Not that the tabloids weren’t doing their best to make the murders sound as sexy as possible. The first thing they did was suggest that the Glock Murders were in fact serial murders, and then they quoted various FBI profile statistics common to most serial murders.
Never mind that until the murder of the priest last night, there had been only three killings…
(A serial killer is someone who usually kills more than five people.)
Never mind that the now-four murders had been committed in the relatively short space of six days…
(A serial killer usually slays over a longer period of time, sometimes even months or years, allowing a so-called cooling-off period between each murder.)
Never mind that the victims here were a mixed bag: a blind musician, a cosmetics saleswoman cum dope dealer, a university professor, and now a priest.
(A serial killer’s victims are usually of the same type - prostitutes, hitchhikers, postal employees, what have you, but always easily categorized.)
Never mind that all the victims here were shot in the face at close range with an automatic pistol.
(Most serial murders are committed by strangulation, suffocation, or stabbing.)
One of the tabloids suggested that the serial killer here was trying to obliterate his victims’ faces, a supposition with which a PD profiler actually agreed. All of the tabloids agreed that the primary motive of a serial killer was sexual, whether or not any sex had actually taken place before or after the murder. They also agreed that most serial killers were white males between the ages of twenty and thirty, which description fit half the stockbrokers downtown.
The detectives looking at all these statistics saw only two converging characteristics that might have marked their man as a serial killer: his victim’s ages and their race: they were all getting on in years, and they were all white.
It was Fat Ollie Weeks who came up with the notion that three of the murders might be simple smoke-screen murders.
‘Maybe he was only after one of them,’ he said. ‘Let’s say the priest last night, for example. Maybe the rest were just to throw us off the track. No connection at all between them.’
‘Among them,’ Willis corrected, though he had to admit Ollie might have a point here. Aware that Eileen Burke was watching him, waiting for his further response, he merely said, ‘In which case, which one?’
‘Was he really after, you mean?’
‘You kill four people, you’re really after each and every one of them,’ Parker said.
‘I’m inclined to agree,’ Byrnes said, surprising Parker. ‘A smoke screen isn’t usually this prolonged. Too much danger here of us closing in.’
‘I don’t see the danger yet,’ Eileen said. ‘We haven’t found any connection, so maybe Ollie’s right.’
‘In which case, which one was he really after?’ Willis insisted. ‘Who was the real victim?’
‘Far as I’m concerned,’ Byrnes said, ‘they’re all real victims, and he was after each and every one of them. Stay on all of them,’ he advised. Or warned. ‘And bring me something!’
* * * *
Parker caught up with Ollie on his way out of the squadroom, and asked how things were going with his little Latina dish.
‘Or do you plan on marrying her?’ he said. ‘Is that it, Ollie?’
‘Well, no. I mean, the subject hasn’t come up. We’ve only seen each other a few times, whattya mean marry her?’
‘Is exactly what I’m saying. But if there are no wedding bells on the horizon, then when do you plan to make your move?’
‘I don’t know what move you mean.’
‘Ho-ho, he don’t know what move I mean,’ Parker said to the air. ‘I mean getting in her pants, sir, is what I mean. When do you plan to attempt this?’
‘I didn’t make any plans for that,’ Ollie said.
‘Then start now,’ Parker said. ‘When are you seeing her again?’
‘Saturday night.’
‘Tomorrow night?’
‘No, next Saturday night.’
‘No,’ Parker said.
‘Whattya mean no? That’s when I’m seeing her. July third, next Saturday night.’
‘Wrong,’ Parker said. ‘Saturday night is wrong, July third, July whenever. She’ll know what you’re planning, she’ll…’
‘I ain’t planning nothing.’
‘She’ll think you’re planning something. Saturday night? Of course you’re planning something! She’ll be on High Alert, she’ll put up a Panty Block.’
‘A what?’
‘These Latinas, they call themselves, they know all kinds of ways to cut off a man’s dick and sell it to a cuchi frito joint. It’s called a Panty Block. If she suspects for a single minute what you’re planning…”
‘But I’m not…”
‘… she’ll throw up a Panty Block like you never saw in your life. Here’s what you gotta do,’ Parker said. ‘If you wanna get in this girl’s pants, you first gotta create an ambulance.’
‘A what?’ Ollie said.
‘An ambulance. In French, that means like a setting.’
‘I always thought an ambulance
‘Yeah, I know, but the French are peculiar. To them, ambulance means lighting, music, mood, the whole setting. Ambulance, is what they call it. They know about such things, the French. Saturday night is out. Any Saturday night. What’d you plan to do that Saturday night?’
‘I told her to come over around seven. I told her I’d cook dinner for her.’
‘Oh boy! High Alert at once! Panty Block, Panty Block!’ Parker said, and threw up his hands in alarm. ‘You want my advice?’
‘Well…’
‘Call her, tell her you want to change it to brunch. Tell her to come over for a nice Sunday brunch. Eleven o’clock Sunday.’
‘That’s the Fourth of July.’
‘Good, that’s a good American holiday, these Latina girls like to think they’re American. Tell her you’ll make pancakes. Pancakes are very American, very innocent. Tell her to dress casual. Blue jeans, if she likes. Most of these Latina girls don’t wear pants under their jeans, you’re already halfway home.’
‘Well, I’m not sure I want to trick her that way…”
‘What trick? You’re creating a safe ambulance is all. Nice Sunday morning brunch, the Fourth of July, who could suspect Wee Willie is lurking in the bushes?’
‘It ain’t so wee.’
‘That’s just an expression. No one’s disparaging your package.’
‘Just so you know.’
‘Call her. Change it to brunch.’
‘You think?’
‘Am I talking to the wall here?’ Parker said. ‘Call her!’
* * * *
Dr. Angelo Babbio was the head of the Visual Impairment Services Team at the Veterans Administration Medical Center. He told them that before the Iraq War began, a survey here at VAMC estimated that the number of legally blind veterans in America would increase by 37 percent, from 108,122 in 1995 to 147,864 in 2010.
‘That was before we started getting the figures from Iraq,’ he said.
‘Do your records go back to the Vietnam War?’ Carella asked.