Inmate 1577 Read online

  “Such as?” Burden asked.

  Vail frowned. “A high degree of variation in a series of crimes could also be because we’ve got an offender with a tremendous amount of impulsivity. Another thing to factor in is that psychopaths get bored. It’s part of who they are. So they might vary their crimes just to keep it interesting.”

  “Fair enough,” Friedberg said.

  “Until we know what the emotions, or motivations, are behind these murders, we can’t know if the offender’s making a statement by brutally raping and torturing the woman and doing far less to the male—yet still killing him. It could simply be that his real target was the wife, and the husband got in the way. He could’ve knocked him unconscious, had his way with the wife, then decided to make a statement by displaying him here. Or maybe he tied the guy up and made him watch, like you thought back at the townhouse. Once he was done with the wife, he couldn’t leave a witness, so he offed the husband.”

  “I’m not convinced,” Burden said.

  A bluster of wind snaked through the loose knit of Vail’s sweater. She drew her arms in close to her body. “An important determination will be whether or not he planned out the husband’s murder. Looks like he did. And if he did come here once or twice to sketch it all out, then we’re looking at something more involved than what it appears to be right now.”

  Jackson folded up his kit. “I’m ready to cut him down. I’ll need a hand.”

  “You got gloves?”

  Jackson pulled two from his kit and passed them over to Vail, who unfurled them and shimmied her fingers in as Burden and Friedberg helped the CSI lower the body carefully to the ground.

  “I don’t think he’s even one-thirty-five,” Friedberg said. “He’s pretty freaking light.”

  Jackson collected the nylon fishing line while Friedberg and Burden rolled the stiff corpse of William Anderson onto its side.

  Vail tugged on Anderson’s shirt and examined his back, then his neck and head. “Right here,” she said.

  Burden pointed to a spot lower on the body. “And there. Abrasions on the pants. The buttocks, and down by the shoes. The black leather’s pretty chewed up. Probably from scraping along the cement facing as he was pulled up.”

  “How does he do this without anyone seeing?” Friedberg said. “I mean, it’s gotta take a good three to five minutes to pull the body up with that rope.”

  Burden, still kneeling beside the body, swiveled around and took in the lay of the land. “Unless he did it at night, or the early morning hours. No one’s around.”

  “If he’s a psychopath,” Vail said, “and I think that’s likely, they’re not nearly as affected by stress like you and I would be. So interacting with a dead body, out in public, wouldn’t cause the UNSUB the kind of anxiety we’d feel. And that’s why we often see a boldness to a psychopath’s behavior, a brazenness. They just don’t experience fear to the same depth that we do.” She curled some hair behind her right ear. “Do we have a TOD on the wife’s body?”

  “About three hours before I called your boss,” Burden said.

  Friedberg adjusted the glove on his left hand. “So either the UNSUB kept Mr. Anderson around for a while, or he killed him at the same time and stored him somewhere till he was ready to...do this. Transport him here and tie him up.”

  Burden grumbled, “If it’s the same guy.”

  “Doesn’t make sense he’d kill the husband at the house,” Vail said.

  “Because...” Burden said.

  “Because I’m assuming he planned all along to display the guy here. This was part of his plan. So why kill the guy at the house, then have to lug a dead body around? But if you could incapacitate him, tie him up and gag him, then have him walk wherever you want him to go, kill him closer to where we are, then pose him. It becomes a logistics issue.”

  “How so?” Friedberg asked.

  “Transporting a dead body bears a high degree of risk for the offender, right? He’s gotta drive around with a DB in his car. He gets stopped by a cop, he’s got a big goddamn problem. So where’s he gonna put it? Not in the backseat, in plain sight. Generally, the more risky it is, the more thrilling it is for these guys. So while he’d probably get off on the risk, there’s a difference between it being thrilling and just plain stupid. So he’d have to put it in the trunk.”

  “Yeah, but lifting a DB out of a trunk isn’t fun, and it isn’t easy,” Burden said.

  “Right. So that’s what I was saying. The best way to do this is to control him somehow. Using a gun, or a drug to make him drowsy, you can do pretty much what you want. Control is the key.”

