The Mussorgsky Riddle

by Darin Kennedy

  “Do you know why?”

  “Oh, yes.” Caroline’s voice grows quiet. “Though I still can’t believe it.”

  “Well? What was it? Why was he here?”

  She glances at the front door. “Are you working with them?”

  “The cops?” A bitter laugh escapes my lips before I can stop it. “Not as of ten minutes ago.”

  “Then I need to show you something.” She goes to a drawer across the room and pulls out a manila envelope. “Mr. Hartman brought this.”

  I unwind the red twine holding the envelope closed and pull out a collection of 8 X 10 photographs, the subject of each picture a blue Honda parked behind a dumpster. The focus is a little off, but there’s no doubt about the identities of the car’s occupants. Reclining in the driver’s seat, Glenn Hartman appears more than content. Next to him, not quite in the passenger seat and more visible in some of the photos than others, Julianna Wagner is clearly occupied.

  As I flip through the photographs, the air fills with the odor of fermenting apples. The scent of jealousy, roiling off a stack of 8 X 10 glossies. Unmistakable.

  An index card fastened to the bottom of the last photo contains a scrawled message.

  I know.

  J.F.

  “My God.” I rest the photograph on the table. “Did Jason take these pictures?”

  “I don’t know.” Caroline rests her cup of coffee on the table and rubs at her eyes. “I don’t know anything anymore. All I can tell you is Jason became very upset when he saw these. That’s when the fight broke out. Don’t tell anyone, but I’m a little proud of the shiner my son left under Hartman’s eye.” A wicked smile spreads across her face. “The Faircloth left hook is one thing he gets honest from his father.”

  “You didn’t give these pictures to the police?”

  Caroline’s eyes grow cold. “My son has already been brought in for questioning twice over the last three weeks. You don’t seriously think I’m going to hand the police photos that suddenly give him motive, do you?”

  “You’re obstructing justice, Caroline.”

  “I know. I just didn’t know what else to do.”

  “Call Sterling. Tell him what happened. He’ll understand.” I pray my advice doesn’t get Caroline thrown in jail, or Jason for that matter, but holding on to those photos is like sitting on a burning powder keg. It’s not a question of if it’s going to blow. It’s a matter of when.

  “Thanks, Mira.” She raises an eyebrow. “Can I ask you something that’s been on my mind all morning?”

  “Hit me.”

  “Do you think any of what’s happened this morning has to do with what Jason asked you to do yesterday?”

  I bite my lip. “Actually, I think it has everything to do with it. Do you remember the session with Anthony where I met Hartmann the Cart Man?”

  Her face blanches. “The visit where you saw Julianna’s body plowed out of the field?” Her gaze darts to the door and then back to mine. “It was him, wasn’t it? Mr. Hartman, or some psychotic version of him, living in Anthony’s mind. Like Jason, Rachel, and the others.”

  “It’s more than that, Caroline. One of the reflections I picked up from Jason’s mind yesterday was a memory of a party. Jason was there, as were Julianna and Mr. Hartman, who I understand is her teacher as well as her music tutor. He and Julianna seemed… close.” I gesture to the photo of the two of them in what I’m guessing is Hartman’s car. “Looks like my suspicions yesterday weren’t too far off the mark.”

  “You exonerated my son, even after I kicked you out of the house.” Caroline’s cheeks go crimson. “I’m so sorry.”

  “No apologies. It’s all water under the bridge and we still have Anthony to take care of.”

  Caroline brightens. “You’d still work with Anthony after all the things I said?”

  “It would seem I don’t have any choice in the matter.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I relate my experience from the night before, at least the parts I can remember. I make a point to leave out my suspicion as to the true origins of Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuÿle.

  “You think Anthony touched your mind from all the way out here in the suburbs?”

  “Not intentionally, but yes.” I glance down at my watch and yawn as the adrenaline of the morning begins to fade. “For better or worse, it seems my multiple visits to the Exhibition have linked us somehow.” I squeeze Caroline’s hand. “I may need his help now as much as he needs mine.”

