When the Bough Breaks

by Jonathan Kellerman

  Milo knocked.

  I realized then that the place was amazingly silent. There must have been at least fifty units but there wasn't a soul in sight. No evidence of human habitation.

  We waited a few minutes. He raised his fist to knock again just before the door opened.

  "Sorry. I was washin' my hair."

  The woman could have been anywhere from twenty-five to forty. She had pale skin with the kind of texture that looked as if a pinch would crumble it. Large brown eyes topped by plucked brows. Thin lips. A slight under bite Her hair was wrapped in an orange towel and the little that peeked out was medium brown. She wore a faded cotton shirt of ochre-and orange print over rust-colored stretch pants. Dark blue tennis shoes on her feet. Her eyes darted from Milo to me. She looked like someone who'd been knocked around plenty and refused to believe that it wasn't going to happen again at any moment.

  "Mrs. Quinn? This is Dr. Alex Delaware. He's the psychologist I told you about."

  "Pleased to meet you, Doctor."

  Her hand was thin and cold and moist and she pulled away as quickly as she could.

  "Melody's watchin' TV in her room. Out of school, with all that's been goin' on. I let her watch to keep her mind off it."

  We followed her into the apartment.

  Apartment was a charitable word. What it was, really, was a couple of oversized closets stuck together. An architect's postscript. Hey, Ed, we've got an extra four hundred square feet of corner in back of terrace number 142. Why don't we throw a roof over it, nail up some drywall and call it a manager's unit? Get some poor soul to do scutwork for the privilege of living in Pacific Palisades...

  The living room was filled with one floral sofa, a masonite end table and a television. A framed painting of Mount Rainier that looked as if it came from a Savings and Loan calendar and a few yellowed photographs hung on the wall. The photos were of hardened, unhappy-looking people and appeared to date from the Gold Rush.

  "My grandparents," she said.

  A cubicle of a kitchen was visible and from it came the smell of frying bacon. A large bag of sour cream-and-onion-flavored potato chips and a six pack of Dr. Pepper sat on the counter.

  "Very nice."

  "They came here in 1902. From Oklahoma." She made it sound like an apology.

  There was an unfinished wooden door and from behind it came the sound of sudden laughter and applause, bells and buzzers. A game show.

  "She's watchin' back there."

  "That's just fine, Mrs. Quinn. We'll let her be until we're ready for her."

  The woman nodded her head in assent.

  "She don't get much chance to watch the daytime shows, being' in school. So she's watchin' 'em now."

  "May we sit down, ma'am?"

  "Oh yes, yes." She flitted around the room like a mayfly, tugging at the towel on her head. She brought in an ashtray and set it down on the end table. Milo and I sat on the sofa and she dragged in a tubular aluminum-and-Naugahyde chair from the kitchen for herself. Despite the fact that she was thin her haunches settled and spread. She took out a pack of cigarettes, lit one up and sucked in the smoke until her cheeks hollowed. Milo spoke.

  "How old is your daughter, Mrs. Quinn?"

  "Bonita. Call me Bonita. Melody's the girl. She's just seven this past month." Talking about her daughter seemed to make her especially nervous. She inhaled greedily on her cigarette and blew little smoke out. Her free hand clenched and unclenched in rapid cadence.

  "Melody may be our only witness to what happened here last night." Milo looked at me with a disgusted frown.

  I knew what he was thinking. An apartment complex with seventy to one hundred residents and the only possible witness a child.

  "I'm scared for her, Detective Sturgis, if someone else finds out." Bonita Quinn stared at the floor as if doing it long enough would reveal the mystic secret of the Orient.

  "I assure you, Mrs. Quinn, that no one will find out. Dr. Delaware has served as a special consultant to the police many times." He lied shamelessly and glibly. "He understands the importance of keeping things secret. Besides--" he reached over to pat her shoulder reassuringly. I thought she'd go through the ceiling "--all psychologists demand confidentiality when working with their patients. Isn't that so, Dr. Delaware?"

  "Absolutely." We wouldn't get into the whole muddy issue of children's rights to privacy.

  Bonita Quinn made a strange, squeaking noise that was impossible to interpret. The closest thing to it that I could remember was the noise laboratory frogs used to make in Physiological Psych right before we pithed them by plunging a needle down into the tops of their skulls.

  "What's all this hypnotism gonna do to her?"

  I lapsed into my shrink's voice--the calm, soothing tones that had become so natural over the years that they switched on automatically. I explained to her that hypnosis wasn't magic, simply a combination of focused concentration and deep relaxation, that people tended to remember things more clearly when they were relaxed and that was why the police used it for witnesses. That children were better at going into hypnosis than were adults because they were less inhibited and enjoyed fantasy. That it didn't hurt, and was actually pleasant for most youngsters and that you couldn't get stuck in it or do anything against your will while hypnotized.

  "All hypnosis," I ended, "is self-hypnosis. My role is simply to help your daughter do something that comes natural to her."

