Mortal Fear (58 page)

The Explorers parked behind the superintendents office.

Thats a hundred yards away.

Im going to leave my guitar here.

She squeezes my hand, hard. Shouldnt we take it with us? Try to act casual and get as far as we can? You can drop it if we have to run.

We have to run
now
. He could be fifteen yards away, between us and the truck. Take three or four deep breaths, then break for it when I do. Watch the ground, not the building. Dont trip.

Should I hold your hand?

No. If he chases us, Ill stay behind you. Dont look back. If he jumps up in front of us, Ill have to try to kill him. You keep running.

Harper

Keep running
. My thirty-eight is under the drivers seat. Thats the only way you can help me if I have to fight. Here are the keys.

Oh.

Take them. God, I wish your father was still here. Wed kill that son of a bitch right now. Okay, get ready. One, two

Were off without ever saying go, flying across the grass like locust shells blasted before a prairie wind. With every step I see Berkmanns powerful body rising from behind a gravestone, scalpel in hand, moving with the speed and inevitability of nightmares. I pump my legs furiously, willing Drewe faster as in my mind Berkmann
angles toward her, me running to get between them but not making it as he plunges the scalpel into her stomach

The superintendents office is closer, maybe fifty yards. I hold back, giving Drewe the lead, pivoting my head as I try to scan 360 degrees of threat, knowing he can see me, that he can pick his moment

Harper!

Drewe is down. Something tripped her and laid her out hard on a flat stone the length of a coffin. I yank her up, still looking frantically around us. She cradles one elbow as if its broken.

Can you run?

Go! she gasps.

I start to run, but she jerks me to a stop. The keys!

She darts back to the gravestone and begins scouring its surface like someone searching for a contact lens.

Drewe?

Ive got them! Go!

Even as the ranks of stones tighten around us, we pick a sure path through them, dodging the little bronze-roofed markers that read Perpetual Care. They might as well be land mines. Were five yards from the office when a dark-haired man in a tan jacket steps out from behind it.

Drewe shrieks and cuts to the right. With adrenaline spurting like hydraulic fluid into my limbs, I empty my lungs in a savage scream and charge. The man shouts my name and brings up one hand, but I see only his throat. I pounce like a wildcat, both hands throttling him as he tumbles backward. The impact knocks out his wind, and I pummel his face with three quick rights before he can recover. Fury and fear flash in his eyes as blood from his broken nose fills the orbits. Feeling him going limp beneath me, I push off his chest with both hands, scramble to my feet, and sprint the last few yards to the back of the superintendents office.

Drewe is already inside the Explorer. A sharp thump startles methen I realize she just unlocked the doors. I leap into the drivers seat as she clambers across the console to the passenger side. In one continuous motion I crank the engine, throw it into gear, and hit the gas. The
tires spin wildly on the gravel before they catch, and we hurtle forward onto the narrow asphalt lane as though shot from a catapult.

Was it him? yells Drewe, gulping air.

Get down! The Explorer is doing fifty through the headstones and still accelerating.

Was it him?

I dont know!

You dont know?

It looked like him!

Did you kill him?

I shake my head, trying to keep us on course and watch the rearview mirror at the same time. I hurt him enough to get past him.

Drewe slumps down in the seat and begins probing her elbow joint. Maybe it wasnt him, she says, her breathing ragged. I mean, anybody could have dropped those glasses.

Into her grave? No. Hes here.

You dont know that. I think you didnt kill him because you werent sure.

As the Explorer rockets through the cemetery gate and onto the highway, one image fills my mind: two tall, stunningly dressed and coiffed young women at the edge of the burial crowd, and beside them, a gray-hatted man wearing sunglasses.

Hes here, Drewe. He wants to kill us.

So why didnt he?

I dont know.

From the cemetery I drove straight to Sheriff Buckners office in Yazoo City. I answered Drewes questions about Berkmann as best I could without revealing the existence of the videotape. I told her who he was, that the FBI had identified him with Miless help, and that Miles had sent me a picture of him via computer. The fact that Drewes early theories about the case had proved to be so accurate gave her little solace. She seemed bent on convincing herselfand methat Berkmann had died in the plane crash.

Sheriff Buckner had attended Erins burial, but when Drewe and I were ushered into his office we found him eating a shrimp poboy with his feet propped on his desk. He started shaking his head the moment he saw me. Before I said anything, he wiped tartar sauce off his mouth, put down his sandwich, stood, and paid Drewe his respects. Then he looked at me and said, I dont know whether to arrest you or give you a medal.

Buckner had just heard from the Yazoo City police chief how Bob Andersons son-in-law had gone crazy out at the cemetery and assaulted an FBI agent named Wes Killen. The agent had called 911 on a cellular phone and was now on his way to the emergency room at Kings Daughters Hospital.

While Drewe and I gaped, Buckner explained that the FBI had insisted on sending an observer to Erins funeral on the chance that her killer might show up. He got a big charge out of the fact that Id brained the FBI man before he could get to his gun, and pointed out that Erins murderer, had he been there, would probably have killed Special Agent Killen long before he was observed.

