Psychomech (15 page)

Mid-afternoon Friday he was well enough to discharge himself and return to Hayling Island. He spoke on the telephone, haltingly and with some difficulty, to Doctor Harwell, who protested at first but finally gave in and sent a nurse to collect him; and he had been back at the centre less than an hour when he was once again called to the phone. A call from Germany. It was Willy Koenig.

‘Richard, Thomas has gone.’ His voice was flat but showed no trace of its customary harshness. Koenig sounded drained.

‘I know,’ Garrison answered, a shudder in his words. His tongue was still badly swollen, but the shudder had come from deep inside his body.

‘He said you would know. I phoned to say I’m coming soon.’

‘When?’

‘A week to ten days, as soon as possible. I have one or two things to do…’

‘I’m sorry about Thomas, Willy.’

‘He was in a lot of pain. I’m sure he was glad to go in the end.’

‘Willy, you should know something. He wasn’t glad to go. He wasn’t glad to go at all! He fought it. Fought hard. Jesus, Willy, no man
ever
went like that before. I was with him…’

‘Oh?’ There was wonder now in Koenig’s voice. ‘I… I didn’t know. He didn’t want me to be there.’

Again Garrison shuddered. ‘Well I
was
there. It’s hard to explain—and anyway I don’t want to remember.’ He paused, then said: ‘It will be good to see you, Willy.’

‘To see me? So you’ve slipped back into the phraseology of the sighted, have you?’ A new note had crept into Koenig’s voice. A note of interest.

Garrison managed to grin, however painfully, and his amusement carried right down the line. ‘I suppose I have. And I do believe your English has improved. You seem to have less of an accent.’

‘Well, I have been practising. For six months!’ There was life now, animation. ‘It seemed prudent, since English is to be my Sprache for the foreseeable future.’

‘And how do you view the foreseeable future, Willy? Personally, I think we both deserve a long holiday.’

‘An excellent idea,’ Koenig answered with enthusiasm, ‘—but work to be done first. Affairs to be put in order. One week, perhaps, to straighten things out, and then… Where will we go?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. The Greek Islands. The Americas. The Seychelles. Hawaii. Somewhere I’ve never been. Or maybe all of those places.’

‘Well, why not?’

‘Could we?’ Garrison felt a rising excitement, like fresh air after a long session in a smoky barroom.

‘Of course we can. Before that, though, we must come back to Germany, to the Harz. It’s yours now, you know, this place.’

Garrison’s excitement ebbed. ‘Yes, I know. But why must we go there first, and for how long? The place will seem—’ (he almost said ‘dead’)’—empty—now.’

‘But there is someone you must meet.’

Garrison’s heart gave a little lurch. ‘Someone I know?’ Impossibly, he was thinking of Vicki.

‘No, no—a total stranger. Well, no, that’s not true. She, at least, knows you.’

Garrison frowned. He never really had been able to fathom Willy’s mind. Th& rapport was there, but hidden, deep. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘I’m talking about Suzy, the “S” on your horoscope.’

‘The “S” on my… the black dog? Suzy’s a dog?’

‘Indeed she is. A beautiful black Doberman pinscher bitch. Just one year old, and in love with her master, and pining desperately for him.’

‘Her master?’ Koenig didn’t seem to be making sense.

‘You, Richard, you!’

Garrison shook his head. ‘I don’t think I follow.’

‘Then you have forgotten what Thomas told you. Suzy was trained on your scent, your clothes, the samples taken from you, your body. She knows and loves the smell of your blood, sweat, even your urine. She longs to hear your voice. Her heart is bursting to hear you laugh, shout, command.’

Now Garrison understood. ‘A brainwashed bitch,’ he said. He somehow felt let down, disappointed.

‘If you wish. But wait until you see her.’

‘I’m still not sure I want a blind dog. Isn’t it a bit like carrying a white stick, or those shitty armbands they make you wear in Germany?’

‘No, not like that at all. Just take my word for it. With Suzy, it will be a whole new world.’

Garrison said: ‘I seem to spend an awful lot of time just taking people’s words. But we’ll see. One thing’s certain—I’ll be glad to see you again. It will be just like old times.’

After a slight pause, Koenig asked, ‘What old times?’

Garrison was caught short. That was a damned good question. ‘Just… old times,’ he finally answered. He could somehow picture Koenig nodding his crewcut head in understanding.

‘Just a week to ten days, then,’ the German said.

‘Yes. I’ll be looking for you. But Willy—’

‘Yes?’

