Instinct and study; love and hate; Audacity-reverence. These must mate, And fuse with Jacob's mystic heart, To wrestle with the angel-Art.
Leads were pursued and the usual suspects were arrested, held, and interrogated, but all of it netted authorities nothing. One reason local police went through this charade was to demonstrate to press and public that all that could be done was being done, but to insiders it meant a shakedown of the street lowlifes, the bottom feeders, as Sturtevante called them. It, in fact, involved such people in the search for the killer, enjoining them to keep their eyes and ears open. Everyone who maintained a street snitch put the informant on notice. Every cop in the city wanted to know anything remotely to do with the Poet Killer. However, this time around, the efforts appeared futile, or as one indelicate detective kept saying, “It didn't bear a single fruit”-pregnant pause-”cake.” No one knew anything about the Poet. Word on the street was stone silent. No one's snitch had a single useful tip. The few leads that did come out only enticed the investigators down the well-trod primrose path. And with each new wasted effort, Jessica and the others became increasingly disappointed, irritable, and frustrated.
But no one felt disappointed that the killer appeared to have taken a holiday, as the weekend passed without incident. Meanwhile the FBI had enlisted professors of English across the country to study the poems left on the backs of the victims for any clue, any sign of a possible suspect. But no one recognized the work, although some called it Ginsberg-like or a pastiche of Burroughs. It appeared that the killer fit no known profile, either as a killer or as a poet. One old professor saw the poems as existentialist in impulse, while another saw them as an example of New Age philosophy with a Jungian twist. Another saw them as descendants of Edgar Allan Poe's lunatic-narrated dramatic monologues and tales. Everyone thought the poet astute, clever, highly intelligent, well read, and learned-even if he was insane. Not unlike a narrator in a Poe story, after all.
Despite their frustrations, Jessica and the others working the case did learn a great deal about Second Street and what went on there over the weekend. The coffeehouses and pubs, filled to capacity, routinely featured poets who read their work, and many places Jessica and Kim visited were into body art and display. At one such place, the Brick Teacup, the evening began with a tattoo competition and it ended on a somewhat higher-brow note with a poetry competition-poetry written on the backs and chests of young people, both male and female, who didn't feel shy about exposing their bodies along with the words.
Someone acting as master of ceremonies for the night read aloud the words as the “poems” kept moving across stage. A panel of judges made their decision on both the body and the poem, and the artistic merging of the two.
Kim and Jessica felt as if they stood out in the crowd, but looking around, they found any number of touristy-looking people and older men out for a good time. Still, Jessica guessed the average age in the place hovered around twenty-one or two.
After taking in the scene, she began asking questions of the bartender, who doled out far more coffee and latte than he did hard liquor. The bartender waved her off, saying loudly, “We don't know anything about those killings.”
“You can talk to me here or downtown, Steve,” she told him, reading his badge. “What's your preference?”
“The boss doesn't like us spending too much time with any one customer.”
“I'm not your average customer. Now tell me, you have anyone you have had trouble with lately, any little oddball disturbances at all?”
“The whole damned place is one long oddball disturbance.”
“Anything out of the ordinary insanity, then?”
“Bounced a guy out of here last night.”
“Really? What was his name?”
“Hell if I know. I didn't stop to get his name. Just kicked his ass through the door.”
“Why'd he need bouncing?”
“He grabbed one of the poets.”
“Which one?”
“One with the big tits… so, I'd say he's pretty normal as guys go.”
“You notice anything unusual in his behavior prior to his grabbing the girl?”
“Naaah, came out of the blue. He'd had too many bourbons.”
“Isn't that unusual in a place like this, a bourbon drinker?”
“He was an older dude. Didn't fit with the usual crowd, no more'n you and your partner do.”
“There you go. Then there was something out of the ordinary about this fellow. Anything else?”
“Well, I couldn't say, but the girl he grabbed, I think she kinda knew him. ”You think?”
“She called him by some name. Can't remember what.”
“What was the girl's name?”
“Dali, I think she calls herself, Dali Esque. Stage name. Don't know her real name.”