I wasnt amused by the story, but at last I understood whyif Edward Berkmann
had
been at the cemeteryhe did not kill Drewe and me. Special Agent Wes Killen didnt pull a gun on me because he knew meprobably from picturesbut he would have shot Berkmann in a heartbeat.

Sheriff Buckner listened to my sunglasses story with the sincerity of a doctor humoring a schizophrenic. He promised to look into the three out-of-towners Id noticed at the funeral, but we were clearly wasting our time. As we left, Buckner told me not to worry about the FBI agent pressing assault charges. The Bureau would never stand for the embarrassment of a public trial.

We are almost to Drewes parents house now, and Im doubting myself more with each passing mile. Whos to say someone
didnt
accidentally drop their sunglasses into the grave, then decide that retrieving them would be too embarrassing? Maybe its Berkmanns video thats got me paranoid. The shocking intensity of his personality makes it hard to accept the idea that hes dead.

When Bobs mansion comes into sight, surrounded by a visiting fleet of automobiles, Drewe says, I really do have to be there.

I know.

Looking into her lap, she shakes her head. All those damned casseroles.

I know. Erin would have hated it.

She looks sharply at me. Then, slowly, she softens her gaze. Youre right.

I decide to take a desperate gamble for normalcy. Think of the poor chickens who died to make all that tetrazzini.

Drewe backhands my chest with a stinging pop, but the hint of a smile tugs at her mouth. She knows exactly what Im feeling. A thousand sacred words and condolences are nothing compared to one throwaway line that captures something of Erins real life. We both know Erin would have hit me the same way for that joke, and Drewe acting as her surrogate brings her back to life for us, if only for an instant.

In the momentary escape from grief, Im tempted to
bring up the question that has tortured me ever since I told Drewe the truth about Holly. What about Patrick? Does she think he should be given the answer to the question that has haunted him so long? Has she already spoken to him? This is the final legacy of the secret, the last unexploded mine. But right now I dont have the nerve to probe it.

What does the house look like? Drewe asks, her voice heavy.

I scrubbed out the office. The deputies tore things up pretty bad, and it smells like tear gas, but I managed to sleep there last night.

Pull in, she says, pointing out a path through the cars blocking Bobs majestic drive.

I have to park thirty yards from the front entrance. Drewe opens the Explorers door but does not get out. Feeling a strange tingle in my chest, I reach for the ignition key and shut off the engine. She closes the door again and settles into her seat.

We sit in the muggy silence, the dead motor ticking like a half-sprung clock. Im about to suggest that we get out and talk when she says, As bad as this is, I still believe one thing. We were meant for each other. Ive always known that, and so has anyone who ever knew us.

She is looking at the windshield, not me. A hundred words pop into my head; all sound calculated and hollow.

Ive been thinking, she says, watching an elderly couple shuffle out of the entrance arch. Weve been here too long. Rain, I mean. Its too safe. I know that sounds ridiculous, considering what happened to us here. But maybe thats
why
it happened. You know? We wanted too much to go backward. To this ground where we grew up, to our families, or their memories. At last she turns to me, her eyes filled with conviction. We wont grow in this soil, Harper. Weve got to find our own place.

In these words I hear the door to my future opening. Youre my love, Drewe. You always have been. Just tell me where you want to go.

She smiles and lays a hand over mine. Give me an hour and a half. Then come back for me.

Excitement quickens my blood. Youre coming home tonight?

Yes. To pack.

Where are we going?

Were moving, Harper. Tomorrow, if not today.

Where?

Well rent a house in Jackson to start. After that, well work it out. Wherever we want. Its time to go.

I search her face for signs of doubt, but there are none. I start to get out and to walk her to the door, but she stops me by leaning over the console and kissing me on the cheek.

Make it an hour, she says.

Still flying from Drewes kiss, I pull into the parking lot of a convenience store and head for the pay phone. The Kings Daughters Hospital operator connects me with an ER nurse who eventually gets special agent Wes Killen to the phone.

I apologize before I tell Killen who I am, and again after. He listens to my explanation with professional detachment, then begins asking questions as I tell him the story of the sunglasses. He promises to have the Bureau check with the airlines for anyone resembling the New York people I saw at the funeral.

Unbelievably, Killen has to return to the cemetery and continue his vigil at Erins grave. He even criticizes himself for leaving his post long enough to get his nose patched up. After he gives me a cellular phone number I can use to reach him if I need to, I apologize once more and sign off.

Driving back to our farmhouse, I feel Im traveling a road Ive never seen before. Because it is no longer the road home. Its the road away. The road that will lead Drewe and me out of the past and into our future. The events that brought us to this point are too painful even to focus on, yet they have delivered us from ourselves. For the first time, I allow myself to believe that the demented killer who pissed into my guitar for posterity might actually be bumping along the bottom of the Mississippi River, getting nested in by catfish or ripped to pieces by gar.

