THE BUTLER Read online

  THE BUTLER

  by

  BILL WENHAM

  THE BUTLER

  Prologue

  “Dios mio, I am going to die!” was the very last thought the young woman had as the car, sliding upside down on its roof, hurtled across the road towards her.

  A moment later the impact had driven her violently backwards into the storefront behind her. Broken glass cascaded down all over her crushed and bleeding body. Long thin shards of it stuck out of her corpse like gleaming transparent daggers.

  She was one of the unfortunates, a victim of circumstances, and another innocent bystander whose only wrongdoing was to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time. She’d paid for that mistake with her life.

  If she’d only been able to take an earlier bus, she would have been safely home by now, but she had to wait for her precious package to be completed. She would have worn it proudly later that afternoon.

  But today, like many others, she became another statistic of crime in the big city, along with the two criminals whose mangled remains were also entangled in the gory mess of bent steel, blood and broken glass protruding from the shattered storefront.

  She was gone now and the media would soon forget her. The ugly mess would be cleared away and life in the City would go on, other people’s lives, but not hers. Her life and her hopes had been so easily snuffed out by other people’s violent actions, as she’d just stood there waiting at the bus stop. But the end result was always the same. Another dream had been shattered.

  Beyond her out flung right hand the clear plastic bag containing her newly altered wedding dress laid torn wide open on the sidewalk. Fragments of glass glittered all over it like hundreds of diamonds. At first glance the huge blotches of blood splattered all over the white lace material looked sadly like her wedding bouquet of red roses would have done.

  Moments later the usual ghoulish and ogling crowd started to gather.

  Chapter One

  I sat, casually cross legged, on a rocky outcropping, and gazed out at the still waters of the lake. The far side of it was still shrouded in the early morning mist as the dawn’s rising sun tinged it with a pale yellow glow.

  I picked up a small stone from the ledge beside me, pitched it out into the dark green water and watched as the ripples radiated out from it like the age rings on a sawn log. As the stone hit the water a fish jumped just beyond it, causing another ring of ripples to spread out to join with the first. I watched as the widening circles merged with each other and after a moment or two, the water became still again. Out in the middle, somewhere out in the mist, a loon called and received an answering call from the far side of the lake.

  Why couldn’t everywhere be as peaceful and calm as this little piece of heaven, I thought. When I died, I hoped St. Peter would just hand me a tackle box and a fishing pole and point me to a spot in his Heaven just like this one. To hell with angel wings, I thought, by then I’d have done all the flying I ever wanted to do anyway.

  People like me came to places like this to get away from it all but down here on earth trouble had a nasty habit of seeking us out. I’d deliberately not had a phone installed in the cabin and in this valley lake, nestled between the hills as it was there was no usable cell phone signal here either. Phone or not, it hadn’t stopped Wayne from driving up here last night and ruining it all for me.

  As if he’d read my mind, I heard my partner yelling from the cabin, that breakfast was ready. Yeah, right, I thought. Go fishing and get away from it all! It was a nice enough thought and bloody near impossible to accomplish.

  The ‘it all’ in my case, was all the ugliness, selfishness and their related crimes of violence the City seemed to thrive on. Everyone wanted a piece of something belonging to someone else, whether it was money, property, sex, drugs or whatever.

  It didn’t matter if it wasn’t given up freely either; it was taken from them anyway. And if it still wasn’t given up, then people were just killed for it. Even the wild and predatory animals in the jungle could learn a thing or two about savagery from some of the people I’d had the misfortune of dealing with since I’ve been a cop.

  The very worst of the current bunch calls himself ‘The Butler’

  Judging by the current rash of homicides being attributed to him a far better name for him would have been ‘The Butcher’.

  Some time back, I’d received a message on my voice mail. It had been recorded by someone using what seemed to be an obviously phony upper class English accent. It had said.

