Grave Instinct

SIX

Public library, Savannah, Georgia July 12, 2003

NURSE Susan Thorn aspired to be a doctor. She had been taking classes part time, and to maximize her time, she had taken to the Internet for help. In her anatomy class, she had arrived at the frightfully difficult chapter on the human brain, and she had to know everything she could about it before the exam. Signing on to the computer as Twisted-Nurse, she had been cruising for information for sometime now.

She'd seen some weird stuff on the Net, but there was one website in particular that spoke of the cosmic soul being housed in the brain. Some of the talk on the site had gotten into cannibalizing animal and human brains, which she chalked up to juveniles at play on the Web. While the site had at first promised to be useful, not long into it, she decided it must be for comic-book readers. She logged off and soon found something more professional, and from there Susan Thorn began taking notes from what she read: The medulla oblongata serves as the organ of communication between the spinal cord and the rest of the body. In the embryonic state, it is called the brain bag-the centers that govern such autonomic functions as breathing, heartbeat, regulation of blood vessels, body temperature and certain reflexes of swallowing.

This is more like it, Susan told herself. Still, something about the other site nagged, like a little cyber voice, calling her back. She held firm to her initial conviction, however, stayed with her study, and read on:

Projecting a little in front of the medulla is a wide band of nervous tissue forming a bridge over the two halves of the cerebellum called the pons Varolii. This along with the medulla forms the brain stem.

In the brain stem lies a network of nerves known as the reticular formation-millions of neurons in a matrix of fibers, from which long branches are sent out to every part of the body. Thus, it participates in every neural function; so it coordinates and filters information in the brain.

It is the center of arousal and wakefulness, regulating awareness. Anything that might put the reticular formation out of action would result in coma or death. Lying longitudinal along the brain stem is the raphe system, active during sleep. Anything destroying the raphe system results in chronic insomnia.

Susan came back to herself, thinking about her aunt Naomi's insomnia, wondering if her smoking interfered with her raphe system. “Maybe she needs to cannibalize somebody else's brain to recover,” she muttered to herself, thinking of the foolish information floating around on that first Web page she had cursorily visited.

Since the news of the Brain Thief had been aired on TV, everyone was hoaxing in one manner or another, and the Web was filled with lunatics who professed responsibility for the killings. Word had it that the FBI was inundated with such fools. “Got brains?” asked one Internet site.

Savannah Police Department Same morning

“ You don't understand. I had too much to drink. I get mean when I drink, but I'd never hurt anyone, 'specially my sweet Winona,” Nathan Campbell told them, his brown eyes wide and bloodshot. “I picked a fight with her. Wanted to test her, you know. See if she really meant all those things she said. I wouldn't do that kind of thing if I was sober.”

Campbell was several years older than Winona, and their relationship had been stormy. Jessica saw instantly that Nathan Campbell was in a state of exhaustion and mental anguish. He blamed himself for his girlfriend's death. Agitated, no words of solace could calm him or dissuade him from his belief. The end result: It proved difficult to get relevant information out of him.

“ Can you tell us the make and model of the van?”

“ I think it was a Dodge, maybe a Plymouth, maybe late '90s, but I couldn't swear to that.” This corroborated info from the near-abducted woman in Fayetteville, North Carolina.

“ Did you see anything at all of the driver?”

“ Older guy I think. White, I think. Didn't recognize him, but didn't really get a good look at him, either. Pretty sure he wasn't one of our crowd or a regular at the club… at least, I don't think so.”

“ Did Winona act as if she knew him?”

“ I can't say but maybe… maybe she did act that way, I mean. I first saw her alone where I left her. I'd gotten so mad I fuckin' drove off… but I was just going round the block-throw a scare into her, you know.”

“ So, you drove around the block and then what?” pressed Jessica.

“ By the time I came back around, she was being chummy with this guy, flirting through the passenger window like a cheap hooker.”

“ What did you see of the driver?”

“ I didn't get a decent look. Like I said, his van didn't look familiar, but she acted friendly like maybe she knew him. But I thought that was for my benefit, you know- that she knew I'd come around the corner and was playing me, you know. That's when I kept going the second time. Time I drove back again, the van was gone and so was she.”

