image : john wayne as edward franklin
By morning the whole campus knew. They knew that a third body had been discovered; they knew that the second body was a Carol Thomas. Identifying those who knew Thomas was easy. Beyond the students who let fear of a killer on campus overwhelm them, beyond the ones who felt consumed by rage and helplessness over the arrogant and evil act of murder, there were those who mourned. They grieved, weakly and vulnerably, succumbing to the terror of living through loss.
The local authorities had encouraged the board of the university to regulate the comings and goings of students to better control the situation. By the afternoon a notice had gone out and all of the professors had announced to their classrooms that a curfew had been instated, that all students living on campus in dormitories must be checked into their rooms by eleven o'clock at night. They announced that police officers would be patrolling campus as a protective detail; the police department had hired officers from other districts to work on campus during their off duty hours to maintain as many men as possible.
"It doesn't make sense," Betty mumbled under her breath to Douglas. They stood together in a chemistry lab, finishing reports for different projects. "Why instate a curfew when one of the killings was in broad daylight? And how is a beat cop going to be able to prevent murder by poison? What are they going to do, body check everyone before they drink their coffees?" Her voice was low and whispered, her chin low to her chest to avoid being overheard by those around them.
Douglas didn't look up from his report, pausing in his determined scribbling to push his glasses back up his nose before responding to her quietly, "The curfew is a result of two of the bodies being found late at night. If all of the students are checked into their rooms at night there's a lesser likelihood of being killed after curfew, which is arguably a good thing. On the off chance that someone is killed after curfew, they can track down those students who were not in their dorms and have a selection of suspects. The police officers are going to be on campus looking for behavior that they've been trained to recognize as suspect, and they're also going to be around in case someone needs protection. You think you're being followed? There's probably an officer around the corner. You just had a cup of coffee and now you feel a bit topsy-turvy? Go snag an officer to get you medical attention as quickly as possible. It's not a solution, it's a Band-aid to make us feel like everything's going to be okay."
Betty wrote her name on her report and filed it away in her book bag, dropping her pencil in along with it. "I have to go. I'm running a few things down to the post office, do you need anything mailed?"
He shook his head, waving one hand distractedly in farewell as she clutched the strap of her bag and hurried out of the lab.
{ tenebrous }
"Did Gale ever mention any concerns about anyone in his life?"
The young woman frowned at Charles, uncomfortable with the question. "Concerns?" She tapped her red fingernails against the bone china teacup that sat steaming before her. She was the fourth person Charles had interviewed that day; two of the people had been friends of Carol Thomas and the other had been another friend of Gale Smith's. None of them had any prior awareness of any problematic relationships in the victims' lives.
"Yes, concerns," Charles pressed gently. "You know, maybe someone was following him? Maybe he made someone angry or jealous?" He had his notepad on the tabletop under his hand, half a dozen interview questions already filled out on the front page.
"Isn't this for the school paper?" The woman, Patricia, questioned. "Didn't all of this sort of information go into the police report?"
Charles shrugged his shoulders and took a draw of his smoke. "I wasn't figuring on writing the answer to this particular question. I just wanted to know, since it happened here on campus. I can't help but wonder, what if you or one of Gale's other friends knew the name of the guy who did this and they don't even realize it? What if we could get an idea of who to look out for, you know?"
Patricia smiled insincerely but shook her head. "I'm sorry, I never heard about any of that. Gale could be annoying sometimes, he thought he was the smartest guy on campus, but he never talked about any enemies. Though, to be honest, it's not like he would have known if he had any. He kind of just lived in his own little world." Her eyes were fixed on the simple design painted on her teacup and saucer. "He could do no wrong in his own head."
Throughout her confession, Charles' expression had become unsure. He had come to glean a particular emotion from Patricia and was realizing that perhaps she wasn't the most reliable source for seeing things exactly the way they had been. He made a few more notes on his page and then rose from his chair. "Well, thank you very much for speaking with me, and I'm so sorry for your loss."
He went on a few more hours, interviewing the friends and families of Smith and Thomas. For all the information he could get he never got a name or clue about anything that might have seemed off before their deaths. He'd learned that Gale Smith was an obnoxious engineering student who had dated four of the girls in the same communications class in his sophomore year and that Carol Thomas was the nicest person her friends had ever met, and that she must have been killed by mistake because no one could possibly be out to get her.
