The Bourbon Street Ripper (Sins of the Father, Book 1) (40 page)

“This is Dallas Christofer,” said Dr. Lazarus, “son of Maple Christofer, and the only survivor of the Bourbon Street Ripper.”

Michael just stared at Dallas in disbelief. The burnt man didn’t seem to notice that there were two people in his room, and instead just went on scribbling. Michael didn’t know what to think, so he just turned to Dr. Lazarus. “So, what happened? Was he burned by Vincent?”

Dr. Lazarus shook his head and said, “No. When Dallas came to me, he was physically whole.” He gave a heavy sigh.

“Let me start from the beginning. When Dallas and Samantha were brought to me, both children were suffering from severe psychotic fits. Both arrived here on the same day. If I remember the timeline, Dallas was found buried with his mother’s remains underneath a cypress tree in a field owned by Vincent Castille, the police led there by an anonymous tip. He was very weakened from repeated blows to the chest and back with whatever was used to bury them. It took a short time for a judge to issue a search warrant for Vincent’s properties, which is how the police discovered the evidence needed to get an arrest. It was right afterward that Vincent was arrested, minutes after murdering his son in front of his granddaughter.”

That all seemed to add up to the old case as Michael knew it, so he nodded and said, “Yes, Doctor, that’s the events as they were told to me. So it was just a matter of hours between the Christofers being found and Vincent being arrested. So subsequently, both children were sent here on the same day?”

“Correct,” replied Dr. Lazarus, giving a curt nod. “As I said, both were suffering from severe psychotic fits when they arrived. Dallas was housed here in room six, while Samantha was housed in room five.”

Dr. Lazarus motioned to the room on one side of Dallas’s.

Michael nodded, figuring that Samantha and Dallas being housed right next to each other had to mean something. He just couldn’t figure out what.

“Both children arrived switching between psychotic fits and a catatonic state,” said Dr. Lazarus. “At first, we simply observed. Dallas’s fits continued much as you’d expect of a child who was suffering from such severe trauma. Very soon, he had to be medicated to keep from hurting himself.”

Dr. Lazarus’s tone started darkening as he said, “But Samantha quickly lessened with the fits and withdrew instead. Not catatonic, but calm, deliberate, quiet. She talked to Dallas through their wall and talked to herself while cuddled in the corner of her bed.”

“Sounds more than a little creepy, Doctor,” said Michael, who was beginning to wonder if maybe he was underestimating Sam.

Nodding, Dr. Lazarus said, “‘Creepy’ is a good word to use here. And her condition continued to improve at a remarkable pace. Three days after Samantha arrived, she was completely normal.”

Michael picked up the tale, saying, “Which is when the Castille attorney had Samantha released, correct?”

The doctor nodded and said, “Correct. Samantha’s fits had completely stopped. Dallas’s had not. Dallas had to be heavily medicated. Samantha had a full recovery and walked out.”

Dr. Lazarus’s voice lowered. “Do you see the problem here, Detective?”

It only took a moment before Michael answered. “Dallas did what one would expect someone in his situation to do—suffer a complete breakdown. Samantha, in the meantime, reacted in an unbelievable way.”

Dr. Lazarus nodded and said, “Correct again. Samantha’s reaction was one of psychotic repression. I am convinced that she took all of that shock, all of that rage, all of that hatred, and locked it away deep inside the darkest recesses of her mind.”

Nodding, Michael found himself frowning, his mental scale of Sam’s innocence starting to tip in the other direction. “When a person represses that much hatred and anger, it’s bound to come back, correct?”

“Yes,” replied Dr. Lazarus, folding his arms and tilting his head back, as if recalling the memories for the first time in years. “If there was ever a person with a demon inside them, waiting to come out, it was that little girl.”

Michael continued to stay silent. He understood that Lazarus wasn’t being literal with the term
demon
, but even he could think of no words other than
demon
or
monster
to explain the darkness he was being told existed within Sam Castille.

