Chapter 25: Rain Rain Go Away 04
That hand landed on his head, its fingers strong, its fingertips rough; through the tall windows of the church, the dim light of early morning filtered in, faint and gloomy; he stood somewhere before the altar, on the smooth, cold floor, directly beneath the cross, and was gathered by the circular rose window behind the cross into a brilliance from which there was no escape.
The stained glass pattern set into the long side windows of the church depicted a young man interpreting dreams for the Pharaoh of Egypt, foretelling to the Pharaoh seven years of famine in Egypt—he was Joseph, son of Jacob and Rachel, one of the twelve patriarchs of Israel. His father Jacob loved him more than all his other sons, and so gave him a beautiful coat of many colors; because of this, Joseph was even envied by his brothers.
“My child,” the man said, a thick, lingering note in his voice, “I love you more than all my other sons.”
—Then Hestal suddenly jolted awake.
The room was empty except for him; Elliot was not there. He lay on that grayish, thoroughly uncomfortable mattress, his throat dry and aching from his rapid panting. His hands were still bound behind his back, and as consciousness returned, a stinging pain began to spread through them. Without exaggeration, he could barely feel some of his fingers.
Naturally, Hestal could not have slept well that night. Although he knew it was impossible for Elliot to kill him while he was asleep, he had still woken up many times. As a result, at this moment he felt more dizzy and disoriented than on any other morning, accompanied by a hallucinatory urge to retch.
He maintained that curled-up posture, doing his best to steady his breathing—so this was Albanino’s revenge against him. Hestal couldn’t help but direct a sardonic, cold smile at the moldy ceiling.
In the Bob Landon case, from the moment the magistrate at the pretrial hearing denied Albanino bail to the moment the CSI found evidence in Landon’s home sufficient to prove Albanino innocent, the forensic examiner had been held in New Tucker Federal Prison for a total of eight days.
Eight days—many people had no idea what that number meant. Most assumed that as long as Albanino was eventually cleared of all charges, everything would be fine. But eight days—exaggeratedly speaking, enough time for God to create the entire world and then rest for two more days—was by no means a short period for the chief forensic examiner who had handled countless murder cases for the Westland City Police Department.
Albanino Bax was thrown into a prison full of hardened criminals, and it was obvious that in order to continue masquerading as a law-abiding citizen, that fellow couldn’t recklessly harm anyone even in prison.
Hestal certainly knew that Albanino wouldn’t let this go, but he had never imagined that revenge would come down on him in this manner.
This was practically ironic: a serial killer like the Sunday Gardener couldn’t empathize with his victims at all—in fact, he was incapable of truly sympathizing with anyone else’s suffering. And yet, Albanino had managed to pick, from that pile of simulations, the exact method Hestal hated most, using it to take revenge on him. It was a slap in the face to Olga Morozer and her criminal profiling—even Hestal wanted to praise him for being extraordinarily gifted.
But now he could only lie there and slowly take deep breaths, trying to dispel the discomfort caused by the numbness in his limbs and waiting for the symptoms of low blood pressure to pass.
Then he would have to find a way to solve his current troubles, because he undoubtedly would not linger in this place for long, and the Westland Pianist would certainly not sit idle and wait for death.
—October 29th, the day after “Killer Johnny” kidnapped his second victim in Westland.
Shortly after everyone returned from the crime scene yesterday, all the various scene reports were delivered to Lavasa McCade and Officer Hardy. Even though CSI had hauled the entire Rolls-Royce back to the crime lab for examination, no further evidence was found. The only good news was that the DNA test results from the pool of blood on the highway came back—at least that pool of blood definitely did not belong to Hestal Amaret.
However, when the DNA information from the killer Johnny’s blood was run through the existing databases, it didn’t match anyone. Clearly, this killer Johnny had no criminal record, which made the road to catching him even longer.
The 29th was a Saturday, and Olga had no classes to attend. As a result, when Hardy walked into the WLPD office area early in the morning holding his coffee cup, he saw Olga already slumped in a corner of his office, sitting in a circular ocean of paper made up of densely packed autopsy photos and transcript copies, like a pagan deity enthroned at the center of a skull altar.
“You know you’re pretty terrifying like this, right?” Hardy asked wearily. Yesterday the officers had run a marathon reviewing all the surveillance footage that might have captured the killer, but the remote wilderness hadn’t recorded anything meaningful, and he hadn’t slept well at all the entire night.
“She might know,” a voice lazily pointed out from behind Hardy, giving him a fright.
“Good God!” Hardy finally couldn’t help but exclaim. He whirled around and saw Albanino Bax curled up in another corner of his office, cradling another stack of autopsy reports in his arms, staring at him with dull green eyes framed by two enormous dark circles.
