The Taint (14 page)

FORTY-NINE

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Jon spoke in a quiet voice so that Nathan and the guard wouldn’t hear.

“Your confidence in me is touching,” she answered softly and smiled. “Just warn me if you decide to shoot him so I can duck.”

“I’m serious.”

“If this is going to make you nervous, why don’t you wait outside?” She checked the wrist restraints on Wendall Tyler.

He watched her for a moment. “You won’t admit that this could be dangerous.”

“Yes, it could be. Now are you satisfied?” Her look softened. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to argue with you, but unless I feel that the hypnosis is detrimental to Mr. Tyler, I’m going to do this.”

“Stubborn.” He turned and walked over to the far wall, leaning against it, arms crossed in front of his chest.

She turned her attention back to Tyler, wrapping a blood pressure cuff around his right arm.

When she was ready she faced the observers.

“It is very important that the only voice that Mr. Tyler hears is my own. If I succeed in establishing a state of hypnosis, the sound of a strange voice could be very upsetting to him. If anyone,” she looked pointedly at Jon, “feels a need to ask a question, please write it down and give it to me. I will decide whether or not to ask Mr. Tyler as I see fit.”

Nathan nodded and the guard returned her look blankly.

“Sheriff Scott?”

“Doctor Adams?” An insincere smile.

The room was darkened and Rachel began to talk, her voice soft and even.

“Mr. Tyler, I’m Dr. Adams and I’d like to help you. I think I can help you feel better. I’d like you to feel better, you’re very tired, and you need to rest.” She took a small penlight and held it in front of his face. “Can you see the light?” She moved it slowly from left to right. “Concentrate on the light. Watch it move, that’s it, follow the light with your eyes. You can hear me, Mr. Tyler. Listen to my voice, and watch the light.” She put her hand on his wrist, checking the pulse.

“I’m going to help you relax, so you can rest. Watch the light and feel how heavy your arms are, feel how heavy your legs are. While you watch the light a warmth is beginning to spread through your body, through your arms and legs. Can you feel it? Blink slowly for me if you can feel it.”

His eyelids began to close.

“Very warm and very heavy, relaxed. You can feel the heat spreading, spreading, and you feel very good. Very safe. You are safe and warm and relaxed and as you close your eyes, you can still see the light. You can see the light even though your eyes are closing. Follow the light, Mr. Tyler, and let the warmth flow through you.”

“The warmth is all through your body, you are warm and relaxed and safe. Nothing can harm you now, you are safe. Follow the light, concentrate on the light.”

She paused and nodded to Nathan who took Tyler’s blood pressure while she continued to pass the light in front of his closed eyes. Nathan wrote the BP on the sheet: 110/70.

“You are falling into a deep sleep. You can still hear my voice as you sleep, you can hear me, and you can answer me. You are completely relaxed and warm and safe and you want to tell me something.”

She waited but Tyler did not speak.

“You are asleep and warm and safe and you want to tell me what happened.”

Nathan took the blood pressure again. One thirty over eighty. He shook his head at her.

“You still can see the light, even though you are asleep, the deepest sleep, where nothing can harm you. You can hear my voice. You can hear me, and you can answer me. What is your name?”

Choked: “Wendall Tyler.”

She exchanged a look with Nathan and heard Jon moving behind her, coming closer.

“Your name is Wendall Tyler. Are you married?”

“Yes.”

“Can you tell me your wife’s name?”

The muscles in Tyler’s throat were working, knotted with the effort but he made no sound. He tried to raise a hand to his throat but his arm flopped uselessly by his side.

“I want you to concentrate on warmth, Mr. Tyler, I want you to feel it, spreading through your body. You can feel it in your throat. Feel the heat in your throat, and your muscles will relax, and you are safe, no one can harm you. As you swallow, the warmth flows through you.”

Tyler swallowed repeatedly, the corded muscles slowly relaxing. His body eased.

“Is Louisa Tyler your wife’s name?”

The man’s face contorted and he shifted in the bed.

“Do you know Louisa?”

He lunged forward, suddenly, sitting upright, the restraints holding, his body thrown forward with such force that it wrenched his left shoulder with an audible pop.

“No! Louisa! No!”

Jon shoved Rachel out of the way and grabbed Tyler by the shoulders, slamming him back onto the bed. “Take him out,” he ordered her, still restraining the struggling man.

