any more. He had moved out. He had called her a psycho bitch. She had called him a murderer. Words had been said that could not be unsaid.

‘Hi, Joe, it’s Sue,’ she said softly.

‘Hi.’ He sounded distant. ‘What do you want?’

‘Listen – I know you’re still angry with me –‘

‘What would you think if you’d been blamed for the murder of your own daughter?’

‘I know, I know. I’m sorry.’ She wasn’t actually, but she knew she had to say that to get him to listen to her. ‘I didn’t meant that. You know how hard it’s been for me.’

There was silence on the line.

‘Anyway, I just wondered if you’d heard anything from the cops? If there were any nearer solving this thing.’

‘What do you think? ’

‘I don’t know. I was just –‘ She thought about telling him about the letter. No. He’d just tell her to throw it in the trash. ‘Okay. Not to worry. Maybe see you soon?’

‘Yeah, that would be good. I’ll call you.’

Both of them knew that their marriage was over. That there was no way back. That these were empty words.

She was about to say something else when the phone in the hall rang. ‘I’ve got to go, but if you hear anything, will you let me know.’

‘Sure, will do.’

‘Bye.’

She cut the connection on her cell and ran to the phone. Perhaps it was the cops. Perhaps they had been questioning this Reckard guy for a few days and had only now managed to wrestle a confession out of him.

‘Hello?’

‘Is this Susan Gable?’ The voice was polite, authoritative. In fact, it sounded like a cop’s voice.

‘Yes? Is that the police?’

‘In a way. Yes. I suppose you could say that.’

‘What do you mean?’

There was a pause on the line.

‘Did you get the letter I sent?’

‘Who are you?’

‘Did you get the letter?’

‘Yes. What’s going on here?’

‘I’ve got some more information about the person who killed your daughter.’

She felt her throat tighten. She could not speak.

‘Do you want to hear it?’

She desperately wanted to respond, but she was paralysed by a feeling of – what was it exactly? An anticipation, something much more powerful than sexual desire, an emotion more terrifying than anything she had ever felt before.

‘I take that as a ‘yes’. Carl Reckard is no longer at the address mentioned in the letter.’

She swallowed, moved her lips, cleared her throat.

‘So the – the cops have him, right?’

‘No, not exactly. He left the house before the cops arrived.’

‘So they’re on his tail?’

‘If you mean do they know where he is? Well, no, they don’t. But you see. I do. I know where he is.’

She felt that delicious thrill again.

‘Tell me. Where is he?’

‘You sure you want to know?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’

‘And what?’

‘What will you do with the information? I don’t want to waste it.’

‘I won’t waste it.’

‘You promise?’

‘I promise.’

‘Okay. Do you need a pen a paper?’

‘No, just tell me,’ she snapped. She felt her head swimming, her brain burning.

‘No need to loose your temper, now.’

She bit her tongue, tasting blood.

‘Let’s see, yes, here we are. He’s staying in a motel, the Grand. Unfortunate name, I admit, as I’m not sure it ever was. Certainly isn’t now.’

She took a deep breath. She had to try and modulate her voice.

‘The address?’

‘1437 Bundy Drive, West LA.’

She was about to cut the line.

‘Aren’t you forgetting something?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Aren’t you going to thank me?’

‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘Thank you. Thank you very much.’

61

Kate stared at Cassie as she slept. God, she hoped she would be okay. She had always thought her friend’s recovery had been too quick, too easy. At first she had put it down to Cassie’s remarkable ability to fight back against all the odds, her extraordinary will to survive. After all, she had been forced to toughen up, refusing to be beaten first by the onset of blindness and then by Gleason. And, for a while, it looked as though, once her physical injuries had healed, she would be fine. But then, however, on the day she was due to leave hospital to be transferred to a secure location everything changed.

