THE WIND IN THE TREES by Steven Raker

The voice whispered to him from the deep as his cold eyes stared beyond the headlights into the soft night, the truck racing through the faint light of the half moon. The voice murmured to him from the center of his being and his muscles rippled beneath his skin as his body played out the images of what was to come. He slowed as he saw the opening in the forest that marked the road found several days before. Turning off the lights, he downshifted and slipped into the trees, the rutted road a dark tunnel beneath the moonlit branches and leaves.
He drove until the road dead-ended in a clearing of silver gray grass with splotches of bare earth still moist from the late afternoon shower. From the back of the truck he grabbed a can of kerosene, slung his jumper cables over his shoulder and started through the woods towards the distant field, the smell of the damp earth filling his nostrils. He moved quietly through the woods, accustomed to the darkness from youthful nights, he and his dogs hunting as ancient predators through the forests for whatever prey the night could yield.
At the edge of the field he sat against a tree, legs propped up, arms resting over his knees, watching the lights of the house in the distance through the pale fog that was forming. He noted the occasional movement of shadows across the kitchen curtain. A breeze wafted through the woods, rustling the leaves as sounds of insects in their nightly rituals floated on the shadows.
Shifting his body, he watched the two-story block house without interest, as he had done before. He strained to see the clump of bushes where he would leave the kerosene as he approached the garage shop but it was lost in the mist. Once before when he had watched he had stalked close to the house, listening to the couple talk, staying just out of the pools of light from the windows, the excitement of the hunt screaming through him, before walking silently back to the tree, trying to control his emotions.
His mind wandered, barely noting the fog muffled clink of dishes from the half-open kitchen window or the tires singing as a car passed by on Stone Bridge Road. Soon, he thought, the light would go on in the upstairs bathroom when the woman goes to take her shower and the man will take his flashlight and walk out to the garage shop to work on the chest of drawers.
He laid his head back against the rough bark, eyes staring up at the patchwork of moonlit branches. His mind went blank for a moment, coldness came over him and he shivered. All thoughts removed, he slipped down into emptiness, a void opening in his center and the voice speaking to him in the depth of his being, telling him it was time to go. Deep inside a door opened. His eyes fluttered beneath closed lids. Slowly he returned his mind and body tingling as if pricked with a thousand pins. He got up from beneath the tree, picked up the kerosene and cables and started across the field.

"That was good, as usual," Professor Fenton said, picking up the last of the dishes and carrying them to the sink. "Want me to help," he asked his wife Jean as he raised the window further to let the cool autumn air in.
"David, you'll help most if you finish the chest of drawers," she said with a laugh. "I don't want to risk any more plates to the fate of the other two."
"They jumped out of my hands," he said with a smile, "if you wouldn't buy Mexican jumping plates this wouldn't happen. I'll be working on the chest for an hour or so tonight then I'll be in." He kissed his woman's wrinkled neck beneath her gray hair, pleased with the familiar routine of their life together.
"Don't forget, we both have an early class tomorrow. Don't make it a late night. You've already have bags under your eyes and you need your sleep."
"I've had some extra work to do at the university," he said with a sigh, staring at the plate in front of him.
"When will the chest be finished?" she asked.
"Saturday at the latest. I promise," he said as he got up from his chair.
"I've got just the place for it when you're done," she said with a laugh.
He chuckled as he walked out the door. "You had just the place for it before I even got started." They had been known to bicker over the arrangement of furniture, sometimes to the point of anger and argument. There were definite ideas about how the house should present itself.
David Fenton took a breath of the crisp fall air deep in his lungs as he turned on the flashlight and started down the worn path to his workshop, the flashlight making erratic circles on the grass. A cold snap had rolled in three nights before, bringing early morning frost to the city of Stamford Hill that lay in the gently rolling land of northern Florida, just south of the Georgia border.
There was no sense bringing the wife into what was going on, he thought. Not until he had concrete proof, something he could go to the authorities with and be certain they would take action. She would want to help and there would be nothing she could do. At least Nancy had come through with the information and the drug sample, though he hated using the young woman, he had too. There was no other choice. It had taken long enough for he and Dr. Tessloff to talk her into it. Now to get the drug analyzed and decipher the coded papers. Tessloff would be down soon. Together they could chart an appropriate course of action against the monstrous thing they had found.
He unlocked the garage shop door with its four-pane window and walked to the chest of drawers in the middle of the cluttered room. Woodworking always gave him a much-needed escape and cleared his head. He turned on the radio and moved the dial until he found a station that played the old tunes and raised the volume a bit. Some of the old music still brought back memories that made him smile. Rummaging in the toolbox he found the right grain of sandpaper he was looking for. He ran his hand over the chest, relishing the grain of the wood, enjoying the aroma from the stacks of fine wood along the wall. He began working the top of the chest, lost in thought.
A rapping at the windowpane startled him. He walked to the door without opening it, seeing the window filled with a large body with a gaunt angular face that hung over a protruding Adams apple.
"Can I help you?" David asked, a note of caution in his voice as the man put his hand on the jumper cables slung over his shoulder.
