The Dead and the Dying Page 17

  I stare at him, and after a moment I realize that I can't answer.

  "You were pleased," he says. "I could see it in your eyes. You couldn't wait to rip the scab off and start digging into the whole thing again."

  "The copycat is going to strike again," I reply, suddenly feeling a little tired of this game. "You know it, and I know it. There's going to be a new body, and it's going to show up soon. Nothing else matters, as long as we find this person and find her fast. The rest is all bullshit. It doesn't matter why any of us are here. It doesn't matter if we're sick little puppies on our own time. All that matters is that the killer is caught, and that's the only thing we should be focusing on." I wait for him to reply, but I can see from the look in his eyes that he knows I'm right. "Unless you've come up with any better leads," I add finally, feeling as if I'm getting my point across, "I'd suggest that we go, together, and see if this Dr. Huston woman can help us."

  We stand in silence for a moment.

  "Heads up," Dawson says eventually, glancing over at the door. "I think D-Day just hit the deck."

  Turning, I see what he means: Schumacher is coming right this way, and from the way he's got his gaze fixed on me, I'd say he's pretty unhappy. Steeling myself, I try to focus on the fact that I just need to get this over with and then go to see Dr. Huston. It's no secret in the department that Schumacher hates me, and he'll undoubtedly take this opportunity to come down on me like a ton of bricks. Still, I've faced his wrath before and I can face it again. The guy doesn't scare me. In fact, in a way, he kind of amuses me.

  "I'll come to your funeral," Dawson says, sounding faintly amused by the whole thing.

  "Thanks," I mutter, feeling a shiver pass through my body. The truth is, my funeral might come a lot sooner than anyone around here is expecting.

  "Mason," Schumacher says firmly as he pushes the door open, "get in my office. Now."

  "I was just -"

  "My office! Now!" He turns to Dawson. "I thought you understood that I was to be informed as soon as she came into the building?"

  "I was just about to get onto it," he replies.

  "Come on," Schumacher says, standing aside to let me out into the corridor. "I've had enough of your bullshit, Mason. You've gone too far this time and we're gonna put a stop to it. Permanently. I've already got the forms printed up, you just need to sign them."

  I glance over at Dawson and see the worried look on his face. Schumacher's raked me over the coals before, but there have never been forms to sign. Taking a deep breath and forcing a smile onto my lips, I step past Schumacher and start walking toward his office. Something tells me that this isn't going to be the most pleasant meeting of my life. Frankly, this is the one time I actually wish my mind was a little fuzzy.

  Dr. Alice Huston

  "I don't have it," Paula says as she leads me into her bedroom. It's a squalid little building, typical of the kind of rundown hellhole that students live in all over the city. "I swear to God, I don't have Sam Gazade's diary."

  "I think you do," I reply calmly, watching as Paula walks over to her desk and starts looking in the drawers. She's so preoccupied, she doesn't notice as I take the diary from my coat pocket and toss it onto her bed. It's only a matter of time before she notices it, and when she does, the deception will be complete. In a way, I feel sorry for her, but there's no room here for sympathy. She's basically just a cog in my machine.

  "Where would I get Sam Gazade's diary from," she says, sounding a little uncertain as she turns to me. "I read about that thing. Most people don't even think that it exists."

  "Then what's it doing on your bed?" I ask.

  Looking down at the sheets, she spots the diary and, for a moment, she seems to be completely frozen. I'm not surprised, since she's having to rapidly come to terms with the fact that she's been doing all these things without remembering any of them.

  "Do you mind if I take a look?" I ask, reaching down and picking the diary up. It's been a couple of months since I first tracked the thing down, and it's lost none of its power to amaze. It was in these pages, twelve years ago, that Gazade wrote down detailed explanations of every murder he'd committed, as well as every murder he was planning. The man was extremely well organized, and the diary would have answered many of the questions asked by the police, if only they'd ever managed to find the damn thing. Instead, they assumed it wasn't real and gave up looking.

