Bliss

by Gordon Phillips

  I took the last volume, and saw the dates on its title page. The latter date was two months before Quentin’s death. Turning to the back, I saw that the volume was full. I looked at the shelf. There was no gap on the shelf after this final volume, other books filling the entire space.

  I felt a sinking feeling in my gut.

  Horst, who had been looking over my shoulder, now said, “Maybe there’s another volume somewhere?”

  I looked at him, blinked, and nodded. Feeling grateful for his suggestion, I put a hand on his chest and pressed into his pectoral muscles, running my hand over his shirt. He chuckled.

  “Careful!” he warned, and I laughed, but took his hand and held it.

  “Where do you think it might be?” I said.

  He shrugged. “How about I just search? I can be useful.”

  There was something plaintive in the last statement that caused a twinge. I looked at him, shaking my head. “You’re more than useful,” I said quietly. “You’re wonderful.”

  We hugged, rocking each other. I murmured against his chest, “It’s just my luck that you find something in me to interest you.”

  He paused, and held me by the shoulders at arm’s length.

  “You’re kidding!” he said, looking at me in amazement.

  I shook my head. “I’m not asking for compliments, but—come on! I’m pretty ordinary. And you, sir, sure ain’t!”

  He dismissed the compliment, frowning and holding my shoulders tighter. Then he shook me slightly, his eyes shining with unshed tears.

  “But you—” he said, and stopped, searching for words. “I mean—you’re smart!”

  I blinked. “So?”

  He looked incredulous. “Smart is sexy.”

  “It is?”

  “Yes!” he said, and shook me again.

  “Okay!” I cried, laughing. “Don’t take me apart. I accept that you find it sexy.” I smiled and added more soberly. “And for that I can’t tell you how grateful I am.”

  He continued to hold me and stare at me.

  “And you’ve got a big heart.” Then he blushed. “And a good body.”

  I laughed. “Enough! I don’t want a litany. It’s enough that you’re interested, okay?”

  He let go and turned away, but I heard him say, half to himself, “I’m more than interested.”

  I felt a glow at that, but decided not to pursue whatever this conversation was.

  * * * *

  We searched the study exhaustively, but didn’t find the missing, latest journal and had to be content with what we had. Examining the volumes, it was interesting, but hardly relevant. Quentin was someone who had wide interests, and he put his thoughts on all of them in these journals, along with quotes he thought interesting.

  But the problem was: he was all over the place, and there was nothing strictly suggestive of what I was looking for: neither threats, trouble, nor thoughts of suicide.

  Finally, I gave up, phoned Detective Solomon, and suggested a meeting. He agreed, so I left Horst in the early evening and headed downtown.

  “I’ll have a late dinner for you,” were his parting words. I kissed him and left the apartment with a spring in my step, feeling I had it pretty good just now.

  Except for this one thorny question: What exactly had happened to Quentin?

  Chapter 7: Diary

  I was thankful, when Detective Solomon entered the interrogation room, that he was not wearing his uniform. With our past interactions, he was distracting enough now in his civies: those long legs, and where they led—

  He looked at me, for a second the over-confident, predatory male—and when he saw my face, his manner changed.

  “You’ve got something?”

  I nodded. Reaching into my bag, I extracted one of the gas masks I had seen in Ted’s bedroom in Quentin’s condo.

  “Quentin’s second roommate, a guy named Ted—” I began.

  “Yeah,” Solomon said, nodding. “We interviewed him.”

  “Well, he has what Horst calls oxygen parties, which are something like orgies.”

  Again, Solomon nodded. “We know about such things. He keeps oxygen in his closet. A lot of it.” He toyed with the plastic bag containing the mask and looked up at me questioningly.

  “Do you have a photograph of the victim’s face?” I said.

  Solomon nodded, and flipped through the thick stack of files he had brought in.

  “Here it is.” He handed it to me.

  I studied the photograph. It was a copy, so I took out my pen and a ruler from my bag and, measuring carefully, scaling for the smaller size of the head, using the ruler next to the head that was part of the photo, made a scaled copy. Solomon watched me, and when I had finished, I slid the photograph over to him.

  “See?”

  He looked at it, then picked up the gas mask, and finally looked at me. He was puzzled.

  “But, it’s—”

  “Yes!” I cried. “That’s what fooled us, that and the bruising right around the mouth. He had the mask on upside down!”

  Solomon grunted. Then he nodded slowly. “And what about the bruising around the mouth?”

  “Horst tried mouth to mouth.”

  “What?”

  I related what Horst had told me.

  “And you have a tape of him saying this?”

  I nodded. Solomon was silent for several minutes. Finally, he pushed away the photograph.

  “Okay, so far,” he said. “But it still doesn’t explain the cause of death.”

  I nodded. “Unless,” I said, “unless the tube to the oxygen tank was twisted, closed somehow.”

  Solomon stroked his chin, which had some stubble on it—momentarily distracting.

  “But—” he began. “What about the oxygen tank. There was no tank there.”