“ You think she could have known him?” Combs asked again.

“ I thought she was doing it all for my benefit, to teach me a lesson, you know. I thought for sure she'd get back out of the van as soon as I disappeared, and that I'd just come back for her again. I'd been drinking, not thinking so clear, you know? I got pissed off again. I went home thinking it was over for sure between us, and I slept it off. Next thing I know, the cops're knocking at my house and my parents are waking me up.”

“ Did you happen to notice the van's plates? In state, out of state?”

“ I didn't see 'em. Damn me…”

“ Did Winona ever talk about meeting anyone on the computer?” asked Combs, who had a team working that avenue of inquiry.

“ No… no, she said people that did that were sick fucks.”

“ Did she spend a lot of time on the Internet?” persisted Lorena.

“ Nah, she wasn't like addicted to it or anything. Why?”

“ Just part of routine questioning these days, Mr. Campbell.”

“ Is that how the son of a bitch works?” he asked.

“ We're exploring that notion.”

Sheriff Combs had already pressed the local deputy related to the victim, Jeff, to confiscate Winona's computer. Amanda Manning's parents had turned over her computer to Combs as well, and leads had been made and investigated regarding men who had propositioned Amanda over the Internet. So far, none had panned out.

When they had discussed this line of inquiry, Jessica was guardedly enthusiastic, but she had suggested, “Watch for any crossing of the same guy in contact with both victims. If we have probable cause, then we can get the Net server to open its files.”

“ It'd help if Richmond and Winston-Salem would share what they have along these lines. You think some high-ranking SOB with the FBI could get on them to confiscate and examine the computer tracks of the other two victims?”

“ I've already asked Santiva to push for it, Lorena.”

“ Who knows… maybe we'll get lucky.”

Combs volunteered to go through all of Winona's E-mail to see if anyone had contacted her for a meeting on or around the time of her murder. She would also attempt to find any matchups with correspondence between the two young women-Winona and Amanda-as well as anyone writing to them both.

Here in Savannah's largest police station, Jessica felt the weight of the case on her shoulders. She stepped away from Campbell and his weak-to-useless testimony. “We still have little to go on.”

Combs countered, “We've got more than we had. The tire prints, two and a half shoe prints. We know for a fact now that the killer leaves a mark on his victims.”

“ Yeah… his final statement of power and ownership. The marking likely makes the bastard feel good, that he holds sway over his victim even after death. I can't tell you how many times I've heard such killers profess a belief in an afterlife that'll reunite them with their victims-that they will be connected throughout eternity.”

“ Madness begets fantasy.”

“ Mad Matthew Matisak himself had such plans for me,” Jessica confessed.

“ You'll have to tell me about it sometime.”

“ On the way back to your town.”

“ Well, while we have little to go on, it is a good deal more than the Skull-digger's left anyone before now.”

Campbell asked, “Can I go now? I gotta go see Winona's folks. Try to explain.”

“ I'd caution you away from them for a while, Nathan,” Jessica suggested. She and Sheriff Combs had gone to the Miller home earlier in the day to question the barely functioning, distraught parents to no avail and to confiscate the computer and all of Winona's disks. They found a typical young girl's bedroom, filled with stuffed animals, rock CDs, posters, makeup and mirrors. Jessica's gaze had fallen on a sculpture of an angel on the girl's nightstand. Winona was not quite out of her teens yet. “If the victims have any one thing in common, I'd call it innocence,” Jessica had confided as Lorena lifted the angel statue and stared at it.

Nathan Campbell now nodded at Jessica's advice to keep his distance from the parents for the time being, but she sensed he would not heed her words. “Maybe you're right,” he said without conviction.

“ You might want to get some professional help too, Nathan. You're free to go. Your parents are waiting outside.”

Campbell stood, thanked them and left in a dejected state, his shoes having been confiscated and replaced by prison booties.

“ What now?” asked Combs of Jessica in the empty interrogation room.

“ Boyd's having Campbell's shoes and his tire treads checked against the casts. But Nathan doesn't strike me as a vicious killer.”

Just then Jessica's cell phone rang and she dug it out of her pocket. “Coran,” she said into the phone, “how can I help you?”

