Gideon (30 page)

Payton.

It was definitely Payton. The cop who’d tried to kill him in his own apartment.

Just when you thought the insanity had reached its peak. Maybe there is no peak. Maybe the lunatics have stormed the asylum doors and are now running the world
.

Payton was searching. Sniffing him out. Those eyes were darting through the crowd. He sensed something …

“We’ve got to go,” he whispered urgently to Amanda. “
Now
.”

Two more police cars pulled up in front of the fire, sirens blaring and lights flashing. And now Payton’s instincts took over; Carl could see him react, like a bloodhound moving in for the kill.

Payton’s neck swiveled. His eyes locked onto Carl. The thick lips quivered. A smile. And then he began to run, his arms pumping, his round, fleshy legs moving quickly, surprisingly light on his feet, dodging through the gathered crowd.

“Amanda,
please
. We can’t stay here.”

She let him pull her back toward the car. He opened the door and gently shoved her back into the rusty Subaru. Then he went to the driver’s side, glanced backward. Payton was still sprinting—he was close now, too close. Red in the face and panting, but he hadn’t slowed down. The veins in his neck were popping. He was so damn close.

Carl jumped behind the wheel, turned the car around, and tore away, tires screeching. In the rearview mirror he saw Payton still running, saliva flying from his open mouth. For a moment Carl thought the impossible was happening. He thought Payton was still gaining on them. But his image slowly began to recede in the mirror. He slowed down, then stopped, then bent over, hands on his knees, gasping for air, barely able to look up at their disappearing taillights.

As he rounded the corner, he saw Amanda turn to look behind her. She was not looking at Payton. She didn’t care about an obsessed cop who wanted to kill them. She didn’t care about a tattoo or the meaning of
bienvenue
, either. None of that mattered to her. She stared instead at the crowd, at the spinning lights, at the shooting sprays of water, at the horrible flames, caring about everything she ever owned or ever was, which had just disappeared from the face of the earth.

Partial transcript of the July 11 edition of
Sunrise News
, the one-hour ANN morning news program, airing at 5 A.M. Eastern time:

Dan Eller, anchor:
Good morning. We have a tragic update on the hunt for Carl Granville, the young writer already wanted for questioning in the death of two women, one of whom was flamboyant publishing executive Margaret Peterson, here in New York City. As of yesterday morning, FBI agents tracked Granville’s flight to the Washington, D.C., area, where Amanda Mays deputy metropolitan editor of the
Washington Journal
and an ex-girlfriend of Granville’s, lives. In what appears to be a clear case of arson, Ms. Mays’s house has been burned and nearly one hundred percent destroyed. Firemen appeared on the scene at approximately one-thirty this morning and are still doing their best to salvage what remains. Ms. Mays is missing, although there is no proof yet that she was in the house when the fire began. When police and firefighters arrived at the blaze, they found FBI Special Agent Bruce Shanahoff in his car, which was parked in front of Ms. Mays’s house. Agent Shanahoff was dead when discovered, shot once in the head.

We have no more details at this time. Neither police nor FBI officials are commenting on any possible link between the D.C. fire, Agent Shanahoff’s death, and the two murders in New York. We hope to be able to provide more information when
Wake up America
airs, following this program, in one hour.

On a lighter note, the Bronx Zoo announced last night that Brownie, a fourteen-year-old camel, gave birth to twins. The baby girl is named Humpty and the handsome young boy is Dumpty …

FBI FUGITIVE POLICY TEN MOST WANTED FUGITIVES

WANTED BY THE FBI

Carl Amos Granville

ALIASES: Carl Granville, Granny

AGGRAVATED ASSAULT—ARSON—MURDER

PRESUMED ARMED AND
EXTREMELY DANGEROUS

DOB: April 23, 1971
Sex: Male
Height: 6’ 1”
Weight: 185 pounds
Hair: Blond
Eyes: Blue
Race: Caucasian

THE CRIME:

Carl Amos Granville
is wanted for the July 8 murder of Margaret Alex Peterson, the July 8 murder of Antoinette Louise Cloninger, and the July 11 murder of FBI Special agent Bruce Leonard Shanahoff. In all three cases, Granville fled before he could be charged and indicted. He is last known to be in the Washington, D.C., area where he is also wanted by local authorities as a suspect in a July 11 alleged act of arson, the burning of a house lived in by Amanda Dorothy Mays. Amanda Dorothy Mays is missing and feared dead in said fire. Granville is also wanted in connection with her disappearance. FBI Special Agent Bruce Leonard Shanahoff was found shot near the scene of the alleged arson.