It had begun with a few silent tears, then her body was attacked by a constant wave of trembling until, finally, her whole being was wracked by a series of sobs. Kate had tried to calm her down, reassure her that she was safe, that neither Gleason nor his monstrous offspring could harm her, but it was no use. She seemed certain that the killer was in the room with her. She said that he was so close she could taste his foul breath on her lips. The touch of him was so alive in her fingers, she said, that it felt as though he was raping her. She could not see him, of course, but somehow he had inveigled his way into her very being. The medics had said she was so in danger of mental collapse that they had been forced to tranquilise her.

Kate ran her hand over Cassie’s brow and watched her eyelids flutter as she dreamt. Her only fear was that, on awakening, Cassie would not be able to escape the nightmare.

62

He never thought he could gain so much satisfaction from observing one person watch another. It was as if the man and the woman had sprung fully formed from his imagination and transformed themselves into real people. Flesh and blood.

He was sitting in his car with a pair of binoculars raised to his face. Through them he could see Susan Gable in her car, waiting outside the single-storey West LA motel. Inside room 47 was Ryan Gleason.

What would she be thinking right now? Had she already formulated a plan, he wondered. How would she do it? Would she use a gun, a knife, her bare hands or what? And what were the odds of her killing him? A mother’s rage was certainly not to be underestimated. But she was a small, slight woman. And her target was a ruthless psychopath with a wide range of particularly cruel tricks.

What would he do in her position? Try and surprise him. Yes, that would be best approach. Simply tap on the door and pretend she was looking for her friend. Was this not room 46. Gee, she was sorry, she must be mistaken. Then she could quickly take out her gun from her purse and blast his brains out.

Or would she make him suffer? Would she want to luxuriate in her revenge? Stretch it out over a period of time so she could really feel the full benefit? She might shoot him in the shoulder, disarm him, tie him to a chair in the motel room and then inflict a number of subtle tortures on him.

Just what was she capable of? Was she made of the same stuff as him? He genuinely hoped so. He was looking forward to the entertainment.

63

Kate was by her bedside when Cassie opened her eyes. She stroked and soothed her forehead, held her shoulders gently, and listened to her cries.

‘It was awful,’ she repeated. ‘The dream.’

‘I’m here,’ said Kate. ‘You’re safe. The nightmare’s over.’

She continued to hold her in her arms as Cassie went back to sleep, peacefully, naturally. When she awoke again, her eyes still wet with tears, she was able to drink a little water.

‘How long was it that I slept for?’ asked Cassie, her voice still groggy, her throat dry and sore.

‘Just a little while,’ lied Kate. She said nothing about the worries of the medics or the tranquilisers.

‘I’m scared, Kate,’ whispered Cassie.

Kate looked towards the two police guards stationed either side of the private room. Downstairs, at reception, there were another couple of cops. And at the entrance to the ward were a clutch of undercover detectives.

‘Cassie, you’re safe. No-one is going to get to you here. The place is full of cops.’

‘I’m not worried about myself.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m worried about you.’

‘Why? I’ve got round the clock protection, just like you. Just like Weislander, just like Hoban. All of us should be safe.’

‘I know. It’s just that –‘

‘What?’

Cassie sighed. ‘The dream I had. It was about you.’

‘And?’

‘Oh, it was nothing. Don’t listen to me. It’s the painkillers. Nothing but –‘

‘Cassie, I want to know.’

There was silence.

‘Tell me,’ she said.

‘You were down at the beach house. You were taking photographs just as you were that morning – when you found the baby. But you had – what are they called? One of those things that produce photos straight away?’

‘A Polaroid?’

‘Yes, one of those. As you looked through the camera you saw someone come closer towards you. You couldn’t make him out at first, he was in shadows. And you couldn’t take your eyes away from the viewfinder. Somehow, in the dream, the camera had become your eyes, well, sort of –. Look, I told you it was nonsense, stupid nonsense. Doesn’t make any sense if I – ’

‘Go on,’ said Kate.

‘So you carried on looking through your camera until you realised that the man who was walking towards you was Gleason. Well, not quite him, but a younger version of him. And not quite like the man who attacked me, the one you think is Ryan, his son. But a man who looked like both of them. I can’t explain. Anyway, as he came towards you, you realised he was carrying a knife, a long knife with a horrible blade, all raised and serrated. You don’t need to hear any more. Honestly, Kate –‘

‘I want to hear it all,’ she said. ‘Carry on.’

