Big Three-Thriller Bundle Box Collection (79 page)

The other two stopped and stood motionless. As Parker listened, he wondered how he could run back up the steps without running over his two companions.

A steady, low, rumbling growl
.

Parker directed the light around warily. A creaking, breaking noise came from under Parker’s feet.

A loud crack
.

The step he stood on gave way with a crash.

The flashlight banged against the handrail and went out.

Parker slipped the eight inches to the floor and fell back against Hill. She dropped her gun and held onto him with both arms, trembling. Simpson had already reached the top of the steps and was poised with both hands on his revolver, aiming down while yelling out for backup.

Parker and Hill sat statuesque for a long moment. Parker rapped the light on the wall twice and it blinked back on. He began searching the darkness once more.

Still, a low, steady growl
.

His eyes were adjusting to the darkness. Another faint light came from the far corner. He shone the light there quickly.

The sound wasn’t a growl. An old gas water heater, burner roaring, kept the old man’s bath water warm.

After an analytical pause, Parker and Hill laughed in relief.

Simpson sounded frantic. “You guys all right? What the hell’s going on down there?”

Their laughter diminished until they looked up to respond to Simpson and burst out laughing again. Simpson’s concern seemed less sincere, standing safe at the top of the steps with his pistol aimed.

“Well, shit, bust a gut, why don’t you?” Simpson said. He holstered the revolver. “I told you, I don’t like dogs.”

“Nothing here,” Parker said, dusting himself off. “Nothing but two dog beds that’re worth more than most of the furniture in the house.”

Parker glanced around and noticed the lid of a shoebox lying in the crawl space at the top of the wall between the two dog beds. He picked it up and noted streaks of dust on it as if it had been wiped off recently.

He tossed the lid back where he’d found it and followed Hill back up the stairs.

Parker stepped over the bodies once more. “Let’s take a look at the rest of the house.”

In the kitchen he found an electric clock on the floor. It was unplugged, the prongs bent, and the plastic outlet cover on the wall it leaned against was cracked, looking like it had been yanked out of the receptacle. A light spot in the shape of a square clock showed on the old, yellowed wallpaper six feet up. The plug-in was near the hall doorway. The clock pointed to twelve thirty.

“What about the clock?” Parker asked, looking down at it.

“Probably been that way for months. The one on the CD player wasn’t correct, either,” Simpson answered. “Look at all the dust on that thing.”

Beside the clock sat two huge Tupperware bowls. One bowl contained a few pieces of dry dog food, the other, a half inch of water.

Parker looked around the room. The back door had a three-foottall dog port in the middle of it.

“That’s big enough for a Shetland pony to walk through,” he said. “I’ll bet it let in one hell of a draft in the winter. You might have someone check the back yard.” He opened the door gingerly and looked out to insure another dog wasn’t there. “Look for blood and dog hair on the privacy fence. That’s probably how the dog left. And you might put some strap iron on the inside of this dog-port door to keep it from opening out. If we’re not able to catch the dog by tonight, maybe the thing’ll come back and we can set a trap inside the house.”

“Will do, Tony. That’s it except for the old man’s bedroom,” Simpson said. “The door was closed tight, and nothing looked disturbed when we got here.”

Parker looked in anyway. Nothing seemed disturbed, just like Simpson had said. The bed had been made, and everything seemed clean and neatly arranged.

“Are all the window screens in place and locked?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Simpson said. “Check it out, Smith. Hey, what is this anyway? You Sherlock Holmes or something? This is a dog attack we’re talking about—isn’t it?”

“Uh-huh, it’s just odd. I’ve got a funny feeling about it.”

“Me, too,” Hill said.

“I don’t get it,” Parker said. “Why would a dog—even a rabid dog— attack its master, especially a harmless old man sleeping in a recliner? And did you notice the blood on the nameplate on the basement wall downstairs? It looks as if the bigger dog beat its own head against the wall, like it was trying to make itself stop or even kill itself.”

“Bullshit, Tony! Now you’re going to tell me this crazy, murdering dog was sorry for what it did and became suicidal?” Simpson asked.

“Just the same, have them check it out. I want to know what time the blood was put there, and whose it was.”

As they stepped out of the room, the body bags and gurneys were being brought in.

Two emergency medical technicians lifted the old man from his recliner to place him in a heavy, rubberized canvas bag on a gurney. A piece of paper tumbled over the arm of the chair and fell lightly to the floor.

“What’s that?” Parker asked, pointing.

Simpson walked over and picked it up carefully by its corner with the tips of his thumb and forefinger.

“A page from a
Bible
. There’s a passage highlighted.
Do not give dogs what is sacred: do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces.
” Simpson’s eyes shifted to Parker. “I think he should have followed Jesus’ advice.”