"I'm sorry to bother you, sir," he said, a note of respect and deference in his deep voice, "but I was looking at property for sale down the road and my battery's gone dead. I tried to flag someone down but I just couldn't get no one to stop. Stood there with my hood up and my cables in my hand and they just passed me by. Guess they don't want to help after dark nowadays. With all the crime and all. Cant say as I blame em. I live right here in Stamford Hill. I'd be willing to pay, he said, his deep-set eyes pleading beneath bushy brows.
David thought for a second then opened the door. "I can give you a jump," he said, looking at the sad eyes, his apprehension gone. "Don't worry about the money. How far away are you?"
"Not far at all. Bout two, maybe three hundred yards," the man said, fighting for control of his body, the muscles beneath his mournful mask struggling to hold back the truth a little longer, to enjoy the prey before the explosion.
He stepped into the shop and they introduced themselves, shaking hands. The old mans hand felt thin and puny and he knew he could rip the arm from the socket with one screaming twist. Rip it out and hold it in front of the gray haired man so that he would see what his rage could do before death swept him from the earth. The man complimented David sincerely on the chest of drawers; he had been a carpenter all his life and knew how much work had gone into the chest. He didn't think he could match such fine work. David Fenton swelled a bit from the flattery from one in the profession.
"I appreciate your help, Professor. I hate to be bothering you like this but I imagine my wife is gonna start to wonder where I am," he said, almost choking as he fought to hold back the rage that strained at the walls of his being.
"I can call her from the house and let her know if you like," David said, putting the sandpaper back into the toolbox.
"I don't think she'll be worrying unless I'm really late. Besides, she's been after me to change that battery. No sense causing troubles where there dont need to be none," he said with a hearty laugh. He could feel the rage scurrying inside and he fought for control as David laughed and closed his toolbox.
In an instant the mans face transformed as the dam broke. His rage howled into the world. The huge fist slammed into David's jaw, teeth slicing into fingers as Davids mouth collapsed under the blow. The struggle of life and death began.
With a growl the man grabbed David by the collar, slinging him hard against the table, drawing his face close so the old man could smell the animal and see death coming. David clawed at him, terrified fingers raking down the side of the animal's head, fighting for life.
With a grunt, he hit the professor in the face, the slap of his fist like an oar slapping the water. Grabbing David by the collar he rammed his knee up into the groin, the old body doubling over in agony. A low, gurgling moan erupted from David's bloody mouth. Seizing the shirt the man slammed the frail body back against the workbench, the spinal column snapping from the brute force of the impact. The limp body began to collapse toward the floor and with a snarl he seized the gray head by the hair with both hands and hurled it against the corner of the table, then slammed it again with even more force.
He let go and David Fenton slid to the concrete floor, lying still, blood soaking into the fresh sawdust by the table. Kneeling over the body he gathered the head in his hands and with a quick jerk twisted the head with all his might, a sharp crack splitting the air.
With one hand he dragged the body to the vise and propped the professor beneath it, holding the body up as he twirled the heavy steel jaws open. Putting the index fingers together, he pulled them up into the vise and spun the jaws closed, using his full weight for the final turn, crushing the bones flat between steel jaws.
His body tingling with the kill, he stood for a minute, looking at the lifeless form. Excitement pounded through his veins. Looking down at the body of David Fenton, fingers pointing at odd angles to the heavens, he smiled. Then he took out his handkerchief and carefully wiped the vise and the doorknob.
"Good night Professor Fenton," he said to the lifeless body as he picked up the flashlight, turned out the light and quietly closed the door. He stood in the moonlight for a moment, a bone-deep feeling of peace and pleasure washing through him, almost buckling at the knees from its force. He steadied himself against the wall with one hand. His body quivered as an ecstasy more powerful than orgasm cascaded through him and took him close to the point of pain, almost into delirium. Slowly it subsided, his breathing began again and he returned to the world in satisfaction.
He felt something moving inside him and he knew the emptiness was coming as a coldness came over him. He gazed unseeing at the field as the void opened inside him and he willingly slid down into its waiting arms, into the state of peace and grace where the voice muttered to him what must be done. He stood in the darkness and looked up at the bathroom window, straining to hear the sound of the shower on the womans naked body. Retrieving the can of kerosene he clicked on the flashlight and headed toward the porch, walking beside the well worn path, the light making lazy circles in front of him.
Inside, he rummaged through the refrigerator until he found what he was looking for putting a small bottle in his pocket. He could feel the tingling racing over his body again and his senses longed for the kill. He slipped an engraved carving knife from the rack above the counter and moved through the darkened house to the staircase. He stood for a moment at the foot of the stairs and listened, looking up at the second floor, illuminated by the upstairs hall light. She hadn't started her shower yet. She always took a long time in the bathroom. Typical woman. He lay the knife down on the first step and looked up the staircase. The voice whispered to him. Today is a day of vengeance. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life, a rape for a rape. He quickly stripped off his boots and his clothes then picked the knife up and smiled as he heard the faint sound of the toilet flushing. A moment later the soft, faint hiss of the shower fell through the shadows on the staircase and a smile came to his face.
She would scream. She would scream when she saw his rage had cornered her and she knew she was going to die. Perhaps she would fight. That would please him deeply. That would bring the frenzy and his vengeance would be complete. His mind a white-hot fire, his body tingling and growing erect, he walked softly up the stairs and opened the bathroom door.