“Mr. Tyler, you hear my voice, you see the light. When I count to three you will come awake and you will feel very rested and very calm and you will be safe. You will remain aware of the light, and the next time you see it, you will relax and sleep when I command you, using the letters, ABC. You are calm, one . . . two . . . three.”

Tyler slackened at the command.

Jon let go and straightened up. “Damn.”

“Very good,” Nathan said to Rachel and then put the stethoscope in his ears to listen to the blood pressure.

“Good?” Jon looked at her. “I want to talk to you.”

He waited until they were in her office, the door closed.

“I don’t want you to try that again.”

She looked at him, unbelieving. “I have to.”

“Why?”

“I can help him. The fact that I was even able to hypnotize him in his state of mind indicates that I can get through to him.”

“Wait a minute. You got through to him and he almost came off that bed. He could hurt somebody.”

“All that means is that I’ll have to be more careful asking him questions. If I approach it the right way . . .”

“That man is about to explode . . . His jaw was tight with anger. “Whatever it is he’s hiding.

“You saw the look on his face, do you really believe he killed his wife? That . . . anguish?”

“Or anger. Even regret. Whatever feelings he can’t face . . .”

“Oh that’s right, I should listen to you, the authority on hiding your feelings.” She faced him squarely, head high. “Let me tell you, you’re the one you should worry about. I can help him . . . you won’t let anybody help you.”

She watched his anger turn to icy control. Then he turned and walked out of the door, leaving it open.

Nathan came in later and handed her Tyler’s chart.

“Jon leave?”

She nodded. “Damn him. God damn him, he always walks out.”

“You did a nice job with Tyler.”

“He doesn’t want me to hypnotize Tyler again.”

“Did you explain to him about the prognosis without treatment of this sort?”

“I tried to. But he’s already made his mind up. He thinks Tyler killed his wife.”

Nathan sighed. “The thought crossed my mind once or twice.”

“I’ll never understand why he can’t give anyone the benefit of the doubt. Always suspicious. Thinking the worst.”

“That’s what policemen do. It sometimes saves their lives.” He reached over and patted her hand. “Tim would have been the same way by now.”

“But Nathan, the look on Tyler’s face! It wasn’t hatred or anger or rage. It was fear and pain, and hopelessness. Why can’t Jon see that? Why can’t he see the hurt and loss in Wendall Tyler’s eyes?”

“What he saw,” Nathan said gently, “was a man whom he considers to be dangerous make a sudden movement which threatened you.”

“I don’t . . .”

“He was protecting you. Defending you. Reacting on instinct. He wasn’t willing to take a chance that you’d be hurt.”

A slow smile. “He was pretty impressive.”

“Next time . . . watch Jon’s face. Look into his eyes. It’s there. Just keep looking.”

FIFTY

“Frank, you asleep?” Nathan leaned into the room, holding the door frame.

“I’m slept out,” came the hushed answer. “Come in.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Honestly? My wrists are throbbing and I need a drink.”

Nathan switched on the headboard lamp, put a finger to his lips and held up a paper bag which obviously concealed a bottle. “Don’t tell anyone.” He pulled out a bottle of Jack Daniels.

“Bless you, bless you.” Frank struggled to sit up.

“Hold this,” Nathan said, shoving the bottle into his hands, “and I’ll roll up the bed.” After he finished he went to the small bathroom and brought back two paper cups.

“This makes the second time you’ve saved my life,” Franklin Dunn said as he watched whiskey being poured into a cup. He took the drink eagerly.

“To inebriation,” Nathan toasted.

“To intoxication . . .”

“In moderation,” they proclaimed jointly, and downed the whiskey. After the second cupful they were content to sip it.

“What was all the ruckus going on tonight?” Frank asked, savoring the burn of the liquor as it ran down his throat.

“Ruckus? Oh, that. Nothing much, just a patient reacting rather violently to a hypnotic question . . . no wait, a hypnotic patient to a violent question . . .” Nathan stared down into the small cup. “I didn’t have dinner.”

Franklin nodded knowingly. “Broccoli.”

“Anyway, my question is . . . how are you?”

“Better.” He sipped.

“I’m gonna let you go home in the morning, but I want you to take a mild tranquilizer for a while.”

“What, those elephant tranquilizers you’ve been giving me?”

“It’s a little tiny pill . . .”

“That could stop a bull elephant at twenty paces.”

Nathan laughed.

