Dagger of Flesh (15 page)

He sat up straight in his chair and peered at the spot. He looked up at me, then back at my arm again. "How'd you get this?"

"I don't know."

He studied it for a moment, then noticed the two little punctures farther down on my arm. "What are those?"

"I don't know that, either. I got them tonight. Somewhere. Some time. I don't know. I just don't know."

"Sit down, Shell. You'd better tell me everything you know about this."

I did. I started with my getting up in the morning. I told him every detail I could think of. When I got to the point where I'd lied my way out of jail, I skipped the involved explanation of how I'd managed that so I wouldn't have to drag in the whole story of my "buying" Jay's business. I wanted to get on with this, get it out. Bruce didn't move or say anything; just listened quietly and smoked a cigarette. I told him about the urge to go to the Phoenix.

When I got to that point I pulled the note out of my pocket. "I wrote this before I left for the hotel, Bruce. At least I know I went to the hotel, though I don't remember it. Then, the next thing, I was back at the office. Half an hour or more, just gone, vanished."

He glanced at the note and nodded. "Go on."

I brought it up to date. Then I said, "And here's the recorder. I don't even know where the hell I got the thing. Maybe I stole it, I don't know. Am I crazy, or what?"

"You're not crazy, Shell. But God, this is a rotten thing."

I turned to the recorder and set it up ready to go. Now all I had to do was flick a small switch and I could listen to something that had happened to me over an hour ago.

Bruce moved the coffee table out from between the chairs and I placed the recorder on the floor between us. He said, "At least you know what's going on now, Shell."

"Yeah? What the hell is going on?"

"Well, I don't know why it's going on, but it appears that you were drugged, all right, as you've guessed, and in a state of lowered resistance you were hypnotized. And from your description, it appears that it was last night. The puncture in the crook of your arm and the rest of it fit in. Perhaps your conditioning took all night; makes no difference how long it took, though. Once you were in deep trance the entire memory could be eliminated. For some reason you were directed to go to the Phoenix Hotel. Maybe to meet someone. Possibly even to report to somebody. After all, you were investigating Jay's death."

"How about that? I must have been drugged before Jay was killed. Couldn't I—couldn't I have murdered him?"

He shook his head. "Get rid of that idea, Shell. I'd say it's virtually impossible in so short a time as a few hours. Not you, anyway, and not so quickly. Besides, we both know your gun was stolen from your office. I know about that and the fingerprints on your desk. So stop torturing yourself."

"Bruce," I said quietly, "my gun wasn't stolen. I had it when I went home last night."

He reached up and stroked his chin again, his head lowered. He didn't say anything.

"Well, here goes," I said finally. I flicked the switch to "Play," turned the volume up full, and settled back in my chair as the tape began to unwind.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Fifteen

 

 

BRUCE CROSSED HIS LEGS and closed his eyes. He appeared relaxed, but all my nerves and muscles felt taut and stretched, like thin lines of ice traced through my body.

Then I heard soft noises from the recorder's built-in speaker. Just little whispers of sound that meant nothing to me. Silence for a few more seconds, then four or five soft, dull sounds. I looked at Bruce. He opened his eyes and raised his fist and wiggled it back and forth like a man knocking on a door. I nodded.

Then from the speaker: "Come in." It was faint, and I strained to distinguish the words.

There was the small, clicking sound of a door opening, then another voice, "Well, hello ..."

Now Bruce uncrossed his legs and leaned forward closer to the machine as if to hear better what was coming next. He probably could guess what the next words would be even better than I could. The volume was as loud as it would go, but even so the sounds and the voices were dim and distorted. I knew that the last voice must have been my own.

I leaned forward, myself.

"Shell," Bruce said suddenly.

"Huh?" I looked up. Dimly, from the speaker, I heard the words, "Sleep! Fast asleep. Fast asleep." I said, "What's the matter, Bruce?"

He shook his head, listening. "I'll explain later," he said.

