Mind Games (32 page)

“Sleeping pills?” he said.

“I expect so.”

We found an internist down the hall and left Vivian to his mercies and his stomach pump.
It’s all over
. Her life, she meant. I rebuked myself for not having picked up her signals – she’ll need intensive, long-term care, the help of a worthier psychiatrist than I.

At last report she’s recovered from all but her despair; her father has taken her in and hired an around-the-clock home-care nurse and a therapist recommended by the Suicide Prevention Centre. Dr. Lalonde, however, hasn’t called to express regret, nor has he paid my last bill.

I told Brovak to drop any thoughts of an action against Vivian – I actually grieve for her. There was reward enough in the hypocrisy of Schulter’s formal letter exonerating me and paying tribute to “a fighter, a caring physician, and one of the
keenest minds of our difficult profession.” But I intend to send a hefty final bill to her father.

On the day following the hearing, I rode Vesuvio II like the devil’s horseman, up the Squamish Highway, in heavy traffic, trying to erase my sadness at having failed Vivian. In counterpoint to my melancholy, it was one of those perfect days of autumn, a blue sky that showed no hint of the coming sullen months of grey.

We have to hope the weather continues to hold, particularly in the Interior – it’s a tricky time of year, mists lingering through the morning, nighttime freezes, always the possibility of sudden fronts, of storms.

My main challenge will come from an orthopaedist who in his student days tried out for Canada’s Olympic team in the thousand-metre sprints. But does he have the lasting power? The entrants include other amateur athletes, but (aside from stair-climbers and trained ballet dancers) most of our colleagues are overworked, overstressed, and overfed. None can have trained as hard as me.

Now let’s move on to yesterday, October 23, a date forever enshrined in the honour roll of law enforcement fuckups.

James had called Grundy earlier in the week to remind him of his two p.m. appointment, his regular time on his regular day: everything must seem normal. “How’s the good doctor?” Bob had asked. “He was under the weather last time I saw him.” Polite, relaxed.

Jack Churko and a dozen of his crew – three in SWAT gear, just in case – packed themselves upstairs in Dotty’s office – my own offers no hidden alcoves. James, however, had bravely volunteered to be at his desk.

He’d phoned Grundy to tell him: “The doctor requests he see you alone” – without his soulmate and brother in crime. Was I exposing myself to a supposedly psychotic attack?
You are next
.

Grundy was late, and I assumed he couldn’t find a niche on Granville Island to park – the Vancouver International Writers Festival was in full swing. More time passed, and we began to wonder if he was even planning to show up. As of half past two it seemed not: surveillance officers, parked near the gates to The Tides, reported no sighting of Grundy, or Lyall, or any vehicle leaving the estate.

Churko had missed his lunch. “How long are we going to wait? You better call him. He leaves now, it’ll take him an hour, so some of us are grabbing some chow.” I watched as he, Dotty, and several others strolled off to the Granville Island Hotel, leaving a skeleton crew upstairs.

James was just about to dial The Tides when I glanced outside and saw to my consternation that Bob Grundison was coming up by a stairway from the pier. As he entered, he was smiling as if at some private joke. James quickly hung up.

“Real sorry, Dr. Dare, I didn’t think we’d take so long by boat. Lyall and I had plans, but … it’s okay, we can be late.”

Lyall was trespassing on the
Altered Ego
, lashing a line from a sleek inboard launch, hitching fenders between the boats, balloon floats.

I called from the balcony: “Careful of my boat, Lyall, it’s freshly varnished.” That would alert the officers above, in case they hadn’t noticed this back-door arrival. As I later learned, they saw Grundy coming up the staircase, took up their headphones, eavesdropping while keeping an eye on Lyall.

I led Grundy into the consulting room, so our conversation could be picked up by the hidden microphones. The dialogue that follows is as recorded:

“You said you had plans?”

He shrugged. “We were going for a little harbour tour with a friend.”

“Who?”

“Jossie.”

“Ah, yes, Ms. Markevich. Exactly
whose
friend is she, Bob?”

“What do you mean?”

“Three’s not a crowd in Lyall’s bed, is it?”

