"What's this all about?" Butts asked.
Chuck filled him and Florette in on Lee's wild car chase.
"We think there might be a connection," he added.
Frowning, Florette cocked his head to one side. "According to your profile, that doesn't sound at all like this guy."
"I know," Lee agreed. "That what's so disturbing about it."
Butts's homely face crinkled in concern. "Do you think you oughta be-I mean, maybe you should-"
"Look, we can talk about that later, okay?" Lee interrupted. "Right now, let's deal with what we do know, okay?"
"Okay," Chuck said. "What do you make of this new twist?"
Lee frowned. He wished Nelson were here to help him.
"I suspect there's a significance to the placement of the body parts, but I don't know enough to explain that. I do think he's-"
"— becoming more confident," Florette finished for him.
"Yes, that's true-but he could also be unraveling. Some serial killers fall apart after a while. The strain of being chased gets to them, and they become sloppy and reckless. Bundy fell apart completely at the end, butchering several residents of a sorority house and leaving behind all kinds of evidence, including an eyewitness who survived. And Gacy began to break down after being conspicuously trailed by the police for a week."
"So that's good, right?" Butts said.
"Not necessarily. It also makes him more dangerous, more unpredictable."
"So what now?" said Chuck.
"Well," Lee answered, "we have to hope that he's getting overconfident."
"Pride cometh before a fall," Florette murmured.
"Something like that," Lee agreed. He looked out the window at the sunless sky.
As he walked from the subway to his apartment, Lee's cell phone rang. The Caller ID said Fiona. That was odd-she hated cell phones, and never called him on his.
"Hello?"
"Lee?" His mother sounded upset-her voice was shaky.
"What's wrong?"
"It's Groucho. He's…" Her voice shook, and he could hear a muffled sob.
"What happened?"
"I don't know. I couldn't find him last night, and today I found him underneath the willow tree." Another muffled sob, and then she came back on the line. "I don't know if I'm imagining things, but I think he was poisoned."
"Have Stan take him to the vet for an autopsy."
"Am I being silly? I know he's just a cat, but-"
"No, you're not being silly! How's Kylie taking it?"
"She's very upset. She's with her father today."
"Okay. Now listen carefully. You call Stan and have him take Groucho to the vet for an autopsy-and let me know the results, okay? Then you go immediately to George's and stay there."
"But-"
"Please! Do as I say-for God's sake!"
"All right," she answered meekly.
"I'll call you in an hour to see if everything went all right. And for God's sake let the police escort know where you're going in case you get separated, will you?"
"Yes, dear. What do you think…?"
"I don't know. But please don't take any chances."
"I won't. I'll be all right. Stan's here with me."
"Good-keep him with you." The more people he could surround his family with, the safer they would be.
I'll take Manhattan…
The Slasher, whoever he was, didn't make empty threats.
Chapter Forty-eight
The results from the vet in Jersey were exactly as Lee had expected. The cat had indeed been poisoned-arsenic, mixed in with canned tuna fish. "Poor Groucho. He never could resist tuna fish," Lee's mother had said on the phone. There was no way to determine who had done it, of course-but Lee didn't have much doubt. He urged Fiona to stay at George's and not leave the house unless she was accompanied by a policeman.
Their meeting in Chuck's office the next day had a desultory feeling. There didn't seem to be any way to stop the Slasher-in fact, he seemed to be hitting his stride. Chuck sent out a notice to all precinct commanders in Manhattan to be on alert, but none of them thought it would do any good. The level of vigilance was already high citywide after the attack on the World Trade Center.
Long after darkness closed in on the city, Chuck sent them all away. The mayor had called a press conference for the following day, and he had to meet with the mayor that night to catch him up on their progress-or lack of it.
As everyone was leaving, Chuck beckoned to Lee.
"Got a minute?"
"Sure-what's up?"
Chuck looked down at his shoes.
"I'm worried about you."
"Look, Chuck, I-"
"No, please-just hear me out, okay? I was willing to believe on some level that the attack in the subway might be unrelated to this case, but after the incident in Jersey, I've been thinking long and hard about this, and we've got to face it, Lee: he's after you now."
"But why me in particular?"
"That's what I've been asking myself, and I don't have any answers. But it's getting too dangerous for you. I wish you'd just-"
"I know what you're going to say. Now let me say something. I need this case, okay? If we allow him to win, I'll never be able to get over it. Besides, we don't know for sure that whoever is after me is really the Slasher."
Chuck folded his arms. "No, we don't. But what do you think the odds are?"
"I don't know-just like I don't know how he knows the details of my sister's disappearance, or even if he does. But I have to be the one to find out. You can see that, can't you?"
Chuck looked down at his shoes again. They gleamed like a new penny.
"For God's sake, Lee, put it all together. The gunshot, the text message, the-"
"Look, just give me a couple more days, okay?" Lee said. "Please-I'm begging you."
Chuck bit his lower lip and looked out the window at the darkened city. "Okay, okay," he said. "Christ, even in school you could always get your way in the end. I'll let you stay-but for God's sake, Lee, be careful, will you?"
"I promise."
What neither of them said was that all the vigilance in the world couldn't keep the Slasher from making his next move.
Lee went home and played the piano for two hours straight. He spent the entire first hour thrashing through a Bach partita he was working on. It was gritty, sweaty work-the Devil himself had taken up residence in the left-hand passages. What was really irritating was that he could just imagine Bach himself playing the damn thing without so much as a minute of practice.
"Goddamn genius," he muttered as he grappled with a knotty modulation. No matter what he played, though, the same song kept intruding, running through his head: I'll take Manhattan…
He made a pot of coffee and drank it until his teeth ached, as he looked through his case notes. After several hours of this, he had to stop, but he was too caffeinated to sleep, so he turned on the radio. A Verdi opera was playing, and he wasn't in the mood for tremulous tenors and overwrought sopranos, so he tried television.
He watched the Turner Classic Movies's rerun of Gaslight for a while, but Charles Boyer's sadistic, tormenting husband routine irritated him. If only villains announced themselves so baldly, he thought. If only their evil intentions were so obviously displayed. He wanted to grab Ingrid Bergman and shake her, lovely as she was, scream at her to wake up and realize what was going on.
"Trying out a little projection, Campbell?" he muttered as he changed channels restlessly. Well, it's always easier from the outside looking in, isn't it? Everything is easier-spotting people's neuroses, destructive patterns, self-delusions. Much harder to spot your own. Physician, heal thyself, indeed.
There was nothing else good on the television, so around 2 A.M. he sat down at his computer and logged on to the Internet. The moment he typed in his password, an instant message appeared in the upper left-hand corner of his monitor. Lee's chest tightened when he saw the name on the screen: