Joe Victim

Chapter Fifty-Four

Raphael opens the gun case on the floor. He takes out the box with the two bullets in it and places each of them into the magazine. He takes out the armor-piercing bullet and kisses it. For luck, he supposes, though he never thought about it and can’t rightly say, it was something that just happened. It’s cold. He slots it on top of the others. He assembles the gun. He’s getting better at this. Next time he shoots a serial killer he could probably assemble the gun in the dark. He clicks the magazine into place. He stays in his own clothes for now.

He sits by the window with a corner of the cloth tucked aside and stares out at the courthouse. He thinks about the three bullets. One for Joe. One for Melissa. And one spare. Hopefully he won’t need the spare. Traffic starts to build as eight o’clock arrives and builds even more the closer it gets to nine. Then a police car shows up and puts out road cones to block off the street. Good thing he got here early. Good thing he parked around the corner. Groups of people are walking from the direction of the bus station-he can see them from his viewpoint starting to fill the streets as they come his way. They’re carrying placards and signs down by their sides. Soon they start coming from every direction. If he went to the office across the hall and looked north he’d see the same amount of people carrying the same kinds of signs coming in his direction. The protestors are wrapped in thick jackets and have scarves to keep their vocal chords warmed up for the yelling to come. Some he recognizes from group. They’ve brought friends and family. Media vans start to show up. They drive around looking for parking spaces, but can’t find any, the drivers double-parking and reporters and camera operators jumping out. He sees brothers and sisters of people Joe has killed. He sees people carrying signs that say Execution is murder and Only God decides who lives and dies. He sees trouble brewing. He sees both signs as being wrong. He supposes that would make them bad signs. He sees Jonas Jones, the psychic who was on the news all day yesterday, arrive at the back gate and not go any further. Other people see that too, and a small squadron of them gather there, but mostly people are making their way to the front of the courthouse, where they are out of his view.

Around quarter past nine comes the chanting. “Two, four, six, eight, let us eradicate.” Over and over it comes from the front of the courthouse, the words traveling easily on the cold, still air. The numbers start to grow. Soon people are arriving at the end of the block and can’t go any further, the street right outside the courthouse is packed. They spill out onto the other roads. The intersection becomes jammed. Then Elvis appears. He’s walking with Dracula and they’re carrying a six-pack of beer. They are followed by four beer-drinking Teletubbies and a couple of thin girls dressed up as maids. There is a moment, a comical moment, where he wonders if he’s having some kind of stroke, but no, what he is seeing is real. He doesn’t understand why it’s real, but it is. They disappear into the crowd.

At nine twenty a car waits for the gate to roll open, then enters the parking lot behind the court. Detective Carl Schroder-or just Carl these days-climbs out. The gates roll closed behind him.

Walking past the gates is Magnum PI and two nuns, Magnum saying something to make the two nuns laugh. With them is Smurfette. Raphael observes as Schroder watches the group walk past, then Schroder is slowly shaking his head before he disappears inside. Raphael pulls more of the drop cloth aside and reaches around the back and opens up the window. The air is chilling. The murmurs of street life kick up a few notches, he can hear people shouting and laughing and people arguing. He secures the curtain back into place.

He changes into the police uniform. He stuffs his clothes back into the bag along with the thermos, then he reaches up into the ceiling and throws it as far as he can. He knows he’ll probably be in jail by the end of the day, but no reason to make it easy for the police.

At nine thirty Raphael lies down on the platform they made. He has the urge to unload the magazine and reload it, just to make sure everything is how it should be. The same urge makes him want to take apart the gun and put it back together. But ultimately there’s no point. It wouldn’t go any different to how he already has it-and he’s satisfied it couldn’t be any better. He looks at his hands for any sign of the shakes and doesn’t see one. He positions the gun and he waits for Joe and Melissa to arrive.