Personally, Charles thought that Smith might have been killed because he had too many friends for someone so fond of himself and Thomas had been chosen because every guy in her immediate vicinity thought she was perfect. All in all, he'd learned nothing absolute.
{ tenebrous }
"Dr. Roberts said that this was where Gale Smith was found." Hayley pushed her hands into her jacket pockets and toed her way around the bench that stood outside the library. It was in the flower bed around the back, near an employees' entrance. Gale had been found lying on it as though asleep.
Edward stared down at it, arms folded across his chest. "Can you imagine dying here?"
"I'd rather not, thanks, Ed." Hayley muttered, kneeling to examine every inch of dirt around and beneath the bench. By that time, so many people had sat on the bench and tramped their footsteps around it that any evidence that may have previously been found in the mud was long since destroyed. Nevertheless, she tried to form a clear image in her mind of what the bench and area around it would have looked like at the time of Gale Smith's death.
She was by no means a trained investigator or detective, but she couldn't help herself. She couldn't refrain from trying, at least to satisfy her own curiosity. Unfortunately, to her uneducated eyes, all she could see was a bench sitting in the mud.
"At the risk of sounding like an idiot," Edward still hung back from the muddy ground and rain-dampened bench, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. "What if they killed themselves?"
Hayley straightened, turning to him with a blank, unbelieving look. "When Barber said to think outside the box, he didn't mean to entertain the impossible." She picked her way out of the flower garden and rubbed her shoes off in the grass.
Edward shrugged one shoulder and turned a full circle, staring at the surroundings. "I'm just saying, I get that the autopsy found poison in Smith's system, and the same poison in Thomas, but what if that substance is just...available somewhere? They knew how to find it, they escaped their troubles." He raised his eyebrows at her, imploring her to consider it.
As much as she wanted to laugh in his face over the idea of three students committing suicide with the same rare poison, she couldn't deny that there had to be the slightest chance that it was possible. "Yeah, okay, I guess maybe. So what do we do, ask around for anybody who knows where to find illegal drugs?"
Edward floundered for a long moment. "I don't know, I didn't think that far ahead."
She stared at him once more, unimpressed with his contribution to her impromptu investigation. Deciding to ignore the dead-end ideas of her companion, she followed his earlier lead and gazed around them. "I don't necessarily know how to psychologically profile a killer, but do you think he would want to stick around and make sure that his victim died?" She couldn't even begin to know what kind of person would want to kill three university students.
They seemed to be unrelated, nothing in common, no connections between them. She didn't know where to start guessing his mental state, whether he was a psychopath looking to kill just anyone, if he was a cold-blooded sociopath who hunted people, or if he was on some mission to reach a particular goal. It was all beyond her.
Edward strolled a few feet closer to the bench but stopped before entering the flower garden. "I don't know. I guess it depends on his motive." He turned away from the bench and marched past her. "Let's go on to the next one. Carol Thomas was found on the sidewalk behind the art building, right?" Without waiting for a response from Hayley, he pressed on and left the scene of Gale Smith's murder.
Hayley wished she could do something more than familiarize herself with the locations. Even standing where they had died, she felt completely useless.
{ tenebrous }
Dr. Michael Sanders, the dean of the science department, admitted the black-haired chemical engineering student to his office. "Welcome, Mr. Martin, how can I help you this evening?" He closed the door behind the young man and circled back around to sit at his desk.
Douglas nodded his thanks for the entrance and then found a sit in front of the professor's desk. He'd already turn in his lab reports and finished the night's homework and was finished with everything he'd had planned for the day, but he couldn't bring himself to leave campus yet. His mind rested heavily on the recent killings, the fact that the victims had been poisoned. The police hadn't released the type of poison in order to more easily identify when someone knew too much about the murders, but he knew that if anyone had gotten a heads up about the method, it would have been the society.
"Actually, I was wondering about the killings. The police said they were poisoned but they didn't say what they were poisoned with. Do you..."
Dr. Sanders leaned back in his desk chair with an amused smile. "And why are you interested in this unreleased information, Mr. Martin? They've kept those details quiet for good reason, as I know you're smart enough to have realized."
Douglas shifted slightly in his chair, smoothing one hand down over the lapel of his brown jacket. "Yes, of course, sir, and there's really no reason for you to tell me what the poison was. By all accounts, I suppose I don't need to know. I'm just curious. And, while the police have good reason for keeping those details quiet, wouldn't we be better prepared to deal with any symptoms of poisoning if we know about the poison? Wouldn't we be able to treat it if we knew what it was going into it?"
