Pity Him Afterwards

He had taken a shower. Last night he’d come home drunk with the others, and instead of going straight to bed he’d taken a quick shower, but he’d been so drunk he’d stepped under the water without taking his clothes off first. Then he’d taken them all off. It was as simple as that.

That would cover the rest of the clothing, too. The shirt and underwear and socks stuffed still damp into his laundry bag. The damp trousers hanging way back in the corner of the closet. None of the clothing had any obvious bloodstains, so they would have to accept his explanation. And there were plenty of people to testify that they’d all drunk too much last night.

So much for the search. There was nothing to find but some wet clothes, and Sondgard/Chax probably wouldn’t even notice them, and even if he did the madman had a sensible explanation for them, so the search wouldn’t be so terrible after all. Sondgard/Chax would just be wasting his time and his energy, that’s all.

But then there was the fingerprint. Now that wasn’t clever. He hadn’t thought about fingerprints at all, either time. Of course, Sondgard/Chax had admitted there was a chance the fingerprint wouldn’t be any good, but it was a small chance.

The business about the fingerprint was stupid. It was not clever. Not in any way. There hadn’t been any reason to write that note on the mirror; at this point he could hardly remember why he had wanted to do it at the time. And it had just been foolish not to remember fingerprints. There were so many things he’d forgotten, that he had once known, long ago, before the asylum. He had to be so careful, while he was relearning.

But what to do about the fingerprint? Surely they were watching the house, so it wouldn’t be either clever or safe to try to run away now. If there was any way to change his fingerprints between now and three o’clock this afternoon, he didn’t know about it.

A nine-to-one chance. That’s what Sondgard/Chax had said.

But was that right? Maybe it wasn’t a nine-to-one chance. Maybe it was a one-to-one chance. Maybe Sondgard was just hoping the fingerprint would be good, and was trying to bluff the madman into running away.

Why else would he be searching? If he had a nine-to-one chance, would he waste so much time and energy searching?

He’d admitted, admitted, that they couldn’t be sure about the fingerprint until they got the enlargement. So how did he know it was a nine-to-one chance?

It didn’t matter. The only thing to do was hope. Hope Sondgard/Chax had the odds wrong, and then hope the odds turned out not to favor all the Doctors Chax. It was the only way to handle this threat; wait to see if it turned out to be a real threat. Make no move at all before three o’clock. But if the men from the state capital did come at three o’clock, and did start taking everybody’s fingerprints, then that would mean the enlargement had turned out good, and then the madman would see to it that he escaped before his own fingerprints were taken. There would be a lot of milling around when the state men came, a lot of inevitable confusion. He could go out a side window, from the second floor, land on the dirt below, and get away.

So that took care of the second. The search, no real problem. The fingerprint, wait and see. But there still remained a third thing to think about, and that was the most dangerous of all.

Bobby did it.

Who had written that? Who had come downstairs after he had gone to bed, and written that in the jam he’d smeared on the table? Who in this group knew his secrets? Somebody, somebody. Somebody knew he was the one who had killed them; and somebody the same somebody the same sneaking somebody somebody knew his real name!

Was it possible? He didn’t know any of these people, he’d never met any of them before Wednesday, so how could one of them know so much about him?

He hadn’t written those words himself, he couldn’t have. He thought back to last night, and he could remember two times when he’d made aimless lines, scratched lines with his fingers, but he hadn’t been writing anything, not either time. Once was by the lake, just before he’d washed off the blood. And the other time was in the kitchen, after he’d smeared jam on the table. But he hadn’t written anything. There wasn’t any reason to.

(He didn’t ask himself why he’d smeared jam on the table; he didn’t think about that part of it at all.)

Somebody knew. That was the only answer. Somehow, some way, somebody knew.

But why do such a senseless thing? Either tell Sondgard/ Chax, or keep it quiet; but don’t just hint. What was the purpose?