The Inquisitor: A Novel

by Smith, Mark Allen

  Geiger, his head inclined again, shifted his jaw slowly, searching for a position that would allow him to talk with the least discomfort.

  “Do with what?” he mumbled.

  “With the pain. I read all the studies. Do you do that ‘put it in a box’ thing? Or do you go Zen and rely on mind over matter? Which is it? I’m fascinated—honestly. I saw the backs of your legs when we stripped you down, and clearly you’ve had plenty of chances to practice. So what do you do with the pain?”

  “It’s my…” The last word was difficult for Geiger’s battered mouth to form, so it came out a slushy mutter.

  Dalton bent down. “It’s your what?”

  Geiger’s head slowly rose until his eyes met Dalton’s. Their faces were just inches apart, so close that Geiger could see his reflection in Dalton’s glasses.

  “My ex—per—tise,” Geiger said.

  Dalton’s hands came out from behind him. They held Geiger’s antique straight razor, and Dalton saw the shift in Geiger’s eyes and the tightening of his chest muscles. The movements were minute but unmistakable. Dalton’s feral smile reappeared.

  “This is a real beauty, Geiger. Where did you get it? Is this an old friend?” He admired the ornate handiwork on the mother-of-pearl handle. “And the backs of your legs? You know, the way you deal with the pain tells me that maybe the two of you know each other very well.” He pulled the blade out from its sheath. There was an inscription etched into the polished steel. “‘To Ben, with love, from Paula.’ Mom and Dad? Am I right?”

  A smoke-spewing train came chugging through a tunnel in Geiger’s memory, barreling toward the moment. He sensed what cargo it brought, and the train’s clatter and roar set his eardrums vibrating.

  “You got cut for years, huh? Was it Mommy or Daddy? I’m thinking it was dear old Dad.”

  Geiger saw a glimmer of something new in Dalton’s eyes, but it wasn’t sympathy.

  “You had a very bad time of it, didn’t you, Geiger? Sorry, but now you and I are going back there.”

  Dalton ran his gloved thumb gently up and down the blade’s finely honed edge. The latex split open.

  “A little too sharp, I think.”

  Geiger watched him start tapping the razor on the cart’s metal railing, creating a serrated design the length of the blade’s edge. The train kept coming, its Cyclops eye burning fiercely.

  “Where is the boy?” Dalton said.

  * * *

  “Are you ready, son?” said the voice inside Geiger’s head.

  * * *

  “I’m ready, sir,” Geiger replied.

  Dalton turned, smiling quizzically.

  “No need to be so formal,” he said. He examined the blade and then laid it down on Geiger’s left quadricep, four inches above the knee joint. “We’ll work upward. I think that’s what your father did. When I reach the groin—if we get that far—I’m going to cut off your testicles.”

  Dalton pressed the blade down evenly. The entire length of it sliced into the flesh.

  * * *

  The boy lay facedown, naked, on a bench in the great room. The music played softly. “I see my light come shining…”

  His father stood over him, holding the pearl-handled razor.

  “What do we know, son?” he said.

  “Life makes us ache for the things we think we need, and the pain makes us weak.”

  “So what must we do?”

  “Embrace the pain, a little each day, and grow strong.”

  * * *

  Behind his glasses, Dalton’s eyes narrowed as he examined his handiwork. The altered razor left a puckered, four-inch incision whose jagged edges sent the blood flowing in different directions across Geiger’s thigh.

  “Tell me where the boy is, Geiger.”

  * * *

  Geiger’s father laid the blade down on his upper thigh.

  “Steady now, boy.”

  It had been years since he had flinched or made a sound during the ritual, but his father still prompted him each time.

  “Say it with me, son,” he directed, and they chanted together softly.

  “Your blood, my blood, our blood…”

  * * *

  “Your blood, my blood, our blood,” mumbled Geiger.

  Dalton, about to make his third cut, had stopped to wipe Geiger’s blood off his gloves when the slurred words slipped out.

  “What did you say?”