  Caroline’s incredulous expression fades into a disheartened scowl. “If that’s the case, God help us all.”

  I spend most of the morning with Caroline, taking a few minutes early in the day to arrange a meeting with Veronica for lunch. Now that Caroline has invited me to work with Anthony again, I need every advantage in figuring out the younger of the Faircloth boys. Other than Anthony’s family and Dr. Archer, she’s the only person I’ve met who has the first insight into what he was like before the Big Event.

  My desperation for answers goes well beyond my wish to see Anthony back among the land of the living. This Pandora’s box I’ve opened will never shut again until Anthony is whole. Even if I left Charlotte and never looked back―and that thought has crossed my mind more than once―the Exhibition would follow me. Tunny’s appearance in my car. Goldenberg and Schmuÿle coming for me from all the way across town. Isabella’s screams as I fall seizing in our home in Georgetown a week from now, my mind fighting an invisible battle with an imagined witch who lives only inside the mind of a comatose little boy.

  I have to finish this. I have no other choice.

  I pull into Anthony’s school and sprint for the sheltered walkway to get out of the light mist falling from the slate-gray sky. Veronica waits for me on a bench in the designated smoking area.

  “Nasty habit, I know.” She takes one last drag off her cigarette and flicks the butt in the trash. “Trying to quit, but on days like today, the nicotine is all that gets me through.”

  “No judgment here. I had to give them up when I found out I was pregnant with my little girl. Not sure how I’ve managed to stay quit. Six years plus, though, and I still wake up some days wanting a smoke with my morning coffee.”

  Veronica shakes her head. “I had pretty much given them up till this past summer.”

  “What happened?”

  “Oh, I was seeing this guy. You know how it goes.” Her eyes roll almost imperceptibly. “Things didn’t end so well, and I ended up falling back in with my old boyfriend, Mr. Marlboro.” She smiles and offers a subtle shrug. “Once something’s got its hooks in you, right?”

  “I get that.” My mind flashes on an image of Anthony Faircloth, so innocent and helpless, and yet all the while his Exhibition grows in both our minds like some kind of psychic cancer.

  “Shall we?” I rise from the bench and motion in the direction of my car. “Maybe we can beat the lunch crowd if we leave now.”

  As we head for the parking lot, a strange heat breaks on my neck as if I were an antelope being stalked on an open plain. A glance back at the school’s front entrance reveals the janitor I met on my last stop at the school standing atop a ladder. He’s working on one of the gutters and though he appears to be paying me no mind, at least one of his eyes seems to follow me all the way to the parking lot.

  Mental note, Mira. Pay closer attention to your surroundings in the future.

  We reach the car and I pop the locks with my keychain fob. Veronica drops into the passenger seat.

  “Thoughts on lunch?” I ask.

  “Don’t know what you’re in the mood for, but there’s a diner just down the road that serves a mean BLT.”

  Veronica and I exchange pleasantries over a checkered tablecloth and wait for our food to arrive. The chlorine scent I picked up from her the last time we met has developed a pungent edge.

  “Is everything okay?” I ask.

  “Is it that obvious?” She takes a sip of tea, leaving a crimson crescent on t
he rim of her glass. “It’s been quite a morning.”

  A quiet chuckle escapes my lips. “You have no idea.”

  “No, seriously. Before classes today, the principal called us all into the teacher’s lounge for an emergency meeting to let us know one of our teachers was arrested this morning.”

  I work to keep any expression from my face.

  “It’s Glenn Hartman, one of our music faculty. Well liked by the other teachers. Popular with the students. Hell, he won Teacher of the Year two years back.”

  “Did your principal say what happened?”

  “Not outright, but there were whispers after the meeting it has something to do with the Julianna Wagner case.” Her gaze grows quizzical. “You knew, didn’t you?”

  “Between you and me?”

  “Of course.”

  “I was called to the Faircloth house early this morning. Glenn Hartman and Anthony’s older brother apparently had a bit of a disagreement. Sounds like it wasn’t pretty.”

