“Where was he when he was doing that?”
“By the door.”
I nodded to Todd that I was finished, and he began his detailed questioning, prompting her to take all three of us through her ordeal step by step, virtually movement by movement. He paused occasionally to ask if she felt like taking a break, but every time she urged him to continue, although all of us could see the toll it was taking on her.
I was grateful he was there, to do the job I doubted I could have done alone. Watching Gail reliving the event, her body still sore and throbbing from its brutality, her voice quavering toward the end, was more than I would have allowed. And yet, the three of them knew better than I-knew that she had to partake in her own reconstruction, and perhaps play a hand in the capture of her tormentor-or forever remain his victim.
Finally, two hours and several tapes later, Todd punched the off button on his recorder, the sharp metallic click making Gail start with surprise, her nerves frayed and hypersensitive. “That’s it. You did a super job. I’m sorry we had to put you through it. And I’m afraid, as I said earlier, that this won’t be the last time, either. To be honest, especially if we get this guy to trial, there’s going to be times you wished you’d never called the police. But you did the right thing.”
He gathered his equipment together and turned to me. “Is there anything more you wanted to ask, Joe?”
I looked at his blandly pleasant face-an unsettling mix of everyone’s favorite Uncle Charley and an IRS auditor-with something approaching wonder. He’d been so perfect through it all-concise, polite, accommodating, solicitous, and efficient, to Gail and me both-that it almost challenged his sincerity. That viewpoint was mostly fueled by my own ambivalence, of course, but knowing it didn’t help any. I was feeling increasingly disenfranchised, unable to be either the grieving partner or a sisterly friend or even, I was beginning to think, an objective cop.
I turned to Gail, shoving all this to one side. “It’s a bit of a long shot, and I know you’ve got a lot on your mind-a lot to work through-but if you can take some time to think about who might have done this to you, it would help.”
Gail’s eyes took on a bewildered look, glistening with tears. “I’ve tried, Joe.”
The pain in her voice was saturated with despair and bafflement. Still, I persevered. “You’ve been looking for a monster. Think about normal people-men who struck you as just a little odd-too attentive, maybe, or too quiet, or who showed up at odd times with odd excuses. We’re looking for anything out of the ordinary.”
She shook her head at the vagueness of the suggestion, muttering, “So many people.”
I stood up, and Todd followed my example. I hesitated, then leaned forward and touched the back of her hand gently and briefly. It was cold and unresponsive, and after I straightened back up, she tucked both her hands into the opposing sleeves of her flowing robe as if she’d suddenly felt a chill.
I groped a moment for the proper platitude-“We’ll get him,” or “You’ll be all right,” or “At least you’re alive.” I’d already tried “I love you” at the hospital and had walked away feeling drained. I finally gave it up, said, “Take care. I’ll come back to see you soon,” as if I were addressing some octogenarian in a rest home, and took my leave.
Susan Raffner followed us downstairs and ushered us through the door. She grasped Todd’s forearm as he passed by her. “Thank you. That was the best interview I’ve ever seen.”
He nodded and smiled sadly. “Sorry I had to do it at all.” She stopped me too, as Todd made his way down the stairs and toward the car. “I’ve got a problem with you, though.”
I stared at her, my face rigid, the dormant rage in me giving a tiny lurch, like a tremor across a field of thinly crusted lava.
But she leavened her words by laying her hand gently on my arm. “I know what you’re going through, Joe, but you can’t expect her to hold your hand. She doesn’t need to worry about you.”
“I don’t expect her to.”
That was at best suspect, and Raffner knew enough to ignore it. “She also doesn’t need you to bottle it up inside. Find someone to talk to-someone professional. Don’t try to tough it out-it’ll only do you both dirt in the long run.”
I heard the echo of Nurse Pace’s counsel earlier-except that lurking within Raffner’s soothing tone I heard the subtle implication that she would be keeping a critical eye on me.
I nodded but didn’t respond directly. “Thanks for being there for her, Susan. Let me know if she comes up with any names.”
She frowned slightly, nodded without comment, and closed the door behind me. I turned away and walked to the edge of the porch. The smooth, black surface of the reservoir met my gaze-ugly, wrapped in concrete, awaiting winter’s frozen glaze. That’s what they all expected from me, I thought without blame, despite their conciliatory words: a quick, solid solution, delivered without screwups. And they were right.
3
My apartment was down the hill and two blocks over from Susan Raffner’s house. I had Todd drop me off so I could shave, shower, and get properly dressed. It had been just a few hours since I’d been catapulted from my sleep by some primordial instinct, but I felt totally drained, as if I’d been up for days.
Yet there was a familiar inner momentum slowly picking up speed, fueled as it always was by the first faint stirrings of an investigation coming to life. Even now, with so many of my own emotions in play, the steadying instincts of over thirty years of police work were beginning to settle in. The sad irony remained, however, that the very questions lending me stability were the same ones torturing Gaiclass="underline" Who did it? And why?
I watched myself in the mirror as I prepared to shave-placing the lathered brush just below my right sideburn, working the creamy soap down one cheek, across my chin, and back up the other side. Methodical, practical, a habit born of endless repetitions. Gail’s attacker had neatly stored his clothes before waking her up, had put on gloves before trashing the room and again before running the risk of hurting his hands by striking her. He’d covered her face, protected himself by tying her down, spoken only in a whisper, had shown very little emotion, and had come prepared with rope and knife-a neat and tidy man, not easily seized by impulse. Gail had been a carefully chosen target, and raping her had been the reward for good planning.
I’d given Gail a difficult assignment, asking her to conjure up possible suspects. Any public figure, but especially an outspoken, successful, left-wing feminist, drew resentment and contempt from far beyond her knowledge. Any vote she’d cast as a selectman, any unorthodox stance she’d publicly taken, could have lit the twisted, vengeful fuse this one man so tenderly cultivated. Separating him from his surroundings, based on the very subtleties I’d told her to think about, would take some doing.
Unless, as Todd had mentioned, he’d done it before.
An hour later I stepped out of my corner office on the first floor of the Municipal Center and handed a single sheet of paper to Harriet Fritter, the detective squad’s secretary, or “clerk,” according to the current politically correct nomenclature-although Gift from God was more the way I thought of her.
She looked at it wordlessly over the top of her half-glasses, her snow-white eyebrows colliding in silent fury. Over the years that Gail had visited me here, Harriet and she had formed their own friendship.
“That’s the MO of this morning’s rapist, or at least what we have so far. I’d like copies sent to the Vermont Department of Corrections, state police, SA’s office, and the sheriffs’ and local police departments in all surrounding counties, including Massachusetts and New Hampshire. And see if you can’t set up an appointment for me with Lou Biddle at Probation and Parole-this afternoon if possible.”
“How’s Gail?” was all she asked.