Obviously some sort of technical demonstration. Why would Arthur, a delver into death, a wielder of bone saws and carpentry tools, find it fascinating? The old curiosity kicking in?
That was probably it. Arthur was mentally voracious, a true intellectual. Jeremy, who read magazines in his spare time and rarely opened the classic psychology texts he collected, felt shallow by comparison.
He wondered why the pathologist didn’t get up and join the group. An intrusion to be sure, but Arthur was an important man at Central, and his stature would have guaranteed a welcome.
Then Arthur’s interest seemed to wane and he turned a page of his newspaper, and Jeremy wondered if he’d been wrong. Perhaps Arthur wasn’t noticing the three men any more than he’d noticed Jeremy. Maybe the old man was caught up in some internal rapture—butterflies, predatory beetles, the minutae of body fluids, whatever—and the cant of his big, bald head toward the discussion had been a coincidence of angulation.
Now, the old man’s eyes were glued to the paper. All the better. Jeremy could drink his coffee in peace, return to his office unmolested, put his feet up on his desk, and recall the wonders of making love to Angela.
He allowed himself to wonder what the next time would be like.
Men do it to women.
The pale man stopped waving his pen. Seemed to draw himself away from his demonstration. Stared across the room at Jeremy.
Intense stare.
Or perhaps, Jeremy had imagined it because now the man was back to his lecture.
Arthur stood, folded his paper, fixed the tilt of his bow tie. Headed straight for Jeremy’s table. Big smile on the pink face. “How fortuitous,” he said. “I was just about to call you.”
12
He took a seat at Jeremy’s table, unbuttoned his white coat, stuffed the paper in his pocket. His shirt was snowy-white piqué, heavily starched, with a high, stiff collar. The bow tie of the day was mint green, a luxuriant silk specked with tiny gold fleur-de-lis.
“I wondered,” he said, “and please don’t think me forward—I wondered if you’d care to join me for supper this Friday evening. There are some people, interesting people, whom I’d like you to meet. Who, I’m allowing myself to presume, you might enjoy meeting.”
“Friends of yours?”
“A group . . . so to speak.” The old man’s speech, usually fluid, had grown choppy. Arthur Chess, embarrassed?
Perhaps to cover, he smiled. “We meet from time to time to discuss matters of mutual interest.”
“Medical matters?” said Jeremy. Then he remembered Arthur’s persistent curiosity about “very bad behavior.” Had all that been a prelude to this?
“A wide range of issues,” said Arthur. “We aim for erudition, but nothing ponderous, Jeremy. The company’s amiable, the food is well prepared—quite tasty, really—and we pour some fine spirits. We sup late. Though I don’t imagine that will be a problem for you.”
How could Arthur know of his insomnia? “Why’s that?”
“You’re an energetic young man.” One of the pathologist’s big hands slapped the table. “So. Are we set?”
Jeremy said, “Sorry, Friday’s tough.” He didn’t have to lie. Angela’s on-call ended Thursday night. No date had been set for Friday, but there was no reason for her to turn him down.
“I see. Well, another time, then.” Arthur got to his feet. “No harm trying. I didn’t mean to put you on the spot. If you change your mind, feel free to let me know.” He placed a palm on Jeremy’s shoulder. Weighty; Jeremy became aware of the pathologist’s bulk and strength.
“Will do. Thanks for thinking of me, Arthur.”
“I thought precisely of you.” Arthur’s hand remained on Jeremy’s shoulder. Jeremy whiffed bay rum and strong tea and something acrid, possibly formaldehyde.
“I’m flattered,” said Jeremy.
Arthur said, “Do consider this: During times of abject disorder, a good, late-night supper can be most fortifying.”
“Disorder?” said Jeremy.
But the old man had already turned and left.
Back in his office, he failed to conjure anything to do with Angela, past or future.
The word caromed around his head: Disorder.
Not mine; the city’s. The world’s.
Mine.
The old bastard was right. What better description of a time when women were stalked and hunted and brought down like prey simply because they were women. Where men with low resting heart rates chose their victims with all the gravitas of grocery shoppers squeezing melons.