  He slapped Geiger across the face, smearing his cheeks with his own blood.

  “Geiger, you said something. What did you say?”

  * * *

  Geiger’s father drew the honed edge across the flesh, opening a thin, wet, red crevasse. The boy stayed rock-still. He was watching the music inside his head.

  “Did it hurt, son?”

  “It didn’t hurt, Father.”

  “The truth?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. In a world of liars, pain will always bring the truth. When I’m gone, that may serve you well.”

  * * *

  Dalton bent down and rested his hands on Geiger’s knees.

  “Tell me where the boy is.”

  Geiger’s lids fluttered and rolled up. Dalton peered at him; it was like looking into the windows of an abandoned house.

  “It didn’t hurt, Father,” said Geiger.

  Dalton looked to the viewing room. “Hall! I’m not sure what we’ve got here!”

  The viewing room door opened.

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Hall said.

  “The light’s on but nobody’s home. See for yourself.”

  Hall moved toward Geiger. He was becoming increasingly aware of a heavy weariness—not some existential burden or crisis of conscience but a palpable weight, like a ball and chain trailing from an ankle. He’d put in almost twenty years. Nothing got simpler; everything got more complicated, more opaque. No one really knew anything anymore.

  Hall stopped beside the barber’s chair.

  “I’m not going to bullshit you,” said Dalton. “I don’t really know where he is.”

  “Where he is?”

  “I’ve never seen anything like this before. Believe it or not, I’m not sure he’s feeling this.” Dalton adjusted his glasses. “It’s like he feels the pain, but it…”

  “But it what?”

  “It doesn’t hurt.”

  “Cut him again. Let me see what happens.”

  Dalton made another cut. Geiger’s pupils and nostrils flared, his hands balled up, and the muscles in his forearms visibly hardened. But he made no sound and showed no other response.

  Hall grabbed him by the sides of his head with both hands. “Do you want to die? Is that it?” He bent down and spoke directly into Geiger’s face. “Have you ever seen someone bleed out?”

  Geiger shook from the rumble of the churning steel roaring toward him. It was nearly on top of him now.

  “Because I have, man—and you wouldn’t want a rabid dog to die like that. You hear me?”

  But what Geiger heard was a different voice calling to him. And as his eyelids fell, the memory train plowed into him, shattering his view of Hall and the room around him, revealing another, more vibrant world beyond.

  * * *

  “Son! Come here, son!”

  The boy came out of the cabin and headed up the side of the mountain. It was dark, but there was a good moon and he could make his way through the woods without much difficulty.

  “Son! Where are you?”

  His father’s voice, higher-pitched than usual, seemed to be bouncing off the dense trees, but he had a general sense for where it was coming from.

  “I’m coming, Father!”

  Something made him start running. It had been raining all week, and his shoes sank into the wet ground with each step.

  “The truck, son! Do you see the truck?”

  The boy ran a bit farther and then spotted the pickup’s dim silhouette about fifty feet away. Leaning downhill, the truck looked like
a bull with its head lowered, ready to charge. He could see that its bed was filled with freshly cut four-foot sections of a tree.

  “Yes—I see it!”

  “Come to the truck! Come around!”

  His father lay on his back, pinned beneath the left rear tire, which rested on his thighs. The upper half of his father’s body was visible in the moonlight, but his lower legs were obscured by the truck’s wheel. To the boy, his father looked like some mythological creature, a half man who must have angered the gods.

  “I can’t move, son. The truck got stuck. I was trying to jam some wood under the tires when the brake slipped.” Rising from the waist with a growl, he pushed against the tire but couldn’t free his legs. He lay back down, his chest rising and falling violently. “Come pull me out.”

  The boy moved behind his father, crouched down, and put his arms around his chest.

  “Now pull, son, on three—pull hard! One, two, three!”

  With a roar, his father shoved against the tire again and the boy pulled. But his shoes slid from under him in the mud and he fell.

  “Again, son. Try again.” The boy got back up, arms tight around his father. “One, two, three!”

