Never Burn A Witch: A Rowan Gant Investigation (8 page)

“Yeah, it’s Storm,” he said after a short
wait. “I was paged.”

He paused for another moment, apparently
holding to be transferred to the individual who had done the
paging. I decided I was finished with my lunch and pushed the plate
of gelatinized gravy and cold vegetables to the side then began
molesting my itchy forearm in a distracted fashion.

“Yeah. I’m at lunch. What’s up?” Ben finally
spoke into the cell phone once again.

I watched him as he listened to the voice at
the other end. Slowly, his face took on an expression of deep
concentration, and his free hand went to the back of his neck and
began automatically massaging.

“Yeah... Yeah... Uh-huh,” he grunted. “Hold
on a sec...”

He switched the phone to his other ear and
fumbled for his notebook. The struggle ended quickly, and he
flipped the pad open on the surface of the table then snapped the
button on his ink pen. Resting one elbow on the notepad to hold it
in place, he looked like a contorted giant trying to use miniature
replicas of everyday items.

“Okay, go ahead... Yeah... Uh-huh... Yeah, I
know ‘im…” He scribbled furiously, stopping only briefly as breaks
in the information coming to him warranted. “Sure. We worked
together a few months back.”

Ben scrawled a line on the paper and accented
it with a double underline then motioned for me to have a look. The
blue ink scribble read “Carl Deckert.”

Detective Carl Deckert worked for the county
police department. We had met during the last case I worked when he
had been assigned to the Major Case Squad, Saint Louis’ version of
a violent crime task force. The MCS was formed as a collective of
municipal police departments, all supplying manpower whenever a
particularly heinous or high profile case came along. That case
would then receive the highest priority and the undivided attention
of the officers assigned. The intention was for the squad to be a
trump card, activated only when absolutely necessary.
Unfortunately, these days, they seemed to spend more time active
than not.

“Yeah... What’s the name of the place
again? Uh-huh... Uh-huh... Got it.” Ben flipped to a fresh page and
returned to scribbling. “Yeah, I took ‘im down ta’ the morgue a
little while ago.” He pointed at me, verifying for me that I was
the
him
to whom he was
referring. “He identified the symbol and he’s got a theory. It
ain’t a good one, but I’m guessin’ you already figured that out.
Yeah, he’s with me right now... I dunno, hold on....”

He cupped his free hand over the mouthpiece
and turned his attention completely on me.

“Jonsey says the chief wants ta’ know if
you’re free ta’ go check out another crime scene.”

“When?” I asked.

“Now.”

I mulled it over for a moment. I had at least
two clients waiting for updates on their software, and I had to
customize it specifically for them. Fortunately, owning my own
consulting firm and working from home allowed flexibility in my
schedule. It didn’t take me long to decide that I could spend a few
hours working in the evening to catch up.

“Sure. No problem.”

“He’s okay with it,” Ben said as he resumed
speaking into the phone. “Yeah... No problem. We’re on our
way.”

He remained silent after switching off the
device and stowing it in his coat, then he gathered up the
notebook. His grim countenance was almost enough to verify what I
already suspected.

“He killed someone else, didn’t he?” I asked,
following Ben’s example and shrugging into my coat.

“That’s gonna be your call,” he responded.
“But yeah, looks like it. Meadowbrook Park out in the county. Carl
Deckert’s waitin’ for us.”

“How was the victim killed?” I pressed.

“Not sure ‘bout that, but the body was
burned,” he answered. “The vic was found tied to a piece of a
telephone pole in one a’ the pavilion fire pits where it’d been
torched.”

The itching sensation on my forearm had now
mutated into a knife-edged pain.

A
sk any number of people
on the street, and they will tell you that they abhor violence and
crime. Then ask those people how they feel about rubbernecking
sightseers who slow down to gawk at automobile accidents, and they
will tell you that they despise them. They will tell you that such
individuals are sick and twisted. They will tell you that such
individuals are morbid and in need of psychiatric help.

Now, using the very same people you’ve been
questioning, throw in yellow crime scene tape, flashing lights,
police cars and a dead body. Mix well.

