Kiss The Girls and Make Them Die

by Charles Runyon

  She considered it, then nodded. “A person can kill and be rational when examined, yes.”

  “Once and once only, I should think.”

  “No. When faced with the same circumstance, it could trigger the same reaction. Whatever reason he had for killing the first girl—or thought he had—could have been reproduced for the second, the third, and so on.”

  “So you think Bollinger killed them?”

  “I did not say that! Jeff, you’re putting—”

  “You’re both straying from the agenda,” said Ted. “We’ll now hear from our occupational therapist, Mrs. Holman …”

  Elizabeth paused on the landing to readjust her mind to the Outside. Leaning her hips against the iron railing, she looked across the rolling grounds toward the pink granite wall which separated the hospital from the rest of the world. A group of female chronics sat under a sweet-gum tree, some knitting, some plucking at the grass, others staring at the official vehicles drawn up along the curb outside the administration building. Behind the sheriff’s car stood a baby-blue panel truck with wire mesh on the back windows. God, how utterly tasteless and cruel, and he’s so damn sure we’ll be forced to give him up …

  She went down the steps and walked along the path of tilted broken concrete slabs which wound among the ancient maples. So far it had been the most tedious staffing in her memory—proving that psychiatrists were no more immune to the pressure of public opinion than anybody else. Though we like to think we are. And should be. Oh yes, definitely, should be immune to all that, also the desires of the flesh.

  Now the conference was in recess. At last they had exhausted their own nebulous opinions and decided to take a look at the patient.

  The afternoon sun hammered down on her head as she emerged from under the trees. She reached into her shoulder bag, took out her silver-rimmed sunglasses, and hooked them over her ears. Two men in baggy khakis tossed a frisbee out behind the alcoholic unit; she couldn’t see their faces, but she knew what they would look like: sweated-out, watery-eyed men with drawn cheeks and haunted eyes. A few baseball players churned up dust on the diamond. A hot wind blew gusts between the men’s cottages, rattling the sparse yellow leaves of the lombardy poplars which lined the sidewalk.

  The closed wards looked quaint and archaic from the outside, with English ivy growing up around the narrow windows. She used her passkey to open the door, and stepped into a hallway musty with the shower-room odors of dirty socks, detergent and Aqua-Velva. She put her face to the grimy window and looked into the long dormitory room. A man sat staring out the window. Another played solitaire on his bunk. Two others watched tv, an old man rocked in his rocker. Eternity’s waiting room. She wiped the glass with the edge of her hand. It felt gritty slimy. She pulled a tissue out of her bag and wiped her hands, then opened the door of the staff room. It was dim, musty, sour. The attendant lurched up from his cot, propped himself on one elbow, and rubbed his eyes. Pale orange hair, like caterpillar fuzz, covered his pudgy-pink arms.

  “Didn’t you know Bollinger was to be staffed today?”

  ‘Today ain’t Wednesday!”

  “It was moved up. I’d like to see him in the quiet room first.”

  He swung his feet to the floor and sat up, muttering: “Bol’nger, quiet room.”

  She was standing at the window when he came in a few minutes later. He was clean shaven, his hair was combed. He wore a clean white shirt and jeans which hugged his lean hips. Still no belt. His face wore a ravaged, desperate look of hostility, suspicion, paranoia. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I don’t really know, Dan.”

  “You wanted to see if I’d slip. Why not admit it?”

  “I would if it were true. I’m not sure it is.”

  He studied her for a minute, then dropped into a chair and looked down at the floor. “And now—what? I suppose the tape is in the hands of the prosecutor.”

  ‘That tape is confidential, between you and me.”

  “Like between the priest and the communicant?”

  “Yes.”

  ‘What if he subpoenas the damn thing?”

  “He won’t get it.”

  “What if the hospital orders you to give it up?”

  “I’ll burn it.”

  “Even if they fire you?”

  “They won’t fire me.”

  He looked up at her for a minute, then put his hands on his knees and pushed himself up. “Let’s go. I’m ready.”

  She looked at him. “Are you?”

