“Yes,” he said slowly.
“You do not believe that this is a delusion and a paranoid one, at that?”
“No,” he said, trying unsuccessfully to not sound hesitant.
The doctor nodded his head. “And why do you think this?” he asked.
“Miss Jones seems convinced. And so does Peter. And I don’t think that Lanky …”
Gulptilil held up his hand. “These details we’ve discussed before. Tell me, what has changed in the ah, investigation, ah, that suggests that you are on the correct path.”
Francis wanted to squirm in his chair but didn’t dare to do so. “Miss Jones is still interviewing potential suspects,” he said. “I don’t believe that she has reached any conclusions yet about any individual, other than some that have been cleared. Mister Evans has helped her with that.”
Gulptilil paused, assessing the answer. “You would tell me, would you not, Francis?”
“Tell you what, Doctor?”
“If she had made some determination.”
“I’m not sure …”
“It would be a sign, at least to me, that you have a much firmer grasp of reality. It would show some progress on your part, I think, if you were able to express yourself on this score. And who knows where that might lead, Francis? Taking charge of reality, why that’s an important step on the road to recovery. A very important step and a very important road. And that road would lead to all sorts of changes. Perhaps a visit from your family. Perhaps a furlough home for a weekend. And then, perhaps greater freedoms, still. A road of significant possibility, Francis.”
The doctor bent toward Francis, who remained silent.
“I make myself clear?” he asked.
Francis nodded.
“Good. Then we will make time to speak of these matters again in the next few days, Francis. And, of course, should you think it important to speak to me at any time, about any details or observations you might have, why, my door is always open to you. I will always make the time available. At any time, do you understand?”
“Yes. I believe so.”
“I am pleased with your progress, Francis. And pleased, as well, that we had this talk.”
Francis again remained silent.
The doctor gestured toward the door. “I believe we are finished for this moment, Francis, and I have to prepare for a rather important visitor. You may let yourself out. My secretary will arrange for someone to escort you back to Amherst.”
Francis pushed himself up out of the chair and took a few tentative strides toward the office door, when he was stopped by Doctor Gulptilil’s voice. “Ah, Francis, I almost forgot. Before you leave, can you tell me what day it is?”
“Friday.”
“And the date.”
“The fifth of May.”
“Excellent. And the name of our distinguished president?”
“Carter.”
“Very good, Francis. I hope we will have an opportunity soon to speak some more.”
And with that, Francis let himself out the door. He didn’t dare to look back over his shoulder, to see if the doctor was watching him. But he could feel Gulptilil’s eyes boring into his back, right into the place where his neck met his skull. Get out now! he heard from deep within his head, and he was eager to oblige.
The man seated across from Lucy was wiry and small, a little like a professional horse racing jockey in build. He wore a crooked smile, that seemed to her to bend in the same direction that the man hunched his shoulders, giving him a lopsided appearance. He had stringy black hair that encircled his face in a tangled mass, and blue eyes that glowed with an intensity that was unsettling. Every third breath the man took seemed to emerge in an asthmatic wheeze, which didn’t prevent him from lighting one cigarette after the other, so that a smoky haze surrounded his face. Evans coughed once or twice and Big Black retreated to a corner of the office, just close enough, just far enough. Big Black, Lucy thought, seemed to have an instinctive knowledge of distances, almost automatically going to just the right amount for every patient.
She glanced at the file in front of her. “Mister Harris,” she said. “I wonder if you might tell me if you recognize any of these people.”
With that, she thrust the crime scene photographs across the desk at the man.
He took each one carefully, spending perhaps a few too many seconds examining each. Then he shook his head. “Murdered people,” he said with a lingering emphasis on the first word. “Dead and left in the woods, it looks like. Not my cup of tea.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“No. I don’t know them.” His lopsided grin expanded slightly. “And if I did, would you expect me to admit it?”
Lucy ignored this. “You have a record of violence,” she said.
