Dr. O (33 page)

"Car went off the road," Ovierto managed to gurgle and moan.

"Car? Don't see no car," he said.

"Back a half mile... in the ditch... in the water!"

"Christ, you mean you been crawlin' half a mile and nobody'd stop to pick you up? Christ... world comin' to?"

He stared back, trying to locate the car while at the same time helping Ovierto to his feet and the roadbed.

Gravel slipped beneath Ovierto's feet and the farmer held tighter. Ovierto's good hand was on the blade stuffed in his belt. He could kill the old fool here now, take the truck and try to make it to Long Sault Airport, but cars were passing, one slowing down as if wondering if assistance was needed, and besides, Ovierto didn't have that much strength, yet.

"Don't see no car," the old man said.

"It's in the goddamned water!" shouted Ovierto, annoyed. "Get me into your truck."

The older man did so, grumbling about the authorities at the dam. " 'Spose to give residents around fair warning when they're going to open that mother! But they don't... they don't..."

"Opened the dam... yeah... that's what she did," Ovierto said to himself as the old man walked around to the other side to get in.

"What'd you say?" he asked, getting in.

"Get going," said Ovierto. "I said, get going."

He cranked up the truck and after a minute's waiting for other cars to pass him, the truck was barreling down the highway, passing a patrol car. The old man waved at the patrol car, saying, "We ought to get you an escort! That leg looks nasty!"

But the patrol car whizzed by, ignoring the old man's wave. "Where you live?" asked Ovierto.

"Back about three or four miles."

"Take me there."

"What? Mister, you need medical attention."

"Take me to your house!" He jabbed the knife into the farmer's ribs.

"Son of a bitch," said the older man.

"Do as I goddamned say!" He punctured the old man's midriff.

"Okay, all right... all right!"

"Don't do anything stupid, if you want to live through this day."

"No... no, I won't."

"No kindness goes unpunished, old fella. Old as you are, you ought to know that," Ovierto told him with a tsk, tsk. Ovierto was beginning to brighten, to feel a bit of cheer, a little hope for his future, which was getting brighter thanks to the Canadian farmer with the pig shit on his feet.

Even with the cooperation of the Canadian authorities, even with the powerful turbines shut down and the undersea doors opened to churn up the sea-way for miles upon miles downstream, and even with the rising waters overflowing their banks and flooding the flatlands to the roads on either side, no sign of Ovierto was found. His plane was, however, definitely identified, sitting between two others at Long Sault. Still, they dredged the river for miles below the dam, repeating the process for three days before giving up the search completely. Meanwhile, an APB was circulated to every police agency on both sides of the border. Police were on the alert at every bus depot, train station, airport, and seaport. The net began to tighten when the police began a door-to-door search of every house within a fifty- mile radius of the crash site.

Boas had seen to it that every pharmacist and doctor in the area was on the lookout for anyone requiring an emergency supply of high-carbohydrate concentrates and drugs to combat acute intermittent porphyria. He also alerted all area asylums to be especially watchful for anyone unfamiliar to the staff, as Ovierto had a habit of charming his way in and out of such places, sometimes with a hostage, such as Rosenthaler. Everyone was on the alert. The newscasts flashed photos of Ovierto in and out of costume, and the headlines warned of his sinister nature, detailing his record of atrocities with the necessary "alleged" before each crime.

In the meantime, the Canadians were calling for a halt to the search, claiming that the madman was somewhere below the St. Lawrence River piloting the Hellspur (the ship that had gone down in a terrible gale here the year before and had taken on the status of a legend when the singer Gordon Lightfoot had made a ballad of the incident).

In the meantime, all the efforts to create a net around the phantom that was Dr. O failed one after another. The most important measures simply had taken too much time.

Karl Van Jaecle, an old farmer who ran hogs to and from the Ottawa Market, was found dead with his aged wife inside their farmhouse, discovered not by the police but a young priest who was visiting the wife. The priest called the Cornwall Police, who dispatched cars to the location immediately. They had the scene all to themselves for three hours before they handed it over to the FBI. They had decided to do their own manhunt for the killer.

The moment Boas and Robyn Muro entered the farmhouse they knew it was the work of Ovierto, for he had left a clear message in blood to Robyn. It was smeared on the refrigerator door in the kitchen where he had carved up the old woman. It read:

Was it fun for you, Muro?

"The bastard," she muttered, "the bloody, bloody bastard."

"He's got at least a twelve-hour start on us," Boas said, his voice as rough as a washboard from the days of anxiety.

"He's gotten away... far from here now."

"No, there are road blocks everywhere, and we have a description of the truck," said the Mountie in charge. "He's killed Canadian citizens on Canadian soil now, and—"

"And so that makes all the difference!" she shouted. "You're not dealing with a bank robber here. This man's not your ordinary slice-and-dice serial killer, either. He's driven, and he's cunning, Captain... more cunning than one of your timber wolves. And he'll kill again and again without respect to borders or who gets in his way. Maybe if your people had cooperated with me a week ago, these poor devils here would be alive!"

The captain shouted at her all the way out the door as Boas rushed her out. "Who do you think you are? He writes a note to you, and that makes you special? I hope it brings you pleasure!"

"Bastard," Robyn muttered to Boas who rushed her to a waiting car.

"It's over here, Muro. It's over. We go back to D.C."

"To do what? Sit and wait for him to dictate our next move?"

"You're off the case, Muro. For you, it's back to Chicago, back to your work there," Boas said.

She looked at him, her eyes trying to penetrate his calm. "Just like that? You want me to forget all this ever happened?"

"It's an FBI matter; always has been, and we—the Bureau —must pick up the pieces. You are not actually one of us."