  They pulled and pushed, but the result was the same. His father flopped back into the boy’s lap. Exhausted, they huffed in unison, drizzle tapping at their faces.

  “What are we going to do, Father?”

  “Find some rocks and branches and jam them under the other three tires. Then try and drive the truck forward. Remember how I taught you?”

  The drizzle was turning to rain again. As the boy went about his task, he tasted the autumn decay in the air and felt it underfoot beneath the leaves and twigs. He shoved his gatherings beneath the tires and then got into the truck. He had to slide down in the seat so that his feet could reach the gas and brake. He could see his father in the side-view mirror.

  “I’m ready, Father!”

  “Turn the key—but don’t touch the gas yet.”

  The boy worked the ignition, and the engine hacked to life.

  “Put the stick on ‘D,’ and then press the gas gently. When you feel the wheels turning, press just a bit harder. Go ahead—do it!”

  The boy pushed down on the gas pedal slowly, and the truck began to shudder. He could feel the tires starting to turn, but the truck did not move forward. A low growl began to claw its way out of his father. The boy watched him in the side-view mirror, fists dug into the mud.

  “Don’t stop!” his father shouted.

  The boy pressed harder and the tires began to spit mud, splattering the mirror. His father’s torso twisted in its prison, but the truck would not budge.

  “More! Harder!”

  The boy had to tighten his grip on the wheel as the vibrations increased. His father’s growl rose to a bellow. The boy checked the mirror again and saw bits of bright red mixed into the specks of mud.

  He jumped from the cab, ran to his father, and knelt beside him. His father lay coated with muck and blood, ragged breath coming from open lips.

  “No more, Father—you’re bleeding! The wheel is tearing you up!”

  “We’ll wait till the rain stops and try again.”

  “Father, let me go down the mountain. I could find someone and bring them back.”

  “No! You will not leave this mountain. It’s not time yet.” His father paused to catch his breath. “There’s a rifle in the truck. Bring it to me, son.”

  “Why?”

  “Wolves, and the bears. They know when things are hurt. And they can smell blood. Now bring me the rifle and then go home.”

  “I want to stay here with you.”

  His father’s eyes found his. Raindrops had cleared thin, meandering paths down his father’s dirty face.

  “Father…” The boy was silent for a moment. “Does anyone know I’m here?”

  “The world knows nothing of you. That is my gift to you.” He coughed, and then spat blood. “You are no one.”

  Something started to tighten in the boy’s chest. His head ached, and he felt his heart pounding.

  “Father…” he began.

  But his father would not let him continue. He reached up and grabbed hold of the boy’s jacket.

  “You’re my son, and I’ve given you what you needed.” He walloped the boy across the face, but the boy did not cry. His father pulled him chin to chin. “You see? No tears. Remember: better to be strong than to be loved.”

  His father closed his eyes and turned his head away. The boy got to his feet, walked to the truck, and climbed inside.

  * * *

  Ray entered the session room and came over to join Hall and Dalton.

  “Jesus, what the hell is going on?” Ray asked. “Is he asleep?”

  “I wouldn’t call it sleep,” said Dalton. He turned to Hall. “Should I try and bring him out of it?”

  “No,” said Hall. He put a cigarette between his lips, lit it, and winced at his strong inhalation. “Give him a few more minutes. Let’s see what happens. Maybe we can use it.”

  * * *

  The boy shot up awake in the truck. The sudden burst of screams mixed with guttural grunts jerked his eyes to the mirror, and he saw dark shapes thrashing about near the back wheel. He grabbed the rifle and jumped out. The grunting stopped; two pairs of copper eyes flashed at him, and then the wolves went back to work, heads jerking violently as teeth ripped flesh. His father’s howling began again, his arms flailing, his fists useless. The boy raised the rifle and fired. The blast sent the wolves running, and the recoil kicked the boy down on his back. He lay there for a moment, breathless, staring up at the huge, scarred moon resting precariously on the tops of the pines. Then he sat up and moved to his father’s side.