“A fight in a bar isn’t a murder.”
She looked closely at him.
“Nor is drunk driving. Or beating up some guy who thought he could call me names.”
“Look carefully at that third picture,” she said slowly. “Do you see the date inscribed on the bottom of the photograph?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me your whereabouts during that time?”
“I was here.”
“No, you weren’t. Please don’t lie to me.”
The man Harris shifted about. “Then I was in Walpole on some of those bogus charges they like to hit me up with.”
“No, you weren’t. I repeat: Don’t lie to me.”
Harris shifted about. “I was down on the Cape. I had a job down there working for a roofing contractor.”
Lucy looked at the file. “Curious time, wasn’t it? You’re up on some roof somewhere, claiming to be hearing voices, and at the same time, after hours, all sorts of houses within blocks of where you’re working are getting ripped off.”
“Nobody ever filed those charges.”
“That’s because you got them to ship you here.”
He smiled again, showing uneven teeth. A slippery, awful man, Lucy thought. But not the man she was hunting. She could sense Evans growing uneasy at her side.
“So,” she said slowly, “you had nothing to do with any of this?”
“That’s right,” Harris said. “Can I leave now?”
“Yes,” Lucy said. As Harris started to rise, she added: “As soon as you explain to me why another patient would tell us that you boasted of these killings.”
“What?” Harris said, his voice rising an octave instantly. “Somebody said I did what?”
“You heard me. So explain why you’re boasting in the dormitory, it’s Williams, right? Tell me why you would say what you said.”
“I haven’t said anything like that! You’re crazy!”
“This is a crazy place,” Lucy said slowly. “Tell me why.”
“I didn’t. Who told you this?”
“I’m not at liberty to divulge the source of information.”
“Who?”
“You have made claims that have been overheard in the dormitory where you live. You have been indiscreet, to say the least. I’d like you to explain yourself.”
“When did …”
Lucy smiled. “Just recently. This information only came to us recently. So you are denying saying anything?”
“Yes. It’s crazy! Why would I boast about something like that? I don’t know what you’re driving at, lady, but I haven’t killed nobody yet. It don’t make sense …”
“You think everything in here should make sense?”
“Somebody’s lying to you, lady. And somebody wants to get me into trouble.”
Lucy nodded slowly. “I will take that into consideration,” she said. “All right. You can leave. We may, however, have to speak again.”
Harris fairly vaulted out of the chair, taking a step forward, which caused Big Black to uncurl from his position, a movement which the slight man couldn’t help but notice. It made him stop. “Son of a bitch,” he said. And then he turned and exited, after stubbing his cig
arette butt on the floor beneath his feet.
Evans was red-faced. “Do you have any idea the trouble those questions might cause?” he demanded. He pointed at the file, slapping his finger down at Harris’s diagnosis. “See what it says, right there. Explosive. Anger management issues. And you provoke him with a bunch of off-the-wall questions that you know won’t elicit any response other than fury. I’ll bet Harris ends up in an isolation cell before the end of the day, and I’ll be in charge of seeing him sedated. Damn! That was simply irresponsible, Miss Jones. And if you’re intending to persist with questions that will only serve to disrupt life on the wards, I’ll be forced to speak with Doctor Gulptilil about it!”
Lucy pivoted toward Evans. “Sorry,” she said. “Thoughtless of me. I’ll try to be more circumspect with the next interviews.”
“I need a break,” Evans said, rising angrily. He stormed out of the room.
Lucy, however, felt a sense of satisfaction.
She, too, rose up and stepped out of the office into the corridor. Peter was waiting, wearing a small, elusive smile, as if he understood everything that had taken place outside of his presence. He gave her a small bow, acknowledging that he had seen and heard enough, and admired the ploy she’d come up with on such short notice. But he didn’t get the chance to say anything to her because at that moment Big Black emerged from behind the nursing station bars, holding a set of hand and foot cuffs. The chains made a rattling sound that echoed in the corridor. More than one patient wandering through the area saw the attendant, and saw what he held in his hands, and like startled birds taking wing, they swirled out of his path as rapidly as possible.