Suddenly the morbid becomes the curiosity and
they, along with scores like them, will flock to the perimeter in
order to catch the tiniest glimpse of what the commotion is all
about. Meadowbrook Park was filled with those people today.

Normally, the paved road through the park
would remain untouched during the winter; there was no reason to
waste taxpayers’ money plowing a street that wouldn’t be traveled.
Of course, when a murder scene planted itself in the middle of the
snow-covered venue, the concept of normal became quickly
obsolete.

Street crews had cut a double-wide swath from
the park entrance to a point thirty or so yards past the easiest
access point to the main pavilion, effectively clearing a small
avenue to allow ingress and egress for the multitude of emergency
vehicles present. Mounds of the wet winter precipitation were piled
unceremoniously in the center of the road exactly where the plows
had left them, and there they would stay until removed slowly by
the process of thaw.

Ben plugged in his magnetic bubble light and
positioned it on the dash before nosing the Chevy through the crowd
of onlookers. He flashed his badge to the uniformed patrolman
blocking the entry and was told that we were expected. Once we were
waved through, he pressed the van forward up the salted drive and
carefully edged it in next to a row of county police cruisers then
levered the gear shift into park and switched off the engine.

Wide strips of bright yellow plastic
tape—repetitiously imprinted CRIME SCENE DO NOT CROSS—were strung
between pillars and trees, forming an official barrier against the
spectators and the unauthorized. Mother Nature dispassionately
ignored the carefully erected boundary, sending icy gusts of wind
to tear angrily at the tape and to blow swirling white devils of
crystalline snowflakes throughout the pavilion.

Nearby, arctic-suited maintenance workers
were laboring with shovels to dig out the first vehicles that had
arrived on the scene. Small levees of snow had been piled to their
rear bumpers by the passing plow. Ben and I buttoned up then
climbed from the warmth of the van into the frigid winter
afternoon. The sky was still marbled splotchy grey, and the second
round of the predicted snowfall was barreling down upon us from the
northwest. Even at this distance, along the frosty backbone of the
crisp air, I could detect the sickly sweet odor of scorched flesh.
I knew it would only get worse as we drew nearer.

I had to remove my thick glove in order to
sign the homicide scene log before entering the area. I was just
dragging it back onto my frozen hand when I heard my and Ben’s name
called out across the snow-whitened landscape.

Detective Carl Deckert was a fiftyish,
portly, grey-haired man possessing at once a boyish charm and a
grandfatherly demeanor. He had been the only member of the Major
Case Squad, aside from Ben, to accept me when I was first brought
in as a consultant on Ariel Tanner’s murder all those months ago.
It didn’t take long for us to form a strong friendship. He was
trundling toward us now, bundled in a heavy topcoat with a matching
scarf. A brown fedora sat perched atop his head, threatening to
take wing on the chilly gusts. His nose and ears glowed red from
the early stages of mild frostbite, giving an immediate visual
indication of how long he’d already been out here.

“Ben! Rowan!” He greeted us again as he drew
closer and thrust out his gloved hand. “Sorry I called you guys out
in this mess, but I gotta tell ya’, I’m sure glad you’re here.”

“Hello, Carl.” I shook his hand heartily.
“Good to see you too, though I wish it were under different
circumstances.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Carl.” Ben followed suit, shaking his hand
as we continued walking. “So, whaddaya have here?”

Carl reached up to press his hat back down as
a prickly sideways surge of wind sought to rip it from his head. He
proceeded to fill us in as we headed briskly for the negligible
shelter of the picnic pavilion.

“Near as the coroner can tell from what’s
left, it looks like we’re dealin’ with a female. Looks to be about
five-six, five-seven and pretty well developed, so we’re most
likely talkin’ adult. She was secured with chains and a padlock to
what appears might have been a piece of a telephone pole.”

The acrid stink of burnt flesh mingled with
the putrid smells of urine, feces, and vomit to form a sickeningly
malodorous potpourri. Every step closer to the scene intensified
the stench by yet another factor.

“We didn’t get a call on this till a couple’a
hours ago,” Carl said, still continuing with his rundown. “But
judgin’ from the pile of ashes and the amount of damage to the
body, we’re guessin’ she was torched sometime after midnight.
Probably real early this morning.”