The little smile on the professor's face blossomed into a wide grin, surprising Douglas. When he had come to the basement meeting, he had been morose and unwilling to relate to the friends on a sympathetic level. Sitting there in his own office, white hair catching the sunlight that streamed through his window like a glowing halo, Dr. Sanders looked like any kind old man, excited to share knowledge and stories with a bright-eyed, interested boy.
The utterly opposite behavior made Douglas uncomfortable. He shifted and ran a hand over his lapel again before adjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose. He had spent the past three hours in a dark room staring at his formulas with minimal human contact and going from that much isolation to interacting with someone whom he had thought would be straightforward and unengaging, he felt vastly overwhelmed by the amount of charisma the man was exuding.
"You make an excellent point, Mr. Martin." Dr. Sanders linked his fingers together and rocked back and forth in his leather chair. "In fact, I believe your reasoning outweighs the police's. Regardless of trapping the killer by somehow hoping that he admits to too much information, it would certainly save more lives to prepare the students for poison treatment."
His words gave Douglas pause. He still wasn't sure what that meant in terms of whether or not he would be granted the requested information, and he didn't remember asking for what Dr. Sanders thought of the arrangement. "So you do know what poison is being used?"
"I do, indeed." Dr. Sanders nodded and placed his palms on the desktop hesitantly. He seemed to pause and think for a few seconds, deliberating over going against police wishes and giving a student classified information. In all, the friends didn't get much more information about things than the average person. They delivered messages between members of the society, but that's all they were—couriers. They weren't agents or operatives, just messengers. Regardless, Douglas had given him no reason to doubt his integrity, so he pulled his jacket open, retrieved a key from an inner pocket, and unlocked a drawer in his desk.
"I would prefer if you didn't share this information with anyone outside of your immediate circle." Dr. Sanders implored seriously, giving him a long look.
Understanding the implication, Douglas nodded. "Of course, sir, I have no intention of interfering with the investigation, I swear it's just my own curiosity." He promised hopefully, leaning forward in his chair just slightly with anticipation.
"I appreciate your interest, Mr. Martin." Dr. Sanders said, pulling out a file and slapping it down on his desk. "Due to the aforementioned problems, I cannot let you leave this office with this information packet, but I'll let you look through it right here with me. Any questions you have concerning what this means, please feel free to ask." He slid the file over to Douglas, who flipped it open eagerly.
The student found a hefty toxicology report comprised of at least seven pages. There were a few reports done by supervisors who didn't totally understand the chemistry of it, but Douglas focused on the toxicology documents.
Dr. Sanders watch his eyes slowly work across the pages, absorbing the information diligently and without reservation. He admired the utter intelligence in his expression, his obvious understanding of the information in the packet. "Do you have any questions?"
Douglas read for a few more seconds in silence and then finally shook his head and placed the file back on the desk. "No, sir, I understand what it says. Thank you, sir. I'm very grateful to you." He stood, awkwardly offered the professor a smile, and backed away from the desk, towards the door. "Have a good evening, Dr. Sanders."
The professor pulled the folder back and put it back into the drawer, locking it securely. "Mr. Martin?"
Douglas turned back, unsure. His eyes skated around the room in discomfort for a second before he met the professor's eyes. "Yes sir?"
"Do you know what it is, son?"
With those words, Douglas' muscles contracted all through his body. His shoulders and back tensed and the muscles in his neck bulged. His expression lost the uneasy, nervous look and he pinned the professor with an unappreciative stare. "I know what it is, Dr. Sanders." His fists clenched at his sides before he realized the enormity of his own reaction. With a deep breath and a total release of all of the tension in his body, he nodded in farewell to the older man and left the office.
{ tenebrous }
Betty's trip to the post office was suddenly thrown from peaceful and relaxing to stressful and uncomfortable as soon as she noticed that the man who had been at the bus stop outside of the campus and also in the diner across from the hardware store and also wandering around the lumber yard was on the sidewalk behind her, pretending to peer into windows.
She couldn't see his face, as he had a hat tilted low over his brow and a scarf wrapped voluminously around his neck and chin, covering well past his nose. He wore a heavy coat and thick brown gloves, and every time she passed a window angled just the right way, she'd glance back and see him there, always behind her.
