Ann Pinchot - The Twisted Cross

[dem bones]

Ann Pinchot - The Twisted Cross (Brown, Watson 1965: originally Paperback Library, 1964)

Blurb:
Who was the man who prowled the city of darkness? Was he a Saver of Souls, or a Harbinger of Hell?
To his flock he was a guardian of the gateway to heaven.
To the Police he was a rapist and murderer of young girls.
To the main in the street he was a mad dog.
To the psychiatrist he was a human being in urgent need of help
To You he will be one of the most fascinating, mesmerizing characters you've ever met ....

The Twisted Cross is as haunting as a cry in the night — people with characters so real that their shadows will fall across your solitary path long after you have turned the final page of this book.

"... there was no answer to her knock. She waited. No sound of holiday merriment stirred within. With a sense of apprehension, she tried the door. It opened with a faint creak, like the introduction to one of those old horror shows on radio. The sight in the living room reminded her of the St. Valentines Day Massacre in Chicago. The woman with the face of a doll was sitting by the Christmas tree surrounded by the bright glitter of packages. Scattered in a macabre pattern were the bloody segments of her children."

Mary Cunningham, Doctor of the mind. Her IQ is so massive as to intimidate every man she meets, hence the love of her life ditching her in favour of low wattage model. Mary's friends at the Belfont Country Club regard her as "odd" on account of her profession (licensed Peeping Tom). Mary doesn't see it that way. She can't work miracles - case in point, the waif-like Emma, who butchered her kids - but few patients prove beyond help. The blurb suggests there'll be one such lost cause arrive at the clinic very shortly ....

To be continued ... (very promising up to now)

[dem bones]

"This was the place of the ducktail haircut, the black leather jacket, the switchblade knife, and she wondered if there were the prospect of another gang rumble. The last one had cost the life of an innocent fifteen-year-old boy and the eye of a young policeman."

Veronica Olshansky, seventeen, has a flair for dress-design, albeit that her fondness for violent colour clashes are murder on the eye. The daughter of a brutal, drunken dad and neurotic mother, Dr. Mary Cunningham can only admire how this small and frightened Catholic kid refused to join a hoodlum girl gang and took an almighty beating for her defiance. Veronica is a bully magnet with a string of dead end jobs behind her. She speaks like a character straight off a Velvet Underground album (take your pick of All Tomorrow's Parties or Candy Says). Dr. Cunningham persuades her to join the clinic's Wednesday night art group, and, at session's end, they part in optimistic mood. Veronica heads for the church.

They find her body dumped in the bushes on Dock Street. She's been strangled and raped - "in that order."

Dr. Cunningham is distraught. She pays a visit to Veronica's parents, but is unceremoniously booted out by Mrs. Olshansky who calls her a murderess and threatens to take a blade to her. If Mary hadn't filled Veronica's head with nonsense about hope and getting some enjoyment from life, she'd still be alive today!

[dem bones]

Now where were we ...

Douglas Burnett doesn't bother with an appointment, just turns up on Mary's doorstep and demands she see him. Ever one to help the needy, and against all her training, Mary admits him. A big, brooding thirty-something, Burnett's clean-cut exterior masks the raging turmoil within. "My problem is that I'm hog-tied," which translates as he's unhappily wed to a demanding woman. He married out of duty - she'd never slept with a man before - and now he sees what a fool he's been, how he walked into the trap she'd set. There's nothing he can do meets with Mrs. Burnett's approval, and she's even turning their two kids against him. He's always on edge and suffers occasional black-outs. Of late, he's taken to wondering, what he gets up to during those lost episodes.

Whenever Mary ventures a question, Burnett answers in an aggressive manner, even pulls a gun, though he puts it down almost immediately (a present from his brother, he carries it because this is a tough district, but he doubts he'd ever use it). It's evident that Father Burnett is not womankind's biggest fan. Catching a glimpse of Veronica's photo on the front page of The Bulletin reminds him why he called on Mary in the first place. "I have a feeling that somehow - I'm involved in that -"

Mary arranges an appointment for Friday afternoon. This time he wears his collar. Douglas Burnett is the new minister at Belfont Episcopal Church.