by Lis Wiehl
Cassandra’s date was immediately swarmed by Bundesliga fans who wanted to congratulate him. Something similar used to happen when she’d been out on the town with Tommy, but Tommy had always made sure she felt like she had his full attention. Der Sexiest Mann der Welt didn’t even notice when Cassandra slipped away and headed for the buffet at the far end of the room, adjacent to the stage where an eighteen-piece orchestra played jazz standards and suitable holiday music, the singing duties rotating between the piano player, the lead sax player, and the drummer.
She spotted Udo Bauer standing near the end of the buffet, a glass of wine in his hand, conversing in German with two men and a stout middle-aged woman who looked like a politician, speaking animatedly with her hands in the air.
“Denke immer daran, net zu den Leuten zu sein, während du die leiter zum erfolg erklimmst, denn vieleicht benötigst du die leute wieder auf dem weg nach unten.”
The others laughed.
“I don’t suppose you can translate, can you, Henry?” she asked her phone.
“Always be nice to the little people you step on on your way up, because you may need to step on them again on your way down.”
“Charming. Thank you.”
Cassandra took a small plate and filled it slowly from the buffet, her back to Bauer. Soon she was aware of someone standing behind her.
“Do you like German food, Miss Morton?”
“Not so much, Herr Bauer,” she said, turning. He was a head taller than she, his shoulders squared to her but relaxed.
“You know who I am?”
“I Googled you when I saw you were being honored. And this is not German food.”
“We can be thankful for that,” Bauer said. “I find it heavy, and I grew up with it. But I could cook it for you in a way that I think you would like.”
“You cook your own food, Herr Bauer?”
“When I have the time,” he said, smiling. Cassandra popped an olive into her mouth with a toothpick. “Do you?”
“When I have the time,” she said, smiling brightly. “My mother was a cook. On sailboats, mostly in St. John. And St. Barts. I grew up on boats. I could take apart an outboard engine and put it back together blindfolded. Among the many useless things I can do.”
“Perhaps you would like to see mine?” Bauer said. “I have a little dinghy you might enjoy.”
Little dinghy. Ha. Cassandra had done her homework. It was a well-known fact that Udo Bauer owned the largest private yacht in the world, a 680-foot Blohm and Voss German yacht that was 150 feet longer than the second biggest private yacht in the world. He called it Freiheit. He did not, like so many of the yacht-owning Saudi princes and Russian oligarchs and US tech billionaires, flaunt his wealth or show off his yacht by staging elaborate parties on it during film festivals or Grand Prix races. No pictures of the interior existed, as far as Cassandra could tell.
“I would like that very much,” she said. “On one condition. That you don’t make me watch any German soccer games on television. Right now, I want nothing to do with German soccer.”
Her “date” was still holding sway in the middle of the room.
“I own the team he plays for, you know,” Bauer said.
“Yes, I know,” Cassandra said.
“If you want me to, I will trade him,” Bauer said. “I have a friend who wants to create a team in North Korea.”
“Oh, don’t do that,” Cassandra said. “Just send him a picture of me on your dinghy and tell him he needs to learn how to treat a woman.”
“Where are you staying?”
“The Peter Keeler Inn in East Salem,” she said.
“I went to school in East Salem.”
“I knew that too,” she told him, turning to leave. “I hope you’ll tell me something I don’t already know.”
Bauer touched the small of her back possessively. “I’ll send a car for you in the morning. Don’t bother packing—you can buy what you need when you get there.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” she said.
13.
December 21
10:10 p.m. EST
“How do you know he was chosen?” Quinn asked Reese.
Dani watched the boy for indications of deception. She remembered when they’d questioned Amos Kasden, how cold and lacking in affect he was. Reese seemed torn and tormented and, without question, was telling the truth.
“Because we’re twins,” Reese said. “Twins know things about each other. Or at least identical ones do. We actually had our own secret language until we were eight.”
“Secret language?” Tommy asked. “You mean like a code?”