“Dolly Esk?”
“Not Dolly as in Dolly Parton, Dali as in the artist Dali, the painter. Dali Esque.”
“I see. Do all these kids take on stage names?”
“It's a way of stepping out of yourself, your usual inhibitions, you see.”
“What're you, a psych major?”
“How'd you guess?”
“The girl, Dali, does she come in often?”
“Saturday nights, sometimes Fridays, to catch the scene. First time I ever saw her take her blouse off and display, though. She was fine. Hell, I wanted to touch her myself-”
“Do all the girls have to display in order to have their poems read?”
“No, no, it's not required, but if you want to win the door prize, it's, you know, advisable. You get a load of the judges? Two guys and a dyke.”
She finished by slipping him her card and writing the PPD's number on it, telling him, “If you think of anything else out of the ordinary, anything at all happens that you think is strange, give me a call.”
“Sure”-he stared at the card-”sure, Doctor.”
Grasping at straws, she turned back to the bartender, who'd begun to mix a drink for another patron, and asked, “When's the last time you saw Dali?”
“Earlier tonight. She left with some guy; draped all over him, in fact.”
“Not the same guy, I hope.”
“No, some guy she came in with. Guy looked twice her age. Great tipper, but short as a Shetland pony.” Jessica informed Kim she'd gotten next to nothing out of the bartender. Kim merely replied, “Look at this place. It's a far cry from the raunchy topless bars in New York or across-town Philly, I'm sure, but there's something just under the surface that exudes sexual energy.”
“Not exactly the sort of place where naked women wrestle in ten-gallon pools of coleslaw,” said Jessica, recalling a story about Daytona Beach, Florida.
“Not even a wet-T contest here,” agreed Kim. “But the ages and the look of these young people going onstage and baring themselves, that's got to be a real turn-on for your local perverts. Notch over to the impotent poet in search of a winged angel and maybe you might see the appeal.”
“You catch the guy with the camera?” asked Jessica, pointing.
“He's not a pervert. He says he's just doing a job for the owners of the club.”
“Really?”
“His name is George Gordonn. He's making a film for this Web site. Says people traveling in from all over the world can get a taste of what happens at the Teacup and decide if they're poetry lovers or not”
“Gotcha.” Jessica studied the filmmaker. The fellow was young, somewhat heavyset, noticeably unimaginative in his dress and demeanor. Yet he magically blended in here, like part of the decor, and captured all the video he wanted. “What's to keep him from making copies for himself?” she wondered aloud.
“Fact is, that's how he's paid, or so he told me.”
Jessica stared at the young man again, wondering if he was a nutcase or a connoisseur of this newfound art form.
Jessica studied the young women and teen girls who placed themselves on display here. They were young, nubile, innocent-eyed, hardly aware of the power they wielded over the men who ogled them.
“Where to next?” Kim asked.
“We're going coffeehouse crawling, it would appear.”
“Why do we do this, Jessica?”
“Do what?”
“Make a living this way, on the trail of maniacs and murderers? What possible reason can we have to justify this life we lead?”
“Who else is going to do it? And if we don't?”
Kim didn't answer. They went to the next coffeehouse, the local Starbucks, which was situated on a comer. No poetry nights here, they learned, just cash and carry latte and cappuccino. When Jessica asked what was the hottest place to hear good poetry read in the area, the kid behind the counter shrugged and said, “Merlin's most likely.”
“Then we're off to Merlin's. Which way?”
“Straight up two blocks that away,” the young man said, pointing. Can't miss it. Exterior's done up like a castle- you know, Camelot, round table, knights, damsels in distress, all that shit.”
They spent the rest of the evening watching and listening to poetry written on the backs of young people at Merlin's Caf6. Here, exposing breasts appeared taboo, and this fact, along with the stone-tiled floor and castlelike decor, lent an air of respectability that somehow spilled over into the caliber of the poetry, or so it seemed to Jessica.
Again, no one working in the place had any useful information. The evening was beginning to feel like a bust when a stunted little man with short stubby legs waddled in like a penguin, his slight stature and strange appearance-he was impeccably dressed in a three-piece suit- calling attention to him. Everyone in the place waved to him and called his name-Vladoc. He seemed to enjoy his notoriety.
