Jessica's face grew stern as she listened to Repasi, her teeth grinding top to bottom, until she exploded, cutting him off. "Are you finished?"
"Oh, I see," he replied. "It only appears that you're interested in media attention as a modern-day Sherlock Holmes. I get it." A curling smile snaked about his mouth.
He enjoyed making her uneasy, making her squirm, she realized. "That's contemptible, Karl."
"Jessica, I've no doubt we have a serial killer playing deadly with fire here, but that he grants you a private audience with each killing? I have a problem with that."
"Bullshit! I didn't make it up, Karl! And I'm not smitten with the press or building an image for myself. There's no hoax here! Certainly none of my doing."
"Oh, I hope I didn't suggest that you were part of some elaborate medical hoax, Doctor. It's just that I'm having trouble with the idea that this monster serial killer feels compelled to contact you every step of the way. It's sheer madness even for a madman."
''As I said, if I could alter his madness in any way, this moment-"
"So, when did he last talk to you?" he wanted to know.
"I've taken proper steps to inform, on a need-to-know basis, my superiors of any contact made. That doesn't include you, Karl."
"What has he conveyed to you? What is his ultimate goal? And this business of him telephoning it in. Are you sure he's not just some mental patient from a federal facility whom you've had… previous contact with?"
She considered the possibility for half a second. "No, he is not, Doctor. And I'm not sure I like what you're implying here."
"I didn't mean to imply anything unsavory."
She pointed her finger at his eyes and sternly said,' 'This conversation is taking a strange turn, Karl. I think it's at an end, now."
"I, personally, don't believe a word of the rumors being touted about, Jessica, but you know what they say about appearances."
"Whatever are you talking about? What rumors?"
"Press rumors."
"About me?"
"You and this madman, yes, and the idea there might be some former connection; that perhaps you know him, or knew him, but have put him out of your mind, perhaps?"
"No, no… I have as much knowledge of him as you, Karl."
"Some people are throwing it out there, Jessica, this theory, and it has just enough basis in fact that credence is being-"
"Basis in fact? Credence? What fact?"
"It's a well-known fact that you have both access and control over any number of serial killers and homicidal psychopaths in federal care. Is that not true?"
She gritted her teeth, angry, knowing that Karl was right about the press, particularly the tabloid press, with their unspoken motto: We print every half-truth fit or unfit to see print. And there was just enough half-truth in what Karl said to crop up in the rags. She took it out on Karl, saying, "You just reminded me again why I've always disliked you, Karl."
"Hey, don't shoot the messenger. I'm only telling you to watch your back, Jessica. That's all."
Like you care about my back, she thought, wondering anew about his motive in even being here. She tore off her gloves and mask and stepped away from the body. "I'm done here. You can finish up, Doctor." She stormed from the small autopsy room, angry and exhausted, her jaw clenched tight.
An hour later, Jessica was back at the resort marina, where she fell across the bed. She could hardly believe the madness of Karl Repasi, and the gall of the man. Hours of intense labor over a body that kept casting off bits and pieces of itself onto the floor, and then to have to deal with Repasi's obvious mental breakdown. She had suspected him of a fraud and a hoax when all of this began, and now he suspected her of the same. It seemed turnaround was fair game, but how could he believe that she'd be party to such cruelty? Cruelty even on a dead body, if he believed her capable of producing dead bodies for some fire maniac to set ablaze, and that she somehow had hidden the real Chris Lorentian and the real Melvin Bartlett Martin.
She must wash this day off, she told herself, climbing from the bed, feeling the absolute need for a long, hot shower.
First, however, she found a phone and called J. T., locating him still at work at the hospital she had stormed away from. He'd been right to distance himself from the odd and eccentric Repasi, but he was still working out of a lab down the hall from Repasi. She wondered if Karl had tried to feed any of his fantastic nonsense to John Thorpe. If he suggested it in the least to J. T., John would deck him with a single blow, but from J. T.'s tone, obviously, Karl Repasi hadn't repeated his crazy allegations.
''Any luck on the shoeprint?'' she asked J. T.
"Ruled out everyone else's having made the print," he replied.
"That's a positive step."
"Very funny. I oversaw the creation of a cast imprint of the shoeprint."
She let out a gasp of air. ' 'I hope you got more results and conclusions than we did from the autopsy."
"From the size of the shoe imprint, it's apparent that the killer wears an eight and a half shoe size, extremely well worn, and due to the impression it made, fair estimates of the height and weight of the killer are also now known. The Phantom, as the press in Nevada and Utah are now calling him, is in the range of five-eleven to six feet tall."
"That's about what the waitress put him at."
"And he weighs in at a hundred seventy-nine to a hundred eighty-nine pounds."
"Excellent work, J. T."
''I next packaged up the imprint and shipped it to Quantico for an expert FBI imprint man named Kenyan to go over. Kenyan's already at work eliminating any and all footwear that the cast could not have been made from. Through the process of elimination and comparison, it's hoped something specific may be said about the shoes worn by the killer."
"That's good work, John, really."
"I take it the autopsy revealed nothing we didn't already know?''
"You take it right. Except for the fact of the victim's sex and age, the killings were identical, down to the use of a butane torch with a wand attachment."
"How do we know there's a wand attachment on the torch?" asked J. T. "Clear that up for me, will you?"
"According to the fire investigators, both Fairfax in Vegas and Brightpath here, the initial flames were extremely well controlled. They can tell from the controlled direction of the hot spots to the eyes, face, and chest."
J. T. softly whistled into the receiver and remarked, "You said this guy was a highly organized, controlled killer, Jess. Appears he has thought out his every instrument, his every move. Appears you were right again. Amazing ability of yours. You should be proud of it, the accuracy of your predictions."
"Proud? Hardly."
"Why not? They rank up there with Kim Desinor's psychic predictions."
"Believe me, John, knowledge doesn't begin to touch the feelings. Scientific investigation is one thing, instinct born of preparation, you might call it, but it doesn't soothe the gods of the dark night of the soul."
J. T., unable to respond to this bit of philosophy, stuttered into suggesting they meet later for a drink in the lounge at the Wahweap Lodge, where they were staying the night.
ELEVEN
His eyes are bloodshot, his back near broke,
For he has been chasing a distant smoke.
Feydor had settled in at Ruby's Inn, a rustic roadside inn on Highway 63 in Bryce, Utah, within shouting distance of the fantasyland of rock formations created by nature that so dazzled hundreds of thousands of tourists each year. It was a place of sheer beauty, but Feydor had seen enough of rock formations from the bus window to last him a lifetime.