F Paul Wilson - Novel 05 (26 page)

 
          
She
stands in the wings. Her sketches and paintings have been brought to life.

 
          
And
this is no traditional
Otello.
The medieval Venetian castle and the
king's bedroom have been rendered as if the action is taking place on a
spaceship, with a silvery bed that glistens like a fiery jewel.

 
          
A
great wall mural in the back of the stage is all metallic silver and red. On
the mural, the lion of Venice stands thirty feet tall, holding fistfuls of
people in his gripping claws. This is a "political"
Otello,

 
          
The
production will surely cause an incident, a
cause celebre.
Which is why
they came to Sam to begin with.

 
          
And
damn, she's proud of herself.

 
          
But
now
—
for the first time
—
she's watching the costumed singers move through her Act IV
stage design. The floor is red metallic girders, more appropriate to a power
plant. A golden glow filters up from below. The glow will turn orange, then
red, before
—

 
          
Sam
looks back to Mareau, finishing her big solo. Desde-mona's "Ave
Maria" ends. Now she waits, terrified of her husband, the insanely
jealous Moor, Otello.

 
          
Otello,
a tenor in blackface, barges into the bedroom.

 
          
He
launches yet another accusation. "Where is the handkerchief I gave
you?" he demands.

 
          
Mareau
looks genuinely frightened. She squirms on the silvery bed.

 
          
It
is too small
.

 
          
Perhaps
we can-

           
But Sam freezes. Otello is singing
out his rage in Italian. Pointing at Desdemona, yelling, "You love
another... You love... Cassio!"

 
          
Sam's
Italian is perfunctory at best. But she knows what happens. Otello tells
Desdemona that Cassio is dead. And you
—
you,
my wife, are lying on
your
deathbed.

 
          
Sam
grips one of the curtain flies, twisting the heavy brocade material. She feels
dizzy.

 
          
Mareau
—
Desdemona
—
looks scared. The drama is
too powerful, too intense. The music swells, roaring along with Otello's rage.

 
          
Desdemona
begs for her life, for just this night, for an hour, for the moment, but Otello
leaps onto the bed, encircles her throat, and begins to strangle her.

           
And then
—
and then
—
Mareau looks over to Sam,
her eyes bulbous, terrified.

 
          
Sam
releases the curtain. She takes a step out of the wings, and then another.

 
          
The
scene continues, Desdemona writhing, pleading.

 
          
"No,"
Sam mutters. Another step.

 
          
The
light is changing from the metalwork below. Golden, to orange, to
—

 
          
Samantha
is on the stage, but no one stops her. Perhaps she's checking something.

 
          
The
thundering power of the orchestra is overwhelming. Cymbals crash, the drums
rumble.

 
          
Then
Desdemona is dead.

 
          
"No!"
Sam screams.

 
          
She
runs to the bed, pulling at Otello, yanking on the actor's costume. His blue
eyes flash in the surrounding black makeup.

 
          
Sam
is shrieking, her own screams joining the orchestra, which only now starts to
peter out, as if the conductor has lost his way.

 
          
"You
must... not... kill her!"

 
          
She
pushes Otello away, then cradles Mareau's head, not seeing the woman's open
eyes, her shocked face.

 
          
Not
seeing anything because she's rocking and crying, whimpering over and over:
"No... no... no."

 
          
A
tear falls to the metal girders below, glistening there. Before slipping even
lower, to the fire below.

 
          
And
then you're at the stage door. Locked out. You try the latch but you sense the
theater has no more to show you.

 
          
You
feel so empty, so hopeless. You wonder: Is this what Sam felt then? Was this
behind Sam's suicide attempt?

 
          
Reluctantly
you glide back to the front of
ha
Fenice, to the entrance. And there the
gondola awaits.

 
          
You
hurry down the empty steps. The opera is over. You're supposed to leave.

 
          
Presto,
presto . . .

 
          
And
for the first time, you feel compassion for your sister. It was as if she had
created a fantasy image so powerful that it brought her to her knees.

 
          
But
what was this all about? Her love for another woman? Then seeing her killed?
Did it have to do with that self-inflicted fiery glow?

 
          
You
need to know so much more, but now the only thing you want is to get out of
here.

 
          
The
gondola takes a meandering path, leading far away from here, you hope.

