“ Great, great.” Rychman felt a sudden surge of excitement himself.
Rychman called the meeting of the task force to order a little past six, delaying as long as he could for Dr. Ames' arrival. Everyone was still buzzing about the double homicide and the equally puzzling double crime scenes. None of the detectives knew about the bizarre poetry sent to them by Ovid.
“ Gentlemen, ladies,” began Rychman, “we have a great deal to cover this moming, so let's get to it. First, suffice it to say that last night's double murder was most certainly the work of the man known to us as the Claw, no question. But the killer left us with a little more to go on this time than he-or they-have in the past.”
“ They? Whataya saying, Captain? That the Claw is two men instead of one?” asked O’Toole's partner, a burly detective named Mannion.
“ That possibility is being discussed in light of new evidence that has come to our… well, that was placed under our noses. Dr. Darius and Dr. Coran fished a note from the body of the Phillips woman from a man signing himself Ovid. He claimed knowledge of the killer.”
“ A note?”
“ What kind of note?”
Rychman held up his hands. “You'll see the note in due time. At the moment, I'd like you to rethink your quarry; this bird may be two birds. Meanwhile, Forensics is trying to pursue the case from the same angle.”
O’Toole, sitting near the front, said in his baritone voice, “So the creep had to reach out and touch somebody…”
“ More like Western Union,” said Rychman. “He sent a message, which I'll let Dr. Coran tell you about.”
Jessica came to the front and leaned her cane against the podium. “Our killer, or one of our killers, is into poetry. At 1100 hours yesterday, when we were about to close Amelia Phillips up after autopsy, Dr. Darius found a wadded-up piece of paper below the rib cage with a message from this man calling himself Ovid. I'll read it to you in its entirety.” Jessica read the bizarre poem to her audience as the mutilated faces of the Claw's victims looked on from the photos along the walls in the ready room.
A collective sense of curious bewilderment filled the room. The silence was broken by O’Toole, who asked, “Is it literate; I mean, how's the spelling, punctuation, all that?”
“ Not a problem.”
“ Holy shit,” said Mannion. “It does sound like there're two guys. TTiis guy signs as Ovid and he talks about the Claw like he's another guy.”
“ Why'd he leave the poem inside her?” asked Detective Emmons. “How'd he know you'd find it?” she added.
“ He likely knows that on autopsy we'd be pretty thorough,” she replied. “So far, no other messages had been found in this manner, and a recheck has turned up nothing further, according to Dr. Darius.”
“ What Emmons means, Dr. Coran,” said Mannion, “is why'd the creep jam it inside the dead woman? Why not write it on the goddamned wall in blood like a Manson might do?”
She considered this and looked to Alan for a reply. Rychman stepped closer to the mic and said, “People, this is one indication we may be dealing with two separate personalities here: one being fearful and timid, the other dominant and daring. The fearful Ovid is in awe of his more potent accomplice.”
Jessica jumped back in. “Maybe Ovid doesn't want the other killer to know that he took this step.”
“ And he's counting on us not to leak this information, maybe, and maybe he's as good as dead if the other one finds out,” added Rychman. “Least, that's the way Dr. Coran and I see it at this point. Call it educated conjecture, if you wish.”
This seemed to satisfy most in the room. Emmons' thin hand went up as she raised another question. “What does he have to gain by this act? Does he want to be caught? Is he trying to end the killing spree?”
“ We don't have all the answers, not by a long shot,” replied Rychman. “The poem shows a lot of misguided, insane notions are swimming around in the guy's head, like the business of the Claw's doing the world a good turn, servicing us, you might say, by getting rid of the wretched among us.”
“ This ties in with a related theory that Captain Rychman is working on, about the killer or killers knowing that some and perhaps all of his victims were having medical problems,” Jessica added.
This brought a rumble from the assembled detectives. Only a handful were working on the probe of the medical histories. Rychman asked these few to report any new findings, but they'd just begun to scratch the surface and each begged for more time.
O’Toole asked the question that seemed now on everyone's mind. “Then this bastard, or these bastards, knew their victims?”
“ We can't say that's a for-sure at this point,” countered Rychman. “But we're betting that he had prior knowledge of their weaknesses through their medical histories or records. Believe me, people, it has been a leap of faith to take our speculations this far, but that's why we're lucky to have Dr. Coran on our side.”
The group acknowledged this with positive grunts and nods. Emmons asked in her quiet voice, “You got all this from that poem? Maybe I'd better go back to school, because I don't see it.”
“ The medical history trail came independently through Captain Rychman's investigation,” Jessica answered. “All we truly got from the poem is the belief that Ovid is a weak and subordinated personality at the mercy of the one he calls the Claw. It was Ovid who contacted the radio station after the initial attacks way back in November of last year. Ovid has remained silent until now-out of fear, we believe. But just as with his radio appearance, he is championing the work of the Claw with his poem.”
“ Sorry,” said Emmons. “I just don't get that much out of this loon's poem, Doctor, and if you're wrong we could be looking in all the wrong places.”
“ The poem doesn't really say all that much,” agreed another detective.
“ But it does” Jessica disagreed. “It's a sick rationalization for the Claw's cannibalistic nature, and it places the Claw in a godlike role, doing the work of an archangel of death. It tells us a great deal about the killer, and about his accomplice, this Ovid who is in fear for his own life and quite surely in awe of the other man, who has convinced him somehow to be a part of some glorious master plan.”
“ Obviously delusionary,” said Dr. Richard Ames, who had stepped through the door, his secretary beside him with a handful of slides. “However, I'm not convinced that you have two men with murderous intent and cannibalistic urges, and not one man with a dual personality disorder.”
Dr. Ames' contradiction took both Rychman and Jessica by surprise. Jessica tried to minimize the damage already done. “No, this is not a case of one man with two identities, Doctor, but two men with a shared psychosis, acting out a shared fantasy.”
“ If you will bear with me, please,” Ames pleaded with an upraised palm, displaying his huge hand. He then gave a nod to his secretary, who looked disgruntled to be working so early. Priscilla obviously knew the routine, going for the slide projector at the rear of the room. Rychman pulled down a screen from overhead.
Meanwhile, Ames was saying, “I will provide you with my opinion regarding the Claw as he has revealed himself through his writing. Beginning with his handwriting, it is clear that he has a great reservoir of self-hatred and is lacking in self-esteem. As to how many killers you have? I believe this a case of encroaching possession of one personality over the other-that is to say, what the press has dubbed the Claw is another Gerald Ray Sims, i.e., Sims equals Ovid, Stainlype equals the Claw.”
“ No, no,” Jessica started to object, unable to hide her disappointment, her eyes meeting Rychman's. He, too, was upset, realizing that Ames' conclusions toppled all that they had so carefully built up in the minds of his detectives. They had been suddenly clipped at the knees.
Ames had taken the podium, and seeing the dismay in their eyes, he said to Jessica and Rychman, “Aren't you even curious as to how I arrived at my conclusions? Shall I go on, Captain?”