“Find anything?” Fitch asked.
“Their last meal,” Linderman said.
“That’s a good start.”
“And the murder weapon.”
“Even better. What about the bodies?”
“That’s next.”
Linderman took another deep breath before heading back inside.
Chapter 44
He checked the upstairs first. There were four bedrooms and one shared bathroom with an old-fashioned claw-foot tub. Each bedroom occupied a different corner of the upstairs, with its own distinct view of the grounds. They shared the same decorating scheme, with wallpaper and furniture coverings straight out of a Laura Ashley catalogue. Each room also contained a four-poster bed and matching antique furniture.
He was mildly surprised. He’d half-expected to find the bodies of Crutch’s mother and three sisters lying in their beds with their heads bashed in. He’d seen that before with serial killers, a desire to take the victims and return them to some normal setting, as it to separate them from the horrible violence which ended their time on this earth.
He also checked each of the room’s walk-in closets to make sure the bodies were not hanging from a hook, or the ceiling. He’d seen that as well.
Walking downstairs, he realized that he’d not seen a boy’s bedroom, and found himself wondering where Crutch had slept.
The air had cleared enough to breath freely. He checked the den, living room and a small sitting area, but did not find the bodies. The rooms were coated with a thick veil of dust but still remarkably intact, the destruction contained to the dining room.
The house had to have a basement. In the kitchen he found a door that led down a darkened flight of stairs. Rifling the kitchen drawers, he removed a pack of matches and a box of birthday candles. He lit one of the candles, and headed downstairs.
A mad scrambling of tiny feet heralded his approach. Rats. Stopping at the bottom, he did a slow three-sixty, and took in his surroundings. The space beneath the house was dank and low-ceilinged. On one wall, a washer and dryer. On the opposite wall, a work area with an assortment of hanging tools, and a shelving unit lined with coffee cans containing rusted nails of varying sizes. Beside the washing machine was a door. The words NO ENTRY – THIS MEANS YOU! was printed across the door in white letters, the handwriting child-like. He’d found Crutch’s bedroom.
He tested the door and found it locked. He tried kicking it down and got nowhere. He checked the work area for an appropriate tool. The best he could find was a small axe. The candle in his hand had burned down. He used it to light another, then went to work on the door. The wood was old, and fought him every step of the way.
“Hey, is that you?” Fitch called from the top of the stairs.
“Yes,” Linderman replied, breathing heavily.
“You find something?”
“I think so.”
“I called a judge I know, and told him I had reason to believe there had been a murder on this property. He’s issuing a search warrant right now.”
Fitch had just saved him a lot of trouble and headaches.
“Thank you,” he called up the stairs.
“No problem. Let me know if I can do anything,” the officer replied.
“Do you have a flashlight handy?”
“In my car. You want me to get it?”
“Please.”
Soon Fitch came down the stairs shining a megawatt flashlight. He directed the flashlight’s beam at the door without having to be told.
“You looked kind of funny holding that little candle,” Fitch remarked.
Linderman smiled grimly. It had occurred to him that he was about to witness something that no profiler within the FBI had ever seen before – the lair of a serial killer as a young boy. Serial killers dark fantasies started at a tender age, and became more violent and disturbing as they grew older and matured. Now, he was going to see the things which had affected young Jason Crutchfield, and led him to kill his family. Had Rachel Vick’s life not hung in the balance, he would have been giddy with excitement.
Finally the door gave way, and he laid it across the washing machine.
“You want to go first?” Fitch asked.
“Please,” Linderman replied.
Fitch handed Linderman the flashlight.
“Be my guest,” the officer said.
The room was not what Linderman had expected. Meticulously neat and tidy, there were no visible signs of a diseased mind. The bed was made, the floor free of trash. The shelves were lined with teenage bric-a-brac, including stacks of baseball cards and a pair of ping pong paddles. The room also had many comforts, including a stereo system, a portable TV set with rabbit ears that sat on an upturned crate, and a small fridge.
“You see the bodies?” Fitch asked, standing in the doorway.
“They don’t appear to be here,” Linderman replied.
“Crap – there’s my phone. Let me take this.”
“Go ahead.”
Fitch went upstairs to take the call.
The closet came next. It was a small space with stone walls. A half dozen denim shirts and several pairs of stone-washed blue jeans hung from a metal pole. There was one navy sports jacket and gray flannel pair of pants that looked like church clothes. It was all terribly normal, with no signs of problems.
Something wasn’t right here. Crutch hadn’t gone from a normal teenage kid to a serial killer overnight. It had happened over time, the pressure building slowly, until one day he’d erupted like a volcano, and all the anger inside had spilled out.
He rechecked the bedroom. Jammed in the corner was a desk with a stack of school books. Each book had a paper book cover designed to protect it from use. Written on the cover of the top book were the words SOCIAL STUDIES.
Linderman opened the book to a random page, and found himself staring at a page with the words The Nine Satanic Statements written across the top. He shut the book, and removed the cover. The Satanic Bible by Anton Szandor Lavey. Crutch had been reading about devil worship when he was supposed to be studying history.
He removed the paper covers from the rest of the stack, and checked the spines. Each was a book on Satanism and occult worship.
He put the books back into the stack the way he’d found them. The room would need to be photographed by a CSI exactly as he’d discovered it.
A book bag lay beneath the desk. It was black and had escaped his attention. He pulled the bag out and opened it. It was filled with spiral notebooks, the words SOCIAL STUDIES, ENGLISH LIT, MATH, SCIENCE written on the covers.
Crutch’s school notes.
Diaries and personal writings said more about a person’s mind state of mind than anything else. He was finally going to get to the root of what had driven Crutch over the edge. He started with the notebook that said ENGLISH LIT.
The first twenty pages were notes about the novels of Ernest Hemingway and John Steinbeck. Then the notes stopped, replaced by drawings of a crouching, devilish figure with pointed ears holding a sword dripping with bright red blood. Every remaining page of the notebook contained the same drawing.
The other notebooks were identical. After about twenty pages, the school notes ended, and were replaced by the devilish figure.
The notebooks went back into the bag. He placed the bag on the bed so the CSI team wouldn’t miss it. Behind the bed was a black wall with a peculiar shadow. He leaned in for a closer look.
Not a shadow, but a drawing. The same devilish figure, only much larger, almost human size. It’s texture looked odd, and he ran his finger across the outline.
It had been burned into the wall.
He heard a noise and spun around. His flashlight’s beam captured the man standing on the other side of the bedroom. It was young Crutch, holding a baseball bat.