“Every test I gave Samantha before her release led me to believe that she would, sooner or later, snap and become a monster. I tried to warn Mr. Bourgeois, but that Dr. Klein had a proverbial bug in that man’s ear. I believe he wanted her committed at his own facility in New Orleans, perhaps to experiment on her himself. Dr. Klein used his influence to shoot down every emergency hearing to commit Samantha. I could not hold her here. I’m just glad that Mr. Bourgeois betrayed Dr. Klein and kept Samantha out of his care as well. However, after the night of the fire, I had no legal recourse to try to get her back, so Samantha has since then been without the proper, in-patient care that she needs.”

Michael heard skid marks in his head. “Fire? What fire?”

“Ah. I thought you knew,” replied Dr. Lazarus, unfolding his arms and cocking an eyebrow curiously. “The night Samantha left here, there was a terrible fire that broke out in this building. You were never told this?”

Feeling like a deer in headlights, Michael said, “Actually, this is all news to me, Doctor. What are you talking about?”

“That is most unusual,” replied Dr. Lazarus yet again, tapping his fingers together in a thoughtful manner. “It was a deciding factor in the court’s decision to put Samantha into Dr. Klein’s care. Let me tell you the details on what happened.

“You see, for one hour a day, we let the patients of each block out to walk around the central rotunda. Samantha was collected by Mr. Bourgeois during that hour. I remember Samantha said good-bye to Dallas, then left. Less than ten minutes later, the power box in a nearby utility closet shorted and exploded, starting a fire that quickly spread and consumed the entire building.”

Michael shook his head in disbelief. “This is pretty unbelievable. And the patients were inside or outside of their rooms when the fire started?”

“Outside in the rotunda,” replied Dr. Lazarus. “And they were just about to go inside for lockdown. That is why everyone in this block, Block A, was not killed.”

Dr. Lazarus’s voice was thick with distaste as he said, “The other three blocks were not so lucky. We lost every other patient and all of my staff that night, Detective.”

Dr. Lazarus motioned toward where his calves should be. “I was trapped underneath some burning debris. The damage to my lower legs was so bad that they had to be amputated.”

“I’m sorry,” replied Michael, giving a canned response.

Dr. Lazarus, saying nothing at first, rolled over to Dallas, and laid his hand very gently on the burnt man’s shoulder. The patient stopped scribbling and looked up at Dr. Lazarus. That was when Michael saw that Dallas’s eyes looked dull and lifeless.

As he rested his hand on Dallas’s shoulder, Dr. Lazarus said. “It was like in a fairy tale. As soon as the fire started, while I was trapped underneath that debris, flames all around me, this young boy, Dallas, came up to me and pulled me to safety. I remember Dallas saying, ‘Don’t you dare die on me, Doctor. No one who is kind to me deserves to die.’”

Looking between the doctor and patient, Michael asked, “So, how did Dallas get like this?”

Dr. Lazarus gently rubbed Dallas’s shoulder while saying, “After rescuing me, he went back to help the rest of the children. However, Dallas’s heroics proved to nearly kill him. He was terribly burned that night. And the smoke inhalation was so bad that it caused permanent brain damage.”

As Dr. Lazarus patted Dallas’s shoulder and turned away from him, heading back toward Michael, he said, “Even with all my knowledge about neuroscience, I am unable to help reverse the damage done to this boy. So, I take care of him, locked away from the world that could hurt him, the hero who saved my life.”

Michael found himself looking away as if he was intruding on the tender moment between doctor and patient.

Finally, he asked. “So you believe Samantha Castille started this fire?”

“I do indeed,” replied Dr. Lazarus as he wheeled out of the cell. “I remember seeing her near the utility closet several times in the previous days, as if she was examining it. So look at the facts, Detective: Samantha Castille seemingly recovered from the trauma of seeing her father murdered in three days, and then the only living person linked to those murders is nearly killed, the night she leaves. Dallas is a shell of what he once was. In many ways, Samantha nearly finished what her grandfather started.”

Waiting for Michael outside of the room, Dr. Lazarus turned to him and said, “You cannot tell me that this is all coincidence, Detective. My belief is that Samantha Castille started that fire to kill Dallas Christofer. I also believe that she is like her grandfather, and only needs the proper push to become a psychotic murderer.”

Michael frowned again.
I hate to think this about Sam, but Dr. Lazarus does have a point. She’s looking more like a suspect every minute.

