Sarah Armstrong: Singularity Part 4

Morning grew into afternoon, and Garrity stood beside me as we worked, pulling up the information on each case, splitting them up into two piles. He would follow up on one; the other would be my responsibility. Before long, I found myself wondering about him. Why had he stood up for me against Scroggins? That hadnt been my experience with FBI agents. They tended to stick together, forming a united front against local police. Distracted as I was, my hands hesitated on the keyboard, and I found Garrity looking quizzically at me, waiting for me to begin again. Embarra.s.sed and annoyed with myself, I refocused on the job at hand. Yet in the quicksand that was fast becoming this case, I wondered if Garrity could be trusted.

By late morning, wed called departments throughout the state investigating ViCAPs laundry list of unsolved murders. On each, wed compiled a list of the essentials: names and locations of the victims, any telltale clues that suggested one or another of the cold cases could be tied to the Galveston murders. Slow, tedious work.

There were similarities: a garage mechanic stabbed to death in his backyard and left hunched over an old Buick he was in the process of restoring, an elderly minister discovered murdered in the church sanctuary, the six-year-old murder of a woman who had been found nude in the bathtub with her throat slit. Each time, we quizzed the officers whod handled the investigations. Each time, we came up dry. None of the MOs were similar enough to our case to suggest a connection.

"What about this one?" I asked, at three that afternoon.

I pointed at a case on Garritys list, one hed drawn a star next to. The victim: an elderly woman murdered in Bardwell, an East Texas town cut out of the rich expanse of forests and swamps collectively known as the Big Thicket. Garritys summary was brief: no apparent means of entry into the womans house; nothing had been taken. What caught my eye was his notation two knife wounds on chest.

"The sheriff wasnt in to answer questions, and no one in the office seemed to know much about the case. I got the info on the chest wounds from the courthouse secretary. But thats the closest I came to a probable match," he said. "You up for a drive east?"

Seven.

The drive to Bardwell took about two hours. I parked the Tahoe in front of an aging stone mansion surrounded by oaks trailing heavy, ruffled shreds of Spanish moss. Decades earlier it had been converted into a combination county a.s.sessors office and sheriffs department. Sheriff Tom Broussard had delayed his dinner to meet with us, curious that a Texas Ranger and an FBI agent needed his help.

"Yup, Louise Fontenot was a good old woman. People in this town were mighty upset by her murder," said Broussard, chewing a plug of tobacco that stained the corners of his mouth and made his right cheek bulge. Every so often he paused and spit into a dented Sprite can. "Her family was one of the originals around here. Pioneers. She didnt deserve to go that way."

At the time of her death, Louise had been eighty-six years old. In the photo he showed us, she wore a flowered cotton housedress, her white hair permed into tight curls, her gla.s.ses too wide for her narrow face. A tightness about her features gave her a pinched, spinsterish look. Shed been found nude, her throat cut, in her bedroom. There were wounds on the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet that the county coroner, most days the local family pract.i.tioner, described as puncture marks. The "two knife wounds on her chest" formed a cross.

With that, Sheriff Broussard drove us out to the old Fontenot place, a deserted frame house that backed up to the woods on the outskirts of town. The yellow paint was faded, and the plastic holly wreath on the front door drooped from sun and weather. Strands of multicolored lights entangled a small bush next to the front door. Louise had been murdered fifteen months earlier, two days before Christmas.

Inside, the house looked as if its owner had just stepped out. Her furniture remained in place, and her cane leaned against a wall. The old womans Bible waited on a lamp table next to what was undoubtedly her favorite chair, its back covered by a crocheted doily.

"Louise was the last of her family in these parts," explained the sheriff. "For a long time, n.o.body could agree on what to do with her stuff. The county attorney said no one had a right to touch any of it-until the property taxes were left unpaid and the county seized the place, but thered been talk about going through and seeing if anything was right for the local history room at the library. The taxes came due about six months ago giving the go-ahead, but the museum ladies havent gotten around to it yet. I think theyre spooked about even walking in this place."

"Is that how the killer got in?" I asked, pointing at a boarded-up window.

