Ashes To Ashes: Ashton Ford, Psychic Detective (19 page)

"What is your father's name, Karen?"

"Joseph Quincy Highland."

"Aren't you confused, dear? Isn't that the
name of your grandfather?"

"Yes."

"But it is also the name of your
father?"

"Yes."

"Your grandfather is also your father?"

"Yes."

"Package this for me, Karen. We'll come back
for it. Okay?"

"Okay."

"What happened to Bruno and Tony?"

"What happened to them?"

"Yes."

"She came for them."

"Who came for them?"

"Elena came for them."

"Why did Elena come for them?"

"They needed her. Elena always took care of
Bruno and Tony. When she could."

"Did Elena kill her brothers, Karen?"

"Oh no. I just ... came
... to take them ... home."

Who the hell was I talking to? I was having
the devil of a time trying to keep up with it.

"Am I speaking to Karen?"

"Yes." Subtle shift. "With a little
help."

"Where is this help coming from?"

"We cannot explain."

"The same as a blockage?"

"The same, yes. Similar."

"Is Karen a murderer?"

"No."

"I don't mean in legal or moral shadings—is
she a killer?—has she killed anyone?"

"No."

"Did she blow up a boat?"

"No."

"Did she try to drown Marcia Kalinsky?"

"Not ... no."

"Did she pick up a rock and bash in the
skull of Carl Powell?"

"Her body did."

"But she did not?"

"She did not."

"Have we communicated before? You and
me—have we communicated?"

"In a manner, yes."

"Are you Joseph Quincy Highland?"

"I am Karen Highland."

Yes, she was back. But who the hell had I
been talking to?

Chapter Twenty-Three:
Highland

I had the whole thing on tape, using a
cassette recorder from Powell's study. Some of my later
conclusions were arrived at only after a careful analysis of the
material, together with a few leaps of mind, but I had already, at
this point, been doing a bit of mental leaping, the constructs of
which have been more or less borne out by the final
conclusions.

It was not a pretty story, but it was a very
human one, perfectly understandable and even worthy of sympathy in
its finer movements. I have faithfully transcribed above that
portion of the hypnotic session covered thus far, with only a few
necessary editorial comments to aid your understanding of what was
going on there. The entire session, though, took up that whole
Sunday morning, with only a few brief breaks, here and there, to
relieve an occasional unbearable tension in the both of us.

I will not burden you with all that detail,
much of it given to mental maneuvers and laborious retracings of
difficult routes to truth and packaging knowledge as a way around
blocks of various types. It is kinder, rather, that I recapitulate
and paraphrase the session in a straightforward narrative account,
which I have done below, and ask that you simply take my word for
it that this is the real story, to the best of my understanding—and
about 98.5 percent of it straight out of, or straight through,
Karen Highland's mind.

JQ had been a very lonely man, prisoner to
his own hermitage, fifty years old and twenty years a widower,
when Elena and her brothers came to Highlandville. Elena was about
twenty-five, very pretty and vivacious—a real Latin knockout, I
guess—well educated, but a bit old-worldly in her moral
outlook.

JQ became smitten with Elena, and he
proposed marriage shortly after she entered his employ. She
declined, but apparently had a fondness for the older man and
remained close and supportive until TJ, JQ's son, came home from
his latest abortive attempt at college.

I believe, but am not certain, that Terry
Kalinsky and TJ were on the same campus at the same time; it is
probably not terribly important to the story whether or not they
first became acquainted during that period.

TJ and Elena hit it off rather well, rather
quickly, and it seems that this bothered JQ—whether from jealousy
or whatever. Perhaps it was just because he knew, or had some
reason to believe, that any union between the two would be an
unhappy one.

He ordered TJ to stay away from Elena.

Elena then threatened to leave.

JQ relented.

TJ and Elena were married in an intimate
ceremony at the mansion three months after his return from
school.

I get the definite feeling that this
marriage was never consummated. Elena began to fade and apparently
fell into a deep depression during that first year of marriage.