Clearly, Hardy’s office was at risk of becoming a den for some nocturnal creature. He steadied himself and, observing the bloodshot veins in Albanino’s eyes, asked, “Were you two here all night?”
“These files are theoretically not allowed to be taken out of the police station,” Albanino explained, as if that were a convincing argument.
Hardy really, really wanted to sigh, but he guessed that Olga wasn’t listening to them at all—her eyes were red, and her gaze was rapidly scanning the papers in front of her. A moment later she looked up, and the way she looked at Hardy was as if she were noticing him standing there for the first time.
“Hey, Bart,” she said, her voice hoarse. “When does McCade plan to do the profile?”
“This morning. He’ll be here soon,” Officer Hardy answered, bewildered.
“Have him come see me before he holds the meeting with the officers,” she said, wobbling as she propped herself against the wall to stand up. She looked so haggard she seemed on the verge of hypoglycemia. “I want to talk to him—or to everyone on the team he brings, whichever works; though by my estimate, there’s a very good chance we’ll end up arguing.”
Hardy studied her for a moment, then asked cautiously, “Do you have any new findings?”
Olga shrugged, her expression less than pleasant. “I suspect there were some errors in the previous profile.”
Eliot burst into the room at the sound of something landing with a sharp crack.
When he entered, Hestal was kneeling at the foot of the bed—just managing to get off the bed at all was no small feat, given that his ankles and wrists were bound tightly, the ropes digging deep into his skin, and the extremities constricted by the ropes had already taken on an ominous bruised purple hue.
On the ground near the folding table, shattered pieces of porcelain were scattered about—these things had once been a porcelain cup before being completely smashed to bits. In the instant Hestal saw the other, his eyes nearly split with fury. Yes, this pitiful lover, reacting excessively to even the slightest casual movement of the prey he had chosen—clearly, in his eyes, his prisoner should lie quietly in place and accept his care.
Hestal knew it was time for him to show weakness. Elliot’s previous prisoners had likely provoked his sudden madness by trying to resist—those attempts to escape shattered his fantasy of being a devoted lover, and the consequence was that he had nearly cut those people’s heads off from their necks.
So Hestal chose to kneel in place and look up at Elliot. He didn’t know how much panic and helplessness he could successfully work into his expression—he felt it might be difficult, because he was no longer, could never again be, the child he once was.
“Sorry,” he tried to inject genuine apology into his voice, “I just wanted a drink of water, but you weren’t here, so—”
A carefully designed pause, Elliot looked down at him.
“I don’t think I can do it after all. I’m very sorry for breaking the cup.” He spoke hesitantly and softly like this, “But I’m really thirsty… could you feed me a sip of water?”
Hestal observed the rise and fall of Elliot’s chest and the curve of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed when he took a deep breath, and in another corner deep within his heart, Albanino Bacchus was smiling at this scene: his smile was always brilliant, yet very few people could see through it—that it was merely the glaze upon a cold mask.
—But regardless, it might have worked.
“Oh, Hestal,” Elliot whispered, the trembling tenderness in his voice sounding so genuine, “Hestal.”
The other person half-embraced him and helped him back onto the bed. His bare toes scraped across the cold floor, and his ankles ached terribly under the restraint of the ropes. The pain was dull, insignificant compared to everything else.
Elliot quickly brought him a glass of water and, just like yesterday, knelt on the bed and slowly fed it to him. The young man’s eyes shone with a terrifying brightness, ringed by a wet redness, and walking down the street he would almost be mistaken for a junkie high on drugs.
Hestal’s lips drew close to the rim of the glass. The slightly cool liquid burned its way down his throat. Between the fingers tightly bound behind his back, he silently clutched a sharp shard of broken porcelain in his palm.
When Ravassa McCade entered Officer Hardy’s office, Olga was sitting on the folding sofa in the corner, desperately trying to use coffee to wake herself up. In her hand was a bright red mug printed with the Tudor crown, with large white letters reading: Keep Calm and Love Colin Firth.
Whether Olga had actually kept calm was truly hard to say. Perhaps a truly calm person would not look as wretched as someone who had not slept since the 1960s. McCade carefully studied her exhausted face, then asked, “What’s wrong?”
“I’ve read all the profiles the BAU previously did on the killer Johnny.” Olga nodded toward the stack of folders on Hardy’s desk. “When the killer arranged the bodies, he was extraordinarily careful, and aside from the bloodstains on the victims’ clothes that couldn’t be cleaned off, he tended to wipe away all the blood on the corpses’ skin—the BAU believed that was a manifestation of guilt.”
“Isn’t it?” McCade asked in return.