  She probably understood about 10 percent of it, but it seemed to calm her down.

  "You can say that again, natural. She daydreams all the time."

  "Exactly. Hypnosis is like that."

  "Teachers complain all the time, say she's driftin' off, not doing her work."

  She was talking as if she expected me to do something about it.

  Milo broke in.

  "Has Melody told you anything more about what she saw, Mrs. Quinn?"

  "No, no." An emphatic shake of the head. "We haven't been talkin' about it."

  Milo pulled out his notepad and nipped through a few pages.

  "What I have on record is that Melody couldn't sleep and was sitting in the living room--in this room at around one in the morning."

  "Must've been. I go in by eleven-thirty and I got up once for a cigarette at twenty after twelve. She was asleep then and I didn't hear her for the while it took me to fall off. I'd 'a' heard her. We share the room."

  "Uh-huh. And she saw two men--here it says "I saw big men." The officer's question was "How many, Melody?" And she answered, "Two, maybe three." When he asked her what did they look like, all she could say was that they were dark." He was talking to me now. "We asked her black, Latino. Nothing. Only dark."

  "That could mean shadows. Could mean anything to a seven-year-old," I said.

  "I know."

  "Which could mean two men, or one guy with a shadow, or--"

  "Don't say it."

  Or nothing at all.

  "She don't always tell the truth about everything."

  We both turned to look at Bonita Quinn who had used the few seconds we had ignored her to put out her cigarette and light a new one.

  "I'm not sayin' she's a bad kid. But she don't always tell the truth. I don't know why you want to depend on her."

  I asked, "Do you have problems with her chronically lying--about things that don't make much sense--or does she do it to avoid getting in trouble?"

  "The second. When she don't want me to paddle her and I know something's broken, it's got to be her. She tells me no, mama, not me. And I paddle her double." She looked to me for disapproval. "For not tellin' the truth."

  "Do you have other problems with her?" I asked gently.

  "She's a good girl, Doctor. Only the daydreams, and the concentration problems."

  "Oh?" I needed to understand this child if I was going to be able to do hypnosis with her.

  "The concentratin'--it's hard for her."

  No wonder, in this tiny, television-saturated cell. No doubt the apartmen
ts were Adults Only and Melody Quinn was required to keep a low profile. There's a large segment of the population of Southern California that views the sight of anyone too young or too old as offensive. It's as if nobody wants to be reminded from whence they came or to where they will certainly go. That kind of denial, coupled with face lifts and hair transplants and makeup, creates a comfortable little delusion of immortality. For a short while.

  I was willing to bet that Melody Quinn spent most of her time indoors despite the fact that the complex boasted three swimming pools and a totally equipped gym. Not to mention the ocean a half-mile away. Those playthings were meant for the grownups.

  "I took her to the doctor when the teachers kept sendin' home these notes sayin' she can't sit still, her mind wanders. He said she was overactive. Somethin' in the brain."

  "Hyperactive?"

  "That's right. Wouldn't surprise me. Her dad wasn't altogether right up there." She tapped her forehead. "Used the illegal drugs and the wine until he--" she stopped cold, looking at Milo with sudden fear.

  "Don't worry, Mrs. Quinn, we're not interested in that kind of thing. We only want to find out who killed Dr. Handler and Ms. Gutierrez."

  "Yeah, the headshrinker--" she stopped again, this time staring at me. "Can't seem to say anythin' right, today." She forced a weak smile.

  I nodded reassurance, smiled understandingly.

  "He was a nice guy, that doctor." Some of my best friends are psychotherapists. "Used to joke with me a lot and I'd kid him, ask him if he had any shrunken heads in there." She laughed, a strange giggle, and showed a mouthful of teeth badly in need of repair. By now I had narrowed her age to middle thirties. In ten years she'd look truly elderly. "Terrible about what happened to him."

  "And Ms. Gutierrez."

  "Yeah, her too. Only her I wasn't so crazy about. She was Mexican, you know, but uppity Mexican. Where I come from they did the stoop labor and the cleanup. This one had the fancy dresses and the little sports car. And her a teacher, too." It wasn't easy for Bonita Quinn, brought up to think of all Mexicans as beasts of burden, to see that in the big city, away from the lettuce fields, some of them looked just like real people. While she did the donkey work.

  "She was always carryin' herself like she was too good for you. You'd say hello to her and she'd be lookin' off into the distance, like she had no time for you."

  She took another drag on her cigarette and smiled slyly.

  "This time I'm okay," she said.

  We both looked at her.

  "Neither of you gents is a Mex. I didn't put my foot in it again."

  She was extremely pleased with herself and I took advantage of her lifted spirits to ask her a few more questions.

  "Mrs. Quinn, is your daughter on any sort of medication for her hyperactivity?"

  "Oh yeah, sure. The doc gave me pills to give her."

  "Do you have the prescription slip handy?"

