The Poet (41 page)

It was unknown how many girls were victimized by Gomble. He was not discovered until a psychologist treating a thirteen-year-old girl with behavioral problems brought out her assault by Gomble during a hypnotherapy session. A police investigation was launched and Gomble was eventually charged with attacks on four girls.

At trial the defense’s contention was that the events as described by the victims and police simply did not happen. Gomble presented no fewer than six highly qualified experts in hypnotism who testified that the human mind, while in a hypnotic trance, could not be persuaded or forced under any circumstances to do or even say anything that would endanger the person or be morally repugnant to them. And Gomble’s attorney never missed a chance to remind the jury that there was no physical evidence of molestation.

But the prosecution won the case with essentially one witness. He was Gomble’s former CIA supervisor, who testified that Gomble’s research in the early sixties included experimentation with hypnosis and the use of drug combinations to create a “hypnotic override” of the brain’s moral and safety inhibitions. It was mind control, and the former CIA supervisor said codeine and sodium pentothal were both among the drugs Gomble had used with positive results in his studies.

A jury took two days to convict Gomble of four counts of sexual assault of a child. He was sentenced to eighty-five years in prison to be served at the Union Correctional Institute in Raiford. One of the stories in the file said he had appealed the conviction on the basis of incompetent counsel but his plea was rejected all the way up to the Florida supreme court.

As I reached the bottom of the computer file I noticed the last story was only a few days old. I found this curious because Gomble had been convicted seven years earlier. This story also had come from the L.A. Times instead of the Orlando Sentinel, which all the previous ones had come from.

Curious, I started reading it and at first believed Laurie Prine had simply made a mistake. It happens often enough. I thought she had shipped me a story unrelated to my request and that somebody else at the Rocky had probably asked for.

It was a report on a suspect in the murder of a Hollywood motel maid. I was about to stop reading but then I came across Horace Gomble’s name. The story said the suspect in the maid’s killing had served time at Raiford with Gomble and even helped him with some undescribed jailhouse legal work. I reread the lines as an idea spun in my mind and then finally couldn’t be contained.

Once more I called Rachel’s pager after disconnecting the laptop. This time my fingers were shaking as I punched out the number and I could hardly keep still afterward. I paced the room again, staring at the phone. Finally, as if the power of my stare had caused it, the phone rang and I grabbed it up before it had even stopped its first sounding.

“Rachel, I think I’ve got something.”

“Just hope it isn’t syphilis, Jack.”

It was Greg Glenn.

“I thought it was somebody else. Listen, I’m waiting on a call. It’s very important and when it comes I should take it.”

“Forget it, Jack. We’re pushing the envelope. You ready?”

I looked at my watch. It was ten minutes past the first deadline.

“Okay, I’m ready. The faster the better.”

“Okay, first off, good work, Jack. This … well, it doesn’t make up entirely for not being first, but it’s a much better read and much better information.”

“Okay, so what needs to be fixed?” I asked quickly.

I didn’t care about his compliment/criticism parlay. I just wanted to be done by the time Rachel answered my page. Because there was only one phone line into the room I couldn’t use my laptop to connect with the Rocky and view the actual edited version of the story. Instead I called up the original version on the laptop and Glenn read off the changes he had made.

“I want to make the lead a little tighter and stronger, go right out with the fax a little harder. I fiddled around with it and this is what I’ve got. ‘A cryptic note from a serial killer who apparently preys on randomly selected children, women and homicide detectives was being analyzed by FBI agents Monday as the latest twist in the investigation of the slayer they have dubbed the “Poet.” ‘ What do you think?”

“Fine.”

He had changed the word “studied” to “analyzed.” It wasn’t worth protesting. We spent the next ten minutes fine-tuning the main story, going back and forth on nit-picks. He didn’t make too many significant changes and with deadline breathing on his neck he didn’t have the time to do a lot, anyway. In the end, I thought some of the changes were good and some were made simply for change’s sake, a practice all newspaper editors I’ve worked with seem to share. The second story was a short, first-person account of how my search for understanding of my brother’s suicide uncovered the trail of the Poet. It was an understated tooting of the Rocky’s horn. Glenn didn’t mess with it. When we were done he had me hold the line while he shipped the stories to the copy desk.

“I think maybe we should keep this line open in case they come up with something on the rim,” Glenn said.

“Who’s got it?”

“Brown has the main and Bayer has the side. I’ll do the back reading myself.”

I was in good hands. Brown and Bayer were two of the best of the rim rats.

“So, what are you planning for tomorrow?” Glenn asked while we were waiting. “I know it’s early but we also have to talk about the weekend.”

“I haven’t thought about that stuff yet.”

“You’ve got to have a follow, Jack. Something. We don’t go out front this big with something and then come back flat-footed the next day. There’s gotta be a follow. And for this weekend, I’d like a scene setter. You know, inside the FBI hunt for a serial killer, maybe get into the personalities of the people you’ve been dealing with. We’ll need art, too.”

“I know, I know,” I said. “I just haven’t thought about all of that yet.”

I didn’t want to tell him about my latest discovery and the new theory I was brewing. Information like that in an editor’s hands was dangerous. The next thing you knew it would be on the daily news budget-practically the same as being written in granite-that I’d have a follow linking the Poet to Horace the Hypnotist. I decided I would wait and talk to Rachel before I told Glenn about that.

“What about the bureau? They going to let you back inside?”

“Good question,” I said. “I doubt it. I kind of got the sayonara when I left today. In fact, I don’t even know where they are. I think they blew town. Something’s happened.”