A strange, strident male voice replied, “Don't believe a word of the lies my woman has told you.”

“ Who is this, please?”

“ I'm not the Skull-digger. I'm cured of all that a long time ago. Just don't waste your time coming after me.”

“ Who is this?”

“ You focus all your efforts on the right man. Not me.” The phone went dead.

Jessica went into the answered calls in her phone log and punched SEND for a dial back, and though it rang, no one picked up. Her phone displayed a number with a 609 area code. A different number but still a New Jersey exchange- the Atlantic City area of New Jersey.

“ What was that all about?” asked Combs.

“ Not sure, but I may just follow up on a lead that'll take me to New Jersey.”

“ Want to tell me about it?”

“ I've got to alert Eriq about this call I just got.”

“ Go right ahead. Then maybe we can get a bite to eat, a cup of coffee,” suggested Combs, looking tired.

Jessica again caught Eriq and put him on the speaker-phone. “The creep may have called me.”

“ What creep? Cahil?”

“ None other. He didn't identify himself, but he pleaded with me not to listen to the woman who'd fingered him. He's got my cell number now. The number he called from was an Atlantic City exchange.” She read the number off to him. “Maybe it'll help to pinpoint his location.”

“ What'd he say, exactly?”

“ He's concerned I'd be wasting my time on him, that he's not the Skull-digger.”

“ If it's from a pay phone, we'll check surrounding area hotels. If it's from a phone he owns, we've got the bastard, and this time no one's going to let him out of his cage ever again,” said Eriq. “Oh, and we're running down leads on the wife-slash-girlfriend as well.”

“ Maybe the wife's already dead, and he took my number off her body.”

“ I've made arrangements with Deitze for us to see him at two P.M. tomorrow afternoon. Can you make that?”

“ Make it four if you can.”

Eriq had an incoming call. “Let me know of any new-”

“ Will do!”

He hung up and Jessica did likewise. She looked over to Lorena and said, “I'm with you. Let's go get something to eat and drink.”

People milled about the corner restaurant called Savannah Sal's in downtown Savannah, just off the historic section of the city where tourists flocked. Jessica watched the crowd, trying to get her mind to relax from the case. She watched people try the patience of those behind the counter as they stared at an overhead quick-order menu; she saw others picking up their orders and complaining about this or that. Still others searched for their parties, while a few urgently sought the bathrooms. A number of people sat reading newspapers, while one or two worked on their laptops, one of them laughing at something on his screen, the other grimly silent. The average clientele appeared to be of college age, and countless textbooks were stacked and flung across tables and on seats. Some of the young people looked hungover.

Jessica and Lorena had coffee while awaiting a waiter to find them in Sal's more formal dining section. Jessica rested her head in her hands, complaining of her lack of sleep.

“ I know what you mean,” agreed Lorena.

Jessica excused herself and snatched out her cell phone and contacted J.T. back in Jacksonville. She informed him, “We've got an identical killing up here, John, down to the skull etching on the inside. But he left tracks this time.”

“ Foot prints?”

“ Shoe prints and tire marks.” Jessica quickly brought J.T. up to date on both the Cahil angle and that she had to be in Pennsylvania the following day to meet with Jack Deitze. “I need you to get all the evidence gathered on the Manning girl, including the bone fragment, up to Quantico ASAP.”

Their drinks arrived with hot rolls and butter. “Thanks, John. I gotta go now.”

For a brief time, the two women remained quiet, each trying to cut the edge of her hunger. Combs broke the silence. “So, anything else you can tell me about this Cahil guy?”

“ He hit a number of cemeteries in New Jersey as a modern-day grave robber, a ghoul-the old expression aptly fits here, Lorena. Hasn't been a recorded case of actual grave robbery-as opposed to grave vandalism-in the U.S. since.” “The New Jersey Ghoul, yeah, I remember now. Saw a segment on Ripley's Believe It or Not that highlighted his questionable accomplishment as the last of the ghouls.”

“ Apprehended in 1990 in a Morristown cemetery with a bone saw. He cut the heads off and took them with him. Left the graves wide open.”

“ 1990, yeah… I was still in high school at the time, but I recall the case. Something about necrophilia, that he robbed the graves of their heads and used them as sex objects. A real sick freak.”