  "I got the bottle." She got up and returned with an amber vial half full of tablets.

  I took it and read the label. Ritalin. Methylphenidate hydrochloride. A super-amphetamine that speeds up adults but slows down kids, it's one of the most commonly prescribed drugs for American youngsters. Ritalin is addictive and potent and has a host of side effects, one of the most common of which is insomnia. Which might explain why Melody Quinn was sitting, staring out the window of a dark room at one in the morning.

  Ritalin is a sweetheart drug when it comes to controlling children. It improves concentration and reduces the frequency of problem-behaviors in hyperactive kids-which sounds great, except that the symptoms of hyperactivity are hard to differentiate from those of anxiety, depression, acute stress reaction, or simple boredom at school. I've seen kids who were too bright for their classroom look hyper. Ditto for little ones going through the horrors of divorce or any other significant trauma.

  A doctor who's doing his job correctly will require comprehensive psychological and social evaluation of a child before prescribing Ritalin or any other behavior modifying drug. And there are plenty of good doctors. But some physicians take the easy way out, using the pills as the first step. If it's not malpractice it's dangerously close.

  I opened the vial and shook some pills onto my palm. They were amber, the 20-milligram kind. I examined the label. One tablet three times daily. Sixty mg was the maximum recommended dosage. Strong stuff for a seven-year-old.

  "You give her these three times a day?"

  "Uh-huh. That's what it says, don't it?"

  "Yes, it does. Did your doctor start off with something smaller--white or blue pills?"

  "Oh yeah. We had her takin' three of the blue ones at first. Worked pretty good but I still got the complaints from the school, so he said it was okay to try these."

  "And this dosage works well for Melody?"

  "Works real fine for me. If it's gonna be a rough day with lots of visitors comin' over--she don't do real good with lots of people, lots of commotion--I give her an extra one."

  Now we were talking overdose.

  Bonita Quinn must have seen the look of surprise and disapproval that I tried unsuccessfully to conceal, for she spoke up with indignation in her voice.

  "The doc says it was okay. He's an important man. You know, this place don't allow kids and I get to stay here only on account as she's a quiet kid. M and M Properties--they own the place--told me any time there's complaints about kids, that's it."

  No doubt that did wonders for Melody's social life. Chances are she had never had a friend over.

  There was cruel irony to the idea of a seven-year old imprisoned amidst single-swingle splendor, tucked away in a slum pocket on an aerie high above the high Pacific, and dosed up with Ritalin to appease the combined wishes of the Los Angeles school system, a dimwitted mother and M and M Properties.

  I examined the label on the vial to find out the name of the prescribing physician. When I found it, things began to fall into place.

  L.W. Towle. Lionel Willard Towle, M.D. One of the most established and respected pediatricians on the West Side. I had never met him but knew him by reputation. He was on the senior staff of Western Pediatric and a half dozen other Westside hospitals. A big shot in the Academy of Pediatrics. A guest speaker, highly in demand, at seminars on learning disabilities and behavior problems.

  Dr. Towle was also a paid consultant to three major pharmaceutical concerns. Translate: pusher. He had a reputation, especially among the younger doctors who were generally more conservative about drugs, as easy with the prescription pad. No one said it too loudly, because Towle had been around a long time and had lots of important patients and plenty of connections, but the whispered consensus was that he was a Dr. feel good for tots. I wondered how someone like Bonita Quinn had ended up in his practice. But there was no easy way to ask without appearing unduly nosy.

  I handed the vial back to her and turned to Milo, who'd been sitting through the exchange in silence.

  "Let me talk to you," I said.

  "Just one moment, ma'am."

  Outside the apartment I told him, "I can't hypnotize this kid. She's drugged to the gills. It would be a risk to work with her, and besides, there's little chance of getting anything worthwhile out of her."

  Milo digested this.

  "Shit." He scratched his head. "What if we take her off the pills for a few days?"

  "That's a medical decision. We get into that and we're way out of bounds. We need the physician's permission. Which blows confidentiality."

  "Who's the doc?"

  I told him about Towle.

  "Wonderful. But maybe he'll agree to let her off for a few days."

  "Maybe, but there's no guarantee she'll give us anything. This kid's been on stimulants for a year. And what about Mrs. Q? She's scared plenty as is. Take her darling off the pills and first thing she'll do is lock the kid inside twelve hours a day. They like it quiet here."

  The complex was still silent as a mausoleum. At one-forty-five in the afternoon.
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  "Can you at least look at the kid? Maybe she's not that doped."

  Across the way the door to the Handler apartment was open. I caught a glimpse of elegance in disarray-oriental rugs, antiques, and severe acrylic furniture broken and upended, blood-spattered white walls. The police lab men worked silently, like moles.

  "By now she's had her second dose, Milo."

  "Shit." He punched his fist into his palm. "Just meet the kid. Give me your impression. Maybe she'll be alert."