  “Oh no.” She says. “Is Jason okay?”

  “How do you know Jason?”

  “He used to come by the classroom every afternoon and pick up his brother. Anthony doesn’t do well on buses, as you can probably imagine.” She puts down her glass. “How is Anthony, by the way?”

  “I’ve been working with him for just under a week.” My fingers find my fork and nervously tap at the blade of my knife. The rhythm, strangely, follows the “Tuileries” melody. “I thought I was helping him. Turns out, he may be worse off now than when I got here.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Veronica barely says a word as I spend the next twenty minutes trying to explain my experiences with Anthony and his bizarre Exhibition. I leave out some of the more intimate details, though I do opt to tell her about her doppelganger in the Tuileries garden. She takes it all in stride, though her eyes flick toward the door more than once during our conversation.

  “You’re serious?” she asks when I’m finished.

  “Deadly serious.”

  “This isn’t some kind of gag. You’re a psychic. An honest-to-god psychic.”

  “Since I was eleven.”

  She glances down at the table and then locks gazes with me. “Do you know what I’m thinking right now?”

  “It doesn’t work like that, at least not most of the time. Impressions. Feelings. Emotions. Those are my stock in trade. Visual images or any sort of concrete answers are normally the exception, not the rule. This thing with Anthony is different, and so far in my life, unique.”

  And if I make it through this, it damn well better stay that way.

  Veronica takes the last sip of her tea and leans across the table. “What can I do to help?”

  “I was hoping you could join us tomorrow. Anthony wrote that story for you. It’s clear he’s not afraid of letting you in. I’m hoping if we maximize the positive energy in the room, we can finally break through and free him from this cage he’s created in his mind.”

  “And you really think I can help?”

  “Can’t hurt having you there.” I finish my sandwich and gulp down my last couple swallows of tea. “I’ll talk with Caroline and make sure she’s fine with you coming.”

  “Count me in, then.” Her lips pull back in a cautious smile. “Whatever it takes.”

  rcher’s one o’clock slinks past me on her way out of the office. Well into her third trimester, the girl is maybe fourteen and reeks of abandonment and loneliness. The twin aromas of mold and rotting leaves threaten to turn my stomach until she is well out of sight. I’m not certain why it should seem so strange, but a part of me balks at the notion Archer has patients other than Anthony. Not when Anthony’s own need is so great.

  A moment later, Archer appears at the front desk and whispers in Agnes’ ear. He’s had a haircut since the last time I saw him and the two-day-old stubble he’s sporting works for him.

  The mood in the room shifts. The client and mother sitting across from me smile for the first time since my arrival thirty minutes ago. Nothing but fear and anxiety for half an hour, but just a glimpse of Dr. Thomas Archer and the room fills with calm, even confidence. Regardless of his opinions about things they don’t teach you in grad school, Archer is good at what he does.

  As he finishes talking with Agnes at reception, he glances out across the waiting room and our eyes meet. He catches himself mid-smile and instead shoots me a curt nod before disappearing back into the office. A moment later, Agnes calls back the two o’clock patient and her mother. Once they’ve passed out of sight, she motions me up to the desk.

  “Good afternoon, Ms. Tejedor. Dr. Archer asked me to let you know he had a last minute add on. If you can wait another hour, he should be free at three.”

  Like I have anywhere else to be. “Three o’clock will be fine. I’ll just wait out here.”

  Agnes appears grateful when the phone rings a second later and somehow manages to stretch out the call and avoid my gaze till I return to my seat. More times than not, people experience some level of disquiet around me when they know who and what I am, but even after all these years, it still stings when someone is scared of me simply because of what I can do.

  On the other hand, I did come to her office, wander the mind of one her clients, and fall out in a grand mal seizure right in front of her. Two hundred years ago, they’d already be building a bonfire at the center of town. Perhaps I should count my blessings.