He went stiffly into the stuffed chair, took a moment to answer. “I think you got the wrong impression, we weren’t … All I did was let Lyall have a piece of the action. He asked if I minded, it was all very open. She … okay, she kind of went for him. I wasn’t going to get in their way. Like I told you, she’s a free spirit.”

“I thought she was the love of your life.”

“I guess it wasn’t meant to be. You win some, you lose some. Isn’t that the way?” He was looking unblinkingly at me.
I know where you live
. I know you can’t keep a wife, either.

“You don’t like women, do you, Bob? Use them, toss them, pass them down the line.” Dr. Wade’s confrontational approach had reaped interesting rewards, and I was intent on turning up the volume.

“You’re making a big leap. There’s a lot of females I admire. Just because I … Okay, maybe I had some bad experiences. I’m trying to learn about girls, I’m adjusting.” I waited for more. “You’re the psychiatrist. You going to tell me it’s related to my mother?”

“No, I think it’s something more disordered.”

He tensed. “That isn’t very charitable. You mad at me? I break a rule or something?”

“These feelings aren’t just related to women, though, are they? Gay men – do they bother you too?”

“Nothing personal, but I don’t think God intended that kind of union.” Grundy’s expression hardened, and spots of anger showed on his cheeks. “Okay, let’s get it out on the table. I know why you’re bugged about me, you’ve been asking people a lot of questions, you want to connect me with these murders of homosexuals. You’d love it if I was the guy who did this, wouldn’t you? Send me back to the funny farm. Forget
it, I got Lyall as my witness, I got an army of witnesses. I really feel insulted, Dr. Dare. You’ve had it in for me ever since that jury threw out your evidence against me.”

I let the reverberations die down. He was panting slightly, like a dog after a run.

“Okay, so tell me how you feel about homosexuals.”

“I’ll be honest, I’ve got moral objections. They got a choice, God didn’t make them that way.”

“We have a right to choose who we are?”

“And to choose what we do, how we live.”

“Dr. Barbara Wiseman – did she have that choice?”

“Nobody forced her to be a lesbian …” He checked himself. “If that’s what you meant.”

It wasn’t what I meant, but I followed it up. “You were aware she was a lesbian?”

“She made no bones about it.”

“You were resentful at being placed under her care – was her sexual orientation a factor?”

“I didn’t know I needed help then.”

“You recall meeting any of these men who were murdered?”

“I don’t hang around with the gay crowd.”

“How do you feel about these deaths? They bother you at all?”

“I feel bad, same as anyone, it was lucky they didn’t have families.”

“How do you know they didn’t have families?”

“It was in the news, all of them were loners. Maybe not the older guy, the others.”

“The other three.”

“Yeah, the … I only heard about two others.”

He’d nearly slipped on the ice of his lies. A shadow crossed his face, a suspicion that I knew too much.

“Do you read books, Bob? Fiction? Novels?”

“Occasionally, if I got nothing else. Lyall’s the reader.”

“Ever discuss books with him?”

“Yeah, he put me onto a couple of good ones.”

I pulled a copy of
When Comes the Darkness
from my desk drawer. “How about this one?”

He screwed his face up, concentrating on the title.”
When Comes
… No, can’t say I ever heard of it.”

“Remember Lyall talking about it? Serial murderer. Gets a sexual high when he kills. Can’t get it any other way. Ring a bell?”

“No way.”

“My mother wrote it. It’s been in the news.”

“Really? That’s something.”

I wasn’t getting far with this, though he was clearly uncomfortable. I left the book in plain view, opted to stop circling and to move in. “Where were you the night Mr. Wilmott was murdered? You weren’t on the Skeena River.”

Again, he rallied. “Okay, you want to make a big thing about it. Lyall and me were going to drive up there, but then my dad made his plane available. So we took a little extra R and R, buzzed down to Seattle, picked up a couple of girls, shacked up for a couple of nights. Ask Lyall.”

Grundy hadn’t prepared well: this alibi failed to account for the parking ticket, but I held that in reserve. I don’t think he expected this session to be so inquisitorial, and he was becoming rattled.

“You want proof, we’ll go down there and locate those girls, we know where they live.”

I amended the phrase. “I know where you live.”

It took him a moment to react. “You think I made a Freudian slip or something? I already told you, I didn’t write that note.” He tried to work up a smile, quickly lost it. His hands were in his jacket pockets, balled-up fists.

