Skull Session (27 page)

33

P
AUL TOOK ONE OF THE green wingback chairs and sipped cognac from a bottle of Remy-Martin that Lia had found, miraculously intact and unopened, in the cupboard. Lia sat across from him. The lantern hissed fiercely on the table, throwing a harsh white light that cut sharp shadows in the room. Frowning, he told Lia about Royce's interest in the state of Highwood and his urgent desire to hire Paul to do something that didn't need doing for ridiculously high pay.

"A bribe—I love it. Did you confront him on it?" Lia took the bottle from him, swigged, returned it.

"Yeah. He gave me a concise overview of our cultural differences. Told me that different standards pertain among the very wealthy."

"Well, it's not totally implausible, is it?" Paul sighed wearily, rolling the liquid in the bottle. "No," he admitted.

"Did you ask him if he was our midnight caller?"

"As a matter of fact, I did. 'Why, no, cousin. Didn't speak to your mother until just this morning. Didn't know you would be there.'"

"Because Janet called, and it wasn't her—I asked. She'd gotten your message from this morning."

"Is Mark okay?"

"She didn't mention anything, so I assume there wasn't any emergency. Just her usual chilly self. She said you could try her again tonight. And then Vivien called. 'Is this Lia?' she asked. T wondered if Paulie would rope you into helping him.' We only talked for a minute."

"Well, I suppose that's a relief."

"Yes. But before you let your shoulders down, I should tell you that a funny thing happened with Dempsey." Lia scowled. "I was in and out of the library, sorting a box, back and forth, right? So one time I poke my head in, and there's Dempsey scrabbling through the papers, picking up a page, reading it quickly, picking up another. As if he were looking for something specific. He didn't see me."

"Oh, Christ," Paul said.

"Maybe he's worried Vivien has something unpleasant on him, along with the rest of the dirt in her files."

"I don't believe there's any scandal in Dempsey's past. He's always been very aboveboard about his beliefs and actions."

"What, then?"

Paul's neck torqued uncontrollably, whipping his head around. "I have no idea. I'll just have to ask him about it tonight."

Responding to his agitation, Lia went to stand behind him and began massaging his neck. Her strong fingers probed the muscles there, intuitively finding the knots of tension at the base of his skull, loosening them. Paul shut his eyes and gave himself to the sensation.

In the silence he became aware of the big disordered darkness of the main hall, pressing against the closed door of the smoking room. He debated telling her about what he was feeling. But what could he say?
Strange resonances in his memory. A big, dark, webbed, shadowed
thing
—

"Can I ask you something?" he said at last. "Now that you've spent a day here, don't you ever get a . . . weird feeling about it? Like something's wrong here—something very fucked up?"

"Of course. The people who did this have very screwed-up priorities. But that goes without saying. I take it you mean something else."

Paul leaned into her fingers. "I have these memories—being up here, going into the woods, then something else. Something that frightened me."

"Like what?"

How could he describe it? Lia was skeptical of the idea of memory repression, the recovered-memory fad that had resulted in so many recollections of satanic ritual abuse. The allegations of bloodletting rituals, cannibalism, incest, and murder were simply too fantastic to believe.

He gestured with his hands, trying to describe the sense of it. "It's as if I remember the feeling, or the
texture
of it, but past a certain point no visual images come to mind. Just this disturbing, unsettling, scary . . .
turbulence,
this feeling like . . . " He gestured again and then stopped, startled. He was making a tumbling motion with his two hands, the exact movement Mark had made when trying to describe the sensation of his seizures.

"Wow," he said.

"What now?"

Paul took her hands and held them, leaning his head back against her breasts. "Nothing," he said. "I've just got a lot to think about."

Again, it was a relief to sit in the warmth and order of the Corrigans' beautiful house after the chaos at Highwood. They had eaten another of Elaine's incredible dishes, a mouthwatering kielbasa stew served to the strains of Debussy string quartets on the stereo. After drinking half a bottle of rich Barolo, Dempsey seemed to have recovered from his earlier depressed mood, and he launched into a narrative about one of the odd characters who used to live in the region.

"He lived in the woods," Dempsey said. "They called him the Leather Man because he wore a suit he'd made out of leather scraps he'd salvaged. He had a range about the size of a puma's, all over northern Westchester and southern Putnam Counties. You'd see him walking, sometimes along the road, sometimes crossing it as he headed overland." He gestured with a hunk of bread.

Elaine laughed. "Dempsey talks as if he'd seen him. The Leather Man died before you were born, dear."

"What did he do?" Lia asked. "How did he survive?"

