The Helper

TWENTY-THREE

She has never spent the night with a geek before.

Dorks, yes. An abundance of them. Even a few downright freaks.

But nothing compares to Gonzo for sheer strangeness. He’s in a world of his own there. And it seems to be a world that doesn’t sit comfortably anywhere in this corner of the universe.

She’s not sure she can pin it on any particular facet of his personality. He’s just generally. . well, odd.

The staring, for example. He does a lot of that. And she’s convinced that, half the time, he’s not even aware he’s doing it. She can be in the middle of something totally mundane — washing up a mug, say — and she’ll turn around, and there he’ll be. Just standing there, looking at her. And instead of wigging out she’ll remain the polite guest and say something like, ‘Are you okay?’ And it’s as if that causes him to snap out of some kind of trance, and he’ll say, ‘What? Oh, yeah,’ and he’ll look around the room as if trying to work out what fantastic forces caused him to be transported there.

She went straight to bed last night. Would have done so anyway, what with all that had happened. She felt mentally and physically drained. But even if she’d had the energy of a nuclear reactor she would have escaped to the bedroom. Just to be away from His Weirdness.

Sleeping was a different matter. The bedroom just wasn’t conducive to rest. She could put up with all the posters from movies such as Terminator, The Matrix, and Alien. She could even live with all those huge plants crowding around her bed like some flesh-starved triffids. What she couldn’t get out of her head, though, was Gonzo’s vagueness about his changing of the sheets. It kind of left her with the impression that he hadn’t changed them in weeks. Maybe even months.

She wasn’t about to put it to the test. There was no way she was going to permit her skin to come into contact with. . well, whatever had been allowed to permeate or encrust those sheets.

Instead, she changed into pajamas, spread her old clothes across the bed and pillow, then lay on top of those, covering herself over with her night robe. In that situation, and with the thoughts and images rushing through her head, sleep was fitful. At one point she came awake crying out Helena’s name.

And so this morning she is tired and cranky. There is nothing in the refrigerator — not even any milk. For breakfast she had to make do with toast and peanut butter washed down with black coffee, and she never takes her coffee black. Gonzo munched his way through an overflowing bowl of Coco Pops. Also without milk. Said he prefers it that way, the weirdo.

Small talk is a no-no. She tried it a few times, and it just got too bizarre. Like when she said to him, ‘So, do your parents live in New York?’ and he replied with, ‘Depends on what you mean by parents.’ Or, making breakfast, when she asked him if he wanted coffee, and he started telling her about the effects of that beverage on his bowels. Oh yeah, and why does he keep asking her which brand of corn chips she prefers?

She spoke with Doyle about it an hour ago. This was after she’d phoned Mrs Serafinowicz. She stuck to the story. Told Bridget she was fine, there was nothing to worry about, she just needed to get away from that building for a day or two, blah, blah, blah. Then, when Doyle called, she said what she really thought. Took the phone into the bedroom and let rip. Told him this wasn’t working. That it was like being cooped up in a mental asylum, and that she would sooner take her chances with a homicidal maniac than go stir-crazy with this nut-job.

Doyle calmed her down, as she knew he would. He has a gift for that. He only has to open his mouth for her to feel instantly more secure, more serene.

Unlike the freak who’s sitting across from her at the table right now, staring at her while she skim-reads a magazine article on the success of Microsoft. Yes, he has a gift too, she thinks. The gift of turning me into a fucking nervous wreck.

Why couldn’t Doyle stay with me? If he’s so worried about my safety, why didn’t he abandon whatever personal plans he had last night, and spend the night with me? If he had stayed. . If he had held me in his arms. .

‘Is there anything I can do, you know, to make you happy?’

She wants to keep staring at the magazine. Pretend she didn’t hear that. If this is his idea of coming on to her. .

‘What?’ she says. ‘What was that?’

Directly challenged like this, he suddenly looks like he wished he hadn’t said anything.

‘What I mean is. . What I’m trying to say is. . If there’s anything. . that I can do. You know?’

She closes the magazine. Which is crap, anyway. Written by geeks to be read by other geeks.

‘Actually, yes. There is something you can do for me. You can make me happy in bed.’

He flushes the color of his hair. His head is like a tomato with spectacles.

‘What? I, uhm. . What?’

‘The sheets, Gonzo. They need changing. If I have to stay here another night, then it has to be with clean sheets. Do you have any?’