  “I’m not violent. I’m not about to blow my wig. Isn’t that what you’re wondering?”

  “I’m wondering what you’ll say when they ask if you killed those girls.”

  “I’ll say no, of course.”

  “ ‘Of course.’ Like that, with total lack of emotion?”

  “Oh, you want to see emotion?” He clasped his hands together and lifted his eyes to the ceiling. “I didn’t do it. You gotta believe me.”

  “Don’t be flippant. That’s no solution.”

  He stood for a minute, jaw muscles working. Suddenly he swung around and hit the concrete wall with his clenched fist. She heard the dull crunch and felt her muscles go taut, quivering. Her memory looped back to an early-morning call, ah, six years ago now, bringing news that her husband had driven his car into a limestone cliff. She recalled how Noel’s eyes had bulged out in a sightless sheen, like those of a mouse caught in a trap, and the terrible bloody mess the steering column had made of his midsection …

  She stepped forward and took Dan’s hand, turned it over and saw the pinpricks of blood welling up from the knuckles where the skin was scraped off, revealing the white ridges of gristle. “That’s no solution either,” she said.

  He looked at her bleakly. “What is?”

  For a moment they seemed to be standing on opposite sides of a cloudy glass, faces pressed against it, eyes almost touching. She looked down at his hand and felt an urge to touch her tongue to the blood welling up, knowing it would taste salty and warm, with just the faint residue of soap …

  “Gypsy wedding …” he murmured.

  She looked up, startled to realize he had picked up her thoughts. He laughed self-consciously. “They drink each other’s blood. Debra read it in a book. She likes to try everything.” His impression shifted to mild perplexity. “Why do you always pick on us mental cripples, Liza?”

  “Because with a whole man there’s nothing for me to do.”

  “Ah …”

  “Come into the staff room. I’ll put a bandage on it.”

  She took the long way, following the boardwalk which looped past the men’s cottages. It was railed and roofed over, with square red-painted pillars standing at twelve-foot intervals. They met a group of male chronics shuffling out of the chapel, one attendant leading and another bringing up the rear. One of the group called her name and she nodded in reply, but nobody spoke to Dan. There was a rule among patients, Elizabeth had never heard it voiced, but you never talked to someone on his way to a starring.

  She noticed that Dan walked with his arms held stiffly at his sides, palms front, thumbs touching his little fingers. She heard a long sigh and saw his chest drop slowly. “What are you doing?”

  He took three steps before he answered. “Yoga breathing. Calms the nerves.”

  From the corner of her eye she saw a red MG disappear behind a clump of honeysuckle about fifty yards away. She looked quickly at the man beside her, before the image of the driver faded from her retina. The two profiles overlapped, like the double image on a camera range-finder. Dan’s features were larger-scaled, his hair was shorter, but those were the only differences.

  “I called your sister last night,” she said.

  He broke the rhythm of his stride, then resumed. “What for?”

  “I wanted her to come in for some tests.”

  He gave a short barking laugh. “Debra would never agree to that. Did she?”

  “No. She hung up.”

 
; He seemed relieved—or did she imagine it? There was no more conversation.

  Elizabeth noticed a strange shift of magnetic force when Dan sat down at the end of the long table. Carolyn Wood, director of nurses, sat up straight and touched her fingers to her hairpiece, settled the frames of her glasses at her temples. Hall Grimes lowered his brows in a scowl, pushed out his chest and pulled in his stomach. The social worker, Marvin Dobbs, rustled his papers while his eyes darted from one ceiling corner to another. Somehow Dan had become the standard by which she judged everyone else in the room: the administrator, facing him down the long length of the table, seemed diminished to a fuzzy, dry schoolteacherish man. The social worker was a priss, the athletic director a lout, and Jeffrey Kossuth—she saw that he’d slumped further down into the wooden armchair and propped his chin on his palm. He was looking at Dan with a bored, sleepy expression, yet she knew his mind was busy cataloging, weighing … judging. They both had the same … what could she call it? Charisma was too slick, power too blunt. Intensity, or consciousness focussed, two men in their absolute prime of life, facing each other from different sides of the fence. Jeff was eight years older, but he kept himself in good physical condition—as she knew quite well. Jeff also had the advantage of being with his own pack, secure in his power, while Dan was … not the challenger, perhaps the interloper. And what am I? Stray bitch, she thought.