“It wasn’t a code to us,” Reese said. “We weren’t translating anything from English. It was just a language we made up together. It made perfect sense to us.”
Dani nodded. “Idioglossia.” She recalled a documentary film she’d seen once in a class on cognitive development and language. “It’s a remarkable phenomenon. Fairly rare. Sometimes called twin-speak. It usually disappears when the twins reach the age of five or six.”
“We still speak it sometimes. Once in a great while. We don’t have the whole thing, but a few phrases remain,” Reese said. “But we don’t even have to talk. I mean, not all the time. Sometimes we know what the other one is feeling without having to say anything. My mother used to call it ‘twinstincts.’ I would know when Edmond hurt himself without being anywhere near him. Or one day, when he was lost in the woods where we lived, I knew right where to look for him.”
“I’ve heard of that,” Dani said, her scientific wheels turning. She moved her chair slightly closer to the boy, not too close to be threatening but close enough to tell him she was genuinely listening to him. “Twins who are able to communicate telepathically over great distances.”
“Or not so great,” Reese said. “It used to amuse Mrs. Carlyle. Quite often I’d get up and get dressed, and an hour later Edmond would get up and get dressed, and he’d come down the stairs wearing the exact same outfit as me. We didn’t have to coordinate our wardrobes—we would just have the same idea at the same time, for the same reasons.”
“There are a few documented cases in the scientific literature,” Quinn said. “I remember one where a twin in California was in a car accident and his identical brother in New York suddenly said, ‘My brother just died in a car accident,’ at a dinner party, with plenty of witnesses. It was true right to the second. No one has ever been able to explain it scientifically.”
“Which doesn’t mean there isn’t an explanation,” Tommy said.
“I think of it as a God-given gift,” Reese said. “That’s what my father called it.”
“I think he was right,” Tommy said, tapping the kitchen table twice with his finger for emphasis.
“What do you think it means, that Edmond was selected?” Dani asked. “Do you know, Reese?” She remembered one of her favorite teachers from medical school telling her that in a therapeutic transaction, the more you used someone’s name, the more power you transferred to them.
“I was hoping you could tell me,” Reese said. “That’s why I came here.”
“They weren’t trying to kill you?”
“No, they were,” Reese said. “Nothing I’ve said to you is a lie. I’ve been careful to make sure of that. I just haven’t always told you the complete truth.”
“When we asked you if you had family you wanted to call—”
“I said I’d lost my parents,” Reese said. “I didn’t say, ‘No, I don’t have any family.’ I’m sorry I’ve been evasive. I wasn’t sure I could trust you. For all I knew, you could have been one of … them.”
“And the car accident wasn’t an accident?”
Reese shook his head.
“Two of those things attacked the car,” he said. “I couldn’t tell you where they came from. Out of nowhere.”
“But they didn’t kill you.”
“They tried,” Reese said.
“I heard a rumor that
you hit an oil slick,” Tommy said.
“They tend to splatter when you hit them with a car,” Reese said. “I couldn’t get to the second one because of the fire, but the first one left an oily smear on the road. I thought it was blood, but it felt more like paint.”
“You were afraid before any of that happened,” Dani reminded him. “At school.”
“I know they would have killed me if I hadn’t left,” Reese said. “I think they told my brother if he didn’t do what they wanted him to do, they’d hurt me. I definitely got that message. From him.”
“Do you know where he is now?” Dani asked.
“England,” Reese said. “I think he’s in London. Mrs. Carlyle told me he stopped at home to pick up his car, but he didn’t tell her where he was going.”
“Have you tried to call him?” Dani asked.
“I couldn’t get through.”
“Can you …” She hesitated. “Can you sense what he’s doing?”
Reese shook his head. “I’ve tried that. He won’t answer. I can’t even tell if he can hear me. I think … Maybe it’s me, not him. Everything is too cluttered. I have too many things in my head. It’s hard to sort it all out.”
