Extreme Instinct jc-6 Page 28

  "Where's your hospital spokesperson?" she suddenly asked the lady sitting at a nearby desk, typing away.

  ''Spokesperson?''

  "Who will deal with the press regarding the three men in your hospital in critical condition?"

  "That would be PR, Mrs. Crighten, down the hall to your right. Can't miss it."

  Jessica found Mrs. Florence Crighten on her phone, her desk in disarray. She was already dealing with the press over the FBI matter, the gunshot and burn victims in the hospital's care.

  Jessica pressed the cut-off button on the woman's phone, flashing her badge as she said, ' 'Your government needs you. We need your help, Mrs. Crighten."

  Growing gracefully into middle age, Mrs. Crighten's slim waistline and ample bust spoke of a onetime party girl who'd decided a career much more productive. She'd obviously worked extremely hard to get to where she sat atop the PR pinnacle of this medical establishment. Her soft, round tones and tawny black complexion made her the perfect person to pitch news-good, bad, or indifferent.

  "How can I help?"

  "I want a false report sent out to the newspapers."

  "What?" The woman instantly shook her head, as if Jessica had suggested something vile, something perverted. "I can't do that."

  "Even if it saves lives?"

  Now Mrs. Crighten's lips closed and pursed. "What kind of misinformation are we talking about? And how will it save lives?"

  "Trust me, it will save lives. Two, possibly three lives, maybe more."

  "Explain further."

  Jessica smiled, somehow knowing that she'd come to the right woman. She felt hopeful that now she could turn the tables on the Phantom. She explained to Mrs. Crighten how the killer had been operating. She laid out before Mrs. Crighten's astonished eyes the killer's cryptograms, telling her how they'd been left, how they'd been written using the victims' own fatty secretions, after they were burned alive. She told of the phone calls, how much she personally had suffered. Finally she got around to exactly how she planned to confuse the killer.

  "If three men die here tonight, then the killer has reached eight victims for his deadly charade, if he counts his shooting victim, Chief of Operations Agent Warren Bishop. That would leave only one blank space to fill in his demented, infernal game. That leaves only one more victim."

  "If he takes Agent Bishop's death, and the death of the other two agents who were burned in the fire as equal, on a par with one of his burn victims," she replied. "I see. But what if he doesn't take Bishop's death as enough?"

  "Then we'll have saved two lives instead of three."

  "Yes, I see, but suppose he, the killer, doesn't want to count any of them?"

  "He will. He's anxious for this to be over…"

  "How do you know that?"

  "We have a relationship," Jessica firmly said. "I believe-no, I know-how he thinks. He believes everything happens for a reason. He's quite fatalistic. He'll at the very least count the burn victims; he'll see them as reward for carrying out his… his duties, his responsibilities, thus-"

  "Duties," muttered Mrs. Crighten, shivering where she sat, "responsibilities."

  "He's quite mad."

  "Of that I'm sure."

  "Will you put the misinformation out there?"

  "It could backfire. Family members must be alerted to the truth before it gets around. It could cost me my job."

  "The FBI made you do it?"

  The woman smiled and took Jessica's hands in hers. "We'll do it."

  Jessica gave her a prepared statement that she had written out in longhand. It gave names for the additional two agents as Agent Thorn Morganstern and Agent Raleigh Howler. To protect his office from embarrassment, Gallagher had earlier allowed hospital authorities to treat three FBI agents and not just one, but he'd left all three under heavy guard.

  Finished here, Jessica said to Mrs. Crighten, "Thank you.. thank you… Now, how do I get to Salt Lake's largest TV station and newspaper office?"

  Crighten called in her aide, telling the young woman to chauffeur Agent Coran to wherever she wished, when Crighten's phone rang.

  Jessica and the aide were halfway out the door when Mrs. Crighten announced that the call was for Jessica. ''I think it's one of your people," she cheerily said, offering the phone to Jessica. "He says he has information for you alone, Dr. Coran."