  The boy watched his father’s chest rise and fall very slowly, as if a great invisible weight lay upon it. With each ascent, parts of him caught the moonlight and glistened dark burgundy; with each descent came a soggy gurgle, leaking life.

  His father’s right arm rose at the elbow, beckoning. The boy leaned closer and saw that the wolves had torn away his father’s coat and taken parts of his shoulders and arms. His left cheekbone gleamed white beneath the moon. His mouth opened and blood trickled out.

  “The pain,” he gasped.

  “What can I do, Father?”

  “Where is my knife? Give it to me.”

  The knife lay in the mud. The boy put it in his father’s hand. His father’s arm rose, but there was no strength in him, and his fist, clutching the blade, fell feebly upon his chest.

  “Help me.” His eyes wandered in their sockets until they found his son. “Help me.”

  “How? I don’t understand.”

  His father’s forefinger rose an inch and tapped at his chest. “Here.”

  The boy shook his head rapidly back and forth. “No!” he said, his voice a whimper. “No, I won’t do it!”

  “Do as I say, son.”

  The boy was crying now. “Father … please!”

  * * *

  Geiger’s audience leaned forward at his muttering.

  “What did he say?” Hall asked Dalton.

  “He said, ‘Father, please.’”

  “Look,” Ray said, pointing. “He’s crying.”

  Tears leaked from the corners of Geiger’s closed eyes, sliding down his cheeks and turning pink when they mixed with his blood. Suddenly he began to shudder violently, his body quaking in its restraints.

  “Wake him now?” asked Dalton.

  “No,” said Hall. “Not yet.”

  * * *

  His father eyed the boy’s tears, and then his face twisted into a mask of disgust.

  “Is this what I’ve made of you? A weeping, useless little boy? Then go. Get out of my sight! Leave the rest to the wolves. I don’t want your face to be the last thing I see.”

  The boy felt a surge of hot, viscous blood in his chest, and then an unstoppable force rose up from a dark hole and rushed through every part of his body, making h
im shake violently.

  “I hate you!” he shouted.

  His father found the strength to shake his head. “No, you don’t. It takes strength to hate. All my work—for nothing.”

  The boy saw the bloody lips move again, but now he could not hear the words above the roar in his ears. For a moment the world went black. It’s the moon, the boy thought; the moon must have fallen down.

  Finally he looked again at his father. “Where?” he asked.

  His father’s fingertip settled on a point just to the left of his sternum. “Here,” he said, a grim smile pulling at his ruined lips.

  The boy placed the knife’s point next to the finger and wrapped both his trembling hands around the hilt. Slowly, he pushed the blade down into his father’s heart.

  * * *

  Geiger’s mind was sent reeling away from the dark forest, defying the vision’s gravity and seeking refuge beyond it. But what came before him was a floating curtain, and then, as the curtain parted, it revealed the long shelf carrying all his session books: the black binders, the hundreds of Joneses, the thousands of pages filled with strategies and methods, reactions and conclusions. Geiger could see the faces of his subjects, he could hear every epithet and plea ever uttered, every sound a human can make in fear or pain. Confronting him was a compendium of the darkest of man’s arts—and a garish portrait of a monster that now, for the first time, he recognized as himself.

  A sudden wave of nausea rolled over Geiger, and he began to retch. He hadn’t eaten since the previous day, and dry heaves racked him.

  Hall waited until the first wave seemed to pass. “Go back to work, Dalton. Right away—now!”

  “Don’t cut me anymore,” Geiger said between gasps. “Please.”

  Dalton, Hall, and Ray shared a stunned glance.

  “No more pain. Please, no more.”

  “Then tell me where the boy is,” Hall commanded.

  Another surge of nausea rose up, and the retching consumed him again.

  “Jesus Christ, Geiger! Where is the kid?”

  “Still at my house,” Geiger sputtered.

  Hall felt a hot spike of adrenaline, but he quickly throttled the rush. “You left him alone?”