I didn’t pace—not in those shoes on that concrete, but I did shift weight back and forth a number of times. Just then I remembered that I had a pair of sandals in the trunk of my car. They didn’t match my lime green outfit, but they were soft and easy on my feet. My car, however, was on the other side of the hotel. I didn’t want to go over and possibly miss Craig, so I waited.
He breezed through the doorway and said, “Follow me,” and walked on. We ambled to the edge of the car park, and he led me to a lovely gazebo. He sat down and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, but he must have read the expression on my face. “Okay,” he said and put them away. “I need to quit anyway.”
“So please tell me about room 624. Who is that couple? What’s the connection?”
“They didn’t know Lauber, if that’s what you mean,” he said. “It wasn’t anything like that. I mean, they had no involvement with the theft.”
“Okay, so?”
“It’s what they saw.”
“You mean they witnessed the murder?”
He shook his head. “I doubt that. Look, I’ll tell you what I know and then you’ll leave me alone and let me puff away on my little cancer stick, okay?”
“So tell me.”
“It was about 8:30—just barely dark. The police had stopped harassing everybody. Two policemen were still inside room 623, but that was all.” Craig said he had gone out to his car for a smoke. No one was around, so he stood outside the car and puffed. He had barely finished his cigarette when he heard a man and a woman talking. “They walked within five feet of me. I had my back to them, and I don’t think they paid any attention to me, but I’m sure they smelled the smoke.”
He said they sat inside the gazebo, and he would have had to walk right in their line of vision to get back to the inn. “If the Cartledges learned I still smoked, they’d fire me,” he said, “and I want to keep this job. It’s the first real job I’ve had since—you know—since—”
“Yes,” I said simply.
According to Craig, the conversation between the couple went like this:
“But what do we do? Just—just keep our mouths closed?” the woman asked, “I’m frightened.”
“What else can we do? You know from those television shows what happens when witnesses speak up.”
“But those are made-up stories,” she said.
“Made up, all right, but they’re made up from real events,” the husband insisted. “Haven’t we heard enough times that the story is based on real events?”
“So if we say nothing, then what?” the woman asked. “Does he get away with it? I mean, if he truly did it?”
“Aw, c’mon, they always leave clues and make mistakes. Haven’t we seen that a thousand times as well?”
“So you mean we say nothing.”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean.”
“Maybe that’s the best,” she said.
“Look, I’m scared, too. How was I to know that just because we stepped out of the room when we did—”
“I suppose,” she said. “And if we speak up, who knows how long they’ll make us stay in Georgia. I want to get home—”
“He said to stay two more days as we had planned and then we could go and we would be safe.”
“Yes, yes,” she said. “But if police officers come to our door—”
“Then we’ll deal with it,” he said.
“That’s all I heard,” Craig said. “They got up and started to walk away from the gazebo. They were probably going to go inside through the other entrance to the grounds over by the lake. It’s well lighted at night.”
“So you went back to your desk?” I asked. “And you never said anything to anyone?”
“Are you crazy? Why would I do that?” Craig said. “If that Mr. Viktor had been a little nicer to me, maybe I would have told him, but he’s like some of those tough criminals I met in prison. It’s safer and better to stay away from them.”
I didn’t say anything. His fear seemed a bit irrational to me. But if I were a skinny little guy like him and had been in prison among brutish, tough men, I might have been a little more fearful as well.
He got up from the gazebo. “That’s all I know—honest, it is. Please—”
“Please what?”
“Can you tell that detective the truth without implicating me? Maybe—maybe you could mention asking the people in 624 if they heard or saw anything.”
“Burton is with them now.” I didn’t want to go through what had happened, so I said, “Whatever he finds out, we can tell Oliver Viktor.”
“Okay, that’s all right, I guess,” he said. “I just want this to end.”
“Me too,” I said.
Nineteen
We got back to the desk, and Burton still hadn’t come down. I told Craig I would walk along by the lake and he was to tell Burton he should join me. I went immediately to my car and exchanged my heels for the sandals. The relief was immediate. Okay, so they didn’t match my outfit, but I didn’t care. The comfort was worth it.
Besides, after that hug, I didn’t think he’d focus his attention on my feet.
Now I was ready to walk. I don’t know how long I walked or how far. The day had cooled off, and the sun’s rays hid behind the clouds. Other than that, I paid no attention to anything around me because I became absorbed in my own private world. I should have focused on the crime and trying to figure out who murdered those two people, but something else troubled me.
“I’ve become one of them,” I said to myself. “How could such a thing happen?”
I had become a believer. Just like that. That experience didn’t make sense to me. How could it just happen without warning or a conscious decision? No one had used any arguments or tried to prove anything to me. I just believed. It felt strange to think that way.
“There really is a God—a God in whom I believe.” Immediately I thought of Uncle Rich. I figured my experience would upset him, because I believed without going down to the front of the church and confessing my sins to everyone.