She was taken up short by his attitude. She slumped in the car which sped toward Ottawa and the airport.

She quietly said; "You've gotten orders from DC.?"

"That is true, but also, I thought you would like to be at the services being held for Donna Thorpe."

"Yes, of course... and we are going to respect her wishes about an anonymous grave site?"

"Well, yes and no."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that she will be buried twice, discreetly and quietly the first time, a show the next."

"But you said-"

"And we've arranged to lure that sick son of a bitch, Ovierto, to a phony wake and burial at Arlington."

She thought about this sad testimonial to Donna Thorpe's life, and it squeezed at her stomach. She didn't want her life to end this way, to be used even in death as a lure for a maniac.

"Where'd you get the body?"

"Donated, you might say."

"Riley?"

"No, no, we're not that bloody crude."

"Where then?"

"An unattached female resident of Bellevue Psychiatric, a Jane Doe, already in flight toward D.C."

"So, you guys are taking over from here?"

"That's about the size of it, Robyn. You've got nothing to be ashamed of. You did your level best, and everyone appreciates that, everyone. In fact, if you ever want to enroll in the academy, the Agency could use you. As for now... well, we don't need or want another Donna Thorpe-Dr. Ovierto relationship where the crazy bastard's killing people off just to have something to send you. And now the message he left you at that old farmhouse, it's... it is as though he's decided to place you in that role, and none of us —you included —wants that."

"I always underestimated you, Sam... always thought you took orders."

"I do. We all do."

"No, you put this together, and with the best of intentions, I'm sure, but you could also arrange a temporary status in the Agency for me, if you wanted to, couldn't you? Couldn't you?"

"I'm not going to do that."

"Ovierto has already targeted me as his playmate, Sam. He won't let you do this. He'll find me in Chicago. He only plays if there's an audience that cares, the way Donna cared."

"It's out of my hands, Robyn." The finality of his tone told her that minds were made up and that she was out.

"Then why invite me to her funeral?"

"You're invited to her true funeral, not the bogus one"

She nodded, biting her lip. "Gotcha."

"We all feel you did a brave job, a good job, Robyn, and no one wants to see you become his next psychological victim."

"Funny," she replied, "I think it's too late for that." She sat in silence, the bare December countryside, which was brown and stark here in Canada, where the birch trees proliferated like hair on the head of the globe. The trees stretched on for mile after mile. She thought of how Ovierto had maimed her mind, mutilated her heart and soul by taking the people she most loved and admired. She knew she couldn't just walk away from it.

"How do I get started at this academy of yours?"

Boas looked disappointed in her. "I had thought you were a woman of superior intellect. Why would you-"

"Fine, I know I can expect no help then from you... fine."

"I didn't say that I wouldn't help you. If you are determined."

"I am."

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure... I'm very sure."

They'd arrived at the Ottawa airport, a Lear jet waiting to take them back to D.C. The flight was dismal and quiet, the absence of Thorpe felt by everyone. In the silence, the others heard a tossing Robyn Muro mutter in her sleep, "One day... I'll get you... least expect it ... I'll be there..."

CHAPTER THIRTY

Maurice Ovierto had triumphed once again over the forces set against him, and he had seen to Thorpe's death, although it had been a terrible waste. Given her mental state, given the trap that had meant to ensnare him, it seemed inevitable, and yet he still hungered to have her on a rack, to flay the skin from her, to do unspeakable torture to her, drain her blood, syphon it into a pint bottle and hold it up to her eyes and let her watch him drain it like red beer. But she was gone now, all but her body remaining. Torturing her body, even if he could dig it from the earth of the largest, most prestigious cemetery in the nation, would gain him little satisfaction. But maybe the mental anguish it would cause to her friend and fellow agent, this Robyn Muro, perhaps that would make the effort worth something? No one had ever grave-robbed from Arlington. Could it be done?

He certainly missed the Thorpes....

He wandered about the periphery of the fence now, watching the burial party, listening to the snap and pop of the distant twenty-one gun salute given Thorpe. She deserved all their respect. She had come the closest to stopping him, she and Muro.

He remembered watching them in the restaurant together, seeing their affection for one another, but oddly, Muro wasn't present today. Had she been un-able to face it? But how does one stay away from the funeral of a loved one, a colleague, a sister? Was it so painful?

Or was there another reason? He could not fathom the reason. Time and distance constraints? In his casual contact with the Bureau, declaring himself an accountant with the division that took care of such monetary needs as the payment of agents, he had learned that Muro was no agent, and had only been on a kind of lend-lease program with the Chicago PD, like that man, Swisher, who had died for Thorpe's sins. Was there a connection there? Swisher and Muro?

He had made inquiries, discreet and well-targeted, in Chicago, learning that Swisher and Robyn Muro had shared a squad car as partners in various decoy operations, usually in vice and homicide. He wondered about the relationship, and about that which had existed between Thorpe and Muro.

It might take a long time to sort it all out, but it was important to do so, and so he would, eventually.

He had gotten the old man in the back bedroom of the farmhouse, ordering him to tie his wife's hands and legs, forcing her to lie in the bed. As soon as this was done, he stabbed the old man in the heart before her eyes, and told her that if she made any attempt to move that he would do the same to her. She was petrified, and this increased his will to get better and do her.

He had torn the house apart looking for the necessary foods and drugs that he required, stuffing raw potatoes into his mouth, searching for and finding all the starches he could. In the medicinal department, he had located some carbolic acid and camphor. Mixing the two, he created a good germ- combating compound of the tar-based substance. This staunched his bullet wounds, leaving him sweating with the initial pain of applying it, but feeling much better.