Helen offered to drive each young woman into County Services in a private car and return her the same way, Delia managed to persuade all six earlier victims to come in. Her trainee assistant, Delia noted when Shirley Constable appeared, had handled this most damaged of the victims with a cheerful insouciance that had revolved around her green Lamborghini sports car; she hadn’t mentioned the coming interview.
The erstwhile Carew character had retreated so far inside herself that it took Delia almost an hour to get her talking, but when she did, it poured out. She had been a virgin for religious reasons and regarded herself as ruined for life; but that, Dr. Liz Meyers and the rape clinic would help. Delia had already been in touch with Dr. Meyers, a brilliant psychiatrist whose sole interest was rape.
What preyed more cruelly on Shirley’s mind was her conviction that the Dodo would return to kill her, and a large part of her felt she deserved to die. Oh, we women have to get over this mind-set, Delia said to herself. The value society puts on virginity is a way to make sure a man fathers his children—look at poor Morty Jones.
Having assured Shirley that the Dodo was too busy moving on to bother going back and killing earlier victims, Delia sent her off with Helen to see Dr. Meyers.
“He’s definitely escalating in method,” she said to Carmine and Nick later, “but he seems to have settled into a three-week cycle. There were ten weeks between Shirley and Mercedes, then six weeks between Mercedes and Leonie. From Leonie on, three weeks, with a slight preference for Tuesdays and Wednesdays.”
Carmine was scowling. “Then he’s not a moon man or a sun man, Deels, and that means he’s a real headache. He can switch his time span without feeling that he’s offended the sun or the moon—I hate the ones without a planetary pattern.”
“Then perhaps he’s on a Mars or a Venus cycle. We won’t know that until we check the astronomical ephemeris. I’ll get on to it,” Delia said. “However, if he sticks to three weeks, he’s due to strike around October 16. A Wednesday. We should expect it, Carmine, sun, moon, or none.”
“Does he have a physical type of victim?”
“No. Nor a racial one, nor a religious one. All colors of hair, eyes, Caucasian skin. Eastern European roots, Jewish, WASP, Latin-American. Things might pop out at us when we consider the events more dispassionately and conclude all the interviews. Apart from Shirley, all we did today was make their acquaintance.”
Helen came in and sat down.
“Your impressions, Helen?” Carmine asked.
“Well, we didn’t spend much time on our home visits—it will be better when I drive each of them in for a formal interview. I can say that the Dodo himself didn’t vary much from victim to victim—did he, Delia?”
“No.”
“Almost six feet, and extremely well built. Marlon Branda was the movie star they chose. Naked and completely hairless. No scars, spots, moles, pimples. A black, silky hood over his head. He never spoke. The warning and his name were printed on a piece of white Bainbridge board with a black marker.”
“Thank you,” said Carmine, interrupting smoothly. “Delia?”
“Shirley was raped twice, both vaginal. Mercedes also, but the second one was anal. And so it went, Carmine, escalating each time a little. My feeling is that with Maggie Drummond and the arrival of the garotte, or cord, or whatever, the Dodo is close to his kill point. That means it’s imperative we catch him.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Carmine said.
“Have you any ideas about the Dodo, Carmine?” Nick asked.
“He’s verging on unique, for starters. Through six rapes over a period of nearly seven months he managed to be invisible. If it weren’t for the Gentleman Walkers, his attack on Maggie would have seemed the first. None of his earlier victims would have come forward of her own volition. The Dodo is a stalker who must know a great deal about the women he targets. It’s my guess that he’s working from a list, and that list might contain a hundred names,” Carmine said grimly.
“Will he escalate to murder?” Helen asked, not having heard the first part of their conference.
“All multiple rapists of this kind eventually move up to murder, Helen. Asphyxiation is a give-away. That’s why, as you women probe the earlier victims deeper and deeper, I want you to be on the lookout for anything suggesting asphyxiation. In a way, Miss Trainee, that never gives your victim any idea what you’re doing. We don’t want anyone feeding ideas, okay?”
The blue eyes were blazing, but Helen MacIntosh had learned more than merely police procedure: not a muscle moved in her face as she thought: how dared they treat her like a teenybopper! “Madam Trainee!” “Miss Trainee!” They were baiting her, but they wouldn’t succeed in getting a rise. “Okay,” she said aloud.
“The nakedness says the Dodo’s ego is so big he’s sure he can deal with the unexpected, like a room-mate coming home. His rape technique says he’s never going to be a metal or a fire man, cutting, mutilating, even burning with a cigarette. He punches, pokes and pinches, but most of all he kicks. The assaults are erotic, in that they’re directed at breasts, buttocks, belly, pubes. In an odd way, his actions are immature. According to Maggie, he sustained rigid erections for long periods, yet he can’t climax. According to his lights, he has principles.”
“You’re describing an almost supernaturally cool, calm and collected man,” Nick said uneasily.
“Not supernatural, but certainly highly instinctual. Has any victim reported seeing a weapon, Delia?” Carmine asked.
“Not so far.”
“He must have brought a weapon with him and kept it close at hand,” Carmine said.
Ask your questions, Helen, said their trainee to herself. If they make you seem ignorant, that’s because you are ignorant. But you’re here to learn, and sometimes they don’t see the most basic questions of all—too much water under the cop bridge. “Why should so many sex murderers strangle?” she asked, eyes wide and curious. “I mean, asphyxiation is just one form of it.”
Carmine looked pleased. “As against death by mutilation?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know that anyone honestly knows, but the general feeling is that strangulation—hands, a garotte, a scarf—offers the killer about as leisurely a look at dying as he’ll ever get. It can take minutes, depending, and especially if he’s gotten his technique with a cord down so pat that he can drag his victim to the brink of death a dozen times before the coup de grâce. It also means no blood, and a good proportion of sex killers dislike blood as a component of murder. It’s messy and unpredictable unless you’re extremely well prepared to handle the mess. One errant drop can convict if the blood type’s rare and the killer shouldn’t have been there.” Carmine’s large, square, beautiful hands gestured. “One thing I can tell you, Helen. The Dodo isn’t into blood. What turns him on is a woman’s suffering.”
Though they were sitting in a room without windows, it felt as if the sun had gone in; Helen shivered. Suffering. Such a terrible word. It occurred to her that in her twenty-four years of life, she had never truly witnessed suffering any closer than a television screen or news magazine.
“How can the Dodo do meticulous research on
