Blood Marks, page 13
Howland was beginning to think he was onto something. He started going through the other files.
Victim number four, Janet Peters. Small scar on chin as a result of childhood fall.
Victim number five, Fran Landon. Small brown birthmark near right ear.
Victim number six, Lucille Hamm. Round puckered scar on left cheek where her brother accidentally shot her with his archery set when they were children.
Victim number seven, Joan Pollet. Small strawberry birthmark below right earlobe.
Victim number eight, Mamie Manten. Large mole over right eyebrow.
Victim number nine, Laura Roberts. Birthmark on neck.
Howland was sure he had the link among the victims.
The marks were so small as not to be noticeable in some cases, more obvious in others. The medical examiner would never have noticed them because the killer had destroyed them, but they had to be the link.
Had to be.
No one had noticed it before now because the marks seemed so insignificant, but it might be the very thing that explained why Martin's arms had been removed.
In every other case, the victim's head had been destroyed, except for Laura Roberts, the one with the birthmark on her neck.
She had been garroted.
Chapter 24
After the swim, Rob Hensley had asked Casey and Margaret if they would like to come by his apartment for dinner.
"Pizza," he said. "I'll have it delivered."
Casey wasn't particularly in the mood for pizza, but Margaret was enthusiastic.
"Do you have any more alligators?" she said. "I like alligators!"
"No," Rob laughed. "No more alligators. But I do have a lot of books around the place."
Margaret made a face to show that she wasn't impressed. "Books aren't as much fun as alligators," she said.
"What if I have a book about alligators,” Rob said. "How would that be?"
"Well," Margaret said, "that might be all right." Her expression plainly said that she didn't really think so.
"I take it that you're accepting the invitation anyway," Rob said.
"Sure," Margaret said, she knew where her priorities were. "I like pizza."
"I guess that settles it," Casey said. "Give us time to go change and we'll be there."
"Great," Rob said. "I'll call in the order."
Less than an hour later, Casey and Margaret rang the bell at Rob's apartment.
He opened the door and bowed. "Welcome to my humble abode," he said, ushering them in. He was wearing white tennis shorts, Reebok tennis shoes and a blue polo shirt.
"What's an abode?" Margaret said.
"That's a place where people live," Casey said. "Like an apartment or a house."
"Absolutely right," Rob said. "Some abodes are fancier than others, but I bet mine has more books."
"Mom's books are all in boxes," Margaret said. "But I bet she has as many as you do."
Casey wasn't so sure. There were makeshift bookshelves everywhere in Rob's apartment, most of them made from bricks and boards. Casey hadn't seen shelves like that since she had been in grad school.
Rob saw her looking at them. "Crude, but effective," he said.
"I was thinking in terms of having to buy expensive ones," Casey said. "But this is just as good. Maybe better. I can do this myself."
She walked over to the shelves to see what kind of books Rob had. Like anyone else who loved books and reading, she always had to see what other people liked to read.
Rob had a wide selection. There was William Goldman, of course, whom they had discussed before, with The Princess Bride prominently displayed beside The Silent Gondoliers.
"I was going to let you borrow that one," Rob said. "Here, take it before I forget."
He pulled the slim volume from the shelf and handed it to Casey.
"Thanks," she said absently, looking along the shelves.
There were more Goldman books, including The Color of Light and Marathon Man. There were quite a few mysteries, with Robert B. Parker, John D. MacDonald and Rex Stout well represented. There were westerns by Justin Ladd and Louis L'Amour, horror novels by Stephen King, Robert McCammon and Peter Straub, and a couple of strange looking fantasies about a drive-in movie by someone named Joe Lansdale. There were a number of other fantasy novels in the sword-and-sorcery vein, as well, by people like Robert E. Howard and Michael Moorcock.
On other shelves there were numerous reference books, including an encyclopedia, Bartlett's Quotations, dictionaries, books on Hollywood and movies, books about music, a thesaurus and quite a few books about the Old West.
There was one shelf devoted exclusively to true crime, with titles like The Stranger Beside Me, The Cop Who Wouldn’t Quit and Daddy’s Girl.
Margaret wasn't interested in any of this. "Where's the book about the alligators?" she said.
Rob looked around the reference shelf and came up with a thin book called All About Alligators and Crocodiles.
"Here you are," he said. "Everything you ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask."
"I'm not afraid to ask," Margaret informed him.
"I should have known," he said.
Margaret started flipping through the book, looking for the pictures.
"You really do have a lot of books," Casey said. "Maybe more than I have. And yours are certainly more varied."
"You never know what you'll need to know," Rob said. "I don't like to have to go out to the library unless it's absolutely necessary. I could call, I guess, but I like to have things at hand when I'm working."
Just then the doorbell rang. The pizza had arrived. Rob paid the delivery man and they went into the kitchen area to eat. There were even books in the kitchen.
Cookbooks," Rob said. "I have to admit, I use them less than any other books I have."