Just as Michael was preparing to leave, he turned to give Dallas Christofer one last good look. Dallas looked back at him, his blank, mindless eyes staring dully. However, from this angle, Michael could see what Dallas was scribbling.

What the hell!

Michael quickly moved over to where Dallas was, which made the young man slip back anxiously, as if expecting an attack. Michael paid Dallas no mind, crouching down and looking over what Dallas was scribbling. The words were unmistakable.

Michael called out to Dr. Lazarus, “Doctor, Dallas is scribbling some words down here. Has he been doing this much lately? Or is this a new behavior?”

“If it’s the same two words over and over again, then he’s been doing that off and on for the past twenty years. What is he writing down?”

Michael looked back over the shell of the man who used to be Dallas Christofer, then looked back at the writing on the wall. Taking in a deep breath, he read the words off the words to the doctor.

“Nite Priory.”

Chapter 21   
Michael’s Busy Day

It was well past lunchtime and much closer to dinner, by the time Michael left the hospital, having been given a couple of boxes from Dr. Lazarus containing dossiers on every employee and patient of the facility from twenty years ago. Michael was surprised that Dr. Lazarus would break doctor-patient privilege in this way, but the doctor had just smiled and shaken Michael’s hand. Michael had again noted the strange tattoo on the doctor’s wrist.

“I’ll be keeping an eye on you, Detective LeBlanc. Do your very best,” Dr. Lazarus had said.

Michael didn’t know what to make of that statement.

Stopping at a café for a very late lunch, Michael took time to compare and organize his notes. After an hour, he realized that he was running out of both leads and daylight. He was just about to pay his bill and head out when he saw a note from his and Rodger’s trip down to the bayou to talk to Robert Fontenot. Curious, Michael read over the note:

Fontonet’s mistress
Jean-Laffite Theater
Lives in Lafayette now

“Looks like I’ve found a missing lead,” Michael said to himself, paying his bill and heading out of the café.

It didn’t take Michael long to find what he was looking for—the Lafayette Police Department. Pulling up in a visitor parking space, Michael entered the precinct and headed over to the front desk, where a uniformed officer sat looking very bored.

Michael showed his badge and identified himself, saying, “I’m working the New Orleans serial murders. I need to call in to the New Orleans Eighth Precinct and check up on something. Mind if I use the phone?”

“Not at all,” replied the officer, who let Michael in behind the desk. “I needed a chance to make some fresh coffee anyway.”

Scratching himself, the officer headed off to the back, leaving Michael to wonder two things: first, if there was anyone in southern Louisiana who did not drink coffee, and second, who would be manning the front desk.

Picking up the phone, Michael dialed his precinct and asked to be connected to Homicide. A few moments later, a familiar female voice answered, “Homicide Department, this is Detective Dixie Olivier.”

“Dixie, they have you answering the phones, eh?” asked Michael, glad to hear his friend’s voice.

“Hey, Michael,” replied a tired-sounding Dixie. “Wait, the caller ID says… Hey, are you calling from Lafayette?”

“Yeah, the case is leading me here,” Michael said. “Long story, I’ll be sure to include it all in my report. You sound exhausted. Still jet-lagged?”

“Yeah, and Gino is still asleep, poor dear. Kyle is distracted with Cathy and Cheryl. It’s a real mess, Michael,” Dixie replied.

Michael leaned against the desk, looking down and focusing on his call with Dixie. He was still not pleased that his closest friend had to come back from vacation so early, but he knew why Commander Ouellette had put the four of them together.

Fortunately, Dixie soon changed the conversation. “So, Michael, what did you need?”

That snapped Michael back into the present. He quickly straightened up and said, “Right. So I need some information dug up from the archives. From the Bourbon Street Ripper case. Robert Fontenot, the suspect who Rodger and Edward arrested, had a mistress. She worked at the Jean-Lafitte Theater. She lives in Lafayette now. Can I get a name and address?”

“Sure thing,” replied Dixie. “I just got finished sorting all the information from the original case. Man, Rodger takes terrible notes. I think the information on Fontenot is over on Kyle’s desk. Mind holding for a few minutes?”