5.

The straight corridors of lead pipes running overhead testified to the 1930s updating of the oldest section of the hospital. Like a metallic spiderweb, they led to the boiler room, a square cut deep down at the center of the old building. Smack in the middle of this deep square sat the enormous cast-iron boiler, as good as the day it was built in 1911.

Hunkered down, fingers touching the stone floor for balance, Rick Shaw, sheriff of Albemarle County, glanced up when his trusted deputy walked into the room.

She stopped a moment, surveyed the blood splattered on the wall ten feet away, then bent down on one knee next to her boss. "Jesus Christ."

Lying in front of her was the still-warm body of Hank Brevard. His throat had been cut straight across with such force that he was nearly decapitated. She could see his neckbone.

"Left to right." Rick pointed to the direction of the cut.

"Right-handed perp."

"Yep."

The blood had shot across the room when the victim was killed, his heart pumping furiously.

"Tracks?"

"No." Rick stood up. "Whoever did this must have come up behind him. He might not have much blood on him at all and then again even if he did, this is a hospital. Easy to dump your scrubs."

"I'll look around."

Coop hurried down the main corridor. She heard a door slam behind her, hearing the voices of the fingerprint and lab teams.

She pushed open grimy pea-green doors, each one guarding supplies, empty cartons, odds and ends. The old incinerating room was intact. Finally she found the laundry room for the old part of the hospital. Nothing there caught her eye.

Rejoining Rick she shrugged. "Nada." She paused a moment. "You know, I had a thought. I'll be back. But one quick thing. There may be laundry rooms for the newer sections of the hospital. We'll need to check them fast."

"Where are you going?"

"Incinerator."

She ran back down the corridor, opened the door, and walked in. In the old days the incinerating room burned body parts. These days such things were considered biohazards so they were hauled out of the hospital and burned somewhere else. It seemed odd, trucks of gallbladders and cirrhotic livers rolling down Main Street to their final destination, but the laws made such incongruity normal.

She searched each corner of the room, then picked up the iron hook and gingerly opened the incinerator. A sheet of flame swept near her face. Instinctively she slammed the door shut. If there had been any evidence tossed in there, it was gone now.

"d.a.m.n!" She wiped her face, put the hook back on its hanger, and left the room.

Rick had returned to the corpse. Wearing thin plastic gloves like the ones worn in the hospital he went through Hank's pockets. A set of keys hung from the dead man's belt. In his left pocket he had $57.29. His right pocket contained his car keys and a folded sheet of notepaper, a grocery list. Rick put everything back in Hank's pockets.

"All right, guys. Do what you can." He stood up again and propelled Coop away from the others. "Let's get to Hank's office before we notify the hospital staff."

"Boss, who called you? And why isn't anyone else here?"

"Bobby Minifee called me from his cell phone. I told him not to speak to anyone, to stay with the body. He's outside in the unmarked car with Petey."

Bobby Minifee was Hank's a.s.sistant.

Petey D'Angelo, a young officer on the force, showed a flair for his job. Both Rick and Coop, young herself at thirty-four, liked him.

"So you're hoping no one knows about this except for Bobby Minifee and whoever killed Hank?"

"Yeah. That's why I want to get to Hank's office. Bobby said it was at the northeast corner of the building. This is the center so we take that corridor." As they walked along in the dim underground light, Rick cursed. "s.h.i.t, this is like a maze from h.e.l.l."

"You'd have to know your way around or you'd run into the Minotaur."

"I'll remember that." He vaguely remembered the Greek myth about the half-bull, half-man.

They arrived at an open door, the name Hank Brevard on a black sliding nameplate prominently displayed. The s.p.a.cious office was jammed with file cabinets. Hank's desk, reasonably neat, had an old wooden teacher's swivel chair behind it and a newer, nicer chair in front for visitors.

Coop began flipping through drawers while Rick pulled out the file drawers.

"Records go back ten years. If this is only ten years I'd hate to see all of the records."

"I've got a pile of oil bills from Tiger Fuel. A picture of the wife and kids." She stopped. Who would get that awful job, telling them? She opened the long middle drawer. "Pencils, pens, a tiny light, paper clips. Ah . . ." She pulled the drawer out even farther. A few envelopes, lying flat, were at the rear. "Winter basketball league schedule. Repair bill for his car. A new alternator. Three hundred forty-nine dollars with labor. That hurts. And . . ." She turned. "You getting anything?"

"It will take half the force to go through these file cabinets and we'll do it, too, but no, nothing is jumping right out at me except the mouse droppings."

"Need Mrs. Murphy."

"You're getting as bad about that cat as Harry."

Coop opened the last letter; the end of the envelope had been slit. She took out the letter. "Sister Sophonisba will bring you good fortune." She laughed a low laugh. "Guess not." She glanced up at the date. "Guess he didn't make the twenty copies in time."

"What in the h.e.l.l are you talking about?"

"A chain letter. Mail out twenty copies in three days. Well, it's past the three days."

