“So all you’ve really got on the poisoning is Burke’s rabbit.”
“That’s all Rochester’s got. I’ve got that.” Pointing toward the still-unopened file folder. “I’ve also got Roger Sharveneau, certified respiratory tech. Buffalo police never checked out his Burke story, but Sharveneau worked at Unitas for three months, same time Burke was there. Sharveneau mentions Burke, and a week later he’s dead.”
“Why didn’t Buffalo check out the Burke lead?” said Milo.
“To be charitable,” said Fusco, “Sharveneau came across highly disturbed and lacking credibility. My guess would be severe borderline personality, maybe even a full-blown schizophrenic. He jerked Buffalo PD around for a month—confessing, recanting, then hinting that maybe he’d killed some of the patients but not all of them, calling press conferences, changing lawyers, acting goofier and goofier. During the time he was locked up he went on a hunger strike, went mute, refused to talk to the court-appointed psychiatrists. By the time he gave them the Burke story, they were fed up with him. But I believe he did know Michael Burke. And that Burke had some kind of influence on him.”
I said, “Why would Burke put himself in jeopardy by confiding in someone as unstable as Sharveneau?”
“I’m not saying he confided in Sharveneau, or gave Sharveneau direct orders. I’m saying he exerted some kind of influence. It could very well have been subtle— a remark here, a nudge there. Sharveneau was unstable, passive, highly suggestible. Michael Burke’s the peg that fits that hole: dominant, manipulative, in his own way charismatic. I believe Burke knew what buttons to push.”
Milo said, “Dominant, manipulative, and he gets away with bad stuff. So what’s next, he runs for public office?”
“You don’t want to see the profiles of the people who run the country.”
“The Bureau’s still doing that J. Edgar stuff, huh?”
Fusco smiled.
Milo said, “Even if your boy really is the ultimate purveyor of evil, what’s the connection to Mate?”
“Tell me about Mate’s wounds.”
Milo laughed. “How about you tell me what you think they might be.”
Fusco shifted in the booth, leaned to his left, stretched his left arm across the top of the seat. “Fair enough. I’d guess that Mate was rendered semiconscious or totally unconscious, probably with a strong blow to the head that came from behind. Or a choke hold. The papers said he was found in the van. If that’s true, that’s at odds with Burke’s tree-propping signature. But the wooded site fits Burke’s kills. More public than Burke’s previous dumps, but that fits the pattern of increased confidence. And Mate was a public figure. I suspect Burke conned Mate into arranging a meeting, possibly by feigning interest in Mate’s work. From what I’ve seen of Mate, an appeal to his ego would be most effective.”
He stopped.
Milo said nothing. His hand had come to rest atop the file folder. Touching the string. Unfurling it slowly.
Fusco said, “However the meeting was arranged, I see Burke familiarizing himself with the site beforehand, learning the traffic patterns, leaving a getaway vehicle within walking distance of the kill-spot. Which in his case, could be miles. Probably to the east of the kill-spot, because the east affords multiple avenues of escape. Living in L.A., Burke needs wheels, so I’m sure he’s obtained registration under a new identity, but whether he used his own car or a stolen vehicle, I couldn’t say.”
“I assume you’ve combed DMV, done all the combinations of Burke, Rushton, Sartin, Spreen, whatever.”
“You assume correctly. No good hits.”
“You were going to speculate about the wounds.”
” ‘Speculate.’ ” Fusco smiled. “Brutal but precise, carved with a surgical-grade blade or something equally sharp. There may also have been some geometry involved.”
“What do you mean by geometry?” said Milo, sounding casual.
“Geometrical shapes incised into the skin. He began that in Ann Arbor, the last victim, diamonds snipped out of her upper pubic region. When I first saw it, I thought: his idea of a joke—the irony again, diamonds are a girl’s best friend. But then he changed shapes with one of the Fresno vies. Circles. So I won’t tell you I know exactly what it means, just that he likes to play around.”