George Orson's personnel file."
"It's downstairs in the records room."
"Then that's where we're going."
The records-room treasures were concealed by one of the unmarked doors bordering
Swig's office. Tight space, hemmed by black file cabinets. The folder was right where it should have been. Milo examined it as the sheriff's men looked over his shoulder.
Missing photo, but George Orson's physical statistics fit Derrick Crimmins perfectly: six-three, 170, thirty-six years old. The address was the mail drop on
Pico near Barrington. No phone number.
"What else exactly did this guy do?" said Banks.
"Series of cons, and he probably killed his dad and mom and brother."
Swig said, "I can't believe this. If we hired him, his credentials had to be in order. The state fingerprints them-"
"He has no arrest record we know of, so prints don't mean much," said Milo, taking the file and flipping pages. "Says here he completed the psych tech course at Orange
Coast College.... No point following that up, who cares if he bo-gused his education." To Swig: "Would there be any record if he actually returned his keys?"
"His file's in order. That means he did. Any irregularity-"
"Is picked up by the system. I know. Of course, even if he did return them, seeing as he got to take them home every day, he had plenty of chances to make copies."
"Each key is clearly imprinted 'Do Not Duplicate.' "
"Gee," said De la Torre. "That would scare me."
Swig braced himself against the nearest file. "There was no reason to worry about that. The risk wasn't someone breaking in. Why don't you look for him, instead of harping'? Why would he come back!"
"Must be the ambience," said Milo. "Or maybe the new air-conditioning." He looked up at a small grilled grate in the center of the ceiling. "What about the ductwork?
Wide enough for someone to fit?"
"No, no, no," said Swig, with sudden conviction. "Absolutely not. We considered that when we installed, used narrow ducts-six inches in diameter. It caused technical problems, that's why the work took so long to-" He stopped. "Peake's my only concern. Should we keep searching?"
"Any reason to stop?" said Milo.
"If he killed that woman on the freeway, he's miles away."
"And if he didn't?"
"Fine-exactly-got to go, need to supervise."
"Sure," said Milo. "Do your thing."
Outside the main building, the fireflies continued to dance, fragmented sporadically by the downslanting beams of circling helicopters. Milo yelled at a guard to get us out of there.
He and I and the sheriff's detectives reconvened in the parking lot, next to the unmarked. The white coroner's van was still in place, as were the squad cars and a pea-green sedan that had to be Banks and De la Torre's wheels.
Banks said, "So what's the theory here? This Orson, or whatever his real name is, snuck in somehow and got Peake loose? What's his motive?" Milo flourished an open palm in my direction. "Unclear," I said. "It may have had something to do with
Peake's original rampage. Crimmins and Peake go way back. It's possible-now I'd say probable-that Crimmins was involved somehow. Either by directly urging Peake to kill the Ardullos or by doing something more subtle." I described the long-term conflict between the Crimminses and the Ardullos, described Peake's prophecies. "Money," said
De laTorre.
"That's part of it, but there's more. The root of all this is power and domination-criminal production. Orson- Derrick Crimmins-sees himself as an artist. I think he views the massacre as his first major creative accomplishment. He's been working on something called Blood Walk. At least three people associated with the film are dead; there may very well be others. I think Crimmins has reserved a role for Peake, but I can't say what it is. Now he's decided it's time to put Peake in the spotlight." "Sounds nuts," said De laTorre.
Banks looked back at the yard. "Funny 'bout that, Hector." To me: "So Crimmins is crazy, too? They hired a psychotic to work here?"
"Crimmins comes across as a classic psychopath," I said. "Sane but evil. Sometimes psychopaths fall apart, but not usually. Fundamentally, he's a loser-can't hold on to money, can't stick with anything, has had to take jobs that he considers below him. On some level, that enrages him. He takes out his anger on others. But he's fully aware of what he's doing-has been careful enough to shift identities, addresses, pull off one scam after another. All that spells rationality."
"Rational," said De la Torre, "except he likes to kill people." He stretched both wings of his mustache, distorting the lower half of his face. Releasing the hair, he allowed his lips to settle into a frown. "Okay, now Peake. Basically, you're saying he was a head-case blood freak who turned into a vegetable here because they overdosed him. But for him to cooperate in the escape, he'd have to be significantly better put together than a summer squash. You think he could've been faking how crazy he is?"
"The guys on Five do it all the time," said Milo.
"And rarely succeed," I said. "But Peake's a genuine schizophrenic. For him, it wouldn't be a matter of either-or, it'd be the intensity of his psychosis. At an optimal level, it's possible Thorazine made him more lucid. Clear enough to be able to cooperate in the escape. Crimmins could have played a role, too. He was a significant figure in Peake's life. Who knows what fantasies his showing up on the ward could have stimulated."
"The good old days," said Milo. "Like some damn reunion. And once Crimmins got here, he'd have seen right away how rinky-dink the system was. Pure fun. Betcha he had keys to every door within weeks. We know he floated overtime on Peake's ward.
Meaning he could wear his badge, drop in whenever he wanted, arouse no suspicion."
He shook his head. "Peake must've seen it as salvation."
"Crimmins dominated him before, knows he's passive," I said. "Slips him a knife. No one bothers to check Peake's room for weapons because he's been nonfunctional for sixteen years. Crimmins cues Peake that the time's right; Peake sneaks up on
Dollard, cuts his throat, leaves on the staff elevator. Dollard was a perfect target: lax about the rules. And if he was involved in a drug scam with Crimmins, that would be another reason to hit him. You asked Swig if Dollard had access to the drug cabinet, so you were thinking the same thing. Or maybe Crimmins sneaked in and did the cutting himself. Showed up on the ward during the staff meeting, knowing he had only Dollard to contend with."