  I spend the next hour perusing the stack of magazines arranged on the table. An issue of Men’s Health with the latest Bond actor posing shirtless, a recent issue of Us Weekly with some reality show bimbo explaining how she’s not still hung up on her ex, some other rag plugging the fall movie lineup. Just when my brains feel poised to leak out my ears, the girl and her mother emerge, schedule a follow-up appointment, and leave. Soon after, Archer appears and waves me back. I follow him to his office and take a seat in the armchair by the bookcase. He sits opposite me, his plateau of dark cherry between us, and retrieves a pair of bottled waters from the mini-fridge in the corner.

  “Thirsty?”

  “Sure.” I unscrew the cap and take a sip. “Glad you could squeeze me in today.”

  “Sorry you had to wait, but we had a last minute add-on who needed to be seen today.” The mix of pepper and vinegar wafting off him betrays his placid expression. “I hope keeping you here another hour hasn’t messed up your evening plans.”

  “Nothing to worry about there, apparently.” I punctuate my comment with a quiet sigh, and immediately regret it.

  “Oh.” Archer’s face doesn’t move a muscle, though the peppery smell shifts a bit more toward the floral end of the spectrum. “Sorry to hear that.”

  “On the other hand, I got a chance to clear the air with Caroline. Things with us look like they’re going to be all right.”

  He chuckles. “Glad you took my advice on giving her some space.”

  I coil like a snake. “It wasn’t exactly my choice. The police called me to the Faircloth house a little after six this morning.”

  Archer coughs with surprise. “The police? What happened?”

  I catch Archer up on the events of the day, detailing everything I can remember about my near encounter with Glenn Hartman and carefully avoiding any further reference to my falling out with Sterling.

  “Sounds like the police have their man,” Archer says. “Once Jason’s name has been cleared, Caroline can focus on Anthony again. Maybe we can finally make some headway with him, if you’ll pardon the pun.”

  “You’re worse than my ex.”

  Archer cracks a smile and I answer in kind.

  “Last I heard, though, Jason hadn’t come home or even checked in since taking off this morning. Caroline has no idea where he could be.”

  Archer raises an eyebrow. “That’s odd. You’d think he’d be ecstatic about being cleared.”

  I let out a bitter chuckle. “I don’t think Jason does ecstatic.”

  My phone ring
s. It’s Caroline’s home number.

  “Hello?”

  “Mira?” It’s Caroline. She sounds terrified.

  “I’m here.” I do my best to keep an even tone. “What is it?”

  “I… I need you. Can you come over?”

  “What’s happened? Is it Jason?”

  “No. He hasn’t come home yet.”

  I shoot a worried glance at Archer. “What is it, then?”

  “It’s Anthony. He’s… humming.”

  “Humming? Another song from the Mussorgsky piece?”

  “Not exactly. Listen to this.”

  A static squelch fills my ear as Caroline holds the receiver up to Anthony. At first I can’t hear anything, but as the line grows quiet, I can just make out the boy’s squeaking voice. The tune he’s humming is indeed familiar, though it’s not Mussorgsky but Rimsky-Korsakov.

  A melody I know all too well.

  Scheherazade’s theme.

  The sound of Anthony attempting to duplicate the high-pitched whine of a violin sets my nerves on end. Over and over again he repeats the few bars that depict the wife of Sultan Shahriyar begging for her life. With each repetition, my heartbeat grows faster.

  “There’s no doubt about it. He’s calling for you.” Archer leans over Anthony and raises one of his closed eyelids. “But in this state, I’m not even sure he knows you’re here.”

  “Oh, he knows.” I draw closer a few inches and the volume of Anthony’s caterwauling rises. “He always knows.”

  “He’s been doing this for hours.” Caroline paces the room. “It was so quiet when he started, I couldn’t make it out.”

  I wince as Anthony hits the high note for the hundredth time since Archer and I arrived at the house. “It’s not quiet anymore.”

  “What do you think he wants?” Archer asks.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” I wipe a bead of cool sweat from my brow. “He wants me back in there. Back in his Exhibition.”

  “Out of the question,” Archer says. “This ‘controlled’ experiment of yours has gone off the rails. In case you’ve forgotten, he’s already proven he can find you all the way across town.”