“I was wondering, Reese,” Dani asked. “Was your brother taking the blue pill as well?”
“I don’t know,” Reese said. “Like I said, the school separated us. And then he cut me off. It felt like he’d changed. He thinks the less I know, the safer I’ll be. I tried to tell him I’m safe. I told him, ‘Dubbo di zubbo.’ That’s one of our phrases. ‘Remember that I love you.’”
“And he’s not answering?” Tommy said.
The boy shook his head. Dani could see how saddened he was, and more than that, how scared.
“But when I told you they’re planning something for Christmas Eve,” Reese said, “it was his voice I heard. Sometimes, if he’s really thinking about something, it gets through. Edmond has been obsessed with that date lately. I’ve seen it in his mind. I feel it.”
“Twinstincts?” Quinn said.
The boy nodded. “But as I said, there’s been a lot of clutter. It’s hard to know.”
“Dani,” Tommy said. “Can I have a word with you in the study?”
When they were alone, he asked her what she thought about the idea of twinstincts—was it legitimate?
“It’s not something anyone has been able to scientifically determine,” Dani said, “but yes. There have been plenty of examples, stories, where identical twins are able to see, mostly visual or audio glimpses, what the remote other is perceiving. It’s not some carnival trick mind-reading or ESP, but it’s … something. Think about it, Tommy—it almost gives us a way to spy, a way to hack into their inner circle. If we—”
“I thought of that,” Tommy said. “But Dani, if we can see into their camp, how do we know they can’t see into ours? If it goes both ways, then Edmond is going to know what Reese is up to, and if Edmond tells Ghieri or Wharton … Maybe his brother is only pretending he isn’t listening. How do we know?”
“You could be right.”
“Reese wouldn’t necessarily know he’s being used, would he?”
“I don’t know,” Dani said. “But I know this. He’s terrified that he’s never going to see his brother again. He may not exactly realize it, but if he’s fearing for Edmond’s life, it might be because Edmond is fearing for his own life and Reese is picking up on it. And if Edmond is fearing for his own life, it probably means—it might mean—that he’s not collaborating with Ghieri and Wharton. Does that make sense?”
“Does anything?”
“Let me talk to him,” she said. “I’ll be careful.”
Back in the kitchen, she asked Reese if he thought his brother had aligned himself with Ghieri and Wharton and the other boys who’d been selected.
“I want you to really think about your answer,” she said. “I’m just going to tell you flat out—we’re afraid that your brother might be reading your thoughts and passing along whatever he learns to Dr. Ghieri or Dr. Wharton. Do you think that’s possible?”
“I don’t,” Reese said. “My brother is a good person. He thinks he’s doing something good, whatever it is. He’s afraid of Ghieri, and the headmaster too, and he’s afraid of what they’ll do to me, but he thinks … well, he’s not sure. He wants to believe he’s doing good.”
“Can you tell us who the other boys are?” Dani asked. “The other ones who’ve been selected?”
Reese shook his head.
“If I felt a connection, and if he was thinking of them—if he visualized one of the other boys, I might be able to recognize him. But as I said, he cut me off,” Reese said. “When we started at St. Adrian’s—”
“Which was when?” Dani interrupted.
“Three years ago,” Reese said. “Ever since the end of the first year, more and more, it’s been one way. I can’t get through to him anymore. And like I said, it’s hard for me because there’s so much going on in my head. But I know one thing for sure. My brother is in pain. Something is really tearing him up. He’s …”
“Conflicted?” Dani said.
Reese nodded.
“That’s good,” she said. “It means part of him is still fighting it. It means he’s got the same goodness inside of him that you do.”
“Do you think you can help him?” Reese asked, his eyes pleading.
