“I’m looking for a set of twins. Teenagers. A boy and a girl.”
“What’d they do?” she asked, sensing he was either a cop or a private investigator.
“Plenty! We’re talkin’ one bad pair.”
“It’s them drugs, ya know. It’s all the rage, now. Teenagers, huh? How old?”
“Sixteen or so.”
“Well, I dunno if it’d help any, but a number of years back, maybe ten, there was a seta twins down here that fit that bill.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Two blond kids. A boy and a girl, like you said. Spittin’ images. They lived on the Indian reservation. Cute little buggers, they were.”
“You sure they lived on the reservation?”
“Sure as there’re carrots in the stew.”
Chapter 34
“Why’d you lie?” Driscoll asked, his eyes boring into Taniqua’s.
The woman’s face flooded with color. With a long exhalation, Taniqua surrendered to the inevitable.
“I’ll tell you what you came to hear,” she sighed. “Please, sit.” Taniqua squatted on a prayer mat and faced Driscoll. “My mother was loved as a midwife. To her, every birth was special. To the tribe, she was its shaman. She talked to the spirits and they answered her. The mother of the twins you’re looking for was a white woman, a drifter, who had come knocking on my mother’s door, wanting an abortion. Said she was pregnant and that her brother had raped her. But the woman was near full-term, so my mother delivered the twins.”
“Why’d you hold that back?”
“My mother didn’t want to involve herself, or the tribe, in a white man’s investigation of a rape. She assisted in the births and made no record of them. I lied because I didn’t want to disgrace my mother.”
Fair enough, Driscoll thought. “What became of the woman?”
“She disappeared after the babies were born.”
“And the twins?”
“The birth of a set of twins to a Catawba tribe is considered an omen of good fortune, so my mother felt honored to raise them herself. But when they were going on seven, the woman returned for them. Said she and her brother were heading up north and had plans for the twins.”
“What can you tell me about this woman and her brother?”
“Not much. I only saw the woman.”
“Get a name?”
“No.”
“What’d she look like?
“A very white woman. Blond hair. About my height. It was a long time ago.”
“Was that the last time anyone heard from the twins?”
His question went unanswered. Not certain if he had been heard, Driscoll asked it again.
“Was that the last time-”
“It was,” said Taniqua, sharply.
But something was astir in Taniqua’s eyes. Driscoll waited.
“They’ve been sending me things.”
“Things?” He felt a rush of adrenalin.
The woman’s eyes locked onto Driscoll’s as if seeking escape.
“Wait here.” She stood up and disappeared into another room. When she returned, Driscoll’s eyes widened at the sight of what she was holding in her hands. “I don’t know what they mean.” She handed her oddities to Driscoll.
The Lieutenant thought he had seen every butchery of the human body imaginable. But what he was now holding in his hands filled him with an unfamiliar mix of repugnancy and awe. He had located the scalps. Each had been stretched to fit a five-inch wooden hoop. The hair had been combed and their undersides had been scraped of all flesh. What was tattooed in their centers was a puzzlement.
Driscoll didn’t know what to make of it. The zagging lines were sky blue. “Native American?” he asked.
“No,” said Taniqua.
“Would it have been the custom to mark scalps like this years ago?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Why would they be sending them to you?”
“I don’t know that, either. They came about a week apart in a padded envelope. ‘Angus and Cassie’ was the only thing written as a return address.”
“Did you keep the envelopes?”
“No.”
“Remember anything about the postmark? The city, maybe?”
She shook her head. “They’re in trouble, aren’t they?”
Driscoll didn’t answer. “Are there any pictures of the twins?”
“There were. But they were burned with my mother and buried along with her ashes.”
“All of them?”
“No,” she said, sheepishly. She stood and disappeared again. When she returned, she produced a tattered black-and-white photo and handed it to Driscoll. “I keep it under my pillow.”
There, captured in Kodak clarity, were the full figures of the pair as five-year-olds, standing side by side, holding a makeshift poster. It read: HAMESA RE YI HATCU.
Driscoll looked to Taniqua.
“It means, ‘We Love You, Sis.’” She paused. “You’re not from an adoption agency, are you?”
Driscoll smiled sympathetically, and the woman began to cry.
Chapter 35
Driscoll was anxious to decipher the meaning of the scalps’ tattoos. He regretted not packing a laptop because his accommodations at the Sugar Grove Inn included access to the Internet.
Time to update Margaret. He punched in her number on his cell.
“How’re things at Teepee Junction?” she asked.
“Didn’t walk away with Tonto’s autograph but we’ve got a positive ID on our twin killers and a dated photo to go with it. Number four on Cedric’s list, Angus and Cassie Claxonn, have been mailing the scalps to an Indian woman on the reservation. I’m bringing them back with me. They hold a secret of their own.”
“A secret?”
“Each one’s been tattooed with a symbol of some kind.”
“Native American?”
“That’d be too easy. I’m hoping the Internet will help me interpret their meaning. Where are we in finding a parallel between the victims?”
“There’s very little listed anywhere on Shewster’s daughter aside from her G-rated escapades with the highbrow socialites she ran with.”
“Doubt there’d be a record of anything out of character had she been raised from the dead! Big money hides secrets.”
“Tell that to the parents of Paris Hilton. We’ve got calls in to Interpol on the other vics from China, Japan, Germany, and Italy. They are all member countries. We’re waiting to hear back.”
“Good. What I want you to do now is get the names to the media. See if anyone can help us locate these Claxonn twins. Then I want you to run a check of reported rapes in and about West Virginia that would have occurred in 1990. We’re looking especially for any involving incest.”
Incest? Margaret’s heart raced. “On it,” she said.
Call completed, Driscoll unzipped his American Tourister carry-on and began to pack. Turning on the bedside radio, he heard an evangelist’s voice: “Jesus saves! Repent you sinners! Praise the Lord, your God! The all-knowing Almighty who begs for your repentance. Turn your back, brothers and sisters on sinfulness and transgression, lest you become kindle for Satan and his disciples.”
“Praise the Lord!” echoed Driscoll as he packed the last of his attire and headed for the door.
Chapter 36
Driscoll returned from his lawyer’s office, where he had finally closed the deal on his house in Toliver’s Point. Considering where he was in the investigation, he would have postponed it, but it had already been rescheduled twice. His lawyer warned him that any further delay could affect the buyer’s closing commitment. Settling into his swivel chair, he peeled back the lid from his coffee container and logged in on the department’s IBM desktop. His eye caught sight of his likeness on page one of yesterday’s Daily News. The headline, emblazoned above his face, read: STILL THE BEST MAN FOR THE JOB??? Driscoll didn’t know why he had kept the rag, suitable now for wrapping fish. Today’s paper featured the photo of the youngsters, with CLAXONN inscribed above it. His capabilities were no longer for debate. Politically or otherwise.