week or so, possibly up to two.”
A sigh of relief before I spoke. “That’s good news. But
unfortunately we still have very little to go on. If this elderly woman was
killed in haste, wouldn’t you think he might have made a mistake?”
“Your suspect is a perfectionist. Order is very important to
him. He wouldn’t sacrifice his methods even if it meant having to give up a
kill. I would hazard that the reason this last victim was elderly was that he
was afraid of revisiting his previous crime. By selecting an older woman he
didn’t run the risk of murdering another pregnant woman.”
“Thanks Doc.” I needed to ask it again, just to be certain.
“So you think we’re on offense for a while?”
“I do. A week, two if you’re lucky. Make them count.”
I had to do it, even if it was just for my benefit. “No
uncertainty?”
Heisenberg laughed. “Is that a joke?”
“Only in principle,” I said.
“Clever, Detective.” He was still laughing faintly. “Good
luck,” he said.
I pressed “end call” and slid the phone back into its
holster on my belt. Kara was pleased when I relayed the doctor’s opinion but I
could tell that our thoughts were the same: if he didn’t kill again, would we
have any chance to catch him? We had been playing cleanup for so long while
waiting for an error—DNA left at the scene, hairs, fibres, a decent eyewitness,
anything we could go on—that we weren’t sure we could catch him without another
body.
It was a depressing thought and neither of us spoke beyond
what was necessary as we finished up at the scene, delegated tasks to the other
detectives and uniformed officers that had arrived, and returned to the office.
The only satisfaction came from tearing off two pages of my calendar. It was
June tenth now. Laconic; concise to the point of seeming rude or mysterious,
using or involving the use of a minimum of words. How fitting as we sat in
silence, pouring over documents and awaiting news that something had been
found.
The call never came.
—9—
Three days had passed since the last murder and the good
doctor’s theories were presenting as fact. We all felt that we were in a sort
of grace period. It was like the five days of celebration that never existed on
the Julian calendar—an unmarked end to the year. Days that time itself forgot.
Spirits in the office were hard to track, high one moment as
people thought about the time in between killings, then rock bottom when they
realized we had spent the last three days dissecting old case files without
seeing anything new.
It was 9:30 a.m. now and I was well into my third green tea.
My son’s mug was sitting in front of me, steam escaping from its rim. Kara had
been silent for the last hour. Her desk was clean as she went through file
after file on the computer, an approach I had yet to master.
New photos and documents cluttered my desk with the previous
case folders right beside me, ready to pull out for a comparison. There were
consistencies: strangulation; the postmortem removal of flesh; the posing of
the bodies; the lack of blood; the absence of physical evidence; the borrowed
knife left on the bedside table; the woman home alone while her significant
other worked the night shift; the rural neighbourhoods; the lack of alarm
systems.
We knew the killer had to stalk his victims to make sure
they fit his profile, but we didn’t know how the killer picked his victims in
the first place or how long he stalked them for. None of the regular motives
fit. It wasn’t sex—the women were stripped, but there were no signs of any
sexual contact and the theft of their clothes only meant the killer was
cleaning up after himself. It wasn’t money—nothing was ever stolen with the
singular exception of Dupuis’s lipstick, again cleaning up after himself. It
wasn’t revenge—there was nothing to link the victims together. It wasn’t even
the sadistic enjoyment of killing—following Dupuis’s death and
A sigh of relief before I spoke. “That’s good news. But
unfortunately we still have very little to go on. If this elderly woman was
killed in haste, wouldn’t you think he might have made a mistake?”
“Your suspect is a perfectionist. Order is very important to
him. He wouldn’t sacrifice his methods even if it meant having to give up a
kill. I would hazard that the reason this last victim was elderly was that he
was afraid of revisiting his previous crime. By selecting an older woman he
didn’t run the risk of murdering another pregnant woman.”
“Thanks Doc.” I needed to ask it again, just to be certain.
“So you think we’re on offense for a while?”
“I do. A week, two if you’re lucky. Make them count.”
I had to do it, even if it was just for my benefit. “No
uncertainty?”
Heisenberg laughed. “Is that a joke?”
“Only in principle,” I said.
“Clever, Detective.” He was still laughing faintly. “Good
luck,” he said.
I pressed “end call” and slid the phone back into its
holster on my belt. Kara was pleased when I relayed the doctor’s opinion but I
could tell that our thoughts were the same: if he didn’t kill again, would we
have any chance to catch him? We had been playing cleanup for so long while
waiting for an error—DNA left at the scene, hairs, fibres, a decent eyewitness,
anything we could go on—that we weren’t sure we could catch him without another
body.
It was a depressing thought and neither of us spoke beyond
what was necessary as we finished up at the scene, delegated tasks to the other
detectives and uniformed officers that had arrived, and returned to the office.
The only satisfaction came from tearing off two pages of my calendar. It was
June tenth now. Laconic; concise to the point of seeming rude or mysterious,
using or involving the use of a minimum of words. How fitting as we sat in
silence, pouring over documents and awaiting news that something had been
found.
The call never came.
—9—
Three days had passed since the last murder and the good
doctor’s theories were presenting as fact. We all felt that we were in a sort
of grace period. It was like the five days of celebration that never existed on
the Julian calendar—an unmarked end to the year. Days that time itself forgot.
Spirits in the office were hard to track, high one moment as
people thought about the time in between killings, then rock bottom when they
realized we had spent the last three days dissecting old case files without
seeing anything new.
It was 9:30 a.m. now and I was well into my third green tea.
My son’s mug was sitting in front of me, steam escaping from its rim. Kara had
been silent for the last hour. Her desk was clean as she went through file
after file on the computer, an approach I had yet to master.
New photos and documents cluttered my desk with the previous
case folders right beside me, ready to pull out for a comparison. There were
consistencies: strangulation; the postmortem removal of flesh; the posing of
the bodies; the lack of blood; the absence of physical evidence; the borrowed
knife left on the bedside table; the woman home alone while her significant
other worked the night shift; the rural neighbourhoods; the lack of alarm
systems.
We knew the killer had to stalk his victims to make sure
they fit his profile, but we didn’t know how the killer picked his victims in
the first place or how long he stalked them for. None of the regular motives
fit. It wasn’t sex—the women were stripped, but there were no signs of any
sexual contact and the theft of their clothes only meant the killer was
cleaning up after himself. It wasn’t money—nothing was ever stolen with the
singular exception of Dupuis’s lipstick, again cleaning up after himself. It
wasn’t revenge—there was nothing to link the victims together. It wasn’t even
the sadistic enjoyment of killing—following Dupuis’s death and
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