Red Dragon

  He started the second film.

  A birthday party appeared on the screen in the courtroom. The Jacobis were seated around a dining table. They were singing.

  Graham lip-read “Haaappy Birth-day to you.”

  Eleven-year-old Donald Jacobi faced the camera. He was seated at the end of the table with the cake in front of him. The candles reflected in his glasses.

  Around the corner of the table, his brother and sister were side by side watching him as he blew out the candles.

  Graham shifted in his seat.

  Mrs. Jacobi leaned over, her dark hair swinging, to catch the cat and dump it off the table.

  Now Mrs. Jacobi brought a large envelope to her son. A long ribbon trailed from it. Donald Jacobi opened the envelope and took out a big birthday card. He looked up at the camera and turned the card around. It said “Happy Birthday—follow the ribbon.”

  Bouncing progress as the camera followed the procession to the kitchen. A door there, fastened with a hook. Down the basement stairs, Donald first, then the others, following the ribbon down the steps. The end of the ribbon was tied around the handlebars of a ten-speed bicycle.

  Graham wondered why they hadn’t given him the bike outdoors.

  A jumpy cut to the next scene, and his question was answered. Outdoors now, and clearly it had been raining hard. Water stood in the yard. The house looked different. Realtor Geehan had changed the color when he did it over after the murders. The outside basement door opened and Mr. Jacobi emerged carrying the bicycle. This was the first view of him in the movie. A breeze lifted the hair combed across his bald spot. He set the bicycle ceremoniously on the ground.

  The film ended with Donald’s cautious first ride.

  “Sad damn thing,” Crawford said, “but we already knew that.”

  Graham started the birthday film over.

  Crawford shook his head and began to read something from his briefcase with the aid of a penlight.

  On the screen Mr. Jacobi brought the bicycle out of the basement. The basement door swung closed behind him. A padlock hung from it.

  Graham froze the frame.

  “There. That’s what he wanted the bolt cutter for, Jack—to cut that padlock and go in through the basement. Why didn’t he go in that way?”

  Crawford clicked off his penlight and looked over his glasses at the screen. “What’s that?”

  “I know he had a bolt cutter—he used it to trim that branch out of his way when he was watching from the woods. Why didn’t he use it and go in through the basement door?”

  “He couldn’t.” With a small crocodile smile, Crawford waited. He loved to catch people in assumptions.

  “Did he try? Did he mark it up? I never even saw that door—Geehan had put in a steel one with deadbolts by the time I got there.”

  Crawford opened his jaws. “You assume Geehan put it in. Geehan didn’t put it in. The steel door was there when they were killed. Jacobi must have put it in—he was a Detroit guy, he’d favor deadbolts.”

  “When did Jacobi put it in?”

  “I don’t know. Obviously it was after the kid’s birthday—when was that? It’ll be in the autopsy if you’ve got it here.”

  “His birthday was April 14, a Monday,” Graham said, staring at the screen, his chin in his hand. “I want to know when Jacobi changed the door.”

  Crawford’s scalp wrinkled. It smoothed out again as he saw the point. “You think the Tooth Fairy cased the Jacobi house while the old door with the padlock was still there,” he said.

  “He brought a bolt cutter, didn’t he? How do you break in someplace with a bolt cutter?” Graham said. “You cut padlocks, bars, or chain. Jacobi didn’t have any bars or chained gates, did he?”

  “No.”

  “Then he went there expecting a padlock. A bolt cutter’s fairly heavy and it’s long. He was moving in daylight, and from where he parked he had to hike a long way to the Jacobi house. For all he knew, he might be coming back in one hell of a hurry if something went wrong. He wouldn’t have carried a bolt cutter unless he knew he’d need it. He was expecting a padlock.”

  “You figure he cased the place before Jacobi changed the door. Then he shows up to kill them, waits in the woods—”

  “You can’t see this side of the house from the woods.”

  Crawford nodded. “He waits in the woods. They go to bed and he moves in with his bolt cutter and finds the new door with the deadbolts.”