  ‘Since you are no doubt seeking a villain to blame for your little episodes of unpleasantness, please remember what the old time detective stories told you. It was always ‘the butler that did it’, wasn’t it? And in this case they would be entirely correct. You see, Detective Spicer, I am ‘The Butler’ and I did it. Not it, actually. I did all of them, in fact. So now you know - come and find me. But fear not, my good fellow, for I shall be in touch with you again soon, after the next one, that is. Ta ta for now.’

  Wayne had driven up last night with a recording of the guy’s latest missive. I was about to tear a strip off him for disturbing the peace and tranquility of my mini-break, when Wayne pointed out the difference in this one from the others.

  So far, all of the messages had been boastful admissions of responsibility for these ghastly homicides and all had been after the fact, or more correctly, perhaps, after the act. All except this one. This was an announcement that this one was about to happen and included an open invitation for Detective Sandy Spicer to catch him in the act.

  That was why I’d been sitting on my ass out on a rock by the lake for the past three hours, before dawn, wracking my brains and trying to figure out what to do next.

  My younger brother, Hec and I had endured a great deal of teasing all of our lives, thanks to our father’s love of history and mythology. Our father, much to our mother’s displeasure, had insisted his first born son be named ‘Lysander’. That’s me, Sandy, shortened, thank God, from Lysander.

  Lysander was the Spartan general who destroyed the Athenian fleet in 405 B.C. in the Peloponnesian War.

  My father’s second son didn’t fare any better either, being named ‘Hector’. This time, Hector was the hero of Homer’s ‘Iliad’ and was the leader of the Trojan forces during the Trojan War.

  Both men had been immortalized further in the song, ‘The British Grenadiers’

  As the professor’s first son, I was forever thankful my name could be acceptably shortened to ‘Sandy’ from Lysander. If my father had called me ‘Apollo’, I could envision myself being called ‘Polly’ for the rest of my life, for Christ’s sake.

  It was just as well our father had been a History professor too, I thought. If he’d taught Botany, Lord knows what we boys might have been called.

  Forget about Johnnie Cash’s ‘A boy named Sue’. Names like Pansy, Iris, Daphne, Lily and Poppy flashed through my mind. Try shortening or living with any of those, little brother, I thought. We both got off pretty lightly with Sandy and Hec, didn’t we? Thinking about it, perhaps our father had deliberately named us that way in order to encourage us to both to be fighters, like our namesakes. Well, he’d certainly gotten that part of it right enough.

  I’d come under some good natured ribbing and ‘Heckling’ from the guys when I’d received my Lieutenant’s shield and once again with the medal. My first name, Lysander, as well as all of my others, equally embarrassing, had been read out in front of everyone by the Chief of Police. But both occasions had been worth a couple of minutes of embarrassment.

  Hell, I’d been embarrassed enough for receiving a medal for just doing my job, for Christ’s sake. Sure, I’d saved the life of that clumsy rookie, Patino, but that was really only because he’d been lying in the w
ay. If I hadn’t taken him out with me, we’d both have been burned to death in the fire. Patino had been shot in the leg and it had been much easier to just throw him over my shoulder and dash out through the flames. In another couple of seconds, we would both have been overcome by the heat and the smoke. As I’d told everyone, I’d done it to save my own skin as much as to save Patino’s.

  And I’d even gotten a goddamned medal for it!

  But the medal itself was nothing compared to some of the side benefits that flowed from my action. Sure, I’d earned the respect of the men and women I worked with, and obviously that of my superiors. I had no doubt at all I’d made Lieutenant as a direct result of it.

  Vince Patino was a young Italian guy, just a rookie. He was also a young Italian guy who had a typical and traditional Italian mother who doted on her only son. Since that day, at the insistence of Mama Patino, I enjoyed more varieties of superb Italian dishes at her house than I’d even known existed.

  The downside of these visits, if you could call it that, was that Mama Patino also had two daughters, Anna and Carla. She wanted to see them both of them married and at least one of them to the local hero, namely me!

