A Mortal Terror (32 page)

“Louie? Jesus, he was my pal. What happened?”

“Bullet in the back of the head, close range. You fire your automatic out there?”

“Of course not, we were never close enough to the Krauts for that.”

“It was fired. One round gone. I checked it when I found you.”

“Can’t be. Louie, who’d want to kill Louie?” he said, struggling to keep his eyes open. “Was a major killed? Who?”

“Yeah. Arnold, the day we left Caserta. You know that.”

“No. You mentioned him, said he was alive.”

“I just didn’t say he was dead. How’d you do it, Stump? Get him alone like that?”

“I didn’t,” he said. “Why would I?”

“That’s what I want to know. Why strangle Harding after he saved our bacon? Why any of them?”

“You said Harding was choked by his binocular straps?”

“Yes. Do you remember?”

“And that you found me holding that card?”

“Yes.”

“Lieutenant, my head is scrambled, but even I know you’d need two hands free to strangle a guy. You’d grab and twist those leather straps real tight. Hard to do with a playing card in your hand. That one’s a little worn, but it would be badly crumpled if I’d done that. You’d keep it in your pocket until the deed was done. Now leave me alone.”

Maybe that made sense. Maybe I should have thought of it. But I wasn’t taking any chances. I found an MP and had him cuff Stump to the cot. If he was going anywhere, he’d be dragging an army cot along with him.

I wandered outside, wondering what to do next. I could go back to HQ and see if there was any message from Kaz. I could also check with Kearns about Danny’s transfer and see about getting him out of the platoon. It was a dangerous place, with death dealt from both sides of the table. But first I needed some chow. I spotted Cassidy checking charts and asked him where the mess was. He ditched his bloodstained operating gown and said he was buying.

“It’s not much on taste, but there’s plenty of it,” Cassidy said as we filled our mess tins with corned-beef hash and lima beans. The coffee was hot, and there was even sugar, so I couldn’t complain.

“Do you get many cases like that fellow who tried to dig a hole in the floor?” I asked after I got most of the grub down.

“We’re starting to see them. The artillery bombardment has been getting worse real fast. Most of the wounds we treat are shrapnel. It’s the kind of thing that wears on a man.”

“But the Third Division is a veteran outfit. Shouldn’t it take longer for them to be affected?”

“That’s just it, Billy. The Third has been at the sharp end since North Africa. Then Sicily, then the landing at Salerno, where they took a lot of casualties. After that, the Volturno River, and then Cassino. They only had a few weeks’ rest before this landing, and now we’ve got Germans on the high ground shelling us constantly. The replacements don’t know what to expect, the veterans do, and I can’t tell you which is worse.”

“What do you do for them?”

“The GI you saw will be evacuated as soon as a transport is available. He’s got a million-dollar wound, both arms riddled with shrapnel, so he’s going home. It’s the ones without physical wounds I worry about. A short time in a safe rear area is a big help, but there is no safe haven here. Last I heard, the beachhead was only seven miles wide. The Germans can shell us anywhere they want, day or night.”

“How do you doctors decide which wounds are the milliondollar variety?”

“It’s not an official term, Billy. It’s any wound bad enough to get you sent home but not bad enough to be permanently crippling. That guy had severe muscle damage. No way he could heal up well enough to handle a rifle in combat, but with physical therapy he should be okay. Might take a while, so he fits the bill.”

“What do you think about these murders? Does a killer like that have to be crazy?”

“Crazy isn’t an official term either. Well, to a normal person, yes, someone who commits multiple murders is crazy, since they operate outside the norms of society. But these killings were well thought out, and had a distinctive pattern. The killer eluded capture, until now. These are all signs of intelligent planning. Is that crazy?”

“You sound like a lawyer.”

“Goes to show, there are no easy answers when it comes to crazy.”

“Take a look at this, and tell me if this sounds like a lunatic murderer,” I said, handing Cassidy Stump’s unfinished letter to his mother. Cassidy read the letter, nodding a few times. He handed it back.

“I can’t say he’s not a murderer, based on this. There are many reasons for murder, and plenty of them wouldn’t preclude telling your mother a little white lie. He obviously wants her to think he’s safe behind the lines, in Naples, since the Anzio landing will be in the news.”

