Koontz, Dean R. - Hideaway

by Hideaway(Lit)

  his own darkest instincts, and markedly more garrulous.

  Liquor revealed the gabby fool hidden inside the legend of taciturnity;

  anyone wanting to shut him up would have needed a horse veterinarian's

  hypodermic full of Demerol or a .357 Magnum. Lindsey ate faster,

  deciding to skip dessert and depart Honell's company as swiftly as

  possible.

  Then he recognized her. He kept glancing over his shoulder at her,

  blinking his rheumy eyes. Finally he unsteadily approached their table.

  "Excuse me, are you Lindsey Sparling, the artist?" She had known that he

  sometimes wrote about American art, but she had not imagined he would

  know her work or her face. "Yes, I am," she said, hoping he would not

  say that he liked her work and that he would not tell her who he was. "I

  like your work very much," he said. "I won't bother you to say more."

  But just as she relaxed and thanked him, he told her his name, and she

  was obligated to say that she liked his work, too, which she did, though

  now she saw it in a light different from that in which it had previously

  appeared to her. He seemed less like a man who had sacrificed family

  love for his art than like a man incapable of giving that love. In

  isolation he might have found a greater power to create; but he had also

  found more time to admire himself and contemplate the infinite number of

  ways in which he was superior to the ruck of his fellow men. She tried

  not to let her distaste show, spoke only glowingly of his novels, but he

  seemed to sense her disapproval. He quickly terminated the encounter

  and returned to the bar.

  He never looked her way again during the night. And he no longer held

  forth to the assembled drinkers about anything, his attention directed

  largely at the contents of his glass.

  Now, sitting in the arms in her studio, holding the copy of Arts

  American, and staring at Honell's byline, she felt her stomach curdle.

  She had seen the great man in his cups, when he had uncloaked more of

  his true self than it was his nature to reveal. Worse, she was a person

  of some accomplishment, who moved in circles that might bring her into

  contact with people Honell also knew. He saw her as a threat.

  One way of neutralizing her was to undertake a well-written, if unfair,

  article criticizing her body of work; therafter, he could claim that any

  tales she told about him were motivated by spite, of questionable true.

  She knew what to expect from him in the Arts American piece, and Honell

  did not surprise her. Never before had she read criticisms more vicious

  yet so cunningly crafted to spare the critic accusations of personal

  animosity.

  When she finished, she closed the magazine and put it down gently on the

  small table beside her chair. She didn't want to pitch it across the

  room because she knew that reaction would have pleased Honell if he had

  been present to see it.

  Then she said, "To hell with it," picked up the magazine, and threw it

  across the room with all the force she could muster. It slapped hard

  against the wall and clattered to the floor.

  Her work was important to her. Intelligence, emotion, talent, and

  creativity went into it, and even on those occasions when a painting did

  not turn out as well as she had hoped, no creation ever came easily.

  Anguish always was a part of it. And more self-revelation than seemed

  prudent.

  Exhilaration and dispair in equal measure. A critic had every right to

  dislike an artist if his judgement was based on thoughtful consideration

  and an understanding of what the artist was trying to achieve. But this

  was not genuine criticism. This was sick invective.

  Bile. Her work was important to her, and he had shit on it.

  Filled with the energy of anger, she got up and paced. She knew that by

  surrendering to anger she was letting Honell win; this was the response

  he had hoped to extract from her with his dental-pliers criticism. But

  she couldn't help it.

  She wished Hatch was there, so she could share her fury with him. He

  had a calming effect greater than a fifth of bourbon.

  Her angry pacing brought her eventually to the window where by now the

  fat black spider had constructed an elaborate web in the upper right

  hand corner. Realizing that she had forgotten to get a jar from the

  pantry, Lindsey picked up the magnifying glass and examined the silken

  fillagree of the eight-legged fisherman's net, which glimmered with a

  pastel mother of-pearl iridescence. The trap was so delicate, so

  alluring. But the living loom that spun it was the very essence of all

  predators, strong for its size and sleek and quick. Its bulbous body

  glistened like a drop of thick black blood, and its rending mandibles

  worked the air in anticipation of the flesh of prey not yet snared.

  The spider and Steven Honell were of a kind, utterly alien to her and

  beyond understanding regardless of how long she observed them. Both

  spun their webs in silence and isolation. Both had brought their

  viciousness into her house uniuvited, one through words in a magazine

  and the other through a tiny crack in a window frame or door jamb.

  Both were poisonous, vile.

