The Analyst

by John Katzenbach

  Ricky recognized this for the bank’s advertising slogan. He also knew that the bank trustees would eagerly embrace any takeover effort by one of the megabanks, were a profitable enough offer one day to walk through their door. “Yes,” he said. “That’s always been one of your strongest selling points . . .”

  “Well, thank you. We like to think we give personalized service . . .”

  “But the unauthorized access?”

  “Shortly after we closed down your account as per your instructions, someone sought to make adjustments to your account, using our electronic banking services. We only learned of these attempts because an individual telephoned after they were denied access.”

  “They called?”

  “Someone who identified themselves as you.”

  “What did they say?”

  “It was in the nature of a complaint. But as soon as they heard that the account had been closed, they hung up. It was all very mysterious and a little confusing, because our computer records show they had knowledge of your password. Have you shared that code with anyone?”

  “No,” Ricky said. But he felt momentarily foolish. His password was 37383 which translated from numerals into letters as FREUD and was so blatantly obvious that he almost blushed. Using his birthday might have been slightly worse, but he doubted it.

  “Well, I guess you were wise to close the account.”

  Ricky thought for a moment, before asking, “Is there any way for your security to trace back either the phone number or the computer that was used to try to access the money?”

  The bank vice president paused, then said, “Well, yes. We have that capacity. But most electronic thieves are capable of staying ahead of the investigators. They use stolen computers and illegal phone codes and that sort of thing to hide their identities. Sometimes the FBI has success, but they have the most sophisticated computer security in the world. Our local security is less advanced, and therefore less effective. And no theft took place, so the criminal liability is limited. We are required by law to report the attempt to banking regulators, but that merely becomes another entry in what I’m sorry to concede is a growing file. But I can still have our guy run that program for you. I just don’t think it will lead you anywhere. These electronic bank robbers are pretty clever. Usually just leads to a dead end, somewhere.”

  “Would you try, please, and get back to me. Right away. I’m under some time constraints here,” Ricky said.

  “We’ll give it a shot and get right back to you,” the man replied, hanging up.

  Ricky sat back in his chair. For a moment, he allowed himself the fantasy that the bank security would give him a name and telephone number and this single slip would provide him the avenue to his tormentor’s identity. Then he shook his head, because he wondered whether Rumplestiltskin, so careful and cautious with everything to this point, would make an error that was so simple. Far more likely that the man had accessed that account and then made the subsequent disturbing and telltale telephone call with the precise intention of providing Ricky with a path to travel down. This thought worried him greatly.

  Still, Ricky realized as the day began to flee from beneath him, that he now knew much more about the man stalking him. Rumplestiltskin’s clue within a poem had been curiously generous, especially for someone who had first insisted that his questions be answerable with a yes or no. The response had narrowed the distance between Ricky and a guess of the man’s name considerably, he thought. Twenty years, give or take a couple, put him into a range from 1978 through 1983. And his patient was a single woman, which eliminated a significant number of people. Now he had a framework that he could function with.

  What he needed to do, Ricky told himself, was re-create five years of therapies. Examine every female patient in the time frame. Somewhere in that mix would be the woman wearing the right combination of neuroses and troubles that would have been subsequently directed at the child. Find the psychosis in flower, he thought.

  As was Ricky’s training and habit, he sat, trying to focus, eliminating the sounds of the world around him, trying to remember. Who was I twenty years ago? he asked himself. And who was I treating? There is a tenet to psychoanalysis that helps form the foundation of the therapy: Everyone remembers everything. One might not remember it with journalistic accuracy or religious detail, perceptions and responses may be clouded or colored by all sorts of emotional forces, events recalled with clarity may actually be murky, but, when it is finally sorted through, everyone remembers everything. Hurts and fears can lurk deeply concealed under layers of stress, but they are there and can be found, no matter how powerful the psychological forces of denial can be. In his practice, he was adept at this process of peeling away, skinning memories down to the bone, to find the hard layer underneath.

  So, alone in his office, he began to plumb his own memory. Occasionally he would glance over the shreds of notes and jotted images that constituted his record keeping, angry with himself for not being more precise. Any other physician, confronted with an issue from years past, would merely dust off some old file folder and pluck out the right name and diagnosis. His task was considerably harder, because all his file folders were invested in his memory. Still, Ricky felt a surge of confidence that he could manage this. He concentrated hard, a legal notepad on his lap, reconstructing his past.

  One after another, images of people took form. It was a little like trying to converse with ghosts.

  He discarded the men even though they intruded on his powers of recollection, leaving only the women. Names came slowly; oddly enough, it was almost easier to remember the complaints. Every image of a patient, every detail about a treatment, he wrote on the legal pad. It was still scattered and disjointed, inefficient and haphazard, but, at least, he thought to himself, it is progress.

  When he looked up, he saw that his office had filled with shadows. Day had drifted away from him in this semireverie. On the yellow sheets of paper in front of him, he had come up with twelve separate recollections from the time period in question. At least eighteen women had been in some sort of therapy with him over that era. This was a manageable number, but he was troubled that there were others that he was blocking, unable to immediately recall. Of the group he recollected, he had only produced names for half of them. And these were the long-term patients. He had an unsettling sensation that Rumplestiltskin’s mother was someone he’d seen only briefly.

