She promised to send me a copy of the file on her case as well. I hung up and told Sampson everything I’d learned.
The big man looked sober, sipped his coffee, but then shook his head slowly as if swallowing a bitter pill. “He’s evolving. He doesn’t torture the girl in Albuquerque before strangling her. But two years later he mutilates the student in Tampa before he takes her out. Hate to say it, but makes me wonder what sick new ritual he’s got planned for Cam if we don’t find her first.”
My stomach soured completely, and I put my coffee down. Nodding grimly, I picked up the bizarre letter that had begun my day. “But somehow I keep coming back to Thierry Mulch. Who is this guy?”
Chapter
49
The following morning, Marcus Sunday smiled at the woman at the front desk at Sojourner Truth School on Franklin Street. But she was looking suspiciously at his flaming-red Abe Lincoln beard, white pants, white shirt, purple shoes, and violet suspenders.
“Thierry Mulch, here to see the principal,” he said, handing her a flawless forgery of a California driver’s license that featured a photo from Preston Elliot’s school ID doctored up with a red wig, red eyebrows, and the Lincoln beard.
The woman took the fake ID and ran it under a lamp to check the blue-light watermark, which was right where it was supposed to be. She handed it to him without any change in expression and gestured over his shoulder, saying, “Ms. Dawson’s waiting for you down the hall there. First double doors on your right.”
“Love it,” he said, winking at her. “And thank you.”
Sunday turned and strolled down the hallway, enjoying the reflections of himself he caught in the glass cases that lined one wall. With this getup, he was one step shy of a cartoon character. Just about perfect for his intended audience.
The writer sniffed. What was that smell? Burgers frying in the school lunchroom? Had to be. Was there anything more elementary school than that?
He neared the double doors and heard the excited chatter of children. A tall African American woman dressed in a blue business suit came out. She beamed at him, said, “Mr. Mulch?”
Sunday reacted as if overjoyed. “Principal Dawson?”
She grabbed his hand, pumped it, said, “You don’t know how much your offer to come speak to our children means to me.”
“Giving back,” Sunday said modestly. “It’s the least I can do.”
“Well, I know they’ll appreciate it.”
“Not as much as I will.”
She opened the door and let him pass inside.
The auditorium was packed with second and third graders, who erupted into cheers and laughter when Sunday started grinning and waving with wild exaggeration, as if he were some escapee from Ringling Brothers.
The writer responded to their amusement by punching at the sky and skipping sideways up onto the stage, where he stopped and looked about brightly, searching for someone in particular.
The principal followed uncertainly and went to a podium. Waving her hands to calm the churning crowd of seven- and eight-year-olds, Ms. Dawson called into the microphone, “Quiet down, now. As fun as Mr. Mulch seems to be, I hope you listen closely to what he has to say.”
She paused, waiting for the last goofballs and whisperers to stop their squirming antics and fall silent.
“Thank you,” she said. “Mr. Mulch is the founder of a website like Facebook that is going live later in the year and is dedicated to kids your age. He’d like to tell you a little about himself, his life, and the site. Mr. Mulch?”
Sunday didn’t respond at first. Amid the clapping children, he’d spotted the one he was looking for, over there, third row, at the end on the right.
“Mr. Mulch?” the principal said again.
The writer cocked his head, shifting his focus off his quarry and smiling at the principal. “Glad to be here, Ms. Dawson.”
Sunday stepped to the podium, let his eyes roam over the kids looking up at him with the sort of immediate attention given to a man well over six feet tall with a shock of flaming-red hair.
“You’ll hear this again in your lives,” he began.
“But Mr. Mulch is here to tell you that you can do anything you want, be anybody you want to be. When I was a little boy about your age, I lived on a pig farm. And now look at me.”
Chapter