Peter, however, remained stock-still, waiting.
From a few feet away, Cleo stood up, her immense bulk swaying back and forth as if buffeted by a hurricane wind.
Lucy watched Big Black approach Peter, whisper an apology, and then snap the cuffs on his wrists and attach them around his ankles. She kept her mouth closed.
But as the final restraint clicked shut, a red-faced, infuriated Cleo abruptly shouted out, “The bastards! The bastards! Don’t let them take you away, Peter! We need you!”
Silence hammered the corridor.
“Damn it to hell,” Cleo sang out, “We need you!”
Lucy saw that Peter’s face was set, and that all his grinning insouciance had fled. He lifted his hands up, as if testing the limits of the restraints, and she thought she could see a great agony sweep through him, before he turned and passively allowed Big Black to lead him down the corridor hobbled like a wild beast that couldn’t be trusted.
chapter 21
Peter cautiously shuffled down the hospital pathway at the side of Big Black in the unmistakable loping manner caused by the restraints binding his legs and hands. The huge attendant remained silent, as if embarrassed by the escort duty. He had apologized once to Peter as they stepped outside of the Amherst Building, and then shut up. But he was walking quickly, which prompted Peter to half run to keep up, and forced him to keep his head down, eyes on the black macadam walkway, concentrating on what he was doing so that he would not stumble and fall.
Peter could feel a little of the late afternoon sunlight on his neck, and he managed to lift his head a couple of times to see that shafts of light were streaking over the rows of buildings, as the sunset took grasp of the end of the day. There was a little chill in the air, a familiar reminder that the spring in New England owns a warning to not be overconfident about the advent of summer. Some of the white paint on the window frames glistened, making the barred glass look like heavy-lidded eyes watching his progress across the quadrangle. The cuffs around his hands dug painfully into the flesh of his wrists and he realized that all the exuberance he’d felt when he’d first sneaked out of the Amherst Building in the company of the two brothers to start searching for the Angel, the excitement that had flooded him with every remembered smell and sense, had fled, replaced by a gloom of imprisonment. He did not know what meeting he was being taken to, but he suspected it was significant.
This thought was buttressed by the sight of two black Cadillac limousines parked in the rotary in front of the hospital administration building. They were polished to a reflective sheen.
“What’s going on?” Peter whispered to Big Black.
The attendant shook his head. “They just told me to get the restraints and bring you along real quick. So now you know as much as me.”
“Which is nothing,” Peter said, and the big man nodded in agreement.
He lurched up the stairs behind Big Black and hurried down the hallway to Gulptilil’s office. Miss Luscious was waiting behind her secretary’s desk, and Peter saw that her familiar scowl had been replaced by a look of discomfort and that she had covered up her usual skintight blouse with a loose-fitting cardigan. “Hurry up,” she said. “They’ve been waiting.” She did not say who they were.
The chains jangled with the music of restraint as he hurried forward, and Big Black held the door open for him. Peter shuffled into the room.
He first saw Gulp-a-pill behind his desk. The medical director rose, as Peter entered. There was, as usual, an empty seat in front of the desk. There were also three other men in the room. All wore the black suits and white collars of the clergy. Peter did not recognize two of the men, but the third was a face familiar to any Boston Catholic. The Cardinal was seated to the side, dead center of a couch that was placed along the wall. He had his legs crossed, and he seemed relaxed. One of the other priests was seated next to him, and held a brown leather folder in his hands, a yellow legal-size notepad, and a large, black pen, which he fiddled with nervously. The third priest had been given a seat behind Gulptilil’s desk, just to the side of the medical director. He had a sheaf of papers in front of him.
“Ah, Mister Moses, thank you. Please, if you would be so kind, remove the restraints from Peter’s hands and legs.”
