Seraphim (7 page)

Rachel glanced back at Duncan with a look that said she was growing a little perturbed with his seemingly misguided concern.

“I wonder why she’s sleeping so hard,” she said. “Did they give her something, you think?”

“Hawthorne Avenue, Rock Bay,” Duncan said, more to himself.

“Uh-huh,” Rachel said, obviously not listening. She was craning over Amy, looking like she wanted desperately to grab her shoulders and shake her out of her stupor.

“Rock Bay,” he repeated, louder. “Little coastal town in Massachusetts. Your home town, my dear. You know, the one we were
married
in.”

She turned, giving him her full attention. “What?”

He showed her the papers. “Katherine Bently, 1402 Hawthorne Avenue, Rock Bay, Mass.” And as he spoke those words, heard his own voice say them, an ambiguous memory glittered in the deep darkness of his mind, like a lone firefly trying to illuminate a vast, starless night. It was so brief, so transitory that he barely noticed it before it was gone.

“Small world,” Rachel said.

Duncan, however, wasn’t ready to believe the world was
that
dinky.

*****

Doctor Constance Strickland was a tall woman, lanky, and had a face that Duncan instantly labeled a “Two-Hundred Yarder,” an old cop expression for homely women: not nauseatingly ugly, but definitely a few football fields away from ever gracing
Vogue
.

She entered ebulliently, so much so that Duncan wondered if she was writing her own prescriptions for amphetamines.

The doctor introduced herself, extending a hand to Duncan, then Rachel. “I understand that there’s been a mix-up with your daughter’s name?” She regarded them with subdued suspicion, as if they might be impostors.

“The paramedics apparently got her confused with another patient, or something like that,” Duncan said, bewilderment having tempered his anger.

Doctor Strickland took the clipboard from Duncan’s hand. “Strange,” she said. “I saw her when she first came in, and she clearly told me her name was Kathy Bently.”

Duncan lifted his eyes to the ceiling.

“Oh, you know,” Rachel offered suddenly, “I don’t know if this means anything, but Amy had an imaginary playmate by the name of Kathy for…well, a good while.”

Strickland didn’t seem concerned. “About how old was she when you stopped hearing about this playmate?”

Rachel looked at Duncan. “Oh, say four? Maybe five?”

Duncan had forgotten all about “Kathy” until just now. He thought a moment, needing to catch up with Rachel. He finally nodded. “Yeah, four or five.”

“Well,” Strickland said, “it may be coincidental, it may not. But I’ll make note of it.”

“Why is she sleeping so hard?” Rachel said. “I can’t seem to rouse her.”

“We’ve given her a sedative,” Strickland explained. “She was quite upset when she came in, and from there became uncontrollable. Please understand—we needed to calm her down for her own safety.”

The concern on Rachel’s face surrendered to fear.

“What the hell happened to her?” Duncan quietly demanded. “Did she hit her head, suffer a concussion?”

“She was apparently having her picture taken at school and, according to her principal, just slipped off of her chair and fell to the floor,” Strickland said. “And as far as suffering some kind of head injury, I’m not convinced. There’s no signs of trauma or swelling, anything like that.” She sighed. “But in light of her apparent
identity crisis
, I’d like to go ahead and schedule her for a CAT scan, just to be sure. I would also like to keep her here overnight, for observation.”

“Yes, of course,” Rachel said.

“If she doesn’t have a head injury,” Duncan persisted, “then would you please tell us why she would suddenly assume someone else’s identity?”

Doctor Strickland removed the patient’s blank medical history form from the clipboard, then craned over it with a pen, seeming to ignore Duncan’s question. “Has your daughter ever suffered from seizures?”

“You mean like epilepsy?” Rachel said.

“No,” Duncan said. “Never.”

“Has she ever sustained a severe head injury?”

“No,” he repeated, feeling his chest tighten with each question.

“Any history of diabetes in either family? Psychiatric disorders?”

They shook their heads.

Doctor Strickland asked more questions, the final one eliciting a murderous gaze from Duncan.

“Drugs?” he hissed. “You’re barking up the wrong tree!”

Strickland remained composed. “I realize she’s only in elementary school, but I have to ask. Sadly, it’s not uncommon anymore to see children her age abusing drugs.”