“Maybe it’s from his pastor,” Parker said.

“No pastor would tear a page from the Good Book. That’d be sacrilegious,” Simpson answered. “There’re initials printed up at the top.
TP
. Hmm,
TP, TP
. . . . ” Simpson’s eyes lit up as if he had made a remarkable discovery. “Tony Parker,” Simpson speculated. “Maybe it’s for you.”

“Yeah,
right,” Parker said with a half-smile.

“Well,
TP
are your initials, and it’s about dogs, and you’re the head dog catcher.”

“Yeah, and it’s also about pigs and you’re a pig,” Parker came back.

Sarah Hill had been quiet. “Maybe someone else left it after his death. Maybe someone is trying to tell you something.”

“Oh, come on, Sarah,” Simpson said, “or should I call you Dr. Watson—now you’re going back to Parker’s conspiracy theory? The damned dog killed the old man on his own.”

Parker turned and looked at Hill, unintentionally staring, thinking, wondering if it were possible. The
Bible
verse could be a clue, a hint to what was going on, why the dogs attacked. Perhaps it was a piece to a puzzle not yet assembled. All the meaningful pieces not found, it represented only blank blue sky to a very frightening picture.

Simpson looked to one of the uniformed officers. “Smith, check to see if the old man has a
Bible
and if it’s missing page 991.”

The cop nodded and started searching the shelves.

Simpson looked through the living room window. “It’s that asshole reporter from Channel Two, Haskins.”

Parker looked to see the reporter streak across the lawn with his c
ameraman tailing him.

Simpson slipped the
Bible
page inside his jacket.

Before Parker had time to prepare himself, Haskins stood in the front door with the bright camera lights blazing through from behind. Parker, Simpson and Hill blocked the reporter’s view of the bodies. He was a slim man with sharp features and sandy blond hair.

“Well, Officer Parker, another one of your beloved pit bulls attack a harmless citizen again?” he asked into the microphone and then shoved it into Parker’s face for his comment.

Haskins had obviously not yet been informed of the gravity of the incident, only that it was an animal attack.

“Not this time, Asskiss—I mean Haskins.”

Parker had known Haskins since returning from Vietnam, years ago, when Julie was in college. Julie had been dating Haskins, but upon his arrival, Parker found it easy to talk Julie into coming back to him and breaking up with Haskins. Now, after all those years and a couple of recent serious pit-bull attacks, Haskins finally found a way to get back at Parker by making him sound like he was defending the dogs and not doing his job properly.

“But it was a dog attack, wasn’t it, Parker?” Haskins asked, sarcastically. Spying a red rubber dog bone on the floor, he picked it up and pointed it into Parker’s face. “So, did the attacker use a bone to beat its victim?”

Parker didn’t answer. He knew what Haskins was trying to do. He’d get Parker riled up on camera and edit out his own idiotic comments. Parker stepped to the side and squeezed between the cameraman and the doorway. Hill followed him out. Sheer horror showed on Haskins’ face as the camera light shone across the scene of torn up bodies being placed into body bags. His chin dropped, and his tongue snaked around inside his open mouth. He was obviously trying to suppress the urge to vomit.

Parker stuck his head back in the doorway and, seeing the dog bone still in Haskins’ hand, said with a wink, “Oh, and Jack, make sure that everybody without gloves that’s touched anything the dogs might have come in contact with gets rabies shots. Poor bastards!” He turned and walked away, shaking his head. “Twenty-one hellacious shots in the stomach.” When he reached the porch steps, he looked back and watched Haskins.

The reporter stood aghast as Simpson squeezed past, taking care not to brush against him. The coroner was next to walk by. He had a black plastic bag hanging heavily from one hand.

There was a sound like plastic wrap being ripped from the roll and a thump on the floor. Sergeant Morowsky’s head had slipped from a tear in the bag and rolled up against the reporter’s left foot.

“Damn!” the coroner said, “I keep telling ‘em we need Hefty bags, but the bastards just go on giving us these shitty, no frills, generic ones.” He scooped the head up and wrapped it with the plastic. “Next time, I guess I should just put all the parts together inside the body bag.”

Haskins choked and dropped the bone. He ran outside and lost his breakfast while leaning over the porch railing. The cameraman followed him out and got some nice footage of the entire event while Haskins, between regurgitations, tried to wave him off. Parker, Simpson and Hill all watched, grinning morbidly.

Officer Smith came out the door and was careful to avoid the spewing reporter. He stepped up to Simpson, holding a small white
Bible
.

“This was the only one I found,” Smith said. “Too small. That page isn’t missing, anyway.”

Simpson grunted and gave a nod.

“Did anyone see anything?” Parker asked.