  "I've never seen that before," Paula says, her voice trembling with fear.

  "You don't remember going to the Lark Bermuda Hotel a month or two ago and searching through each of the rooms until you found it?" I ask. The truth is, I'm the one who went to that rundown little place and found the diary, but I need Paula to believe that she was responsible for all these things.

  She shakes her head.

  "What about the first murder? Do you remember killing Edward Hunter? Do you remember using Sam Gazade's diary to copy his actions?"

  "I didn't kill anyone," she says quietly, even though I can tell she's doubting herself.

  "And Patrick Donnelly? You don't remember killing him? Or Sam Pressman?" I wait for her to say something, but it's as if she's on the verge of a complete breakdown. I need to judge this carefully, so that she walks the tightrope but doesn't fall into the chasm of her own fear and insanity. "You don't remember consulting the diary as if it's your bible?"

  "I've never even touched it before," she says, with tears running down her cheeks.

  "Of course you have," I reply, holding the diary. "How else did it get into your room? It's quite an achievement, Paula. You should be proud of yourself. Even Joanna Mason, purportedly one of the smartest cops in town, apparently gave up on the search for this thing. You must be an extremely intelligent young woman to have tracked it down. A lot of very, very intelligent people tried to do the same thing, and they failed. It must have taken an absolute genius to come up with the answer. Tell me, what was the code?"

  "I don't know," she replies, taking the diary and turning it over in her hands as if it's some kind of strange, alien object. "I swear -"

  "Where was the diary?"

  "I don't know."

  "How did the code work?"

  "I don't know," she says again, with tears in her eyes. "I swear, this wasn't in my room before today. I've never even seen it before -"

  "Do you think the police would believe you?" I ask. "Do you think they'd accept your claim that it just turned up without your knowledge? Or do you think they'd start looking into your movements? They'd work out what you've been doing, Paula. I don't mean to offend you, but it's very obvious that you've got problems. It's in your eyes, and the way you talk. You haven't had an easy life, have you? I can tell that you're in pain, Paula. Perhaps you were never given the support you needed."

  I wait a moment, watching as she flicks through the pages of the diary. It's the first time she's ever held the damn thing, of course, but I need her to believe that she's been using it to plan her murders. I've got a shock lined up for her later today, and it's vital that I've got her completely on my side by then. Fortunately, she seems to be warming to my claims more quickly than I ever could have imagined. She must be even more fragile than I'd anticipated.

  "How could I kill people and not remember?" she whimpers, with tears rolling down her cheeks. "I know there's something wrong with me, but how could I forget that I'm evil? You can't do that kind of thing and then just walk away as if it didn't happen! I'd feel it! I'd know!"

  "You're not evil," I say, walking over and putting an arm around her shoulder. "Never think like that, Paula. Who taught you to have such a low opinion of yourself? Your mother? Your father? Society?" I wait for her to reply, but she seems to be lost in her tears. Taking the diary from her hands, I put it in my pocket before giving her a hug. "You're a lot of things, Paula," I continue, "but you're not evil. You're not alone, either. I'm here, and I'm going to help you. You don't have to do these things by yourself anymore."

  She holds me tight, and it
's clear that I've got her under complete control.

  "Tell me one thing," I say. "Tell me why you think you did all of this? Why would someone like you decide to copy the murders of a misogynistic serial killer like Sam Gazade?"

  She continues to sob for a moment, before pulling away from me and wiping her eyes. "I don't know," she says softly. "I have no idea why I'd start killing people. I've thought about it in the past, but something seems to have changed recently. Something's different. Gazade... I've been reading about him, for an essay. Or at least, that's what I thought I was doing."

  "You're losing control," I reply.

  "I'm on these," she says, picking up the pill packets from the side of her bed. "My doctor prescribed them for anxiety and depression, and I think for insomnia too. I kind of lost track. They've been making me feel pretty weird. Do you think they could be the reason I can't remember stuff? The doctor said there'd be some side-effects, but I never thought they could make me lose my mind."