JQ hired a live-in psychologist to counsel
her. She recovered, and there then ensued a renewed camaraderie
with JQ. They became intimate and Elena became pregnant.

I do not know what TJ was doing during this
period or how he felt about any of it; indeed, TJ appears as little
more than a wraith throughout this story—apparently a very solitary
and troubled individual, more or less lost in the confines of his
own confused reality.

But I do know how JQ felt
about it all. He was horrified by Elena's pregnancy, renounced
their covert relationship, withdrew from her completely ...
forever.

Even before Karen's birth, Elena's
depression returned and deepened. She was in and out of
Institutions for the rest of her troubled and haunted life,
reviving somewhat to some accommodation of her reality only after
JQ's death.

Meanwhile, JQ himself showered upon Karen
all the love and open affection that he could not or would not
bestow upon Karen's mother.

There appears to be no hint that Karen's
early life was anything less than happy and healthy. Her troubles
began when TJ and Elena perished together on a burning boat, but
that was only the beginning of troubles—nothing more remarkable
than the trauma that may be experienced by any young girl who
awakens one day to find herself alone in the world without family
except for two uncles who may not be self-sufficient, themselves,
in an open society.

It seems that the real troubles—the hardball
kind of troubles—began for Karen only after a certain house
physician was added to the staff at Highlandville, and this was
some six to seven years following the unfortunate incident with
the boat.

The coming of Carl U. Powell—CUP, for short-
marked the true beginning of the trouble with Karen.

I have not decided, not even at this
writing, if Powell was an evil man, a weak man, or simply an inept
and stupid man. I do know, and I know this unequivocally, that he
was a terribly destructive influence in Karen's life.

The hypnotherapy was inaugurated within the
first few weeks of his arrival at Highlandville. The sessions
continued on a twice-weekly basis throughout the following five
years.

No wonder(!) that Karen
was, by this time, such a remarkably good subject. The conditioning
was complete. She could respond to audible triggers, visual
triggers, even time triggers—even if these were mixed together in
patterns spaced seconds apart. I could touch my left ear and put
her in deep trance, touch the right and she is instantly back; wink
my left eye to sit her down, the right to start her dancing. Go to
sleep at eight, Karen, and wake up at six. Pee at ten and take a
nude dip in the pool at eleven.

He had used her as a guinea pig! As a
research subject for his own enlightenment and amusement! The
notes, I believe, were for a book he intended to write one day.

Pissed, yeah, I knew a lot of pissed during
this investigation. But Powell was not the only culprit, nor
necessarily the worst, and apparently he had at last begun to see
the damage he had done through his inept tampering with a human
soul.

Whether by accidental clumsiness or by
design, he had this girl's mind pretty badly scrambled, though, and
it was going to take more than one Sunday morning session to put it
all back together again in a fully integrated and coherent
personality.

And then, of course, there are those "other"
entities. I frankly do not know. My jury is still out on this one.
I saw things and experienced things that are patently outside the
paradigm that guides most of us in our apprehension of reality, but
reality is primarily a mental construct, anyway. It does not really
matter—or maybe it does, depending on what you are after. If some
proof of life after death is what you happen to be after, okay, it
matters, and I leave it to you to make your own conclusions.

I was having trouble enough with the instant
world, and my troubles were not yet resolved there.

I remembered that Marcia had set up a
poolside brunch for twelve-thirty. I called Kalinsky at twelve
sharp to make sure that he would be present for that, then I
prepared Karen for a final dramatic performance, this latter
requiring all of ten minutes working in deep trance with PH
triggers.

I figured, what the hell—sauce for the
goose, as our old friend Doc Powell had told me some fourteen hours
earlier, is also plenty sauce enough for the gander.

We were going to spread some around.

Chapter Twenty-Four:
Sauce

Karen looked positively devastating in a
white wraparound skirt over the yellow bikini, sandals, a white
carnation in her burgundy hair. She walked with a lively bounce and
held my hand as we giggled our way across the patio to join the
Kalinskys at brunch.