Rachel took Duncan’s hand, and this calmed him.

“Test her for drugs, then,” he said. “I’ll guarantee that you won’t find her peeing anything stronger than Kool-Aid.”

The doctor smiled sympathetically, shook her head. “Mr. McNeil, I’m pretty sure drugs aren’t to blame. Although she didn’t display all the classic symptoms, I’m inclined to believe that your daughter suffered some sort of seizure, most likely provoked by an outside stimulus.”

“Such as...?” Duncan said.

“The strobe flash of a camera,” Strickland said, as if that should have been highly obvious.

6.

Duncan left Rachel with Amy and hurried his way back to the ER waiting area, hoping that Amy’s principal had not yet left the hospital.

With each step he felt more like a neglectful parent. Contrary to Rachel’s ambivalent ogling back in the “bay,” he was concerned for Amy; passionately so. But he just couldn’t ignore his gut instinct, and right now it was telling him that something wasn’t right; that perhaps something had been missed. This perception wasn’t entirely palpable, just a scent in a mild breeze. But if it was already raising his hackles at this early stage then he would give it his full, undivided attention.

Katherine Bently
, he thought.
Damned if that doesn’t have a peculiar ring.

He was reminded that he’d not had such potent intuitions, at least in any constabulary sense, since his days on the force. Back then, his inklings and hunches had always proven themselves dead-on, and more than one among his peers had, at one time or other, cast their suspicion that his charmed nose was more precognitive than instinctive. Perhaps even divine. Duncan had just thought himself streetwise, and a good judge of character; still did. Whatever the reasons, he’d quickly garnered a reputation worthy of any blue-ribbon bloodhound.

And any dust that may have settled on those olfactory glands since had just been blown away.
Clean
away.

Duncan found Kincaid sitting in a small waiting area gazing up at a television screen and eating pumpkin seeds, shells and all. He appeared engrossed with some Japanese chef, who was passionately demonstrating the fine art of shucking shrimp and the English language.

Eight chairs were arranged in an L-pattern in the small room. A giant, balding black man was rocking slowly back and forth in his seat. He held a blood-soaked bandage over his right shoulder, chanting “Cecil Mendez, that cocksucker,” as if practicing his court testimony. In the corner opposite Kincaid sat an elderly couple, weeping quietly as they held one another.

“Kincaid?” Duncan said, standing over the man. “We need to talk.”

Kincaid looked up and smiled. “Of course, of course.” He jubilantly patted the cushion next to him. “I was just about to come check. How is Amy feeling?”

Duncan remained standing. “We’re not really sure. Listen, I want the name, address, and phone number of the photographer who took my daughter’s picture. I’m assuming it was a man.”

“That’s correct,” Kincaid said, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly, his smile dimming at the edges, forming an expression that said he knew where this was heading: straight to court. “But Mr. McNeil, I can assure you that the person in question is beyond reproach. Why, he’s been photographing our kids for years, the old-fashioned way, and we’ve never had a—”

“I’m not accusing him of any wrongdoing. I just want to talk to him.” Duncan shrugged. “Call me silly, but being a parent and all, I guess I’m just a bit concerned.”

Discomfited, Kincaid thought for a moment, then said, “I’m not comfortable at this time to reveal that information. Please understand my position. If I give you the man’s address and phone number, then, as an acting representative of the school, I might be inviting a lawsuit should something…unpleasant come of it.”

“…that
cocksucker
,” the black man continued to chant, getting louder.

Duncan finally sat down next to Kincaid, and, speaking very softly, said, “Please understand
my
position. This isn’t an issue of confidentiality. The photographer hasn’t been charged with a crime. I simply want to find out everything I can concerning the accident that
my
daughter suffered at
your
school this afternoon. However, if I
do
find sufficient evidence to suggest that this Kodak provocateur acted inappropriately, negligently or criminally, and that you or someone else at the school had knowledge of indiscreet acts committed by him prior to his contractual employment with Jefferson Elementary, then your days of haunting lunch rooms and wiping snotty noses will be over. Now, I can get the info from you, or I can acquire it independently. If I’m forced to do the latter, however, I’ll be rather upset. And seeing how I don’t really like you anyway, I might vent my frustrations in a manner that might only be described as something ...
unpleasant
.” Duncan stood. “It’s your call.”