I was told I might find you two here,” said the small, dark-featured man, walking up to Jessica and Kim and joining them in their booth. “I am Peter Flavius Vladoc, Philly police department shrink. Please, don't be alarmed to see me. Leanne Sturtevante put me onto you. In fact, she has had you put under surveillance so that I could find you. She knew you'd be in the vicinity, called me up. I maintain a flat here, sometimes working late hours, especially around holidays, and sometimes it's just absolutely necessary that I have privacy, and it's far closer to the campus where I teach than my house in the 'burbs.”
Kim raised the glass of dark Guinness she'd been nursing and muttered, “I think, sir, you have some catching up to do.” The two psychiatrists appeared already to have sized each other up, and apparently liked what they saw; Jessica guessed that Kim had done her homework on Vladoc.
“We're only human,” she said, smiling. “Something to bolster our courage for the ordeal ahead of us.” She then toasted and drank as well.
Vladoc nodded, gestured to a waiter and ordered, then said to the ladies, “The poetry, the wine, the camaraderie followed by murder-this is indeed a strange case. I confess, I am envious of your work. Weird fellow this Poet Killer. I wonder if he might not be an academic intellectual type.”
“I'm not yet convinced his motive is mercy, Dr. Vladoc, but it sounds as if you have familiarized yourself with the details of the case.” Although such details had been kept from public and press, Vladoc, as a police psychiatrist, would have no trouble gaining access to them.
“Word spreads here like spilled wine on a white tablecloth, believe me,” the psychiatrist said. “The people here in this establishment know more about the details you think you're keeping secret than you can imagine.”
Kim yawned and stretched out her legs, kicking off her shoes.
“Not getting enough sleep, I see,” Vladoc said to her.
Jessica added, “Don't get too comfy. I don't want to have to carry you home.”
“Caseload back in Quantico is up to the rafters, and Serena Lansforth, my best and brightest up-and-coming talent, has decided she wants no part of this line of work ever again, not since the Milwaukee Mauler,” Kim lamented.
The little man laughed lightly-a throaty, big man's laugh. “And weighing in at 289 pounds… the Millllwaukeeee Mauler! Sounds like a Wrestle Mania guy to me.”
“God, that man was into mutilation.” Kim shook her head, remembering. “Just the opposite of our boy in the City of Brotherly Love.”
“Serena having nightmares?” asked Jessica.
“Daymares, nightmares, all of it, yes. Sent her to your friend Lemonte to talk it out. She's stopped listening to me.
“Have Philly authorities allowed you some private time with the physical evidence and items that belonged to the victims?” Vladoc asked Kim. “I should say I'm terribly curious about what you two have come up with thus far, and if it is to your liking, I would be extremely glad to go over any and all of my findings with you-put in my two cents, as it were.”
“They have precious little evidence,” Kim confided in the man, “and they're being stingy with what little they do have. But I've had assurances from Roth that that'll change tomorrow.”
“You think the killer might be close in age to the victims, who were all barely out of their teens?” asked Vladoc.
Jessica found herself at ease with the odd-looking psychiatrist, who reminded her of the mayor of Munchkin land in The Wizard of Oz¦ She told Vladoc, “I gave that some thought, yes… kind of an acting out of teen angst, or should I say-dare I say-Generation-X angst or goth angst?”
“You into labeling now, Jessica?” Kim scoffed. “At least get with the times. X is out, traveled on down the time line, and we're well into the Double Ought Generation now, the Y2Kbies.”
“All right, whatever you want to call the current generation.”
“Well, actually,” Vladoc said, as if beginning a lecture, “many generations now have grown up with the gothic symbols of dark beauty that have been in existence since before Dante wrote The Divine Comedy.”
“Part of which is Dante's Inferno,” Jessica put in. “Otherwise known as hell.”