“ I don't know too much about the man's motivations.” Jessica wanted to change the subject, so she asked, “How old are you, Lorena? You must be the youngest female sheriff in the South, or the country for that matter.”

“ Democrats thought a woman running for office would fail, but we surprised them. I got the black vote and the Indian vote and a good chunk of the white vote.” Lorena stirred back to the case. “So, how does grave robbing and brain snatching go together?”

“ I'm not sure, and I'm not sure that Cahil won't lead to another dead end. If I hadn't gotten those two calls, we probably wouldn't even be looking at the guy.”

“ So, you don't think anything'll come of it?”

“ Maybe, maybe not. I'll know more after I talk with Dr. Deitze.”

“ The clown who authorized Cahil's release? Good luck.”

The waiter returned with two hot steaming plates, Jessica's a roast beef dinner and Lorena's a vegetarian lasagna. Jessica glanced at the decor as she ate, studying the walls covered with historical items supposedly out of old Savannah's past: old soda pop and cigar signs, buckets, milk pails, rusty traps, harnesses, an entire plowshare heavy enough to kill someone should it fall. Combs, following Jessica's gaze, said, “All items no one in his right mind would hang above a plate of food anywhere but in a restaurant.”

Jessica laughed in response, and Combs joined her.

“ I still have no idea how someone like Cahil could get my private number.”

Combs said, “Doesn't take much these days with computer access to everyone you know on the planet, Jess. Remember the Theresa Saldana stalking murder attempt?”

“ The actress who survived-what was it? — seven or eight knife wounds?”

“ Yeah, that's it. Her attacker told police that a hundred dollars to a private eye gave him the family address.” Combs allowed the fact to sink in. “And nowadays with the damn Internet it's easy enough to get information on your own. Cut out the middleman to get names, addresses, phone numbers.”

“ But I'm very careful with that number.”

“ The celebrity stalker told Saldana that he was a production assistant for Martin Scorsese, and wanted to know if she would look at a script for 'Marty.' Now, maybe you didn't get a call from Scorsese, Jess, but you did get one from a resourceful lady in a day and age when you don't have to be all that resourceful to electronically get reams of information on what you want.”

“ I know you're right. I guess I just want to hold on to the illusion that I have some privacy left.”

They continued their meal. Then Combs asked, “What next?”

“ I want to be on hand at the Miller girl's autopsy. From there, I find a bed, get a good night's sleep and tomorrow get myself up to Philadelphia and the penitentiary.”

“ I'll be heading back to Jax-town, but I'll keep you apprised of anything useful we might find on the Net searches, if you'll part with that number of yours.” “Why don't you steal it, if it's so damned easy to do?” Jessica joked.

“ How do you know I haven't already?”

Jessica wrote out the number on a pad and gave it to Combs. “I want to thank you, Lorena, for all your help and hospitality. Sorry you've got that long drive alone.”

“ Not in the least. Just doing my job.”

Pennsylvania Federal Penitentiary for the Criminally Insane, outskirts of Philadelphia 4:15 P.M., July 13, 2003

Eric had failed to show up, leaving Jessica on her own to deal with Dr. Johnathan “Jack” Deitze. Furious, she had telephoned Santiva only to learn that he'd gone to Atlantic City, New Jersey, on a lead in the Skull-digger case. She pictured his search there motivated out of a sense of desperation. He must have a great deal of pressure on his back at the moment to stand her up and leave her alone with Deitze. She told Henrietta in no uncertain terms that her boss was to get in touch with her as soon as possible. Henrietta conveyed the last of Eriq's message to Jessica: “You are to meet a Detective Maxwell Strand at the penitentiary. The two of you can interview Dr. Deitze.”

“ Strand? I don't know any Strand.”

“ He'll be looking for you.”

The facility was a gleaming new and sleek structure back in the '70s when it'd been built, but its age was beginning to show in small ways, from poor windows to cracks in the tiled floors leading through the massive lobby where a pair of security guards walked her through a tired metal detector. A man in a suit watched her give up her two guns and come through the detector with unusual interest, and he asked, “Dr. Coran? Dr. Jessica Coran?”

“ Yes.”