“Just the neighbor, Mrs. Crane,” Simpson said, looking to the old woman standing at her screen next door.

C
HAPTER 8

Mrs.
Crane wavered in her doorway. With one hand on the inside handle of the screen door and one over her forehead, Tony Parker knew it would only be seconds before she was on the floor. He sprinted across her yard and onto her porch with Jack Simpson following. Reaching through the doorway, Parker caught the old woman by the upper arm just in time.

“I think you’d better sit down, Mrs. Crane,” Parker said, leading her to a large overstuffed chair in her living room.

“Yes—yes, I think you’re right,” she said frailly. “But who are you?”

“Tony Parker, Animal Control Director.”

“Who?”

“I’m the dog catcher, ma’am.”

“Oh.”

“Are you okay, Mrs. Crane?” Simpson asked, coming into the room from her kitchen with a glass of water.

“Oh, yes. I’ll be fine now, I think,” she said, taking the glass.

“Can you answer a few questions for us, Mrs. Crane?” Parker asked and patted her hand gently.

She nodded and set the glass down on a lamp table after a sip.

“Did you see any of what happened this morning?”

“Yes, I called the police when Mr. MacGreggor wouldn’t come to the door, at about eight. I always check on him first thing in the morning when I go on my walk. Then I go over every afternoon and help him read his mail, make his bed, do some light housekeeping and feed the dogs. His eyesight isn’t, or wasn’t . . . ” She choked and twisted a handkerchief she had pulled out of a pocket in her skirt. “ . . . very good.”

She dabbed at her eyes and wiped the cloth under her nose before continuing. “I couldn’t hear anything in his house except for that weird Irish music, and that wasn’t like him to have it on first thing in the morning like that. He usually played it at night before he went to bed. Didn’t have a television. He didn’t have much at all, except for that high falootin h
i-fi and all those DC’s or whatever they call ‘em. He belonged to some kind of a record club. Then there were his dogs. I guess I shoulda told those poor officers about those dogs.” She stared at the wall.

Parker and Simpson glanced at each other.

“I doubt if that would have made any difference, ma’am,” Parker said. “What happened after the police arrived?”

“They had to break the door in to get inside. Then I heard some yellin’, and the young man came running out and kicked his gun clear under their car. I guess he didn’t mean to ‘cause he ran over and started to look for it, but I don’t think he ever did find it. He must not of remembered the shotgun sticking up inside their car. Then the man inside started screaming. I was a little scared, so I got inside. I couldn’t see anything except the young man standing outside his car, talking on the radio. He was so young. Not much more than a boy.

“Then, he went inside the house, and I didn’t see or hear a thing until this nice young black man drove up.” She looked at Simpson and smiled.

Simpson smiled back.

“What can you tell us about Mr. MacGreggor and his dogs?” Parker asked.

“He got the dogs about five years ago. They were just cute little— well, big puppies. He had them sent over from Great Britain. Mr. MacGreggor had an old army buddy that married an English girl and lived there. He was a big breeder of prize winning Great Danes, and the two old fools kept in touch through the mail. Mr. MacGreggor was pretty lonely in that old house by himself. I couldn’t be all things to him, you know. And his friend kept sending him pictures of his prizewinning dogs and kept telling him how gooda companions they made ‘cause they were so loyal and loving and such.

“One day he finally gave in and asked him to send him a couple. They came from champion bloodlines, both of them. They were the only things he loved more than his music. He made sure they always had the best—the best dog food, silk cushions to lay on, a diamond on each of their dog tags big enough to choke a horse. . . . ”

“Diamond dog tags,” Simpson said, shaking his head.

“Yes, three carats. Both of them.”

“Where’d he get his money?” Simpson ask
ed. “I mean, his house is a run-down shack.”

“You know, I never really found out. Whenever he needed anything, he’d pay for it in cash, usually hundred dollar bills. Once a month, I’d go buy money orders for him to pay the few bills he had.”

Parker asked, “Did he get a pension check or Social Security? Money from a relative?”

“No, I never saw a dime. And I opened all of his mail—with that letter opener that has a diamond at the base of its blade. It’s three carats, too. They gave it to him when he retired from that insurance company he used to work for. It was the only thing he owned that was worth much besides that record player. He thought the diamond was so pretty that he got one for each of the dogs when they finally showed up.”

Parker said to Simpson. “Did you find a letter opener?”

“No, and believe me, I’d remember one like that. We’ll check it out.”