“Yes, as well I know; at any rate, these 'dark side' symbols have been around forever-cabalists, necromancers, alchemists, you name it-but in modern America, where the normal rituals of Homo erectus have vanished, we now embrace the ancient rites and rituals, no matter their erotic and pagan beginnings, and we do it with a passion beyond all reason, and so these symbols and rituals and various occult businesses are thriving, especially among the young and on the Internet.”
“The ancient religions and beliefs have taken on new power for the young,” agreed Kim. “For some, this is good, a faith in something being, for most of us, far better than nothing. For others, however, such beliefs can be a kind of slow poison, if you will.”
“Precisely,” said Vladoc, his teacher's voice easy to hear over the reggae band that was now onstage. “Nowadays we have whole mall unit stores devoted to the romantic idea that being chained to a wall in an oubliette beneath a castle is… well, you know, cool…”
Taking a page out of Kim's book, Jessica kicked her shoes off and lifted her feet onto the cushions of the bench opposite her. “I see, I think.”
“And this generation, whatever you wish to call them, has a love affair with dark and gothic symbols, instruments of torture, pagan beliefs, mystic places, practices, and magic,” continued Peter Vladoc. “In fact, they would return to the Middle or even Dark Ages if they could, just on the off chance that their romanticized notions about such times are true.”
“You've seen some of the trappings the victims surrounded themselves with?”
“Leanne walked me through the last crime scene, yes. We talked long on what the task force has thus far learned… and failed to learn.”
“Of course, going to the crapper in the Middle Ages couldn't have been much fun,” Jessica interjected, somewhat off the point and clearly beginning to feel no pain.
“Yes, well,” Vladoc said in his mellowest voice, “with indoor plumbing centuries away, and the almost knighted Thomas Crapper having not yet been born, you can assume all toilet facilities were outdoor affairs, the original Public Domain, and if not, the private affair amounted to a slop bucket in a cell.”
“Imagine a visit to the local dentist or doctor,” Kim added.
Jessica yawned. “Hey, maybe I'm out of touch with the young, but what exactly are their romanticized notions?”
Vladoc shrugged. “The usual.”
“What? That dragons walk the earth and that men in armor, like Sir Lancelot and Sir Galahad, slew them to save virgins nailed to crosses in fog-laden glens? Come on.”
“Yes, all that, but perhaps more accurately that fairies, and fairy godmothers and godfathers, and angels are real, and that they are interested in the lives of those humans who are 'clued' into them.”
“Dungeons and Dragons, fairies and elves, huh? The little people with gleeful hearts.”
“This is the mythology to which they owe a great deal of their romantic notions, along with pop-culture vulgarizations of the Knights of the Round Table. Romantic notions abound in art, literature, poetry.”
“Romantic or fantastic?” asked Jessica.
“The romantic is the fantastic,” Kim countered. “Hey, I know from experience.”
Jessica nodded as the miniature helicopter inside her head began a slow buzz, and she knew she'd had enough to drink for one night. She began a slow descent, alerting Kim that she was no longer drinking. Kim agreed to do the same, while Vladoc downed his Miller draft and called for another.
“You know, if you ask my opinion about this killer and his victims, I would have to say that a young and impressionable person-childlike in his thinking-can derive security only from the conviction that he understands nature and reality and truth, and that he feels safe in his convictions, and if this killer can make him feel so, well then, the con man and the manipulator is well on his way.” It all sounded to Jessica like vague generalities, and she was tiring of Vladoc's pontificating. It reminded her of a philosophy class she'd once struggled through in college. Still Vladoc droned on, saying, “That same young person, given so-called scientific fact to refute his belief in a fantasticized reality, will only be faced with more and greater uncertainties, but then isn't that true of us all?”
“We're exhausted, Dr. Vladoc, and we're going home now, aren't we, Kim?” was Jessica's only answer. “Sounds like a plan,” replied Kim.
“More than magic thinking… magic itself exists, if you believe in angels and hobgoblins, little people and aliens,” continued Vladoc, undaunted by the indifference of his audience. “And I believe your victims held such beliefs. They're all relatives in this sense, members of a same-thinking group.”
“Are you suggesting the victims were members of a cult?”