There had been a moment's silence from the recording since the last words, then there was the muffled sound of a door slamming. Words poured softly from the speaker, "Fast asleep, that's fine, you're fast asleep now, in a deep, sound, hypnotic sleep. Going deeper and deeper now, deeper and deeper now, that's it."

I looked at Bruce, the hairs tingling at the nape of my neck. His eyes were on the unwinding tape, but he saw me move and nodded without looking up.

The voice droned on, unrecognizable, speaking slowly, barely audible. Then, "You must do whatever I tell you to do. Do you understand? You can speak normally. Say 'Yes' if you understand."

And then, muffled but distinct enough, I heard the other voice—my voice—answer, "Yes."

This was fantastic, unbelievable even as I listened to it. This was something that had already happened to me, but consciously I was hearing it for the first time. It was terrifying to know that the words that had been spoken, the words and commands yet to be spoken were, all of them, etched deep in some inner recess of my brain, graven there even more indelibly than the molecular patterns on the tape now unwinding before my eyes.

And yet they were all strange to me, unknown, unremembered words and phrases which in an hour I had forgotten more completely than I had forgotten what happened to me on my third day in school or the morning after my tenth birthday. For one whirling, spinning moment I found myself distrusting all of my memories and thoughts and impressions, wondering which were real and which false, even distrusting what I heard and felt now.

I listened unmoving, as I was told by the other voice on the recording to relax in a chair and to roll up my left sleeve. I frowned as the words slipped from the tape. I didn't understand. Bruce was frowning slightly, too, but at the next words the frown smoothed out and he nodded to himself.

"Your left arm is so heavy, so heavy, it is becoming numb and dead. All sensation is leaving your arm. All sensation is leaving your arm. It is becoming completely anesthetized. You can feel no pain in your left arm; you can feel nothing ..." Over and over again, "Your arm is like an arm of lead and you can feel no pain ..."

Bruce glanced up and when I looked at him he pointed at my left forearm.

I looked at my arm, the sleeve still rolled up above my elbow. I touched the stained spot at the bend of my arm and looked back at Bruce. He shook his head.

There was no sound from the recorder now but the tape was still unwinding slowly. Bruce looked quickly around, then picked up a burned paper match from an ashtray nearby. He gripped it between his fingers then, wordlessly, he leaned forward and grabbed my left wrist, holding my arm out, palm up. He held the paper match a few inches from my arm, then suddenly jabbed me with it. I flinched involuntarily and he drew back the match and jabbed me with it once more.

I looked at the two smudges the burned-out match had left on my skin. They almost touched the two tiny perforations I'd discovered earlier in my arm. I shivered, imagining a needle being jabbed deeply into my flesh as Bruce had jabbed with that paper match.

Then there were again words from the tape recorder. "Your arm is now completely normal except that you will feel no pain in it. You will remain sound asleep, yet you will be able to speak normally and answer all my questions completely. You will remain comfortable and relaxed, and will enjoy answering all my questions. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Why were you released by the police?"

"I invented a story for the police and told them my gun had been stolen from my office. They discovered my office had been broken into, and that the desk drawer in which I said I'd left my gun had been forced. They found George Lucian's fingerprints on my desk top and released me."

Bruce swung his head up and looked at me, but I barely noticed him. My mouth was dry, and I was waiting for the next questions. The volume swelled slightly and faded, the words sometimes becoming almost inaudible.

"Describe your movements after you left the police. Name all the people you talked to. Describe your actions and tell me what you learned."

The words that came next from the recorder were all in my unrecognizable voice, but I knew it was mine. I described everything briefly but in good detail, surprising even myself as I sat with Bruce in his living room and listened, with the wealth of detail I unfolded in the recording.

I spoke in a flat voice with little expression and named each person by his or her full name. I always used the third person and the full name, never saying "he" or "she" and—most disappointing of all—never saying "you" to my interrogator.

I told of leaving City Hall, going to my office, visiting Robert Hannibal, Gladys Weather, Ann Weather, Martha Stewart, Arthur. Finally I got to the point where I'd gone back to Ayla's apartment, and I could feel the blood rising to my face.

It was awful.