Mrs. Crane continued, “He didn’t have any relatives that I ever heard of, let alone rich ones. His wife died twelve years ago, and he didn’t have any children. He had one brother, but he and his wife were killed in a car accident about ten years ago. Now, they did have a son. That would be Mr. MacGreggor’s nephew. But they were poorer than church mice, and he hadn’t heard anything out of the boy since about four years ago. That was when the boy asked to borrow some money from him. Mr. MacGreggor was a real tight wad. He told him to go straight to hell!” she said, leaning into Parker’s face. “Never saw him again.

“The only thing I can figure is the old man collected a whole mess of money on his wife’s insurance and rat holed it, and whatever else he’d saved over the years, somewhere in the house. I saw him take some money out of a shoebox once.”

Simpson shook his head. “Didn’t find anything.”

Parker raised his eyebrows. “I saw a shoebox lid in the crawl space when we were in the basement. The dust had been wiped from it. I didn’t find the box, though.”

Parker looked back to the old woman. “What about the dogs, Mrs. Crane?” he asked. “Were they out of control over there?”

“Oh, no! Why, they were the nicest, most even-tempered animals I’ve ever seen. That’s what was so surprising about all this. They were always very obedient, and Mr. MacGreggor just loved them to pieces,” she said with a hint of jealously. She paused. “Especially that Jezebel, or ‘Jazbo,’ as he’d call her. She was the sweetest and smartest dog I’ve ever seen, and biggest, too.”

“You mean, next to Beelzebub,” Parker said, hoping the coroner was wrong.

“Oh, no!” she said. “She was nearly a hand taller than him.”

“Holy . . . ,” Simpson said, looking at Parker.

“That’d put her at about forty two or three inches at the shoulder,” Parker said. “A record height, by as much as an inch.”

“But she was as gentle as a kitten,” Mrs. Crane said. “She’d always greet me with her long ol’ tail just a whippin’ back and forth. Now that thing would hurt if she hit you with it. She’d be wagging it around and knocking things off the table when she got real excited. But she’d never hurt anyone on purpose. Now, I couldn’t vouch for Beelzebub so much, although he seemed friendly enough. It was just that he was kind of shy, maybe a little sneaky.”

Parker handed Mrs. Crane his card. It had his home number hand printed at the bottom. “We won’t trouble you any longer, Mrs. Crane. But be sure to call me if you think of anything else that might be important. You’ll be all right?”

“Oh, yes—yes, I’m fine.”

“And, Mrs. Crane,” Parker said, as he rose from the chair.

She looked up at him, innocently. “Yes?”

“Beelzebub is dead, but Jezebel seems to have gotten away. There’ll be officers patrolling the neighborhood night and day until we find her, right, Jack?” Parker glanced over his shoulder at Simpson.

Jack nodded to the old woman.

Tony continued, “But if you see Jezebel, don’t go near her. Stay inside and call me right away, okay?”

Mrs. Crane looked down at her handkerchief. “Yes, I understand.”

Parker and Simpson turned and walked out the door. Haskins and his cameraman had left, but there was still a flurry of activity.

“Damn it, Tony, what is this, anyway?” Simpson asked as they walked down the porch steps. “I’m getting the impression you think this is more than a dog attack. You think the damn dog ripped off his master and ran off to the Bahamas or something?”

“Her.”

“What?”

“Her master. Jezebel is a she. You guys gonna make it to the picnic tomorrow?” he asked with his back turned, not responding to Simpson’s question as he walked to the truck.

“Uh, yeah. Wouldn’t miss it for the world. You know that.”

“You’ll take care of the press for me, won’t you? Downplay it some. We don’t want a panic. But we do want to let people know she’s out there and to be on the lookout so we can catch her before anyone else gets hurt.”

“Sure, Tony. Where are you going to be?”

“I’m going to run ol’ Beelzebub out to Doc’s and have him examined. Maybe he can give us a little more insight on this. After that, I’ll be out with the posse.”

Hill stood at the back of the Jimmy truck with the coroner and Tommy Chin, who had just arrived. She broke away and hopped into the passenger’s side when she saw Parker heading that way.

“Chin, did Sarah fill you in?”

“Yeah, boss. Incredible.”

“Will you handle things for a bit?” Parker asked.

“Sure, boss.”

“Get everyone down here that’s working today and everybody that’s on call. Have them go door to door to warn the neighbors within a mile of here and see if anyone’s seen this monster,” Parker said. He turned toward the truck.

“You got it, boss.”

Parker stopped and glanced back at Chin with a considered look. “Hey, Tommy. Call me if anything turns up. And be careful. If you can’t reach me by radio, I’ll be at Doc White Cloud’s.”

“Sure thing, boss. Wish I could be at the picnic tomorrow. Tell Julie happy fifteenth for me, will you?”

“There might not be a picnic if we don’t find this thing.”

Parker looked in his side mirror as they drove away and saw Simpson standing on the lawn looking over the scene. He appeared somewhat awestruck.