“Shit, Jack. I thought you-“

“Don’t worry, Greg. I’ll find out where they went. And when I do, I’ve still got some leverage with them and there are a few things I didn’t have room for in the stories today. One way or the other, I’ll have something tomorrow. I just don’t know what, yet. After that, I’ll do the scene setter. But don’t count on any art. These people don’t like having their pictures taken.”

After a few more minutes Glenn got an all clear from the copy desk and the story was shipped to composing. Glenn said he was going to baby-sit it to production to make sure nothing went wrong. But I was finished for the night. He told me to have a nice dinner on the company expense account and call him in the morning. I told him I would.

As I contemplated whether to page Rachel for a third time, the phone rang.

“Hiya, sport.”

I recognized the sarcasm dripping off the voice.

“Thorson.”

“You got it.”

“What do you want?”

“I’m just letting you know that Agent Walling is tied up and she won’t be calling you back any time soon. So do us and yourself a favor and stop calling the pager. It gets annoying.”

“Where is she?”

“That’s really none of your business now, is it? You shot your wad, so to speak. You got your story. Now you’re on your own.”

“You’re in L.A.”

“Message delivered, signing off.”

“Wait! Listen, Thorson, I think I’ve got something. Let me talk to Backus.”

“No, sir, you aren’t talking to anyone on this investigation anymore. You are out, McEvoy. Remember that. All media inquiries on this investigation are now being handled by public affairs at Washington headquarters.”

Anger was balling like a fist inside me. My jaw was clenched tight but I managed to take a shot at him.

“Does that include Michael Warren’s inquiries, Thorson? Or does he have a direct line to you?”

“You’re wrong about that, fuckhead. I’m no leak. Your kind of people make me sick. I’ve got more respect for some of the scumbags I’ve put in stir than I have for you.”

“Fuck you, too.”

“See what I mean? You people have no respect what so-“

“Fuck that, Thorson. Let me talk to Rachel or Backus. I’ve got a lead they should have.”

“You have something, you give it to me. They’re busy.”

It galled me to tell him anything at all but I swallowed back the anger and did what I thought was the right thing.

“I have a name. It could be the guy. William Gladden. He’s a pedophile from Florida but he’s in L.A. At least he was. He-“

“I know who he is and what he is.”

“You do?”

“Past experience.”

Then I remembered. The prison interviews.

“The rape project? Rachel told me about that. He was one of the subjects?”

“Yes. So forget him, he’s not the guy. Thought you were going to be the hero and solve it, didn’t you?”

“How do you know he’s not the guy? He fits and there’s the possibility he learned hypnotism from Horace Gomble. If you know about Gladden, then you know about Gomble. It all fits. They’re looking for Gladden in L.A. He cut up a motel maid. Don’t you see? The maid could be the bait murder. The detective-his name is Ed Thomas-could be the intended victim he was talking about in the fax. Let me-“

“You’re wrong,” Thorson interrupted loudly. “We already checked this guy out. You’re not the first to come up with him, McEvoy. You’re not that special. We checked Gladden out and he’s not our guy, okay? We’re not stupid. Now drop it and go the fuck back to Denver. When we get the real guy, you’ll know.”

“How do you mean you checked Gladden out?”

“I’m not going into it. We’re busy and you’re no longer inside. You’re out and you’re staying out. Just don’t call the pager anymore. Like I said, it gets annoying.”

He hung up before I could say another word. I slammed the phone into its cradle and it bounced down to the floor. I was tempted to page Rachel again immediately but thought better of it. What could she be doing, I wondered, that would have made her ask Thorson to call me instead of calling me herself? A crushing feeling began to form in my chest and many thoughts went through my mind. Had she merely been baby-sitting me while I was on the case with them? Watching me while I watched them? Had everything just been an act for her?

I broke away from it. There was no way to know the answers until I spoke to her. I had to guard against letting my impressions of Thorson’s comments speak for her. Instead, I began to analyze what Thorson had told me. He said Rachel could not call me. She was tied up. What could that mean? Did they have a suspect in custody and she, as lead investigator, was conducting the interrogation? Was the suspect under surveillance? If so, she might be in a car and away from a telephone.

Or by asking Thorson to call me was she sending me a message, communicating something she didn’t have the guts to tell me herself?

The nuances of the situation were unreadable to me. I gave up on a deeper meaning and thought about the surface. I thought about Thorson’s reaction to my mention of William Gladden. He’d showed no surprise at the name and seemed to easily dismiss it. But in replaying the conversation in my mind, I realized that whether I was right or wrong about Gladden, Thorson would have played it the same way. If I was right, he would have wanted to deflect me. If I was wrong, he would not have missed the opportunity to let me know.

The next thought I focused on was the possibility that I was right about Gladden and that the bureau had somehow made a mistake in dismissing him as a suspect. If this was the case, the detective in Los Angeles could be in danger and not even know it.

It took me two calls to the Los Angeles Police Department to get a number for Detective Thomas at the Hollywood Division. But when I called the number it went unanswered and kicked over to the station’s front desk. The officer who answered told me Thomas was unavailable. He would not tell me why or when the detective would be available. I decided not to leave a message.

I paced the room for a few minutes after hanging up and wrestled with thoughts about what to do. I came to the same conclusion from every angle I tried. There was only one way of learning the answers to the questions I had about Gladden and I knew that was to go to Los Angeles. To go to Detective Thomas. I had nothing to lose. My stories were filed and I was off the case. I made some calls and booked the next Southwest flight from Phoenix to Burbank. The airline agent told me Burbank was just as close to Hollywood as L.A. International.

The front-desk clerk was the same man who had checked all of us in on Saturday.

“You’re leaving on the fly, too, I see.”