Psychopath (15 page)

That was more information than Jonah had asked for.  He savored every word.  The pain in his head began to ease.  His vision began to clear.  He put the car in drive, pulled back onto the road.  Maybe he would make it through the night after all.  "How about you, Doug?  Are you married?"

"Hoping to be," he said. "I’m headed to my girlfriend’s parents’ place.  She’s there waiting for me.  I’m going to pop the question tomorrow night.  Bended knee.  The whole nine yards."

"Tomorrow night."  Jonah felt excitement begin to eclipse his desperation.  "How wonderful."

"She’s a great lady."

"In what way?"

Holt shrugged.  "That unconditional love thing, you know?  She’d stick by me no matter what."

"How did you two meet?"

"Fate."

"Oh?"

"She’s a resident in ophthalmology.  I went for a checkup with my usual guy, and she was doing some sort of rotation with him."  He shrugged.  "Weird how things work out, huh?  Troy shooting that BB took something away from me, but it gave me back something — twenty-five years later.  I never would have met Naomi otherwise."

Naomi.  Could that name be a coincidence?  Jonah pictured Naomi McMorris sitting in his office.  He felt a warm wave of reassurance wash over him.  God was still with him.  "The Lord works in mysterious ways," he said, smiling at Holt.

Holt smiled back, winked.

Jonah stared at him a few seconds, then turned and looked down the road.  His pulse began to race.  A dull ache rose up the back of his neck.  Because he knew that Doug Holt — if that was even his name — had been lying to him.  A man blind in one eye from the age of five never learns to wink, never chooses to close his one good eye and blind himself.  Not even for an instant.  "She’s pregnant, actually," Holt went on, wistfully.  "Four months along.  So I’ve got a lot of new things happening in my life.  I’ve got a lot to look forward to."

Jonah didn’t hear much excitement in Holt’s voice, probably because his supposed engagement and new baby were lies.  "Did you tell Naomi that tall tale you told me — the one about your buddy Troy?" he asked.  "About being shot in the eye?"

"Sure," Holt said.  He shrugged.  "I mean, she was working under my doctor."

"Where did it happen, anyhow?"

"What?"

"The accident.  The BB."

"The fields in back of my house," Holt said.  "There was a pond where we’d horse around, play cowboys and Indians.  Troy didn’t even know it was a BB gun.  It was his older brother’s.  He took it from his room."

"I see," Jonah said.  "Does your handicap allow you to work?"

"I’m an artist," Holt said.

"What sort of art?"

"Glass sculpture, glass jewelry, stained glass."

"How interesting."

"It can be," Holt said.  "When the glass does what I want it to do."  He paused.

"How about you?"

"Psychiatrist."

"Wow.  Now
that
sounds interesting."

"It always is.  I love being able to find out the truth about people."  Jonah looked over at Holt, kept looking at him until Holt grew visibly tense.  Then he stared back down the highway.  "This may sound bizarre to you, but I’d like to see it."

"My glasswork?"

"No.  Your eye.  Or whatever’s left of it."  He glanced at Holt, who suddenly looked very worried.  "Is that asking too much?"

"You’re kidding, right?"

"I’m quite serious."

One of Holt’s hands moved to his door handle.  "I promise it’s not pretty.  It’s covered for a reason."

"People always cover up for a reason," Jonah said.  "But I’ve seen — and heard — very ugly things in my life.  You can show me."  A few seconds passed in silence.  "Go ahead."

"I never show anyone."

Jonah forced a smile.  "If there’s a reason you’re wearing that patch other than the one you gave me, you should just tell me."

"What do you mean?"

Jonah slowed the car, pulled to the side of the road.  "All I want is the truth, Doug.  If that’s your name."

Holt’s other hand inched toward the electric lock button on the center console.  Jonah dropped his hand to the hunting knife he kept taped to the bottom of his door.  It had an eight-inch blade, sharpened to a razor’s edge.  He didn’t want to use it, knew that using it would be a sin against the God he loved, but he was desperate for the truth, even if the only truth he could get from this man would be his genuine panic at having his throat cut.  "I’ll give you an example.  Let’s say that patch was just a clever way to get noticed by the side of the road, increase your chances of being picked up.  It wouldn’t matter now.  What matters now is that you be honest about it."

