Clutching the child’s bones, Colm eyed the shelves for a suitable place to deposit them. He would need time to build her showcase. The residents groaned in unison. He understood their grievance. It was crowded enough already without another relic. He would renovate the atelier, he thought. It would add another one thousand square feet to their catacomb. It meant he would have to cease his killings, for the time being, but he could resume his sport once the expansion was underway.
Maybe he would apply to the New York State Council for the Arts for a grant to back the project. After all, these were former residents of New York City, now inhabiting Nassau County. It would be a form of income-maintenance subsidy to guarantee proper lodging for these former taxpaying members of the community. He filed the thought for consideration at a later date.
The ground suddenly shimmied, followed by stillness. A second tremor was more pronounced. It displaced a clavicle, which tumbled from its shelf and shattered on the terra-cotta-tiled floor.
Earthquake! he thought. He wedged himself into the lift.
Reaching the ground floor, he bolted out of the house, expecting an apocalyptic landscape of shattered houses and burning cars. But the street was intact. A diesel breeze fumigated the thoroughfare; smoke billowed from a bulldozer with a spider arm, its jackhammer pulverizing the asphalt. Huge steel pipes lay nearby, awaiting installation.
Colm envisioned the bulldozer causing the walls of his precious trophy room to cave in, entombing his possessions in mountains of rubble. Then a worse fear crept into his consciousness. What if the vibrations didn’t bury his guests? What if it unearthed them?
Chapter 67
A grief-stricken Eileen Tiernan straddled the chair, hugging her son, Timothy, close to her bosom. Ryan was clamped to her leg. Her husband sat at her side. They all glanced up as Driscoll and Margaret stepped into the pediatric ward’s corridor.
“They won’t let us see our daughter,” said Seamus Tiernan.
Driscoll walked over to the policeman stationed at the door to room 732. “What gives, officer?”
“I got my orders from Captain Hollis, Lieutenant. No one’s to be let inside. And he means no one.”
“They’ll be with me.”
“I’d like to accommodate you-”
“Then let us in.”
“But I’ve got my orders.”
“You just got new ones.”
The officer stared hopelessly at Driscoll. “I’ll have to check. Give me a minute.”
Driscoll shrugged, and the officer walked down the corridor to a wall phone.
“Margaret, why don’t you accompany these folks to the cafeteria?” Driscoll suggested. “It may take a few minutes to reconcile the situation.”
“We’re not going anywhere until we see our daughter,” said Mr. Tiernan.
“How about I take the kids for a soda?” said Margaret.
“I wanna see Moira,” said Timothy, red faced.
“They’ll wait right here with us,” said Mrs. Tiernan.
The policeman returned and spoke to Driscoll. “I’m sorry sir, the Captain’s orders don’t apply to you.” He opened the door to let the Lieutanant in.
“They’re coming with me,” Driscoll announced as he ushered the family inside. Then the Lieutenant’s eyes widened. Moira’s body was completely encased in plaster, the shell strategically punctured by catheters and tubes to allow for respiration and feeding. There were two slits for the eyes and two apertures for the nostrils.
All heads turned as Doctor Stephen Astin came into the room to check on his young patient. “Her bones were fragmented, some of them pulverized,” he reported.
Mrs. Tiernan’s face drained of all color. She stood frozen, staring at the plaster cocoon that contained Moira.
“How could someone do such a thing to our little girl?” Mr. Tiernan asked. “He’s crushed our Moira. Do you know what it feels like to see your only daughter shattered, Lieutenant?”
“More than you know.”
The Lieutenant’s eyes were brimming with tears. Not since Nicole’s death had he felt so heartbroken. And why not? Hadn’t Moira become his daughter in Nicole’s absence? He cast a look at the girl, this madman’s latest victim. And as his eyes took in the living and breathing plaster mummy that Moira had become, his rage was set aflame. The son of a bitch had made it personal. And by doing so, he had signed his own death certificate.
As Driscoll stepped away from Moira’s bedside, his eyes met those of the Tiernan family. It pained him to witness the emotional damage that had been inflicted upon them.
Their daughter had been savagely brutalized, and Driscoll knew why. This heartless assault was a message. The killer could have murdered the girl and boned her like all the others. But he didn’t. He chose to let Moira live, a cripple for life. She would be an ever-present reminder to Driscoll of his meddling. He was telling the Lieutenant to back off. Like hell he would! If it took assigning legions of policemen, Driscoll would track down this bastard and dole out vengeance.
As Driscoll scanned the room, a feeling of claustrophobia overtook him. He fought the urge to pound the walls, send a quake throughout the building, wake up the dying, call attention to the living. For he knew Moira lay somewhere between the two. Why, he asked himself, had the women closest to his soul met with tragedy at such an early age? His mind began to race. He found himself inside the Plymouth Voyager that carried Colette and his daughter on that ill-fated day in May. He imagined throwing his body over Nicole’s as the gasoline tanker collided with the family van. Was that some sort of silent death wish? Was that what was going on inside his guilt-ridden head? Here, now, was Moira, another daughter in his charge. He should have stopped her from the start. What was he thinking? How could he have allowed her to step into the path of a murderer? It was because of him that Moira was so horribly victimized. He was certain of that. That reality would follow him to his grave.
He approached Moira and gently placed his hand on her plaster-encased shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I hope you’ll forgive me. I know I’ll never forgive myself.”
Thomas O' Callaghan
Bone Thief
Chapter 68
“What’d he do?” the rookie patrolman asked.
Richie Winslow, the veteran detective, shot a disdainful glance at the prisoner in the holding cell.
“This here’s a vandal,” said Winslow.
“He looks a little old to be a graffiti artist. What’d he vandalize?”
“Our friend here got a yen for earth-moving equipment. He poured a pint of maple syrup into the diesel fuel tank of a bulldozer. Speaking directly to the prisoner, he asked, “Now whad’ya go and do that for?”
Colm winced. He felt caged, ensnared inside the Old Brookville Police Department’s holding cell. “How long will I be held here?”
“As long as it takes!”
The phone purred on Winslow’s desk. He spoke briefly, then turned to his prisoner.
“Your medical degree just bought you a desk appearance ticket.”
“Does that mean you’re letting me go?”
“For now. Tomorrow, you’ve got an 8:00 A.M. appointment with a man in a black gown. And you’d better have lost your taste for pancakes.”
Chapter 69
Driscoll kept being hammered by the DA, the Mayor, and the Police Commissioner. He felt as though his head were a drum and everyone from the Mayor on down were pounding away with their drumsticks. He couldn’t stop his mind from racing. Moira’s circumstances kept coming to the forefront of his thoughts. Burdened with guilt, he summoned Margaret and Thomlinson to his office for a brainstorming session. He needed to get his mind back on the case and to restore his sanity.