The closest parallel that made sense to me was my learning Spanish. In college I had signed up for Spanish as my required language course. I didn’t get the language. I did the exercises faithfully and memorized the words. I learned to parrot everything the instructor and anyone else in the class said. About two weeks before the end of the first year, I groaned and knew I could never pass the final exam. It was like memorizing math formulas.
About a week before finals, I sat in the classroom, groaning miserably while the teacher read us a short story completely in Spanish. As I listened, I understood—just like that. It was as if the language suddenly made sense. I no longer had to translate word by word.
“Is that the way Christianity works too?” I asked myself. “At least for me, is that it?”
Just as I decided that it was, another thought hit me—Did I truly believe, or did I think I believed so that I could be more attractive to James Burton? “Am I that self-deceived?” I whispered.
“I don’t know,” I answered myself, but I did know. I liked Burton—a lot—maybe even more than a lot. Yes, I did love him, but my sudden faith in Christianity was quite apart from that.
“It is, isn’t it?” I asked.
I felt as if I had awakened from a daze. Peace filled my soul, and I don’t recall ever having felt such tranquility at any time in my life. “This is real,” I whispered to myself. “This is real.”
Burton hadn’t sought me on the walk, and I finally went back to the front desk. Craig was busy with a check-in, but he shook his head. “Haven’t seen him.”
That meant he was still with the couple in room 624. I thanked Craig and decided to go back to the room the hotel had given Ollie to use. When I opened the door, I could see Ollie Viktor standing in the bathroom. He had injected a needle into his arm.
I must have cried out, although I wasn’t aware of anything except a feeling of immense shock.
Ollie turned. He looked up and star
ed into the mirror. He saw my image and finished injecting himself. He cleansed his arm, rolled down his sleeve, put the medication in a small case, and walked into the room where I stood.
“Shocked?” he asked. “Don’t be. It’s not an illegal drug, and I’m not an addict. It’s called medication.”
I didn’t know if I believed him, so I said nothing.
“Perhaps you noticed the tremors in my hands. They come and go. They’re usually the best sign to tell me when I need a shot. Usually one in the morning and one at night are enough for the day.”
“Usually?” I asked.
“Most days.”
“I assume you’ve injected yourself several times today—”
“This is my fourth,” he said matter-of-factly. “When I’m under intense pressure, the med seems to wear off quicker.”
“Want to tell me the problem?”
“I wish I knew. So do my doctors. The problem is that no one knows for certain. I’ve been tested for Parkinson’s disease, or as we call it, PD, and that seems to be the best explanation so far. In two weeks I’ll have a brain scan, and that should help.” He explained that PD is a motor-system disorder and is difficult to diagnose. He had only one of several telltale signs—trembling hands. He said that sleep problems were common and he had begun to experience some of them.
“So what were you taking?”
“Artificial dopamine,” he said. “It’s an experimental drug. So far it hasn’t produced any positive results.”
I nodded, not quite convinced, but open to believe him.
“Another thing is that you may have noticed my mood changes. That’s not a common symptom. I get irritated easily or depressed. I can’t help it. I know I’ve made you angry—”
“Yes, yes, you have.”
“Please believe me that I can’t help it. It—it just happens.” Those green eyes stared at me with such intensity I no longer doubted his word. He explained that the symptoms had actually gotten slightly better during the past two weeks. “Until today. I think the tension—you know—made me need extra meds.”
“Okay, then what can I do to help? You haven’t been particularly nice to some of—”
“I’ve been a jerk. Don’t you think I know that?” Before I could respond, he took my hands in his. “Please try to understand. Right now I feel fine. Why shouldn’t I? As you observed, I just injected myself. I have no idea when it will wear off. When I feel the symptoms start to return, I tell myself I won’t get angry or yell or—”
“I’m sorry. Honest.”
“Help me, Julie; help me. When you see me act weird, just tell me to shut up. I’m not sure it will work, but when Burton did that, somehow I was able to calm down.”
“You can count on me to tell you to shut up,” I said. In spite of myself, I began to laugh.
Ollie laughed too, and released my hands. “Hey, I don’t know if I like giving you blanket permission—”
“Oh, I’ll use it wisely,” I said and laughed again. “Or at least I’ll use it whenever I don’t like what you say.”
“Thanks,” he said.
His voice was soft—in fact, so soft I don’t think I’d ever heard him speak quite like that. He melted me, but then, I’m a sucker for a soft voice. His eyes moistened, and that slapped me down even further.
We looked at each other in silence before I asked, “Does Burton know?”
He shook his head. “Outside of my doctor, you’re the only one. Please don’t tell—”
“I’m a professional, remember? You don’t have to ask me not to tell Burton or anyone.”
Almost as if we had planned it that way, a soft tap came at the door. I turned toward it and it opened. Burton walked inside.
“Hey, there’s our man,” Ollie said. “Now we can get some things done with you back on the job!”
“Yeah, I think you’re right.” Burton laughed—maybe it was slightly forced, but it was a laugh.
I stared at Burton and tried to read his face. Sometimes it’s easy to do that, but he can also be inscrutable when he wants. This was one of those times.
“What do you think we ought to do now?” Burton asked.
The question hung in the air.
