Judas Burning (10 page)

It didn’t seem possible that the two girls had disappeared without a trace, but no one had seen or heard from them since first period at school the past Tuesday.

Dixon thought again of the river, with its deceptively quiet surface. The girls had been taken. By the river or by someone. What would a kidnapper do with them? They weren’t girls whose families could pay a big ransom. But they were pretty girls. Sexy girls. Perfect prey for a predator. The thought of Robert Medino’s theory about a religious zealot chilled her.

The bell over the door jangled, and she looked up to find Medino standing just inside the door.

“What’s the lead headline?” he asked. The smile that followed was calculated.

“Too early to tell,” she said. “We could have a breaking story before we quit tonight. Where have you been all week? I haven’t seen you at any of the searches.”

“I had to finish up a story in New Orleans.” He shook his head. “Those girls won’t be found. At least not alive.”

“What makes you so sure?” Dixon remembered the way the sheriff had looked at Medino. Not contemptuously, exactly, but close, tempered with suspicion.

“I’ve been tracking this guy since last spring. I’ve devoted months to this story. This statue that he decapitated here, it’s sort of the culmination of his obsession. At least with statuary. Now he’s moved on to flesh.”

“And his obsession is?” Dixon didn’t have time to shoot the breeze with Robert Medino, but she couldn’t help herself. He was smart and articulate, and he had the fire of a good story in his eyes. He had a high opinion of himself, but Dixon found that appealing; confidence was an attractive quality.

“The Virgin Mary.”

His serious expression stopped her from laughing. Medino wasn’t a man who would enjoy being laughed at under any circumstances. “So how do you figure he hooked up with those two girls? Angie Salter, from all I’ve heard, wouldn’t qualify as a virgin.” She thought about Tommy Hayes and Welford’s insinuations.

“If I have this man pegged correctly, he views women as either/or. Either a slut or a virgin. This obsession stems from something in his past, some church-related incident.”

“I didn’t realize you had a degree in psychology.” Dixon took care to keep her needling complimentary.

“I’ve done a lot of reading and a lot of talking to several authorities. Dr. Jonas Brennaman of the Center for Human Wellness, folks like that. That’s one thing about working for
Cue:
people find the time to talk to me.”

“I can see where it would be a real asset.” Dixon had known national magazine reporters. They had access to people. The rich and famous wanted good press. “And your theory is that this religious fanatic has moved from statuary to flesh?”

“It’s not that simple. I’ve been following him for months. I’ve seen the progression of his anger. That’s what drives him. He’s torn between his belief in the sanctity of the female and her terrible sexual power over him. He wants to be loved and nurtured, yet he wants to screw her. When he first started destroying church property, it was only images of Mary where she was praying. He’d leave the ones of her with an infant or with the saints. As his desire grew, so did his anger.” He shrugged. “He can’t win, and that frustration has grown over the past months. It’s the virgin/whore complex taken to the ultimate extreme. I’d guess his mother figures prominently into this. It was inevitable that he’d move against a woman-child. If the sheriff had listened to me, those girls might still be alive.”

“It isn’t every day that a religious nut case strolls into Chickasaw County. So how does he travel?”

“I’m not certain. Could be a car, or it could be by bus.”

“How did this guy find out about the statue in Jexville?”

“He reads. I’d be willing to bet he’s well educated. Possibly church educated. That statue, because of the blind artist, got a lot of media attention. I believe he’s traveling 1-10 East. My guess is that he’s going to head to St. Augustine, where the Spanish first brought priests into the New World. I expected him to do something dramatic there, but he’s upped the ante here in Jexville.”

Dixon nodded. “It’s an interesting theory.”

“It’s more than a theory.” Robert leaned closer. “This is going to be a big story. Huge. Maybe a movie. Why don’t you help me?”

“Why are you doing this?” National reporters weren’t in the habit of offering a portion of the pie to locals.