"What drug scam?" said Banks.
Milo explained the theory, the cars in the driveway that had bedeviled Marie
Sinclair. "What's better than pharmaceutical grade? Dollard's the inside man,
Crimmins works the street. That's why Dollard got so antsy when we kept coming back.
Idiot was afraid his little side biz would be blown. He shows his anxiety to
Crimmins, tips Crimmins that he can't be counted on to stay cool, and signs his own death warrant. Crimmins has a history of tying up loose ends, and Bollard's starting to unravel." "This," said Banks, "is... colorful." "Lacking facts, I embroider," said Milo. "Whatever the details," I said, "the best guess is that Crimmins managed to get Peake down in that elevator. I think he entered the hospital grounds tonight through that cut in the fence, made his way across the rear yard, maybe hid in one of the annexes. Easy enough, no one uses them. Coming in through the foothills wouldn't be much of a problem. Crimmins used to race motocross. He could've brought a dirt bike or an off-roader."
"Where does your vie come in?" said Banks. "The Argent woman?"
Milo said, "She could've come across the drug scam. Or found out something from
Peake she wasn't supposed to."
"Or, she was part of the drug scam."
Silence.
"Why," said De la Tone, "did Peake start prophesying?"
"Because he's still psychotic," I said. "Crimmins made the mistake of divulging what he was going to do, figuring Peake would keep his mouth shut. Don't forget, Peake's been mum for sixteen years about the Ardullo murders. But recently something-probably the attention Claire paid him-opened Peake up. He got more verbal. Started to see himself as a victim-a martyr. When I brought up the Ardullos, he assumed a crucifixion pose. That could make him a threat to Crimmins. Maybe the role Crimmins has hi mind for him is victim."
"Not if he's the one sliced that woman up on the I-Five."
"Not necessarily," I said. "In this case monster and victim aren't mutually exclusive."
Banks ran his hands down his lapels, looked up at the helicopters.
"One more thing," said Milo. "That fence wasn't cut tonight. There was some oxidation around the edges."
"Well rehearsed," I said. "Just like any other production.
That's the way Crimmins sees life: one big show. He could've come anytime, set the stage."
"What a joke," said Banks. "Place like this and they take keys home."
"Not that it matters," said De la Torre. To Milo: "You ever seen a maximum-security prison that wasn't full of dope and weapons? Other than my mother-in-law's house."
"Can't stop inhuman nature," said Banks. "So now Crimmins and Peake are heading back to the hometown? Why?"
"The only thing I can think of is more theater. A script element. What I don't get is why Crimmins would leave that woman on the freeway. It's almost as if he's directing attention to Treadway. So maybe he's deteriorating. Or I'm totally wrong-the escape's a one-man operation and Peake's fooled everyone. He's a calculating monster who craves blood, is out to get it any way he can."
Banks studied his notes. "You're saying the Ardullo thing might've been financial revenge. Why kill the kids?"
"You ruin my family, I ruin yours. Primitive but twisted justice. Derrick might have planned it, but at twenty he lacked the will and the stomach to carry out the massacre himself. Then Peake entered the picture and everything clicked: the village lunatic, living right there on the Ardullo ranch. Derrick and Cliff started spending time with Peake, became his suppliers for porn, dope, booze, glue, paint.
Psychopaths lack insight about themselves, but they're good at zeroing in on other people's pathology, so maybe Derrick spotted the seeds of violence in Peake, put himself in a position to exploit it. And it was a no-risk situation: if Peake never acted, who'd ever know the brothers had prodded him? Even if he said something, who'd believe him? But he did follow through, and it paid off, big-time: Carson
Crimmins was able to sell his land; the family got rich and moved to Florida, where the boys got to be playboys for a while. That's one big dose of positive reinforcement. That's why I called Peake a major influence on Crimmins."
"Crimmins didn't worry about Peake blabbing back then," said Milo, "but now it's different. Someone's listening."
"Maybe Claire was involved in the drug scam," I said, "but unless we find evidence of that, my bet is she died because she'd learned from Peake that he hadn't acted alone. And she believed him. Believed in him. Because what she was really after was rinding out something redeeming about her brother. Symbolically."
"Symbolically," said De la Torre. "If she suspected Crim-mins, what was she doing getting in that Corvette?"
"Maybe she got involved with Crimmins before Peake started talking. Crimmins held himself out as a cinematic hotshot, a struggling independent filmmaker trying to plumb the depths of madness or some nonsense like that. He calls his outfit Thin
Line-as hi walking the border between sanity and insanity. Maybe he asked her to be a technical adviser. The guy was a con; I can see her falling for it."
"Something else," said Milo. "If Peake's blabbing to Claire, he's telling her about
Derrick Crimmins. The guy she knows is George Orson."
That made my heart stop. "You're right. Claire could've told Crimmins everything.
Fed him the very information that signed her death warrant."
"Eye wounds," said Milo. "Like the Ardullo kids. Only he sees. No one else." He rubbed his face. "Or he just likes carving people's eyes."
"Evil, evil, evil," said Banks, in a soft tight voice. "And no idea where to find him."
The helicopters' sky-dance had shifted westward, white beams sweeping the foothills and whatever lay behind them.
"Waste of fuel," said De la Torre. "He's got to be on the road."
35.
MILO AND THE sheriffs did more cell-phone work. Better suits and they might have looked like brokers on the make. The end result was more nothing: no sightings of