  “Say he finds the new door. He had it all worked out, and now this,” Graham said, throwing up his hands. “He’s really pissed off, frustrated, he’s hot to get in there. So he does a fast, loud pry job on the patio door. It was messy the way he went in—he woke Jacobi up and had to blow him away on the stairs. That’s not like the Dragon. He’s not messy that way. He’s careful and he leaves nothing behind. He did a neat job at the Leedses’ going in.”

  “Okay, all right,” Crawford said. “If we find out when Jacobi changed his door, maybe we’ll establish the interval between when he cased it and when he killed them. The minimum time that elapsed, anyway. That seems like a useful thing to know. Maybe it’ll match some interval the Birmingham convention and visitors bureau could show us. We can check car rentals again. This time we’ll do vans too. I’ll have a word with the Birmingham field office.”

  Crawford’s word must have been emphatic: In forty minutes flat a Birmingham FBI agent, with Realtor Geehan in tow, was shouting to a carpenter working in the rafters of a new house. The carpenter’s information was relayed in a radio patch to Chicago.

  “Last week in April,” Crawford said, putting down the telephone. “That’s when they put in the new door. My God, that’s two months before the Jacobis were hit. Why would he case it two months in advance?”

  “I don’t know, but I promise you he saw Mrs. Jacobi or saw the whole family before he checked out their house. Unless he followed them down there from Detroit, he spotted Mrs. Jacobi sometime between April 10, when they moved to Birmingham, and the end of April, when the door was changed. Sometime in that period he was in Birmingham. The bureau’s going on with it down there?”

  “Cops too,” Crawford said. “Tell me this: How did he know there was an inside door from the basement into the house? You couldn’t count on that—not in the South.”

  “He saw the inside of the house, no question.”

  “Has your buddy Metcalf got the Jacobi bank statements?”

  “I’m sure he does.”

  “Let’s see what service calls they paid for between April 10 and the end of the month. I know the service calls have been checked for a couple of weeks back from the killings, but maybe we aren’t looking back far enough. Same for the Leedses.”

  “We always figured he looked around inside the Leeds house,” Graham said. “From the alley he couldn’t have seen the glass in the kitchen door. There’s a latticed porch back there. But he was ready with his glass cutter. And they didn’t have any service calls for three months before they were killed.”

  “If he’s casing this far ahead, maybe we didn’t check back far enough. We will now. At the Leedses’ though—when he was in the alley reading meters behind the Leeds house two days before he killed them—maybe he saw them going in the house. He could have looked in there while the porch door was open.”

  “No, the doors don’t line up—remember? Look here.”

  Graham threaded the projector with the Leeds home movie.

  The Leedses’ gray Scottie perked up his ears and ran to the kitchen door. Valerie Leeds and the children came in carrying groceries. Through the kitchen door nothing but lattice was visible.

  “All right, you want to get Byron Metcalf busy on the bank statement for April? Any kind of service call or purchase that a door-to-door salesman might handle. No—I’ll do that while you wind up the profile. Have you got Metcalf’s number?”

  Seeing the Leedses preoccupied Graham. Absently he told Crawford three numbers for Byron Metcalf.

 
He ran the films again while Crawford used the phone in the jury room.

  The Leeds film first.

  There was the Leedses’ dog. It wore no collar, and the neighborhood was full of dogs, but the Dragon knew which dog was theirs.

  Here was Valerie Leeds. The sight of her tugged at Graham. There was the door behind her, vulnerable with its big glass pane. Her children played on the courtroom screen.

  Graham had never felt as close to the Jacobis as he did to the Leedses. Their movie disturbed him now. It bothered him that he had thought of the Jacobis as chalk marks on a bloody floor.

  There were the Jacobi children, ranged around the corner of the table, the birthday candles flickering on their faces.

  For a flash Graham saw the blob of candle wax on the Jacobis’ bedside table, the bloodstains around the corner of the bedroom at the Leedses’. Something . . .

  Crawford was coming back. “Metcalf said to ask you—”

  “Don’t talk to me!”