"No. Were not sure how he got in. We think maybe through an open window in the back bedroom, although we couldnt find any footprints or fingerprints to confirm that," the sheriff said. "Teenagers broke that, months after the killing. Theyre the only ones not afraid of ghosts, I guess. They used the house to smoke pot after school, until we ran them off."

"Sarah," David called. "Come take a look."

I found him in the bedroom, standing next to the bed. On the wall above the tarnished metal headboard was a b.l.o.o.d.y cross, a smaller version of the one wiped onto the wall above the tortured, murdered bodies in Galveston.

"Is this where the body was found?" David asked, pointing at the bed.

"Thats it," said the sheriff. "Funny thing, nothing was taken, not even the fifty dollars she had in her billfold."

"How was she positioned?"

"In bed, flat on her back, the covers folded real neat at her feet," he said. "The killer tied her ankles together and her hands. He had her hands propped up, on top her chest. When we walked in the room, it looked like she was praying."

"Anything else strike you as odd?" I asked.

"Well, one thing," he said, smacking the corner of his lips and tapping the straw cowboy hat he held against his thigh.

"And that was?" I nudged.

"The telephone was smack on top of her chest."

"The phone?"

"Yup," said Sheriff Broussard.

"What did you make of that?" David asked.

"Didnt know what to make of it except..."

"Except what?" I prodded.

"Folks around here thought it was pretty strange with the way old Ms. Fontenot was, thats all," he said, this time antic.i.p.ating our next question. "Its not a pleasant thing to talk bad about the dead, but the fact is Louise Fontenot was the town gossip. She was always on that d.a.m.n phone talking bad about somebody."

David and I glanced at each other.

"And this was well known in town?"

"This was well known in the county," said the sheriff. "Anytime anybody had anything going on that they didnt want their neighbors to know, they did their best to hide it from Miss Fontenot. Anytime I wanted information out, like that if the kids didnt stop smoking in the big oak tree behind the high school, that I was considering raiding the place, I just let it slip while I was talking to Louise. Less than a day and everyone in town had heard about it and no more worries about the school catching fire from a cigarette b.u.t.t."

"Was Louise talking, gossiping about anyone in particular in the weeks before the murder?" I asked.

"Not that I remember."

"Anybody disappear from town around the time she died?"

"Not that we could tell," he answered. "We thought of that and made a canva.s.s, a deputy and me, but we didnt find anybody noticeable gone. The thing is, around here a lot of people live back in the woods and people dont see them much. That and we have a lot of migrants and the like. Its not the kind of thing where we can really keep track of people."

"Any evidence the killer hung around after the murder?" I asked.

"I considered that possibility," he said. "There were wet towels in the bathroom, and it looked like maybe he cleaned up right here in the house before he took off. He was careful though. We closed the house up and had the forensics people come in from Beaumont P.D. They didnt find a thing."

David glanced over at me and I knew what he was thinking. With the cross, the positioning of the body, and the similarities in the victims wounds, we hadnt needed more, but here, too, the killer had taken his time on the murder scene, then meticulously cleaned up all evidence. It was another piece of the puzzle that fit perfectly, as well as further evidence of our killers bravado. This guy wasnt spooked. Dead body in the next room and the killer hung around and made himself presentable.

It was past eight when we finished at the house. The sheriff went home, and David and I found the only non-fast-food place in town, a small dimly lit restaurant with wood tables and a lunch counter. Someone, it seemed, had apparently put a couple rolls of quarters in the jukebox and a George Strait marathon was playing over the tinny speakers.

David ordered a brisket sandwich. When it came, it dripped with a sweet barbecue sauce and shared the plate with mayonnaise-and-mustard potato salad and a pickle. Id been meaning to start watching my cholesterol but ordered the chicken-fried steak. Together with mashed potatoes and white gravy, it hung over the chipped white plate like a bedspread over a mattress. The gravy had all the finesse of Elmers glue, which left me nibbling at the peas and carrots. I ordered a s.h.i.+ner Bock and figured that gave me enough calories for the night.

"Weve got two murdered adulterers and a gossip," I said, putting into words what I knew wed both been thinking. "So weve got a murderer on a mission from G.o.d, placed on earth to smite the sinners?"