Holt sat motionless and said nothing.

"Just tell me the truth," Jonah said.  "I’m begging you."

Holt turned and looked out his window.  "Okay," he said.  "Here goes."  Then, with no more warning than the tensing of his forearms, he pressed the button to unlock his door, then pulled the door handle.  His movements were coordinated, but a little too slow.  Because as his door was swinging open, Jonah’s arm was swinging, the knife in his hand slicing through Holt’s carotid arteries, esophagus, and windpipe. 

Holt turned and looked at Jonah with the bewildered gaze of all Jonah’s victims.  His eyes may have focused long enough to see Jonah reaching for him, weeping.  And he was probably still alive to hear two words whispered in his ear, words that would have sounded completely sincere, because they came from the bottom of Jonah’s heart.

"I’m sorry."

*            *            *

He dragged Doug Holt four feet into the woods and left him there, with his two good eyes staring up at the black sky, his eye patch tied like a tourniquet around the arm Jonah had drawn blood from.  He grabbed his pack out of the backseat, dumped it beside him, and turned to go.  But then curiosity got the better of him.  He turned back, walked over to the pack, and crouched down to see what Holt had been carrying with him — who he had been, after all.

He found the expected items:  changes of clothes, a nylon tent, a climber’s pick, a squeeze bottle of water.  But then he found the unexpected — chapters of Doug Holt’s life story.

The first was a summons, dated eleven days before, for Holt to appear before the Trial Court of Bristol County, Connecticut, on charges of marijuana and cocaine possession with intent to distribute.  That explained his rudimentary disguise.  He was on the run.

Second were two United Airlines tickets to Brazil — one in Holt’s name and one in the name of Naomi Caldwell, MD.  They were about to leave the country together.  And then Jonah found what cut him to the core:  a photograph of a brunette in her early thirties, her hands cradling her pregnant abdomen; a black velvet box with a modest diamond engagement ring inside; and a larger, white cardboard gift box that held a magnificent conch shell of blown glass, a rainbow swirling inside it.

Inside the gift box was a tiny envelope.  Jonah opened it and read the card inside:

For Mr. and Mrs. Caldwell,

Please accept this small token of my undying gratitude for you having brought Naomi into the world.  She has changed my world forever.

—Doug

Undying
.  Jonah sank to his knees on the frozen earth.  Holt had been telling him the truth, even from behind his disguise.  Not about everything.  Not about running from the law.  But about the important things.  The woman he loved.  The infant about to be born to him.  And Jonah, in his arrogance, in his angry panic that he was being duped, that he was being kept from the life blood he so desperately needed and so justly deserved, had failed to resonate with that truth, had failed to follow its path to Doug Holt’s heart.

Of all things, he had failed to listen.

Tears streamed down his face.  His mind was flooded with questions for Holt.  Did he and Naomi plan the pregnancy?  How did he feel about becoming a father?  What was his relationship like with his own father?  Did he know the child’s gender?  Had they chosen a name?

Holt would have told him.  He would have answered those questions and more.  Truthfully.  And in so doing, he would have made Jonah part of his growing family.

Instead, Holt was dead, and a baby would be born fatherless, with a gaping wound already cut in his psyche.  God had indeed sent another angel, but Jonah had failed to receive the gift.  Failed miserably.  He had killed a man and absorbed almost nothing of that man’s soul.  He had laid waste to him.  Obliterated him. 

Forever.

As he sped down the highway, he felt self-loathing greater than any that had visited him before.  He felt vile.  Grotesque.  And he felt this all the more because the pain in his head and jaw and heart and lungs were gone.  Holt’s murder itself, without any potential for his resurrection inside Jonah, had filled the raw void of his own existence.

Only a monster would be satiated by pure destruction.