 
          
Above
the buildings you see the knife-point edge of the rising moon as it begins
climbing the sky on the far side of the memoryscape. You barely notice the
passing bridges and buildings. You want only to be away from this place, to
sit alone and sort out these feelings, to disentangle Sam's emotions from your
own, to rid yourself of Sam's strange love for that woman and this overwhelming
sense of loss and desolation.

 
          
But
you can't leave the memoryscape. Not yet. You have to get out among the islands
again and see what else awaits you among the drowned memories.

 
          
And
then you hear a familiar sound. The soft, rapid ratcheting of a fishing reel.
You look up and see the little boy again. You realize this is a different
bridge, but he's still reeling in his line. Who is this child, this street
urchin with a fishing pole? And what does he mean to Sam? Suddenly there's a
splash as his catch breaks the water.

 
          
Finally!
You lean over the edge to see what he's caught and recoil with revulsion when
you realize it's a severed hand, hooked through the webbing of the thumb. It
drips and wobbles as the child reels it higher and clutches the line to land
it.

 
          
What
is it with this image? This is the third time you've seen it: once in the real
world and now twice in the memoryscape. What's Sam trying to tell you
—
if she's trying to tell you anything at all?

 
          
You
watch silently, waiting for him to recognize his catch for what it is and toss
it back. But his eyes light as he grabs the hand and places it on the railing.
With a single swift motion he unhooks it from the line, raises it to his mouth,
and bites into the fleshy heel of the palm.

 
          
"No!"
you shout, but he ignores you and continues to tear at the hand with his
bright, sharp teeth.

           
Sickened, you turn away. Now, more
than ever, you want to leave this place, but that's the last bridge up ahead.
No sign of the Cheshire possum. Soon the last turn is negotiated and you are
once again sailing the open waterways. You search the horizon but find no
signs of life. No glow of memory nodes clinging to the surface of this black,
oily, sea.

 
          
This
world is all but dead.

 
          
Is
that all there is here
—
the Venice memory? There's
got to be more to this vast, wet wasteland than a single node. But even if
there are more nodes, this one has so drained you that you lack the will to go
on.

 
          
And
why this particular memory? Has it anything to do with the fact that you were
discussing it with Sam's psychiatrist shortly before entering the memoryscape?
Are you bringing things with you? Are you in some way shaping the memoryscape?
Programming it? Is whatever's left of Sam's subconscious somehow responding to
what's in your mind as you enter?

 
          
Or
is it just coincidence?

 
          
Too
damn many questions.

 
          
God,
you wish this wasn't such an infant science. If only you knew more. If only you
could
—

 
          
Suddenly
the boat rocks as something scrapes against its keel. A rock? A reef? Are you
entering shallow water?

 
          
Another
scrape. That wasn't rock. Too soft for rock. Almost ... leathery. The gondola
had been steady but now it weaves on the water.

 
          
Exit
button or
no
Exit button, you don't want to fall in.

 
          
And
then a splash to port. You whirl. Something black and shiny has broken the
surface. It glistens for an instant in the moonlight, and then it's gone,
leaving only spreading ripples to mark its passing.

 
          
You
shiver. Guess you should be encouraged to know that these waters aren't
completely dead. At least some sort of life exists here, but you can't help
having a creepy feeling not knowing what
kind
of life is moving beneath
you.

 
          
But
you make it back to the isle where your trip began with no further scrapes or
splashes.

 
          
You
reenter the gallery and it's pretty much as you left it, except the
flame-maned lion has returned to his gondola. And the painting on the easel has
more detail in the trees, but little else has changed. Three steps ahead, two
back.

 
          
You
feel depression seeping through you. Your own emotion or Sam's? Could be
either. This certainly seems hopeless. The devastation seems worse on this
level than above. How are you going to learn anything here when everything is
drowned?

 
          
"Shit,"
you say
—
simply to hear your own
human voice.

 
          
Before
the feeling can overwhelm you, you click EXIT and get out.

 
          
People
shouldn't compare memory to a videocamera, either. No way is a memory an objective
recording of an event. Memory is an extension of perception, and stored as
outcomes of perceptual analysis. It's colored by our feelings about the event,
our emotional state, hell, probably even our blood Sugar level at the time.

—
Random
notes: Julia Gordon

1

 
          
Julie
removed the headset and glanced to where Eathan and Alma sat before the
monitor.