Men who craved blood gas and terror-struck eyes, the confiscation of body juice, the ultimate power.
Monster-men who needed all that to get their own blood rushing.
Disorder was the perfect description of a world where Jocelyn’s death enlisted her in the same sorority as Tyrene Mazursky.
He hadn’t been able to conjure Angela, but now Jocelyn’s face flew into his head. Her laughter, even at his lamest jokes, the way she cared for her hopeless patients. Her pixie face when it flushed and compressed in the throes of pleasure.
When it had been really good for her, the flush that rose from her pelvis to her chin.
Then, another kind of face. Also compressed. No pleasure.
Nausea coiled around Jeremy’s gut. He felt the urge to vomit, grabbed his wastebasket, and plunged his face into it. All that came were dry heaves. He sat low, dangling the basket, his head between his hands, sweating, panting.
Monster-men, creating human dross. Then other men—coarse civil servants like Hoker and Doresh—fashioned careers from the waste.
He managed to expunge a plug of mucus from his throat and throp it into the trash. Removing the plastic bag from the basket, he took it to the men’s room, tossed it, returned to his office, locked the door, and thumbed through his address book.
He found the number and punched it.
Detective Doresh answered, “Homicide,” and Jeremy said, “I was wondering why a black woman would have a name like Mazursky.”
“Who’s—Dr. Carrier? What’s going on?”
“It just struck me as odd,” said Jeremy. It struck me as profoundly disordered. “Then I thought: Maybe she used an alias. Because prostitutes do that. I’ve seen it—we treat them here at the hospital, they come in for their STDs—sexually transmitted diseases—and their nonspecific urinary tract infections, malnutrition, dental problems, hepatitis C. One woman will have five different charts. We don’t expect much in the way of reimbursement, but we do try to bill the state because the administrators order us to. But with prostitutes it’s mostly futile, because of how rapidly they switch names. They do it to fool the courts—to conceal evidence of prior arrests. So maybe that’s what she did. Tyrene Mazursky. Maybe there’s more to her than one identity.”
“An alias,” said Doresh, enunciating slowly. “You don’t think we thought of that.”
“I—I’m sure you did. It just occurred to me.”
“Anything else occur to you, Doc?”
“Just that.”
Silence. “Anything else you want to tell me, Doc?”
“No, that’s it.”
“Because I’m listening,” said the detective.
“Sorry if I bothered you,” said Jeremy.
“Tyrene Mazursky,” said Doresh. “It’s funny you should mention her because I just got back her final autopsy report and have it here in front of me. Not pretty, Doc. Another extremely not-pretty. Kind of a Humpty-Dumpty situation.”
The detective let the message sink in. No way to put her back together again . . . another . . . the same had happened to Jocelyn.
It was the closest, since the murder, that he’d come to being informed.
He nearly screamed out loud. Took a breath, said, “That’s horrible.”
“Tyrene Mazursky,” said Doresh. “Turns out, she was married to a Polish guy, years ago. Commercial fisherman, one of those guys who goes out on the lakes and seines and ha
uls in whatever comes up. Also, he was part of those crews that go looking for submerged logs—hundred-year-old logs that fell off the barges. Fancy maple wood, they use ’em for violins. Anyway, this guy was a big drunk. He died in a capsize a few winters ago, left her with nothing. Even before that, she was whoring a little, what with him being gone all the time, drinking away his wages. After he died, she got serious. About her profession, that is.”
Hearing Tyrene Mazursky’s life reduced like that froze Jeremy’s heart and his mouth. His hands began to tremble.
He said, “Poor woman.”
“Sad story,” Doresh agreed. “Guess we both know about that, huh? Have a nice day, Doc.”
Jeremy placed the phone in its cradle. Imagined Tyrene Mazursky working the docks. Waiting for her ship to come in.
Jocelyn. Working the wards, waiting to see Jeremy that night.
Men do it to women. That’s what it is.
