They spent the rest of the afternoon preparing for the straitjacket escape. While Jan and Crystal set up the portable spotlights, Hardare timed the roller coaster with a stopwatch. A life-time of performing escapes had taught him that most mechanical things were not dependable. The roller coaster was a perfect example: each ride was shorter by a few seconds than the one before it. After the tenth ride, the times evened out at two minutes, two seconds. He had honed the escape down to a minute forty-nine, which left a comfortable thirteen second margin for error.
He then assembled the small trampoline that was essential to the escape’s finale. Once the straitjacket was off his body, he would release his ankles from the block-and-tackle that was holding him in the air, and jump to the ground. The distance was over thirty feet, and the new trampoline had him worried. He had worked with them for years, and springs often popped, usually when someone was bouncing too hard on them.
When the trampoline was assembled, the three of them took turns testing it, then all got on together. It felt sound, and Hardare quickly put it out of his mind.
Bob Olley’s Carnival opened its gates at 5 p.m. that night. When Jayne Hunter and her crew arrived to film the escape an hour later, the place was a mob scene, and two carnival employees had to escort the Action Ten van through the crowd.
The van parked behind a concession tent. Hunter and her crew got out and began unloading their equipment, the escape artist and family no where in sight.
As Hunter got ready, she considered how much she had gotten out of this story. Two exclusives, her name mentioned repeatedly in the newspapers, and now this. She’d done well by Hardare, and she regretted only giving him three minutes of air time for his escape. The problem was, it was a publicity stunt, something which had no real news value, except if he fell. She knew how ghoulish that sounded, but also knew the public’s taste.
“Hello Jayne,” Hardare said, his face partially hidden by a pink swirl of cotton candy.
“Hello yourself,” Hunter replied.
The magician was dressed in skintight black clothes, his sleek body rippled with muscles. “A small token of my appreciation,” he said, handing her the candy.
“What did I do?” Hunter asked.
“Hundreds of kids started pouring into the carnival an hour ago, and they came to see me. One of them told my daughter you plugged my escape on your channel all afternoon. I couldn’t ask for much more than that.”
“I talked the station manager into it,” Hunter admitted, pleased to see him so happy. “My way of saying thanks.”
While Hardare talked to her crew about lighting and camera angles for the escape, Jan appeared and took Hunter aside.
“You’ve done a lot for us,” Jan said, squeezing her arm appreciatively, “and I think we’ve maybe helped you a bit, too.”
Hunter smiled. “You’ve helped me a lot.”
“I need to ask another favor,” Jan said.
“Really? What’s that?”
A train filled with screaming kids riding the roller coaster roared above their heads, making conversation useless. Jan’s entire body started to tremble, and Hunter recognized the fear lurking behind Jan’s mask of happiness.
“What do you want me to,” Hunter said.
At six o’clock Wondero was still in his office, on the phone with a sheriff in Pennsylvania who was singing his praises. At first, Wondero had been flattered, then embarrassed, and finally got annoyed. The sheriff simply wouldn’t stop lavishing praise on him. He was beginning to dislike being famous, and it had only started a few hours ago.
The thought of the century had occurred to him as he had stepped foot in his office that morning. It was something that should have dawned on him much earlier, and he supposed that it hadn’t because it was so obvious.
D.B. had other roommates.
Dr. Cavanaugh had faxed him their names. There were six, and one by one, Wondero had started tracking them down.
His luck had been phenomenal; two were dead, and he had located the other four, and turned up two more killers, the first a plumber in Reno, the other a security guard in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. Both had basements and refrigerator freezers filled with human trophies, and both were now behind bars.
“I had the F.B.I. up here ten times,” the sheriff in PA was telling him, “and they turned up squat. I’m going to call them first thing tomorrow, tell them what you did.”
The sheriff in Reno had promised the same, the F.B.I. agents in his territory having rubbed him the wrong way.
“Glad to have helped you out,” Wondero said.
“Not as glad as me,” the sheriff said.
As Wondero said goodbye, his phone lit up. The Reno killer’s capture had been picked up by U.P.I. and he had been deluged by calls. The newspapers were calling him the serial killer catcher, and if he didn’t leave his office soon, his head would grow too large to fit through the door.
His secretary stuck her head into his office. “Got a collect call for you, Harry. Somebody named Ernesto Rodriguez.”
“Never heard of him,” Wondero said.
“He says a man gave him your business card,” his secretary said.
Puzzled, Wondero punched in the line. “Hello? Yes operator, I’ll accept the call.”
“Hello,” said a man with a thick Mexican accent. “This is Ernesto. I work at the mental hospital in Atascadero.”
“Oh, right,” Wondero said, now remembering.
“Got a note in my box that says you wanted to know if I remembered who visited D.B. on Monday.”
“We already found him,” Wondero said. “Thanks for calling.”
“You found them both?” Rodriguez said.
Wondero blinked. “What did you say?”
“There were two of them. Eugene and his buddy. I heard D.B. was causing trouble, so I figured you’d better know.”
“Can you describe Eugene’s buddy,” Wondero said.
“Sure. He was in a wheelchair, real sickly-looking. Eugene wheeled him up to the fence, and D.B. talked to him for a while.”
Wondero felt his face burning up. “Do you remember anything else? Think hard.”
“Come to mention it, yeah. When they left, Eugene told D.B. how much the guy in the chair had wanted to meet him. I thought that was a little strange, you know?”
Wondero banged his fist on the front door of Mr. Kozlowski’s house, listened for life inside, then kicked in the door.
He entered with his gun drawn. The shades were drawn on every window, the interior pitch dark. Bumping into the living room furniture, he found a light switch, and flicked it on.
He found Myrtle Jones lying unconscious on the living room floor. The old gal had been through hell the past two days, and he grabbed a blanket off the back of the couch, and wrapped her in it. As he punched in 911 on his cell phone, her eyes snapped open, and she stared up at him.
“Eugene’s alive,” she whispered.
“Lie still, I’m calling for help.”
“He and Mr. Kozlowski are buddies. I never knew...”
The call went through and Wondero gave the operator the address. Then he walked to the back of the house, and found Mr. Kozlowski watching a portable TV sitting on the kitchen table. It was turned onto channel 10, home of Action 10 news.
“Why did you do it?” Wondero asked him.
Mr. Kozlowski blinked at him. His fingers danced across the keyboard of the computer on the arm of his wheelchair. His reply appeared on the computer screen.
I LIKE EUGENE WE’RE KINDRED SPIRITS
“Are you a murderer, too?”
YES
“Where are your victims?”
BASEMENT OF MY OLD HOUSE IT WAS A LONG TIME AGO