He thought again of suicide, but fleetingly.  He still thirsted for what Christ had promised on the cross.  He wanted to be healed in this life.  Forgiven.  He wanted redemption.  Even if he had to risk everything for it.  Because then — only then — could he die in peace.

t w o

March 31, 2003

Chelsea, Massachusetts

The
New York Times
ran Jonah’s letter front page.  By the time Clevenger drove up outside his office at 9:00
A.M.
, an army of reporters was waiting for him, thrusting microphones emblazoned with insignia from CNN, Fox, CBS, and Court TV at his window.  He looked toward the office, made eye contact with North Anderson standing outside, looking very uneasy, his massive arms crossed over his chest, a folded-up newspaper in his fist.

The reporters surrounded him as he stepped out of his truck, shouldering and elbowing each other for position, shouting questions: 
Are you in contact with the FBI?  How do you interpret the letter?  What do you make of his 300 lovers?  Will you respond to him?

Clevenger gave them the standard “No comment” as he pushed past them, climbed the stairs to the office and escaped inside, followed by Anderson.

Anderson locked the door behind them.

"What the hell is going on?" Clevenger asked.

Anderson handed him the newspaper.  "The
Times
ran a letter front page from the Highway Killer."

Clevenger shook his head.  "And everyone showed up to get my angle on it?"  He started to unfold the paper.

"The letter is to you."

Clevenger stopped, looked back at Anderson.

"He must have seen the news coverage when you turned down the FBI.  I guess he liked what he saw."

Clevenger unfolded the paper the rest of the way.  His heart began to pound as he read the headline in the upper right-hand corner of the front page: 
HIGHWAY KILLER REACHES OUT FOR HEALING
.  He read on:

Special to the Times

On March 26, 2003, this newspaper received a letter from an individual purporting to be the Highway Killer, the serial killer responsible for at least 14 deaths across the country.  The letter, addressed to our managing editor, is an appeal to Frank Clevenger, MD, the Boston-based forensic psychiatrist best known for solving the murder of infant Brooke Bishop on the island of Nantucket.  Factual information enclosed with the letter convinced us of its authenticity.

After careful editorial consideration and with guidance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, we are printing the letter in its entirety.  We reserve the right to publish or to not publish any future correspondence.

"Kane Warner," Clevenger said, looking up.

"Has to be," Anderson said.  "Someone had to give the Times the green light to publish."

"And convince them to publish it without notifying me."

"That way you couldn’t get a lawyer to stop the presses."

"You think it’s for real?" Clevenger asked.

Anderson nodded.  "Take a few minutes to read it, and let’s talk about what we do next."

Clevenger heard the we loud and clear. "Thanks," he said.

"Any time." Anderson turned and left.

Clevenger sat at his desk, riveted from the first sentence:

Dr. Clevenger:

I am soaked and filthy with the blood of others, yet I have goodness in my heart.  I have no motive to kill, but I cannot stop myself from killing.  My hunger for the lives of others is greater than for food or sex or knowledge.  It is irresistible.

I have thought of destroying myself.  I have made halfhearted attempts.  Halfhearted, because destroying the whole of me would be no triumph.  Nor would there be triumph in surrendering to any ‘authority,’ to then be judged by small-minded men and caged like an animal.

The glory would be in defeating the darkness in my soul, freeing the eternal light to shine.  And the only proper judge of my success or failure in that great quest is our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe.

Is not my struggle, after all, a reflection of man’s great struggle?  Is my existence any less than a microcosm of humanity’s hope for the triumph of good over evil?  In facing my destructiveness am I not taking the first step toward redemption?

And if I am redeemed, are we not all redeemed in small measure?  If I am resurrected, does not all humanity rise with me?

I hear the words of Jung:

‘The sad truth is that man’s real life consists of a complex of inexorable opposites — day and night, birth and death, happiness and misery, good and evil.  We are not sure that one will prevail against the other, that good will overcome evil, or joy defeat pain.  Life is a battleground.  It always has been, and always will be; and if it were not so, existence would come to an end.’