He sat there bathed in sweat, sour-mouthed, watching as evening darkened the air shaft outside his window.
Finally, he picked up the phone again and punched an extension.
“Chess,” boomed a familiar voice.
“It’s me, Arthur. Turns out Friday’s fine.”
13
Late Thursday, Jeremy found a handwritten message in his box, forward-slanted script, black ink on substantial blue rag paper, the liquid elegance of a fountain pen.
Dr. C:
Friday, 9:30 p.m. I’ll call with details.
AC
On Friday, serious rain arrived, frigid, unannounced, relentless as a military assault. Overtaxed storm drains backed up, and some regions of the city were assailed by filth. Auto collisions played a drumbeat on tight urban skin. The air smelled like mercurochrome. The docks at the harbor grew slick with accumulated slaps of oily lake water, boats rocked and sank, and unshaven men in knit caps and waders retired to dark bars to drink themselves senseless.
Jeremy’s car fishtailed all the way to the hospital. Angela phoned him at shift’s end, sounded exhausted.
“Rough day?”
“A bit rougher than usual,” she said. “But I’ll try to be sociable. If I fall asleep, you can prop me up.”
“I’m sorry,” Jeremy told her. “Something came up. An evening with Dr. Chess.”
“Dr. Chess? Well, then go, of course. He’s brilliant. What’s the topic?”
Jeremy had hoped for disappointment. “Something erudite. He wasn’t clear about the details.”
“Have fun.”
“I’ll give it a shot.”
“Why don’t you call me when it’s over?”
“It could be late,” said Jeremy. “Dinner doesn’t begin until half past nine.”
“I see . . . how about Saturday, then? I’m not back on until Sunday morning.”
“Okay,” said Jeremy. “I’ll call you.”
“Great.”
Jeremy saw his patients and filled the rest of the day with futile attempts at writing. Two hours were wasted in the hospital library, running searches of behavioral and medical databases, as he looked for backup articles he knew didn’t exist. Rationalizing his folly by telling himself that scientific research moved at a quirky pace, you could wake up one day and find out everything you’d believed in was wrong. But the facts hadn’t altered in six months: If he wanted to produce a book—even a chapter—he’d have to go it alone.
When he returned to his office it was 8:40 P.M., and his box was stuffed with mail. He sifted through it, found a handwritten note in the middle of the stack: the same black cursive on blue paper.
Dr. C:
It’s best if I drive tonight.
A.C.
He phoned Arthur’s office, got no answer, tramped over to the main building and down to the basement, where the path lab was housed, found the entire department locked up, halls dim and silent, but for the mechanical whine of arthritic elevators.
A few doors down, the morgue was closed as well. Arthur had left. Had the old man forgotten?
Jeremy climbed the stairs to the ground floor, entered the cafeteria, and poured the day’s eighth free cup of coffee. He sat, drinking slowly, in the company of worried families, sleepy interns, jaded orderlies.
When he returned to his office, Arthur was waiting outside his door, dressed in a black, hooded slicker so long it nearly reached galosh-encased shoes. Puddles spread beneath rubber soles. The slicker was beaded with rain, and Arthur’s nose was moist. The old man had left the hospital and returned.
The hood covered Arthur’s face from eyebrow to lower lip. A few white beard hairs straggled above the latex seam, but the end result was near-total concealment.
How fitting for a man of his profession, thought Jeremy. The Grim Reaper.
“Cheers,” Arthur said. “We’ve got ourselves a torrential situation. I do hope you’ve come protected.”
Jeremy collected his briefcase and his trench coat. Arthur regarded the wrinkled, khaki garment with what might have passed for parental concern.
“Hmm,” he said.
“It’ll do,” said Jeremy.
“I suppose it will have to. You don’t object to my driving, do you? Under the best of circumstances our destination’s a bit out of the way. Tonight . . .” Arthur shrugged, the plastic hood rattled, rain sprayed.
The Reaper goes fishing, thought Jeremy.
Then: What would he use for bait?