‘You couldn’t move. You couldn’t take the camera away. You saw his face coming closer, looking at you through the camera, until all you could see were his eyes. He continued to look at you – and you at him – as he moved his knife down to your stomach. At the moment you felt him push the blade into you, you took a photograph.’

Kate didn’t want to listen to any more, but it was no use. She felt compelled to ask the question, the answer she knew she didn’t want to hear.

‘And what did the photograph show? What was it of?’

There was no answer.

‘Cassie?’

‘That was the odd thing about it,’ she whispered. ‘It was a picture of the man holding a baby. Your baby.’

‘Was – it – okay? The baby, I mean.’

‘Yes, she was fine. But the man said he was going to bring it up as one of his own.’

A shiver went through Kate. She thought about what Roberta had endured. Abuse at the hands of her father and her brother. The knowledge that she was both the daughter and sister of a serial killer. She remembered the way she had looked in that interrogation room. Her face pale, miserable. Her eyes lifeless. By the time Kate had left her Roberta had fallen silent, withdrawn, reduced to a mere fragment of a person. Josh told her that she hadn’t uttered a word since. Even if Ryan was apprehended, Kate wondered whether she would ever be able to fully recover.

‘Cassie, you need to get some rest. It’s not good for you to keep worrying about the –‘

‘I know. I told you it was stupid.’

‘It’s not surprising you’re having nightmares, after what you’ve been through. But I’m sure it doesn’t mean anything.’

‘But you will be careful, won’t you?’

‘Me? Of course. What am I going to do?’

‘That’s what I’m worried about.’

Kate looked at her watch. She had a date with Josh. Not a proper date, of course. A catch-up about the case.

‘Look, I’d better go. I’ve got to see Josh. I’ll come tomorrow, okay. Same time?’

‘Same time,’ said Cassie, her voice infused by sadness.

Kate took hold of her hand.

‘We’re going to get through this. We’re all going to be okay.’

‘You think so?’

She nodded her head. ‘What am I doing?’

‘You’re nodding your head.’

‘How do you do that?’ said Kate, trying to lighten the mood. ‘I always said you were a witch.’

Kate turned to go.

‘You know what I think?’

‘What?’

‘I think he’s going to ask you back.’

‘Who?’

‘Who do you think? Josh.’

‘Not in a million years.’

‘I think he still loves you.’

‘I think you’ve been reading too many romances.’

‘I’m blind. Or have you forgotten?’

‘Point taken. But no, I don’t think it’s going to happen.’

‘Talking hypothetically – what would you do if he did?’

‘What?’

‘Ask you back.’

‘I told you, it’s not a –‘

‘I know, but if he did.’

Kate felt a surge of anticipation within her. It was tempting to indulge her feelings, but she had to keep those fantasies in check. She had been there before.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ she said.

64

Kate thought about Cassie’s dream as she drove along the Pacific Coast Highway. She pictured Ryan Gleason holding her child – Cassie had pictured it as a little girl – in his arms. He looked at it neither with affection nor sympathy. His cold, black eyes studied it like a snake gazes upon its prey in the moments before the kill. What would he do to her? Cassie said that in her dream he planned to bring the child up as his own. She couldn’t bear to think of what he might do to her when she reached – what? How old had Roberta been when her abuse started?

Would it all have been different if Mary Gleason had not died? Would Robert Gleason’s murderous urges – his proclivity to sexual violence – have been contained had he not lost his wife? Certainly, if Mary had survived it’s unlikely that Gleason would have fostered a child like Ryan. He had created a monster in his own image.

And now that monster was free. Free to kill again.

She tried to imagine his plan. He was, after all, the kind of murderer who liked to be creative. What was it that reporter, Cynthia Ross, had once said of him? He had a genius for the gruesome, a talent for the macabre. What sick scheme had he dreamt up now? And what did the sequence of film captured by the security cameras have to do with it all? Was he using himself as some kind of bait? And if so, whose attention was he trying to gain?