The tall, stout man with thin gray hair looked too old to be a working police detective. “I'm Strand.”

“ Are you with the Philly police?”

“ No… Retiring Morristown PD in a couple of months. I worked the Cahil case with my partner. We apprehended Cahil in the act.”

“ What more can you tell me about our target?”

“ Nobody knows more about him than I do, but Deitze will tell you he does.”

She sensed there was no love lost between the cop and the shrink. “So, fill me in.”

“ Full name is Daryl Thomas Cahil, aka the Ghoul, age thirty-six. Apprehended in Morristown after things became too hot in Newark for him. Caught red-handed in the disinterred grave of a child named Amiee Lee Pheiffer by my partner, Reed, and me. Cahil was only twenty-three at the time.”

“ How much does he weigh?”

“ Kinda slight from his photo, which I've sent copies of to your boss, who's likely forwarded it on to every law-enforcement agency in the southeast by now. Weighs maybe 155 maybe 160.”

“ Did you send a picture of him at twenty-three years of age?”

“ No, I've kept him under surveillance since his release, up until a few weeks ago. I had a bout with some trouble that put me in the hospital. But the photo's current.” He slid a photo from a file he carried. Jessica looked at the sunken-faced, small man in the picture. He didn't look large enough for the image she'd had of the Skull-digger. His weight, he's got to weigh more, she was thinking of the prints found in Georgia.

“ Height?”

“ Five-ten.”

She told him of the shoe print find at the latest murder scene. “It's from a guy who's at least 175 to 180, possibly one hundred and ninety pounds, Detective Strand.”

“ Prints at a crime scene can be unreliable.”

“ The officer in charge was very thorough and professional. And Cahil can't have changed his foot size or his height, so… Then there's the thing about how leopards don't change their spots.”

“ You mean a ghoul can't graduate to live prey?”

“ He dealt in dead bodies, not live ones, right? Like his height and weight, his MO and his fantasy aren't likely to change.”

“ Unless it has developed into something else. Hell, he had nearly thirteen years to tweek it.”

“ Our current ghoul makes dead bodies; he doesn't dig them up. Other than the brain theft, there's not a lot of similarities here between what Cahil was convicted for, and what the Skull-digger has done.”

“ But that's just it. Cahil lost more than twelve years. He's now making up for lost time. He could well be the Skull-digger, still in search of this 'island' thing, this 'real thing.' “

She had no idea what he meant, but she asked, “Then why isn't he in custody, Detective?”

“ He will be as soon as we can locate him. Place is under surveillance at the moment and an order for his arrest has been issued. I took the liberty and asked your field operatives in Jersey to haul him in on suspicion, just to see if he was there, but he's not, which tells me he's elsewhere.”

“ Where is 'elsewhere'?” “Possibly in Atlantic City, as your mysterious phone calls suggest.”

“ Santiva told you about the calls?”

He nodded.

She knew the way to Deitze's office; it had been Gabe Arnold's before Matisak had hooked him up to a dialysis machine in the infirmary and drained him of every ounce of blood. Jessica hadn't returned here in almost nine years, and she'd forgotten about the constant wail of madmen behind these walls. Fortunately, she needn't go through lockup for her purposes today. Her groundbreaking study on socio-paths, done here back in the early '90s, had become required reading at the FBI Academy.

Strand struggled to keep pace, a bad leg plaguing him. She slowed in response.

“ Can you verify that he's actually been out of town, and if so do his vacations coincide with the killings?”

“ Neighbors verify that he's been out of town, but no one can say where or for how long. He's a recluse, and he timed his disappearance to coincide with my operation and hospital stay.”

“ Was he living with anyone in Morristown?”

“ I've seen a woman come and go, but it's him… one of his personality manifestations.”

“ He's schizophrenic?”

“ Multiple personalities. So, in a sense, yes. A woman resides there with him. I suspect the first call you got, the female caller, was this manifestation. So, you can stop worrying about her safety.”

“ He has no wife? No girlfriend who lives elsewhere, maybe out of town, maybe down the street or in Atlantic City?”

“ None. He has no interest in anything smacking of normal, Dr. Coran.”