The table was already set, and Rob got some ice from the freezer and dropped it in their glasses. Then he poured them some Coke from a two-liter bottle.
The pizza was hot, with double pepperoni and double cheese. They devoted themselves to eating it without much conversation. Margaret finished first and asked if she could go back in the other room and look at her book.
"I'm trying to figure out the difference between an alligator and a crocodile," she explained.
Casey told her that she could go, and when she was out of earshot, Casey decided to ask Rob about something that had been bothering her.
She looked at him across the table. The pizza box was between them, its top slightly open. She reached out a hand and pushed the top down.
"I wanted to ask something," she said. "I hope you won't think I'm prying. At least not too much."
Rob chewed on a piece of crust. Then he said, "It all depends on what you want to ask."
"It's about something that was said earlier, at the pool," Casey said. She really didn't know where to begin, and she wasn't sure that she should be asking in the first place.
Finally, however, her curiosity got the better of her. "It's about your childhood," she said.
Rob put the last piece of crust down on his plate. "What about it?" he said. He wasn't smiling.
"You said something about how happy it was, but I got the feeling you were holding something back."
"Maybe I was," Rob said. "But maybe I had a reason."
Casey felt awkward. She didn't know why she had brought it up in the first place.
"I'm sorry," she said. "It's really not any of my business."
Rob stood up and carried his plate to the sink. He came back and took Margaret's and Casey's plates. When he had run water on them, he sat back down and looked at Casey.
"You're right, of course," he said. "I was holding back."
"It's all right," Casey said. "I didn't mean to pry."
"Sure you did," Rob said. This time he smiled a little.
"OK, I guess I did. But, well, I just thought you might like to talk about it to someone."
"There's not really too much to say." Rob took the last swallow of Coke from his glass. The ice had nearly melted, and thin slivers slid down the side of the glass when he set it back down.
"Let's talk about something else," Casey said. The conversation was making her uncomfortable.
"No," Rob said. "You're the only person who's ever caught me in a lie before. I suppose you deserve to know the truth."
"I didn't think you were lying," Casey said, wishing she hadn't brought it up. "I just thought there was more to the story than you were telling."
"You were right. My childhood wasn't as wonderful as I tried to make it sound. The truth is, I don't remember much about it."
Casey didn't say anything. She didn't know whether Rob was talking about amnesia or something else.
It turned out to be something else.
"I've talked to professionals about it," he said. "In the course of my work as a writer, not formally. They tell me it might be because I moved around so much. I don't really remember my real parents. I lived in a lot of foster homes."
"There's nothing wrong with that," ' Casey said.
"No, of course not. I just don't like to talk about it much."
Casey told him about the deaths of her own parents. "What happened to yours?" she said.
"I'm not sure. That's part of what I don't remember. I think I was taken from them when I was pretty young."
Rob held up his arm, the one with the broken elbow. "I do know that this is a souvenir from the early days. My foster parents always treated me just as I said they did this afternoon. I don't think I was ever spanked by any of them. But somewhere back in the time I don't remember, with my real parents, something must have happened."
"You told me you fell out of a tree," Casey remembered.
"That's my standard story," Rob said. "For all I know, it might be true. But, then again, it might not."
"I did fall out of a window once," Casey said. "I've got a scar to prove it." She put her hand to her left eyebrow. "It's not much of one, not many people notice it." She ran her finger slowly along her eyebrow. The scar was about an inch long, but it was very faint.
She winced at the memory. "It wasn't a high window, but it was about four feet to the ground. There was a rock there, and I landed right on it. I was lucky in a way, I guess. I could have landed on my eye and maybe even lost my vision. But it was really nothing serious. I bled a little and cried a lot, but that was about all."
"Margaret has one, too," Casey went on. "Even less noticeable than mine. It's on her right cheek, high up, just under the eye."
"I did notice that," Rob said.
"You're very observant, aren't you?" Casey said.
"I'm a writer. I'm supposed to be observant. Actually, it's a habit. You never know what you might want to use."
Casey put out her right hand and touched the pizza box, moving it slightly on the table.
"It's not much of a story," she said.
"I told you my story, whether it was much of one or not."
"All right," Casey said. "I've always blamed myself for that scar, which is probably why I don't like to talk about it. I was driving to the store when Margaret was a baby, and I was in a hurry. I hadn't strapped her in her safety seat, since the store was only a few blocks away. I was sure nothing would happen."
"That's always the way it is," Rob said. "A lot of the worst accidents happen pretty near home. I wrote an article about that once."
"It wasn't an accident," Casey said. "A cat ran out in front of me, and I braked too hard. I didn't hit the cat, but Margaret was thrown into the dash. She hit the tuning knob on the radio and it opened a little cut under her eye. It didn't even need stitches, and I never dreamed it would leave a scar. It's not very noticeable, really. Makeup will cover it when she gets older."
Rob smiled. "That's a good story, and I'm sure it's true. But what if you couldn't remember what happened? What if you had a suspicion that you or someone else, your husband maybe, had abused Margaret, but you were ashamed to say so. Wouldn't you make up a story like mine?"