 
          
Eathan
stood up and rubbed his hands on his thighs. "I'm very uncomfortable with
this," he said. "Very. I really don't want to know this much about
Sam's personal life. I never realized everything she went through. I..."

 
          
Words
railed him.

 
          
Julie
understood. She, too, was beginning to appreciate the depth of her sisters
torment, but the fact remained that Sam was ultimately responsible for all the
messes she created for herself. The question was, why did she create them? What
were the demons that drove her into these situations?

 
          
Demons...
she thought of the Brueghel picture and its demon.

 
          
Quickly
Julie signed off with Dr. S., then noticed Alma, still sitting before the
monitor, gazing at it as if mesmerized. Sensing Julie's scrutiny, she shook
herself and looked up.

 
          
"I...
I'm speechless," she said. "This is the most phenomenal... the most
revolutionary ..."

 
          
Julie
knew all that. She wanted Alma to tell her something she didn't know.

 
          
"But
did you learn anything?" she said.

 
          
Alma
nodded vigorously. "Oh, yes. Your sister was always so vague about certain
details. Now I know exactly what happened. I mean, I
—
saw it."

 
          
"Don't
be too sure of that," Julie said. "I've learned never to
 
accept what I see in there as objective
truth. It's Sam's take on
 
reality. It's colored by fears, dreams,
fantasies__ "

 
          
"I
realize that," Alma said. "And that's my point. This may not be what
actually happened, but it's how Sam remembers it, how she feels about it
—
and to a psychiatrist that's always more important than
objective truth."

 
          
Julie
nodded, encouraged. No doubt about it, Alma was on the ball. But could she add
anything?

 
          
"What
do you think? What about all that water? Post-holocaust on the first level,
post-deluge on the second. Any significance to that?"

 
          
Alma
rubbed her chin. "Water is always mysterious. You never know what lurks
beneath the surface."

 
          
Well,
thanks for that news flash, Julie thought. "What about my father as a
vampire and the floating Jesus?"

 
          
"Blood
imagery, perhaps?'

 
          
"And
the severed hand?"

 
          
"Now
that
was disturbing. Quite grotesque and completely out of place."

 
          
"But
it's not the first time I've seen it." She told
Alma
about the possum gnawing
the hand on the first level and the father carving a hand for his family in the
painting in Sam's apartment. "If I'd seen it only once, I could ignore
it. But it's a recurring theme. It has to be important."

           
"Yes,"
Alma
said slowly, leaning back
and closing her eyes. "Obviously it's important. The hand is a potent
image
—
the Hand of Fate, the Hand
of Death ... we shake hands, touch each other
—
but
in each instance in Sam's memories someone seems to be devouring the hand. I
don't know
—
" She opened her eyes
and straightened. "Biting the hand
—
biting
the hand that feeds you!"

 
          
Julie
felt a chill. Alma was close, but Julie sensed she didn't have it all. She
looked up and saw Eathan staring into space, a queasy look on his face. The
cannibalistic scene had obviously rattled him.

 
          
"I
think you've almost got it," Julie said. "But what could it
mean?"

 
          
"I
don't know," Alma said. "I'd like to view the videotapes of your
other sessions before I attempt to answer that."

 
          
"Fair
enough. When will you have time?"

 
          
"How
about right now? I am absolutely entranced by the wonders of your equipment. I
wouldn't sleep a wink tonight knowing I'd have to wait until tomorrow to see
more."

 
          
"Great.
We'll take the tapes downstairs, plug them into the VCR in the family room, and
leave you alone with your pa-
¹
tient."

 
          
"I
can't wait."

2

 
          
Eathan
had already seen the first tape and didn't care to view it again. After her two
exhausting excursions into the memoryscape already today, neither did Julie.
They left Alma entranced before the oversized screen of the family room's
projection TV and retired to the drawing room.

 
          
As
Eathan poured her another port, Julie said, "Isn't there
anything
left
of my father's work besides his published papers?"

 
          
"I'm
afraid not. The fire razed the house to the foundation."

 
          
"But
didn't he have an office somewhere?"