When I sight a sheriffs department cruiser parked by our mailbox, it strikes me how paranoid I must seem to Sheriff Buckner. Yet as I park under the weeping willow by our porch, my anxiety returns. Heeding the old fear, I reach under the seat for my .38 and grip it tightly as I open the front door of the house.

The reek of tear gas and Clorox is still strong, and the house feels empty. In fact, it feels more like a place I once lived than the home that nurtured four generations of my family. This feeling embarrasses me, as though Ive broken faith with my maternal ancestors. Yet if my great-grandfather were alive, he would probably forgive me. He came to Mississippi from Scotland, and despite his love for this land, he understood that most primitive of truths: sometimes people have to move to survive.

I open all the windows in the house, hoping to air out some of the stink for Drewes sake. Then I get out my address book and call every bank and brokerage company with which I have an account. Balances in hand, I go to my Gateway 2000, boot up Quickenwhich I have neglected for weeksand update each account. Then I total all the balances.

The result is pretty gratifying.

My watch tells me Ill be ten minutes late picking up Drewe, given the usual twenty-minute drive to Bobs house. Picking up the keys and the .38, I trot for the front door. My hand is on the knob when the phone rings. I pause, listening for the answering machine in case its Drewe. Instead I hear the voice of Arthur Lenz.

Hello? Cole? Pick up if youre there.

Im here! I yell, sprinting back to the machine. I hit the MEMO button so that Lenzs words will be recorded, then pick up the cordless. Im listening, Doctor.

Oh. Good. Ive spoken to one of the profilers Daniel has working the EROS case. A man I trained. Im conversant with the new data on Berkmann.

And?

Ive put together my own profile.

Go.

I believe our usual classification systemorganized versus disorganized behavioris inadequate to describe
Edward Berkmann. Until recently, he did not kill from uncontrollable impulse. Nor did he develop better technique with each murder, as most killers do. He was like Mozart. From the very first crime he demonstrated genius. He not only staged murder scenes, he seemed to know our specific classification criteria and manipulated evidence accordingly, to prevent computer matches. Effectively, he had no crime signature. Super-organized would be my term of choice.

Okay.

No serial killer has functioned in society to the degree that Berkmann did. The only possible analogy would be the royal physician suspected in the Whitechapel murdersthe Jack the Ripper casebut his guilt was never proved. In terms of raw intelligence and education, Berkmann wasor isprobably superior to ninety-nine percent of the people hunting him.

Thats painfully obvious.

You actually hit on the truth that night in my car, Cole. Until recently, Berkmann was killing for a perfectly rational reason. Transplantation of human pineal tissue is theoretically possible and may have significant therapeutic effects. As a neurosurgeon, Berkmann understood that this procedure would never be developed under current experimental guidelines. He simply decided it was worth sacrificing a few lives to make the attempt. Not so long ago, mainstream American medicine made similar decisions about research using convicts.

You sound like youre defending his actions.

I merely make the point that their moral character is a separate question from their scientific defensibility. Its immaterial so far as analyzing motive, and especially in trying to predict his future behavior.

Wheres all this leading?

Berkmann saw himself as a sort of modern-day Prometheus. Defying Gods law to steal fire for mankind. Fire symbolizes freedom. Given Berkmanns background, particularly his disease, he sought the only fire modern man is still denied: freedom from death. He committed the gravest mortal sinpremeditated murderin pursuit of immortality. He undoubtedly believed that others
would eventually see him in a heroic context as well. Thats what he meant in his note, when he told us to be patient. That he would come to us when his work was done. He eventually meant to go public.

That doesnt tell me what I want to know.

Im getting to that, Lenz says, obviously annoyed at being rushed. Despite all Ive said, I now believe that Berkmann is in fact decompensatingcoming apartjust as other serial killers do. Our murderous Mozart is finally joining the ranks of the Salieris.

Why do you say that?

Because if he werent, he would not have made a single tactical mistake. As it stands, hes made several. When he learned we were hunting him, he could have gone underground, stopped his pineal work indefinitely. But he didnt. Like all egomaniacs, he took offense, became indignant, then furious. And eventually he committed a murder simply to chastise us.

Your wife.

A brief pause. Yes. You see, even though there was a rational reason for Berkmanns early murders, an underlying sexual psychosis was always at work. Like two minds working in parallel. We were both right, Cole. With the stressor of FBI pursuit, Berkmanns subconscious drive began its ascendancy.

And?

Thats the key to his future behavior. If hes still alive, of course.

How so? Whats he going to do?

It all comes down to the mother.

Catherine Berkmann?

Yes. From his oral family history, you might think the flamboyant fatherRichardwas the dominant force in Edwards life. But he wasnt. It was Catherine who seduced her brother in order to prevent the extrafamilial marriage. It was Catherine who gave birth to Edward amid shot and shell, shepherded him through hunger and privation to reach America.
She
was the anima behind his subconscious sexual urges. And she made herself felt at every EROS crime scene, even though the murders were technically committed to harvest pineal glands.

The postmortem rapes?

Exactly. Tell me, did you notice that the name Erin is fully contained within Catherine? That undoubtedly contributed to your success in drawing Berkmann, even though you knew nothing about it.