  “My girls, they both cook good just like me. I teach them myself,” she had said proudly on my first visit there, pushing them both forward at me.

  Rather than offend their mother, I had taken both of the girls out at the same time, believing in safety in numbers. It had been a bit expensive but it had worked out very nicely. And since I was now eating regularly and well at Patino’s place, I was even saving the money I was spending on the girls. It wasn’t that they were unattractive. On the contrary, they were both beautiful but with Anna already showing signs of developing her mother’s rotund figure. I just wasn’t ready to settle down with either of these girls, or with anyone else for that matter.

  One night in ‘Downtown Bugsy’s Bar’, a regular off duty hangout for the guys, I’d introduced the girls to some of them. Anna immediately took a shine to Glen Lassiter, who very happily took her off my hands.

  I was now just left with Carla, who was already casting an appraising eye at the balance of the available talent. Suddenly I felt a bit like a tofu hamburger being offered up at the same time as a plate of prime rib. Both of the girls had known I wasn’t in the marriage market or I’d never have taken them out together like this. It soon became apparent Carla wasn’t a vegetarian either when Denny Anderson ambled over to be introduced.

  I had the feeling my Italian meal days at Mama Patino’s were just about over. I hadn’t been looking for a serious relationship anyway. And besides, pretty as the girls were, when I finally make that long trek down the aisle, I wanted it to be with a girl of my own choice.

  I wouldn’t say I’d be glad to get rid of them either. No, that wasn’t the case at all, but I’d had no romantic interest in either of them. Denny and Glen were both good guys and close friends, partners actually, and they would take good care of the girls.

  I’d let the girls explain it all to their mother themselves and then I’d be off the hook. I had to admit they all looked good together, with Denny and Glen looking as though they’d just won a lottery, grinning all over their faces. The girls didn’t look too unhappy to have changed partners either. At least they had a guy each now. I grinned too as I wondered if I’d be invited to a double wedding later this year.

  Mama Patino should be happy enough with the outcome too, I told myself. All she wanted really was for both of her girls to be married and to be producing hordes of grandchildren for her to fuss over and fatten up. At least tonight might be the start of good things to come. Christ, I thought with a grin, here I had them both married with kids and the poor girls hadn’t even been out on a proper date with these guys yet.

  Chapter Two

  After we’d received the first one of the Butler’s messages, together with many of the others, we’d spent countless hours in the squad room at the Precinct.

  We were asking ourselves, and each other, why this murdering bastard was calling himself ‘The Butler’? He was obviously an egotistical son of a bitch and he wanted us to know exactly who he was and where he was, but only if we could figure it out for ourselves.

  In some of the later messages he would taunt us, especially me, by emphasizing the word ‘detective’, and also always using the same phony English accent.

  My squad consists of seven police officers. There are three guys and three girls, and of course, me.

  Wayne, my partner, has been with me in the squad the longest. In fact we’d been partners in the patrol cars before I’d been made up to Lieutenant.

  Next in terms of seniority is Sullivan. Sharon Sullivan, but almost nobody ever calls her Sharon, since she always addresses everyone one else by their surname. It just seems fair enough for us to return the favor. She seems to prefer it that way. It makes any contacts we have with her seem less personal perhaps.

  Sullivan is a very smart lady though and would make a good detective one of these days. She is very thorough and will worry a case like a terrier until she feels she’s gotten a good handle on it. Sullivan is a big lady, not heavy, just big boned and tall and she doesn’t take any crap from anyone, on the squad or off it. She doesn’t socialize with any of us outside the Precinct either but we all realize, in this job, some of us need our privacy. Very few of us want to take our work home with us.

  Ray Petrocelli is next in line, seniority-wise. He is a big, heavy set Italian-American and is as tough as nails. Petrocelli and Sullivan are constantly bickering with each other but it is always good natured on both sides. I believe Petrocelli would like to ask her out if she would only shut up long enough and give him half a chance sometime.