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Chapter 2

Detective Charley Dimarco poured the last of the coffee into his cup and looked around the counter for the spoon. The spoon was gone again. Why couldn't you keep a spoon next to a coffeepot in a police station? It was such a simple procedure. Pick up the spoon and put the sugar in, stir your coffee, put the spoon down. Go to your desk, get to work, do you job. Charley picked up the jar and carefully poured some sugar into the steaming brew and stirred it with his pen. He rubbed the pain in his lower back, stretched as much as he dared, picked up his coffee and ambled back to his third floor cubicle wondering if the lid to his cup had gone the way of the spoon for the sugar. Disappeared into the private collection of some cop who collected things that didnt belong to them. He chuckled as he remembered the first time something of his had disappeared in a police station and the anger he had felt as a young officer. Now he was thankful just to have the cup.
He was a man with a belly but his large frame and broad shoulders carried the weight well. There was a face of ruddy, faintly sagging flesh topped by thick salt and pepper hair. Thick, solid arms ended in broad hands that were not afraid of a fight. Violence was one of his tools of his trade, to be used if the situation demanded it and he prided himself on settling such an issue quickly.
In his early days he had loved the action of the street and quickly earned the nickname Thumper for his habit of thumping suspects in various ways to achieve a desired result. He would thump on the nose with his finger to increase attention span and assist in the flow of information, on the head or knee with the stick when it was a serious case of inattentiveness or attitude. The "Whole Body Thump" was done against the nearest surface be it wall, car or pavement. The whole body thump was most often used on those who had made crime a profession or resisting arrest a chosen activity. No one who had resisted arrest by Thumper wanted to be caught by him a second time. Thumper had a long memory.
He sat in his chair, tilted back and took a sip of coffee staring through the full-length window at the traffic below. The detectives room was almost silent now, one vice officer slapping away at her computer in the early evening recording the varied lusts of humanity. Megan wouldnt be home for another half and hour from her classes for her Bachelors degree in business and he no longer enjoyed the house when it was empty. With Susan attending Stamford Hill University and living near the campus and Michael in the Army the house seemed empty and deserted. He rarely went home to an empty house now, preferring to work on the seven open homicide cases or tackle the never ending paper work that flowed across his desk and threatened to engulf him. There had been a short time when he enjoyed having the house to himself in the evenings but that time was gone. It was just an empty house now. He was better off with the paperwork.
Management man, a detective said giving him the thumbs up as he passed, dont forget the soldiers in the field.
Never happen, Charlie said with a smile. He watched with a touch of sadness as the officer went out the door. The realization that it was time to move on had been some time in coming, creeping up on him slowly, its truth growing until one day his gut told him that it was time for another of lifes changes. He had finally spoken to Chief Hayes after finally accepting that his body just didn't move like it used to and it wasn't just the extra weight he carried on his stomach or the back getting worse. His strength was gradually leaving him and he was going down a gentle slope that he knew would come but the knowledge did not make the coming any easier. And he was becoming just a little too . . . too what? Tired? Cold? Hard? He still couldn't put his finger on it, couldn't put into words exactly what was happening in him, but it was happening, there could be no doubt about that. He had made the decision and made peace with the decision. He had spent his time on the streets and done his job to the best of his ability. He had seen enough.
There had been one shooting of a killer who had gone for a gun during his arrest and almost got a shot off. Charley had tried his best to kill him but the two rounds went to the left of the heart, one of them severing the spinal column. The rapist died at the hospital entrance and was brought back to life by the doctors much to Charlies chagrin. The man was paralyzed from the waist down and still working on his thirty-year sentence. True justice.
He gazed out the window. The old war-horse that was Charlie Dimarco would be coming off the streets soon and moving into administration and he knew he would miss the action. It will be paperwork and politics. Paperwork and bullshit, he thought, correcting himself with a laugh, there will be plenty of that, but it's definitely time to move up. It would be more money to throw at the retirement account, he thought and Megan had been waiting impatiently for the day he would move up the ladder. No more late nights and foul moods when cases followed him home and twisted around him until he could think of nothing else. He had done his time on the streets and it was the time in life to take the next step to a more financially rewarding position. Time to put a little distance between him and the scum that he had to deal with. He would still hunt the killers, he would just do it by managing the forces that brought them to justice.
He picked up the case of a twenty-two year old male homicide and looked over the information again, remembering the emotional interviews with the devastated family and friends. Drugs again, most likely. The young man was gunned down at his front door in a rough neighborhood known for drug dealing, prostitution and violence. He drove a Corvette on a construction workers pay, no financial help from his family, no inheritance or recent recorded payments of any kind except his paycheck.
He put the case aside for a moment and sat looking out over the room, his mind drifting back through the cases that had come into his life. Through the drudgery of long days, late nights and endless cases, there had been few who had thanked him with a phone call or even a letter for catching their loved ones killer. He understood. In the beginning they could only feel their grief and loss. For those cases where there was an arrest, sitting through the trial with the killer in the same room, they could only think of a guilty verdict and when it was over and they had their verdict they wanted to finish their tears, heal their wounds and carry their memories close.
If there was a guilty verdict. There were two killers who had walked and the not guilty verdicts had ripped into him almost as hard as it had the families of the victims. He was thankful that he wasnt allowed in the courtroom where he would have to look the survivors in the face and see their torment.
There was one old man who came some distance to thank him in person. A widower farmer who had lost his only son to a car jacking. He had driven two hundred and fifty miles to meet Charley and thank him. He had come at the end of the day because, as he told Charley, he knew the detective would be busy and he didnt want to take him away from his work. No, he sure didn't want to do that. He had just come to say thank you to the man who had caught his son's killer and put him in prison for life, a sentence that pleased neither of them. They had talked outside the police station in the lengthening shadows, the old man telling him about his boy and who he had been, the things that he had done, the things he was gonna do. His suffering was still very much with him. The world didnt even blink, the old man had said, staring into the distance, but at least the bastard is in prison where he wont kill nobody but his own kind.
The white haired gentleman had apologized again for taking up the detectives time and said he had to be getting along. When Charley shook his hand and looked into his eyes he could see the torment and loss in the depths of the old man's spirit. But he saw something else too. He saw a tiny victory that he had brought about. There was a bond between a homicide detective and the family he brought justice to. It might not be a bond that was expressed very often but it was there for him. It was his job, his duty and his chosen profession to bring them their victory, small and unjust as it may be compared to their loss. He had done it from the streets and he would continue to do it from a desk or a teaching position and he knew he would somehow be involved in it to the end of his days. He pulled himself out of his thoughts and picked up the construction workers case and began to reread the file. He heard Chief Hays door slam and when their eyes met he knew what it was. "Charley, you've got this one. Sorry, but I've got to have you on this. It's a double murder and arson, two professors from Stamford Hill University. Got a call from the fire department answering an automatic alarm. Two bodies. Crime scene is being secured, one body is partially burned. Don't worry, we'll get you into administration yet," the Chief said, patting him on his broad back.
"Haven't I heard that somewhere before," Charley said with a laugh.
"I promise. It's just going to take a while. I'm assigning Big Jim McKenna with you on this one, you've worked with him before. I need two old pros on this one. Youre lead man. He'll still keep most of his case load." Chief Hayes glanced at his watch. "I want you full time on this. Give the construction worker to Johnson and I'll spread your load around. I'm late for a city council meeting. I'll get out to the crime scene as soon as it's over," Chief Hayes said and then he was gone.
After sixteen years in homicide, Charley thought, one more case wouldn't make any difference. He would give himself wholeheartedly to the case as usual. Charley picked up the phone and had dispatch call the forensics team at their homes then put in a call for an illumination trailer to be sent to the crime scene.