“No, not really, but rather members of society that finds it comforting to believe in what you and I would call fairies or angels.”
Nodding, Jessica added, “Elves of old have become the aliens of today? Nothing a few lines of a chant or an old-fashioned curse couldn't accomplish, so, too, a TV show like The X-Files. What was it Carl Sagan said-something about as mankind's campfire grows larger, so, too, do the imaginings of what's out there in the darkness beyond the flames?”
“Wish I knew a chant now to dispel this dizziness in my head,” Kim interjected.
Jessica teased, “I should think that being psychic, you'd know beforehand when you'd had your last drink.”
“That's funny. You know it doesn't work that way.”
“Oh, excuse me, ladies, I see someone I must speak to across the room,” said Vladoc, attempting to make a graceful exit. “It's been interesting chatting with you. Doctors, and good luck on the case. Do send me everything you find pertinent, and I will assist in any way I can.” He even bowed before leaving, and they watched him join a group of young women at another table, all college-aged kids, all appearing to know him.
Jessica and Kim located their shoes, got to their feet, and made their way out of the pub.
Outside, as the cool night breeze played through Jessica's hair, she said, “So we have a whole generation that believes in an invisible world surrounding us, an entire world in which magic thinking exists, in all its strange and bizarre permutations, while that strange little Peter Flavious Vladoc looks for a new conquest among the young?”
“I predict he will come to a bad end, especially if he is popping Viagra.”
“Do you think he's one of those men who will do anything, go anywhere, to sire a child, preferably a male child? And if so, has it to do with his being so short?”
“I think he could well be our killer, Jessica, but then you know that.”
“I do
“He's here, isn't he? Scouting a late-adolescent prize? He may write poetry very close in style and content to that of the Killer Poet, and he appears to have a fascination with the case, all facts in evidence.”
“It's his job.”
“What's his job?”
'To follow the close casely-I mean case closely, isn't he? Getting all his information from one source, Leanne Sturtevante, can't be good. He needs to see it from all sides, right?”
“Ah,” joked Kim, “so… do you think that something's up between those two?”
“Haven't a clue.”
“Shocking, isn't it?”
“No, not in and of itself, but Sturtevante's on thin ice with the pillow talk she's cooing to Dr. Vladoc.”
They walked on toward the hotel. “You know it,” Jessica muttered. “She could sabotage our case against a suspect if too many of the details are made public.”
“Agreed.”
“So, can you predict how my and Richard's relationship will end?”
“I wouldn't presume to go there, Jess. And you know it.” You mean I have to go to dial-a-psychic for that?”
“Sure, give me a year or so and I'll give you a 1-800 number I trust.”
“Hey, I've seen those ads. Everyone on them swears up and down that dial-a-psychic works.”
“Yeah, like my one-eyed, one-legged cat works.”
At PPD headquarters crime lab the next morning, Jessica found Parry on her doorstep, this time with news of a possible break in the case. A half grin played across his face as he said, “A call came to my office this morning from a distraught university dean. The woman believes she has a match up with the poetry. She's a dean of arts and sciences at the university here.”
“The University of Philadelphia?”
“Right.”
“And she got our FBI packet, studied the killer's poetry, and-”
“Bingo, a match.”
“Then I guess we need to talk to her.”
“She suspects a guy working under her at the university, and a check reveals that several of the victims were, at one time or another, in the guy's classes.”
“Sounds close enough for a look-see to me. Let's get over there.”
“I want you and Desinor to interview her, see what you can get.”
“What will you be doing in the meantime?”
“Sturtevante has set up the surveillance of a guy she's gotten some leads on from the street, a kind of Weird A1 Yankovic character that a lot of fingers keep pointing at. Sturtevante thinks she's onto something, and I need to review her findings. They're trying to get a warrant to search his apartment now.” So while you and Leanne are storming in to search and seize this Quasimodo's apartment and belongings, we're going to canvass the upper-crust possibilities, is that it?”
“Just trying to cover all the bases. We don't know jack-shit about the Poet at this point. We have to follow up on citizen tips and anything that smacks of reliable.”
“Sure, got it.”