  Jessica took the phone and immediately recognized the voice of the killer at the other end as he said, "Satan, disguised as a one-eyed Minotaur, carried me on one hell of a journey until I could see down into an endless hole where flesh and fire, like wick and candle, were one."

  "Dorphmann," she let his name fall on him like a bomb, "Feydor Dorphmann, we know now who you are and why you're driven to kill."

  It was as if she were whistling in a wind tunnel; the surprise seemed to have no effect on Dorphmann as he continued speaking over her. "The journey kept me always on a downward spiral, and there were rungs on either side of the belly of this place, like they were made from Satan's ribs, you see…"

  "Just as in Dante's Inferno," she suggested. "But Feydor, don't you see? If you turn yourself in now, I'll get help for you."

  "Perhaps the historic Dante Alighieri in the 1300s was himself visited by Satan, because Satan wants us to praise him, you know, Dr. Coran. He wants us to never forget his presence. He must've made Dante's life a living hell like mine, turning his skin to boils and red rashes, making it impossible to live in his skin. He must've persuaded Dante to chronicle his domain, his dark kingdom. He's very good at persuasion techniques, you know, far superior to your FBI in that regard."

  "You don't have to kill any more people, Feydor," she told him. "You've killed eight now by our count."

  Jessica watched Crighten's face as it turned ashen grey with the realization that the killer was on the hospital line, her line. Feydor Dorphmann paused momentarily at her words but then continued, "He got Dante to sing the praises of Hades…"

  "The two men you burned during your escape, two FBI agents, and a third you shot, Feydor. They've all died here at the hospital."

  ''But those killings were incidental, not part of the bargain."

  "How do you know that? Satan works in mysterious ways, Feydor."

  "They all must die by fire, all but one-you, Doctor… "

  "But these men did die by fire."

  "Two of them, yes."

  "Then why not count Dr. Stuart Wetherbine, Feydor? You torched his body, remember? And he was trying to help you, remember?"

  This silenced Feydor momentarily. "Then you do know all about me. Good, Doctor… very good. Now you will come for me all the more."

  "What about it, Feydor? What about Wetherbine in San Francisco and the two agents you burned to death here in Salt Lake? It means you can be finished with your work, whatever contract you made with… with Satan that much sooner, Feydor."

  "Perhaps… perhaps…"

  She prayed he was considering the possibility she held out to him.

  He coldly said, "I'll have to wait, see what he says about all this."

  "Feydor, every FBI agent in the territory, every cop with a gun is now going to shoot to kill, knowing you killed three of their own. The stakes have gone up, Dorphmann. We not only know who you are, Feydor, but we know your shoe size and preference, we have your fingerprints and likeness, and it will appear in every newspaper and on every television screen across this country. There's no place you can hide now."

  "Don't waste your breath, Dr. Coran. I've had assurances none of that will matter once I've finished with you."

  "Even if you succeed, Feydor, in killing me, number nine, there'll be no place for you to hide."

  "Satan will provide. He's already removed my fingerprints and my hair, and he's working on my bone structure, my height, weight, skin color. You see, it's all part of the deal."

  How do you bargain with a madman? she wondered. "Give yourself up, give yourself up to me this moment. Tell me where you are and I'll come there personally
to see no harm comes to you." It was a half-truth. If he invited her, she would see to it he was put out of his misery before he could fire-kill her.

  "Harm? You have no idea how much harm I've already gone through, you foolish bitch. No, I won't be giving myself up. There's still work to do. Still, I do want you to come for me."

  "Where and when?" she replied instantly, challenging him.

  "Soon, soon now you will know."

  She knew it was hopeless, but to encourage him, she added, "Read the morning papers, Feydor, then contact me again if you don't believe me. Will you do that, Feydor?"

  "I told you! I have to talk to him.'"

  "Where are you now?" she pleaded. "Are you still in the city?"

  He cut her off.

  Jessica looked up to see Mrs. Crighten staring at her with the frozen look of a statue, shaken at hearing just one side of Jessica's conversation with the killer. "I wouldn't have your job for all the money and prestige in this life," Mrs. Crighten finally said.