  The administrator opened his folder and smoothed it out with his palm. “We’d like you to feel relaxed and at ease, Danny. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  “Sure, if it’s not the same crap we get at the canteen.”

  Ted Ditscher blinked his eyes, then looked at Rita and nodded. The secretary stood up, smoothed down the front of her jungle-green jersey, thrust out her large breasts. “Uh … you want cream and sugar?”

  “Just cream. Two squirts, if you can spare it.”

  She walked out quickly, her hips rocking inside her short skirt. Ted cleared his throat. “Now, Danny, if you wouldn’t mind answering a few questions—”

  “Why should I?”

  Ted looked up, startled. “I beg pardon?”

  “Why should I answer your questions? Give me a reason.”

  “Well … common politeness.”

  “Okay, and by the terms of common politeness I should be able to excuse myself and walk out of here, correct? Or I could have said this morning, I’d rather stay in bed, I don’t feel well. But I was rolled out at five-thirty, I was marched to the mess hall, I was fed like an animal from a trough—”

  “Mr. Bollinger, this isn’t helping you.”

  “That’s exactly what I’ve been saying. You people aren’t helping me. If I were free I could help myself.”

  “But weren’t you sent here because you couldn’t? Weren’t you in fact arrested for breaking the law?”

  “I thought a man was innocent until proven guilty.”

  “Certainly, that’s true.”

  “So you’ve got only the sheriff’s word. Get him in here and pick over his brain, why don’t you? Find out why he had his piglets work me over.”

  “Oh come now, that’s completely beyond our scope. All we can do here is learn if you are … let’s say sufficiently adjusted to go out into the world, or whether you feel you would like to stay here for a while longer.”

  Dan looked at the administrator a moment, let his eyes drift slowly around the table, then focussed on Elizabeth. He smiled and turned back to Ted. “I’ll take the second option.”

  “I see. You would like to stay here?”

  “Yes.”

  Ted pulled at his nose a couple of times, then bent his head over his papers. He seemed to be searching for something, but Liza had seen this particular ruse many times before. Ted was confused. Finally he turned to Jeff: “You have any questions?”

  Jeff, doodling pyramids on his notepad, said nothing for thirty seconds, then without looking up: “You know anything about those girls who were buried out at your cabin?”

  Somebody gasped; Elizabeth saw Mrs. Holman lift her hand to her mouth. Dan’s face looked chiseled in stone.

  “No, I don’t know anything about it.”

  “Is it possible you killed them and don’t remember? During a drop-out, for example?”

  “Oh man, what’s a drop-out? You mean you trip off into the far-nooney and when you get back there’s this bloody corpse and you don’t know how it happened? You’ve been reading too many liquor-company press releases. Anyway I’m not the type.”

  “You got a bronze star with ‘V’ device for valor. I don’t suppose you got it for throwing flowers at the enemy.”

  “The enemy had guns. You’re talking about harmless women.”

  “I’m postulating a situation in which you might not have thought they were harmless.”

  “You mean I might have been hallucinating?”

  “Why not? You were taking hallucinogens.”

  Elizabeth knew Jeff was needling him, in a rather supercilious snotty manner, and she knew his purpose was to push Dan out of control. She watched Dan lift the cup to his lips, and saw the coffee ripple slightly inside it. His hand was steady when he set it down again.

  “I gather you’ve never taken any.”

  “No, and that only the first chorus.”

  “Suppose I forced some down you?”

  “Then I would resist.”

  “You’d fight and struggle, kick and claw?”

  “If such an action produced the desired result, yes.”

  “Okay. That’s what I did.”

  “But it didn’t produce the desired result, did it?”

  Dan shrugged. “I got off the brain rot.”

