CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT

When Riley arrived at the flight desk, she was breathless from haste and anxiety, and her head was spinning with dangerous scenarios and possibilities. Her mind boggled at the realization that had sent her here—and with thoughts of what she was going to have to do to stop Mason Eggers from killing again.

She kept telling herself …

I won’t know exactly what I have to do until I have to do it.

Just when she finished buying her ticket, she heard a familiar voice behind her.

“Hey, Riley!”

It was Bill’s voice.

She turned and gasped aloud as she saw Bill and Jenn hurrying toward her.

“What are you doing here?” she said.

Bill grinned at her as Jenn started to buy her own ticket.

“What do you think we’re doing? You didn’t think we’d let you go alone, did you?”

“But how did you …?”

Riley was about to ask Bill how he and Jenn had gotten here so quickly. But of course, the answer was obvious. It was a shorter drive for them from Quantico than it was for her from Fredericksburg. As soon as they’d read her message, they’d gotten together and driven straight here.

Riley felt overwhelmed. Their arrival here was much, much more than she had dared to hope for. She couldn’t find words to begin to express her gratitude.

She wouldn’t have to do this alone after all.

Later, she thought. After we’ve caught the killer.

When all three agents had their tickets, they hurried to the departure gate, where the plane was already boarding. They showed their badges to the flight attendant and told her that they’d need to deplane as soon as possible after landing in Detroit. The attendant quickly found them three seats together near the door. Jenn sat between Bill and Riley.

The three agents were still winded when the plane took off a few minutes later.

“So,” Riley said breathlessly, “you believe my theory.”

Bill and Jenn looked at each other, as if surprised by the question.

Bill said, “Hey, that article you linked us to was pretty convincing.”

Jenn added, “And the victims all resemble his wife so strongly. It’s surely no coincidence. And now, this is the anniversary of her suicide.”

Riley shook her head and said, “I wish I could get someone else to believe me. And I’ve still got all kinds of questions of my own …”

When the plane reached cruising altitude, Jenn got on the Internet to do some research.

She said, “I’m finding out more about Mason Eggers. He left Dunmore soon after his wife’s death, then moved to Chicago where he became a railroad cop. He never remarried.”

Bill asked, “Has he ever had any trouble with the law?”

“Just the opposite,” Jenn said. “He had a distinguished career with the railroad police and got several commendations. As far as I can tell, he’s never hurt a fly.”

New doubts started to creep into Riley’s mind.

“I can’t make sense of that,” she said. But then she remembered the feeling she’d had that something had gone wrong in the man’s mind. She added, “He seems to have gone through some kind of serious psychiatric change. Schizophrenia, maybe?”

“Maybe,” Bill said. “But as I understand it, schizophrenia typically starts in late adolescence or early adulthood—not in old age.”

Jenn’s fingers danced on her tablet computer as she brought up more information.

She said, “Schizophrenia is rare at that age, but not unheard of. It’s sometimes called very-late-onset schizophrenia when it occurs after the age of sixty. But older people can suffer from delusions, hallucinations, and mental confusion for other reasons. There’s a condition called Charles Bonnet Syndrome that involves visual hallucinations. And of course, he might be suffering from some physiological brain disorder—brain cancer, maybe, or early stages of Alzheimer’s or even Parkinson’s. There really are lots of reasons why his mental health might be failing.”

The three agents thought in silence for a few moments.

Finally Bill said, “It’s still hard to understand his behavior—as it relates to us, I mean. I know he put us onto that stakeout as a ruse. But some of his suggestions seem to have been genuine, even helpful—like how he listens to scanners to figure out freight train schedules. And the last town, Dermott—it really does begin with a D, following the alphabetical pattern he described.”

Again, Riley felt an alarming surge of uncanny empathy with Eggers.

She said, “Part of him wants somebody to stop him, and part of him wants to get away with his murders. Part of him is trying to help us, part of him is trying to trick us. He’s at war with himself. As lucid as he seems in person, he’s slipping into some kind of dementia, and he doesn’t know which he wants more—to go free or to face justice.”

Bill scratched his chin and looked at Riley.

“I’m just wondering one thing,” he said to her. “What made you look for that news story in the first place? Checking into that kind of ancient history is a pretty big intuitive leap—even for you.”

Riley gulped. She couldn’t very well tell him about Aunt Cora’s phone call.

She stammered, “It—it was just a wild hunch.”

Jenn locked eyes with Riley. The younger agent looked worried.

Riley was sure …

Jenn has guessed what happened.

They would need to talk about this sometime—but not now. Riley realized that she wasn’t eager to ask all of her many questions about Aunt Cora anytime soon.

Coffee was served, and the three agents continued to quietly brainstorm. Jenn also arranged to rent a car at the airport so they could drive directly to the train station. But as the time for their landing neared, they heard the pilot’s voice.

“Folks, I’m sorry to say that our landing is going to be delayed a bit. There’s some bad weather down in Detroit, so we’ll have to circle for a little while—probably about twenty minutes.”

As the pilot went on to assure his passengers about connecting flights, Riley and her colleagues exchanged looks of despair.

“Twenty minutes,” Riley said. “We’ll be too late to meet the train when it arrives. He’ll abduct his victim after all.”

Bill said, “Can’t we get somebody to pick him up at the platform?”

Riley suppressed a groan as she remembered her desperate phone calls.

“We won’t get any help from the Detroit cops, believe me. We don’t even have a warrant, and we’d never get one soon enough—even if this were still an open case, which it isn’t.”

Jenn got busy on her tablet computer again.

“We need to change gears,” she said, bringing up a map.

She pointed to the map and explained, “We’re coming in west of Detroit, and Dunmore is also to the west of the city. But he’ll be arriving on the other side of Detroit. He’ll have to drive through the city to get back to Dunmore, but we’ll be able to drive straight there. We can get there as soon as he can. With any luck, before he does. “

Riley stared at the map, hoping Jenn was right.

But her worry was still building up.

She knew that, tonight, Eggers was going to transport a victim to the very place where the tragedy of his life had taken place fifty years ago.

We’ve got to be there too, Riley thought.

We’ve got to get to the train tracks in time to stop him.

But was that possible?