“You don't like Sturtevante, do you, Jess?”
“She's a contradictory person; she wants a team effort, she heads a task force, but she's not a team player herself. I find her lack of interest in our autopsy findings curious and strange. She confides only in Shockley, and I find her reluctance to share information directly… well, a pain in the ass.”
“Can't argue with you there. She's somehow, for some reason, developed a similar set of feelings for you, and somehow I find myself in the middle, a kind of referee.”
“Don't put yourself out on my account.”
“She's been a street cop for a long time, Jessica. This idea of working closely with the FBI, it's new to her, and her superiors forced us on her. You know how that goes.”
“Meanwhile, she tells me she's so glad to have us aboard, so anxious to work with us, so full of shit.”
“Get over it; you've seen it before. Now, how about getting over to the university, interview this Dr. Harriet Plummer.”
“Yes, sir.” She gave him a mock salute. “I suspect our killer is far more likely to spring from that rarefied air than from some sleazy bar where street punks hustle babes.”
“See if you can learn three things from Plummer. One, are the poems found on the bodies original or plagiarized? Two, stolen or not, does she recognize the poetry? Three, does she truly recognize the hand at work as this colleague of hers-who, by the way, is named Garrison Burrwith. Take her measurements, and be certain that she is acting out of something other than hurt, anger, or confusion. Meanwhile, I'm doing a background check on Burrwith.”
Jessica's eyes met Parry's, and for a moment the look lingered. Then, to cover her sudden embarrassment, she asked, “Anything come of your reading of Maurice's diary?”
“Nothing usable, no. Filled with a lot of whining.”
“Whining? About what?”
“Life.”
“Life?” she asked. “What about life?”
“You know, the usual soul-search stuff, and then the complaints, asking why can't life be kinder, gentler, all the usual claptrap from a person who can't handle life on its own terms. Guy needed a reality check big time. Reminds me of my college reading of Kafka's Metamorphosis. Who cares after a point to read on when the initial whine fest never ends?”
“Perhaps Kim ought to do a reading on the boy's diary.” Jessica thought Kim might well be more sensitive than Parry to Maurice's plight.
“Yeah, I'm sure she could get a lot more out of it than I did.”
“You mean we actually agree?” she asked, her eyes telling him she was only half kidding.
Jessica immediately lifted the phone and called Kim from her office upstairs, a large closet of a place off the task-force operations room. She'd wanted to be close to all the paraphernalia of the crime scenes that Sturtevante's team had gathered. Getting Kim on the line, Jessica explained what Parry had brought them.
“That sounds a lot more reasonable than rounding up street lowlifes like Sturtevante's people are doing,” Kim said, echoing Jessica's thoughts. “Most of whom appear too illiterate to write a letter home much less a poem.”
“We'll leave that line of inquiry for Sturtevante and company. You never know what will drop out in a shakedown of this magnitude,” Jessica replied, not knowing why she felt compelled to defend Sturtevante's approach.
“Are we any closer to determining any connections among the victims?” Kim asked. “Did you turn anything over to that house shrink, Vladoc?”
“Fact is, I have. Sent him all the poetry we have, our suspicions, minus what Mr. Rocky J. Squirrel had to say, and he said he'd get back to me ASAP.”
“What's he really like, Jess? I mean in the clear-and sober-light of day.”
“Don't know. Didn't meet face-to-face this time; spoke to his secretary. She handled everything.”
“You never saw him?”
“No. He never came out of his office.”
“Strange he wouldn't come out to meet you.”
“Burrowed in. Had a patient in with him, a local cop, rookie who had to bring someone down with deadly force, I hear.”
The entire way back out to the University of Philadelphia campus, Jessica and Kim discussed the victim profile. “Other than the geography, all living in and around Second Street,” Jessica said as she drove the PPD loaner, “and the fact that all were of the same approximate age and body type, they didn't appear to have known each other.”
“Although they certainly frequented some of the same shops and possibly the same coffeehouses,” Kim noted.
“They may well have been passing acquaintances.”
“Many took courses at the local colleges and universities.”