Ballistic reports confirm that the same gun was used in the murder of Antoinette Louise Cloninger and FBI Special agent Bruce Leonard Shanahoff.

This information is valid as of 7 A.M., Thursday, July 11

Partial transcript from the July 11 edition of
Need to Know
, one-hour tabloid journalism show broadcast daily, 9 to 10 A.M. Eastern time, on ANN:

GINNY STONE:
Unfortunately for his two newest alleged victims, it seems that Carl Granville, the man already being dubbed the “Literary Killer,” is intent on proving that the sword—and almost any other weapon at his disposal—is mightier than the pen.

As you can see from the charred ruins behind me, it appears as if Granville has struck again. You’re looking at what used to be One thirty-two Klingle Street, in the sedate Washington, D.C., area called Kalorama, where the frustrated and out-of-work novelist’s ex-girlfriend lived. Amanda Mays ended her relationship with Carl Granville a little over a year ago. Now it appears that Granville, in a clear case of arson, has ended her life as well as the life of thirty-one-year-old FBI agent Bruce Shanahoff.

The dots are slowly being connected, and they’re forming a horrific and deadly picture. At approximately two o’clock yesterday afternoon, Agent Shanahoff came to this once lovely two-story house to interview Ms. Mays. At that interview, he warned her that Carl Granville might be armed and dangerous but, according to FBI sources, Agent Shanahoff received no cooperation. He allegedly reported to his superiors that he suspected Granville had already paid Ms. Mays a visit. It seems he also suspected that Granville would return—for Agent Shanahoff, apparently acting on his own, staked out the house on Klingle. It was to be his final act of heroism.

I have with me here Dr. Ruth Matthiesson, a psychologist who specializes in obsessive sexual relationships and is the best-selling author of
From Bundy to Cunanan: Love, Hate and Murder.
Dr. Matthiesson, what patterns, if any, can you recognize in the tragedy that’s unfolding before us?

DR. RUTH MATTHIESSON: Of course, Ginny, you have to understand that I haven’t yet spoken to or worked with Carl Granville, although I certainly hope to at some point. But the pattern is exactly the same as I laid out in
From Bundy to Cunanan
. What we clearly have is someone who grew up in a troubled home and who is desperately seeking love and acceptance, both on a personal level and on a professional one. In this instance, the killer is someone who would have come to this house with the intent of destroying it. In a sense, he turned the house into a person. It became more than a symbol; it merged, as an image, with the woman who inhabited it. The killer is someone unable to create a domestic home life for himself and, out of jealousy, would refuse to allow anyone, particularly an ex-lover, to enjoy one without him.

GINNY STONE: And how would the death of Agent Shanahoff fit into such behavior?

RUTH MATTHIESSON: Well, anyone who would get in his way, who would try to interfere with is mission, if you will, would be fair game.

GINNY STONE: Thank you, Dr. Matthiesson. As this sedate community is thrown into an uproar and as police search through the rubble for the body of a woman close friends describe as “intelligent, caring, and unwilling to give up on a troubled and unstable lover,” questions still remain. How was the killer able to get close enough to shoot, at point-blank range, an experienced FBI agent? Where is Carl Granville now? If he is innocent, which seems more and more unlikely, why is he hiding? And, most disturbing of all, if he is guilty, where will his murderous spree take him next? Right now all we know for certain is that there is a growing myth of invincibility that is beginning to surround Carl Granville. Let us hope that that myth is shattered and sanity can be restored before it’s too late.