Rick came over, s.n.a.t.c.hed the chain letter, and read it. "'Ignore this letter at your peril.' Under the circ.u.mstances it's like a sick joke." He handed the letter back to Coop, who replaced it inside the envelope. "All right, let's find Sam Mahanes."

"Sat.u.r.day night."

"H-m-m. I'll find Sam. You find out who's the head honcho Sat.u.r.day night."

"Boss, when are we going to notify people?"

"Not until I talk to Sam and you talk to whoever. I think we're already too late. The killer's flown the coop."

"Or he's over our head." She looked up at the ceiling.

"There is that. I'll send Petey over to Lisa Brevard. He's going to have to learn to deliver the bad news. Might as well start now. I'll keep Bobby Minifee with me-for now."

"Rick, think Bobby could have done it?"

"I don't know. Right now I don't know much except that our killer is strong, very strong, and he knows where to cut."

6.

Face as white as the snow that remained in the crevices and cracks of the county, Bobby Minifee clung to the Jesus strap above the window on the pa.s.senger side of the squad car.

Rick lit up a Camel, unfiltered, opening the window a crack. "Mind?"

"You're the sheriff," Bobby said.

"You need me to pull over?"

"No. Why?"

"You look like you're going to be sick."

A jagged intake of breath and Bobby shook his head no. At twenty-one, Minifee was good-looking. He worked nights at the hospital to make ends meet. During the day he studied at Piedmont Community College. A poor boy, he had hopes of going on to Virginia Tech at Blacksburg. He was bright and he wanted a degree in mechanical engineering. The more he studied the more he realized he liked fluid dynamics, waves, water, anything that flowed. He wasn't sure where this would lead him but right now he was considering a different kind of flow.

"Sheriff, you must see stuff like that all the time. Blood and all."

"Enough. Car wrecks mostly. Well, and the occasional murder."

"I had no idea blood could shoot like that. It was all over the wall."

"When the jugular is cut, the heart, which is close to the throat, remember, pumps it out like a straight jet. It's amazing-the human body. Amazing. Was he still bleeding like that when you found him?" Rick slowly worked his way into more questions. When he arrived on the crime scene he had gone easy on Bobby because the kid was shaking like a leaf.

"No, oozing."

"Do you think he was still alive when you found him?"

"No. I felt for his pulse."

"How warm was his wrist or his hand when you touched him?"

"Warm. Not clammy or anything. Like he just died."

"The blood was bright red?" Bobby nodded yes, so Rick continued. "Sure? Not caked around the edges, or clumping up on his neck?"

"No, Sheriff. The reddest red I've ever seen, and I could smell it." He shook his head as if to clear his brain.

"It's the smell that gets you." Rick slowed down for a stoplight. "I'd say you were a lucky man."

"Me?"

"You, Minifee, could be lying there with Hank. I'd guess you were within five minutes of seeing the killer. Did you hear a footfall?"

"No. The boiler is pretty noisy."

"Freight train. Those old cast-iron babies go forever, though. Our ancestors expected what they built to last. Now we tear stuff down and build structures and systems that decay in seven years' time." He stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray. "Didn't mean to lecture."

"Takes my mind off-"

"When I drive you home I'll give you a few names of people you can talk to, people who specialize in this kind of shock. It is a shock, Bobby, and don't do the stupid testosterone thing and go it alone."

"Okay." His voice faded.

"Did you like Hank Brevard?"

"He was a harda.s.s. You know what I mean? One of those guys who likes to make you feel stupid. He always knew more than I did or anybody did. A real negative kind of guy."

"So you didn't like him?"

Bobby turned to directly stare at Rick. "Funny, but I did. I figured here's a real loser. In his fifties, mad about young guys coming up. Used to s.h.i.t on me all the time about my studies. 'An ounce of experience is worth a pound of book learning,'" Bobby imitated Hank. "I kind of felt sorry for him because he really knew his stuff. He kept on top of everything and he could fix just about anything. Even computers and he's not a computer guy. He had a gift."

"Being plant manager of a hospital isn't a small job."

"No, but he couldn't rise any higher." Bobby sighed.

"Maybe he didn't want to."

"He did. You should have heard him gripe about baseball player salaries or basketball. He felt plenty trapped."

"Insightful for a young man."

"What's age got to do with it?" Bobby turned back to gaze out the window. The night seemed blacker than when they had driven away from the hospital.

"Oh, probably nothing. I'm just used to young people being self-absorbed. But then think of what I see every day."

"Yeah, I guess."

"The other men who worked under Hank, feel the same way you did?"

"I'm night shift. I don't know those guys."

"Can you think of anyone who might want to kill Hank?"

"He could really p.i.s.s people off." Bobby paused. "But enough to kill him-" He shrugged. "No. I'd feel better if I could."

"Listen to me. When you return to work, stuff will fly through your head, when you first go back to that boiler room. Sometimes there's a telling detail. Call me. The other thing is, you might be scared for yourself. I know I would be. From my experience this doesn't look like a sicko killer. Sickos have signatures. Part of their game. Hank either crossed the wrong man or he surprised somebody."

"What could be down in the boiler room worth killing for?"