  Friedberg looked up at the column where the body had been fastened. “Soon as the ME gets us a time and a definite cause of death, we’ll be able to piece this all together. For now, we should look into the vics’ backgrounds.”

  Vail lifted Anderson’s right hand and examined the fingers. “No defensive wounds.” She reached across the body and checked out the left. “Hmm.” She stood up and looked out, through the columns ahead of her. “What’s around here, in this area?” Vail asked.

  Friedberg pointed. “Out ahead of us is a man-made lagoon. They do lots of weddings there. Navigating the seagulls can be a challenge.”

  As if on cue, a cacophony of birdsong built to a crescendo. Vail ducked as several gulls sped past her head and swept through the rotunda. “What the hell’s that?”

  “Every once in a while they go nuts. Hundreds of them.” He gestured out over the expansive, irregularly shaped pond, where the large gray birds were diving and climbing, darting and swooping. “Lasts a minute or two, then they quiet down.”

  Over the water, the cloud of gulls eventually calmed, as Friedberg predicted.

  “As I was saying,” Friedberg continued. “There are homes along the perimeter. Expensive ones, well maintained. That building you saw when we parked, directly adjacent to the property, is the Exploratorium. Kind of a hands-on science museum.”

  A science museum. Perfect. “Let’s head back there, I’ll bet they’ve got some expensive equipment in there. With expensive equipment comes security cameras.”

  “Hang on a minute,” Jackson said. “You may want to see this.”

  They gathered around the criminalist. His gloved fingers spread the hair on the back of Anderson’s head, toward the base of his skull.

  “Blood?” Burden asked.

  “Looks like it. Bruising of the cranium. And over here,” he said, gesturing at the throat. “Those marks you were talking about, anterior C-spine. I don’t think they’re finger impressions, but we’ll know more once the ME examines him.”

  Friedberg said, “Just like the wife. Assuming it’s the same UNSUB.”

  “Or,” Vail said, “he could’ve struck his head on the cement while he was being pulled up on the rope. Or he could’ve fallen when he was killed. We don’t know at this point.”

  Leaving Rex Jackson to finish his work, they headed back toward their cars.

  As they entered the small parking lot, Vail stopped. “There.” She nodded at a panoramic lens mounted atop the tall adobe-tinted Exploratorium building, near an inside corner overlooking the arched glass doors of the museum. She traced the line of sight to where she was standing, at the mouth of the Fine Arts entrance. “But that might be a problem.” Below and in front of the building was a grouping of three gnarled and heavily leaved trees, partially blocking the view.

  “We’ll take what we can get,” Friedberg said. He headed toward the entrance. “I’ll get started on securing the tapes.”

  As Friedberg walked off, a bushy-haired man with iPod earbuds plugging his ears strolled in front of them. His hands were curled around a long bar that protruded from a rectangular shaped, three-wheeled cart, colorful stickers dotting its surface: Good Humor chocolate chip, Big Dipper, Popsicle Shots, Pink Panther, Scribblers, Snow Cone.

  An ice cream vendor discovered the body.

  “Hey, Robert! This the guy?” Vail asked, tipping her he
ad in the direction of the vendor.

  Friedberg cricked his neck, snatched a look at the man, and nodded.

  Burden stepped in front of the man and held up his shield.

  The vendor, who looked no more than twenty-two, pulled his right earbud free and, as he turned his head to reach for the left ear, his gaze found Vail. His eyes slid down her body. And his demeanor transformed. He straightened up. “Can I—do you need help with something?”

  “Yeah. You are—?”

  He narrowed his eyes and held out his hands palms up, indicating his cart. “An ice cream vendor.”

  “No,” Vail said. “I got that. I meant, what’s your name?”

  “Oh. Oh. Alex Montague.”

  “Mr. Montague,” Burden said, taking back control of the interview. “We understand you found the body in there.”