From the July 11
Washington Journal:

EDITOR’S LIFE TOUCHED MANY OTHERS

by Shaneesa Perryman

Journal
staff writer

The lurid details on page one tell it only too well: An FBI agent shot to death in his parked car. A Kalorama carriage house burned to the ground, its tenant, thirty-one-year-old journalist Amanda Mays, missing and presumed dead. Her ex-lover, Carl Granville, missing and presumed guilty, and now the object of one of the largest manhunts in modern criminal history.

But the story on page one doesn’t tell it all. Not really. Because for those of us who knew and worked with and loved Amanda Mays, she was not just another name in the newspaper, another victim, another statistic. She was our big sister, our coach, our nursemaid, our friend. She was a shoulder to cry on, a sofa to crash on. She was Amanda.

It was Amanda Mays who took a chance on this reporter that cold, gray morning last winter when I showed up here at the
Journal
looking for a job—a gangly, knock-kneed young black woman with no experience and no clue, unsure whether I had what it took. Amanda told me that I did. Amanda Believed in me.

And now she is gone.

Amanda smoked too much and drank too much coffee and was way too honest with her superiors to ever be considered a team player. She was always fretting about her weight, although
plump
was not a word that ever applied to this particular woman. She liked to dress in the color purple even though she looked much better in softer colors. She had the most beautiful red hair I’ve ever seen. If she was reading something that she didn’t care for, she would wrinkle her nose, as if smelling something unpleasant. When she was excited about a story, which was often, she seemed more alive than anyone I’ve ever known.

And now she is gone.

Amanda was born and raised in Port Chester, New York, where her father was a local banker. She was an only child. In high school she was head cheerleader and went steady with the captain of the football team. “A full-time practicing bimbo, complete with pink nail polish,” was how she described herself in those days. Her father died when she was a freshman at Syracuse University. Her mother, whom Amanda called “the last truly authentic housewife in America,” died less than a year later. “She lost her will to live after her man was gone.” Amanda told me late one night over beers. “I will never, ever let that happen to me.”

And now she is gone.

It was at Syracuse that Amanda discovered her love of journalism. Because she was so lovely, her professors tried to steer her toward a broadcasting career. She resisted, preferring the meatier, less glamorous world of newsprint. After two years at the
Albany Knickerbocker
she was hooked on politics. After two more years at
Newsday
she was hooked on New York City. Living in Manhattan now, she began writing pieces on city government for the
Village Voice
and
New York Magazine.

It was at a publication party for a friend’s book that she met a promising young writer named Carl Granville. “He was,” she later told me, “exactly the man I had dreamed about when I was a little girl lying in bed at night, hugging my pillow. He was my Prince Charming, my white night, my everything.”

And now she is gone.

They shared a love of good books, foreign films, Chinese food, and each other. “They were so good together,” says an old friend who knew them both. “Everyone thought it was a real shame that they couldn’t make it work.” According to Amanda, she was ready for a greater commitment and Carl was not. Never one to stand idly by. Amanda promptly moved to D.C., where she became the
Journal’s
deputy metro editor and a den mother to us young cubs. Her babies, she used to call us. She changed our diapers, encouraged us, guided us, touched us. And she still had time and heart enough to be proud of her ex-lover. “He’s really doing well. He’s writing a secret political memoir,” she told us. “For one of the top editors in New York.”

And then that top editor was found murdered.

And then Carl Granville followed Amanda here.

The rest of the story is found on page one.

As I sit here writing these words, I can’t imagine how I will get along without Amanda Mays. But I will have to try. We will all have to try.

Goodbye, Amanda. I don’t know how to thank you, but this is me typing, girl.

Love, Shaneesa.

Amanda had to fight back the tears as she stood in line at the Gourmet Bean. Reading her very own obituary in that morning’s
Washington Journal
, she was losing the fight.

Shaneesa’s tribute was so sweet and heartfelt. And there was something so stark, so
real
about the sight of her own photograph right there on page one. Amanda hated to cry. She especially hated to cry in public.
Oh, screw it
, she thought. She had the right to cry as hard as she wanted. In the past twelve hours he had discovered a murdered man in a refrigerator, watched everything she owned go up in flames, and spend the night on the road, sleepless, dodging police and federal agents. She was confused, frightened, and exhausted.

And now she was dead.