“Folks around here don’t like me, except for maybe Ruth Ann. She likes me okay, but she doesn’t know anything. No one will talk to me about these girls. I need a local to bring them to life. You could do that. No byline, but a credit at the end of the story.”

He wanted this story badly. She could almost taste his desire for it. He’d spent months already working on it. She nodded. “Okay. I’ll help you, but not today. I’m on deadline, and I have to get back to work.”

“Later in the week let me take you to lunch. After deadline. I’ve rented a room in a charming B and B, the Magnolia. Do you know it?” He didn’t wait for an answer as he opened the door. “It’s like stepping back in time, a theory of mine about Southerners. You people have managed to cling to the things that are important. Graciousness, good manners, and … trust. I’ll be back later in the week. After deadline.”

He went out the door, turned to look at her once, then walked away.

Linda Moore walked through the saloon door that led to the back shop. She went to the front window and leaned for a last glance at Medino’s disappearing back. “Who the hell was that?”

“The Writer from the East—that’s all caps.”

“That man is trouble. Trouble with a capital T.” Linda swung around to face her. “He’s got a way with words, but I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if he isn’t the one abducting young girls and making up theories to cover his own tracks.”

J.D. stood at the edge of the river about twenty yards from the landing that marked Eustace’s camp. With the summer rains over, the water level was down. He’d been lucky, weatherwise. For the past seven days there had been no thunderstorms, only the heavy dews that silvered the early mornings. That luck couldn’t hold out long, not in September. A massive low was moving in from the west, and he figured he had one day, maybe two, before Chickasaw County would be drenched.

“Sheriff, are you waiting for Eustace?”

Camille’s voice was soft and cultured, the product of private schooling and summers in Europe. He shook his head. She’d been watching him for a while from her porch, but he hadn’t acknowledged her, and she’d managed to slip up behind him. Camille was an odd duck, on the verge of either brilliance or insanity.

“Eustace has given me all the help he can. We’ve sent divers into every deep hole from here to Cumbest Bluff.” He didn’t look at her, uncomfortable with his half-truth. No matter how he cut it, Eustace came up as a possible suspect. There was no real evidence to link him to it, except proximity and lies. And his peculiarities, one of which was Camille.

“Eustace says I can’t walk in the woods anymore.” Her statement was tentative, not quite a question, not quite a confession.

J.D. turned his back on the river and looked at Camille. He was startled, as always, by her beauty. She was the most delicate human he’d ever seen. Her skin was painfully white, her eyes big and pale green, wide open with innocence—or maybe drugs the doctors had given her for depression, anxiety, and a host of other problems. He knew enough about women with money to know that ordering Camille to stay out of the swamps would be stupid.

“Eustace wants to keep you safe. I’d listen to him, Camille. Once we find those girls, this will all be over with and things will get back to normal.”

She hesitated, staring at the ground. “I saw someone in the woods this morning.”

J.D. kept his tone quiet. “What did you see?”

She searched his face, and J.D. knew she was hunting for a sign that he intended to tell Eustace she’d been in the swamps. “I drove over the bridge. There’s a place across the river that’s special to me.” She looked at her bare toes digging into the sand. “Usually I just take the skiff across the river, but Eustace has been locking the boats up lately.” She looked up at him. “You can’t tell Eustace I went over there. I promised him I wouldn’t go to my place until this whole mess was finished. You promise you won’t tell?”

“I won’t tell him unless I have to, Camille. But it’s important that you tell me. Those girls may be alive somewhere in the swamp. If someone has them, what you saw could make a difference.” He looked up at the sound of Eustace’s old truck coming through the oaks.

Camille heard it too. She swallowed. “I saw a man. He was in a tree, looking down at me. At first I thought I’d imagined him, but I didn’t. He’s real. He’s been in the area for a week or so.

“What did he do?” J.D. wasn’t certain whether to believe her or not. Camille’s mental problems were legendary in Jexville, but the townspeople had a way of blowing everything out of proportion, especially when it was vicious and cruel.