  Montague reluctantly pulled his eyes from Vail. “Yeah, dude was just hangin’ out there. Looked kinda weird. As I got closer, I was, like, what the fuck. He ain’t movin’. So I wheeled up far as I could, and well, it looked to me like the dude was dead. I mean, I’m no expert or nothin’.”

  “That’s right,” Vail said. “The dude was dead. You’re a sharp guy. Expert or not.”

  He didn’t like that retort, because he stopped looking at her with lust. He was actually frowning.

  “So,” Vail said. “We’d really like to know if you saw anyone in the area the past few days who didn’t look right.”

  “Didn’t look right?”

  Burden shoved his credentials case into his jacket pocket. “Yeah. Like he didn’t belong. Or he was doing stuff that a typical tourist doesn’t do. Not just a tourist. Anyone, really, who might come around here.”

  Montague shrugged.

  “You been doing this a while?” Vail asked. “Selling ice cream here?”

  “’Bout a year.”

  “Good. Then you’ve seen thousands, if not tens of thousands of people, visit this place. Based on what those people look like, have you seen anyone lately who looked out of place?”

  “Out of place, how?”

  I wonder if brain cell transplants are possible yet. This kid needs some. Badly.

  As she was pondering how to get some meaningful answers from Alex Montague, a woman nudged up to the cart, brushing Vail aside.

  “Excuse me,” Vail said, not bothering to hide her annoyance. She tilted her head. “Can I help you?”

  The woman lifted her eyebrows. “Oh. Yes. I’d like two snow cones and a chocolate sandwich. But if you’ve got lemon popsicles, I’ll take that instead of one of the snow cones.”

  Montague opened his mouth to speak but Vail beat him to it. “Yeah, thing is, we’re all out.”

  “Out? Of which?”

  “Everything. Go find another ice cream cart.”

  The woman eyed Vail warily, then turned and walked off.

  “What the fuck?” Montague said.

  Vail stepped forward. “We’re in the middle of an important conversation, Mr. Montague. We can have it here, and be done in a couple of minutes, or we can do it downtown.”

  “Downtown?” Montague said. “But we are downtown.”

  Vail clenched her jaw. “Just answer the question.”

  “Which question?”

  Burden must have sensed Vail’s building consternation, because he held up a hand. “Mr. Montague. Focus for a second and we’ll be out of your hair. Did you see anyone suspicious the past few days? Maybe he was looking at the area around the rotunda, scoping things out, like maybe he was looking for a place to put a dead body.”

  “Oh,” Montague said. “Oh, I see what you’re gettin’ at.” He looked off a moment. “Mind if I?” He held up his iPod.

  “Do we mind if you listen to music?” Vail asked. “While we’re talking to you?”

  “It’ll help me remember.”

  Burden motioned with some fingers. “Go ahead.”

  Montague plugged his ears and glanced around. His head began bobbing with the beat.

  “This is a new one on me.”

  Burden shrugged. “If it helps him concentrate, what’s the harm?”

  “I’m not a very patient person, Burden, and this—”

  “There was a guy.” Montague yanked the earbuds and said, “He was up in that same spot, looking around. And I remember thinking that it was strange. I mean, he didn’t have a camera and he wasn’t with anybody. Lots of times people will put their kids up on those steps and take pictures of ’em. And sometimes they’ll go up there to get a different view of the columns—but again, they have cameras.”

  “What’d the guy look like?” Burden asked.

  “Tall. He had a hoodie on.” Montague stuck one earbud in and listened a few seconds. “Navy.”

  “He was in the Navy? Was there a logo on the sweatshirt?”

  “No, no. His sweatshirt was dark blue. You know, navy.”

  “Right,” Vail said. “Navy. Anything else you can remember? How tall was he?”

  “Hard to say, because he was like up on that platform, or whatever you call it. He looked tall and kind of thin.”

  “Beard?” Burden asked. “Glasses? He walk with a limp?”

  Montague shook his head. “I don’t know, I kinda was trying to sell ice cream. Not the easiest gig in San Francisco in the summer.”

  Vail chuckled. “Mark Twain once said something about that.”

  Burden frowned at Vail and said to Montague, “Call us if you think of anything else. Or if you see the guy again.”

