False Memory (61 page)

Clearly shaken, she extracted the recorder.

“Put it on the desk, please.”

She leaned forward from her chair and surrendered the recorder.

Ahriman switched it off and extracted the minicassette.

“You’ve got that tape,” Martie said angrily. “All right, okay. But we’ve got a better one, you sonofabitch. We’ve got one of Susan Jagger—”

“Raymond Shaw,” said the doctor.

“I’m listening,” Martie responded, stiffening slightly in her chair as she was activated.

Immediately, as Dusty turned to frown at his wife, Ahriman said, “Viola Narvilly.”

“I’m listening,” Dusty replied, his attitude identical to that of his wife’s.

Accessing the two simultaneously would be tricky but doable. If more than six seconds passed between exchanges in their enabling haiku, they would revert to full consciousness. Therefore, he would have to switch back and forth between them, like a juggler spinning plates on top of sticks.

To Martie, he said, “Blown from the west—”

“You are the west and the western wind.”

To Dusty, he said, “Lightning gleams—”

“You are the lightning.”

Now to Martie: “—fallen leaves gather—”

“The leaves are your instructions.”

And back to Dusty: “—and a night heron’s shriek—”

“The shrieks are your instructions.”

Ahriman finished with Martie: “—in the east.”

“I am the east.”

Finally to Dusty: “—travels into darkness.”

“I am the darkness.”

Martie sat with her head tipped slightly forward, her eyes on her hands, which were clutching her purse.

Beautiful bowed head. If told to blow out her brains…obeys her master.

Admittedly, this was not first-rate haiku, but the doctor found the sentiment charming.

Still turned toward his wife, head half cocked in an attitude of puzzlement, Dusty appeared to be focused on her.

Of course, she was not actually interested in her purse, and her husband was not truly aware of her, because both of them were waiting for one thing: instructions.

Perfect.

Astonished and delighted, Ahriman leaned back in his chair and marveled at how abruptly his fortunes had improved. The game, which he’d been restructuring this morning, could now be played out with much of his original strategy. All his problems were solved.

Well, except for the Keanuphobe. But now with the universe seeming to be considerate of the doctor’s every need, he expected that the issue of the hemi-billionaire bubblehead basket case would be resolved to his advantage before the day was out.

He was curious to know how this unlikely pair, the housepainter and the video-game designer, had survived New Mexico. Indeed, he had five hundred questions if he had one; he could have spent the entire day quizzing them about how they had puzzled out so much about him even with the few wild cards that had fallen in their favor.

As important as attention to detail was, however, one must also remember to keep one’s eye on the prize. The prize in this case was the successful completion of the most important game of the doctor’s career. Although originally he had intended to play with Martie for a while before using her and Dusty in Malibu, he was no longer willing to wait months, weeks, or even an extra hour for his final satisfaction.

Ultimately, in spite of their cleverness, Martie and Dusty were nothing but two plebs, two common little people desperately striving to rise above their social class, which is what all the plebs wanted even if they would never admit it, two earnest scrabblers with dreams far bigger than their ability to fulfill them. No doubt some of the details of their pathetic sleuthing would be amusing, but in the end, their escapades would be only slightly less witless than the doings of Detective Skeet and his nameless pal. They were interesting not for who they were but solely for how they could be controlled.

Before the Keanuphobe called or showed up to complicate matters, Ahriman needed to instruct Dusty and Martie, wind them up and send them off on the killing spree that would be the final inning of this game.

“Martie, Dusty, I am addressing both of you now. I will instruct you simultaneously to save time. Is this understood?”

“Is it understood?” Martie asked, even as Dusty asked, “Is it?”

“Tell me whether or not you understand what I’ve told you.”

“I understand,” they said simultaneously.

Leaning forward in his chair, savoring this moment, downright giddy with delight, not even regretting that now he would not have the chance to boff Martie a few times, the doctor said, “Later today you are going to take a drive out to Malibu—”

“Malibu…” Martie murmured.

“Yes, that’s right. Malibu. You know the address. The two of you are going out to visit Dusty’s mother, Claudette, and her husband—that greedy, grasping, self-aggrandizing little shit, Dr. Derek Lampton.”

