Monday Mourning Part 45

Birdie strolled in, sniffed two pairs of boots and one pair of loafers, made his choice.

"The little guy likes you, Luc." Charbonneau winked at his partner.

"Sorry." I jumped up and removed my cat from Claudel's lap.

Birdie, in as much as cats are capable, looked offended.

"Cameron Hooker kept Colleen Stan sealed in total darkness, subjected to complete sensory deprivation, for up to twenty-three hours per day. For seven years."

"Sonovab.i.t.c.h," Charbonneau said.

"Hooker imprisoned Stan in a series of boxes he designed specifically for that purpose. When it suited him, he took her out, hung her from pipes, stretched her on a rack, whipped her, shocked her with electrical wires, starved, raped, and terrorized her."

Claudel picked a cat hair from his sleeve.

"Hooker's wife ultimately set Stan free. Hooker was arrested in November 1984. The following fall he was convicted of kidnap, rape, sodomy, and a number of other charges. Media coverage turned into blood sport."

"What is the relevance of this?" Claudel sighed.

"Colleen Stan's ordeal took place in Red Bluff, California. Red Bluff is forty miles from Chico."

"Stephen Menard was a grad student in Chico in 1985," Charbonneau said, reaching for his second doughnut.

I nodded.

Birdie sidled to the couch, arched, then brushed Claudel's leg. Going bipedal, he placed both forepaws on Claudel's knee.

Again apologizing, I scooped the cat up and secured him in my bedroom.

"But the mutt here in Montreal isn't Menard," Charbonneau said when I returned.

"I'm using the name for convenience."

"So where's the real Menard?"

"I don't know. Maybe he was killed by the man living in Pointe-St-Charles. That's your job."

"Go on," Ryan urged.

"The Stan case was all over the news from the fall of eighty-four through the fall of eighty-five. The press loved it, called it the Girl in the Box Case. Then the s.e.x Slave Case."

Claudel looked at his watch.

"In 1985 a fourteen-year-old girl named Angie Robinson disappeared from Corning, California. Corning is located between Chico and Red Bluff." I paused for emphasis. "I have reason to believe one of the three pizza bas.e.m.e.nt skeletons is that of Angie Robinson."

Charbonneau's doughnut stopped in its trajectory to his mouth. "The kid in the leather shroud?"

"Yes."

"The one with the broken wrist," Claudel jumped in. "You were certain the ages are incompatible."

"I said Angie Robinson was too young and too short to be a match with skeleton 38428. But if Angie lived for some time after her disappearance, that would account for the discrepancies."

"Explain the strontium and Carbon 14 results to Luc," Ryan said.

I did.

"And explain the dental sealant again."

I did.

"Holy s.h.i.t," said Charbonneau. "You think Menard followed the news coverage and was inspired by this head case Hooker?"

"Yes. But there's more. Anique Pomerleau disappeared from Mascouche in 1990 at age fifteen. Friday, Ryan and I saw Pomerleau in Menard's house."

"Menard's been here since eighty-eight," Charbonneau said.

Claudel tipped back his head and spoke down his nose.

"So based on this story about a girl in a box-"

"The girl has a name." Claudel's cynicism was jiggling my switch. "Colleen Stan."

Claudel's nostrils tightened.

"So you believe Menard has been holding Anique Pomerleau against her will for a decade and a half? That Angela Robinson and the other females buried in the cellar were also his captives?"

I nodded.

For a few moments no one spoke. Claudel broke the silence.

"Did Anique Pomerleau attempt to escape?"

"No."

"Did she signal to you in any way that she wanted to leave Menard's house?"

"She wasn't wearing a banner that said 'Help Me,' if that's what you mean."

Claudel arced an eyebrow at Ryan.

"Pomerleau looked pretty scared," Ryan said.

"She looked terrified," I said.

"What exactly did she do?" Charbonneau asked.

"She ducked out of sight as soon as Menard looked at her. Acted like an abused puppy."

"You think Menard's holding Pomerleau as some kind of s.e.x slave?" Charbonneau.

"I am not suggesting motive."

"Bull snakes." Claudel snorted.

"I'm a little hazy on herpetology, Detective. What exactly does that mean?"

Claudel raised both shoulders and spread his hands. "Any healthy adult capable of doing so would reach out for help."

"Psychologists disagree," I snapped. "Apparently you're not familiar with the Stockholm syndrome."

Claudel's outstretched palms turned skyward.

"It's an adaptation to extreme stress experienced under conditions of captivity and torture."

The hands dropped to Claudel's lap. His chin dipped.

"The Stockholm syndrome is seen in kidnap victims, prisoners, cult members, hostages, even abused spouses and kids. Victims seem to consent to, and may even express fond feelings for, their captors or abusers."

