Mister X

24

The air conditioner was off, and the apartment was miserably hot. Mary Bakehouse sat bent forward on the remaining chair and looked up at Vitali and Mishkin. The sofa remained, along with whatever else had been there when Mary had rented the place furnished. It wasn't much. The rest of what she'd bought to decorate or furnish the living room was gone. Two sweaty guys in identical wrinkled gray pants and white T-shirts huffed and puffed their way out the door carrying a mattress. A cardboard box with a lamp shade and some knickknacks in it sat near the door, almost close enough for the movers to trip over.

Sweat was rolling down Mary's heart-shaped face as she struggled for words. A sweet woman, Harold Mishkin thought. Sweet and under a terrible strain, knowing her ordeal might not be over. The kind of visitor she'd had, sometimes they came back.

"Did he tell you directly he wasn't finished with you?" Mishkin asked.

Mary Bakehouse appeared momentarily thrown by the question. "Not exactly, but he gave the impression he could come back anytime he wanted. That he could do whatever he wanted to me."

"They often give that impression," Mishkin said, "but usually they don't return." Not that we can be sure about that. "They get their kicks knowing you'll worry about them for a long time."

"Sadistic animal!" she said.

"That sums him up. But knowing what he's about, you don't have to worry so much. Scaring their victims is often the object of their sick game. He'll probably move on to some other unsuspecting woman."

"Do you really think so?"

"Absolutely. There's no shortage of potential victims out there. He's probably done with you. Besides, you're moving. He's not gonna go to the trouble of tracing you in a city so full of potential victims."

Vitali waited patiently for Mishkin to finish his comfort patter. His partner seemed compelled to console crime's victims, especially the more vulnerable, and women in particular. In her heart of hearts this woman knew her attacker might very well return and finish what he'd started. Maybe he'd follow her to the gates of hell to torture and kill her. It all depended on what kind of whack job he was, and who knew the answer to that?

When Mishkin had finally run down, Vitali glanced around at the now minimally furnished apartment. "Is that the only reason you're moving, so he can't find you?"

"Yes," Mary said. "At least it will make it more difficult."

"Could you identify him if you saw him again?" Vitali asked.

"I think so, but I can't be sure. I saw him clearly, but it all happened fast, and…my God! I was confused."

"Of course you were," Mishkin said.

"Describe him as best you can," Vitali said.

And she did, obviously growing more afraid as her words caused her to relive what had happened. Watching her, Vitali understood Mishkin's point of view. He felt himself growing angry at the attacker.

What has he done to your sleep, Mary Bakehouse? To your dreams?

"Did you get the impression you surprised him?" Vitali asked. "Or do you think he was waiting for you?"

"Waiting. But I can't be sure."

"Any sign that you interrupted a burglar?"

"No."

"Nothing missing?"

"No, I don't think he was a burglar. He seemed more interested in me than in stealing anything."

Vitali looked at her previous statement. "You said he had a knife."

"Yes. I think he had it strapped to his ankle." She described the knife, how her attacker had drawn it and used it to threaten her. Held it before her eyes so she had to look at the sharp blade. A boning knife, made to cleanly separate flesh from bone and gristle.

"Did he describe to you what he was going to do with the knife?" Vitali asked.

Mary Bakehouse turned pale. She shook her head no. "He didn't say anything to me. Not all the time we were together. It was like there was a spell, as if some terrible thing would happen if either of us spoke. He smiled. He seemed…amused."

"Excuse me for asking this," Mishkin said, "but…"

"Go ahead," she said. "Ask what you must."

"It's just that I need to confirm something. You said he pinched your right nipple?"

The embarrassed shrinking of Mary Bakehouse made Mishkin feel miserable for having asked. This should have been Sal's question.

She nodded silently.

Vitali gave Mishkin one of his "I'll take it, Harold" looks. Mishkin was getting as uncomfortable as the victim.

"He waved the knife around while he held it in front of you?" Vitali asked.

Another nod.

"Did he try to make it seem as if he was about to…cut off the nipple?"

"Of course he did! That was the whole idea!" She bowed her head and began to sob silently.

Mishkin got down on one knee in front of her as if he might be about to propose marriage. He pressed one of her hands in both of his. "It's all right, really. We've got to ask you this stuff. We don't like it any more than you do."