“What about the lunatic part?”

“That’s harder, Billy. This letter shows genuine concern for another person. I’m just theorizing now, but cold-blooded murders as you’ve described them demonstrate a total disregard for others. No remorse at all. This letter shows the opposite. He could have not written her, or he could have written her the truth, but instead he took a different tack, making up a story to ease her mind.”

“So Stump is normal?”

“Billy, one of the things you learn on a psychiatric ward is that words like normal and insane are essentially worthless. It’s what I find fascinating about the human mind.”

“That’s swell, Doc, but I need answers and I need them now. I’ve got a lunatic on the loose.”

“Well, ‘lunatic’ is not a precise term, but ‘psychopath’ is. I think that may be what you’re looking for.”

“Like I said, crazy.”

“A psychotic is crazy, in the conventional sense; they’re the ones who hear voices, that sort of thing. But a psychopath is different. You could talk with one and you’d never know it. A true psychopath could write that letter, only if it served a specific purpose and was to his benefit. They’re emotional mimics. They don’t feel real emotion, but they are great observers, and know when to act normal. But a psychopath wouldn’t care about his mother’s feelings. He wouldn’t even understand what that meant.”

“So how can you spot one?”

“It’s easy, once they’re caught. They’re great deniers, sometimes telling such outright lies about their guilt that it’s easy to see through them. They usually have a grandiose sense of their own self-worth and capabilities. But otherwise, they can act just like you and me.”

“Except that it wouldn’t bother them to kill half a dozen people.”

“No, it may even be a source of satisfaction for them. Think about it. No conscience, no empathy or understanding of others. They’re not good at long-term planning, so they find it easy to act on impulse, and they are highly manipulative, so they can often get away with things.”

“But you said this whole thing took planning.”

“Yes, but if we’re dealing with a psychopath, I doubt he planned everything out first. I’d bet it was an impulse that started the ball rolling. Then the grandiose thinking might kick in. In his own world, he might derive pleasure watching those around him react to his escalating crimes. The more he gets away with, the more powerful he feels.”

“It doesn’t sound like he’d be a candidate for combat fatigue.”

“No. He’d have a sense of self-preservation, but he wouldn’t suffer any effects from killing, or seeing his comrades killed. Other than enjoying the spectacle of it all, maybe. Want some more joe?”

“Yeah, thanks,” I said, and thought about what Cassidy had said while he refilled our cups. Impulse. The sequence of the first two killings always had bothered me. Now I was sure Landry hadn’t been killed first. The playing cards were a trick, a manipulation, to cover up an impulse killing to divert suspicion. Galante had been an immediate threat, and had to be dealt with on the spot. On impulse. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that Landry knew the killer and Galante were together, so he had to go. Then that grandiose imagination kicks in. Make it look like a guy with a grudge against the chain of command. Get everyone in a tizzy, and watch the fun.

“Would a psychopath enjoy army life?” I asked when Cassidy returned with the coffees.

“Well, you’d have to be crazy to,” he said, grinning at his own joke.

“So what would happen if someone told this nutcase he was going to pull him off the line? Send him to a hospital, cure him?”

“You mean a psychiatric hospital? No way. Our hypothetical guy would kill to stay out of one of those.”

“He’d prefer to stay in combat? Now that’s crazy.”

“I’d say in some ways it could be the perfect environment, since there are clear rules and procedures. He could figure out how to manipulate the system easily. But on the other hand, the peacetime army would be too boring. Psychopaths crave stimulation.”

“Combat is stimulating.”

“Yeah, I see what you mean. I’ve always said that if you keep men in combat long enough, ninety-eight percent will break down from combat fatigue. The other two percent will be psychopaths.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

“W
E’RE SHORT ON
men, Boyle,” Kearns said. “I’m sorry, but Second Battalion has been pulled back into reserve, and that’ll have to do. No transfers, not for anybody.”

“But sir—”

“Can it, Boyle. If I could I would—we really owe you one. But orders are orders.”

“Okay,” I said, not liking it one bit, and not certain that I was owed a damn thing yet.

“The provost marshal is taking charge of Sergeant Stumpf as soon as he’s discharged from the hospital. Meanwhile we have MPs standing guard. You going back with him?”