I shifted uneasily in my chair as Bruce glanced at me and then away, a slight smile on his lips. In a way it was the most interesting part of the recording, but I didn't enjoy one word of it.

I was growing more relaxed as I listened. My embarrassment was taking my mind away from the more frightening aspects of what had happened to me. And then suddenly I got rigid in my seat. All embarrassment and all ease left me completely.

I was thinking ahead of the recording. I remembered that right after I'd left Ayla I'd gone to my office. Then there'd been the desire to go to the Phoenix Hotel, followed by my recognition of that posthypnotic urge. Everything I'd then done flashed through my mind: the indecision and fear, the note to Bruce, and then the blank that was now unfolding on the recording. But somewhere in that blank I'd somehow got the tape recorder itself.

I didn't understand. If I'd spilled that, why hadn't the machine been found and destroyed? Obviously it hadn't. I looked at Bruce Wilson, wondering, thinking crazy thoughts, unable to pick from my mind which of my memories were real and which unreal. I even wondered for a crazy moment why I'd come here to see Bruce, tried to remember if there'd been any compulsion, any greater-than-ordinary desire. But there hadn't been. It had been entirely logical, the sensible thing to do.

I sat up gripping the arms of the chair, telling myself I was silly, idiotic in my fears. I hung onto the words coming faintly from the speaker, straining to hear what came next.

I was still speaking, telling of leaving Ayla's and going to the office. My voice continued, "At seven o'clock I decided to call Joseph Borden again. If I had to, I was going to beat some answers out of him. I picked up the phone, and then remembered I had to go to the Phoenix Hotel, to Room Five-twenty-four. I got ready to leave."

I was weak, wondering what would come next when the other voice broke in, "That's fine. That's fine. Now listen to me. Listen carefully to me. I am going to give you instructions and you must follow them."

I let out such a huge sigh that Bruce looked up at me, startled. I smiled weakly. Of course. Whoever I'd been talking to obviously wanted to know what I'd done during the day. Inasmuch as I was sitting there talking to him—or her; I couldn't even be positive of the sex because the voices were so muffled and faint, but the voice sounded like a man's—he must have accepted without question the idea that I'd come directly to the hotel. It was the only logical explanation, or I wouldn't have been sitting here now.

I returned all my attention to the recording. The other voice continued, repeating every suggestion slowly two or three times, "You will leave this room and return to your office. You will be normal in every way and continue to act as you normally would. You will suffer no ill effects from this and you will remember nothing from the time you left your office till your return. You will be able to recall none of this." Then he said more loudly, "You will always go into a deep, sound, hypnotic sleep when I tell you to, when I say, 'Fast asleep.' But no one else except me will be able to hypnotize you! Do you understand? Say 'Yes' if you understand this."

"Yes."

"That's fine. Now listen very carefully. You will return to this room tomorrow night at seven o'clock." The suggestion was repeated slowly three times and I answered that I understood. Then, "When I count to three you will open your eyes but remain in the hypnotic sleep. You will open your eyes and in every way appear normal, yet you will remain in the hypnotic sleep until you return to your office. You will return to your office, and you will remember none of this. You will not remember being here, nor will you remember anything that has happened here."

Again he repeated the suggestions, then counted to three. After that there was no other sound for five or ten seconds, then the sound of the door opening and closing. Bruce and I listened intently, but that was all except for soft, whispery sounds and an occasional thud, as if someone were still moving around in the room.

I relaxed, feeling tired from the strain. "Thank God," I said. "I didn't kill Borden, anyway."

Bruce frowned at me. "Kill Borden? You mean—"

"I mean I just didn't know. I couldn't remember anything, and I thought maybe ..." I stopped as I realized I still couldn't be sure. "At least," I said, "I didn't kill him tonight. My time tonight seems to be pretty well accounted for. Well, there it is, Bruce. The whole damned day. You know as much about it now as I do."

He nodded and lit another cigarette, then said from behind a cloud of smoke, "Some of it's clear now, Shell."

"But it all seems like it happened to somebody else, not me," I said. "It's still all blank, even now."