  Crawford wasn’t offended. He waited stock-still and his little eyes grew narrow and bright.

  The film ran on, its light and shadows playing over Graham’s face.

  There was the Jacobis’ cat. The Dragon knew it was the Jacobis’ cat.

  There was the inside basement door.

  There was the outside basement door with its padlock. The Dragon had brought a bolt cutter.

  The film ended. Finally it came off the reel and the end flapped around and around.

  Everything the Dragon needed to know was on the two films.

  They hadn’t been shown in public, there wasn’t any film club, film festi . . .

  Graham looked at the familiar green box the Leeds movie came in. Their name and address were on it. And Gateway Film Laboratory, St. Louis, Mo. 63102.

  His mind retrieved “St. Louis” just as it would retrieve any telephone number he had ever seen. What about St. Louis? It was one of the places where the Tattler was available on Monday night, the same day it was printed—the day before Lounds was abducted.

  “Oh me,” Graham said. “Oh Jesus.”

  He clamped his hands on the sides of his head to keep the thought from getting away.

  “Do you still have Metcalf on the phone?”

  Crawford handed him the receiver.

  “Byron, it’s Graham. Listen, did those reels of Jacobi film you sent—were they in any containers? . . . Sure, sure I know you would have sent ’em along. I need help bad on something. Do you have the Jacobi bank statements there? Okay, I want to know where they got movie film developed. Probably a store sent it off for them. If there’re any checks to pharmacies or camera stores, we can find out where they did business. It’s urgent, Byron. I’ll tell you about it first chance. Birmingham FBI will start now checking the stores. If you find something, shoot it straight to them, then to us. Will you do that? Great. What? No, I will not introduce you to Hotlips.”

  Birmingham FBI agents checked four camera stores before they found the one where the Jacobis traded. The manager said all customers’ film was sent to one place for processing.

  Crawford had watched the films twelve times before Birmingham called back. He took the message.

  Curiously formal, he held out his hand to Graham. “It’s Gateway,” he said.

  43

  Crawford was stirring an Alka-Seltzer in a plastic glass when the stewardess’s voice came over the 727’s public-address system.

  “Passenger Crawford, please?”

  When he waved from his aisle seat, she came aft to him. “Mr. Crawford, would you go to the cockpit, please?”

  Crawford was gone for four minutes. He slid back into the seat beside Graham.

  “Tooth Fairy was in New York today.”

  Graham winced and his teeth clicked together.

  “No. He just tapped a couple of women on the head at the Brooklyn Museum and, listen to this, he ate a painting.”

  “Ate it?”

  “Ate it. The Art Squad in New York snapped to it when they found out what he ate. They got two partial prints off the plastic pass he used and they flashed them down to Price a little while ago. When Price put ’em together on the screen, he rang the cherries. No ID, but it’s the same thumb that was on the Leeds kid’s eye.”

  “New York,” Graham said.

  “Means nothing, he was in New York today. He could still work at Gateway. If he does, he was off the job today. Makes it easier.”

  “What did he eat?”

  “It was a thing called The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun. William Blake drew it, they said.”

  “What about the women?”

  “He’s got a sweet touch with the sap. Younger one’s just at the hospital for observation. The older one had to have four stitches. Mild concussion.”

  “Could they give a description?”

  “The younger one did. Quiet, husky, dark mustache and hair—a wig, I think. The guard at the door said the same thing. The older woman—he could’ve been in a rabbit suit for all she saw.”

  “But he didn’t kill anybody.”

  “Odd,” Crawford said. “He’d have been better off to wax ’em both—he could have been sure of his lead time leaving and saved himself a description or two. Behavioral Science called Bloom in the hospital about it. You know what he said? Bloom said maybe he’s trying to stop.”

  44

  Dolarhyde heard the flaps moan down. The lights of St. Louis wheeled slowly beneath the black wing. Under his feet the landing gear rumbled into a rush of air and locked down with a thud.

  He rolled his head on his shoulders to ease the stiffness in his powerful neck.

  Coming home.