Gonzo looks around him, as if he is thinking they ought to be in plain sight.

‘I, uh, no. I don’t think so.’

‘Is there a laundry room in this place?’

‘Sure. In the basement.’

‘Okay, good. We’re getting somewhere. Then what you need to do is strip the sheets from the bed, take them down to the laundry room, and get them clean and dry.’

He looks at her as though the notion is an alien concept to him.

‘I. . I can’t do that.’

‘What do you mean, you can’t do it? How hard can it be? You’ve done it before, haven’t you? Please tell me these sheets have been cleaned at some point since you bought them.’

‘No. I mean yes, they have been cleaned. But I can’t. Not now. Detective Doyle said that we can’t leave the apartment. I have to be with you, at all times.’

‘He meant the apartment building, Gonzo. I’m not asking you to head across to New Jersey. Just the basement. For half an hour. Okay?’

He scratches his head. ‘I don’t know. I think I should give Detective Doyle a call first.’

She loses it then. ‘Jesus Christ, Gonzo. Will you just go wash the fucking sheets before I throw the whole bed out of the fucking window?’

Gonzo stands slowly, uncertainly. ‘Last night Detective Doyle called you a lady. Ladies don’t talk like that.’

‘You’re right,’ she says. ‘I should have said please. Now please go wash the fucking sheets. Okay?’

Doyle’s shift won’t start until four in the afternoon. Which is killing him. Wandering around the apartment like this, trying to find chores to occupy his mind, trying not to get in Rachel’s way, is just not working. He finds he’s constantly checking his cellphone to make sure he hasn’t missed a call. He feels like a man whose wife is about to give birth.

He needs the distraction of work. He will be kept busy in the aftermath of the Helena Colquitt killing. He will follow the procedure, the routine. He will talk to the people he is supposed to talk to, put the questions he is supposed to ask, write the reports he is meant to write.

All of which will be hard given that he suspects none of it is worth jack shit.

What will keep him going on this seemingly fruitless task is the possibility that somewhere, buried deep perhaps, is a clue to the unraveling of these apparently random killings. Okay, Helena wasn’t the intended victim. But the killer thought she was. So why? Why did he think that? And why target Tabitha anyway? What links her to the other victims?

And the more important question right now: do any of those victims provide pointers to the next one?

He believes the killer when he says that he isn’t going after Doyle’s family. For one thing, the man hasn’t lied to him once so far. He’s provided Doyle with uncertainty, ambiguity, clues which are open to interpretation. But no downright lies. And deep down, Doyle knows that his own family doesn’t fit the pattern of killings. He has no idea what that pattern is, but for some reason he knows that Rachel and Amy aren’t part of it.

So how does he know that? What is he missing?

Laden with a plastic basket containing a mountain of washing that threatens to landslide and bury him at any moment, Gonzo has to wrestle with the basement door to get it to open. He snakes his arm round the door jamb, feathers it up and down the rough wall in search of the light switch. He finds it, clicks it on.

Nothing. The bulb must be dead.

He exhales. Steps gingerly through the doorway. Tries to make his feeble eyes gain mastery over the dimness in here.

The blow to the side of his head sends him reeling across the room. He bounces off the wall, hears his glasses clatter to the floor. He puts his hands up to fend off his attacker, but it’s a pathetic defense. Another cruise missile pilots its way between his hands and zeros in on his cheek. When it slams home, it feels as though it detaches his head from his shoulders, leaving his body to crumple to the floor. His gargantuan brain, capable of composing complex pieces of software without going anywhere near a computer, scurries for the panic button and allows his survival instincts to take the helm. He tries to push himself up from the floor, because that’s the only message he’s getting.

And then something soft and warm is pulled over his head. Musty cloth presses tightly against his mouth and nose. He tries to suck oxygen through the weave, but it won’t come quickly enough. The claustrophobia and the pain make him want to vomit, but he swallows it back, knowing that he could drown in his own sick. He feels an asthma attack coming on. He’s going to die. He knows he is going to die.

Everything turns to black.

She had hoped for at least an hour of peace and solitude, maybe even longer given the amount of washing she made him take downstairs — Jesus, does he actually wear those clothes? An hour without the staring, without the randomness. Time to reflect. To think about Helena, her parents, her life. To decide what to do with her future when she gets out of this damned city.