“I told the nurse, even if I wanted to hurt myself, which I don’t, I couldn’t work up the energy. I feel . . . very mellow.”

“I don’t suppose you could tell me, then, how you managed to cut your wrists in the first place? Since you’re not currently in pain?”

Franklin looked at him, his face rearranging itself into a serious expression. “You’re going to think I’m crazy.”

“I’ve thought that for many years.”

“Ha! Presumption of guilt.”

“No, more like a preponderance of evidence.”

“Jesus, now you sound like a lawyer.” Franklin finished what was left in his cup and held it out for more. When it was filled he held it in both hands, silent.

“I remember,” he said after a minute, “sitting in my study. It was dark out, and I had a fire burning. I’d had a brandy after dinner and I was feeling a little sleepy, there in front of the fire.” He narrowed his eyes, trying to remember. “I began to feel a little warm, but I didn’t think anything of it . . . and then I began to . . . tingle. My whole body was prickling and . . . it felt very strange. It felt like a dream. It felt like . . . an absence of feeling. No sensations. All of a sudden I was just sort of numb. I think I got up, and I remember being surprised that I could stand. It was very dreamy and unreal, and I went into the bathroom.” He took a long swallow of the whiskey, his eyes troubled. “I saw my face in the mirror, but I had no feelings for it. Just a face. And then I opened the medicine chest and took out my straight razor . . . and I put it to my wrist. It was cool metal on my warm wrist, but I didn’t care if my skin was cut. It was even . . . fascinating . . . to watch the skin part. It didn’t bleed immediately, seemed like a long time before the blood began to run down my arm. And . . . that’s all.”

“A dissociative episode.”

“Does that mean I’m crazy?”

“No . . . no. But it does indicate maybe a deep depression, or some intense emotional conflict.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m speculating. Was something bothering you, or were you working out an emotional problem?”

Franklin shook his head. “I can’t think of another time when I’ve been so settled in my life. I have no financial worries. I have a successful career. I have friends. I keep busy.”

“Sometimes it’s something that you only think you have under control, and you’re repressing it, even from yourself. But the subconscious mind is harder to fool.”

“What do I do?”

“That depends on what you want to do.”

Franklin finished the whiskey and crushed the cup, then looked at it. “Anger I don’t know about?”

“Analysis might help.”

“I think that frightens me more than anything else. Except . . .”

“Except what?”

“I don’t want it to happen again. I don’t want to die . . . but that face in the mirror . . . it didn’t care, at all.”

FIFTY-ONE

Amanda Frey sat at the kitchen table looking at her folded hands. There was still a lot to be done. She had the French dictionary and several textbooks from when she had taught public school, and a stack of handmade flash cards. The slides were in a big box, mixed with hundreds of unlabeled vacation pictures, and she needed to sort them out.

Still she sat, unwilling to move. Her arms and legs were heavy with fatigue and her back ached from carrying the boxes down from the attic.

Water dripped in the kitchen sink.

The dough for making long loaves of French bread sat rising beneath the linen handtowel, the room fragrant with yeast.

Upstairs Martin slept.

The skin on her hands was chapped and tender, her knuckles red. Her wedding ring dug into swollen fingers. Strong, sturdy hands, not at all the hands of Amanda Sue Johnson. No polish on the fingernails anymore. No time to be idle.

She looked around the kitchen; it was alien to her. She did not belong here, she thought. The feel of it was wrong.

All day she’d had the feeling that she was seeing her life for the first time, an endless parade of baking and serving and doing what was expected of her. Little things that had never bothered her before now rankled.

The garbage container, full to overflowing, and not emptied since she’d done it on Saturday. Sitting full, drawing flies, waiting for her. Martin had always implied that garbage was not a concern of the ministry, and she had acquiesced.

Other things. His refusal to accept wash and wear shirts, preferring cotton, not caring if the ironing was yet another burden on her. His hatred of canned foods, requiring her to make everything from scratch. Even his bedtime, which was nine-thirty sharp and carved in stone, never to be changed for anything as minor as her needs.

As he was asleep now.

Something in her recognized the injustices she had endured uncomplainingly for all these years. Something protested. Something demanded retribution.

It was not only Martin. The mothers and fathers of her summer students, confident that she would care for their sad neglected children. And not caring, really, whether the child enjoyed or understood being cast off. Rich parents. All that money could buy, everything but time.

And she . . . she had wasted more time than anyone.