Part 3 (1/2)

And then a breakthrough. What the detectives hadn't told Chad - but what he now learned -was that the tire tracks left by his daughter's desecrater had been identified last year, back in April, as standard equipment on a particular model of American van. Not only Stephanie's corpse near Yale but the later victim near Va.s.sar had been linked with the tire tracks on that year and model of van. Because the Biter's numerous targets had all been students at colleges and universities in New England, the authorities had concentrated their search in that area.

When a blond, attractive, female student narrowly escaped being dragged inside a van as she strolled toward her dormitory at Brown University, the local police - braced for the threat - ordered roadblocks around the area and stopped the type of van that they'd been seeking.

The handsome, ingratiating male driver complied too calmly. His responses were too respectful, not at all curious. On a hunch, an officer asked the driver to open the back of the van.

The driver's eyes narrowed.

Chilled by the intensity of his gaze, the policeman grasped his revolver and repeated his request. What he and his team discovered... after the driver hesitated, after they took his keys... were stacks of boxes in the rear of the van.

And behind the boxes, a bound, gagged, unconscious co-ed.

That night, the police announced the suspected Biter's arrest, and Chad shouted in triumph.

Finally! A textbook salesman. The b.a.s.t.a.r.d's district was New England colleges. He stalked each campus. He studied his variety of quarry, reduced his choices, selected his final target, and...

Chad imagined the Biter's enticement. ”These boxes of books. They're too heavy. I've sprained my left wrist. Would you mind? Could you help me? I'd really appreciate.. .Thank you. By the way, what's your major? No kidding? English? What a coincidence. That's my major. Here. In the back. Help me with this final box. You won't believe the first editions I've got in there.”

Rape, torture, cannibalism, and murder were what he had in there.

Step in farther. Nothing's going to hurt you.

But now the b.a.s.t.a.r.d had finally been caught. His name was Richard Putnam. The alleged Biter, the media carefully called him, although Chad had no doubt of Putnam's guilt as he studied the television images of the monster. The unafraid expression. The unemotional eyes. The handsome suspect should have been sweating with fear, bl.u.s.tering with indignation, but instead he gazed directly at the cameras, disturbingly confident. A sociopath.

Chad phoned policemen and district attorneys to warn them not to be fooled by Putnam's calm manner. He wrote letters to the parents of every victim, urging them to make similar calls. Each night at three a.m. as he wandered through his cluttered apartment, he always found Stephanie's brilliant light hovering in the kitchen.

”At last they found him,” she said. ”At last you can give up your anger. Sleep. Eat. Rest. Distract yourself. Work. It's over.”

”No, it won't be over until the son of a b.i.t.c.h is punished! I want him to suffer! To feel the terror you did!”

”But he can't feel terror. He can't feel anything. Except when he kills.”

”Believe me, sweetheart, when the court finds him guilty, when the judge p.r.o.nounces his sentence, that sociopath will suddenly find he can definitely feel emotion!”

”That's what I'm afraid of!”

”I don't understand! Don't you want revenge?”

”I'm speeding so brilliantly. I don't have time to.. .I'm afraid.”

”Afraid about what?”

Stephanie's radiant light faded.

”What are you afraid of?”

Nothing will hurt you. The song kept echoing in Chad's mind. While he hadn't been able to protect his daughter as he had promised when she was a child, he could do his utmost to guarantee he was there to make sure that the monster suffered. Calls to police departments revealed that the various states in which the murders had occurred were each demanding to put the Biter on trial. The result was bureaucratic chaos, arguments about which city would have the first chance to prosecute.

As the authorities persisted in quarreling, Chad's frustration compelled him to visit the parents of each victim, to convince them to form a group, to conduct news conferences, to insist that jurisdictional egos be ignored in favor of the strongest evidence in any one city, to plead for justice.

It gave Chad intense satisfaction to believe that his efforts produced results - and even greater satisfaction that New Haven was selected as the site of the trial, that Stephanie's murder would be the crime against which the Biter was initially prosecuted. By then, a year had pa.s.sed. As part of his divorce settlement, Chad had sold his co-op apartment in Manhattan, splitting the proceeds with Linda. He moved to cheaper lodgings in New Haven, relying on the income he received from his ten percent of royalties that his former authors were required to pay him for contracts that he'd negotiated.

Successful.

Sure.

Before Stephanie was...

Nothing will hurt you?

Wrong! It hurts like h.e.l.l!

Each day at the trial, Chad sat in the front row, far to the side so he could have a direct view of Putnam's unemotional, this-is-all-a-mistake, confident profile. d.a.m.n you, show fear, show remorse, show anything, Chad thought. But even when the district attorney presented photographs of the horrors done to Stephanie, the monster did not react. Chad wanted to leap across the courtroom's railing and claw Putnam's eyes out. It took all his self-control not to scream his litany of mental curses.

The jury deliberated for ten days.

Why did they need so long ?

They finally declared him guilty.

And yet again the monster showed no reaction.

Nor did he react when the judge p.r.o.nounced the maximum punishment Connecticut allowed: life in prison.

But Chad reacted. He shrieked, ”Life in prison? Change the law! That son of a b.i.t.c.h deserves to be executed!”

Chad was removed from the courtroom. Outside, Putnam's lawyer make a speech about a miscarriage of justice, vowing to demand a new trial, to appeal to a higher court.

Thus began a different kind of horror, the complexities and loopholes in the legal system. Another year pa.s.sed. The monster remained in prison, yes, but what if a judge decided that a further trial was necessary, that Putnam was obviously insane and should have pleaded accordingly? A year in prison for what he'd done to Stephanie? If he was released on a technicality or sent to a mental inst.i.tution where he would pretend to respond to treatment and perhaps eventually be p.r.o.nounced ”cured”...

He'd kill again!

At three a.m., in Chad's gloomy New Haven apartment, he raised his haggard face from where he'd been dozing at the kitchen table. He smiled toward Stephanie's speck of light.

”Hi, dear. It's wonderful to see you. Where have you been? How I've missed you.”

”You've got to stop doing this!”

”I'm getting even for you.”

”You're making me scared!”

”For me. Of course. I understand. But as soon as I know that he's punished, I'll put my life in order. I promise I'll clean up my act.”

”That's not what I mean! I don't have time to explain! I'm soaring so fast! So brilliantly! Stop what you're doing!”

”I can't. How can you rest in peace if he isn't - ”

”I'm afraid!”