So when there’s a rap on the door barely ten minutes after Gonzo left the apartment, she is not amused. Can’t he even manage a simple task like-

Oh.

She doesn’t recognize the man standing there in the hallway when she opens the door. But he’s tall, he’s good-looking and he’s holding up a leather wallet containing a police badge.

‘What are you doing?’ he says. ‘Didn’t Detective Doyle tell you not to open the door to anyone?’

‘I. . I’m sorry. I thought it was. . Who are you, exactly?’

‘Detective Todd Morton. I work with Cal Doyle in the Eighth Precinct. He sent me to get you. We don’t have much time.’

She stares at him. Keeps hold of the door, just in case.

‘What do you mean, not much time? Time for what?’

‘I hate to tell you this, but we think the killer’s on to you. He knows where you are. We need to move you out. We’ve already got Gonzo in a car downstairs.’

‘He knows? How could he know? Detective Doyle said I was safe here.’

The man sighs. She thinks he looks embarrassed.

‘We think he must have been tipped off somehow. It’s the only way. Maybe Gonzo. . We don’t know.’

‘Gonzo? No. Not him. He couldn’t. . I mean. .’

‘Whatever, we’re taking you to separate places. Just to be on the safe side. From now on this stays with you and the police. Nobody else will know. We’re organizing a twenty-four hour guard for you. Detective Doyle has offered to do the first watch.’

She feels her heart skip a little. Doyle? Spend a whole day with her?

‘Where are we going?’

He smiles. ‘Didn’t I say? Your place. I’m going to take you back to the apartment Mrs Serafinowicz put you in. Right now it’s as safe as anywhere else, especially with police protection. Are you okay with that?’

She scans him up and down again. He looks like he could be a cop. He knows too much for him not to be a cop. He knows about Cal Doyle, Gonzo, and Bridget Serafinowicz. He even knows that Bridget put me up in a vacant apartment after Helena was killed. How could he know all that and not be a cop?

But still. .

‘I think I should call Detective Doyle. You mind if I do that first? Just to check with him?’

Another sigh. Exasperation this time. ‘All right. But can you make it quick?’

She turns away from him. Starts toward the phone. Realizes then that she doesn’t know Doyle’s number. Gonzo has it, but she doesn’t. She turns back, and sees that the detective is craning to look along the hallway outside the apartment. His hand is tucked under his jacket, as if in readiness to pull his gun.

She thinks, This is no bullshit. He’s really expecting trouble.

‘I. . I don’t have his phone number.’

The man looks at her in disbelief. He digs a phone out of his pocket and starts thumbing buttons on it.

‘What do you want? His home number? Wait, he’s probably on his way to your apartment by now. I think I got his cell number here somewhere, but we got to be real fast.’ He pauses, glances up the hallway again, slips his hand back under his jacket.

Shit. This is for real. He could have killed me several times over by now if he’d wanted to.

‘Never mind,’ she says. ‘Let me grab my stuff. Thirty seconds, okay?’

She runs for the bedroom, almost tripping over in her eagerness not to waste any more of Detective Morton’s time.

In the car, he asks her lots of questions about her life, and invents a life for himself in response to her own gentle probing. He gives himself a wife and two kids. Twins, in fact — Jesus, they can be a handful. Plus a dog which he never wanted to get in the first place, and which is tearing apart what little furniture they have, that little scamp. Which, by the way, is his name: Scamp.

He enjoys weaving this alternate world on the fly. Relishes the challenge of throwing in each new deceit whilst avoiding becoming caught in any contradictions.

But it’s obvious she doesn’t suspect a thing. Each additional fragment of his fantasy is swallowed whole. She’s building up an image of a solid, dependable cop just doing his bit to help out the poor victimized civilian. And each city block he takes her closer to her apartment only serves to reassure her that there is nothing wrong with this picture.

When they finally pull up in front of her building and he takes her bag and leads her up to the front door and invites her to open up, he senses the relief in her. The absolute trust she now feels for him simply radiates from her.

And when he follows her up the staircase, he has to smile at what he has accomplished today.

Because the clues were there, if she chose to see them.

Didn’t he tell her the killer was on his way? How much clearer could he have been?

And then there was his name. Detective Todd Morton, was how he introduced himself.

Todd, from the German word Tod. And Morton, from the French word mort. Both meaning death.

Detective Death.

What a cool name.