  He had taken a great risk, and the prize he brought back was the power to choose. He could choose to have Reba McClane alive. He could have her to talk to, and he could have her startling and harmless mobility in his bed.

  He did not have to dread his house. He had the Dragon in his belly now. He could go into his house, walk up to a copy Dragon on the wall and wad him up if he wanted to.

  He did not have to worry about feeling Love for Reba. If he felt Love for her, he could toss the Shermans to the Dragon and ease it that way, go back to Reba calm and easy, and treat her well.

  From the terminal Dolarhyde telephoned her apartment. Not home yet. He tried Baeder Chemical. The night line was busy. He thought of Reba walking toward the bus stop after work, tapping along with her cane, her raincoat over her shoulders.

  He drove to the film laboratory through the light evening traffic in less than fifteen minutes.

  She wasn’t at the bus stop. He parked on the street behind Baeder Chemical, near the entrance closest to the darkrooms. He’d tell her he was here, wait until she had finished working, and drive her home. He was proud of his new power to choose. He wanted to use it.

  There were things he could catch up on in his office while he waited.

  Only a few lights were on in Baeder Chemical.

  Reba’s darkroom was locked. The light above the door was neither red nor green. It was off. He pressed the buzzer. No response.

  Maybe she had left a message in his office.

  He heard footsteps in the corridor.

  The Baeder supervisor, Dandridge, passed the darkroom area and never looked up. He was walking fast and carrying a thick bundle of buff personnel files under his arm.

  A small crease appeared in Dolarhyde’s forehead.

  Dandridge was halfway across the parking lot, heading for the Gateway building, when Dolarhyde came out of Baeder behind him.

  Two delivery vans and half a dozen cars were on the lot. That Buick belonged to Fisk, Gateway’s personnel director. What were they doing?

  There was no night shift at Gateway. Much of the building was dark. Dolarhyde could see by the red exit signs in the corridor as he went toward his office. The lights were on behind the frosted glass door of the personnel department. Dolarhyde heard voices in there, Dandridge’s for one, and Fisk’s. br />
  A woman’s footsteps coming. Fisk’s secretary turned the corner into the corridor ahead of Dolarhyde. She had a scarf tied over her curlers and she carried ledgers from Accounting. She was in a hurry. The ledgers were heavy, a big armload. She pecked on Fisk’s office door with her toe.

  Will Graham opened it for her.

  Dolarhyde froze in the dark hall. His gun was in his van.

  The office door closed again.

  Dolarhyde moved fast, his running shoes quiet on the smooth floor. He put his face close to the glass of the exit door and scanned the parking lot. Movement now under the floodlights. A man moving. He was beside one of the delivery vans and he had a flashlight. Flicking something. He was dusting the outside mirror for fingerprints.

  Behind Dolarhyde, somewhere in the corridors, a man was walking. Get away from the door. He ducked around the corner and down the stairs to the basement and the furnace room on the opposite side of the building.

  By standing on a workbench he could reach the high windows that opened at ground level behind the shrubbery. He rolled over the sill and came up on his hands and knees in the bushes, ready to run or fight.

  Nothing moved on this side of the building. He stood up, put a hand in his pocket and strolled across the street. Running when the sidewalk was dark, walking as cars went by, he made a long loop around Gateway and Baeder Chemical.

  His van stood at the curb behind Baeder. There was no place to hide close to it. All right. He sprinted across the street and leaped in, clawing at his valise.

  Full clip in the automatic. He jacked a round into the chamber and laid the pistol on the console, covering it with a T-shirt.

  Slowly he drove away—don’t catch the light red—slowly around the corner and into the scattered traffic.

  He had to think now and it was hard to think.

  It had to be the films. Graham knew about the films somehow. Graham knew where. He didn’t know who. If he knew who, he wouldn’t need personnel records. Why accounting records too? Absences, that’s why. Match absences against the dates when the Dragon struck. No, those were Saturdays, except for Lounds. Absences on the days before those Saturdays; he’d look for those. Fool him there—no workmen’s compensation slips were kept for management.