She glanced in her mirror. The police car was still behind her. She was safe. There was no way Gleason could get anywhere near her.

As she drove into the carport of the beach house she watched the cop car slow down and park outside. She checked her watch. Josh was late.

She walked down the path that led to the terrace overlooking the sea. She stopped for a moment, enjoying the feel of the sun on her face and the faint traces of spray that came off the ocean below. Each time she looked at the water now she felt guilty. She had had to postpone her exhibition yet again. Would she ever get her life back?

She was tempted to try and end it once and for all. To draw Ryan towards her somehow. Or to break away from the cops who tailed her every moment and go looking for him. But what had happened last time? She had nearly gotten herself killed. She wasn’t prepared to do that again. She couldn’t risk losing the baby. And, although she prided herself on her logical mind and sceptical nature, there was something about Cassie’s dream that disturbed her, that chimed with her own worst imaginings.

The only answer was to wait. Surely it was only a matter of time before Josh hunted him down. That, or Ryan accidentally gave himself away, just like his father before him.

She took a deep breath of salty air and turned away from the sea. She unlocked the door and walked into the kitchen. She opened the icebox and poured herself a glass of ice tea. She cut a few slices of lemon and added them to the drink, which she took with her through to the dark room. She glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already 12:40. Josh was 25 minutes late. She took out her cell and dialled his number. It went straight to his answer service. She listened to his voice, but, at the last moment, decided not to leave a message. She didn’t want to hassle him.

He had told her that he had something important to say to her. What could it be? Did he have a lead? Had he discovered where Ryan was hiding? Had he already made an arrest? Was Ryan behind bars? Or had there been some kind of shoot out? Was that why he was late?

The idea turned her stomach. It was something she couldn’t contemplate. No, that wasn’t going to happen. Josh was just stuck in traffic. On one of the freeways he claimed to love so much. The 101, the 405, the 110, the 10.

She finished her ice tea and placed the glass down on the stainless steel trough. She turned on the tap and rinsed her hands with cold water. In the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of something she had been trying to avoid. The clay model of Ryan which she had covered with dry cloth. She couldn’t bear to see his features, that straight jaw, that high forehead, those eyes that stared blankly from the face with such awful indifference. Almost like he didn’t care whether he lived or died.

She felt compelled to move towards it. She took a step – slowly – and then another. Despite the ice tea her mouth was dry. She stretched out her hand, which she noticed was shaking. She hated herself for the fear she felt. For fuck’s sake, she cursed. ‘I’m not supposed to be like this,’ she said to herself. ‘I don’t do superstition. It’s bullshit.’

She steadied her hand and, with a swift motion, whipped the cloth from the bust. There. That wasn’t too bad, was it? It was just a lump of clay that she had worked with. Nothing more. If she chose she could take a hammer or a chisel to it and reduce it back to an amorphous clump, a shape without features, form or fear. She looked around the floor for her box of tools. Where had she put them? Yes, that was right, they were in the cupboard under the trough. She bent down and opened the door. She pushed her hand into the dark space and felt for the ridge of the crate that held her tools. She pulled the box towards her. There was a claw hammer, a chisel, a round of cheese wire, a gavel. Although she was tempted to destroy the model she knew that she couldn’t. Not while the investigation was still ongoing. From the clay maquette the tech-heads in Josh’s team had created a high definition computer image of Ryan Gleason which should have been sent to every force in America. He was going to be hunted down and brought to justice. He would be tried and found guilty and most likely receive the death sentence.

She tried to picture it – Ryan’s arrest, his trial, his imprisonment, his execution – but the images didn’t come. The future was nothing but a black hole, vague and shapeless. And what of herself? What would her future be like? She would have her child and then what? They would live together at the beach house or with her mother? She closed her eyes and tried to imagine the scene. She was in a nursery, its ceiling alive with colourful mobiles, and she was holding a child swaddled in a pure white shawl. Its comfortable form filled her arms. She could smell its milky breath, the honeyed aroma of baby soap. She cooed to it, talked to the baby about how precious she was, how she was mummy’s darling. She went to peel back the top of the shawl to give the child a kiss. But as she did so she realised there was nothing there. She was just holding a mass of blankets, which, as she opened them out to search for her baby, fell apart into fragments of cloth in her arms.