"Undoubtedly, tells himself he is," said Garrity as he consumed the last fork of potato salad and got ready to start on a bowl of apple cobbler in a puddle of half-melted vanilla ice cream. Hed chosen one of the two wine choices the place offered, the red one, although it actually looked more pink. "Of course, the truth is that hes just a pathetic loser carting around a lifetime of anger, of not fitting in, and a twisted perversion that mixes s.e.xual fantasy with an obsession for power and violence," he said. "What do we know so far?"

"Not much. The guy is blond and most likely white, probably twenty-five or younger," I said, based on the found hairs and national profiling statistics. "My guess is hes from somewhere around here. He had to have known of Louise to know she was a gossip. Lucas and Knowles, on the other hand; he would have known she wasnt his wife just by following either one of them for any period of time. He could even have come to that conclusion from the photo of Priscilla and the kids on the nightstand."

"Anything else?"

"These arent his only victims," I ventured. "This guys enjoying it too much to wait more than a year in between."

"Good point," he said. "Weve done the ViCAP search, though. Its hard to understand why more victims arent coming up."

"True," I said. "But Id be willing to bet a months pay that theyre out there."

David nodded. He concentrated on the cobbler, sc.r.a.ping out the last of the ice cream with his spoon, and then glanced up at me across the table.

"I know I didnt mention this before, but I knew Bill," he said. "Scroggins and I both met him in Waco."

"Garrity," I said. "You know, I remember..." Suddenly David Garritys name surfaced in my memory. Bill ranting and raving about the FBI, complaining that theyd taken over the scene. He was irate with Scroggins, but sometimes he mentioned an agent named Garrity. Bill respected him. Once he paid him what, coming from Bill, was the highest compliment: Bill called Garrity a good cop.

"Those were long days and nights in Waco. Bill and I got to know each other a bit. We talked about you, Sarah," David continued. "He said that there wasnt a string of clues you couldnt crack."

"Bill was one of a kind," I said.

"Whats it been now?" Garrity asked. I didnt need to ask what he meant.

"Bill died a year ago last month," I said.

"Im sorry," he said. "Must be rough."

"Yeah," I said. "It is."

"Write This Down" came on the jukebox, Strait crooning to a heavy country beat, reminding his lover of the place she holds in his heart. It was a favorite of Bills, and one we danced to often. I used the music as an excuse to close my eyes. Before long I was swaying a little in time with the song, and when I opened my eyes, Garrity was smiling at me. It was beginning to appear that he found me a continuing source of amus.e.m.e.nt. Embarra.s.sed, I waved at the waitress. In no time, shed slapped down a second bottle of beer.

"Kind of nice that were off duty," Garrity said.

"As off duty as two cops on a case ever get," I said.

"Thats true, but, well, I was thinking," he said, with a soft, nervous chuckle. "There are things I need to learn if Im going to live down here. I mean, I hear things are different."

I stifled an urge to laugh. Nearly every Yankee Id ever met had a preconceived notion about Texas that included cowboys, oil wells, and characters out of that old movie Deliverance. The truth is, they were partially right; we have some of all three, especially the oil wells. Still... "Well, you have entered a foreign country," I replied in my best Texas drawl, deciding to play along. "We Texans are pretty particular. You dont fit in; we may not let you stay. Some of us arent too partial to foreigners. Wed rather all of you packed up and went home."

"Ive heard that," Garrity said, laughing softly, this time without the uneasiness, and I laughed along with him. The beer was going down smooth, and it felt good to unwind after a long day.

"Well then," he ventured. "Under those circ.u.mstances, Id say its your responsibility to teach me to fit in. You dont want your partner, even a temporary one, standing out like a dairy cow in a field of longhorn steers."

"Whatve you got in mind?" I asked. When he didnt answer right away, I suggested, "You know, I could teach you the UT fight song?"

Personally, I thought I was highly entertaining, but this time, Garrity didnt laugh. Instead he reached across the table and covered my hand with his-thick, solid, and warm.

"Lets dance," he said, standing up and trying to nudge me to my feet beside him.

