29

At last. A challenger.

The famed Eliot Ness was coming after him. It was flattering, really. A compliment. Cleveland was sending the best it had to offer.

A voice came to him through the bedroom door. “Sir? We have breakfast ready.”

“Thank you, ma’am. I believe I will be going out this morning.”

There was a brief silence. Her disapproval was impossible to miss. “Will you be gone long?”

“I really don’t know.”

“You know, I’m charged with the responsibility of keeping an eye on you. Making sure you don’t have any… bad actions.”

“I assure you I will do nothing to bring shame on this lovely home, Mrs. McGovern.”

“And the drinking…?”

“I will avoid strong spirits. I have work to do.”

“Sir, I know you still drink.”

“Not to excess.”

“I’ve seen it in your room.”

“Why have you been in my room?”

“It is my charge here, sir.”

“Just a little sip now and again. Just enough to get me through the night.”

“But if you leave-”

“I will behave myself.”

A longer pause ensued. “Just as you say, sir.”

“Thank you, ma’am. You are a kind and generous woman.”

The radio report had ended, but the words still lingered in his brain even as he walked outside and headed toward Shantytown. He would have to show them that he was unafraid. And after only a few minutes in Shantytown, he believed he had spotted someone who could help him do that.

“I just thought you might need a place to spend the night, my dear.”

“ Harvey said-”

“Do you want to sleep in a cardboard box?”

“No, but the choices-”

“That man will be pawing at you. Trying to compromise your virtue.”

Her head hung low. “I know.”

“I’m offering you something better.”

“Why?”

“Because I care about you.”

She laughed, much too loudly. Too boisterously. “You don’t even know me.”

“I know more than you can imagine. I think I know everything that matters. Did you know my girl Flo?”

“Flo Polillo? Course I did. Everyone knew Flo.”

“She was a friend.”

“Did you hear what happened to her?”

“Yes.”

“Horrible.”

“Indeed.”

“Being all cut up like that.”

“Disgraceful. Now come along, dear. I’ll take you somewhere safe.”

How much time before he would be missed? How much time to indulge himself? Was it possible to give too much time to his soul?

She was so numbed by the cold and the booze that she barely even noticed when he tied her up. She had not felt anything-until he swung the axe.

It left him feeling strangely unsatisfied.

He definitely needed a new challenge. A challenger. And now he knew who that would be.

30

Merylo slammed the man in the sailor’s cap up against the wall, hard enough to rattle the hanging pictures and knock two of them to the ground. “Do you know who I am?” he bellowed.

The sailor was taller than Merylo, bulkier, and by all appearances, stronger. And he was terrified. “Sure, mac, sure. I know who you are. Everybody knows you.”

“Who am I?”

“You’re the man. The Bulldog. The guy everybody’s talkin’ about.”

“Yeah?” Merylo tightened his grip on the man’s lapel. “And what are they saying?”

“They’re sayin’ you’re like a crazy man. Like you’re plowin’ through the docks, knockin’ heads together, mowin’ down everyone in your way.”

“They’re right,” Merylo growled. He leaned in close enough to smell the onions on the sailor’s breath. “And you’re going to be next, unless you start talking.”

“But I don’t know anything!”

Merylo slammed him against the wall again. “That’s not good enough!”

“But I don’t!”

“Who was he?”

“Who? The guy they got at the Exposition? Or the new one?”

The new one. The words echoed in Merylo’s brain so painfully he thought it might explode. “I’m talking about the head.”

“I didn’t know him.”

“Maybe you’ve seen him around?”

“No. Never.”

“Was he a sailor?”

“No. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t know him!”

Merylo twisted his fists under the man’s chin. “Then how do you know he’s not a sailor?”

“I’m just sayin’ I’ve never seen him before!”

“But you knew Andrassy!”

“I knew who he was. I didn’t know him personally, but I’ve seen him in some of the joints. Dance halls and stuff.”

“You like dance halls?”

“Sometimes. When I got shore leave.”

“The ladies like you?”

“Not like they liked Andrassy.”

“Well, this new corpse was a friend of Andrassy’s,” Merylo barked, not really knowing if it were true. “So how can you know Andrassy if you don’t know this guy?”

“I just don’t remember seein’ him, that’s all. I don’t get into Cleveland that often.”

“I got a witness says he was a sailor. He had an anchor tattooed on his arm.”

The sailor blew air through his teeth. “That don’t mean anythin’. My aunt Matilda’s got a tattoo on her arm. She’s never even been out on the lake.”

Merylo tightened his grip as much as was possible without strangling the man. “If you’re lying to me-”

“I’m not!” he insisted, his eyes wide. “I just don’t know nothin’!”

Merylo released him and he fell to the floor in a crumpled heap. “You hear anything, you call me, understand? Right away. You call me!”

“I will. I promise. I will!”

Merylo didn’t doubt it, as he watched the man scramble away on all fours. Nobody could be that good an actor. The man was scared witless. If he had known anything, he’d have spilled it.

Like everyone else Merylo had talked to since the tattooed man had been discovered.

And now they had a new corpse, the one found by Marie Barkley. The first one found on the west side. All the previous remains had been found on the east side, most of them on Kingsbury Run near Shanty-town, so he had concentrated his search on vagrants and hoboes. Andrassy and Polillo had both frequented cheap gin joints and dance halls that were little more than meeting places for shady ladies and their clients, so he’d spent weeks searching there. He’d had a lead suggesting the last one might be a sailor, so he’d spent the last three weeks pounding the docks along Lake Erie, trying to turn up someone, anyone who might know something about these crimes.

And still he had nothing. No more information than he’d had before.

And to make matters worse, the killer had moved to the nice part of town.

All the previous victims, so far as they knew, had been scum of the earth, and Merylo knew that had been to his advantage, because even though people wanted the murders stopped, no one could get that worked up about losers like Andrassy and Polillo. But if this killer started going after decent folk, prominent citizens…

There would be hell to pay. And he’d be the one footing the bill.

He unfolded the Cleveland News tucked inside his suit coat. He hadn’t lied when he told Zalewski he didn’t read the papers. He hadn’t-in the past. But he’d had to start. He had no choice.

After the corpse had been found on the west side, the so-called Torso Killer was in the headlines again:

“Is there somewhere in Cuyahoga County a madman whose god is the guillotine?

Or is he a cool and calculating killer who decapitates his victims with the skill of a physician?

Does he dissect his victims in some grisly workshop, carrying them to the isolated sections of the county where they are found?

Or does he lure them to the outdoor scene of the execution, acting with a deceptive charm and style?”

Merylo wadded the paper up in his hands. The fearmongering speculation went on for pages, doing its best to work readers up into a state of panic. The reasons were not hard to comprehend. They sold a lot more papers to the upscale folks on the west side than the folks on the east side who were barely scraping by. Before, this story was someone else’s problem. Now it was closer to home, potentially affecting every rich daddy whose son or daughter might be walking home late one night…