‘Tell me, what’s in this for you?’

‘Oh, my payment is good, be sure of it. And anyway, the Colonel wished it. In fact, those were his last words to me.’

Garrison felt a sudden chill, that same alien cold he had known when speaking to Schroeder himself. ‘What were his last words to you, Willy?’

‘Why, that I let nothing happen to you, of course. “Guard him well, Willy Koenig, with your own life,” he said. “Let no harm come to Richard Garrison.”’

Garrison’s flesh had turned to ice. After a little while he shook himself and said: ‘He really did believe, then?’

‘Did?’ Koenig’s voice came back, a little tinny now with static and distance. ‘Oh, but he still does believe, Richard, and so do I. Yes, and so do you…’

The next morning Garrison was left to sleep it out. He was finally brought awake by a dream, a nightmare. He remembered a little of it. Fire and smoke and a dreadful roaring, and a smell like something cooking in the devil’s own kitchen. And somewhere a voice intoning and others singing, and the strains of an organ mournful in a dirge. Fire consumed him but he felt nothing, and in the end he knew his body was a pile of hot ashes.

That was when he came awake.

Laved in sweat, it took several moments to realize where he was. Then he put out his hand and touched the naked hands of his alarm clock. 9.00 A.M.—in Germany 10.00 A.M.—and Thomas Schroeder had been cremated…

W
hen Koenig arrived at the Hayling Island centre with his silver Mercedes, Garrison introduced him to staff and friends alike as‘Herr Koenig, my man,’ which is exactly what the crewcut German was. Immaculate in a sort of semi-uniform, Koenig looked every bit a combination of chauffeur, gentleman’s gentleman, confidant and companion, and he conducted himself accordingly. Garrison was ‘sir’, he was ‘Willy’, and when the initial astonishment wore off, then the staff of the centre—particularly Matron—began to realize and understand how very different the ex-Corporal really was. It perhaps explained something of his earlier rebelliousness, though Garrison had never seen himself as a rebel.

As for Matron: her role at the centre had at last dawned on Garrison, and he had come to respect her more than any other member of the staff. Which was why, on that cold Monday morning in December when his discharge became official (that is to say, when he had been ‘rehabilitated’) and he was his own man at last, Garrison hugged her to him and in a James Cagney voice said: ‘Listen, Boss Lady, I’ve got your number. You ain’t so tough, sister!’

‘Matron, to you, Mr Garrison,’ she answered, but there was an unaccustomed warmth behind the gruffness. Then she leaned forward and whispered in his ear, ‘Listen, I don’t know how you do it—in fact I’m beginning to wonder if I even know who you are—but you
are
a damned disruptive influence. So for the last time, Richard, will you take your damned Kraut and your whole bag of tricks and kindly get your arse out of my rehabilitation centre?’

‘Shit!’ Garrison answered, in that same confidential tone.

‘Just when I was getting to like the place…’

And that was that. Handshakes all round and a wave from the rolled-down window of the big car, and Koenig drove Garrison away. It was only as they crossed the Hayling Island causeway and turned right on the A27 towards Chichester that Garrison thought to ask: ‘Willy, where the hell are we going?’

‘Ah!’ Koenig answered. ‘I thought you would never ask. Well, sir, you have acquired a property in Sussex. We are now on our way to take possession and inspect the staff. Then, tonight, London. You have a little business there—some investments to make—which should take a few days. Unfortunately we’ll have to stay at a hotel; the Savoy, I think, if only for convenience. Being wealthy, you see, has its drawbacks. For one, you have to be sure you can trust the people who are handling your money. The Colonel never trusted anyone with his money, which is why he spread it out. And after London, back to the house—it stands in seven acres—where a top interior designer and decorator will await your instructions.’

‘Phew!’ said Garrison, and after a moment: ‘Hey, do you think I might one day get a chance to organize my own life?’

‘All you want,’ Koenig shrugged. ‘But you will discover in the end, sir, that big men only dream up the acts while smaller men perform. Running your own life simply means commanding others to run it for you, smoothly.’

‘Oh? Well, I’ve always been a bit of a performer myself, you know. And anyway, you’re not my idea of a small man. And you have your own life.’

‘All wrapped up in you, sir.’

‘And this “sir” business. That has to go.’

‘Very well, Richard—but never in public. You have an image—or will have.’