As she opened her eyes, suddenly terrified, she heard a knock at the door. She steadied herself by the sink, pushing the nightmarish images from her consciousness. There was another knock. She couldn’t move. She felt paralysed by the unknown, by the nasty trace of fear left by what Cassie had told her and now by this awful daydream. She touched her stomach and couldn’t feel it move. She stopped breathing. There was nothing. Was it -?

The ring of her cell made her jump and at the same moment, as if mimicking her movements, she felt something kick inside her. Her baby. It was alive.

She took the cell out of her jeans pocket. It was Josh.

‘I’m standing outside,’ he said. ‘Where are you?’

‘Just in the dark room.’

‘What were doing? Working?’

‘No – but – I’ll be right there.’

‘Bye.’

She cut the line and walked to the door. Josh looked beat. His eyes were circled with black and his skin was pale.

‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

‘Yeah – well. Not much sleep.’

‘I can imagine. What’s the latest? You said you had something you needed to tell me.’

She led him into the kitchen and opened the ice box.

‘Do you want a drink? Ice tea?’

‘I’ll have a beer.’

She handed him a bottle and poured herself another glass of ice tea. He sat down on one of the stools ranged around the breakfast bar. He still couldn’t meet her eye.

Kate took a sip of her drink, suddenly feeling slightly nauseous.

‘Josh. What is it?’

He took a long gulp of beer.

‘It – it’s not about the case.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What I wanted to talk to you about. It’s not about Gleason.’

There was a pause. God, she hoped he wasn’t in some kind of trouble. Or sick. Or worse.

‘You’re not ill, are you?’

‘No, even though I feel I haven’t slept for weeks.’

‘Well – you know you can always talk to me,’ she said softly.

At that point he broke down, his body wracked by a wave of violent sobs.

‘Oh my God, Josh,’ she said, taking him in her arms. ‘What on earth is wrong?’

He tried to form words, but he felt his mouth melting.

‘Kate – I – ’

‘Take a deep breath. Come on.’

She stroked his hair as he regained control of his breathing.

‘It’s taken me a long time,’ he said, swallowing, ‘and I know that you probably won’t. I don’t blame you, after everything that’s go on. The way I behaved. I should never have – ’

‘Hey, slow down. One thing at a time.’

‘I acted so stupidly. I was blind. I didn’t know what I wanted. It was only a fling, but then the way you reacted. I -’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s like this, Kate. I realised – ’

She couldn’t speak. It was all too unreal.

He took another deep breath as he stood up.

‘It’s you, Kate.’

What?

‘It’s you – you that I want.’

She didn’t know how to react, what to say. She opened her mouth, but she couldn’t form the words.

He moved towards her to kiss her, but she stopped him with her hand.

‘I don’t know, Josh. It’s too -’

She was interrupted by the harsh ring of Josh’s cell. He tried to ignore it, but on the fifth ring he answered.

‘What?’ he barked, but then immediately became more business-like. ‘And you’re sure it’s a reliable witness? What’s the address? Okay, I’ll meet you there.’

He cut the connection and turned back to Kate.

‘It was Curtis. In response to the release of your reconstruction there’s been a sighting of Ryan Gleason at a motel in West LA. I’d better get over there now.’

‘Can I come with you?’

‘No. You stay here. As soon as I’m through I’ll come back over, if that’s okay. We need to talk some more.’

‘Sure.’

‘See you later then,’ he said. He thought about kissing her – just lightly, affectionately – and decided against it. Obviously she needed time to get used to the idea. Maybe she wouldn’t even accept him back. It was something he couldn’t force upon her. He turned to go.

‘Josh?’ she said.

He looked back over his shoulder.

‘Take care. Please.’

He nodded, smiled, and walked out of the house without another word.