This was something I hadnt expected. I hadnt danced since Bill died. Drawing my hand away, I said, "You know, theres no dance floor, and I dont think..."

"Well just get a couple of these tables out of the way," he said, doing just that, the table legs making a chalk-on-a-blackboard screech as he pushed them across the wood floor. The place smelled of beer, cooking grease, and decades of cigarette smoke.

"Now I know how to dance, but I hear you do it differently down here," he said, again slipping his hand over mine, gently pulling me toward him. "Come on. Help an old Yank out."

He was watching me, and I felt my face grow warm.

"I dont need any sympathy dances," I said, shaking my head.

"Sympathy dance?" He sighed. "Lieutenant, Id consider this a personal favor. What if I have to work undercover in a Texas dance hall? How will I fit in if I cant two-step?"

I thought for a minute, listening to Straits crooning fill the darkened room. "Why not?"

I stood up and put Garritys right hand on my waist, then wrapped my left arm under and behind him. He took my right palm in his outstretched hand. I waited a minute, and then eased into the strong beat of the music with a quick step forward with my right foot, following it with my left. Then two slides, left, left, with a pause. Garrity bobbled, and we repeated across the dance floor. He had a strong, athletic body, and he moved well, catching on quickly. Before long, he took the lead. Halfway through the song, he pulled me closer. For just a second I tensed, but I didnt pull away. I wanted to remember the heavy sweetness of a mans smell, and the tug of a strong arm gently riding just above my hip.

After our dance, we paid our check and left. David talked on the walk to the motel, but I barely listened. Once there, I hurriedly said good night, agreeing to meet him at my Tahoe at six the next morning. I settled into my room at the Easy Street Motel, with its sagging bed and a nightstand that someone had leveled with the aid of a frayed book of matches, as thoughts of Bill crashed about me. I wished that I could see him, talk to him, one last time. What would I say? That I loved him? Bill knew that, just as I knew without question that he loved me. I pulled on the chain, extinguis.h.i.+ng the only light, and crawled into bed wearing the nights.h.i.+rt from the spare bag I kept in the truck, when it occurred to me that if I had one last chance to be with Bill, Id say nothing. Instead, Id hold him in my arms for every second G.o.d gave me.

Eight.

My hand reached for the telephone before my mind acknowledged the ringing. The sun was just barely up.

"Armstrong here," I said.

"Its Scroggins," the voice said. "I couldnt reach Garrity. Is he there with you?"

Still groggy, I didnt immediately answer. I started to stutter, "No," but it was too late. Scroggins was already laughing.

"I hear those Quantico guys are fast movers, but this has to be a record," he said, still chuckling.

"Hes not..." Then I realized a denial would only do more damage. "What do you want? Its not even six."

"I thought wed give you a heads-up," he said. "Nelson and I are bringing in Priscilla Lucas this morning."

"Youre what?"

"You heard me," he said, his voice thick with self-satisfaction. "We talked to the Galveston D.A. late last night. He says weve got enough to arrest her. The b.i.t.c.h has lawyered up. With the neighbors ID of her as the woman Knowles argued with the night before the murders, weve got more than suspicions. Plus, we found another one of Knowless neighbors who swears he saw the widow Lucas knocking on the dead mistresss door on at least one other occasion."

"Thats not enough to-"

"Theres more," he said, his voice ringing with excitement. "Get this. We pulled her bank records. Three days before the murders, Lucas withdrew a hundred grand in cash from her personal account. We asked her lawyer for an explanation. Guy practically choked when he had to tell us that his client said it was a personal matter."

I pulled myself up and sat on the edge of the bed. This was serious.

"Ted, I know it looks bad for Mrs. Lucas," I said, straining to shake off sleep and gather my thoughts. "But Garrity and I found another murder using the same MO out here in East Texas. Everything about these murders points to a serial killer. Youve got to be careful here. The Lucas family isnt the only one with connections. Priscilla Lucas has not only three kids youll be putting through unnecessary h.e.l.l but her own money and influence. Her father, Bobby Barker, and his lawyers will have you for lunch if youre wrong. This could come back to haunt you, big time."