Garrison turned his head and stared at the man beside him through silver lenses that conveyed a sound-picture of not quite subsonic blips and beeps. It was a picture which would soon become as recognizable and as trusted as the palm of his own hand. But for now he said: ‘There’s more than money in this for you, Willy Koenig.’

Koenig glanced at him and smiled. ‘Indeed there is, Richard. My old master has determined to make himself eternal, immortal, and you with him. I believe he will do it. Together you will be… very powerful. Myself, I have never been able to picture a world in which I do not exist. I can’t imagine myself dead. How better to preserve my life, then, than to place it in the hands of men who know how to prolong it indefinitely?’

Ten more days saw them in the Harz Mountains, where the snows were already crisp and vehicles chewed along the black, icy roads on chained wheels. They stayed over Christmas, which was not Garrison’s intention but a decision forced upon him by Suzy. For he fell head over heels for Suzy from the moment they met, and he wanted to get to know her better before setting out with Koenig upon their as yet unplanned ‘holiday’.

That first meeting with Suzy was almost magical, and it formed another turning point in Garrison’s life. He would never forget it; it would always rank among his fondest memories.

Mid-December and the big Mercedes had hissed through shallow, crusted snow into the grounds of Schroeder’s retreat. (Garrison now owned cars and houses in both England and Germany.) For reasons of Schroeder’s own the industrialist had never given his place in the Harz a name, but Garrison intended to change that. From now on it would have a real name. There would be a stone archway at the entrance to the grounds, and iron letters nine inches tall would curve with the brickwork of the arch, proclaiming the place ‘Garrison’s Retreat’. The name might never find its way on to a map but at least it would be better than being simply ‘here’, or ‘in the Harz’.

Garrison finished describing what he wanted done—the archway and legend—as Koenig brought the car to a halt. The staff had been warned that they were coming and were there to meet them. So was Suzy, and Garrison sensed the presence of the big dog before ever he ‘saw’ her.

She was on a chain, obedient but restless at the feet of one of the ‘groundsmen’.

‘Release the dog,’ Koenig ordered as he helped Garrison out of the car. Garrison heard the rattle of a chain and a low, measured panting. He smelled a sharp, clean dog smell on the frozen air. With the fur collar of his coat turned up against the back of his head, he waited.

‘She suspects you are here but will not let herself believe it,’ Koenig whispered. ‘She smells the air, looks at you. Ah! Her attention is riveted! Call her name—no, whisper it—just her name.’

‘Suzy.’ Garrison barely breathed the word.

The low panting grew deeper, quickened, became a whine.

‘She comes!’ said Koenig. ‘All trembling—but
now
she believes. She has found her Master, the God that Heinz Holzer promised her!’

The black bitch came to Garrison, sniffed at a dangling hand, dared tentatively to tug at his glove. He removed the glove, let her smell his hand. ‘Suzy, girl, Suzy!’ he said.

She whined again, high-pitched and joyous, then laid back her head and howled long and loud. In another moment she had taken his sleeve, was half-dragging, half-leading him forward into the entrance and through the glass doors. Now he led her, talking to her as they walked the remembered way to the bar—his bar, now—where he ordered drinks for everyone present.

Nurse was there, and Cook, and one or two others Garrison remembered, even Gunter. And all of them approaching him in their turn and introducing themselves,and Garrison politely acknowledging their welcome as he assumed his new role of master. And Suzy at his feet, quiet now but watchful, and quick to show her teeth as each member of the staff drew close to her God. For it was an agony to her that they should be allowed to touch him, and Garrison sensed her jealousy.

Later he would fondle and pet her, and never fear spoiling or weakening her character. For her character was steel and moulded into a rigid, unbreakable shield. Her loyalty, her life, belonged to Garrison. And in his mind’s eye as he fondled her he saw Suzy exactly as she was—as she had been in that old, almost forgotten dream of his. And so another link was forged in that strange and inexplicable chain, and from that time on Garrison and Suzy were inseparable…

The next few weeks were the busiest Garrison had known since his previous visit to the Harz. First of all there was his own familiarization with the running of Garrison’s Retreat; as the new master he insisted on knowing every last detail. Then there were extensive holiday arrangements and preparations to be made; and finally the business of Suzy’s shipping to England and her quarantining, whose supervision Garrison himself attended to. In respect of the latter: it was his intention to return to England at least three times during the next four or five months, simply to go and see Suzy at the kennels. After that, during the final month of her quarantine, Garrison would have returned to England following his holiday and he would go to Suzy at least once a week. And during her last week until he collected her he would stay close and see her every day.