Jessica imagined the pressure Eriq must have been under from both above and from this man to place someone- anyone-in custody for the Skull-digger's heinous crimes. “I want to believe this is the guy as much as you do, Detective-that we're closing in on the bastard, but I have to be careful.”

“ Are you preaching the book to me?” he asked and then laughed.

“ I'm sorry. I've been down a lot of dead ends recently.”

“ I'm sure you have.”

One of the guards at the greeting desk must have called up to Deitze's office because he stood outside the door, waving her forward while telling Detective Strand that he would speak only to Dr. Coran.

The two men glared so hard at one another that Jessica feared each would be turned to stone. Obviously, they had some bad history between them. “I'll speak to Dr. Coran alone or not at all, Strand,” declared Deitze.

Strand whispered in her ear, “Watch him. He's a liar.”

Jessica had met Deitze at various law-enforcement functions, but they had never spent any time together, and what little she knew of him, she didn't care for. He was an overbearing, self-aggrandizing sort who, she believed, would sell his mother for a chance to be published in a major medical journal.

The first thing he extended to her was his published paper on Cahil's treatment, and secondly, his sweaty hand. “The paper is on Cahil, although I used a fictitious name. If you will, Dr. Coran, read it thoroughly, you will find Cahil harmless and incapable of the skullduggery and butchery of this so-called Brain Thief who takes human life. If Cahil is involved at all, it is only peripherally and not of his own choosing.”

“ What do you mean by that?” she asked.

“ Let's retire to my office. I have coffee. This will take time.” As she entered his office, she apologized for Santiva's absence. He replied, “Hardly a problem… much better for medical people to understand one another before we go off to others with our theories, wouldn't you say?”

She wondered if what he said was meant as a slap of sorts. She wondered how much Santiva had told him about her suspicions of Cahil. “I suppose so, yes.”

“ Can I pour you coffee?”

“ Black, please.”

He poured for them both. “Take the time to read the report.”

She did so, asking questions as she went. “Cahil admitted to why he robbed the graves of five children? Says here it had nothing to do with the tabloid speculations about necrophilia.”

“ Cahil was not sexually motivated whatsoever to attack his dead victims, no. He wasn't in it to create sex objects of his victims, no. All balderdash.”

“ I was within these walls on several occasions while he was incarcerated, doing my own study, as you recall, Dr. Deitze, just before you took over as Chief of Psychiatry here. Neither Dr. Arnold nor you thought him of interest to my study, yet he harbored these antisocial behaviors? Why was he kept from me?”

“ Hardly kept from you. He was kept in isolation.”

“ And you two worked with him.”

“ Yes, before Arnold's unfortunate end… yes.”

“ I see.”

“ Cahil was never a candidate for your study because he had not actually murdered anyone.”

“ Necrophilia was the sensationalized story, yes. Page one of the tabloids. So, what's the real story?”

“ He cut off the heads in order to take them to a safe place where he could do what he wanted with them. To take his time.” “The safe place being his basement at home?”

“ With a stopover at his place of work, a butcher's shop, where-”

“ Where he could damn well take his time with the victim's head, I'm sure.”

“ Yes… but it was in order to take his time with his true intended prize, the brains of the dead children, Dr. Coran.”

“ Ghoulish, all right… and what did he do with the gray stuff? Breakfast, lunch and dinner?”

“ Not exactly, no.”

“ Blended it in the mixer and drank it with his Ovaltine?”

“ If you'll just listen, Doctor.”

“ Bathed in it?”

“ No.”

“ What then?”

“ To gain his freedom, he had to describe his crimes in detail. He had to give a complete elocution.”

“ Dr. Deitze, what the hell did Cahil use the brain matter for?”

Deitze cleared his throat, sipped at his now-tepid coffee and replied, “The man sincerely believed it would place him in touch with something he called the eternal cosmic mind.”

“ Then he did consume it?”

“ Not all of it, or so he professed in open court. Said it was just a small island of tissue he really cut the head open for.”

“ Small island of tissue?”

“ Discarded the rest of the brain. But to get at this small dab of brain matter, he had to cut deep into the center to pluck it out.”

“ Island of tissue?”

“ Deep at the center, something of an island. Called it the Real Island at his elocution. No one knew what he was talking about, least of all me.” “You were at the trial?”