Casey didn't know how to respond to that. She was saved from having to do so by Margaret, who came in with the book she had been reading.
"I still don't understand," she said. "What's the difference between an alligator and a crocodile?"
Rob took the book from her and flipped through it. He found a couple of pictures and began explaining the differences.
Casey watched him as he smiled and talked to her daughter. One thing was for sure. If he had been an abused child, there was no sign of it now, and she was glad of that.
Chapter 25
Howland went immediately down to Romain's office. The door was closed, but Howland didn't bother to knock. When he opened it, he automatically stepped back, being greeted by a haze of gray smoke.
He fanned the smoke away and peered inside. Romain was sitting at the desk, his feet propped up on the writing arm that slid out on the right side. He was not, at the moment, smoking. He was simply staring up at the ceiling, as if the answer to some question might be written there.
"I've got something," Howland said.
"Did it come to you in a dream?" Romain said, swinging his feet to the floor and turning to face the doorway.
"It's nothing like that," Howland said. "It's a supposition, but it's based on facts."
Romain frowned. "In that case, you might as well come on in. The door's open, anyway."
Howland entered the office and took a seat. "Doesn't all this smoke ever bother you?" he said.
"No," Romain said. He wasn't going to explain to anyone that the cigarettes provided him with a smoke screen that kept most people away. Howland was just more persistent than most people. "And you forgot to close the door."
"I didn't forget," Howland said. "I thought it might be nice to be able to breathe while we talked."
"Hmph," Romain said. "All right, we'll leave it open, though I prefer the confidentiality of having it closed. You never know who's walking down the hallway listening for gossip."
Howland knew that Romain was right, but it was really stuffy in the office today. The air conditioner couldn't deal with the smoke. If there had been a smoke alarm in the place, it would have been beeping.
"Go ahead," Romain said. "Tell me what it is that you've got."
Howland told him.
Romain was less than enthusiastic. "Even if what you're saying is true, what good does it do you?"
That was something Howland hadn't thought about. He had been so excited about finding a common feature among the murdered women that he hadn't really considered the practical aspects of it.
When he thought about it, he realized that there weren't any.
"I guess we can't warn every woman in Houston with a mole or a birthmark or a scar on her face to be on the lookout for a killer," he said. "Damn. I thought I was onto something."
"You probably are,"' Romain said. "It may be that the killer is repelled by women with a facial disfigurement, no matter how small. It tells us something about him, but it doesn't really help us warn any of his future victims."
"What does it tell us about him?" Howland said. With the door open, the air was getting better in the office already. Much of the smoke was being sucked out into the hall.
"Well, there again we have a little problem," Romain said. "It's hard to say exactly what it tells us, beyond what we already know."
"Wait a minute," Howland said. "What did we already know?"
"That he’s hostile toward women," Romain said. "I thought that went without saying."
"I wish you'd said it anyway," Howland told him. "I suppose I assumed it, though. So what else do we know? Besides the bit about facial disfigurement."
Romain couldn't resist getting out a cigarette and lighting up. He held it between his thumb and forefinger and took a puff.
"We don't know anything. But we might go on the assumption that something was done to him at some point in his life by a woman with some sort of facial disfigurement."
"What sort?" Howland wanted to know.
Romain of course disappointed him. "It's impossible to say. It could be anything. He hasn't exactly restricted himself to women with one kind of mark, has he? It would've been easier if he had."
"Yeah," Howland said. "And we would've spotted it a lot quicker."
"You might consider this, too," Romain said. "Since he's done everything else right, he might very well be varying his victims to throw us off the track. If so, he's been successful."
"Goddammit," Howland said. "I thought I had something, but there's nothing here even to go to the Chief with. Much less the newspapers."
"I wouldn't even think about the newspapers," Romain said. "The Chief's another matter."
"Why?"
"I think he might be interested in the fact that you're making progress. It's more solid than hypnosis and dreams."
Howland hadn't told the Chief about that, either, but he had been thinking that he would. He owed the Chief a report.
"You're probably right," he said. "I'll give him what I've got. If we went to the newspapers, every woman in Houston would panic."
"Probably," Romain said. "But it would do wonders for the sale of cosmetics."
Howland went back to something Romain had said earlier. "What might have been done to this guy by a woman?"
"Anything," Romain said. "It's really useless to speculate in a case like this. However . . . " His voice trailed off.
"What?" Howland said. "Come on, Romain. Let's have it."
Romain mashed out his cigarette. The ashtray was overflowing, and Rowland wondered if it had been emptied the previous evening or if Romain was just smoking more.
"In a number of cases of serial killers," Romain said, "there's been a history of child abuse. Not in all of them, not by any means, but in a significant number."
"So what does that tell us?"
"Nothing, really, except that I was just thinking. What if the killer's mother had a birthmark, a scar, something like that—a prominent one? And what if he had been severely abused? That might explain the pattern that you've discovered."