“I suppose it’d be too much to hope for a
witness,” Ben spat the rhetorical comment as we rounded a wide
stone pillar and came face to face with the unbridled horror.

Shriveled black patches of skin and cooked
flesh were drawn tight over the gnarled skeleton held partially
erect in the fire pit. The jaw of the charred skull locked open in
a silent, agonized scream, hideously baring blackened teeth where
the softer, unsupported flesh had been completely seared away.
Surprisingly, more than enough of the torso remained intact to show
with relative certainty that the corpse was in fact that of a
woman.

“Jeezus...” Ben exclaimed, unable to pry his
stare from the disfigured remains.

“Coroner wanted to take her on in,” Carl
offered, “but I wanted to wait until you got here.”

Though an autopsy was yet to be performed, I
knew that she had been alive when the fire was ignited around her.
In my mind, I could see the flames licking up her body, first
blistering her skin and then consuming it with an appetite
unmatched by a starving animal. The fire enveloped her, searing her
nose as she fought not to breathe, only to then be sucked deep into
her lungs when she could no longer hold her breath. She wanted to
cry out. To scream. But she couldn’t. She had been gagged.

The barrier had eventually burned away, but
by then it was too late. I could sense without a doubt that she had
been aware of her fate to the very end.

Color and light began to drain from the scene
around me in a glittering whirlpool, and I knew I was being pulled
into a place I didn’t dare go. Without even trying I was about to
channel her last moments on this physical plane. Consciously, I
knew that without a solid anchor to pull me back, this was one I
could not survive.

Steeling myself against the onslaught of
desperate emotions and excruciating unearthly pain, I latched
myself onto the nearest thing I could find.

“Rowan!” Ben yelped, finally breaking his
stare as I grasped his arm and stumbled forward. He took hold of my
shoulders and steadied me before I could plunge face first onto the
concrete.

Standing on the opposite side, Carl came to
my aid as well. “Hey, Row, are you all right?”

“Thanks...” I muttered to them both as I
shakily regained my balance. “Sorry about that.”

“You were goin’ all
Twilight Zone
, weren’t ya’?” Ben asked. I’m sure
that having witnessed similar episodes before he knew the signs all
too well.

“Yeah,” I sighed. “But I think I caught it in
time.”

“You sure you’re okay?” Carl interjected in
his usual fatherly tone.

“I’ll be fine.”

“I hate ta’ ask,” Ben queried in an
apologetic tone, “but ya’ didn’t happen to see the asshole who did
it when you went... Well, went wherever it is ya’ go when ya’ do
that.”

“No. I wish I had.”

The flesh rending pain that had started as a
simple itch on my forearm was eating at me with a vengeance. I
could feel my eyes watering as I fought to suppress tears.

“Did you find a Bible anywhere on the scene?”
I queried Detective Deckert while attempting to ignore the
torment.

“No. No Bible.” He shook his head. “But funny
you should mention that.”

“Why?”

“Well,” Carl ventured and extended his arm,
pointing toward the corpse. “The real reason I called was the
symbols.”

My eyes followed his finger down to the
stone base of the fire pit. There, skillfully drawn in matte black
spray-paint, was the Christian symbol that had become painfully
familiar over the past few hours. The
Monogram of Christ
.

“Fuck me,” Ben muttered.

“Excuse me?” Carl looked at him
curiously.

Ben shook his head. “Sorry… Just that we got
one just like it carved into a dead call-girl in the city
morgue.”

“You found Christ’s Monogram at another
murder scene?” Carl asked incredulously.

Ben cocked his head to the side and gave
Deckert a sideways look. “You know what it is?”

“Yeah. I’ve seen it before.” Carl nodded.
“Not a lot, but I remember it from church when I was a kid.”

“You said symbols,” I interjected the
question between stabs of blinding pain. “Plural.”

“Yeah,” Deckert answered with a nod. “The
other one is layin’ on the ledge of the fire pit. It’s one of those
Pentacle necklaces. That’s kinda why I wanted to get your
opinion.”