  She put down the magnifying glass. She could do nothing about Honell,

  but at least she could deal with the spider. She snatched two Kleenex

  from a box atop her supply cabinet, and in one swift movement she swept

  up the spinner and its web, crushing both.

  She threw the wad of tissues in the waste can.

  Though she usually captured a spider when possible and kindly returned

  it to the outdoors, she had no compunction about the way she had dealt

  with this one. Indeed, if Honell had been present at that moment, when

  his hateful attack was still so fresh in her mind, she might have been

  tempted to deal with him in some manner as quick and violent as the

  treatment she had accorded the spider.

  She returned to her stool, regarded the unfinished canvas, and was

  suddenly certain what refinements it required. She opened tubes of

  paint and set out her brushes. That wasn't the first time she had been

  motivated by an unjust blow or a puerile insult, and she wondered how

  many artists of all kinds had produced their best work with the

  determination to rub it in the faces of the naysayers who had tried to

  undercut or belittle them.

  When Lindsey had been at work on the painting for ten or fifteen

  minutes, she was stricken by an unsettling thought which brought her

  back to the worries that had preoccupied her before the arrival of the

  mail and Arts American. Honell and the spider were not the only

  creatures who had invaded her home uninvited. The unknown killer in

  sunglasses also had invaded it, in a way, by feedback through the

  mysterious link between him and Hatch. And what if he was as aware of

  Hatch as Hatch was of him? He might find a way to track Hatch down and

  invade their home for real, with the intention of doing far more harm

  than either the spider or Honell could ever accomplish.

  5

  Irreviously, Hatch had visited Jonas Nyebern in his office at Ora
nge

  County General, but that Tuesday his appointment was at the medical

  building off Jamboree Road, where the physician operated his private

  practice.

  The waiting room was remarkable, not for its short-nap gray carpet and

  standard-issue furniture, but for the artwork on its walls. Hatch was

  surprised and imp by a collection of high-quality antique oil paintings

  portraying religious scenes of a Catholic nature: the passion of St.

  Jude, the Crucifixion, the Holy Mother, the Anmmciation, the

  Resurrection, and much more.

  The most curious thing was not that the collection was worth

  considerable money. After all, Nyebern was an extremely successful

  cardiovascular surgeon who came from a family of more than average

  resources. But it was odd that a member of the medical profession,

  which had taken an increasingly agnostic public posture throughout the

  last few decades, should choose religious art of any kind for his office

  walls, let alone such obvious denominational art that might offend

  non-Catholics or nonbelievers.

  When the nurse escorted Hatch out of the waiting room, he discovered the

  collection continued along the hallways serving the entire suite.

  He found it peculiar to see a fine oil of Jesus agony in Geane hung to

  the left of a stainless-steel and white-enamel scale, and beside a chart

  listing ideal weight according to height, age, and sex.

  After weighing in and having his blood pressure and pulse taken, he

  waited for Nyebern in a small private room, sitting on the end of an

  examination table that was covered by a continuous roll of sanitary

  paper.

  On one wall hung an eye chart and an exquisite depiction of the

  Ascension in which the artist's skill with light was so great that the

  scene became three-dimensional and the figures therein seemed almost

  alive.

  Nyebern kept him waiting only a minute or two, and entered with a broad

  smile. As they shook hands, the physician said, "I won't draw out the

  suspense, Hatch. The tests all came in negative. You've got a clean

  bill of health."

  Those words were not as welcome as they ought to have been. Hatch had

  been hoping for some finding that would point the way to an

  understanding of his nightmares and his mystical connection with the man

  who had killed the blond punker. But the verdict did not in the least

  surprise him. He had suspected that the answers he sought were not

  going to be that easy to find.

  "So your night are only that," Nyebern said, "and nothing more-just

  nightmares."

  Hatch had not told him about the vision of the gunshot blonde who had

  later been found dead, for real, on the freeway. As he had made clear

  to Lindsey, he was not going to set himself up to become a headline

  again, at least not unless he saw enough of the killer to identify him

  to the police, more than he'd glimpsed in the mirror last night, in

  which case he would have no choice but to face the media spotlight "No

  cranial pressure," Nyebern said, "no chemicoelectrical imbalance, no

  sign of a shift in the location of the pineal gland-which can sometimes

  lead to severe nightmares and even waking hallucinations.. ." He went

  over the tests one by one, methodical as usual.