  I nodded, shifting in my seat. “I think I have an answer. It’s the same reason there were no telltale fingerprints. Horst is the housekeeper, and he’s a clean freak. I think he was upset, and only half awake after his nap, and he just cleaned and put away the oxygen tank, and mask—as he was used to.”

  “So, no prints.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Bit of a stretch, no?”

  I shrugged, then looked the detective in the face.

  “I just want you to know: I believe the guy. Everything has a ring of truth.”

  “What about doing a polygraph? Could you get him to do that?”

  “I might. But his memory—it’s blocked. I used hypnosis, like I said.”

  “Mmm.” Solomon looked unhappy. I knew where he was coming from. This sort of thing didn’t rate as proper evidence, strictly speaking.

  Finally, he said, begrudgingly, “The bruising on the face, that’s good. That explains things, more or less. But the rest—isn’t it still a bit up in the air?”

  I nodded.

  “Listen,” I said. “Did you interview the person who delivered the gas?”

  Solomon nodded and searched through his files.

  “And we looked at the video from the hallway security camera for the month prior to the incident.”

  I nodded, impressed. “And?”

  “He came every two weeks, with one cylinder, and took one away.”

  “Did you talk to the guy?”

  “Yes. His name is Henderson, Greg Henderson.”

  “Do you have the times of his deliveries?”

  Solomon nodded, and slid a piece of paper over.

  I examined the notes. “These are great!”

  Solomon looked well-pleased, and from the level of the arrogance that was beginning to show itself, I thought he might be looking in need of another draining. But I was too deep in the mystery now. I asked for copies of both the photo of the bruising, and the report on the gas deliveries—and left, assuring Solomon I’d get back to him when I had it figured out.

  * * * *

  When I got back to the condo, I saw that Horst was excited about something. I, of course, was excited j
ust to see him, and my initial idea was to initiate something intimate. But he laughed and held my hands.

  “Wait!” he said, laughing. “I have something to show you.”

  I kissed him, straining futilely against his hold. “Okay. Let’s unwrap it.”

  He laughed again, but shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “It’s something else.”

  I looked at him and blinked. “Is there anything else?”

  He hesitated and then released his hold.

  Afterwards, we lay together, covered in sweat, me holding him from behind, my fingers still savoring the feel of him.

  “Man!” I said. “That was even better than before!”

  He made a pleased noise in his throat, and stroked my forearm with his big, sausage fingers. Idly, I took hold of his hand and pulled it up until I could put on of those sausages in my mouth. I was beginning to feel interested in round two, but Horst pulled his hand from my mouth.

  “Don’t you want to see what I found?”

  “Found? You found something?”

  Horst nodded. “The last volume of Quentin’s diary.”

  A new kind of excitement flooded me, and we got up. Yet, as eager as I was to see the diary, I didn’t hurry our customary post-sex shower: Horst’s body, wet and naked, his skin glistening as water sluiced over his curves and muscles, was something that claimed attention. When we were drying off, he told me how he’d found the volume.

  “I was wracking my brains, trying to think where it might be—and then it hit me: the only places were where I didn’t clean. One of them was between the headboard of Quentin’s bed and the wall. And there it was!”

  At last, we were seated in the kitchen with fresh coffees, the final volume of Quentin’s diary before us on the table. A dozen pages were filled, and we read them all. When we had finished, I sat back.

  “Huh!”

  Horst looked at me questioning. “What do you think?”

  I pursed my lips. “Well,” I said cautiously, “there’s more rumination about death. Look here.” I flipped the pages. “A quote from Wittgenstein: Death is not an event in life. Then there’s this:

  “I think it came from my dreams that maybe the descent into death is like an asymptote in math: something approached but never reached. Like a curve on a graph whose slope increases as the asymptote is approached. If the horizontal direction is time, then as it veers up, our subjective experience along that curve, a constant rate, involves less and less time. Then, the moment of death is never experienced, and our subjective experience of existence continues without limit before that time.”

  Horst looked blank. “You understand that?”

  I shrugged. “I think I do, a bit. But not entirely. But he is trying to understand the moment of death, I guess.”

  “But—why?”

  I thought I could guess, but said nothing, instead flipping back several pages.

  “And this. Look at this.”

  I put my forefinger on a short note:

  “I am only ever really happy when I’m lying in bed, half awake. For then my mind stills, all the worries pass away, and I’m happy, and content. When I’m awake my mind buzzes—the endless thoughts, worry, and the darkness. And that only truly goes away at the moment of somnolescence—just before the lights of the mind go out and the dreams come, that moment of blissful peace, where nothing can get at me—not from outside, from the world; and not from inside either.”

  “That kinda explains why he used to spend so much time in his bedroom—or, I guess, his study.”

  I turned another page, and pointed to two references to trying oxygen.

  “He seems to have used Ted’s oxygen supply. Does that make sense?”

  Horst shook his head. “No idea. I think it’s supposed to give you a high.”

  “Well, Quentin sounds disappointed with the effects.”

  We were both silent for a time.

  “I guess,” I said at last, “the question is: Did Quentin want to die or not?”

  “You mean—suicide?”

  I nodded.

  “But how?”

  “I have no idea. But—I don’t know—I think this opens up a new set of ideas.” I smiled. “At least we’re making progress.”