Charley stood in the smoke blackened living room with Big Jim McKenna, puddles of water forming around their shoes from the soaked carpet, their flashlight playing over the scorched walls and charred, dripping furniture. Where the fire had burned through the ceiling he could see a concrete slab that had saved the second floor from destruction long enough for the fire fighters to arrive. The fire department had cleared the staircase for use and the first floor for walk through. Outside the generator on the light trailer kicked on and the room was bathed in illumination. Charley watched the forensic team unloading their cameras, chemicals and fingerprint kits, none of which he thought would be of much use in a burned out building where fire fighters had plied their trade. But there might be something on the second floor. You always had to look and look good.
"You and me again, Thumper," Jim said with a wide smile, "we'll get this one the same way we got the other one." Jim had latched onto the nickname immediately upon hearing the stories about Charley. The stories were something he could relate to. It was the only way to deal with dirt. Charley had developed a good rapport with Jim from the beginning, seeing eye to eye on most things. The two of them had worked well together on a difficult case of a wife brutally drowned by her husband for the insurance, finally putting him away for life.
The two large men were about the same size though Jim worked out and didnt have the belly that Charley did. They made a good, imposing team. Jim had been with Stamford Hill for three years having served in Atlanta for most of his previous time in law enforcement. In his younger days he had garnered several medals for his service on the Atlanta SWAT team. He was always where the action was if he could get there before it was over.
Charley stepped outside and gathered his team around him noting that some of them were relatively new to their positions. "Forensics. I want a grid search of the outside tomorrow as soon as there's enough light," Charley said, "and a video of everything. Do what you can tonight with the lights but go over it again completely in daylight. Bag and tag everything that might be evidence and I mean everything. Jim, send one of the patrolman to see if there are any back roads leading to the property or any place where someone could park without being seen." Charley went through his usual checklist to make sure everyone knew what he required and sent them on their way. A radio report came in saying the station would handle the notification of the next of kin, a daughter living out of town, Charley was thankful it wouldn't be his task.
When forensics had finished their work, the two men walked through the house surveying the damage. The fire started in the den, Charley thought, analyzing the burn patterns. Burned remains of drawers and their contents were scattered about the floor where the killer had thrown them. The charred metal shell of a computer case could be seen in the area that had been consumed by the worst of the flames.
When the portable lights were turned on upstairs Charley and Jim mounted the stairway and checked the body of the woman in the smoke blackened bathroom. She lay against the side of the tub, vacant eyes staring at the wall, her plump body a mass of jagged red holes and cuts. The torn shower curtain sagged around her in mourning, trying to cover her nakedness. Blood was everywhere. Charley counted over a dozen stab wounds before he decided to let the Medical Examiner do the math. He stood over the old woman's body for a moment, wanting desperately to cover her with the flowered curtain, knowing that he couldn't until her naked death had been video taped for the file. With a sigh he knelt down and closed the eyelids of another of the endless march of bodies. He stood up and checked to make sure forensics would get all the tissue samples from under the woman's fingernails, as the ambulance crew brought the gurney noisly up the stairway.
Lets see the other one, Charley said to Jim with a sigh as the video rolled and recorded the woman in her tub.
In the workshop Charley surveyed the scene quickly, trying to hold his breath, the smell of charred flesh churning his stomach and almost making him gag. The man sat beneath the vise, his head hanging down on his chest, his fingers pointing to heaven. The body was burned and blistered from the fire set in the stack of wood against the wall. The fire had consumed half the room before being extinguished. Charley saw that what the heat had left of the hair on the side of the head was just a little more fully gray than his own. Jim searched the shop with the careful probing of a surgeon, his handkerchief over his face to block out the smell.
Charley suddenly gagged, the stench overcoming him and driving him from the room into the fresh, cool air as his stomach churned and the smell lingered in his nose. For a moment he felt he might throw up, something he hadn't done at a crime scene since his first days on the streets of Miami. He stood, looking out into the night, gasping for air. Again his gut spoke to him, telling him it was time to leave the street of broken bodies and shattered families that was homicide. Time to step out of the river of cruelty, brutality and blood that started in the slums of South Florida where he had spent his first days as a detective, learning that the river flowed through every part of the city, its tributaries coming from every neighborhood. There he had finally learned to put away his feelings and control his anger, learned to keep the pain and destruction of the families at arms length, to build a determination that would handle whatever the streets and animals could throw at him and take it inside and use the memories to propel him in his pursuit.
The learning had taken time. There had been two charges of police brutality against him in the early days when he had been overcome by the cruelty of those not quite human to those almost totally helpless. Two, of more numerous possibilities. Internal Affairs had investigated the complaints but were unable to gather enough evidence for any serious trouble to develop. That had been a wake up call. It was then he started in earnest to develop the control, knew that he had to develop it well if he were going to stay on the force. There were times in the night when he looked back at the eighteen years in homicide and realized that perhaps he had done too good of a job. Perhaps his armor was a bit too thick and kept too much inside. Perhaps there wasn't room to breathe. But the control and the armor were there, as they had to be for someone to be a cop.
Well, I'm almost off the streets, he thought as he headed back into the room, wondering when Hayes was actually planning to put him in administration. Somebody's got to do homicide he told himself as he put his handkerchief to his face and I'll do my job wherever I'm at. It really doesn't matter if I leave homicide, he told himself, I could finish out my time out in homicide if I had too.
His gut whispered that he was lying.