Jessica turned the vehicle off the main street and onto the lanes of the campus. “We know at least two of them used Ink, Line amp; Sinker for paper, pens, and art supplies, and several used Darkest Expectations for books, and Moulin Rouge for wall decorations and furnishings. “We need to question the people that work there.”
“Being done, I'm told, by Sturtevante's people. Nothing anyone remembers out of the ordinary about any of the victims. Actually, on Second Street, you and me, we are the strange ones. Everyone else down there sees straight people wearing matching blouses and suit pants, and they know we don't belong.”
“Agreed. “Maurice was taking classes at one of the colleges in town,” said Kim. “His diary makes mention of it.” She had skimmed the diary after Parry left it with her. “We need to find out who his instructors were, question them about Maurice. See what they knew about him, and see if they know anything about the poetic style of the killer. Might take less time and do more good to investigate the local boys than to ask for a national search on a student or other person whose writing style might ring a bell.”
“Here we are, another foray into academia.”
“Can't be any scarier than dealing with a Hungarian cowboy,” Kim replied.
“I don't know about that. I had a chat with the woman we're about to meet. Called for an appointment, thinking it best.”
“And?”
“Dr. Harriet Plummer. She's convinced she knows who the Poet Killer is.”
“Really?”
“Works under her in the English department here.”
“University of Philadelphia, where Maurice was enrolled.”
“Really? Do we suspect he knew his killer?” asked Jessica.
“We do, but it remains only a suspicion.”
“Then perhaps someone here at the university who knew Maurice killed him?” It's possible they could have bumped into one another.”
“We'll see what feathers we can ruffle on campus.”
“Maybe we can get everyone in English, professors and students alike, to submit a writing sample for Wahlbore, and let him feed them to Rocky. See what the flying squirrel spits out.”
“Sure, just try to get everyone to cooperate. You know how quick these academic types are to scream human rights violation?”
Kim replied to this, “And you think the accused should have no rights?”
“The known rapists and the known murderers ought to be stripped of anything resembling civil and human rights, just as they did to their victims.”
“Careful of such views. Upper-level types don't care for them,” Kim cautioned. “I know from experience, and look what's happened to your friend Parry.”
“Thanks for the warning.” Jessica looked up to see the tall, imposing building that housed the English department, a three-story Disney-like turreted castle with six to ten times more space than the linguistics department's small cottage. “Feudal system still at work on college campuses,” she muttered. Kim laughed as Jessica stared out at Dean and Professor Harriet Plummer, who was at that very moment coming toward the car as if chased by a demon. The scene recalled to Jessica the phone conversation she'd had with the distraught dean of arts and sciences.
When Plummer had come on the line and Jessica introduced herself, she had declared, “It's about time. I've been expecting you.” A faint trace of desperation, perhaps repressed fear, had laced the woman's businesslike tone.
“Oh, and why is that, Dr. Plummer?” Jessica had wondered if perhaps they might not be closer to some solutions to this case than she'd previously thought.
“I received a packet of information on this Poet Killer fiend a few days ago. I put it aside. Busy here, you know, extremely. I had no idea the killer's poems were being cut into the backs of his victims until I read the material from you people.”
It'll be all over the evening news tonight, Jessica had thought. “I see,” she said.
“I believe I know who your killer is. I believe he… he works under me here at the university.”
“Do you have any evidence of this?”
“The poems, the style, and the way they were left, yes. Now, will you come to speak to me, or do I have to come to you?” the dean had asked.
“A colleague and I will be right over, Dr. Plummer.”
“I'll change my schedule, put aside all else until we talk.”
Now, as the dean pounded on the car window, Kim's eyes were alight with the same curiosity about her as Jessica had felt during their phone conversation.
“He's here; in his office. Just so you know, just so in case he sees you and me together, well… I may need protection.”
Dr. Harriet Plummer had already considered the possibility that something strange might be going on at the U. of Philadelphia. She had pulled the files on three of the victims, all of whom had taken basic-level courses there. The other victims, while not students at the university, the dean had found, were students at other colleges and universities in the area, and furthermore, they were all taking poetry-and fiction-writing courses, some with Dr. Garrison Burrwith, the man she suspected of being the Poet Killer. This they learned all in the time it took to climb the considerable number of steps to the miniature castle entryway of the English department. Atop the tallest turret of the castle, a clock tolled four p.m.
