Ten Plagues

“Caldwell is losing it. Look at the painting.” O’Shea held up photos of the dress that had been found on Melody. “Remember how carefully he painted Juanita’s shroud? And the work on the first two signs was meticulous.” O’Shea held up the sign from Keren’s apartment. “This one that arrived with Hardcastle is sloppy.”

“It looks like he carved it out in a few minutes. He didn’t bother to sand or varnish the wood,” Paul noticed.

“I’d say our killer is spinning out of control.” Keren ran her hand over the splintered wood.

“Which should make him careless and easier to catch,” Dr. Schaefer added. “I’ve got to get back to work.”

“You can see the deterioration of his mental state in this work.” O’Shea gestured with the eight-by-ten picture of the dress. “The drawing of Pharaoh isn’t nearly as realistic. I wouldn’t even think it was a pharaoh, if I hadn’t seen the earlier paintings.”

Jabbing a blunt finger at the dots at the bottom of the picture, he added, “And these aren’t identifiable as gnats. I mean, I don’t know how he’d do that, but he managed to depict exactly what he wanted with the other paintings.”

Paul said, “Pestis ex culex. The plagues must have some special meaning to him. Why hasn’t the profiler come up with something?”

“I think they’ve quit involving Dyson since they got a name.”

“Well then, why don’t they send him back to DC?” Paul muttered. “That guy is weird.”

“Caldwell is falling apart.” Keren stepped back from the table.

“I’ll do the Hardcastle autopsy first thing in the morning,” Dr. Schaefer informed them. “But my preliminary examination tells me victim number four died more like Juanita. He took her alive. My staff has done a species examination of the frogs, gnats, and flies. They’ve come up with supply houses and websites that sell things like these in quantity. Here’s a copy of the suppliers.”

“Great, we can get a court order and have a look at their customer lists.” O’Shea nodded with satisfaction.

Keren glanced at Paul. “What’s the next one?”

He didn’t miss a beat. “Pestis ex bestia.”

O’Shea snagged the list of Internet sites that dealt in bugs and frogs. “I can’t keep track. What is bestia?”

“Beasts or animals.” Paul reached for the exit door and stopped. “The plague of animals.”

“So he’s going to turn loose a herd of sheep in O’Shea’s house?” Keren asked scathingly.

O’Shea’s face turned ice cold. “I need to call my wife.” He opened his phone and walked a few steps away.

Keren tried to think of anyone else who would need to be warned. Her family wasn’t around Chicago.

“She’s going to stay with her sister in St. Louis for a while.” O’Shea’s voice was impassive, but he clicked his phone shut with undue force. “Now what about the plague of beasts?”

Keren wanted to tell O’Shea how sorry she was for the whole mess, even though it wasn’t her fault. But O’Shea’s expression didn’t invite comment.

Paul must have gotten that, too, because he went on. “Actually, the plague of beasts was a little different. Up until then, all the plagues had been some sort of blight. Blood made the water undrinkable. Frogs covered the land, and they crawled into beds and into the food. The gnats and flies made the air impossible to breathe. But the plague of beasts was about hurting the animals. Of course, that hurt the Egyptians by extension. But Caldwell might not be setting loose a herd of sheep so much as killing a bunch of animals, and his next victim along with them.”

“Where do you find a flock of sheep in Chicago?” Keren wondered.

“Or any animals.” O’Shea handed the pictures to Keren and she took them, annoyed that because of her purse she ended up being a pack mule. There was a kind of animal.

“Mounted police, maybe?” Keren tried to think of different kinds of animals that might be in danger. “Horses? A stable?”

“Could he be planning some kind of attack on a zoo?” O’Shea wondered.

“Zoos are sewn up pretty tight,” Keren said. “So far, he hasn’t done any high-tech breaking and entering.”

“He got into your apartment,” Paul reminded her.

“Yeah, but it looks like he used a sledgehammer on my patio door.”

“That’s low tech,” O’Shea agreed.

“He got into your apartment, too, Paul,” Keren pointed out. “And the lock wasn’t broken.”

“Yeah, but the mission is wide open. I don’t lock my door.”

“You don’t lock your doors?” O’Shea exploded. “What kind of dumb thing is that to do?”

“I’ve got nothing anybody wants.” Paul shrugged. “My furniture comes from donations. If someone needs my old couch enough to steal it from the fourth floor, then they’re welcome to it. I’ll just get another one from our used-furniture storehouse.”

“What about stealing your life? You’ve got enemies,” Keren warned. “Even before this nightmare, Carlo and a host of others weren’t overly fond of you.”

“ ‘The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear?’“ Paul quoted.

“ ‘Don’t help a good boy go bad,’“ O’Shea tossed back, quoting from an old television commercial.

“Mine’s from the Bible, yours is from TV.”