PRECINCT 20: Dead Strange (excerpt from the published book)

"Sniper, Viper..." Part II

After the briefing, Garris sat down by his desk and went over the sniper case on his computer.

He had other ongoing cases to think of, as did the other few detectives on Homicide, Precinct 20. But apparently everyone in his department focused on finding the unknown sniper who had shot and killed fifteen people in the city area over the past three weeks. The most recent shooting had occurred in Precinct 20, only last week.

That the military had just entered the investigation did nothing to help the detectives. The general's theory about an Islamic terrorist struck Garris as wholly unrealistic. Previous serial killers and mass murderers in the city had worked without any religious or political affiliations whatsoever.

Would the police find the sniper? Garris had no idea, but he wanted to get his hand around that creep's neck before any criminal psychologist or slimy lawyer managed to declare the guilty unfit for trial.

Serial killers almost always turned out to be male. Were guys more inclined to do evil? Garris had brooded over that question too many times. The jails certainly contained many more male killers than female. His mother used to say: Boys will be boys.

Maybe, he thought as he flipped through page after page of grim crime scene photos, files and reports on the PC screen, maybe Mom was right. We never grow up. We keep playing childish games, and the games just get more violent and nihilistic as we grow older...

"Sir?"

He looked up and saw the lean, poker-faced Sergeant Bolland, thirty-seven and prematurely balding, standing in front of Garris's desk. Bolland was holding a cup of coffee in one hand, and a handcuffed, scruffy-looking young man in the other.

"Who's the punk, Sergeant?"

"Just a pusher I ran into on my way here. I missed the briefing. Did the chief have anything interesting to say, sir? I saw someone in uniform leave the place..."

Garris saw the ink blots on the arrested punk's fingers—Bolland worked his routines swiftly. The detective picked up a file printout and urged Bolland to come along.

"Put him in the tank and I'll tell you. I've got a lead I want to check over at Riverside Park. If you have no other pressing business today..."

Bolland made a light shrug, pushed the handcuffed man before him, and plopped him down on a chair by Lieutenant Melvin Keck's desk.

"Found him in Ratboro," said Bolland and dropped the evidence bag on Melvin's desk with the fingerprint sheet. "Fill in the report for me, will you?"

Melvin sighed and nodded. Bolland followed Garris and picked up his jacket on the way out.

Bolland drove the squad car out onto the street, keeping cruising speed; Garris rode shotgun. They had not come far, when a man in a black coat and glasses stopped on the edge of the road and waved excitedly at them.

Bolland stopped alongside the man and Garris rolled down the side window, with one hand on the shoulder holster. He did not quite recognize the person, but he had seen him before...

"Officer Garris!" gasped the man.

"What's the matter?"

"Rob Ferment, National Surveillor." Garris suppressed a groan. "What's your comment on the rumors that the Invisible Sniper is a rogue FBI agent—"

"No comment." He turned to Bolland. "Drive."

"'Rogue FBI agent?'" Bolland chuckled as they left the reporter behind. "When I was young, it would've been something more creative, like 'Aliens Brainwash Elvis into Mad Sniper.'"

Garris shook his head. "'The Invisible Sniper'... I hate it when the media give the killers a nickname. The crazies get off on that."

"But it fits, doesn't it, sir? Seems the sniper really can make himself invisible. The bullet trajectories, the way the bullets impacted on the victims... he always shoots from a high point, like rooftops and water towers. But what with all the surveillance cameras in this city, we should've gotten at least one picture of the guy entering and leaving a building. So how did he get up there?"

"If the sniper uses a helicopter to get up on the rooftops... or he parachuted in, I don't know... then the military are bound to find him. If he doesn't, the general isn't going to find him. I was thinking, maybe he climbs walls."

Bolland's stomach burbled and groaned. "I'll stop for donuts. Want some, sir?"

"Sure."

"How does a sniper, carrying a high-powered rifle, scale the highest house on Bayliss Street after sunset, on a Saturday night, shoot a man on the street, and then disappear without a trace?"

Bolland sounded unusually excited; even he had been infected by the mood at the station, the feeling that everyone must hunt for the sniper. "That's twenty stories of almost perfectly smooth glass and concrete. Not even a monkey could do it."

Garris felt a thought stir in his mind, a vague conceit that could grow into a hypothesis. Bolland had ignited it.

A monkey... a trained monkey carried the rifle for the killer, climbed the building, then delivered the rifle to the man at the top floor... farfetched, but if no better theory appeared Garris was prepared to try it.

They made a stop at Dunkin' Donuts and then drove on south down Chippewa Alley until they came to Riverside Park.