  "It's possible," I tell her, "but I'd say the most likely explanation is still to do with your refusal or inability to recognize the truth about what you've been doing." I watch as, with trembling hands, she puts the pill packets back on the table. "Tell me," I continue, "how have you been different lately? Have you noticed anything new about your personality?"

  "I'm angrier," she continues. "I try to hold back, but there's this searing hatred that I can't stop. It's like I hate the world. I hate everyone. Every time I go outside, I want to make people understand what they're doing wrong, but they all just keep going, as if they think they're doing the right thing."

  "You want to make them see themselves," I suggest. "You want to make them see their stupidity and ugliness. Particularly the men. They're always the worst."

  "I want to change the world," she continues. "I want to make it a better place, but to do that, I need all those idiots to just..." She pauses, as if she's so exasperated, she can't find the right words. "I want them to recognize their flaws. I want them to stop making me feel as if I'm the one who's wrong. Right now, I swear, I feel like I'm going to lose my mind."

  "Maybe that's a perfectly sane response," I point out. "The world's a damaged and dangerous place, Paula. It's filled with people who deserve nothing more than a painful death. People who contribute nothing but pain and violence. I can't help but think that all these emotions you're feeling - anger and pain and sadness - are a perfectly appropriate response to our insane society." After a moment, I lean down and kiss the top of her head, just as a reassuring reminder that I'm here for her. "You're not a monster, Paula. You're just someone who sees the world for what it is. Believe me, I know how hard to can be to have total clarity while everyone around you is blind. In some ways, you and I are very similar. It's lucky that we recognized one another. People like us usually have to go through this world alone."

  "I never wanted to start killing people," she says after a moment. "I still don't remember doing it. I'm still not even sure that I did anything."

  "It's easy once you're over the line," I continue, glancing down at her bedside table and seeing the various prescription drugs she's been taking. She's on a real cocktail of uppers and downers, which means it should be easy to make her question her own perceptions. "The hard part is making that first, trembling step. That first slice. The first kill. You've done that now, Paula. You know you can do it, and you know how it feels. Once you've passed that moment, you can ever go back. You're on the dark side now, but the dark side isn't necessarily bad. You're over the line. You can't go back."

  I wait for her to say something, but she seems to be sobbing gently. She makes for a rather pitiful sight, and it's hard to believe that I was able to break her down quite so easily. She's obviously a very scared and lonely person, and a combination of her pre-existing problems and the flow of prescription drugs means that her mind is muddled and confused. I feel as if I have complete control over the way she sees not only the world, but her own mind. It's somewhat humbling to realize that I managed to attain such power without much effort, but now I need to make sure that I bind her so tightly to the cause that she's never able to break free.

  "There's something I need to show you," I say after a moment. "Something that I think might help you to embrace this new side of your personality. You've waited a long time to embrace your true destiny, but I'm going to help you, and I promise you'll never look back. You're going to come face to face with your true nature for the first time."

  Joanna Mason

  "So I figure we should just get this over with," I say as I take a seat in Schumacher's office. I'm nervous, but I'm damn well not going to show it. "I know what you're going to say, so -"

  "You don't know what I'm going to say," he replies gruffly as he sits down. A lumbering walrus of a man, Schumacher has never really made much of an effort to hide his dislike of me; the man tolerates me because he knows that I get results, but with my mind having been affected by chemotherapy drugs lately, those results have been thin on the ground. There's a danger that he thinks I'm losing my touch, in which case he might think I've become disposable. "You should try being less cocky," he adds, arranging some papers on his desk. "A little humility never hurt anyone."

  "I fucked up," I reply, taking a deep breath. "I did, and I'm sorry. It's not my fault that Sam Gazade's execution was botched, but I could have handled things differently."

  "You had no business being anywhere near the Sam Gazade case again," he says firmly. "Your emotional state is way too warped to be able to handle that guy -"

  "My emotional state?"