“Where were you and Lyall the night the other two men were killed?”

“I was at home. Lyall will tell you that, Mom too, everybody.” Sweat beaded on his lips, and he sounded frantic. “You think
I’m some kind of freak? I don’t do those things, I got to live with myself. Is this all we’re going to do? I sit here and you bait me, is that it? I had some other plans.” He began to rise. “I’ve got a headache.”

“Sit down!”

He subsided, tight-lipped. “It’s hot in here. I think I’m getting one of my tensions.”

At room temperature, he was sweating. “I’ll open a window.”

When I did so, I saw Churko strolling from the Granville Island Hotel. I had an inkling of the muddle to come from his casual manner.

“Let’s talk about these tensions. The medication doesn’t always do the trick, does it?”

“Helps a bit.”

“Did you find another way to beat them?”

“Sorry, Doc, I’m not following.”

“It builds up, doesn’t it?”

“What does?”

“The drive, the need. Is it a kind of sexual urge, Bob? Like the guy in this book? Sometimes do you feel like you just can’t control it?”

This produced a galvanic response, he was sweating profusely. He went deep into his chair, fighting the impulse to fly at me, knowing I was daring him to do it. I decided to tone things down. I wasn’t prepared to risk goading him into violence, wasn’t sure if the
SWAT
team had returned from lunch.

“Okay, Bob, try to relax. Obviously, we’re going to have to get you some help. Maybe we should be looking at more efficient drugs, a stronger regime of therapy. There are some excellent clinics that offer intensive care. Frankly, these recurring tensions bother me.”

“I’m dealing with them, okay?”

“I’ve never properly understood them. I want you to help me with that. It’s not as if you can stop yourself when the
tensions come, is it? They’re out of your control. Maybe we don’t have free choice in some things, Bob.”

“It’s … you mean like an irresistible impulse? That’s a defence in court, right?”

He was reaching for a lifeline. I played it out. “That’s why you killed Dr. Barbara Wiseman, isn’t it? You had one of your tensions.”

“Yeah, it was out of my control.”

“She found out something you didn’t want her to know, didn’t she? That’s why the tension came on. What did she tell you, Bob?”

“I’m not feeling very good. I’ve got to go to the bathroom.”

“Try to hold it a little longer. Let’s grapple with this.” The moment seemed right. Regardless of consequences, I decided to let fly: “That’s when you get the urge to kill, isn’t it, Bob – when the tensions come. That’s why you had to murder those men.”

He rose slightly, a cat taking position to spring. I could see the venom in his eyes …

It was at this vastly inopportune moment that Jack Churko chose to stride into the consulting room. He failed to notice Grundy and said, “Got any more bright ideas, Doc?”

I later found out that while tucking into his hamburger platter, Churko had checked again with his surveillance team at The Tides: still no sign of Grundy. Instead of consulting with his remaining crew upstairs, he barged past James to tell me my plot had flopped.

When he saw Grundy, he at least managed not to show shock or dismay. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize you had a patient.”

“Still can’t sleep, Mr. Wilson?” I said.

“Ah, yeah, that’s the problem.”

I grabbed a pad, scribbled on it, called to James, who was standing in the doorway, wringing his hands. “Will you send Mr. Wilson to the pharmacy? I’m doubling the dosage.”

Grundy stayed fixed on Churko until I gave James the fake prescription, showed the patient out, and closed the door. But I had little faith our play-acting was fooling Grundy. Churko had got his face in front of a camera outside José Pierrera’s basement suite, and Grundy must have seen the coverage.

I was still by the door when Grundy sprang. For a fleeting second I thought he was leaping at me, in an orgasm of rage, but he ran instead to the balcony door, threw it open, knocking over a potted geranium as he vaulted onto the railing.

He went airborne with a lunge, diving into the cold salt water just aft of the
Altered Ego
.

I raced to the balcony, watched Lyall frantically slipping the moorings free, starting the engine, Grundy swimming hard, grabbing a float, clinging to it, being pulled along as the boat began accelerating to the opposite shore.

Cops were streaming from the quarters above, guns out, bulling their way through a knot of sightseers. Churko was yelling into his phone, calling all cars. Dotty bolted for her runabout, a couple of
SWAT
members on her heels.