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Chapter 3

The shock waves of the Fentons' death rolled through the homes, schools and businesses of Stamford Hill, a shadow of fear entwining itself in the minds behind it. At Stamford Hill University black armbands were worn and a candlelight vigil was held in front of the administration building to remember the couple and the work they did for the school and community. A fund was started for the daughter and calls rang out from all quarters for a quick apprehension of the killer and an increase in Stamford Hill's crime fighting force.
Sitting at his desk, Charley reviewed what they had on the case so far. A skin patch was found beneath the body of the man, stuck to his pants, saved from the heat by his scorched body. The results of the tissue samples from beneath both victims nails and tests on the skin patch would be forwarded when available. Photos of the plaster casts of the foot and tire prints and the gas can indentations found at the clearing would be forwarded as soon as developed. Bloody footprints had shown the killer was without shoes when the killing had taken place.
Papers slapped onto the desk. Goddamn paper work, Big Jim said plopping into the chair.
Goes with the territory, Charley said with a laugh. They discussed the evidence and possible suspects for several minutes. They had already investigated the daughter and close relatives and checked for recent increases in insurance on the couple and found nothing to raise immediate suspicion.
"Let's start with work associates and friends and see what we can find," said Charley, taking a sip of coffee as McKenna sat down.
"I got in touch with his daughter and got the basic information from her, "Jim said, shaking his head, "She's in pretty bad shape. She's trying to go through the house and see what's missing before the construction crew gets it ready for sale."
"Let's give her a little time, if she knew something important she would have called us by now. Sometimes they remember something later that can be important but that's unusual. We have enough to do for now. We've got an appointment to see Dr. Henrich Alfred Jaegar, Head of the Psychology Department and in charge of Psychological Research at Stamford Hill University. This is the first opportunity the good doctor has been able to find to give us an audience." He gave Jim a look as if they should be thankful that they were granted an audience at all.
"This should be interesting," Jim said with a toothy grin. "I've never met a psychiatrist before. My wife sometimes says I need one."
"Mine too. She can't wait for me to get into administration and start working regular hours.
Youre a hunter, Charley, like me. Its either in you or it isnt. Jim got up to deliver his papers. Its in you and you know it. You wont like it off the streets. The hunting is in your blood.
Charley shook his head as he thought about his love of his work and the years of his addiction. The streets were definitely a drug. Once you hunted killers it was hard to stop. Megan had been after him for several years to get off the street with no effect until now. Things had changed but the hunter was still there. When he was finished with this case he would be ready to move on.
Charley picked up the Medical Examiner's report and looked over the pictures of the gray haired woman slumped against the tub and lying in the cold autopsy room, comparing them to the university newspaper photo of the sophisticated lady and gentleman stapled to the front jacket of the file. A picture of their daughter was stapled next to it. It was a habit he had developed to keep in his mind the people that had been brutally taken from their life and the people who survived and mourned them. It kept him focused. In the evening when he was tired and wanting to go home to Megan the pictures sometimes asked him if he had any leads on the killer, if the murderer was still walking free. The pictures of the victims together with their families were the worst. Both the living and the dead spoke to him then. It had never failed to motivate him.
He looked back over the Medical Examiner's report. There had been massive blunt force trauma to the head due to it being repeatedly smashed against the side of the bathtub. She had been sexually assaulted and there were samples of the sperm for DNA analysis. The rape kit with its nine envelopes of scrapings, swabings, blood and body samples were still being analyzed by forensics. There had been thirty-one deep stab wounds or slashes in the woman's body. It was not known if she was alive at the time of the sexual assault. Charley tossed the report back on the table with disgust.
There had been worse, Charley thought, remembering a young man tortured for two days of hell by drug dealers before he died, a young child beaten and starved to death over the period of several weeks by a psychotic mother. But there was no point in dragging them out of the dustbin of memory, there was only the agony at hand that needed attending. The old ones lay in the distance, along a path that sometimes led to conviction, sometimes to an endless rambling leading nowhere. The hope that someday the creatures would be brought to justice and there would be some closure for the victim's relatives and friends would slowly fade as new cases leading nowhere pushed them out of the way. But they were always there in his memory to be brought alive by a new piece of evidence.
He had learned early in his career not to think about what was in the jungle unless there was cause for a questioning, an investigation or an arrest. Do your job. Do the job your assigned to do. Do it by the rules. Do it by the laws that are passed by the politicians, he thought with a laugh, not wanting to even think about all the rules that walled him in. Do it only to watch the dogs of law set them free to roam the streets and wreak their havoc.
He sat back in the chair, going over the Fentons life and death for a moment. Married thirty-two years they had devoted their life to the education of the young without trying to climb the ladder of politics in the university. They had done their job and done it well. The woman's crumpled body in the bathroom floated in his mind's eye. The Medical Examiner had said she was alive for at least forty-five seconds during the knifing. He looked at the old clock on the wall and watched the second hand making its slow circle of terror around the face. A measured march of death. The prayer suddenly bubbled up from within a lake of anguish that he had not known was there. He found himself praying that the woman had been dead before the rape, that she had not died with that piece of filth pounding inside her, laying against her breasts, breathing into her face. That she and her husband had died quickly without too much terror and agony for their many years of devotion to the education of students. He prayed that he would catch the killer and bring him to justice quickly before more innocent people died. Charley wiped the moisture from the edge of his eye. He wasn't sure who he was praying to, it had been a long time since he had prayed.