  Jessica turned to the aide and said, "Let's go."

  As Jessica was about to leave the hospital, J. T. located her and shouted for her to wait. She'd already gotten comfortable in the car and was about to depart from the parking garage. "Mrs. Crighten told me where I could find you, Jess. You're taking on too much alone again. Let me help you," he pleaded.

  "You can help by being here when Warren Bishop recovers. He's going to need a familiar face at his bedside. Will you be there, John?"

  He took in a deep breath. "Mrs. Crighten told me he called you at her office. How does this fiend find you, Jess? It's uncanny. It's almost as if-"

  "As if what?"

  "Nothing, never mind."

  "You starting to think like Repasi, that we… the killer and I have some sort of link?''

  "No, no… nothing like that, Jess."

  "Then what? That there's some kind of supernatural psychic link at work? What?"

  "I don't know."

  "He's shrewd, smart, J. T. He knows we'd be at an area hospital; he goes the rounds with the yellow pages, just like you or me. That's all."

  "Where'll you be, Jess?"

  "Getting the story out. Talk to Crighten about it. We're going to spread the news that the Phantom has added three more kills to his kill list."

  "Hey, I get it. Fill up his list for him and maybe no one else will be hurt on your account, right?"

  She gritted her teeth before replying, "You really are beginning to sound like Karl."

  "I think it's a brilliant stroke, Jess."

  "Only if it works. Now, let me put it into motion."

  "Have you cleared it with headquarters?"

  "No, no, I haven't. Something like this, the fewer who know the real story, the better."

  "All the same, if you want, I'll let Santiva in on the facts."

  She nodded. "Yeah, do that. And J. T., thanks again."

  "Where'll you be after you finish up with the news-people?"

  "On to Jackson Hole with the others, it would appear."

  "Gotcha. I'll join you there as soon as possible." The car pulled from the lot at Jessica's request. The car pulled upward on a slanting concrete hill and out into the predawn light of Salt Lake City. "Take me to the major TV stations first," she asked Crighten's aide, who yawned and apologized, saying she was not used to such crazy hours.

  Jessica finished the rounds of TV and newspaper offices in Greater Salt Lake City and then said good-bye to Crighten's aide Sue Norris when the young woman dropped her off at Gallagher's nondescript FBI branch headquarters building. With Gallagher, Repasi, and that crew long ago off to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, a beautiful western town turned tourist haven nestled in Snake River Valley, amid the foothills of the Grand Tetons, Jessica freely acquired the fax forwarded to Salt Lake City headquarters from Eriq Santiva. As promised, she had every stitch of information they had on Feydor Dorphmann forwarded to the Salt Lake Herald. Returning to the Herald editors, she orchestrated the morning headline and layout of photo and computer-enhanced photo of the killer, alongside a sidebar carrying what Jessica and J. T had composed of the killer's cryptograms and the nine rungs of Hades in Dante's Inferno.

  In the paper account, Morganstern and Howler were listed as fire victims number six and seven and Bishop as murder victim number eight, leaving only one rung to fill. The list now appeared:

  #1 is #9-Traitors Lorentian

  #2 is #8-Malicious Frauds Flanders

  #3 is #7-Violents Martin

  #4 is #6-Heretics Whitaker

  #5 is #5-Wrathful amp; Sullen Grey

  #6 is #4-Avaricious amp; Prodigal Morganstern

  #7 is #3-Gluttonous Howler

  #8 is #2-Lustful Bishop

  #9 is #1-(the last victim?) sent into Limbo… through the Vestibule and over the River Acheron

  The city editor and crime editor at the Salt Lake Herald had, upon Jessica's initial visit, immediately dispatched their best reporters to the phones and the hospital for verification of Jessica's story. At the hospital, Mrs. Crighten held a press conference, detailing the kinds of wounds each of the three FBI agents had endured, how the doctors worked tirelessly on their behalf, but that all attempts had met with unsuccessful results in the cases of all three men. Beside Mrs. Crighten, there on the podium, doctors lamented the conditions they'd had to work under, their long faces giving credence to the ruse. Jessica watched televised news reports from the city desk editor's office. Her plan was working like a charm.