  As Burden handed Montague a card, Vail backed away, keeping her eyes on the entrance to the Palace of Fine Arts pergola.

  Burden joined her a few seconds later. “What are you thinking?”

  “Trying to figure out how he got the body in there without anyone seeing. Even late at night, or early in the morning, there’s risk. I’m thinking he backed his car right into that parking spot,” she said, pointing at an area at the mouth of the entrance.

  “Open the trunk, pull out the body and drag it the fifty yards or so to the place where he wanted to display it.” Burden glanced back over his shoulder at the security camera.

  “If he really did plan this out, and if he knew about the camera, it’s possible he could’ve hidden himself behind the car so the camera wouldn’t pick him up. But we might be able to get a plate. Or at least a make and model.”

  Friedberg pushed through the front door of the Exploratorium. In his hand was a DVD envelope. He held it up as he approached. “I’ve got a week’s worth of footage.”

  “Let’s take it back to your place,” Vail said, “break out some popcorn and watch some movies.”

  13

  January 31, 1958

  Columbia, Alabama

  Their take from the Township Community Savings haul was seven hundred and ninety dollars. Although it seemed like a lot of money, it did not last as long as MacNally had hoped or planned. After ditching the car in an abandoned lot fifty miles outside town, they hitchhiked with a trucker and spent a dozen or so quiet hours traveling south as both father and son fell asleep against one another, despite the chatter of music that poured from the radio. It was a selection Henry found to his liking: Elvis, Chuck Berry, the Shirelles, and some Tommy Dorsey thrown in. MacNally finally convinced Henry to lay his head down, and shortly thereafter both began snoozing.

  Upon awakening, they found themselves sitting in a small-town gas station as the driver tended to his rig. MacNally chatted up the attendant and discovered they were in Alabama, a place he had seen once in a newsreel at the movies, but never visited.

  He placed his hand on his jacket pockets, where he had shoved the money they had appropriated from the bank. He patted them down, and satisfied he had not dreamt their haul the night before, asked how far it was to the nearest city.

  The man estimated it was only about a mile or so down the road, so MacNally told Henry he thought it was best if they thanked the trucker and walked the rest of the way.

  Two week
s after arriving in town, MacNally began plotting out their long-term plans. He had landed a job cleaning a local elementary school, but it fell short of being enough money to pay for room and board. They found a dive of a place to rent, a converted garage that had no heat and no plumbing.

  Through one of the school parents, he heard of a local construction company that needed a hard worker who was good with his hands. MacNally had always prided himself on his sculpting abilities but had no formal training and had never found a way to channel his skills into a money-producing occupation. Building would be a cruder form of sculpting—but he would be utilizing his natural gifts and it figured to pay better than his current job.

  That afternoon, he asked for some time off to tend to a family emergency, and went to the construction site to talk to the foreman. He ended up speaking with Mr. Flaherty, the owner, as it was a smaller company than he had envisioned. The man explained that he had won the bid to build an addition to a home that belonged to a government commissioner in Dothan—and if he executed well, Flaherty could then tap the inner circle of a more affluent customer than usually sought his services, allowing him to elevate his business to the next level.

  But Flaherty needed two additional workers and he had to find them fast. The architect had drawn plans and Flaherty was compelled to complete the renovation before the owner started in his new position at City Hall.

  MacNally explained that he had never worked construction, but he was good with his hands, he possessed a keen attention to detail, he was a hard worker who learned quickly, was always on time and never left early. Flaherty asked him a number of questions, and then, apparently satisfied with MacNally’s responses, said, “Be here tomorrow morning, seven o’clock sharp, ready to work.” But then he pointed an arthritic index finger and said, “Don’t disappoint, me, boy. Screw up, put me in a bad way, and I’ll see to it that no one in town hires your ass again. You hear?”

  MacNally took the threat in stride and assured Mr. Flaherty that he would not regret his decision. He quit his maintenance job and reported to the construction site at 6:45. It was then that he learned that the government official was someone far more important than he had figured: the recently elected mayor.