“I understand,” Dusty said.

“Yes, I’m sure you do,” Ahriman said, amused, “since you had to live under the same roof with the reeking little pisspot. Now, when you get to Malibu, if either Claudette or Dickhead Derek is out somewhere on an errand, you must wait until both are home.”

The doctor realized that by heaping this ridicule on Lampton, he was indulging in adolescent name-calling. But, ah, what a sweet release it was.

With increasing excitement, he said, “You must wait, in fact, until their son is home, too, your venomous little half brother Derek junior—who is, by the way, as much of a suppurating pimple on the ass of humanity as his old man. Jackoff Junior will probably be there when you arrive, because he’s home-schooled, as you know. Your syphilitic stepfather has his own ass-wipe theories about education, some of which I suppose he shoved down your throat, too, and Skeet’s. Anyway, they must all be present before you act. You will disable all of them but not kill them immediately. You will mutilate and dismember them in the following order: Claudette first, then Junior, then Derek shit-for-brains Lampton himself. He must be last, so he can watch everything you do to Claudette and Junior. Wednesday, Martie, I showed you a photograph of a girl whose dismembered body had been rearranged by her killer in a particularly clever fashion, and I asked you to focus particularly on that tableau. Once you’ve cut her apart, you and Dusty are going to rearrange Claudette in the same fashion, with but one variation, involving her eyes—”

He halted, realizing that in his excitement he had gotten ahead of himself. He paused to take a deep breath and then a long swallow of black cherry soda.

“Excuse me. Sorry. I’ve got to back up a moment. Before you go to Malibu, you’ll stop at a self-storage unit in Anaheim to pick up a satchel full of surgical instruments. And an autopsy saw with spare blades—including a few excellent cranial blades that’ll open
any
skull, even one as dense as Derek’s. I’ve also left a pair of Glock machine pistols and spare magazines…”

Involving her eyes.

Those three words from his instructions cycled back through the doctor’s mind, and for a moment he didn’t understand why.

Involving her eyes.

Abruptly he stood up from his chair, pushing it backward, out of his way. “Martie, look at me.”

After a hesitation, the woman raised her bowed head and her downcast eyes.

Swiveling to the husband, Ahriman said, “Dusty, why have you been looking at Martie all this time?”

“Why have I been looking at Martie?” Dusty replied, correctly answering a question with a question, as he was required to do in this deep programmed state.

“Dusty, look at me. Look directly at me.”

Dusty turned his gaze from his wife to Ahriman.

Martie was staring down at her hands once more.

“Martie!” the doctor commanded.

Obediently, she met his eyes again.

Ahriman stared at Martie, studying her eyes, then turned to Dusty, turned from one to the other, one to the other, one to the other, until he said, more shakily than he would have liked, “No REM. No jiggle.”

“No shit,” Dusty said, getting to his feet.

Their attitude changed. Gone, the glazed expressions. Gone, the air of obedience.

Rapid eye movement couldn’t be faked convincingly, so they hadn’t tried.

Rising from her chair, Martie said, “What are you? What sort of disgusting, pathetic
thing
are you?”

The doctor did not like the tone of her voice, did not like it at all. The loathing. The contempt. People did not speak to him in this fashion. Such disrespect was intolerable.

He tried to reestablish control: “Raymond Shaw.”

“Kiss my ass,” she said.

Dusty began to circle the desk.

Sensing a potential for violence, the doctor drew the .380 Beretta from his shoulder holster.

The sight of the gun stopped them.

“You can’t have been deprogrammed,” Ahriman insisted. “You
can’t
have been.”

“Why?” Martie asked. “Because it’s never happened before?”

“What do you have against Derek Lampton?” Dusty demanded.

People didn’t demand things of the doctor. Not more than once, anyway. He wanted to shoot this stupid, stupid, cheaply dressed, nobody, nothing
housepainter
right between the eyes, blow his face off, blow his brains out.

A shooting here, of course, would have unpleasant repercussions. Police with their endless questions. Reporters. Stains that might never come out of the Persian rug.

