The Storm Murders by John Farrow Page B

has his methods. But why don’t you tell me what they are?”
    “How do you suppose I can tell you that?” He wore a slight smile, and Cinq-Mars determined that he could get along with this guy if circumstances ever required him to do so. He sensed that he was no dummy, and not an FBI robot either.
    “Isn’t it part of his modus operandi? Which you know. You didn’t bring me here to figure any of this out. You’ve known it all along.”
    The agent raised one of his bushy eyebrows and gave him a sharp look. “Our killer brings a rope with him,” he began. “He pulls himself up, as you said, then he either lifts the chair or the table, whatever he uses, back up behind him, or he puts it back where he found it. By this point, he has tied the rope to beams in the attic—once he left rope fibers behind on the wood, scraping the wood a little—which he can then use to go up and down as he pleases. He arrives when his victims are out of the house and waits—in one case, for days—for his victims to return. In this case, I suppose he had to dispose of a dog and a cat, or cats. So he’s in the house and is familiar with the layout by the time his victims come home. In one example, we believe that the victims arrived home with friends in tow, so he remained in the attic and waited for the guests to leave. He kills on his own time, then remains in the attic until after the police arrive and eventually vacate the house, and then, and only then, does he rob the place. Even taking clues away with him sometimes. In this case, he shot the officers, I’m guessing, for the reason you gave. After that, he didn’t bother with a robbery as far as anyone can tell. That’s what’s different this time—dead cops and no theft. After killing the police officers, he knew that more were on the way. He hid in the attic, but with dead cops, he knew the crime scene would get more attention than usual. He got out while the getting was good, I’m guessing. No time for theft.”
    “Or what he stole remains secret,” Cinq-Mars added.
    “So now you know what I know,” Dreher said as Mathers returned up the stairs and erected the ladder under the trapdoor. He had been climbing the steps slowly, catching the tail end of the agent’s remarks.
    “So why didn’t you tell us all this when we first got here?” Mathers sounded petulant.
    Cinq-Mars chose to answer when Agent Dreher did not. “He’s testing me, Bill. He wants to know if I live up to my reputation.”
    With a slight nod, Dreher concurred.
    “I hate being tested,” Cinq-Mars declared, in a tone that conveyed exactly that sentiment. “Were you aware of that?”
    “I might have guessed.”
    “So mystery solved,” Mathers enthused.
    His mentor cautioned him. “No, Bill. A much larger one has opened up.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Who called the cops to come out here in the first place?”
    Surprised by the query, the two policemen currently on the job looked questioningly at one another. Neither man proposed an answer.
    “Come on, guys,” Cinq-Mars chided them. “Two police officers didn’t drive out here on a whim. Somebody set them up. Or intended to set the killer up, before it all went south.”

 
    FIVE
    As they tramped through snow across the wide yard to the barn, at Cinq-Mars’s suggestion, the three men remained mute. A simple latch on the gate gave them entry and they flicked on a light. Again they found a premises properly cared for, tidy, likely underused. Once inside, with the door shut behind them against wind from that direction, Mathers was first to speak, citing a report that claimed that the barn had been thoroughly scoured by the SQ. Nothing suggested that any aspect of the crime had extended to the dull gray building.
    Cinq-Mars did not seem to care, off on a tangent, musing. “I could use a barn like this. Let me know if any relatives show up. I might take it off their hands.”
    Dreher gazed at him as if the man had just returned from a stint