  Memory and recollection were like Ricky’s lovers. Now they seemed elusive and fickle.

  He rose from his chair, feeling stiffness and dull pain in his knees and shoulders, the tightening feeling one gets from sitting far too long in the same position. He stretched slowly, and bent down and rubbed a recalcitrant knee, as if he could warm it and reinvigorate it. He realized he had not eaten that day, not a bite, and was abruptly hungry. He knew there was little for him to fix in his own kitchen, and he turned and looked out the window at the fast-crawling night gliding across the city, realizing he would have to go out and purchase something. The thought of actually emerging from his apartment almost stifled his hunger and made his throat go dry.

  He had a curious response: There had been so few fears in his life, so few doubts. Now the simple act of exiting his home made him pause. But he steeled himself to whatever thoughts might have intruded, and determined to head two blocks to the south. There was a little bar where he could get a sandwich. He did not know whether he would be watched— this was becoming a constant question for him—but he decided to ignore the feeling and proceed. And, he told himself, he had made progress.

  The sidewalk heat seemed to pop into his face, like turning on a gas stove. He marched the two blocks south like a soldier, eyes front. The place he was looking for was in the middle of the block, with a half-dozen small tables set outside for the summer, and an interior that was narrow and dark, with a bar set against one wall and another ten tables packed into the space. There was an unusual mix of decorations on the walls. ranging from sports m
emorabilia to Broadway posters, pictures of actors and actresses and the occasional politician. It was as if the place hadn’t quite managed to carve out an identity as any one particular group’s hangout, and therefore tried to make a diverse collection happy, creating a sort of mishmash within. But the small kitchen, like so many similar places in Manhattan, made a more than passable hamburger or Reuben sandwich, and occasionally put some pasta on the menu, all at relatively inexpensive prices, a factor that occurred late to Ricky as he walked through the door. He no longer had a credit card that functioned, and his cash reserves were low. He made a mental note to start carrying the traveler’s checks with him.

  It was dark inside, and he blinked once or twice while his eyes adjusted to the dim light. There were a few people at the bar, and a table or two empty. A middle-aged waitress spotted him as he hesitated. “You gonna have some dinner, hon?” she asked with a familiarity that seemed out of place in a bar that encouraged anonymity.

  “That’s right,” he said.

  “All alone?” she asked. Her tone indicated that she knew he was alone, and that she already knew that he ate alone every night, but that some old-fashioned country courtesy out of place in the city required her to ask the question.

  “Right again.”

  “You want to sit at the bar, or a table?”

  “A table, if that’s okay. Preferably in the back.”

  The waitress pivoted, spotted an empty seat at the rear, and nodded. “Follow me,” she said. She gestured toward a chair and opened a menu in front of him. “Something from the bar?” she asked.

  “A glass of wine. Red, please,” he said.

  “Be right back. Special tonight is linguine with salmon. It’s not bad.”

  Ricky watched the waitress depart for the bar. The menu was large, wearing one of those plastic covers to protect it from stains, far larger physically than was necessary for the modest selection offered. He opened it and propped it up in front of him, staring at the list of burgers and entrées described on the pages with a flowery literary enthusiasm that sought to conceal the simplicity of their reality. After a moment, he set the menu down, expecting to see the waitress with his wine. She had disappeared, presumably into the kitchen.

  Instead, Virgil stood in front of him.

  In her hands were two glasses, each filled with red wine. She wore faded jeans and a purple sport shirt, and she had an expensive mahogany-colored leather portfolio pinned underneath one arm. She set the drinks down on the table, then pulled a seat up and plopped herself down across from him. She reached out and took the menu out of Ricky’s hands.

  “I already ordered each of us the special,” she said, with a small, seductive grin. “The waitress is one hundred percent correct: It’s not all that bad.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Surprise riveted him, but Ricky did not react outwardly. Instead, he stared hard across the table at the young woman, continuing to wear the flat poker face that was so familiar to many of his patients. When he did speak, he said only, “So, your thinking here is that the salmon will be fresh?”

  “Fairly flopping around and gasping for breath,” Virgil replied breezily.

  “That might seem appropriate,” Ricky said softly.

  The young woman took a slow sip from the edge of her glass of wine, just moistening the outside of her lips with the dark liquid. Ricky pushed his own glass aside and gulped at water. “Really should be drinking white with pasta and fish,” Virgil said. “But, then again, we’re not in the sort of place that adheres to the rules, are we? I can’t imagine some frowning sommelier emerging to discuss with us the inadequacy of our selection.”

  “No, I doubt that,” Ricky answered.

  Virgil continued on, speaking rapidly, but without the nervousness that sometimes accompanies quickly spoken words. She sounded far more like a child excited on her birthday. “On the other hand, drinking red has a kind of devil-may-care attitude, don’t you think, Ricky? A cocky quality that suggests we don’t really care what the conventions say—we’re going to do what we want. Can you feel that, Doctor Starks? A bit of adventure and lawlessness, playing outside the rules. What do you think?”