“ I found him fascinating; I asked to be put on his case, and Dr. Arnold arranged everything and set me up for the case study. I was not long out of psychiatric study at Stanford.”

“ Tell me more.”

Deitze had an overlarge face, uncannily wrinkled with worry lines for one so young. Perhaps this single case was meant as his crowning achievement, and it had taken its toll on him. “It was assumed this object Cahil sought was some imaginary prize, part of his warped fantasy. But later on, during incarceration, I began to listen more closely to Cahil. I dug through old texts and esoteric books on the brain, and I made a stunning discovery. This 'Real Island' he spoke of, it was spelled R-h-e-i-1 after its discoverer, a Dr. Rheil in the late eighteenth century. Cahil wasn't talking about some fiction his mind had concocted but a real-that is tangible-piece of brain matter, Dr. Coran.”

“ I've never heard of this Rheil Island, Dr. Deitze. Is there a formal, medical term for this brain part?”

“ Just Rheil. Rheil dissected hundreds of brains during his lifetime, but only stumbled on his so-called island late in his life. Said it was located in the deepest recesses of the medulla oblongata.

“ The midbrain. Cahil claimed in perfect lunatic fashion how the soul resided there, which had been Rheil's eighteenth-century speculation. Cahil said that in consuming this portion of the children's brains, that he meant to consume the souls of these children in order to be more powerful and in touch with something he called the cosmic mind.”

“ Christ save us all.”

“ I'm only telling you what he told the court, and details he filled in later as I worked with him. At any costs, Cahil had stumbled onto the esoteric teachings of the likely demented Dr. Benjamin Artemus Rheil, and he twisted what Dr. Rheil had to say about the Island of Rheil. My own study into Rheil and his work shows there's next to nothing remaining of the man or his theories, and others have simply chalked up his island as a leftover from our primitive brains. But in Cahil's mind, this small portion paradoxically holds all our spiritual being within, and when you die, you go to this island to await your next journey or voyage or incarnation.”

“ You mean purgatory is all in the mind?”

“ Strange thing is that Cahil would draw pictures of it over and over again.”

“ Purgatory?”

“ No, no, the island itself, and it is roughly similar in appearance to a cross that signifies upright man, the horizon, and the godhead.”

“ Do you have any of his drawings?” asked Jessica.

“ I do… and it coincides with the etchings you located on the dead women killed by the Skull-digger. Your chief sent me the image and asked if it meant anything to me.”

“ Strange coincidence, I admit, but you said you could prove that Cahil is not the killer. It looks the opposite to me, Doctor.”

“ Cahil is being set up. Someone is using him. He's accepted my therapy as his cure, to replace the object of his desire-which violates human morality and all the laws of decency known to mankind-with something acceptable. He now consumes a symbolic diet like many of us consume the host and the body of Christ with the wine and the wafer.”

“ And you think he's remained on his diet since leaving here, Doctor? We all know how many patients go off their meds after leaving here, and we are speaking of a symbolic gesture here, something far more difficult to absorb than a psychoactive pill.”

“ I know he's remained true to his new path.”

“ You want to bet the lives of more young women on that assumption?”

“ It's not… I mean, yes.”

“ Tell me, Dr. Deitze, what did this guy do with the children's leftover heads and the portions of brain he didn't want?”

“ Cahil had been a butcher on the outside. After warming to me, he told me that he ground up and fed the rest of the remaining gray matter, along with the heads, to his dogs.”

“ I see… mixed it all together with the usual bonemeal from his little chop shop of horrors. I'm sure the animals went mad for it.”

Deitze stood up and wandered to his window, looking down on the courtyard below where the less dangerous patients were allowed an hour a day.

Jessica was getting messages from the man's body language. “Has Cahil been in touch with you, Dr. Deitze?”

He hesitated a hair. “No… and I've lost track of him. He's disappeared from the home and job we placed him in.”

“ Morristown? Where did he work?”

“ Baby land Furnishings.”

“ My God… you placed him in a job involving children?”

“ He is cured, I tell you, and he is not your killer.”

“ Dr. Deitze… Jack… it's one thing to do a case study and put forth a theory of rehab never before tried, but it's foolish to maintain that we should not take a close look at this guy, unless you have some irrefutable evidence that he is innocent.”