It took a moment or two for the attendant to do this. Then he stepped back, looking toward the medical director, who gave him a small, dismissive wave. “Just wait outside for us to call you, won’t you please, Mister Moses. I’m sure that there is no need for any additional security to be present during this meeting.” He looked over at Peter and added, “We are all gentlemen here, are we not?”
Peter did not reply to this. He didn’t feel very much like a gentleman in that moment.
Without a word, Big Black turned and left Peter standing alone. Gulptilil gestured toward the chair. “Be seated, Peter,” he said. “These men would like to ask you some questions.”
Peter nodded, and sat down heavily, but slid to the front of the chair, poised. He tried to appear confident, but he knew this was unlikely. He could feel a rush of emotions within him, a range from out-and-out hatred to curiosity, and he warned himself to keep whatever he said short and direct. “I recognize the Cardinal,” Peter said, looking directly at the medical director. “I have seen his picture on many occasions. But I’m afraid I do not know the other two gentlemen. Do they have names?”
Gulptilil nodded. “Father Callahan is the Cardinal’s personal assistant,” Gulptilil said, indicating the figure seated beside the Cardinal. He was a middle-aged, balding man, with a pair of thick eyeglasses that were pushed tight to his face, and stubby fingers that gripped his pen tightly and drummed against the legal pad. He nodded at Peter, but did not rise to shake hands. “And the other gentleman is Father Grozdik, who has some questions for you.”
Peter nodded. The priest with the Polish name was much younger, probably close in age to Peter himself. He was lean, athletic, well over six feet tall. His black suit seemed tailored to a narrow waist and he had a languid, feline appearance. His dark hair was worn long, but brushed back from his face, and he had penetrating blue eyes that were lodged on Peter, and had not wavered from him since he’d been escorted into the room. He, too, did not rise, offer his hand, or say anything in greeting, but leaned forward in a eerily predatory fashion. Peter met the man’s gaze, then said
, “My guess is that Father Grozdik also has a title. Perhaps he would share that with me.”
“I’m with the Archdiocese’s legal office,” he said. The priest had a flat, even voice that betrayed little.
“Perhaps, if the Father’s questions are of a legal nature, I should have my attorney present?” Peter said. He formed this as a question purposefully, hoping to read something in the priest’s response.
“We were all hoping that you would agree to meet with us informally,” the priest answered.
“That would of course depend on what it is you wish to know,” Peter said. “Especially, as I note that Father Callahan over there has already begun to take notes.”
The older priest stopped writing in midstroke. He lifted his eyes to the younger priest, who nodded back at him. The Cardinal remained motionless on the couch, watching Peter carefully.
“Do you object?” Father Grozdik asked. “It might be important at some later point to have a record of this meeting. That would be as much for your protection as ours. And, should nothing come of this, well, then we can always agree to destroy the record. But, if you have an objection …” He let his voice trail off.
“Not yet. Maybe later,” Peter said.
“Good. Then we can proceed.”
“Please do,” Peter said stiffly.
Father Grozdik stared down at his papers, taking his time before continuing. Peter realized instantly that the man had had training in interrogation techniques. He could see this in the patient, settled manner the priest had, arranging his thoughts prior to opening his mouth with a question. Peter guessed the military, and saw a simple procession: Saint Ignatius for high school, then Boston College for undergraduate work. ROTC training at college, a tour of duty overseas with military police, a return to BC Law and more Jesuitical training, then the fast track in the archdiocese. Growing up, he’d known a few like Father Grozdik, who had been placed by virtue of intellect and ambition, on the church’s priority list. The only thing out of place, Peter realized, was the Polish name. Not Irish, which he thought was interesting. But, then, in that moment, he realized that his own background was Irish Catholic, as was the Cardinal’s and the Cardinal’s assistant, and so, a message was being sent by bringing in someone of different ethnic origins. He wasn’t precisely sure what advantage this gave the three priests. He guessed that he would find out in short order.
The Madman's Tale Page 34