Gallery of the Dead

Thirty-Two

Before he began, Special Agent Williams allowed Hunter, Garcia and Captain Blake a few seconds to study the new photograph he had just placed on the desk.

‘I can see by the expression on your faces,’ he said, ‘that The Surgeon’s second victim has surprised you as much as it surprised us.’

The man in the photo was looking up from an open newspaper he’d been reading. The smile on his lips was gracious, but it was a sad smile, probably put on just for the sake of the photograph. His old-looking and ill-fitting clothes were clean but scruffy, as if they’d been slept in at least a couple of nights. The little hair he had left, two small islands just above his ears, were as white as milk, matching the color of his bushy eyebrows and his thick mustache. His deep, dark-brown eyes, just like his smile, seemed full of sorrow and the white in them, over their many years on this earth, had acquired a light-yellow tint, losing much of the sparkle that had once lived in them. His rosy face, together with his bony hands, seemed to be held together by a messy web of capillaries and thinning veins, running behind wrinkled and tired skin. He had the look of a man who was used to hard work and suffering. The look of a man who had accepted his destiny.

‘This was Albert Greene,’ Agent Williams reported. ‘An eighty-four-year-old, ex-school janitor from Wichita, Kansas.’

‘He was eighty-four years old?’ Captain Blake asked in a tone coated by a mixture of disbelief and disgust.

‘That’s correct,’ the agent confirmed, his voice solemn. ‘Mr. Greene was born and raised in Northeast Millair, one of the most impoverished and underprivileged neighborhoods in Wichita. His father passed away from pneumonia when he was only thirteen years old. Due to how poor his family was and the fact that he was the oldest of four children, Mr. Greene was left with the task of being family breadwinner; he had no choice but to drop out of school halfway through seventh grade and find a job to help his mother bring up his two brothers and one sister. He was never able to return to school.’

Agent Williams paused and made a somewhat sorry face. ‘Well, not as a student, anyhow. Between the ages of thirteen and twenty-three Mr. Greene helped his family in any way he could, jumping from odd job to odd job until, call it “life irony” if you will, he was employed as the school janitor at the same school he had dropped out of ten years earlier. He spent fifteen years at that school until it was closed down in 1972. By then, Mr. Greene had married and had had a daughter of his own — Jody Elena Greene. By the beginning of the next school term, Mr. Greene had secured a new job, again as a school janitor, but this time in Maple Hills, one of the most affluent neighborhoods in the city, working for one of the best high schools in the whole of Kansas. When he hit the age of sixty, he stopped being a janitor and became the main CCTV control-room operator. He stayed at that same job until he retired, at the age of sixty-nine, and probably only because arthritis had gotten the best of him by then.’

‘Jesus Christ!’ Captain Blake said, taking a step back from Hunter’s desk. ‘Are you telling me that this killer went after an eighty-four-year-old man ridden with arthritis?’

‘Yes, Captain. As sick as it sounds, that’s exactly what I’m telling you.’ Agent Williams turned to address Hunter. ‘Detective, you said that the LA victim, Linda Parker, was found inside her own house?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Well, so was Mr. Greene.’

Agent Williams reopened his blue folder and retrieved another four photographs, placing them on Hunter’s desk. Once again they were divided into two full-body shots and two facial close-ups.

‘You’ve got to be kidding me,’ Garcia said, uneven lines creasing the edges of his eyes as he cringed.

Captain Blake looked like she was about to say something, but words failed her.

Hunter stayed silent, his analytical stare moving slowly from one photo to the other.

‘I guess that now you really understand the reason for our surprise once we discovered what this killer had done to victim number three,’ Agent Fisher said.

The first two photographs on Hunter’s desk revealed that Albert Greene had also been stripped naked and left lying on his back, but not on some sort of dirty floor. This time, the killer had left his victim lying on a bed, in the exact same position he had left Kristine Rivers and Linda Parker — arms resting naturally by his torso, with his legs extended, ankles practically touching each other. But just like Kristine Rivers, Albert Greene’s body hadn’t been skinned, neither had his hands and feet been severed.

‘As you can see,’ Agent Williams proceeded, pointing to photos three and four, the facial close-ups taken at the crime scene, ‘the killer also took away Mr. Greene’s eyes, using the same method he’d used with Kristine Rivers, but this time, no scalping.’

The skin on Albert Greene’s face looked even more wrinkled and fragile than it did on the first photo they were shown. His mouth was contorted out of shape and his eyes... his eyes just weren’t there. The killer had once again extracted both ocular globes, leaving behind two dark holes caked in dried blood.

‘Another orbital exenteration?’ Hunter asked.

‘Of the same professional standard he’d shown with Kristine,’ Kennedy replied.