“He looked at me.” She shrugged. “He watched everything I did.”

“What was he doing?”

“Hiding.”

“What were you doing?”

“Listening to the spirits. They want me to make water designs in my pottery, to show the flow of the river. The river is … what it means to be free.”

“Free?”

“Of obligation, of guilt, of remorse, or thought, or regard for the future. The things that drive humans insane.” She smiled. “I’m an expert on the things that make a person insane.”

J.D. nodded. She might be crazy, but he understood her. In fact, she was more lucid than most people he talked to. “This man you saw, what did he look like?”

“He was crouched in a big sycamore, so it was hard to get an idea of his size, but he had the darkest eyes. They were like black pebbles washed by a strong current. And he had dark hair, very straight but not cut neatly. Hispanic. Youngish. Maybe thirty, maybe older or younger; it’s hard to tell with an olive complexion. They don’t age the way I will.” She touched her cheek as if she suddenly felt a wrinkle. “I’ll be old by the time I’m forty, unless I develop a relationship with Mama’s plastic surgeon.”

“Stay out of the sun,” J.D. offered, trying not to appear too eager. “When he was watching, did he do anything that frightened you?”

She shook her head. “No. That’s what I wanted to tell you. He isn’t dangerous. I mean, he isn’t here to hurt anyone. I would have felt danger from him if he meant to hurt me. He just watched. He never moved at all, except his eyes. I’ve never seen a human hold still for so long.”

“Where was he?”

She hesitated. “My place is secret. I’ve seen all those men hunting for the girls, stomping through the woods. They don’t respect the land or the river.”

“How about if I promise to go myself? Alone.” J.D. looked at the camp. Eustace had finished unloading and was heading their way. After seven days of coming up empty-handed, Camille was giving him something solid—if he could get her to tell him. “Camille, please.”

“I’ll show you,” she said, then turned away and ran toward Eustace.

J.D. watched the flash of her long, slender legs. Young-girl legs that showed muscle and bone. She was an elfin creature with a hint of something untamed in the way she moved. When she got a couple of feet from Eustace, she launched herself at him, hitting him solidly enough that he staggered under the impact but caught her and whirled her around.

“What’s the latest?” Eustace asked J.D. as he walked over. He lowered Camille to the ground and hugged her against his side.

“Nothing new since Orie Webster identified the bikini bottom and top as Trisha’s.” Eustace knew the rest. Dale’s bloodhounds had tracked back and forth from the sandbar through the woods and all the way to the county line without finding a trail. Cadaver dogs from Pensacola had sniffed the river from a mile up both forks and halfway down to Cumbest Bluff. The highly trained shepherds had never even caught a scent. It looked as if the girls had left the sandbar by water but were no longer in or on the river.

“Come up to the shed and have a beer,” Eustace said. “You look done in.”

“I thought we might take J.D. to my secret place,” Camille said. “He knows the swamps. He can say if it will flood or not.”

Eustace stared hard at Camille. “I know it doesn’t flood there, Camille. I told you that. J.D. doesn’t know—”

Camille pulled away from him. “Please.”

Eustace stared at the river, then looked suspiciously at J.D. “Sure. Let’s go. We can take my truck.”

Eustace and Camille got in the cab, and J.D. climbed over the tailgate and took a seat on a wheel cover against one side. He wasn’t disappointed in Eustace’s driving, which was too fast for the bad roads. Eustace had a reputation for vehicular recklessness, and not even the wreck that ruined his leg had slowed him down. J.D. braced with his hands and tried to avoid taking the punishing ride with his spine.

They crossed the river at a dangerous clip, then Eustace spun the truck to the left, barely missing a tree. In the cab Camille began flailing at him with her fists, forcing him to slow so he could defend himself.

J.D. could hear the force of her blows as they rained on Eustace’s shoulder and head, and he wondered at the strength contained in her lithe body.