Sharpe argued, “They could've gotten all that from the press, and so could my six-year-old daughter from turning on the telly.”
“We'll give them both lie-detector tests, if you are still uncertain,” Boulte determinedly replied.
“While it's obvious that these two people are disturbed, it's not so obvious they committed these crimes,” Jessica put in. “Speaking to them, interviewing them, Luc Sante would say we have just interviewed the Devil at play, but-”
“Luc Sante, Luc Sante,” Chief Inspector Boulte lamented. “I knew you should not have involved him on this case, Richard.” Jessica read into his words, And you shouldn't have involved this lady doctor from America, either. “Luc Sante's managed to so brainwash you two with his little sermons on evil that you don't recognize it when you see it before you!”
Jessica tried to reason with Boulte who stubbornly and tenaciously held to his tunnel vision. Finally, Richard said, “These two buffoons are convinced that they are the killers whom all of Scotland Yard, the press, the public, and the prime minister have sought now for weeks and weeks. Such a conviction lifts their mundane lives and low opinion of one another and self to a higher plane.”
“Now you're a psychotherapist, too, Richard?”
“Of course, they can lay claim to this enormous ripple effect they've caused in society's pond,” agreed Jessica, immediately coming to Richard's defense, understanding his point. “It's alluring to them, and it is quite real. Real enough in here”-she pounded her heart-”that no lie detector test designed can help out here. They are themselves convinced that they are the killers. They are convinced of their own guilt, the guilt of murdering the innocent. Yet they've provided no key evidence here, and their eyes bugged out when we asked about their victims' tongues. TTiey first said they cut them out, and later they chose burning the tongues. They know nothing of this!”
Richard again added to the argument, “You see, Boulte, they are convinced beyond all reason and rationale that they are indeed the Crucifiers whom the world seeks. It makes their miserable lives worth a few pounds to think it so.”
Jessica laughed a hollow laugh. “In becoming the Crucifier with a capital C, they take shape, form, and they become something larger than themselves, something the press has made larger than life, as it so often and thoughtlessly does in America with such madmen as Cunanan, Manson, Bundy, Gacey, Speck, Oswald, Sirhan. As your historians have done with Jack-the-Ripper. Rather than turn the cameras away from these desperate and dangerous sociopaths, the press has given them a stature in death or in incarceration that they never possessed in their miserable little lives. They have elevated them to the status of godlike monsters, capable of great feats of daring and genius, when in fact they are pathetic remnants of passing evil.”
“Now you really are beginning to sound like Luc Sante,” complained Boulte. The Chief stared several times at the two-way mirror, telling Jessica that the public prosecutor had been listening in on them all. “You've been talking too long to that old shrink. Look, we have the finest lie-detector men in the world here.”
“And they will tell you the same as I have. Despite even hypnotism, the subject, if thoroughly convinced on this conscious plane of existence, he remains so on the subconscious level of existence as well. Lie detectors detect subtle nuances in honesty and truth, just as a hot blade bums the dry tongue of the village liar when the witch doctor lays the knife on. If the truth is subverted or overtaken by a rock-solid, all encompassing, life-altering delusion, if you are dealing with an abnormality that is the normality of existence for this person, an aberration that is cause for celebration in this individual, no truth other than the delusional truth will be forthcoming in such a test.”
Boulte squinted, half-smiled, and asked Jessica point-blank, “Are you deliberately trying to confuse me?”
Jessica erupted with laughter. It careened off the walls, out the door, and down the long corridors leading to Boulte's office.
Sharpe grabbed her by the arm, taking her aside, saying, “Dr. Coran has been working extremely hard. She hasn't eaten today, either,” he excused her behavior. To her, he added, “Why don't we have a bite to eat? I know a pleasant place just around the comer, a pub where we can have a pint and a sandwich, since I'm off duty. What do you say?”
“I'm famished and I'm buying, but we haven't finished here. We must convince your chief of-”
“His mind is set, was set before he spoke to us, and he'll remain immovable. We're both wasting our time and energy on the man. Walk away from it, now.”
And so they did, together, leaving poor Copperwaite to deal with Boulte.
FOURTEEN
Among… crippled legions-the mass of suffering humanity-the evil reside, perhaps the most pitiable of all.
“Old army saying, Doctor,” Sharpe said in her ear, taking her arm and gaining access to the other side of the busy, downtown intersection. “If it moves, salute it. If it doesn't move, clean it.”
“Is that where you feel the investigation is? A standstill? Or are you saying that you've washed your hands of it?”
“I don't know a blind thing about it… The man on the street in bloody Bloomsbury knows more about the case than I do. Says so in the London Times. Damn all.”
“Isn't that Erin Culbertson's newspaper?”
“She's not to blame.”
“I've met her, you know.”
“Really?”
'Twice now.”
“She's bright.”
“Agreed, and pretty.”
“From Bloomsbury,” he finished.
“Bloomsbury?”
“West Central London. I should hang it all, go to the BM, perhaps.”
“The BM? As in bowel movement?”
He laughed. “British Museum. I should step out of it and leave it to the whole boiling lot of them, and place myself in a fucking museum is what.”
“What's happened?”
“They're after me, pure and simple.”
“The press you mean?”
“No, the department, the Yard. Boulte in particular. I'm certain of it now.”
She joked. “I hadn't noticed any animosity there.”
This made him laugh. “You realize that sometimes paranoia is dead on, but sometimes we do nothing about it for too long a period before heeding its advice, and intuition often knows more than we do, but then it's too late.”
“I'm sorry you're having problems, Richard.”
“Simple matter really. Boulte doesn't want to take responsibility for a botched job, and since I'm nearing retirement, why not put me on the outs? I should just bugger off to Brighton seashore and put my legs up a bit there. I swear, I didn't know that Stuart Copperwaite wore brothel-creepers.”
Jessica tried to slow him, to get him to explain, stopping him amid the bustle of the London streetcorner, asking, “ 'Brothel-creepers'? Copperwaite?”
“Sorry, they're crepe-soled suede shoes. No bubble or squeak to them. How to blindside a fellow inspector, all that, and when I think of how much I've taught that young pup…”
“Whatever did he do?”
“I have it on good authority that he's buttered his eggs with that bumble!”
“Bumble? Buttered eggs?”
“Bureaucrat, Boulte. They're having crumpets and tea together, and have been regularly. His put-downs against Boulte have been a ruse. He's been put on me from the beginning as a watchdog!”
She immediately realized that it had been Copperwaite then and not Erin Culbertson who had informed Boulte of their affair. “Have you talked to Copperwaite about it?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“He denies it, of course, but well, this may be a lot of bumf. but my theory is that Boulte and the public prosecutor-”
“The public prosecutor?”
“Lady you met when Boulte rammed Periwinkle and Hawkins down our collective throats.”