  Horst nodded and got up and stretched. “What about dinner?”

  Dinner was, as usual, marvelous—this time a chicken and vegetable casserole, but spiced perfectly. Then we took the evening off from the diaries, and sat out on the balcony, talking about Quentin and sharing stories of our experiences with him.

  “I think that he had one of the best hearts of anyone I ever knew,” Horst said.

  I decided it was time to tell Horst about Quentin’s will. When I had finished, he was speechless, staring at me in horror.

  “My God!” he murmured. “That’s why the cops think I did it!” He groaned. “Maybe I could refuse it.”

  “If you like, but remember there are eight people listed in the will.”

  Horst sighed and nodded. I reached out and took his hand in mine, and we were silent, looking out at the city at night, and feeling content.

  * * * *

  In the morning I resolved to go over Quentin’s diaries again. I worked in Quentin’s study, and took breaks only to eat meals with Horst. He spoke little, sensing I was deep in my own ruminations, but we hugged and kissed whenever we were together.

  Horst said he wanted to visit someone—a friend, and that he would be back late if that was okay. I said of course it would, and that I’d probably be still at it when he got back. We had an early dinner, and then he left.

  Once alone, I felt I needed to get out to clear my head. I drove down to the lake and sat on a bench on the pier, watching the sun go down. It was always a good place for me—for thinking. But nothing came; it just got more tantalizingly near. When I got back to Quentin’s condo, I was deeply considering the case, feeling there was still a shoe to drop, if that was the metaphor. Something still remained in the pieces I needed to make sense of, and come to some kind of conclusion.

  Horst was still out. I had just got myself a beer from the fridge when my phone rang. It was from Sam. When I answered it, he said in an unexpectedly solemn voice, “Hi, Ian.”

  I felt my stomach knot a bit at this.

  “Everything okay?” I asked.

  “No.”

  “Oh. Okay. Um, what can I do for you?”

  “Uh, could I come up? I’m outside the building now.”

  “Oh! Uh, sure!”

  I let him into the building, then sat down on the couch, wondering what was wrong.

  Chapter 8: Trio in Trouble

  “What’s up?” I said when I had opened the door and ushered him inside.

  When I had closed the door, I looked at him in surprise. He seemed a totally different man from when I had left him just two hours earlier. I took his coat and he followed me into the living room.

  “Have a seat,” I said, adding, “Beer?”

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  When I had handed him the beer, he held it in a distracted manner, looking at nothing. I sat down and sipped my own beer, looking him over. When his eyes finally met mine, he gave a weak smile.

  “Could I crash here?”

  I looked him over again, noticing how the shoulders, usually held proudly back, were slightly hunched now. He looked defeated. And, although he was far less virile-looking now, I found my heart go out to the man a bit. This was the piece that had been missing in him: humility and vulnerability.

  I considered his request, and nodded. “Sure. There’s Ted’s old room. The furniture’s still there. It was Quentin’s apparently. And we’ll be able to find you some bedding, I’m sure.”

  He gave a sad smile and nodded. “Thanks.”

  I held up a forefinger. “But first, you’re going to have to tell me what’s up.”

  He nodded again, but looked down at the floor. Then he seemed to realize he was holding a beer, and took a long swig before s
ighing and sitting back in the chair, resting his head against the top of the back.

  “If you can,” I amended.

  He sighed and took another mouthful of beer. When he had swallowed this, he sat up and looked at me.

  “No, I can talk about it.”

  I waited, but having announced his intention he said nothing more while he got through the beer. Finally, I got up and put a second one on the coffee table in front of him. He handed me the empty, and I took it to the kitchen.

  When I got back, he had changed seats and was sitting on the couch.

  “More comfortable,” he said, sinking back into the white softness of the couch’s exquisite padding. I nodded, and hesitated for a second. But I decided to keep my own seat, which meant we were sitting side-by-side. I put my arm along the top of the back of the couch, behind him. It felt comfortable, and a little more. He pressed his head back so that I could feel the soft fine texture of his hair against my forearm.

  “I think,” he said at last, “that Debra and I are finished.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He sighed. “She said she doesn’t like being married to a cop.”

  I thought about this. “Weren’t you one when she married you?”

  “Yeah. But she said that was different.”

  “How’s that?”

  Sam stared into the middle distance, shaking his head slowly. “No idea. She didn’t say.”

  “Maybe it’s the uniform,” I suggested quietly.

  He looked at me sidelong, and we both chuckled.

  “You mean my being a detective? That it’s not as glamorous as being a cop on the beat or something? Well, maybe. Who knows?” Then he shook his head again. “Really, I don’t think that’s it. We weren’t—well, we weren’t on the same page, for some time; before I became a detective.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again.

  He shrugged. “It felt like kind of not working, but vaguely—just the old sense of being a real couple having gone.” He stopped then, and there was silence for a while. “But then, not too long ago her brother got arrested for dealing drugs. I figure that must have been what pushed her over the edge. She did a lot of yelling at the time, about the ‘system,’ how personal choice should be everyone’s right, that sort of thing.