  “Not by those methods. You did it by refusing to cooperate with our staff psychiatrist, Doctor Bodac.”

  Elizabeth slapped her palm on the table. “Jeff, that’s misleading. He didn’t refuse …”

  “And why do you say ‘our staff psychiatrist?’ “ asked Dan. “I thought you people were here to serve the patients, not to puff up your own bloated egos.”

  “Come now,” said Jeff. “You’re descending to the level of an adversary argument.”

  “Man, that’s what it is. You sit there with your hair styled and your resort tan and you tell yourself it’s all polite and scientific, like some goddam gentleman’s club. In that ward I just came out of we don’t see it that way. When Leroy gets mad he shits in his hand and throws it on you. It’s the only weapon he’s got left. You call it infantile regression, it’s SHIT! Even your own people know that. This redneck you’ve got as ward clerk, he likes to be friendly, he throws his arm around your neck and he says, ‘Looky here, ?l’ buddy, you gotta take this shit because it’s doctor’s orders, and if you don’t take it we pry your jaws open and shove it down your throat, and if you spit it out we slap you in the canvas kimono and shoot a few thousand volts into your skull.’ So don’t give me any of your adversary arguments, you clean-cut cocksucker!”

  “Here now! Here!” Ted Ditscher sat up, quivering and red-faced. “This isn’t doing you a bit of good.”

  “Is sitting quietly gonna do any good? While that asshole sits there and fucks over my life? He hasn’t spoken twenty words to me, and he’s supposed to be in a position to say what goes on in my head.” Dan put his hands on the table and leaned back, looking at Jeff. “Well you’ll never make it, man, you’ll never even get close until you’ve lived the way I’ve lived, and seen the way it works—the way it really works. And then you won’t be able to sit in that chair because you won’t be able to stand your own stink.”

  Jeff lifted his hands and clapped them together twice, silently, while his mouth pulled down in a caricature of solemnity. Elizabeth looked at Dan, saw his bandaged hand close on the cup. A geyser of coffee spewed up from his fist, then the crushed wad of styrofoam flew across the table and struck Jeff on the chin, leaving streaks of coffee along his bronze jaw.

  The two sat perfectly still, looking at each other. Elizabeth noticed that b
oth displayed signs of the pre-aggressive male: nostrils flared, ears laid back, skin tightened around the eyes to give them a hard thrusting belligerence. She became aware of the silence in the room, and her own heart pounding in her throat. This fight has nothing to do with me—has it?

  But there was no fight, for Marvin Dobbs the social worker slid out of his chair, glided to the door, and threw it open. She knew both the attendants stationed there. Rusty and Harold, with 480 pounds of slightly flabby muscle between them, moved swiftly and silently on sneakered feet. They stood on opposite sides of Dan’s chair and looked at Jeff. He gave his head a brief negative shake and said:

  “I think Mr. Bollinger’s finished. Aren’t you?”

  Dan rose slowly, his face drawn, and she thought he was going to launch himself across the table. And you, what would you do? She found she was unable to program herself for any action, she knew she would probably just bounce up and down in her chair and try not to yell.

  But it was not to be. Dan relaxed, visibly, with a sigh. “All right. You’re getting me off your back—and so I’ll move from this chair to another chair in a fucking courtroom—but it’ll all be the same shit, the same stupid, dull boring lies.”

  Jeff, scribbling on his pad, said: “I’m sure you’ll be back, Bollinger.”

  “Oh, you think so?”

  “Of course.”

  “Maybe you’d better hope not.”

  He turned and walked out, the two attendants crowding close behind him. When the door closed behind the three, Jeff plucked his handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped the coffee off his jaw. “I think that answers the question. He’s aware of the proceedings against him, and he’s capable of defending himself. Do I hear any contrary opinions?” His eyes swung around the table, then came to rest on her. “Liza?”

  “I think we should ask for an extension of time. I’ve actually just begun to get beneath his shell.”

  “Liza, you heard the man. Unless the patient is a mental basket case, we’ve got to let the court have him. So let’s decide and get back to work. I’d like to see over my desk by next weekend.”