The interior of Arthur’s Lincoln was warm and sweet-smelling, upholstered in a dove gray felt that Jeremy had only seen in much older cars. The engine started up with a purr, and Arthur backed out smoothly. Once they were out of the lot, Arthur sat up straight, big hands resting lightly on the wheel, eyes shifting from windshield to rearview, glancing at both side mirrors, then back on the road.
Alert, but that gave Jeremy meager comfort. The storm had reduced visibility to a few yards. As far as he could tell, Arthur was driving blind.
The old man aimed the Lincoln downtown but turned left just short of the high, distant twinkles that meant skyscrapers. Jeremy tried to follow Arthur’s route but quickly lost it.
East, north, east again. Then a series of brief turns that addled Jeremy completely.
Arthur hummed as he drove.
When taillights flickered up ahead, the old man seemed to use them as navigational aids. When darkness dominated, and the windshield was a matte black rectangle, he seemed equally at ease.
Raindrops pelted the Lincoln’s roof, a frantic steel drum concert. Arthur seemed unmindful, kept humming. Relaxed—more than that, enjoying the impossible conditions. As if the Lincoln was set on a track and the drive was no more daunting than a bumper-car circuit.
Jeremy looked around. From what he could tell in the darkness, the Lincoln was spotless. Nothing on the backseat. Before they’d set out, Arthur had unlocked the trunk, revealing freshly vacuumed gray carpeting, an emergency kit, and two umbrellas bracketed to the firewall. He’d deposited Jeremy’s briefcase next to the kit, closed the trunk gingerly.
Hum, hum, hum.
Jeremy felt himself nodding off. When he jolted awake, he checked his watch. He’d slept for just over a quarter hour.
“Good evening,” said Arthur, jovially.
The rain was coming harder. Jeremy said, “What part of town are we in?”
“Seagate.”
“The docks?”
“My favorite part of town,” said Arthur. “The vitality, the sensory stimulation. The working people.”
“The working people.”
“The spine of any civilization.” A moment later: “I come from a long line of working people—mostly farmers. Where did you grow up, Jeremy?”
“The Midwest. Not this city but not far.” Jeremy named the town.
“A mercantile community,” said Arthur. “Any farming in your background?”
“Not for generations,” said Jeremy.
“A farm can be an educational place. One learns about cycles. Life, death, everything that falls in bet
ween. And, of course, the transitory nature of it all—one of my fondest memories is helping to birth a calf. A rather sanguinary process. I was seven and terrified. Petrified of being swept away in some great flood of bovine issue. My father insisted.”
“Did that inspire you to become a doctor?”
“Oh, no,” said Arthur. “If anything, quite the opposite.”
“How so?”
Arthur half turned, smiling. “The cow did it all by herself, son. I was made to feel quite redundant.”
“But you became a physician anyway.”
Arthur nodded. “Just a few more blocks.”
14
Smells of fish, fuel, rust, and creosote told Jeremy the docks weren’t far. But no water in sight, just rows of stout windowless buildings, stripped of architectural fancy.
Arthur Chess had driven to an oppressively narrow street lined with what appeared to be warehouses. The rain turned the pavement to gelatin; the Lincoln’s headlights were pathetic amber smears that died before they hit the asphalt. No stars, no moon, nothing to use as a navigational tool; the force of the storm induced myopia.
The Lincoln turned onto another unlit strip and reduced its speed. Jeremy saw no blocks, no sidewalks, just one plain-faced building after another.
A sanguinary process.
Predatory bugs. What did he really know about the old man? What had he gotten himself into?
Arthur continued a while longer, glided to a gentle stop, and brought the Lincoln to a rest in front of an unmarked, two-story cube. All Jeremy could make out were slab walls and a narrow door topped by a roll-out awning. Under the awning a bulb in a frosted glass case cast a fan of light. The illumination was of a hue Jeremy had never seen before—pale blue, purple-tinged, clinical.
The moment Arthur switched off the engine, the door opened, and a small man stepped under the awning. The blue light reached his waistline; below that, he was dark, nearly invisible. The illusion was that of truncation.
The Conspiracy Club Page 6