The highway to the university was heavy with traffic as Charley and Jim drove toward the school. Jim kept him amused with a few coarse jokes and Charley was glad that the bodies and the killings were no longer with him. Above, thunderheads piled into one another, the first peals of thunder rumbling in the distance as the earth turned to half tones below the building storm. The traffic was heavy and Charley slipped down side streets to avoid the bottlenecks, cursing under his breath at the slowness of the drivers. Stamford Hill was bursting at the seams. Its farms, light manufacturing and computer related industries provided steady growth for the area.
Stamford Hill University, named for its founder, dominated the city. It occupied a low, flat hill with a rise at one end overlooking the downtown streets. Where the Chataloka River wound through the university a Riverwalk had been built that become an instant hit with the students and faculty. It was four hundred yards of lamp lit, red brick walkway slipping through stands of pine and oak with covered picnic tables scattered along the route in small clearings. The Riverwalk wound up to the top of the rise where a five story brick clock tower sat in a small clearing looking out over the city, its four sided circular clock now silent.
Jim gave a deep laugh as they came in sight of the clock tower, "I hear you were in on the great bust clock tower raid. Why'd you want to go and bust those poor kids for getting a little drunk and getting a little pussy?"
Charley smiled and chuckled as he remembered the night of the tower bust. The bust that shook the city. Three months of undercover investigation had culminated in the largest police operation in the citys history. Charley had been assigned to vice for the evening to help with the arrests and bookings.
"We had a reason or two, Charley said with a laugh. Possession, sale and distribution of drugs. Possession of drug paraphernalia, indecent exposure, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, public nudity, public drunkenness, resisting arrest with violence, resisting arrest without violence and running naked through the woods." A deep laugh erupted from Jim and he pressed Charley for details.
Charley explained how the clearing had been a gathering place for students after dark until things got a little too drunken, wild and sexy and the investigation was started. The police had come up the access road with their lights off, suddenly bursting into the clearing with lights blazing as patrolmen on foot swept through the woods. They had hunted drunken, naked and half-naked students among the pines and oaks with flashlights. They had had bagged several patrol car loads. Charley laughed as he told how several prominent families putting their children through college had received a revelation from on high that night. There had been plenty of empty beer cans, scantily clad students and drug paraphernalia for the press.
Charley parked in a university police slot across the street from the concrete and glass administration building that stood out against the dark red brick of the older buildings scattered across the tree covered campus. The air was fresh with the hint of the coming rain. They watched a middle-aged man with a long ponytail coming down the steps and Jim shook his head.
Charley smiled. "I hit one of those with a club over twenty-five years ago during the anti-war demonstrations. He's probably a lawyer by now."
"Defense attorney if you hit him hard enough," Jim said. They both erupted in laughter.
Inside the reception area the students parted as the two burley detectives made their way to the elevator. A coldly efficient secretary greeted them curtly from her glass desk, checking their claim of an appointment against her schedule with a certain suspicion as if they didn't really belong in the room. She invited them to sit, gesturing to the couch, then disappeared down the hall. They remained standing. "Bitch," Jim silently mouthed, Charley looked at the floor and stifled a smile. Returning, she stated that Dr. Jaegar would see them now but that he only had a few minutes, Dr. Jaegar was a very busy man. She led the two detectives down a wide hallway lined with pictures of famous psychiatrists and psychoanalysts, their names on brass plates beneath the frames. Charley felt the penetrating eyes of the men on them as they followed what he now labeled the ice princess.
Dr. Jaegars office was one of dark gray carpet and deep paneling with subdued lighting. Soft music played faintly in the background. Dr. Jaegar stood at the window with his back to them, hands clasped behind him, looking intently at the students below. A pair of binoculars was on the table beside him. "Humanity is fascinating to watch, don't you agree, detectives," he said, still looking out of the window, his deep voice filling the room. Charley gauged him at six foot and about one hundred and eighty pounds, physically fit and very stuck on himself. "I can tell so much from a facial expression, from interactions," Jaegar said as he turned, "particularly when they don't know I'm watching." "Not such an unusual hobby for a psychiatrist, I suppose." He introduced himself, shaking their hands with a strong grip. Charley looked into a pair of liquid brown eyes framed by a head of close-cropped black hair and a neatly trimmed beard. There was something in the eyes that Charley could almost read, a coldness that the analytical often have but there was something behind the coldness, something hidden. The penetrating eyes sized him up. A muscular build filled the silk shirt with its diamond stickpin securing the conservative tie. He gestured to the two plush chairs in front of his polished desk and slipped into his chair, typing briefly in his computer before turning off the screen.
"Detective Dimarco, all of us are shocked by the tragic end of Professor Fenton and his spouse. Since I heard of their deaths I have tried to think of any minute piece of information that might be of use to you but I am afraid that I have come up with nothing that could be of assistance. Of course, I put myself and my department at your disposal." Charley felt had a gut feeling he had heard the exact opposite from the man who dripped conceit. Charley and Jim questioned him about Fenton's work history. Jaegar's answers were given with a certain amount of nonchalance. He seemed to want to convey the impression that the matter was closed and of no further interest to him or of any further importance, something in the past to be discarded.
"Anybody have a grudge against him, any enemies?" Jim asked. Charley wished he had phrased the question with a little more depth. The first rain drops splattered against the glass.
"Obviously, in light of recent events," Jaegar said with a small laugh. "I apologize," he said with a wave of his hand. "Not that I know of. He was a bit of a rebel. There was a personality clash between us. Recently I had him transferred to a purely instructional position. A move which I believe greatly benefited the students and the research department. He was an adequate instructor but somewhat of a nonconformist in research management. We had professional differences in addition to our difference in . . . style, if you will."
Charley asked about Professor Fenton's work associates and students as Dr. Jaegar glanced at his Rolex then held up his finger to stop the conversation and called the secretary to draw up a list of the professor's co-workers and students. Thunder rumbled in the darkening sky and the rain began to wash across the campus, sending students scurrying for cover as lightening flashed between the clouds.
Dr. Jaegar leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling for a moment then leveled his eyes at Charley. "There is very little I can tell you about his relations with his students, co-workers or friends or if he had any enemies of any type. We didn't travel in the same circles either socially or intellectually. I do not listen to the normal chitchat that most people feel compelled to spread about themselves and each other. I detest gossips and rumor mongers and do not wish to be a part of anything they engage in. I have work to do, a great deal of it. I will soon be leaving the university and devoting my full attentions to my institute, the Stamford Hill Institute of Psychological Health, where I work to develop human potential, to unleash the productive powers of the human mind. I have some background in criminal psychopathology, perhaps I could provide you with some assistance with your investigation."
"We have our own people," said Jim, Charley hearing Jim's evaluation of the man in his tone. They discussed the Fenton's and their co-workers for several minutes, Dr. Jaegar adding nothing to what he had already said, seeming bored with the whole proceedings. Dr. Jaegar questioned them about the manner of the deaths and mentioned again that he would be available should they desire a second opinion on the case based on the way in which they died. Charley assured him they would call on him if they felt his assistance was needed.
Dr. Jaegar glanced at his watch again and apologized for his busy schedule, there was a very important meeting that he must attend. He rose from his chair and stepped around the desk, gesturing toward the door. Jaegar gave assurances that he would contact them immediately if he came across any information. The ice princess handed them a page of names on their way out.
Outside, the rain rolled across the campus in dancing sheets of silver that exploded on the streets and sidewalks. Thunder claps rumbled over one another in the murky sky, their rumbling felt in the belly. A few students braved the pelting rain with their books or jackets over their heads.
I think he should go on the A list, Big Jim said as they turned from a gust of wind driven rain.
His feet arent big enough to be the killers but its always possible he may have pulled the strings Charley said. Ill rummage around in his past and see what I can find.
A female student pulled a new car under the shelter and three young, well-endowed women ran to the car in the swirling mist.
"If cars could smile," Jim whispered, greeting the ladies with a smile.
. "Looks like it's time for us peasants to get wet," Charley said, looking across the lawn. I'll bet it doesn't rain on Herr Jaegar.
Looks like we run for it." Big Jim said.
Charley eyed the distance to the visitor parking lot, the power of the swirling rain and the time his weight would take him to cross it. The time distance ratios were not in his favor. He was not going to spend the rest of the afternoon in sopping wet clothes.
"The man with a belly suggests we wait," said Charley with a chuckle, patting his stomach.
"Hell, I'll bring the car around," Jim said. "I'd better hurry, we have to get you to the hospital," he said with a grin, "It looks like you're due any time now." With a guffaw Jim sprinted across the lawn and Charley watched as the burley detective splashed through the puddles and quickly negotiated the traffic at the intersection, the rain soaking his clothes. A gust of wind driven rain whipped under the roof as a student with his coat over his head splashed by. Charley took refuge toward the doors, reminding himself there had been a time when he could have beaten Jim to the car. And a time when he smiled at young women too.