Jessica thought of their initial profile of the killer, and she asked, “And if he's disappeared from where he was placed, that only points up the fact he's roving. Possibly roaming the coast from Jersey to Florida.”

“ I know Cahil is cured of feeding on-”

“ On the real thing? Look, we're not excluding other leads, but the mark left on the victims is identical to this man's drawings of his Rheil tissue. You won't mind if I take one or two of his drawings with me, will you?”

“ No… go right ahead. But I wish to caution you about Maxwell Strand. He only wants one thing: to see Cahil killed.”

“ These drawings are more than coincidence, Doctor. They're quite compelling. As for Strand, I'm sure I understand his biases.”

“ Read the rehabilitation paper in its entirety, Dr. Coran,” he called after her as she left.

Strand had waited on a hallway bench. He stood and came alongside her. She wanted to get out of this building full of horrors and bad memories.

“ Did he feed you that line about how he's cured Cahil of his cravings for cannibalizing brains?”

“ He told me about it, yes, along with the story of how Cahil only wanted a small portion of the brains of his victims.”

“ Yeah… the Rheil tissue.”

“ You know about that?”

“ I was there at his elocution, and I've read Dr. Blowhard's case study. I told you, I'm an expert on Daryl Thomas Cahil.”

“ Then tell me,” she asked, slowing her pace so that he might keep up. “Where do these sickos come up with their fantastic rationalizations?”

“ Adolf Hitler rationalized genocide right along with Osama bin Laden.”

“ So they place him in Morristown and provide him with a job at a kid's store? I can't shake this inconceivable idiocy.”

He countered sharply. “But it made a warped kind of sense-bureaucratic nonsense.”

“ How crazy is the system?”

“ Has this harmless job by day, and cracking open and feeding on young women's brains by night,” said Strand.

Jessica felt an urgency to find and put Cahil behind bars for the sake of his next victim. Something about Cahil's working around children convinced her that maybe she ought to be pursuing this man exclusively and full throttle.

They passed the security check, waved to the guards and were out the door. Jessica breathed in great breaths of air. Strand, at her side, said, “Santiva told me about what you found in the victim's heads, that picture of the Rheil cross. It corresponds with the pictures that Cahil drew while in prison, and the one he has up on his website.”

“ Website? Whataya mean, website?”

“ Don't you know? It's all in Deitze's case study, part of his rehab program for poor little misunderstood Cahil. While he was incarcerated, Cahil was set up with a computer and was given access to the Internet as part of his therapy.”

“ You're kidding.”

“ Read the report Deitze gave you. It's all there.”

“ Damn…” She thought of Lorena combing through the computer trails for any connections between or among the Manning girl and the other victims. Could it be Cahil's website? If so, it was a connection that could not be ignored.

Still, Jessica heard her father's voice caution her as they left the prison for the parking lot. Careful, Jess, what at first appears suspicious coincidence is often only a disguised version of wishful thinking.

“ You coming back to Morristown with me?”

“ I had no such plans, no.” Jessica was taken aback by the question.

“ Santiva and his agents are closing in on Cahil in Atlantic City. I can feel it. Your boss said something about getting his best forensic people to go over the man's dwelling. Search warrants are in the works. I'm working closely with your field operatives in Jersey.”

“ If you don't mind, Detective Strand, I think I'll wait for orders before I go racing off to Morristown.”

He nodded, took her hand, shook it firmly and left her at her rental car. Jessica wondered who was stranger, Strand or Deitze, and she opted for the latter. She felt anxious now to get to her hotel room in Philadelphia and look over Deitze's paper for information on this website of Cahil's. She hoped it would be the noose that would slide around the killer's throat. She thought she now knew what Deitze had been holding back. And yet he had handed it to her and asked her to read the paper in its entirety-and she would.

She opened the door to the rental, a strange feeling coming over her. She looked up to where Deitze's office window reflected the fading sunlight back at her, and the man was standing there in the orange glow, staring out at her. She climbed inside the car, tossing the case study on the seat next to her.

She revved up the car, barked its tires in reverse and rushed to the gate, wanting to get off the grounds.