  As he listened, Hatch realized that he always remembered the physician

  as being older than he actually was. Jonas Nyebern had a grayness about

  him, and a gravity, that left the impression of advanced age.

  Tall and lanky, he hunched his shoulders and stooped slightly to

  deemphasize his height, resulting in a posture more like that of an

  elderly man than of someone his true age, which was fifty. At times

  there was about him, as well, an air of sadness, as if he had known

  great tragedy.

  When he finished going over the tests, Nyebern looked up and smiled

  again. It was a warm smile, but that air of sadness clung to him in

  spite of it. "The problem isn't physical, Hatch."

  "Is it possible you could have missed something?"

  "Possible, I suppose, but very unlikely. W"

  "An extremely minor piece of brain damage, a few hundred cells, might

  not show up on your tests yet have a serious effect."

  "As I said, very unlikely. I think we can safely assume that this is

  strictly an emotional problem, a perfectly understandable consequence of

  the trauma you've been through. Let's try a little standard therapy."

  "Psychotherapy?"

  "Do you have a problem with that?"

  "No."

  Except, Hatch thought, it won't work. This isn't an emotional problem.

  This is real.

  "I know a good man, first-rate, you'll like him." Nyebern said, taking a

  pen from the breast pocket of his white smock and writing the name of

  the psychotherapist on the blank top sheet of a prescription pad.

  "I'll discuss your case with him and tell him you'll be calling. Is

  that all right?"

  "Yeth. Sure. That's fine."

  He wished he could tell Nyebern the whole story. But then he would

  definitely sound as if he needed therapy. Reluctantly he faced the

  realization that neither a medical doctor nor a psychotherapist could

  help him. His ailment was too strange to respond to standard treatments

  of any kind.

  Maybe what he needed was a witch doctor. Or an exorcist. He did almost

  feel as if the black-clad killer in sunglasses was a demon testing his

  defenses to determine whether to attempt possessing him, They chatted a

  couple of minutes about things nonmedical.

  Then as Hatch was getting up to go, he pointed to the painting of the

  Ascension. "Beautiful piece."

  "Thank you. It is exceptional, isn't it?"

  "Itaaan."

  "That's right."

  "Early eighteenth century?"

  "Kight again," Nyebern said. "You know religious art?"

  "Not all that well. But I think the whole collection is Italian from

  the same period."

  "That it is. Another piece, maybe two, and I'll call it complete."

  "Odd to see it here," Hatch said, stepping closer to the painting beside

  the eye chart.

  "Yes, I know what you mean," Nybern said, "but I don't have enough wall

  space for all this at home. There, I'm putting together a collection of

  modern religious art."

  "Is there any?"

  "Not much. Religious subject matter isn't fashionable these days among

  the really talented artists. The bulk of it is done by hacks. But here

  and there... someone with genuine talent is seeking enlightenment along

  the old paths, painting these subjects with a contemporary eye.

  I'll move the modern collection here when I finish this one and dispose

  of it."

  Hatch turned away from the painting and regarded the doctor with

  professional interest. "You're planning to sell?"

  "Oh, no," the physician said, returning his pen to his breast pocket.

  His hand, with the long elegant fingers that one expected of a surgeon,

  lingered at the pocket, as if he were pledging the truth of what he was

  saying. "I'll donate it. This will be the sixth collection of

  religious art I've put together over the past twenty y
ears, then given

  away."

  Because he could roughly estimate the value of the artwork he had seen

  on the walls of the medical suite, Hatch was astonished by the degree of

  philanthropy indicated by Nyebern's simple statement. "Who's the

  fortunate recipient?"

  "Well, usually a Catholic university, but on two occasions another

  Church institution," Nyebern said.

  The surgeon was staring at the depiction of the Ascension, a distant

  gaze in his eyes, as if he were seeing something beyond the painting,

  beyond the wall on which it hung, and beyond the farthest horizon. His

  hand still lingered over his breast pocket.

  "Very generous of you," Hatch said.

  "It's not an act of generosity." Nyebern's faraway voice now matched the

  look in his eyes. "It's an act of atonement."

  That statement begged for a question in response, although Hatch felt

  that asking it was an intrusion of the physician's privacy. "Atonement

  for what?"

  Still staring at the painting, Nyebern said, "I never talk about it."

  "I don't mean to pry. I just thought-"

  "Maybe it would do me good to talk about it. Do you think it might?"

  Hatch did not answer-partly because he didn't believe the doctor was

  actually listening to him anyway.

  "Atonement," Nyebern said again. "At.... atonement for being the son