For a moment he suspected treachery at the institute: “Who reprogrammed you?”

“Martie did it for me,” Dusty claimed.

“And Dusty freed me.”

Ahriman shook his head. “You’re lying. This isn’t possible. You’re both lying.”

The doctor heard a note of panic in his voice and was ashamed. He reminded himself that he was Mark Ahriman, only son of the great director, greater in his own field than Dad had been in Hollywood, a puppeteer, not a puppet.

“We know a lot about you,” Martie said.

“And we’re going to find out more,” Dusty promised. “Every ugly little detail.”

Detail.
That word again. Which last night had seemed to be an omen and not a good one.

Convinced they had been activated and accessed, he had told them too much. Now they had an advantage, and they might eventually find a way to use it effectively. Game point to the opposition.

“We’re going to find out what you have against Derek Lampton,” Dusty vowed. “And when we’ve figured out your motivation, that’ll be another nail in your coffin.”

“Please,” the doctor said, wincing with pretended pain. “Don’t torture me with clichés. If you’re going to try to intimidate me, have the courtesy to go away for a while, acquire a better education, improve your vocabulary, and come back with some fresh metaphors.”

That was better. He had slipped out of character for a moment. His was a demanding role, complex, intellectual, and richly nuanced. Of the actors who had won Oscars for starring in Dad’s tearjerkers, none could have settled into this part as deeply and successfully as had the doctor. A rare departure from character was understandable, but once again he was the lord of memory.

Now, in response to their pathetic attempt at intimidation, he gave them a lesson in the real thing: “While you’re embarked on this crusade to bring me to justice, you might need to move in with dear old Mom for a while. Your quaint little house burned to the ground Wednesday night.”

The poor dumb children were bewildered for a moment, not sure if what he had said was true or if it was a lie, and if it was a lie, they couldn’t puzzle out a purpose in the deceit.

“Your marvelous collection of thrift-shop furniture—all gone, I’m afraid. And the damning tape recording you mentioned earlier, the message from Susan—gone, too. The tragedy of fire. Insurance can never replace things with sentimental value, can it?”

They believed now. The stunned expression of the displaced, the dispossessed.

While they were emotionally reeling, the doctor hit them hard again. “The goggle-eyed idiot you left Skeet with. What’s his name?”

They glanced at each other, and then Dusty said, “Fig.”

The doctor frowned. “Fig?”

“Foster Newton.”

“Ah. I see. Well, the Fig is dead. Shot four times in the gut and chest.”

Rattled, Dusty asked, “Where’s Skeet?”

“Dead, too. Also four shots in the gut and the chest. Skeet and the Fig. It was a nice two-for-one deal.”

When Dusty started around the desk again, Ahriman aimed the Beretta point-blank at his face, and Martie seized her husband by the arm, halting him.

“Unfortunately,” the doctor said, “I wasn’t able to kill your dog. That would have been a fine dramatic touch, leading to such a nice reveal just now. An
Old Yeller
moment. But life isn’t as neatly structured as the movies.”

The doctor was
back.
If he could have jumped into the air and high-fived himself, he would have done so.

Great emotions boiled in the plebs, because like all their kind, they were driven far less by intellect than by raw emotion, but the Beretta required them to control themselves, and second by second, they were forced to come to terms with the hard realization that the pistol was not the doctor’s only weapon. If he was willing to confess to the killing of Skeet and the Fig, even here in the utter privacy of his sanctum sanctorum, then he must have no fear of being brought to trial for murder; he must be confident that he was untouchable. Reluctantly, bitterly, they were coming to the conclusion that no matter how vigorously they sought to defeat him, he would gun them down with his superior gamesmanship, with his superior intelligence, with his disregard for all rules other than his own, and with his exceptional talent for deception—which, in fact, made the handgun the
least
of his weapons.

After allowing them a moment for this truth to percolate down through their sadly porous gray matter, the doctor brought an end to the standoff. “I think you better go now. And I’ll give you some advice to make this game a bit fairer.”

“Game?” Martie said.

The contempt and revulsion in her voice couldn’t touch Ahriman any longer.