Read Online A New Kind of Monster by Timothy Appleby - Free Book Online

his confessions that he thought his sexual—and ultimately murderous—obsessions started relatively late in life, beginning in his twenties and thirties. True or not, nothing unusual emerges from a careful examination of his early life. As a boy, Williams was well behaved, shy and polite. As a teen, some thought him a snob, but mostly he is remembered as intelligent and self-effacing, reluctant to talk about himself or to make a big fuss about anything.
    Also visible in his early teen years were signs of the rigorous self-discipline and dependability that would help shape his military future. He had an early morning newspaper route, he was always punctual, and he had no interest in drugs or booze. He was well organized, never happier than when organizing others, and he was a quick learner, provided the topic interested him. He was fastidiously hygienic and invariably well dressed, even in casual clothes, two lifelong traits.
    Whatever the task, Russ Sovka would apply himself hard, mocking slackers. And that energy also shaped his twin passions, sports and music. He excelled at both, especially music, first as a pianist (an interest shared with Harvey) and then as an impressively powerful trumpet player. Jerry Sovka would sometimes join his stepsons for jam sessions. When Williams began attending Birchmount Park Collegiate Institute on Danforth Avenuein 1978, he soon distinguished himself as a jazz trumpeter, quickly rising to become a member of the senior band. Yearbook photos from that year show a serene-looking youth with a helmet of neatly coiffed hair swept across his forehead, gazing confidently at the camera. The band later made a trip to Germany. Later, at university, his love of playing and listening to music—he had an impressive knowledge of jazz—would seem to vanish overnight. From that point on, these activities would be of no interest to him.
    His other great enthusiasm, however, sports and fitness, would never leave him. A diet-conscious regimen of hard jogging and other self-punishment kept him in exceptionally good shape.
    At Birchmount, not everybody was enamored of the new arrival. “I know he kind of thought of himself as being better than other people,” band percussionist Tony Callahan would later say. “There was an air about him, the way he talked … the way he would roll his eyes at you if you said something. He was condescending.” Former Birchmount schoolmate Sandy Zarb, who these days lives in Pickering, east of Toronto, remembers Williams as a polite loner. “He was in my music class in grade ten or eleven. I played the flute. He was a quiet guy. He wasn’t outrageous the way teenage boys can be, he was kind of serious, and he only hung around with one or two people. Russell was not an outspoken guy, or a jokester. He would talk when you talked to him. He seemed kind of shy, very aloof and very focused—to me a serious type. I didn’t pay much attention to him.”
    In short, Russ Sovka blended in. His mother, Nonie, however, was not enthralled with Birchmount Collegiate, which had a reputation for having a tough edge and, at the time, a high dropout rate, reflective of a north–south divide at the school: the rich kids, who mostly lived south of Danforth Avenue, nearer the lake, tended to do well in school; the lower-incomeones from the north side, less so. So extracurricular activities were organized for the two Williams boys by their mother, tennis lessons in particular.
    Tall, slender and possessed of a beauty that would last into her old age, Nonie Sovka’s aristocratic demeanor drew a mixed response. “I think she was very socially conscious, that was my impression of her,” a former neighbor remembers. “Very cool—a product of the English system, very correct. They were involved in all sorts of activities, as I remember. Nice people, but cool and distant. You know—go to the right schools. She once made