  The newspapermen were ecstatic to get an exclusive from the famed Dr. Jessica Coran, but for it, Jessica bargained: They must release it to every other news wire service in the country. She wanted to be certain that Feydor Dorphmann, wherever he was, knew that she knew that he knew that she knew…

  At the newspaper office, Jessica found huge maps of Utah along one wall, each detailing the geographic beauty of the state, distances, and famous tourist attractions. On another wall, a similar map of Wyoming hung, and Jessica stared at the roads leading from Salt Lake City to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and she realized for the first time in years just how close Jackson Hole was to Yellowstone National Park.

  "Doing a travel and leisure piece on Wyoming," said a mild-mannered female editor who noticed Jessica's interest in the map. "You know, places to get away to that aren't too far and aren't too expensive for the middle crowd here in Salt Lake."

  "I'm interested in Yellowstone," Jessica told her. "You have any detail maps of Yellowstone?''

  "It's one of the major highlight of the article, and yes, I do." The woman dug into a desk and came up with a detailed map of the park itself, spreading it in lumpy and crude fashion across the papers and junk that populated the top of her desk. "It's really a breathtaking, fantastic place, almost like stepping onto another planet," said the editor.

  Jessica studied the map, which brought back instant memories of a time when she had once visited Yellowstone National Park as a young assistant M.E. on vacation with a girlfriend. ''Yes, I once visited Yellowstone, many years ago," Jessica told the other woman as she studied the large yellow mass, the park that formed the northwestern corner of the state of Wyoming.

  "My husband and the boys loved it," the woman continued. ''The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, that was their favorite, and the fishing, of course. Me, I became fascinated with the geysers and hot springs and mud pots."

  Jessica scanned the map, her eyes gliding as if directed by a Ouija board pointer to a select few of the more than ten thousand geysers, hot springs, and boiling mud pots in the park, gasping at their resemblance to Feydor's words of earlier. There on the map, she read of the Devil's Well and Hellsmouth geysers in Lower Geyser Basin near Old Faithful and Old Faithful Lodge. A flood of memories, too disconnected and too disorganized at the moment to make any but fleeting sense to her, assaulted her senses while the editor continued to carry on about the grandeur that was Yellowstone.

  "And can you imagine people coming here from the East and telling us, the Forestry Servi
ce in particular, that we need to build protective walls and fences throughout the parks? What utter nonsense. People have no idea the scale of nature out here. Why, it's enormous. Would anyone seriously entertain the thought of putting a fence around the Serengeti Plains in Tanzania or Victoria Falls or Niagara for that matter?"

  Jessica only half-heard the woman. Her mind was on Dorphmann. Feydor's thinking, his quest, came into full focus. Finally, Jessica knew where he'd been headed from day one, what his final destination must be, and how he planned to kill victim number nine. "May I keep this map?"

  "Ahhh, sure, sure… I've got enough material on the park that I don't need it any longer. I've pretty well put the story to bed."

  "Whatever it cost." She dug into her purse.

  "No, take it. Anything to help get this madman you're chasing. And I'm dreadfully sorry about those three brave agents."

  Jessica swallowed her desire to confide any sliver of truth to the woman. "Yes, it has hit the agency hard, just as the previous five murders by this maniac have."

  "Good luck on your manhunt, Dr. Coran. We all know one thing."

  "And what's that?" she asked, folding the Yellowstone map back into its original shape.

  "That you're the best person for the job."

  "Thank you. I hope that's so."

  "Well, obviously, from what you've told us, the killer certainly thinks so."

  She smiled for the first time in twenty-four hours. "Yes. Yes, that certainly is so."

  After the phony story was put to bed, a phone call to the hospital told her that Bishop died at 3:19 a.m. while still on the table, undergoing surgery, and that Agents Morganstern and Howler had also both died of wounds suffered in the fire. Excellent, she thought. Mrs. Crighten had played her part well.

  EIGHTEEN

  I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on men unless they act.