  "You're damaged, Jo," he continues. "After everything that Sam Gazade did to you twelve years ago -"

  "That's all over," I reply, suddenly feeling a little breathless. I swear to God, I'm no longer affected by the things Gazade did to me, but sometimes I get a strange, apprehensive sensation in my chest when his name is brought up.

  "He tortured you," Schumacher says firmly.

  I open my mouth to argue with him, but no words come out.

  "He physically and emotionally tortured you," he continues, "and you've never managed to get past that." He pauses. "Of course, it would have helped if you'd accepted counseling, but even then, I doubt anyone could get over the kind of thing that you went through. I know full well that there were things Gazade did to you that are not in any of the reports. Believe me, Jo, I sympathize. I can't imagine what it must have been like to go through that, and I wish I could wave a magic wand and make it so none of that stuff happened."

  "I'm fine," I reply, still feeling breathless. I'm not sure if it's nerves, or the mention of Gazade, or some kind of delayed reaction to the drugs, but my chest is feeling tight. Even though I've stopped taking my pills, I'm fully aware that my body is still very much messed-up, which means that I can never be sure what's happening in there. It's as if someone gave control of my vital organs to a madman.

  "He tortured you for two days," Schumacher replies. "Two days of pain. Two days of thinking you were going to die. That's not the kind of thing that ever goes away." He sighs. "I blame myself. As soon as Dawson mentioned that there might be a link between the new murders and the Sam Gazade case, I should have known that you'd go piling in at full speed. I should have made more of an effort to keep you distracted -"

  "You make me sound like a child," I reply stiffly.

  Without replying, he slides one of the pieces of paper toward me.

  "I'm not signing anything," I say, staring at the paper with a growing sense of unease.

  "This document confirms that you acknowledge your role in the events at the prison. By signing, you'll be formally accepting a written and verbal reprimand that will be entered into your file."

  "No."

  "You'll also be required to apologize to Governor Lockley in person, without a hint of sarcasm or irony, and without having your damn fingers crossed behind your back."

  "No way."

  "If you refuse to accept the terms of this reprimand,
" he continues, "I'll be forced to put you on permanent leave." He pauses for a moment, fixing me with a determined stare that seems a lot more serious than the usual tellings-off that I get when I'm hauled into his office. "This is bigger than the department, Joanna. There are senior people in the local government who want to hang you out to dry. Believe me, this arrangement wasn't easy to strike. Governor Lockley has very generously agreed -"

  "Governor Lockley can very generously agree to kiss my ass," I reply, interrupting him. "She's the one who ran that prison so close to the bone that they didn't have any back-up supplies. She's the one who dropped the vial. Hell, she's the one who was actively impeding my attempt to speak to the prisoner -"

  "I don't give a crap," he says firmly. "For what it's worth, I've spoken to Dawson and I'm pretty sure you're telling the truth. This isn't about truth, though. It's about extracting you from a mess, so Joanna, please, just sign the goddamn piece of paper, apologize to Governor Lockley, and then get on with your work." He pauses for a moment. "What case are you on right now, anyway? You never file paperwork these days. You just -"

  "I'm going to need some time off," I say suddenly, shocking myself. I knew I'd have to make a request eventually, and I was dreading the moment, but I certainly wasn't planning on saying anything today.

  He stares at me. "You have holiday time coming next -"

  "For medical reasons," I add.

  He pauses, and I can tell that he knows this is serious. After all, Schumacher knows that I'm not the kind of person to just take off unless there's a damn good reason. "So here's a deal," I continue. "You give me a couple of months off, unpaid if necessary, while I... resolve my medical issues. In return, I don't give a crap what you tell the media of Governor Lockley or anyone. Tell them you've suspended me, tell them you're being tough and cracking down on my bad behavior. I don't care. Whatever. And then I'll come back, and everything'll be okay again."

  "You know that anything you tell me will be held in the strictest confidence," he replies after a moment. "If you're sick -"