Sometimes he would be staring into a shop window, sometimes he would be poking through a newspaper stand, sometimes he would be rubbing his hands and waiting for coffee at a coffee booth, and sometimes he would be standing facing the road as though waiting for a taxi cab.
Every time she saw him, every time her eyes landed on him once more, when she felt someone watching her and found him looking, her heart rate increased steadily. Hands shaking, pulse thrumming in her throat, Betty tucked her chin lower into her scarf and pressed on quickly, walking uncomfortably fast in her heels. The wind swished bitterly through her skirt, but she didn't stop to button up her coat. The post office was in sight and she wouldn't slow down until she was safely inside.
The next time she looked behind her, the man was even closer. No longer holding back at a safe distance, he was following her from only about ten feet away. He wouldn't meet her eyes and he wouldn't act as though he were deliberately on her trail, but there was no denying his intent.
Betty stumbled over the sidewalk, costing her precious seconds as she struggled to right herself and avoid slipping in the ice that had accumulated in the dips. Finally, when he got so close to her that she could hear him breathing, Betty realized that her fear was fading, and in its place was anger.
How dare he be so bold as to follow her? How dare he presume to invade her space and track her all the way across town? No matter his intent, his arrogance towards his rights to follow her was making her angry.
When he sped up just enough that she heard his footsteps behind her and heard him breathing through his scarf, Betty whipped around and held her ground, staring him down. His head swung away, staring out over the street next to them as though it was utter coincidence that he was there. He walked past her and stopped at the nearby bus stop. She turned as he went, keeping her eyes firmly on him, a deep-seated scowl on her face.
He lingered by the bench as though waiting for the bus, his gaze glancing over her hesitantly and then snapping away abruptly.
Betty didn't move, persistently glaring at him.
Finally, when he let his gaze glance over her again, avoiding her eyes once more, he realized that there was no escaping her suspicion. His head turned, aimed directly at her. She couldn't see his eyes or his mouth for the hat and scarf, but she knew he was looking at her. She didn't move.
He was big; with the heavy coat on he towered over most of the other people who happened by, his shoulders thick and broad like a football player's. His hands were stuffed into his pockets, but there was great width to his arms and legs.
Betty pulled her own gloved hands out of her pockets and crossed her arms, taking two steps forward. "If I ever see you following me again, I will scream, do you hear me? I'll have you arrested in two minutes."
He didn't look away, her threat carried by a small voice that did not frighten him in the least. It was comical, to be sure, their standoff. He, well above six feet tall and she, narrow, wiry, and only about five foot four, glaring up at him like he'd kicked her dog. He seemed to be weighing his options, head tilted slightly to the side as he thought. At last, when she thought maybe she'd made a fatal error in confronting him, the man hunched his shoulders upwards towards his ears, turned swiftly and jogged across the street.
She watched until he disappeared up the sidewalk into the bus station and then let her arms fall from her chest. Letting loose a shaky exhale, Betty felt her entire body trembling with fear and adrenaline. Had he chosen to overtake her and punish her for her bravery, she would have fallen victim to him in an instant. She had been at his mercy and he had forgiven her somehow.
Pulling her jacket tightly around her, Betty continued her journey to the post office, nearly running in her effort to get there.
The office greeted her with warmth that heated her face instantly, relief like holding her hands directly in front of a heater after a snowball fight in the evening. She loosened her scarf so she could speak with the postal worker, pulling a number of envelopes out of her bag. Marching up to the counter, she felt her eyes filling with tears as she peeled her gloves off, though she wasn't sure if it was for the warmth or the rush of the incident.
Once she'd sent off her outgoing mail and collected the pieces from her box, she asked the attendant if she could use the phone. Kara James, the postal worker, nodded quickly, observing the younger woman's distress, and pointed to the telephone in the corner. "Of course," She watched Betty stumble stiffly to the phone, opening the slip of paper that she'd been given. Once reading the note that the professor had sent, she crumbled it in her hand and strode to the fireplace near the lounge chair off to the side.
There was a percolator over the fire, and in one swift movement, Kara James tossed the note into the flames and pulled the percolator out to pour herself some coffee. She returned to her station at the counter just in time to hear Betty report into the phone, "Don't give me that lip, Charles. I'm just telling you to watch for me coming home; I've been followed by a giant football player and I believe I've made him angry."