“Cheryl Bayne,” Isabel said, “is missing. As are others on an unfortunately lengthy list. We don’t know that anything has happened to any of them.”
“Yet.”
“Yet,” she agreed.
Alan eyed her, then continued, “Anyway, when all is said and done and you’ve got the guy, I reserve the right to inform the public that I was contacted by the killer.”
“Were you?” Isabel murmured.
“Third person,” Rafe noted, studying the note. “He isn’t killing them because they’re blondes. This could have been written by someone who knows the killer. Knows what he’s doing.”
“Or maybe,” Alan offered, “he’s schizophrenic and believes it’s not really him killing these women.”
“You just want this to be the killer,” Rafe said in an absent tone.
“Well, yes. This story could be my Watergate.”
Isabel pursed her lips. “No. Your Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy. Not your Watergate.”
“It could make my career,” Alan insisted.
“Yeah?” Isabel was politely interested. “And do you happen to remember the name of the journalist who was supposedly contacted by Jack the Ripper?”
Alan scowled. “Shatter a man’s dreams, why don’t you?”
“Do you remember?”
“It was over a hundred years ago.”
“And the most famous serial killer of modern times. Countless books have been written about him. Movies made about him. Theories as to his identity endlessly debated. And yet the name of that journalist doesn’t exactly spring readily to the tongue, does it?”
“Do you know it?” Alan challenged.
“Of course. But then, I specialize in serial killers. More or less. Everybody in the business has studied the Ripper case. It’s practically Murder 101 in Behavioral Science at Quantico. Everybody wants to be the one to solve it.”
“Including you?”
“Oh, I don’t think it’ll ever be definitively solved. And I don’t believe it should be. Some things should remain mysteries.”
“You don’t really believe that.”
“Yes, I do. We should never, ever believe life-or history-holds no surprises for us. That way lies arrogance. And arrogance can blind us to the truth.”
“Which truth?”
“Any truth. All truth.” Her voice was solemn.
Alan sighed and got to his feet. “Okay, before you start calling me Grasshopper, I’m going to leave.”
“I’m sure I have a pebble around here somewhere, if you want to stay and test your readiness,” Isabel said, still solemn.
“Somehow, I don’t think I’m fast enough,” Alan said, not without a note of honest regret. He offered them both a casual salute, then left the conference room, closing the door behind him.
“Good job of distracting him,” Rafe said.
“Maybe. With any luck he’ll spend at least the next few hours on the Internet or in the library reading up on Jack the Ripper-just so he can tell me the name of that journalist the next time I see him. It’ll occupy his mind a little while.” She leaned back in her chair and rubbed the nape of her neck with one hand, frowning slightly.
“Still got that headache?”
“It comes and goes. So far, there’s no sign of Cheryl Bayne; her station has backed up Dana Earley’s missing persons report with one of their own. And Hollis and Mallory are checking out the rest of the properties owned by Jamie Brower.”
“You still want to find that box of photos.”
“I want to find whatever is there. Speaking of which, your forensics team confirmed blood in Jamie’s playhouse, I gather. A lot of blood.”
He nodded. “Yeah, you were right about that. And a faint blood trail to the door. T.J. figures the body was wrapped in plastic. I’m guessing it was put into a car and hauled somewhere. They’re going over Jamie’s car now, but we didn’t find anything when we checked it bumper to bumper after she was killed.”
Isabel shook her head. “She wouldn’t have panicked, and she was too smart to transport a body in her own car. It would have been her playmate’s car. And I’m betting she got rid of it afterward. Very rid of it. Like maybe sank it to the bottom of one of the lakes in the area. With or without the body inside.”
“That,” he agreed, “is all too likely.” He hesitated, then added, “Did you pick up anything from Alan?”
“No, he’s a very closed book. Not uncommon for a journalist; they keep a lot of secrets, as a rule. Most of us find it difficult to read them, even the telepaths.”
“You think his guess about the killer being schizophrenic was right?”
“I think it’s at least as likely as any other theory we have. Maybe more than likely.” She drew a breath and spoke rapidly. “One school of thought proposes four different types of serial murderers: visionary, mission-oriented, hedonistic, and control-oriented. The mission-oriented is out to eliminate a particular group he feels is unworthy of living. Common victims for this type of killer are those easily categorized: prostitutes, the homeless, the mentally ill. Or-plumbers.”
Rafe blinked. “Plumbers?”
“I’m just saying. Mission-oriented serial killers target groups. Unless our guy is out to kill all women, or at least all successful women-a task even a madman would have to find daunting-then I don’t believe he’s mission-oriented.”
“Sounds logical to me. Next?”
“The hedonistic killer is after pleasure or thrills when he kills. He may get his jollies from the kill itself, from the arousal and gratification of what’s basically a lust murder; he may enjoy the planning stages, the stalking of his prey. Or he may find pleasure in the consequences of the kill if, for instance, he gains a kind of freedom by killing family or people he perceives as tying him down somehow.”
“Control-oriented type?”
“His thing is having power over the victim, especially the power of life and death. If he rapes, it’s for control and domination, not thrills. And this type generally doesn’t kill his victims immediately. He likes to torture, both physically and psychologically. He wants to draw it out, savor his power over them, watch their helplessness and terror.”
“You must have hellacious nightmares,” Rafe said.
She looked at him with a little half smile. “Oddly enough, no. My nightmares tend to come while I’m awake.”
Rafe waited a moment, giving her an opening, but it was obvious she didn’t intend to take it. “So our guy is not likely to be control-oriented, or at least not driven by that, since he doesn’t waste any time at all in killing his victims. And the visionary type of serial killer I’m assuming is the nail Alan may have hit on the head?”
“Umm. Alan… and the note sent to him.” She tapped a red fingernail against the plastic-sleeved note Rafe had placed atop the stack of papers on the conference table in front of her. “This makes me wonder, it really does. If it’s not purely a ruse designed to throw us off track-and we have to assume that’s at least possible-then this note could tell us a lot about our killer. I’ll need to make a copy for us and send the original to Quantico, by the way. The handwriting experts may be able to tell us something. As for what the note says…”
“He wants us to stop him?”
“If we accept this as written, and as written by the killer, then some part of him does. The sane part.” Isabel paused, frowning. “The least common type of serial killer is the visionary, someone who sees visions or hears voices commanding him to kill.”
“As in Son of Sam.”
“Yeah. He usually attributes the voices to God or some kind of demon and feels himself helpless to disobey them. He’s not in control, the voices are. They tell him to kill, who to kill, when to kill. Maybe why those particular people have to be killed. He may hear the voices from childhood, or it may be a sudden psychosis brought on by stress or trauma. Some people believe a chemical change in the brain is responsible, but, as I said, we don’t know a whole hell of a lot about how the brain really works.