‘And that’s why victim number three,’ Agent Fisher took over, pointing to the picture board, ‘caught us completely off guard. Two victims. Two asphyxiations. Two expertly performed eye surgeries. One scalping. Then, about a month later, we’ve got this — complete mutilation. Hands and feet hacked off, the body skinned like an animal’s, but the eyes...’ She indicated one of the facial close-up photographs of Linda Parker. ‘The eyes weren’t touched. No exenteration.’ She shook her head. ‘We weren’t expecting this.’

‘How about the carvings?’ Hunter asked.

Agent Williams reached for another photograph from his folder and placed it on the desk. Once again, the killer had carved his message into his victim’s back and, just like before, the message was divided into four distinct lines, containing what at first would appear to be an odd combination of letters and symbols. This time the killer had divided the lines as follows: First line — six characters. Second line — eight characters. Third line — eight characters. Fourth line — eight characters.

‘Mr. Greene’s skin was old and thinning,’ Agent Williams explained. ‘Very tenuous, and we believe that that’s the reason why this message looks a little messier than the previous one.’

This time Agent Fisher didn’t give Hunter any time to decipher it.

‘This time we have four words instead of only three — Pulchritudo in oculis aspicientis,’ she revealed, before addressing Garcia. ‘It means “beauty is in the eye of the beholder”.’

After a silent moment, Kennedy took the floor again.

‘So now you can probably understand our frustration, Robert. We’ve been working on this for over two months. Due to the similarities of the first two murders, we’ve been drawing up a few theories and pursuing some specific investigative avenues, but this third victim is like a dagger through the heart of most of what we’ve been working on so far.’

Hunter, Garcia and Captain Blake could clearly see why.

‘You said Mr. Greene was found inside his own house?’ Hunter asked.

‘He was,’ Agent Williams confirmed, displaying six new photos. These ones showed details of the room in which Albert Greene had been found — his own room. There was no blood on any of the walls. No blood on the floor. No blood on the furniture.

‘Any signs of a break-in?’ Garcia this time.

‘None,’ Agent Fisher replied. ‘And no signs of a struggle either, but then again, what sort of struggle could an eighty-four-year-old man with aching joints put up anyway?’

‘What about Mr. Greene’s wife?’ Hunter asked. ‘You said he was married, right?’

‘He was for many years,’ Kennedy replied. ‘But his wife, Elena, passed away six years ago. Mr. Greene lived alone in a small one-bedroom house in Murdock, another poor and rough neighborhood in Wichita. His daughter lives in Colorado with her husband and two kids. She would visit him twice a year, sometimes more, if time and money allowed. Mr. Greene never had a caregiver. Despite his age, he was still able to do everything himself, from going to the shops to cooking and cleaning the house. According to everyone we talked to, he was a very simple but proud man. He was alone in the house when the attack happened.’

‘So who found the body?’ Garcia asked. ‘And how long after the murder?’

‘One of his neighbors,’ Agent Williams replied. ‘Two houses down — Mr. Morales, who is sixty-nine. He’s also a widower and he and Mr. Greene were best friends. They tended to spend most of their days together. Each had a key to the other’s house. On the morning of the twelfth of March, Mr. Morales didn’t see his old friend sitting outside on his front porch like he did every day, so he got worried and went knocking. No answer, he used his key and...’

Garcia nodded, his attention back on the photographs on the desk.

‘We can talk details later,’ Agent Williams added. ‘Or you guys can read the files to your heart’s content, but this is the bulk of what we have.’ He stepped back from Hunter’s desk, placed his blue folder on top of a metal cabinet and faced the picture board. ‘I guess now it’s your turn. Tell us about Linda Parker.’

‘Before we do that,’ Hunter suggested, ‘how about we all take a twenty-minute break? We’ve been locked in this office for over an hour. I, for one, could use a trip to the bathroom and a cup of coffee.’

‘And a cigarette,’ Kennedy added. ‘I certainly could do with a cigarette right now.’

Everyone in the room agreed.

Outside the Police Administration Building, Hunter caught up with Kennedy as he lit his first cigarette.

‘We need to talk, Adrian.’

Hunter’s tone concerned Kennedy, but he kept a straight face. ‘Sure. What’s up?’

Hunter handed the NCAVC director the first portrait photograph they had been shown of Kristine Rivers.

Kennedy took a long drag of his cigarette.

‘OK,’ Hunter asked. ‘So who is she?’

‘What? What do you mean? We’ve told you that upstairs. Her name is Kristine Rivers.’

‘That I know. What I want to know is who she is.’

‘I don’t follow.’

‘Yes you do. You know exactly what I’m talking about, Adrian. No more bullshit. Who is this woman... really?’