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Chapter 4

Bobby Bayles felt the pounding in his head as the first streams of consciousness flowed into his fitful sleep, rolling him over and forcing a profane moan from his mouth. It had been another ragged night of twisted dreams. He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling, pain hammering through his head, then looked at the blur of the clock. It had only been an hour since he was last awake. The first light of day drifted in through the holes in the torn, red curtain hanging in the screenless trailer window. He waited for his mind to clear, feeling something racing in the shadows of consciousness just below the surface, knowing he couldnt grasp it. The murky images came to him from time to time during the day unannounced. Sometimes they brought pain, sometimes fear, sometimes rage. Sometimes they just drifted in the fog.
He sat on the side of the bed, elbows digging into his thighs, his head heavy in his hands, cursing the pain away. It had been over a week since he had slept for a full night unless dead drunk. Nights were spent tossing and turning, drifting between worlds, waking to try and seize images that fled the moment consciousness returned. The struggle had taken its toll on him. Days in a haze, nights in a pit, his face had become drawn and haggard and he gazed at the world with a thousand yard stare through deeply sunken eyes.
He got up and put on his pants and walked unsteadily into the hallway running his hands through a thick stubble of beard. "What's for breakfast?" he yelled down the hall as he walked into the bathroom to urinate.
"Eggs and grits," said a soft, resigned voice from the kitchen.
Bobby came down the hall zipping up his pants, "Eggs and grits, eggs and grits, that's all we ever have around this fucking place." He dropped into the chair, starring at the breakfast with bloodshot eyes, a frown on his face.
Sarah Bayles, moving with a dullness brought on by the never ending repetition of her days, put the plate down in front of him and waited for his reaction. Bobby scowled at it in silence, as if trying to think of a new profanity to hurl at his breakfast and his morning.
"If you'd get some steady work there might be more than eggs and grits, there might be bacon," she said quietly, turning away, wanting no part of the morning. The thin woman adjusted her bra strap under the worn print dress that was her favorite and brushed a strand of her thinning hair from her face. "Your carpentry business isn't much of a business."
"Goddamn it, Bobby growled don't start on me! Jus don't do it," he said, waving his hand at her. "Woman, you know I got a temper. And you gonna see it if you don't leave me alone. And don't start fucking with me about that fight again."
"All I did was ask for you to tell me about it, to tell me what happened. You come home with your fingers cut up, your neck all scratched and you won't talk about it. Every time I ask, you just get mad. You done been to prison once for breaking the law. And you even fought in there. If you been beating and robbing people again I'm taking the boys and leaving."
"You ain't taking them boys and going no Goddamn where," Bobby said with a snarl. "You hear. I told you I got into a fight at the bar. Some son of a bitch mouthed off to me in the parking lot and I had to scuffle with him. He tried to pull a tire iron and I busted his nose and maybe a couple of teeth. A nose really bleeds when you break it. You know how I am when I've been drinking a little. I ain't afraid of a little fighting. And this was self defense."
"I called Ramblers Lodge and the bartender said he didn't see you git in no fight Tuesday night."
"That fat fucking shit don't even know what's goin on in front of him much less what happens in the Goddamn parking lot," he said, disgust in his voice.
"Why did you throw away those clothes, they was still good?"
"They got ripped up in the fight. I'm using them for rags when I work on my car up at my brother's."
"Bobby, we ain't got no money to spend on clothes. They was still good to wear to work, whenever that is."
He slammed his hand on the table, his face erupting in anger, bushy brows furrowed over narrowed eyes. "I told you to leave me the hell alone," he snarled, pointing his finger at her. "You stay on my case and what I did last night won't be nothing," he said with a glare at her turned head.
A bolt of fear shot through Sarah. Her hand went to her face where he had slapped her during last night's argument. She backed away, fearing that he might slap her again. She turned to the sink and began to wash the pan, gazing through the dirty window with tired, hopeless eyes, a feeling of relief coming over her as Bobby began to concentrate on the plate of food.
Bobby Bayles shoveled the food in, his anger driving him. He ate quickly and in silence ignoring the woman behind him. At the sound of their two sons stirring in the other bedroom he put down his fork and burped. "Well, I've got some things to do, he mumbled as he got up from the table, "I'll be back this afternoon"
"Don't you want to wait and say good morning to the boys?" she asked, picking the plate up from the table and scraping the leftovers into the garbage.
"I don't feel like listening to their yelling and whining first thing in the morning. Gets on my nerves. I got business to attend to."
Bobby, dont go drinking today. I know youre in pain cause your mommas gone but please dont go drinking today.
He looked at her hard. I got business to attend to, he said and shoved open the door, and stormed down the steps to the dirty white Ford pickup truck with its two dusty signs on the doors advertising Carpenter at Large. He raced the engine several times, and, tires spinning, backed the truck into the lane and pulled into traffic.
He stopped at a convenience store for a beer, ignoring the cheerful greeting from the clerk. In the truck he opened the can and took two long gulps, the cold beer refreshing him and bringing him to full wakefulness. With the beer between his legs he drove to Stamford Park and pulled under the canopy of an old oak, its thick branches dripping Spanish moss. He sat quietly in the truck, rubbing the cuts on his fingers, his thoughts drifting. Suddenly fear seized him as a womans screaming, contorted face burst into his mind and a scene of killing began to fill him and he struggled against the images, his hands trembling. I didnt killer. Lord, I didnt killer, I aint never killed nobody in my life, He saw his hand slam the womans head against the wall, her hair the same color as his mothers as she lay dying.
He shook slightly as goose bumps sprinkled his arms and a blankness washed over him. The fear and pain emptied out of him and the womans face was gone as the voice spoke to him gently, driving the image away with its overpowering presence. You were in a fight, the voice said softly as a feeling of pleasure washed over him. The voice whispered to him for several minutes the he shivered again and he was back in the world rubbing his fingers and thinking about the fight. A man had almost hit him in the parking lot and there had been an argument. He could feel his fist slamming into the face of a man who was reaching for a tire iron. Got to cut down on the drinking, Bobby thought. Thisll be the second fight where I forgot most of what happened. Hope I won as big as I think I did, he thought, laughing out loud. He took a long drink from the can, draining the last drops and crumpled it in his massive hand.
He decided to drive to the deserted cabin near his brothers trailer that had been his home during his youth. The bloody clothes were there and he wanted to see if he had left anything in the pockets that might jog his memory. He could be alone there with his thoughts and his beer. The drive will do me good, he thought, clear my head and get me going. Billy might have a lead on some work. I damn sure need some more work.