Just then I looked up and saw Jason Omore stroll past our room. He didn’t know we were in that room, and he didn’t look our way.
“I’d like to talk to Jason again,” I said.
“You think he knows something he hasn’t told us?” Ollie asked.
“I think—I think we didn’t ask the right questions.” There it was again—one of those far-out statements and I had no idea how I knew it. I suppose that’s part of why my colleagues say I’m a good therapist. I listen to that inner prompting, to my gut. As a therapist, I don’t get it often, but I listen. In fact, this had happened to me more since coming to Cartledge Inn than it had in the past six months.
I hurried out of the room, and both men followed me. As I exited the building, I saw that Jason had gone about a hundred yards ahead of us. Wearing my sandals made it much easier to walk. If there hadn’t been two attractive men behind me, I probably would have run.
“Jason!” Burton called.
He must not have heard his name the first time, but I walked even faster. About thirty feet from the African, I called his name.
Jason turned, saw me, and stopped. Even from that distance, his smile was as big and as genuine as ever. He walked toward me and greeted me with his arms raised shoulder high, as if he intended to welcome me with a hug. “Good doctor, it is my distinct pleasure to see you again.” He waved to Burton and Ollie, who were both less than ten yards behind.
“How are you?” I asked.
“That is not a good question,” he said. “In our country we would not say that so quickly.”
“How would you say it?”
By then the two men had caught up with me and heard our conversation.
Instead of answering, Jason turned and looked heavenward. Pale clouds had drifted across the sky, and the first hint of sunset had appeared. A mild breeze brought along the fragrance of magnolia blossoms from a nearby tree. I inhaled deeply.
“In our country—in the region we call south Nyanza where I grew up—the people are still what you could call primitive. When someone dies that we love, we mourn, but we do it differently.” He told us that every evening at dark, the family and friends gathered. They wept and cried all night long. So many people would be present, someone would always be crying aloud. “We do that for thirty nights.”
“And after that?”
“After that we return to our lives again. We have mourned, and we have emptied ourselves of the pain. I wish to do this for my friend, but I can only carry this heaviness in my heart for now.” He stared at me and said softly, “You Americans seem to think it is a serious weakness to mourn for an extended period.”
Before Ollie could interrupt, Jason said that he had been in his room. “But, alas, my heavy heart is such that I have not studied. I can think only of my friend. I have already mingled many tears over his Bible.”
“His Bible?” I asked.
“Yes, the Bible that belonged to Stefan.”
“What are you doing with it?” Ollie asked. “If it’s his, did you steal it from his room?”
“And why would I do that? Did he not give it to me?”
I wondered if this was the time to tell Ollie to shut up. I glanced at his hands and saw no tremor.
Burton all but pushed Ollie aside. “Tell us about the Bible, Jason. Why did he give it to you?”
“Akiya—” He stopped. “Sorry, that is my own language, which means, I do not know. Truly, I do not.”
“What did he say when he gave you the Bible?”
“Ah, that. Yes, that was a bit strange, was it not?”
“In what way was it strange?” Ollie asked.
“He was afraid, I think. Yes, he was very much afraid.”
“Of what?” Ollie yelled. “Afraid of what?”
“Of that, I do not know.”
“Don’t give me that kind of—”
“Ollie, Ollie, take it easy,” Burton said. “Let’s find a place to sit down and let Jason take whatever time he needs to explain this to us.” Ollie started to protest, but Burton added, “We have four African families in our congregation. I’ve learned that they operate out of a different time zone. If we’re patient and listen, we’ll learn.”
“And what’s ten minutes more or less?” I asked. I looked at Ollie and hoped my eyes gave him a warning.
Ollie raised his hands in surrender. “Okay.”
Jason led us away from all the buildings until we came to a small promenade that overlooked the lake. It was the highest point of the grounds, and the lake was perhaps thirty feet below. Five leather-cushioned folding chairs were grouped in a semicircle. We sat on the padded seats, which were amazingly comfortable.
“I want your help,” Ollie said to Jason. “Please tell me whatever you know. I get a little impatient at times—”
“Yes, that you do,” Jason said without obvious rancor, more as if he stated a fact. “Is this not a beautiful site? Is not God’s creation special for us? Is it not one of your sayings that we should pause to smell the flowers?”
“Stop to smell the roses,” I said.
“Ah, yes, so it is.” He had been looking around at the lake, and I thought how naturally he blended in with the quiet setting. He turned his chair so that he could see all our faces. “Now my soul is calm once again. I am ready to speak.”
We waited several seconds. From behind me two birds called and sang to each other.
“My friend Stefan knew someone wanted to kill him,” Jason said simply.
“How did he know that?” I asked. “Was he threatened?”
“To that question, I do not have an answer. He said to me, ‘Someone will make an attempt on my life.’ When I asked him for more explanation, he said, ‘Do not be upset. I am not afraid of death.’ ”
“He really said that?” Ollie asked.
“Oh yes, but of course. Even if he had not said such words, of this I am sure that he was at peace. He had only one major concern. It was the one thing he felt he must do even if his life was in danger.”
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