It suddenly occurred to me that not even in the lowest, drunk-enest, ugliest locker room conversation I had ever had with anyone at any time, had I ever had a conversation like this. But then I had to ask myself: If you are innocent of atrocity, what exactly is the right way to answer when you are accused of it? If Bill would’ve thrown up at the question, would I have taken that as guilt, as remorse? If he’d laughed, would I have thought him nervous? Is there anything he could have said or any tear he could have shed that would have been innocent-seeming in the face of such guilt-loaded inquiry?
Perversely, my mother used to ask me what I’d say at her funeral, what sort of wonderful eulogy I would give, this “gifted” writer son of hers.
Of course, I was appalled at the question, appalled and terrified. I did not want to contemplate her mortality in any context. I told her that there was nothing I could say, that mere words could not capture her or the depth of my feelings for her, so her funeral would be the one time I would be tongue-tied, with a case of writer’s block that could not be moved.
She seemed not to understand.
What I meant but could not express was that I would not use my talent and my heart to affirm her death. If I did not acknowledge it, if her death did not just pass like another sunrise and sunset, then it would be like it had not happened. And, if I told her in advance that I could not eulogize her, then maybe she would keep herself from dying. Of course, while she was alive I could not tell her that I was really insolently refusing to do what she’d asked of me, so I couched it as an impossibility, but promised to do the impossible nonetheless.
After all, she wasn’t asking, she was expecting, commanding. So, when the time for her funeral was actually at hand, I knew I would have to say something; and I got up and made a fool of myself, saying that I could say nothing, saying that her life and her death were utterly personal to me and incapable of being shared, not that anyone understood a syllable I uttered as I sobbed away, completely distraught.
Later, I felt I’d done what I’d told my mother I would do, but nonetheless I had let her and myself down. I accepted the obvious—she was gone—and so I wrote poetry about her and to her, etched eternally on her gravestone in iambic hexameter. I did the same for my brother.
Yet, I still cringe when I remember her asking me what I’d say at her funeral. What should I have answered? It wasn’t just that she was putting me in an emotionally impossible position; it was that she made me feel terribly guilty. I was responsible for her death even before I killed her.
“Bill, say something innocent,” I suggested.
“I am innocent,” he said.
How come I felt guilty and this convicted serial killer did not?
“Any idea why someone would cut off these women’s right breasts?”
“Nope.”
“No image comes to mind? No painting or story, some myth, anything?”
“Nope.” Then Bill Suff cleared his throat, and: “But I do have a phobia about anyone putting needles, hypodermics, in my left arm—I tell you that?”
“This is the first time. Go on.”
“That’s all there is to it—I won’t let ‘em give me a shot or take blood out of my left arm.”
“Why is that?”
“I have no idea. But it’s for as long as I can remember.”
“Anyone ever intentionally hurt your left arm? Anyone ever break it or burn it? Your mother or your father ever twist it, abuse it?”
“Not so’s I remember—no.”
“That’s a weird deal.”
“I agree. But it is my left arm and hand that were hurt in my motorcycle wreck. Were you aware I’ve got no strength, no good grip in my left hand?”
“Not enough to strangle anyone with?”
“Wouldn’t know—never strangled anybody.”
“Then… would you be willing to be hypnotized to find out what this left arm business is all about?”
“Sure. Maybe,”
The human body talks to its owner. Emotional memories become visceral sense memories. My left eye twitched because it contained the emotional “data file” of the accident that killed my mother and brother. That eye had been fractured during the accident. Bill’s left arm knows why he kills. Something happened to that left arm, or maybe it’s just the killing arm. Maybe the phobic fear is that sticking a needle in that left arm will cause the truth to leak out. I don’t think Bill’s left arm has anything to do with severed right breasts other than, when you’re facing a body straight-on and cutting with your right hand because your left hand is weak, then it’s easier to remove a right breast than a left. If you’re trying to excise the left breast, you have to twist your wrist down and then back up at a tough angle under the armpit, so you can’t make a clean cut. But, a right breast you can just slice from right to left and down—piece of cake.
Never forget the practical aspects of a serial killer’s pattern— it’s not always so mysterious and psychologically deep. Killing is more often than not triggered by external stress—problems on the job or problems at home. Bill’s killings escalated as soon as Cheryl got pregnant—a problem pregnancy that sent her first to bed and then to the hospital and otherwise made her unavailable for and inattentive to Bill. The details of the killings are influenced by the same sort of stressors. Cathy McDonald died because of the threat and challenge of the profile. Her breast was removed because it seemed like a good idea at the time and because the killer was enjoying his surgical brilliance with the knife in her vagina, neck, and chest—he was on a roll, and he kept on going, hand steady, technique improved from before, no people or cars around, nothing to impinge as he took his time to do whatever came to mind. Cathy wasn’t hacked at; she was quite professionally operated on and then “dressed”.
In all the other cases, the severed breasts were found nearby. In Cathy McDonald’s case, the missing breast was never found.
Forensic experts, biologists, naturalists, and anyone who knew anything were all called in to comb the area in the hope of finding animal tracks, droppings, blood or tissue from the breast, or any other evidence to show what had become of it. Everyone wanted desperately to find the breast because it was the killer’s pattern to leave it, and no one wanted to believe that perhaps this one murder had been committed by some not-quite-accurate copycat.
However, the only thing proved beyond a shadow of a doubt was that the Killer took the breast away with him.
Why?
On September 14, 1991, Bill Suff took his simmering “sweet chili” off the stove and served it at the Riverside County Employees’ Annual Picnic and Cook-off. By acclamation, Bill’s recipe won “best chili” and “best overall dish”—he was the grand prizewinner and he couldn’t have been prouder. His picture appeared in all the local papers. He was a celebrity. His chili had been sampled by stock boys and supply clerks and truck drivers and jail guards and police detectives and their wives and children. In the midst of the Riverside Prostitute Killer’s terror, the picnic was a way for the county to pull together and enjoy high spirits that would momentarily lift the pall. Members of the task force cruised in to enjoy the food and drink as they changed shifts.