"The hell you don't!" Mary Bakehouse shouted at him.

Mishkin recoiled, stunned. He scrambled to his feet and backed away. "We don't! Honest…"

"Harold." Vitali's voice, cautioning. Then, to the victim: "Ms. Bakehouse, it could be very important that we know these things. Or at least have some sense of them."

She sniffed and then wiped her perspiring forearm across her nose. Her hair was a tangle in the heat, wild bangs plastered to her glistening forehead.

"He wasn't going to cut me," she said in a meek and beaten voice. "If he'd wanted to, he would have. Instead he just got up off me and made his way out the window and down the fire escape."

The two guys were back from taking out the mattress. They paused inside the door and gave Mary Bakehouse and the two detectives a look, as if to ask if Mary needed help. Chivalry, Vitali thought. This woman seemed to bring that out in men, a keen desire to protect her. Even Harold, least likely of dragon slayers, had his chest puffed out.

"Here," Vitali said, ignoring the movers and handing one of his cards to Mary Bakehouse. "If you think of something-"

"Or if you feel you need help," Mishkin interrupted, handing her one of his cards, too. "You make sure you call us. We can have somebody at your side in a hurry."

The two burly movers swaggered off into the bedroom. A single damsel in distress could be divvied up only so many ways.

Mishkin rested a hand briefly on Mary Bakehouse's trembling shoulder, and the two detectives thanked her for her time and cooperation and left her sitting hunched over in her chair.

"That tears your heart out," Mishkin said, when they were outside on the sidewalk.

Vitali shook his head. "Don't have a coronary, Harold. We were only questioning a witness."

"You think whoever assaulted her was our guy?"

"I dunno. He made it look like he was going to help himself to a nipple. Our man likes souvenirs. But he didn't cut her."

"Why do you think he bolted?"

"Probably because he didn't like the setup. I think she might have come home unexpectedly and surprised him, which means he wasn't in complete control. Hadn't made the encounter happen on his terms."

"Or he might've been waiting for her, just like she said, and only wanted to scare her that time," Mishkin said. "But that doesn't mean he wouldn't have gotten carried away and eventually killed her."

"True," Vitali said. "But it still doesn't seem like the Carver. Doesn't feel like him."

"I've gotta agree with you," Mishkin said, opening the driver-side door of their unmarked. "But at the same time, we can't absolutely rule the subway guy out."

"If it actually was the man from the subway who attacked Bakehouse."

"If," Mishkin agreed, and waited while Vitali walked around the car and got in next to him.

"What's your gut feeling?" Mishkin asked.

"Same guy," Vitali said.

"Yeah," Mishkin said.

When Vitali had fastened his seat belt, Mishkin started the engine.

"What a science our job is, Sal."

Vitali grunted agreement. "Drive, Dr. Mishkin."

Mary followed the mover down with the last cardboard box packed with the detritus of her life, from the apartment that had once seemed a haven. In a strange way, moving away from here was more of a wrench than when she'd left home to come to New York. That had been a matter of choice. This move was a necessity. If she didn't make it, she would never feel safe in her home again.

Of course, she wasn't positive she'd feel safer in her new apartment, on a higher floor, with a full-time doorman, where she was off her usual subway route and would have to be traced to be found. She didn't think the subway man would go to that trouble. Probably he chose his targets at random.

Or so she told herself. She knew that if she were the object of some kind of sick fixation he might go to whatever trouble he had to in order to find her, his unholy grail.

She carried the seed of fear he'd planted in her with his eyes and the glint of the knife blade. What would he do to her if he did somehow manage to find her?

Mary knew that wherever she went she would ask herself that question, terrified of the answer. The subway man hadn't harmed her, but he'd certainly considered it. She was nothing human to him, merely something to satisfy a sick whim, a plaything of his dark desires. He could see her as that and only that, an object. And he wasn't the only one. There were others out there just like him, looking at her the same way, thinking the same dark thoughts. Every day, everywhere she went, they could simply look at her and know how vulnerable she was. People like them could see her as what she had become, could sense her injured soul the way carnivores could sense their prey.

In head and heart she knew that.

And knowing it had changed everything for her.

She shut the street door and tried not to look back.