“I admit that’s the case in quite a few situations,” Olga took another sip of coffee from her cup, then stuck out her tongue at the awful taste. “Most of the time it goes like this: the killer satisfies his desires by repeatedly abducting the same type of victim. In his eyes, these victims of the same type are all shadows of someone he once loved; after he brutally kills them, he feels guilt—not guilt toward the dead, but guilt over the fact that he killed the phantom of someone in his mind. That’s why when Killer Johnny was committing crimes in other states, the local police conducted extensive screenings of suspects the same age as the victims, right? Because if the killer uses victims as substitutes for a past lover, they might be around the same age?”
“Yes. But you also know that in the end we came up with nothing.” McCard’s face was tense. “He moved between many states, staying in each new city for a while. He might have worked odd jobs in that city—a person like that, around thirty-five to forty-five years old, who once had a failed relationship, possibly with violent tendencies? No, we screened all possible suspects and in the end found nothing.”
“Many serial killers leave a criminal record as their violence escalates, but Killer Johnny’s DNA proved to us that he didn’t have one before.” Olga shook her head and let out a low hum. “We need to change our approach—Al and I have some new ideas. Al, please?”
McCard looked toward Albanino, who stood in front of the whiteboard against the wall, covered with many photographs of the victims.
“I’ve tallied the time from abduction to death for each victim, and there doesn’t seem to be any pattern—we know the killer Johnny strikes after rain, but in reality, he doesn’t necessarily kill his victims after the first rain following their abduction.” Albanino tapped the whiteboard, on which he had previously drawn a long table with messy handwriting. “This is a statistical chart of when the victims were abducted and the local rainfall—Agent McCade, as you can see, four victims here were killed after the first rain, one died after two rains, two held out through three rains, and one didn’t die until after six rains had fallen.”
“A reasonable thought is that it takes time for the killer Johnny to grow tired of his victims, and once he’s tired of them, he dumps the body after the next rain following that point.” Olga picked up the thread. “Or there’s another possibility: the killer himself isn’t even aware of whether he’s grown tired of the victim, but when the rain starts falling, the scene at the time triggers some dark imagination within him, making him unable to control his actions—and then, unable to restrain himself, he kills them.”
McCade’s voice carried a note of irritation: “We’re aware of that. The frequency with which the killer murders his victims doesn’t gradually accelerate, which means how long he’s willing to let them live depends solely on his feelings toward the victim—but we don’t know what governs his feelings. These victims all look exactly the same.”
That wasn’t an exaggeration: the photos of the victims pinned to the whiteboard were all similarly handsome, all of them the pale-skinned, blond-haired type, and they were all about the same height as well.
“That’s why the previous profile wasn’t accurate enough.” Hardy had been listening on the sidelines for a while, and now wearily picked up the thread of conversation.
“The problem is that no two people can be exactly alike,” Albanino said with a smile.
“It’s personality,” Olga said.
“Sorry?” McCard raised an eyebrow.
“Personality—a crucial factor determining how long the victims of the killer Johnny can survive.” Olga leaned back more comfortably on the folding sofa and blinked. “I read the interview records with all the victims’ families. That’s right, they were all the same—blond, tall, handsome, and around the same age. There were no obvious differences between them, except for personality.”
“Although the current sample is probably not accurate enough, it can still serve as a rough reference.” Albanino reached out and tapped the whiteboard. “The victims who died the fastest were generally described as tough or impulsive types—one of them was even a company executive, strong-willed, the kind of person people looked up to with awe; the remaining few fell at two extremes, some described as ‘very reckless,’ and another whose friend reported he was just a pushover; while the one who survived as long as six rains—nearly two months—was described by his colleagues as a ‘calm, cautious’ person.”
Hardy listened for a long while, his brow furrowing tighter and tighter. “Wait, I still don’t quite understand. The killer Johnny prefers—”
“It’s not that he prefers a certain personality type. That description isn’t accurate.” Olga shook her head. McCade stared intently at her, so she knew he had more or less understood as well. “It’s the personality differences between people that shape their attitudes toward the kidnapper. We can imagine that tough-willed people might try to escape, threaten the other party, or attempt to negotiate with them. Those who are too cowardly will in most cases just keep crying and sobbing, which gets annoying… But you have to understand, to the killer Johnny, all of this is love.”
McCade was silent for a moment, then said slowly, “You’re trying to point out to me that the killer, Johnny, killed those victims who resisted too fiercely or were too badly frightened. The calmer they appeared, the more they feigned obedience to him, the longer they lived.”
“That’s what I mean,” Olga replied simply.
“No research can support that claim,” McCade retorted with a frown, though his tone didn’t sound very certain either.