Head craned, Kincaid turned his eyes back to the shrimp-happy chef, who was now either greatly alarmed over the blazing skillet in his hand or just excited to be flambéing the scampi. Hard to tell.

Kneading his package of pumpkin seeds like a manic child with Play-Dough, Kincaid said, “Are you threatening me, sir?”

Duncan smiled. “In every sense of the word.”

Finally, reluctantly, Kincaid reached into the inner sanctum of his jacket and withdrew a pen and a business card, upon which he shakily wrote a name.

Wise move,
Duncan thought. Still, he felt a bit saddened that he wasn’t going to be forced, after all, to drag this gnomish principal/English teacher to the roof and dangle him like a participle over its edge.

“Here,” Kincaid said, handing Duncan the card. “The man’s name is on the back. If you’ll contact my secretary, Ms. Annison, and explain to her the situation, I’m confident she’ll be most helpful in finding you his address and phone.” He glanced at his wristwatch. “She’s normally there until five, so you have plenty—”

“Thank you,” Duncan said, already through the door. Then he abruptly stopped, turned. “Any idea why my daughter would think her name is Katherine Bently?”

Kincaid thought for a moment. “No.
Should
I?”

“You don’t have a student by that name?”

Kincaid brought his trembling hands together and rested his chin on his fingers. “No, I’m afraid the closest thing we have is a Denise Benton.”

“Thanks,” Duncan said. “Oh, for what it’s worth, I really do appreciate you sticking around like this. Amy will be glad to know that you did.”

“Not at all,” Kincaid replied, his eyes indicating otherwise.

7.

COMPUTERIZED AXIAL TOMOGRAPHY (CAT) was stenciled in big white letters across the double doors. In the waiting area, Juanita Santiago paced like a caged cat, treading up and down the full length of the waiting room, her rubber thongs smacking wetly against the buffed tile.

Rachel sat in a burgundy chair, studying her upturned hands. She was so engrossed with her subjects that she might have been a palmist rendering her own reading, searching specifically for that one line or juncture that might reveal the medical reason for her daughter’s admittance.

“Pardon me for saying, Mrs. McNeil,” Juanita said, “but why does Señor Duncan not stay to comfort his very own child in her time of need? Is he not a concerned father?”

Juanita, having tried picking Amy up from school as arranged, had rushed to the hospital after learning of the accident from Amy’s homeroom teacher.

A rosary was clutched tightly in her right hand.

“He had an important errand to run,” Rachel said, still preoccupied with her palms. “Besides, Amy’s going to be fine. There’s no reason we should all be here acting like expectant fathers.”

“Well, at least there is dinner for him in the oven,” Juanita sighed, secretly hoping a large piece of Kielbasa sausage would lodge in his uncaring wind pipe just long enough to see him flopping like a mackerel on the kitchen Linoleum.

“Juanita?” Rachel said, holding out her palms. “Do my hands look funny to you?”

Juanita clutched Rachel’s hands and stared at the lines and bifurcations like a lost motorist. Finally, she shook her head. “They are not funny. You have beautiful hands, Mrs. McNeil. Smooth like a baby’s bottom.”

“Exactly,” Rachel said, a bit troubled. “It’s as if…all of my lines are fading away.”

“It is those creams and lotions you use,” Juanita said. “A couple of more years and you will be a teenage girl again.” The she added, “Unless you put them back in a hot, soapy sink of dishes.”

Rachel looked up reprovingly. “That‘s not going to happen.”

Then, almost direly, Juanita said, “Señor Duncan, he fire me soon, you see.”

“Over my cold, dead body,” Rachel promised. Then she leaned close and whispered, “My God, I screwed up making macaroni and cheese last Thursday night when you were at bingo!”

“
Si
,” Juanita gloated. “And you burned the pan, too. It’s no good now.”

Perpetually strutting in arrogance more befitting a Queen than a maid, Juanita Santiago had never experienced the burden of having too many friends. In fact, she practiced the art of intimidation daily. But once past the initial urge to run like hell, one could begin to perceive a powerful wisdom beneath her effrontery, potent enough to vindicate her, to forgive her brazen disposition. Most people, however, never took the few extra minutes to detect this.