Stopping at another convenience store, he tossed the empty can in the back and bought a six pack, pulling out into traffic with a beer between his legs. A patrol car passed, heading in the opposite direction and Bobby watched him in the rear view mirror for a moment to make sure he didnt turn around. He had a way of attracting cops and some of them had him on their list. He cruised down the highway, lost in thought about finding work, jerking the wheel once when the right tire wandered off the road. He turned onto a dirt road and checked the rear view mirror for cops. He slowed as the double-wide trailer came into view, checking to see if anyone was home. Good, Bobby thought, seeing the truck and car gone, nobody here to bother me about drinking in the morning. Some folks just dont understand. A man needs a little something to get him going. I sure do with the load I'm carrying.
He opened a beer and turned into the woods, driving slowly down what had once been a road to the old cabin, leaning over as the branches brushed through the window. The narrow path ended at a tin roofed, two-roomed structure almost hidden by the underbrush growing along its walls. The screens on the porch hung in tatters. A small, sunlit clearing in front was littered with beer cans where the Bayles brothers brought their cars to be fixed and fixed again. The cabin sagged on the concrete block supports, the cracked and broken windows staring blankly at the forest.
Bobby took a long swallow of beer as he shoved open the broken screen door and shuffled through the rusted parts of cars and trucks that lay scattered around the porch. Inside, a collection of long forgotten articles were stacked in rotting cardboard boxes. He stood in the middle of the dusty room looking out of the window at the sunlight playing on the green and brown montage of leaves and branches, remembering the last days of his mother and how she had died in this cramped room. She had lain in the tattered old bed facing the window as the cancer ate her liver and the pain racked her body. Her eyes had pleaded with him between spasms of torment and she would call out his name and beg him to stop the pain.
He stayed up with her through the long nights as waves of pain came and went. Finally he had raced to the construction site and talked with a long haired man who he knew could get pain killers, telling him he would pay whatever he asked but he had to get pain killers for his mama. The man saw the fire in the giants eyes and heard the ragged pain in his voice and Bobby Bayles got the painkillers at a good price, something Bobby never forgot. The drugs worked at first but at the end did little to ease his mothers passing. On her last day the cancer gnawed at the old woman her moans gnawed at Bobby Bayles.
His brother had argued that she should go to the hospital but Bobby and his mother would have none of that and his brother had paced angrily outside the cabin between arguments, sometimes in tears, afraid to cross his brother. Bobby had turned his hard look upon him whenever he pleaded and told him she would pass in the cabin where she had raised the two of them after their father. Finally, in the softness of the early evening a coma delivered the old woman from her torment and as his brother left to call the doctor Bobby sat by her side until her death rattle, his hand on her head, tears in his eyes.
Bobby had stood in his pain and disbelief as the ambulance attendants hauled her out into the glare of the headlights and taken her away. He had been numb until a day after the cheap funeral then he had gotten falling down drunk for two weeks.
Bobby took a swallow of beer and stared out of the broken window and some of the pain came back to him. The doctor had told her to quit drinking. Told her a dozen times but she was poor and drink was her only happiness besides her two boys. A rich doctor just couldnt understand a poor persons need for that little piece of happiness. The rich never could understand nothing about the poor. What was that saying someone had told him once? The only thing the rich was willing to let the poor call theirs and keep was their distance. Goddamn bastards, he thought as he spit out the hole in the windowpane.
He looked around the cabin and drove the thoughts from his head to keep the pain from coming back. He had put something here after the fight. He just couldn't remember what it was. Walking to the back corner he pulled several boxes from in front of his footlocker and pulled out a plastic bag. He took out the pants with the blood stains and checked the pockets, trying to remember who he had fought, where he had been? What had happened? Why was there so much blood?
Got to slack up on the booze, he thought, got to, gettin to be a little too much lately. Its getting bad when you can't remember a fight with this much blood. He picked up a cloth tied around an object and looked at it for a moment. He shivered violently and his mind emptied. His eyes stared blankly into space as the voice spoke to him, telling him to put the object back, that it wasn't time to bring it out. Pick up the pistol, Bobby, the voice said, Pick up the pistol and look at the cabin. Look at what they did to your mother.
Bobby picked up the 9mm pistol he had bought in a bar several weeks before and looked at the center of the room, a part of him knowing what was coming. A tiny piece of him struggled for control of his emotions against the images that bubbled into his mind. Before him he saw his mother screaming and grappling with the three police officers as they tore her clothes off in the living room of her trailer. The club came down on her face. She moaned as they ripped off her dress and tied her bra around her head, the cups sticking out like knobs. "Well looky here," the fat one said, we got some kind of knobby headed bitch from outer space. Wonder what she's like in the sack? Reckon we gonna find out." Two of them pinned her arms and legs as the third forced his way into her as she sobbed and begged him to stop. They took her in every way they could. When they had satisfied themselves they laughed and joked among themselves, then urinated on her, calling her trailer trash and whore as she lay on the ground and whimpered. A low animal howl erupted from Bobbys mouth as he twisted inside.
Bobby stood transfixed at the images in him mind, struggling for breath. The animal inside screamed for release. There would be vengeance for the rape of his mother, for the rape of the only person who had ever cared for him. The society that had held his family down and spit on them would pay and the cops would pay. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a rape for a rape.
He stood trembling as the voice spoke roughly and commanded him to bide his time, to wait until the proper moment to take his just vengeance. He choked and retched as slowly his pain subsided as the images disappeared. The voice whispered to him to put the gun away and wait. The time of vengeance would come. He did as the voice commanded. His body convulsed as goose bumps raced across his skin and he stood weakly in the middle of the room, a wave of nausea washing over him. He took several deep breaths to calm himself and walked outside.
He sat on the back of the truck with the six pack, enjoying the warmth of the morning sun, his mind going back over the times with his mother, feeling the pain of her passing. Draining the last of drops of the last can he stretched and decided it was time for the companionship of people who understood him a drinkers need to be alone with his pain. Getting in the truck he backed out of the woods with his tires spinning and headed away from town, toward a small country bar that catered to early morning drinkers.

THE WIND IN THE TREES I Ran into a brick wall on this one at chapter 8 and went on to other endeavors. I hope some day to go back and finish it but it may not happen.

Chapter's 1 - 4
© Steven Raker 2003

Chapter 1

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Chapter 2

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Chapter 3

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Chapter 4

Chapter's 1 - 4 © Steven Raker 2003

Chapter 1

<<<<<>>>>> Chapter 2

<<<<<>>>>> Chapter 3

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Chapter 4

Chapter's 1 - 4
© Steven Raker 2003

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Chapter 2

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Chapter 3