  “I think that the rules are constantly changing,” he replied.

  “Of etiquette?”

  “Is that what we’re talking about?” he answered with a question.

  Virgil shook her head, causing her mane of blond hair to bounce seductively. She threw her head back slightly to laugh, revealing a long, attractive throat. “No, of course not, Ricky. You’re right about that.”

  At that moment the waitress brought them a wicker basket filled with rolls and butter, dropping both of them into a stifling silence, a small moment of shared conspiracy. When she moved away, Virgil reached for the bread. “I’m famished,” she said.

  “So, ruining my life burns calories?” Ricky posed.

  Again Virgil laughed. “It seems to,” she said. “I like that, I really do. What shall we call it, doc? How about The Ruination Diet—do you like that? We could make a fortune together and retire just you and I to some exotic island paradise.”

  “I don’t see that as happening,” Ricky said brusquely.

  “I didn’t think so,” Virgil replied, generously buttering her roll, and biting into the edge with a crunching sound.

  “Why are you here?” Ricky demanded, in a quiet, low voice, but still one that carried all the insistence he could muster. “You and your employer seem to have the design of my ruin all planned out. Step by step. Are you here to mock me? Perhaps add a bit of torment to his game?”

  “No one has ever described my company as a torment,” Virgil said, adopting a look of false surprise. “I would think that you found it, well, if not pleasant, at least intriguing. And think of your own status, Ricky. You came here alone, old, nervous, filled with doubt and anxiety. The only people who even stared in your direction would have felt a momentary pang of pity, and then gone about the business of feeding and drinking, all the time ignoring the old man that you’ve clearly become. But everything changes when I sit down across from you. Suddenly, you’re not all that predictable, are you?” Virgil smiled.

  “It can’t be that bad, can it?”

  Ricky shook his head. His stomach had clenched into a ball and the taste in the back of his mouth was acid.

  “My life . . . ,” he started.

  “Your life has changed. And will continue to change. At least for a few more days. And then . . . well, that’s the rub, isn’t it?”

  “You enjoy this, then?” Ricky asked suddenly. “Watching me suffer. It’s odd, because I wouldn’t have instantly made you for such a dedicated sadist. Your Mr. R., perhaps, but I’m less sure about him, because he’s still a bit distant. But getting closer, I would guess. But you, Miss Virgil, I didn’t see you as possessor of the necessary psychopathology. But, of course, I could be wrong about that. And that’s what this is all about, right? When I was wrong about something, correct?”

  Ricky sipped his water, hoping he’d baited the young woman into revealing something. For an instant he saw the start of anger crease the corners of Virgil’s eyes, the smallest of dark signals in the edges of her mouth. But then she recovered and waved her half-eaten roll in the air between them, as if dismissing his words.

  “You misunderstand my role here, Ricky.”

  “Better explain it again.”

  “Everyone needs a guide on the road to Hell, Ricky. I told you that before.”

  Ricky nodded. “I recall.”

  “Someone to steer you through the rocky shores and hidden shoals of the underworld.”

  “And you’re that someone, I know. You told me.”

  “Well, are you in Hell yet, Ricky?”

  He shrugged, trying to infuriate her. This was unsuccessful.

  She grinned. “Maybe knocking on the door to Hell, then?”

  He shook his head, but she ignored this denial.

  “You’re a proud man, Doctor Ricky. It pai
ns you to lose control over your life, no? Far too proud. And we all know what comes directly after pride. You know, the wine’s not half-bad. You might try a sip or two.”

  He took the wineglass in his hand, raised it to his lips, but spoke instead of drinking. “Are you happy, Virgil? Happy with your criminality?”

  “What makes you think I’ve committed a crime, doctor?”

  “Everything you and your employer have done is criminal. Everything that you have planned is criminal.”

  “Really? I thought your expertise was in luxury-class neurosis and upper-middle-class anxiety. But you’ve developed a forensic streak in recent days, I guess.”

  Ricky paused. It wasn’t his normal inclination to play cards. The analyst doles them out slowly, searching for reactions, trying to provoke travels down avenues of memory. But he had so little time, he thought, and as he watched the young woman across from him shift momentarily in her seat, he wasn’t altogether certain that this meeting was going exactly the way the elusive Mr. R. had envisioned it. It gave him a small satisfaction to think that he was disrupting the planned outcome of events, even if only slightly. “Of course,” he said carefully, “so far you’ve committed a number of felonies, ranging from the possible murder of Roger Zimmerman . . .”

  “His death has already been ruled a suicide by the police . . .”

  “You managed to make a murder appear to be a suicide. Of that I am persuaded.”

  “Well, if you’re going to be so obstinate, I won’t try to change your mind. But I thought keeping an open mind was a hallmark of your profession.”

  Ricky ignored this dig and persisted, “ . . . to robbery and fraud . . .”

  “Oh, I doubt there’s proof anywhere of those acts. It’s a little like the old saw about the tree falling in the forest: If there’s no one there to witness it, does it make a sound? If there’s no proof, did a crime actually take place? And if there is proof, it exists out there in cyberspace, right alongside your funds . . .”