  Jan Langham is the second of the female members of my squad. She’s the opposite in appearance to Sullivan, being very slim, blonde and also quite tall.

  Newt Winders has been on the squad now for about six months. He too is big and heavy set and if I had to describe him, it would be as a huge smile set into a big, round and very black face. Newt is a very nice guy, and I could say he wouldn’t hurt a fly. I’d be right too. A fly he probably wouldn’t hurt, but I wouldn’t give much for a bad guy’s chances if Newt set out to take him down. The only trouble I have with Newt, as his boss, is he tends to be a little lackadaisical with his paperwork sometimes. Aw, let’s be honest here, it’s not sometimes, it’s all the time. I’m constantly bawling him out over it.

  And finally, we have a new member of the squad, Ellie Todd. Ellie has been with us for just over a month and came to us directly from the Police Academy. She seems okay, she’s quiet and reliable. So far, just to help her learn the ropes for a while, she’s been teamed up with Jan.

  We were all in another one of our squad room updates and brain storming sessions, when Sullivan spoke up.

  “You know something, guys. I’ve been thinking,” she said.

  “Christ, Sullivan, don’t scare us with wild statements like that,” Ray Petrocelli called out.

  “Up yours, too, Petrocelli,” Sullivan shot back at him. “Someone around here has gotta think, Ray, and you have to have a brain to do that. So just park your fat Italian ass and just listen up.”

  “Okay, guys, that’s enough. What have you got, Sullivan?” I asked her.

  “It’s about this guy’s accent. I’ve been listening to these tapes over and over. It’s just too phony, Lieutenant. It seems to me he wants us to believe it’s phony and that’s why he’s overdoing it.”

  “You reckon he really is English then, do you?” Wayne asked.

  “Maybe, but I’m just not sure yet. It was just one single word in the original tape that made me wonder, that’s all. And he hasn’t used it in any of the others since.”

  “One word? What one word was that? I must have missed it.” I said.

  “Shall, Lieutenant. Over here we say will more often, instead of shall. You know, will you do this or will you do that. Like, we’d say do you want to go to the movies. Brits
are more likely to say shall we go to the movies. It’s maybe nothing but I’ve just noticed in a lot of the Brit movies, especially if it’s someone in their upper classes speaking, they say shall we a lot, instead of will we. The Queen does it too.”

  “Sounds like Sullivan is trying to get one of you guys to take her to the movies,” Jan Langham piped up. “You gonna ask her out, Petrocelli?”

  Before he could reply, Eddie Barrett, one of the Precinct sergeants who had joined us, observed for no apparent reason, “They spell things funny over there too, don’t they?”

  “So you’re thinking the accent is real then, Sullivan?”

  “Yeah, I do, Lieutenant. Exaggerated for sure but yeah, Boss, I think it’s real enough. I don’t think we should discount it as phony just yet and it could be a possibility, right?”

  “Right, Sullivan, good work and thanks for your input,” I said. “Now about this name ‘The Butler’. Anyone got any ideas about that?”

  “I think it’s a pretty sure bet it isn’t his name, but like the accent, he might be just jerking us around, like Sharon says. But I think it could be some variation of it though.” Ellie Todd offered.

  “Like what, for instance?”

  “Well I’m thinking the English angle here too, Boss, the same as Sharon. You know butler, chauffeur, cook, maid, valet and stuff like that. Names of occupations you might find in an upper class English household.”

  “Just domestics then Ellie?” I asked as I walked over to the white board fixed to the squad room wall.

  “No. Not just domestics as such. The list could include gardeners, groundskeepers, foresters, stable boys, groomers and so on.”

  I rapidly wrote all the occupations as my people fired them at me, not discarding any of them out of hand. When all their thoughts had been exhausted, I stood back and reviewed the list.

  “That was just great guys, and especially you and Sullivan, Ellie. I think this may just give us a bit of a break. We haven’t gotten ourselves anywhere so far and this is as good a route to go on as any right now.”