“I have to talk to Colonel Harding first, Major. There are a few loose ends I’d like to tie up.”

“Be my guest. I’m sure you’ll want to visit with your brother for a while.”

“Yes sir.”

“Well done, Boyle,” he said, rising from his desk in the underground wine cellar and extending his hand.

“Thanks. But remember, Stump still denies he’s the killer, and we’re short on proof.”

“I wouldn’t expect a mad killer to admit his guilt. And that card and the marks around Sam’s neck are proof enough. Not to mention a couple of dozen colonels and generals who aren’t asking for bodyguards.”

Explosions shook the ground above us, loosening dust from the rafters and coating everything in the room with gray grit. Men wore their helmets even here, deep underground. The German bombardment was becoming more intense, as the Krauts brought more and more heavy stuff up into the Alban Hills.

I’d stayed with Stump for hours after my talk with Cassidy, just watching, talking a bit, trying to size him up. He was sure of his innocence, but worried about the military justice system taking him in and spitting him out. It seemed like a sane way to look at things. They finally gave him something to help him sleep and kicked me out. I’d been dog-tired, and went back to the house where Kaz and I had bunked, only to find everyone sleeping in the cellar. Between a snoring captain and a couple of artillery barrages, I didn’t get much sleep.

This morning I’d hoped to get Danny’s transfer in the works, but Kearns had put the kibosh on that. At least Danny’s outfit had been pulled off the line and put into reserve, which meant a couple of miles between them and the front. Still in artillery range, but then what wasn’t?

There were no messages from Kaz, and I couldn’t check with him since I didn’t know exactly where he was. So I drove back to the field hospital, looking for Lieutenant Evans and Father Dare. I wanted to find out what Evans had been trying to say about Ileana at Bar Raffaele, and I was still curious about the pistol-packing padre. I’d known my share of priests, and while some liked a good game of poker, none of them carried a .45 automatic. Being a man of the cloth could be a good cover for the kind of maniac I was hunting. Like the army, the church gave you a nice set of rules to follow, and it had been my experience that rules were good things to hide behind. Then another talk with Stump. I wanted to look in his eyes and see—what? All that I saw last time we talked was derision at the idea he was the killer. His only proof he wasn’t was an uncrumpled playing card. If he wasn’t lying, then the real killer was bound to strike again. How sure was I?

Then I’d visit Danny and Flint, and question anyone in the platoon who might have seen a GI with an automatic in his hand during the retreat. What about Flint? If I was right about the killer being in the 3rd Platoon, then he had to be on the list of suspects. But I’d seen him helping Evans out of the smoke. Could he have gone after Harding, then left the job half-finished? Why? If the object was to frame Stump, a dead Harding would have been even better. Could the 88 have interrupted him? But Flint had looked fine, as fine as anyone who’d been through that attack and retreat. If the Tiger had stopped him, he would have shown some effect from the explosion. It didn’t make sense.

“Father Dare? He left early this morning,” a nurse told me. “Said he had to get back to his unit and be of some use. We wanted to keep him another day or so, but his leg will be all right if he keeps it clean.”

“How was he? Was he upset about anything?”

“He just said he didn’t want to become a permanent resident of Hell’s Half Acre. Can’t say I blame him.” She consulted a chart and led me to the tent where Evans was resting, a cast encasing his shoulder and arm, bandages wrapped around his head.

“Flint saved my life,” Evans said. “I took a load of shrapnel in my shoulder. They told me I would’ve bled to death if he hadn’t pulled me out. There was so much smoke, I’m damn lucky he found me.”

“He’s the senior noncom now. He’s probably in command of the platoon.”

“What happened to Louie and Stump? Are they wounded?”

I filled him in on Louie being shot in the head, and Stump being in custody as the Red Heart Killer.

“It’s hard to believe. Stump? And why kill Louie? They were buddies. It doesn’t add up.”

“He’s killed whomever he needed to, not just officers. There had to be a reason, I don’t think he killed randomly. Is there anything you can think of? Something Louie said or saw that he shouldn’t have?”

“Louie spoke to me about believing his time was up,” Evans said. “But that was about the war, not these killings. That’s how I took it, anyway.”