He knew certain things about Mr. Smith’s identity. He knew precisely how he talked. He believed that Mr. Smith might be a philosopher, perhaps a university professor or student.
He had even seen Mr. Smith.
He had looked out from the dumbwaiter — upside down, no less — and stared into Smith’s hard, cold eyes, seen his nose, his lips.
Mr. Smith saw that.
Now there was no hope for him.
“Damn you, Smith. Damn you to hell. I know your shitty secret. I know everything now. You are a fucking alien! You aren’t human.”
Chapter 84
“YOU REALLY think we’re going to track down this son of a bitch? You think this guy is dumb?”
John Sampson asked me point-blank, challenging me. He was dressed all in black, and he wore Ray-Ban sunglasses. He looked as if he were already in mourning. The two of us were flying in an FBI Bell Jet helicopter from Washington to Princeton, New Jersey. We were supposed to work together for a while.
“You think Gary Soneji did this somehow? Think he’s Houdini? You think maybe he’s still alive?” Sampson went on. “What the hell do you think?”
“I don’t know yet.” I sighed. “I’m still collecting data. It’s the only way I know how to work. No, I don’t think Soneji did it. He’s always worked alone before this. Always.”
I knew that Gary Soneji had grown up in New Jersey, then gone on to become one of the most savage murderers of the times. It didn’t seem as if his run were over yet. Soneji was part of the ongoing mystery.
Alex Cross’s notes on Soneji were extensive. I was finding useful and interesting insights all through the notes, and I was less than a third of the way through. I had already decided that Cross was a sharp police detective but an even better psychologist. His hypotheses and hunches weren’t merely clever and imaginative; they were often right. There’s an important difference in that, which many people fail to see, especially people in medium-high places.
I looked up from my reading.
“I’ve had some luck with difficult killers before. All except the one I really want to catch,” I told Sampson.
He nodded, but his eyes stayed locked onto mine. “This Mr. Smith something of a cult hero now? Over in Europe, especially, the Continent, London, Paris, Frankfurt.”
I wasn’t surprised that Sampson was aware of the ongoing case. The tabloids had made Mr. Smith their latest icon. The stories were certainly compelling reading. They played up the angle that Smith might be an alien. Even newspapers like th
e New York Times and the Times of London had run stories stating that police authorities believed Smith might be an extraterrestrial being who had come here to study humans. To grok, as it were.
“Smith has become the evil E.T. Something for X-Files fans to contemplate between TV episodes. Who knows, perhaps Mr. Smith is a visitor from outer space, at least from some other parallel world. He doesn’t have anything in common with human beings, I can vouch for that. I’ve visited the murder scenes.”
Sampson nodded. “Gary Soneji didn’t have much in common with the human race,” he said in his deep, strangely quiet voice. “Soneji was from another planet, too. He’s an ALF, alien life-form.”
“I’m not sure he fits the same psychological profile as Smith.”
“Why is that?” he asked. His eyes narrowed. “You think your mass killer is smarter than our mass killer?”
“I’m not saying that. Gary Soneji was very bright, but he made mistakes. So far, Mr. Smith hasn’t made any.”
“And that’s why you’re going to solve this hinky mystery? Because Gary Soneji makes mistakes?”
“I’m not making predictions,” I told Sampson. “I know better than that. So do you.”
“Did Gary Soneji make a mistake at Alex’s house?” he suddenly asked, his dark eyes penetrating.
I sighed out loud. “I think someone did.”
The helicopter was settling down to land outside Princeton. A thin line of cars silently streamed past the airfield on a state highway. People watched us from the cars. It could safely be assumed that everything had started here. The house where Gary Soneji had been raised was less than six miles away. This was the monster’s original lair.
“You’re sure Soneji’s not still alive?” John Sampson asked one more time. “Are you absolutely sure about that?”
“No,” I finally said. “I’m not sure of anything yet.”