Once they were inside the safe confines of Dr. Plummer's office, she confided, “He is a professor here at the university-our current writer-in-residence.”
“Writer-in-residence? Really?” Kim looked impressed.
“His specialty being poetic expression,” Professor Plummer informed them.
“How did you know we would be coming?” asked Jessica. “On the phone you said you were expecting us.”
“I got my packet from the FBI several days ago, asking if I recognized the poetry of this awful poisoner.”
“Yes, of course. And you suspect this Dr. Burr…?”
“Dr. Garrison Burrwith, yes, but it's awful; you see, he is a member of a prominent Philadelphia family, well known for philanthropy and public service. Dr. Burrwith is something of a prodigy. He's an accomplished violinist, fills in as needed at the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra-he's that good. At only twenty-six years of age, he's an acknowledged scholar of the Romantic poets, in particular Shelley, Keats, Byron, and Wordsworth.”
“And, as you say, you suspect he may be this killer of young people?”
“The poetry is so… so like his. He's an accomplished poet with a great ability to capture the essence of the romanticism of the Byronic era, and I feel much of this murderer's poetry does the same. Here, have a look at some of Garrison's work. Compare it with the murderer's work yourself.”
Jessica reached across to take the volume of poems that Dr. Plummer offered. The book was gilded and exquisitely bound; it must have cost a fortune to produce.
On the cover she read Oration of the Gifts of Those Angels of the Four Quarters. Beneath this, Poems to Still the Forest Soul and Various Jottings by Garrison Burrwith III.
“Old family name, huh?”
“One of the oldest in Philadelphia. Father is on every board in the city having to do with the arts.”
Enough to scar any child, Jessica thought but did not say. “Did you find the poems left on the bodies unique, original, Dr. Plummer?” she asked instead. “Yes, quite. Then we may assume they are from the killer's mind and hand, and not something he picked up somewhere?”
The professor stared back, confused.
“Lifted, plagiarized,” Kim clarified.
“As I said, they reminded me of the work of Garrison Burrwith.”
“So something in Burrwith's style alerts you to call us?”
“Style and subject matter. Read the page I have marked.”
Jessica scanned it and then read it aloud for Kim: SCORN 'S MISTRESS
Opportunity happens by on soft-soled and soft-souled shoe; traipsing merrily until one stumble sends Her falling away from fortune's prize, only to be seized by the middle, lifted overhead, and flattened against all earth, scrunched then into the dark of a rabbit warren. No prize at the end of rain bows lost in tombs of time…
Kim suggested, “Perhaps we should have a talk with Dr. Burrwith.”
“You'll find him in his office, down the hall in Room 21-B. Name's on the door. I always thought him an odd duck, but I would never in a million years have taken him for a killer.”
“Well, Dr. Plummer, we've got a long way to go before we can conclusively prove him to be the Poet Killer.”
“No, you have only a few yards to go to his office; that is all that separates him from me, and for that I have been living in fear since I received your information regarding the killings.” The frail, middle-aged woman's eyes bulged. “I had not heard that the bodies had been… written on, the poems cut into the flesh. Garrison asked me once if I would sit for such a thing, you see.”
“He did? He asked you to allow him to write a poem into your skin, on your back?”
“Along my arm, actually. We… we were seeing each other at the time. He wanted to brand me, I suppose.”
“I see.”
She looked faint. Kim asked if she'd like her to fetch some water, but the woman ignored this and went on: Moreover, I had no idea of the caliber of the poetry involved until, as I said, I received the FBI's information. I've been living in fear since then.”
“I'm afraid we will have to reserve judgment, Dr. Plummer,” Jessica calmly replied.
“Reserve judgment until someone else dies? Another poor unfortunate young person?”
As they left the office, Kim and Jessica heard the dean mutter, “Always knew Burrwith was strange.”