It was a beautiful autumn day, temperature
just right, hardly any smog, sun playing peekaboo among fleecy
clouds.

Marcia watched us all the way. As we were
seating ourselves at the poolside table, she remarked, a bit
archly, "Well, aren't we the young lovers. Karen, honey, you look
absolutely smashing."

Karen smiled prettily and replied, "Thanks.
I'm feeling great. Better than I've felt in my whole life."

"Not to put a damper on anything," Kalinsky
half growled, "but all this gaiety is a little out of keeping with
the moment, isn't it?" He gave me a mildly irritated flash of eyes
and added, "Or is that the whole idea?"

"It is," I replied. "Ashes to ashes, dust to
dust, cry too much and your cheeks will rust."

Karen giggled. Marcia seemed a bit offended,
but kept her thoughts to herself.

Kalinsky signaled the waiter and said,
sarcastically, "Yeah, that's the spirit."

I showed him a level stare and inquired,
"What do you want? Sackcloth and ashes, for God's sake?"

He dropped his gaze, replied, "You're right.
Guess I'm just envious. Can't seem to bring myself to that level."
He forced a smile, swept it toward Karen, said, "You do look great,
honey. I'm glad. Stay that way. We're going to put this whole mess
behind us very soon, now."

She said, brightly, "It's already there,
TK."

He stared at her for a sober moment, then
flashed another smile and said, "That's great."

I scratched my nose with my left hand.

Karen brought a sandaled foot up to rest on
the tabletop, fixed Kalinsky with a direct gaze, and asked him,
"What's the situation in Addis Ababa?"

He stared at her rather stupidly for a
moment before replying, "I guess it's okay."

"What do you mean, it's okay? It'd damn well
better be better than okay!"

I could count the confusions in his eyes. He
told her, "Well, yes, I think it is. We got out before the damage
was done."

I scratched my nose with the other hand.

Karen's foot came down. She leaned toward
Marcia and sweetly confided, "I found the yellow bikini. It was
right where we left it."

Marcia was looking at it. She said, "So I
see. But I saw it on you last night, too, just before dinner."

I scratched the top of my left hand.

Karen scowled at Marcia as she replied, in a
harsh tone, "Damned lucky for you that you did, too, but no thanks
to your buddy. He fucked my mind, Marcia. He really fucked it
over."

Marcia's shocked gaze fled to me, than to
Kalinsky, back to Karen. "What?" she managed in a weak voice.

Kalinsky scraped his chair back and growled,
"What the hell is going on here?"

I scratched the other hand.

"Shut up!" Karen loudly commanded him. She
pushed away a waiter who was trying to transfer food from a serving
cart, returned her foot to the table, and told Kalinsky, "On
balance, you've done a pretty good job, TK, but you're getting just
a little out of hand, don't you think? Don't ever forget where you
were and what you were before you came here." She pointed an
accusing finger at Marcia and continued, "You too, honey. You're
getting to be just a bit too much the whore, don't you think?"

Marcia's chin dropped. She gasped, "Oh my
God!"

Kalinsky leaned toward me and whispered in
my ear, "What the hell is this, Ash? It's Karen's voice, but it's
pure JQ coming through."

I just shook my head and scratched my
nose.

Karen stood up and gave
the hapless waiter a dazzling smile, said, "Oh, I'm sorry,
Charlie—go ahead, please," then did a little pirouette beside
Marcia and sang out, "Oh, God, I'm so happy!"

Marcia got to her own feet and embraced
Karen a bit awkwardly, gave Kalinsky a baffled look, sat back down,
lit a cigarette, looked at me with something approaching anger,
said, softly, "Jesus."

I kept it going for another ten minutes or
so, totally destroying the brunch while moving Karen alternately
across the range of personalities—JQ, Elena, Karen—with rapid-fire
changes. A disconcerting array, to say the least—even for me, and I
knew the game, though the lines were all spontaneously Karen's, or
through Karen, at any rate.