 
          
"Up
until about a year before the fire, he worked for GEM Pharma as a
psychopharmacologist. The company's big R and D thrust back in the late sixties
was for a new antidepressant drug. Nathan's knowledge of brain chemistries made
him a valuable man. But he was more interested in pure basic research. He went
before the GEM board and proposed a number of avenues he wished to follow in
addition to the antidepressants."

 
          
Julie's
interest leaped. "What were they? What was he into?"

 
          
Eathan
shrugged. "I don't know. He rarely discussed his work-
—
thought it would bore everybody but him. As you've probably
guessed, the board saw little or no commercial potential in his proposals so
they turned him down. He stayed with the company but eventually the
product-oriented research and testing wore him down until he couldn't take any
more. He quit and began applying for research grants. Didn't have much luck,
I'm afraid. So all his papers and experimental journals were at home. They all
were lost. Up in smoke. He had a dream. I don't know what it was, but he never
got to make it real."

 
          
Julie's
heart went out to the man she barely remembered. She felt a kinship with him
that went beyond blood. What if she hadn't hooked up with Dr. Mordecai Siegal?
She might be stuck in some deadly dull research job, bored, frustrated as hell,
and climbing the walls. She might be thinking of quitting and hunting for
research grants ... just like her father.

 
          
"Poor
Dad," she said. "I wish I had some idea of what he was working
on." She gave out a hollow laugh. "Maybe I could find a way to
complete it."

 
          
She
looked up and caught Eathan staring at her. For an instant she thought he had
tears in his eyes.

 
          
"What
a wonderful thought," he said. "And what a loving gesture that would
be, if only it were possible. But who knows? Perhaps you
are
carrying on
his work and don't even know it."

 
          
"Now
that
would be creepy."

 
          
Eathan
raised his glass. "To Nathan's dream
—
whatever
it was."

 
          
Julie
raised her own, then sipped. They stood in silence, savoring the moment of
communion with someone long gone but dear to both of them.

 
          
And
then Eathan turned away and reached for his cigar.

 
          
"I
think I'll go out for a little walk around the gardens," she said as he
began relighting it and fouling the air with plumes of smoke. "I could use
a little air."

 
          
"It's
dark out there. Be careful."

 
          
"I
know the paths by heart. I can walk them with my eyes closed
—
unless you've changed the landscaping."

 
          
He
smiled. "No changes. Everything is just as you left it."

 
          
Julie
grabbed her Mets baseball jacket from the hall closet and stepped out the front
door onto the steps.

 
          
It
was cool, and the darkness out here reminded her of the bleakness inside Sam.

 
          
Still,
as her eyes adjusted to the night she saw only a few familiar constellations:
Orion, the Pleiades, the Big Dipper. They were old friends, reassuring.

 
          
She
took in a deep lungful of the clean, briny air and let it out slowly. Clouds
had moved in, obscuring the rest of the stars, and a fine mist was drifting in
from the water. Soon it would be soup out here.

 
          
That's
more like it, she thought. Now we're back to typically English weather.

 
          
She
angled right across the driveway and followed a winding path that ambled among
the gardens and along the manicured lawns, past the line of trees that bordered
the grounds proper, and into the rough. The breeze against her face stiffened
as she picked up the mutter of the North Sea at the base of the cliff ahead.

 
          
Chilled,
she pulled die jacket more closely around her as she stopped at the fence
that
ran along the rocky edge.

 
          
Even
though the cliffs had been a good walk from the house, Eathan had feared that
one of them
—
Sam was the more likely
candidate
—
would fall the hundred feet
or so to the jagged rocks below, so he'd put up the fence when they first moved
in.

 
          
Julie
leaned against one of the posts and felt it sag under her weight. Apparently
Eathan had let the fence go to rot. No sense in maintaining it nowadays. She
remembered sneaking out here with Sam to look for fossils in the shale. The
cliffs were supposedly loaded with them. Once they'd found the remnants of a
prehistoric fern, tattooed into a slab of rock, another time a spiral ammonite
that she'd treasured for years. She wondered where it was now. She smiled
—
maybe in Eathan's cabinet.

           
She was staring out at the darkness,
listening to the waves on the rocks, letting wind fingers run through her hair,
when she had a vague sensation that she was not alone.

 
          
She
turned but saw no one. She could make out the high grass and heather in the
rough, and the lights of the house through the trees, but no sign of anyone
else.

 
          
She'd
been out here long enough anyway.