Chapter 11

He checked his equipment one last time. It was ten o’clock. Almost time to leave. One last trip to the bathroom. Careful visual check of his appearance. Neat, and clean, but not too slick. Hair washed and shiny but curls a little tousled. Clean shaven, no cuts, no funny shine to his skin from too much attention or shaving lotion. He practiced his pleasant and open smile one last time in the mirror, and then turned abruptly and headed for the garage. As he backed out slowly and carefully, he saw the young woman who lived next door, out for a walk with her infant in a stroller. He smiled and waved. “How’s Ginny?” she called.

“Getting much better,” he said, with warmth and sincerity. He liked that ring of truth in his tone. But he’d better not let this bitch hold him up. He hadn’t allowed for too many delays. He reversed onto the street and pulled away, a little faster than usual. The streets were strangely quiet for a Friday morning.

He pulled into the spot he had chosen the day before. 10:25. He slowly arranged his equipment where it would be needed then began his careful hunt. There were fewer people than he would have expected. The weather was good for operating; there should have been young housewives out for walks between the development and the mall. No problem, though. He had allotted himself an hour before the lunch-hour rush from the local school made maneuvering impossible. The window on the passenger side was open, and his sharp ears strained for the right sort of sound. Far-off voices were merely an irritation to be classified and discounted. Then, coming up the footpath he heard the unmistakable sound of steps—one set, perhaps light enough to be the right sort.

She was panting from the effort of her rapid climb up from the river and grabbed a branch to pull herself up the last couple of feet to the sidewalk. She stopped for a minute to scrape the mud off her shoes and wipe the sweat from her forehead, looked back down the path a second, and started along the sidewalk. Her way was almost blocked by a pleasant but puzzled-looking young man, leaning on the open door of his shiny new van, squinting at a road map in his hand. “Excuse me, miss, but do you have any idea where Hawthorne Crescent is? It’s supposed to be in one of these subdivisions, but I don’t seem to be able to find it.” He waved the map slightly toward her, and she automatically stepped back a pace, but good-naturedly glanced down.

“I don’t really know the neighbourhood,” she started, “but my—” Then her quick eye caught the flash of black in his fist, and she ducked as he swung and tossed the map into the van at the same time. The blow glanced off the thick braid on the back of her head, and she reeled as he grabbed her with his left hand. He threw the pipe after the map and reached for her inert body. What he faced, however, was screaming fury. Before he could grab her free arm, a clawful of fingernails raked his cheek. He lunged for her and got only her upraised foot in his grasp just before it landed. All the while she was yelling incoherently but lustily. Her scream ended in a loud gasp as she lost her balance and fell backwards, loosening his grip on her arm, but still caught by one foot. When he looked up from the ruin of his enterprise, he suddenly realized that three people had materialized from the footpath. He let go of her foot and threw himself into the front seat of the van. In seconds he was in gear and lurching toward home. On the bridge, two people helped her gently to her feet, while the third stared after the retreating van.

In less than an hour, Sanders was standing in an interview room looking down at four robust, lively young adults in jeans and heavy sweaters. The smallest of the four, a girl with long brown hair half pinned up in a braid, looked a bit dusty and muddy, but otherwise in excellent condition. “You are”—here he glanced down at the names hastily scribbled in front of him—“Miss Karen Dodds? You are the one that—”

She nodded vigorously. “That’s right.”

“Did he hurt you?” he asked quickly. “Has she been looked at by anyone?” he said, turning to the young constable in the corner of the room.

“I’m fine,” she said. “They tried to drag me off to the hospital, but really, there’s nothing wrong with me. I fell on my backside, that’s all. I’ve done that plenty of times before.”

“I thought you said he hit her on the head,” said Sanders, turning back accusingly to the man in the corner, who reddened slightly as he opened his mouth to protest.

“He missed,” she said. “Hit my hair, that’s all. It’s probably a mess.” She automatically reached up and patted the straying braid back into place. “I saw it coming and ducked. I almost got him, too.” She flashed a triumphant smile at the large young man hovering over her. “Did you see that, Dave? If I’d had boots on instead of these things,” she said, pointing down at her running shoes, “he wouldn’t have felt much like driving off. The bastard.”

“You were very lucky, Miss Dodds. If you had been alone”—he paused to fight off the image of that lively face turned to pulp by savage pounding.

“Luck has nothing to do with it,” she said. “He’d have had some doing to pin me down in broad daylight even if the others hadn’t been there.”

Dave looked down at her in smug satisfaction. “Karen’s a great gymnast,” he said. “And a dancer. She’s fast and strong. He sure picked the wrong one this time.”

“How good a look did they get at him?” asked Sanders, turning back to the young constable in the corner.

“Pretty good sir,” he said. “We’ve put it out.” He flipped back a page or two in his notebook. “He’s taller than average—about six feet—in his twenties, light brown curly hair, medium length.”

“And he should have some pretty good scratch marks on his cheek, too,” said Karen, who looked pleased at the thought. “I think I drew blood.”

“Did you include that in the description?” asked Sanders impatiently.

“No, sir, but I will, right away.” He hurried on with his report. “And he’s driving a new van, probably North American make, light brown or tan, with a license plate number that has a nine in it.”

The other young man looked up apologetically. “By the time we realized what was happening and made sure that Karen was okay, the van was a long way down the road. But we’re pretty sure of the nine.”

“Right,” said Sanders. “We’ll get in touch when we find him. We’ll need you to identify him.”

“Do you think you’ll find him just on this?” asked Dave. “There must be thousands of vans out there.”

“Even if there are,” said Sanders, “we’ll find him.”

He sat in the garage, still trembling, clinging to the wheel of the van with sweat-slimy hands. The door had clanged shut and was firmly locked, but the safety it offered was illusory. What had happened? He hadn’t even heard the others coming up the path. He had failed again. Miserably, disgustingly. “Failed again, failed again” echoed in his skull in that thin, nasty, mocking voice that was going to drive him wild. He slowly picked up the crumpled map and smoothed it out. He studied the folds carefully and then restored it meticulously to its original shape. Clutching it in his hand, he eased himself out from behind the wheel and stepped heavily down onto the garage floor. Slowly, slowly, he locked the van door, opened the door to the house, and moved up the stairs to the kitchen. The powerful stench of rotting food seemed to make no impression on him as he walked through the room, his feet crunching on the broken glass on the floor. He picked up a box of salted crackers from the counter and walked up the stairs to the living room. In a corner the television set flickered on soundlessly and endlessly. From a table beside him, the telephone rang, and rang, and rang. His hand crept up to his right cheek. His fingers slowly measured the long red gouges running down his face until the ringing stopped. He stared, unseeing, into the far corner of the room.