"What's the matter?" Potter asked Kielle.
Frances 's face went cold when she received a response. "She said she tried to kill him."
"Who?"
"Handy, I think she means. She calls him Mr. Sinister."
Potter produced the flyer of the fugitives. Kielle's face screwed into a tight mask and she poked a finger at Handy's picture.
"She says he killed Susan and she was going to kill him. Melanie betrayed her. Melanie is a Judas."
"Why?" Angie asked.
More brutal signing.
"She threw her out the door."
"Melanie did that?"
Potter felt the chill down his spine. He knew there'd be a payback of some kind.
Shannon confirmed that the men didn't seem to have any rifles, only shotguns – her father hunted and she knew something about guns. Beverly 's asthma was bad, though Handy had given her the medicine. She reiterated that the "big man," Bonner, hovered over the girls and kept looking at Emily because she was "prettier and looked more like a girl."
Angie asked delicately, "Has anyone touched any of you?"
Shannon said that they had. But Kielle waved her hand and signed, "Not the way you mean. But Bear looks a lot."
So, Potter reflected, Bonner's a discrete threat, separate from Handy. And probably more dangerous. Lust-driven criminals always are.
"Who picked you to be released?" Angie asked Shannon.
"Him." She pointed at Handy.
"The one Melanie calls Brutus, right?"
Shannon nodded. "We call him Mr. Sinister. Or Magneto."
"Why did he pick you, do you think? Was there any reason?"
"Because Bear" – Shannon pointed at Bonner's picture – "told him to." Frances looked at Angie and said, " Shannon kicked him and he was mad."
"I didn't mean to kick him. I just didn't think… And then I got really scared. I thought it was my fault he was going to burn us up."
"Burn you up? Why'd you think that?"
Shannon told them about the gas can rigged right above their heads.
Frances's face went pale. "He wouldn't."
"Oh, yes he would," Angie said. "Fire. His new toy."
"Damn," Potter muttered. This virtually eliminated the possibility of an HRT rescue. Henry LeBow's concession to the horror was to pause before he typed a description of the device.
Potter walked to the doorway of the van, called Budd out, and then motioned Dean Stillwell over. The negotiator said to them both, "We've got a hot trap inside -"
"Hot?" Budd asked.
"Armed," Potter continued. "We can't give him the least excuse to trip it. There's to be absolutely no action that could be construed as offensive. Double-check – all weapons unchambered."
"Yessir," Stillwell said.
Potter then asked Shannon if there was anything else she could remember about the men and what they did inside.
"They watch TV," Frances translated. "They walk around. Eat. Talk. They're pretty relaxed."
Relaxed. Jocylyn had said the same. Well, this was a first for a barricade.
"You saw the tools they have?"
Shannon nodded.
"Have they used them?"
"No."
"Do you remember what tools they had?"
She shook her head no.
"Can you tell what they talk about?" Potter asked.
"No," Frances explained. "Neither of them can lip-read."
"They watch you all the time?" Angie asked.
"Pretty much. He's scary. Him." Shannon was pointing at Handy. Kielle reached forward viciously and grabbed the picture. She tore it up and signed violently.
"She says she hates Melanie. She could have killed him. And now he's alive to kill more people. She says she wouldn't have minded dying. But Melanie's a coward and she hates her."
As he had done with Jocylyn, Potter warmly shook the girls' hands and thanked them. Shannon smiled; Kielle did not but it was with a strong, self-assured grip that the little girl grasped the agent's hand. Then he sent the two girls off with a trooper, to meet their parents at the motel in Crow Ridge. He conferred with Angie for a few minutes then climbed into the van. She followed him.
The negotiator rubbed his eyes and leaned back and took the cup of the dreadful coffee Derek set beside him. "I don't get it," he said to no one in particular.
"What?" Budd asked.
"A hostage escaped and he's angry. That part I understand. But he doesn't seem angry because he lost a bargaining chip. He's angry for some other reason." He looked across the van. "Angie? Our resident psychologist? Have any ideas?"
She organized her thoughts, then said, "I think Handy's big issue is control. He says he's killed people because they didn't do what he wanted. I've heard that before. A convenience store clerk didn't put the money in the robber's bag as fast as he wanted so she's the one guilty of an offense, not him. That gave him, in effect, permission to kill her."
"Is that why he killed Susan?" Budd asked.
Potter rose and paced. "Ah, a very good question, Charlie."
"I agree," Angie said. "A key question."
"Why her?" Potter continued.
"Well, what I actually meant," Budd said, "was why did he kill her? Why go to that extreme?"
"Oh, when somebody breaks his rules, however slightly," Angie said, "any punishment's fair. Death, torture, rape. In Handy's world, even misdemeanors are capital offenses. But let's ask Arthur's question. Why her? Why Susan Phillips? That's the important issue. Henry, tell us about the girl."
LeBow's finger clattered. He read from the screen. "Seventeen. Born of deaf parents. IQ of one hundred and forty-six."
"This is hard to listen to," Budd muttered. Potter nodded for LeBow to go on.
"First in her class at the Laurent Clerc School. And listen to this. She's got a record."
"What?"
"She was a protestor last year at Topeka School for the Deaf, a part of Hammersmith College. They wanted a deaf dean. Fifty students got arrested and Susan slugged a cop. They dropped the charges for assault but gave her a suspended for trespass."
LeBow continued, "Volunteered at the Midwest Bicultural/Bilingual Center. There's an article here – in the material Angie brought." He skimmed it. "Apparently it's an organization that opposes something called 'mainstreaming.' "
Angie said, "The dean of the Clerc School told me about that. It's a movement to force the Deaf into regular schools. It's very controversial. Deaf activists oppose it."
"All right," Potter said. "Let's file that away for a moment. Now, who's Handy given up so far?"
"Jocylyn and Shannon," Angie said.
"Anything in common about them?"
"Doesn't seem to be," Budd said. "In fact, looks like they're opposites. Jocylyn's a timid little thing. Shannon's feisty. She's a little Susan Phillips."
"Angie?" Potter said. "What do you think."
"Control again. Susan was a direct threat to him. She had an in-your-face attitude. She probably challenged his control directly. Now, Shannon, with her kicking Bonner… Handy'd sense the same threat but on a smaller scale. He wouldn't feel the need to kill her – to reassert control in the most extreme way possible – but he'd want her out. Jocylyn? She was crying all the time. Sniveling. She got on his nerves. That's a way to eat at his control too."
"What about the adults?" LeBow asked. "I'd think they'd be more of a threat than the children."
"Oh, not necessarily," Angie said. "The older teacher, Donna Harstrawn, is half-comatose, it sounds like. No threat there."
"And Melanie Charrol?"
Angie said, "The dean at the school told me that she's got a reputation for being very timid."
"But look at what she just did," Potter said. "Getting Kielle out."
"A fluke, I'd guess. Probably impulse." She gazed out the window. "He's an odd one, Handy is."
"Unique in my experience," Potter said. "Say, Henry, read to us from your opus. Tell us what we know about him so far."
LeBow sat up slightly and read in a stiff voice. "Louis Jeremiah Handy is thirty-five years old. Mother raised him after his alcoholic father went to jail when the baby was six months. The mother drank too. Child protective services considered placing him and his brothers in foster homes several times but nothing ever came of it. No evidence he was abused or beaten, though when his father returned from prison – Lou was eight – the man was arrested several times for beating up his neighbors. The father finally took off when Handy was thirteen and was killed a year later in a barroom fight. His mother died a year after that."