“I can if we can get through to him,” Dani said. She tried to think of what she could do to enhance his twinstincts, but all she could think of were the crazy experiments the army had conducted in the seventies with psychics, trying to test for things like precognition and remote viewing or clairvoyance in order to develop them as military weapons. It was all dismissed as hogwash, or at least that was the official explanation for why the program, the Stargate Project, if she remembered correctly, had been shut down. They probably tried any number of psychoactive drugs to increase their subjects’ mental abilities, but if anything worked, the military was keeping it a secret. The odds were much greater that nothing had worked.
“What do you say the problem is when you try to get through to him?” Tommy asked.
“I just …” Reese struggled to find the words. “I hear a lot of white noise. In my head. I’m not sure where it comes from. It’s hard to think.”
Dani wondered if any of the standard antianxiety medications might work, but she was reluctant to prescribe anything.
“I could probably come up with a way to read and amplify his brain waves,” Quinn said, “but if the problem is too much distraction, it would just make the white noise louder.”
“I’m trying to think of ways to quiet his mind without resorting to medications,” Dani said. “I have a friend who works with guided relaxation to relieve Iraq and Afghanistan veterans suffering from PTSD, but that takes months before it becomes effective. We don’t have that kind of time. I’m open to any suggestions.”
The room fell silent for a moment.
“I have a thought,” Tommy said. “What about sensory deprivation?”
“Torture?” Dani said. “Let me correct myself—I’m open to almost any suggestion.”
“Not torture,” Tommy said. “I know sensory deprivation has been used by interrogators, but what I’m talking about is the complete opposite. Sensory deprivation tanks. They were big in spas in the seventies, and one of my vendors at the gym has been trying to talk me into leasing one. He said they’ve done studies that show people who use them can recover from lactic acid buildup in their muscles after a workout in a few hours instead of days. Sort of like hot tubs. It’s the opposite of torture.”
“Excuse me, but I’m afraid I don’t entirely understand what these sensory deprivation tanks are,” Aunt Ruth said.
“They’re soundproof, lightproof flotation chambers,” Tommy said. “The one my vendor was trying to sell me is shaped like an egg, but the outer shape doesn’t matter. Some are boxes. You lift the lid and get in. Inside there’s about ten inches of warm wate
r mixed with a hundred pounds of Epsom salts so that you float. You close the lid, and when it seals there’s absolutely no light and absolutely no sound. There’s a microphone and speakers if you want to communicate, and the lid has a counterweight so you can open it with your little finger, so you don’t feel claustrophobic …”
Ruth shuddered. “I think I would anyway.”
“You float for about an hour,” Tommy explained, “but after the first few minutes, with zero sensory stimulation, you start to sort of dream while you’re awake. Like daydreaming. Your brain doesn’t have to pay attention to anything, so you completely relax. That’s why the lactic acid that builds up in muscle tissue during a marathon or an Ironman competition dissipates more quickly in a tank. I know a guy who uses one to help people quit smoking. Spas used to use them in conjunction with massages and whirlpools, but they sort of went out of fashion.”
“I like the idea,” Dani said. “Reese—are you willing to give it a shot?”
“Sounds lovely,” Reese said. “If I should somehow lose my mental faculties, will you promise to visit me in the insane asylum and bring me a fresh blanket every Christmas?”
“That’s the spirit,” Tommy said. “My spa guy is in White Plains. If I called him now, I could have one here tomorrow morning. I’m one of his best customers.”
“Excuse me, everyone,” Ruth said. “But look at this.”
Dani turned. During the conversation, the television beneath the cabinets had been on with the sound off. Ruth had the remote in her hand and turned the sound up.
A commercial showed a variety of people, all ages and ethnicities, first wearing looks of concern on their faces and then smiling with contentment, while in the background wheat fields rolled in gentle breezes and the sun set red in front of a soundtrack featuring lush strings swelling romantically. In titles on the screen they read, Provivilan. It Will Change Your Life … for the Better. Coming in January from Linz.
“My beloved employer,” Quinn said. “Speaking of which, I should get to bed or I’ll be useless in the morning.”
“Just so I’m clear,” Dani said, “are you saying that the boys who’ve been selected all have identical twins?”