“Oh, so now you suddenly remember to do research? I thought you were the one most opposed to me doing research.” Olga retorted impatiently, not making much effort to hide her raised eyebrow. “But what can we do now? You know as well as I do that the range defined by the previous profile wasn’t accurate. In any case, relying on that profile didn’t catch the killer in the previous cases.”
“Besides, what Olga said isn’t entirely impossible.” Albanino pointed out calmly. “Among the four people who died after the first rain, three had obvious signs of resistance on their bodies: one had scraped knuckles, another had even had a fingernail torn off—the wounds were all fresh, inflicted shortly before their deaths. Someone among them must have tried to fight back or escape.”
McCade was silent again for a painfully long stretch, then he seemed to relent: “…Fine, Olga. Let’s hear your take.”
Olga gave him an unappealing, almost defiantly provocative smile before speaking: “As I said before, the killer moves between states and is very likely doing odd jobs here in Westland now. He’s a white male, under thirty-five, most likely no taller than one meter eighty, and definitely not the very strong type. The person we’re looking for exists on the fringes of society, is poor at socializing, and might even appear introverted.”
“If he’s doing odd jobs, he’s unlikely to have much in the way of savings.” Albanino added. “The forensic examiner estimated how long the victim was stuffed in that cramped space based on the rigor mortis from the previous murder. He was very likely placed in a car trunk for at least three hours after death before being dumped. So we can combine that profile with Westland’s traffic conditions to narrow down the area where he lives.”
McCade frowned, clearly weighing these words. Then, looking at Olga, he said, “I need an explanation.”
“I know you definitely do,” Olga snorted. “You already understand how the rest was deduced—”
“The killer used a stun gun to take down his targets, and throughout the entire captivity he kept his victims’ hands bound behind their backs. That means he shouldn’t have been able to easily subdue a man of his victims’ build—so he’s likely not strong, and probably not much taller than his victims.” McCade nodded. “I understand. But you think he’s young and introverted?”
“Haven’t you noticed? His pleasure comes from the need for control: among the dead, the one most likely to have humored and accommodated him survived the longest, while breaking down in tears or putting up fierce resistance would most likely trigger his madness.” Olga’s eyes lit up, making no effort to hide her excitement—it was rather terrifying to look at. “A twisted psyche, a rebound after being deeply wounded—the victims were all at least middle class, well-dressed, social elites, and then the killer imprisoned and sexually assaulted them. Judging from the restraint marks on the victims’ hands, they were probably bound behind their backs the entire time, but the killer didn’t starve them, so they had no choice but to take food from the killer Johnny’s hands.”
She paused for a moment, then revealed a smile.
“Isn’t it obvious, McCade? The other party’s submission and demands brought him pleasure. When those who should have been stronger than him, older than him, better than him were powerless and could only rely on him, when they could only open their bodies and let him take whatever he wanted—that was when his desire was finally satisfied.”
About three hours later, Hardy returned to the office once again. The two people waiting for him there were nearly asleep: that was the consequence of staying up all night. Olga was dozing groggily against Albanino’s shoulder, her hair a tangled mess plastered across it.
Albanino, meanwhile, was barely awake. He lifted his head wearily, yet the smile remained on his face.
He mouthed a “what” at Hardy.
“We’ve screened a batch of suspects based on the new profile,” Hardy replied. “Thankfully, the time of death estimated by the forensic examiner can be used to calculate driving distances, so we can at least narrow the scope a little.”
He handed a stack of documents to Albanino, about a dozen pages or so. Albanino understood internally that this was a remarkable achievement: people who lived briefly in this city were incredibly hard to track down, and some of those odd-job workers couldn’t possibly meet the tax threshold; the suspects who had been filtered out now were likely found by combing through credit card records like searching for a needle in a haystack—after all, if someone frequently moved between several cities, their spending records should have distinctive patterns.
But they were still powerless against those who paid in cash. Perhaps, by some unlucky coincidence, they would let a suspect slip right past them just like that.
“We’ll start by interviewing these people. Without a warrant, we can’t run DNA tests, so we’ll just have to hope we can pick up on some clues during questioning.” Hardy lowered his voice, careful not to wake Olga. “We don’t need you two here for now. You can go back and get some rest—”
Just then, Albanino, who had been looking down at the documents, suddenly let out a brief “Ah.”
Hardy asked curiously, “What is it?”
Albanino pulled out a photograph and showed it to Hardy: it was of a young man with his head slightly lowered, his eyes evasive, pale, with black hair covering nearly half his face.
“I know this person,” Albanino said with a frown.
The information page fastened behind the photo with a paperclip noted the person’s name: Elliot Evans.
Note:
[1] Keep Calm and Love Colin Firth:
A play on the British World War II propaganda poster “Keep Calm and Carry On.”