"Weird label," Charbonneau said.

"The syndrome's name came from a hostage situation in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1973. Three women and a man were held for six days by two ex-cons robbing a bank. The hostages came to believe the robbers were protecting them from the police. Following their release, one of the women became engaged to one of the captors, another started a defense fund."

"The defining characteristic is to react to a threatening circ.u.mstance with pa.s.sivity," Ryan said.

"Lie down and take it." Charbonneau shook his head.

"It goes beyond that," I said. "Persons with Stockholm syndrome come to bond with their captors, even identify with them. They may act grateful or even loving toward them."

"Under what circ.u.mstances does this syndrome develop?" Claudel asked.

"Psychologists agree there are four factors that must be present." I ticked them off on my fingers. "One, the victim feels his or her survival is threatened by the captor, and believes the captor will carry through on the threat. Two, the victim is given small kindnesses, at the captor's whim."

"Like letting the poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d live," Charbonneau interjected.

"Could be. Could be brief respites from torture, short periods of freedom, a decent meal, a bath."

"Sacre bleu." Charbonneau again shook his head. Charbonneau again shook his head.

"Three, the victim is completely isolated from perspectives other than those of the captor. And four, the victim is convinced, rightly or wrongly, that there is no way to escape."

Neither Charbonneau nor Claudel said a word.

"Cameron Hooker was a master at this game," I said. "He kept Stan entombed in a coffin under his bed and usually took her out simply to brutalize her. But now and then he'd allow her periods of freedom. At times she was permitted to jog, to work in the garden, to attend church. Once Hooker even drove her to Riverside to visit her family."

"Why wouldn't she just split?" Charbonneau jabbed a hand through his hair, sending the crown vertical.

"Hooker also had Stan convinced he owned her."

"Owned her?" Charbonneau.

"He showed her a cooked-up contract and told her he'd purchased her as a slave from an outfit called the Company. He told her she was under constant surveillance, that if she tried to escape members of the Company would hunt her down and kill her, along with members of her family."

"Cibole!" Charbonneau threw up his hands. "Hooker traumatizes Stan, she feels totally isolated, has to look to him for her slightest need, and she ends up bonding with the freak?" Charbonneau threw up his hands. "Hooker traumatizes Stan, she feels totally isolated, has to look to him for her slightest need, and she ends up bonding with the freak?"

"You've got it," I said. "Some of the most damaging defense testimony focused on a love letter Stan wrote to Hooker."

Charbonneau looked appalled.

"Elizabeth Smart was held by crazies for almost a year," I said. "At times she could hear searchers calling out to her, even recognized her own uncle's voice on one occasion. She never really tried to escape."

"Smart was a fourteen-year-old kid," Charbonneau said.

"Remember Patty Hearst?" Ryan asked. "Symbionese Liberation Army grabbed her and kept her locked in a closet. She ended up robbing a bank with her captors."

"That was political." Charbonneau shot to his feet and started pacing the room. "This Hooker had to be some kind of psychotic mutant. People don't go around s.n.a.t.c.hing up girls and stashing them in boxes."

"The phenomenon may be more common than we know," I said.

Charbonneau stopped pacing. He and Claudel looked at me.

"In 2003, John Jamelske pleaded guilty to holding five women as s.e.x slaves in a concrete bunker he'd constructed under his backyard."

"Right down the road," Claudel said, at last switching to English. "Syracuse, New York."

"Oh, man." Charbonneau again did the hair thing. "Remember Lake and Ng?"

Leonard Lake and Charles Ng were a pair of pathological misogynists who built a torture chamber on a remote ranch in Calaveras County, California. At least two women were videotaped while being tormented by the pair. The tape was labeled M Ladies, M Ladies, M standing for murdered. M standing for murdered.

"Whatever happened to those a.s.sholes?" Claudel's voice dripped with disgust.

"Lake was collared for shoplifting and offed himself with a couple of cyanide capsules. Ng was nailed in Calgary, then fought extradition to the U.S. for about a decade, right, Doc?"

"It took six years of legal wrangling, but Ng was finally returned to California for trial. In 1998, a jury found him guilty of murdering three women, seven men, and two babies."

"Enough." The chill had gone from Claudel's voice. "You believe Menard brought his freak show to Montreal?"

"According to Rose Fisher, Louise Parent phoned to tell me she'd seen Menard twice with young girls. We found three buried in a bas.e.m.e.nt under s.p.a.ce he rented."

"You think Menard transported Angie Robinson from Corning, California, to Montreal?"

"Angie or her body."

"And that he abducted and subjugated Anique Pomerleau?"

"I do."

Claudel voiced my fear.