"Aha," Dempsey continued. "He scavenged food some, or lived off the land like a bear. He was big as a bear too—with a heavy, evil-looking face. Parents would tell children the Leather Man would get them if they didn't behave. Paradoxically, he was considered slightly magical, strange enough that to get a visit from him was considered a good omen. There's a universal human trait: We revere the strange."

The old man went on, elaborating. Ordinarily Paul would have been fascinated, but the day's events, and the prospect of asking Dempsey what he was looking for in the library, made it hard for him to concentrate.

Paul waited until Lia and Elaine took off on a conversational tangent, then turned to Dempsey. "How're those Linnell chairs of yours doing?"

Dempsey's eyes caught his briefly. "Haven't had as much time, with the Highwood windows, but I've got all the new parts in place. Want to see 'em?"

In the workshop Dempsey hit the light switch, and the overhead fluorescents blinked and came on. "Okay," he said. "This isn't a casual visit to the shop. What's up?"

"I want to know what's going on at Highwood."

"How would I know? Kids, crackheads, somebody mad at Vivien—?"

"I mean, what's going on for
you
there?" Paul's heart was hammering, his body was seething with tics. "You've been trying to find something in Vivien's papers. I want to know if it's anything I should know about."

Dempsey turned away, walked half the length of the workshop, then turned back. "It's nothing that bears on you or the damage to the house."

"I also hate the thought that Dempsey Corrigan is keeping anything from me."

"Look, Paulie." Dempsey threw his hands wide, a gesture of exasperation. "I'm a little drunk right now. It feels good, but it doesn't help me think straight at this moment. Part of me says, 'Hey, Paulie, it's my business, leave it be, let an old guy have his private life.'"

"So what's the other part say?"

"It reminds me that your father was my best friend, and that I've always cared about your family. And yeah, I never had kids, there's a father-and-son thing between you and me, and I don't want anything to come in the way of it. Not even my old regrets, though I'm goddamned well fully entitled to them."

Paul flicked his mustache with both hands as the two men listened to the buzz of the lights for a moment. "Do me a favor, Dempsey. Let me know what's going on. I've got my own stuff to unravel. Maybe what you tell me will help."

Dempsey rubbed his chin, then appeared to make a decision. "Okay, fine. Fine. It's not flattering to me, but what the hell. I'd always suspected Vivien kept everything, and seeing that heap of papers proved it. I was looking for some correspondence." He coughed, cleared his throat. "Letters from me to Vivien."

"Why not just ask Lia and me to keep an eye peeled for them? We'll turn them up eventually."

"That's exactly why I wanted to find them. So that you wouldn't."

It was Paul's turn to walk away, swinging his arms, trying to dispel some of the tension. "Jesus. You and Vivien?"

"Yeah. Like I said—a long time ago."

"So what's the big deal? People do that kind of thing. I mean, she was divorced, you—"

"I was married to Elaine at the time. And I'd as soon my dear wife didn't find out. I lost my head, I wrote stupid letters, I'd prefer you and Lia didn't read them. Vivien was a good-looking woman, I was full of juice. Remember, this was after she'd spent ten miserable years waiting for Hoffmann to come back to her. Not to make me sound chivalrous, but after Hoffmann, that woman was really hurting." He waited expectantly, but Paul had nothing to say. "Now you know. So let's go open another bottle of wine and forget it."

"Jesus. You've been worrying about that? I don't care. People of my generation aren't so easily scandalized by extramarital affairs, Dempsey.

Christ, we all grew up watching it on the tube, reading about the illicit affairs of prominent people—"

"You might surprise yourself someday," Dempsey said gruffly.

Paul followed him to the workshop door. "But what do you want me to do? Lia and I have to get the papers cleaned up. Lia's looking over every piece—she's playing detective. Also, Vivien says there are more letters from Ben up there. I'm really wanting to read them."

"Of course." Dempsey stopped with his hand on the doorknob. "I just think you're going to have to figure out how to show some regard for Vivien's privacy, and mine. If it looks like a personal letter, don't read it. Lia will respect that, won't she?"

"There're a lot of letters. Were yours handwritten? Typed?"

"I don't remember. Thirty-five goddamned years ago." Dempsey opened the door and they stepped into the chill night air. The light over the workshop door cut a circle of brightness around them as Dempsey replaced the padlock on its hasp. "So it's a deal then, Paulie? You'll relay my request to Lia?"

"Of course," Paul said. "Look, I'm glad you told me about this. You've seemed awfully tense up there. I hope you can relax about it now."

"Sure." Dempsey flipped the light switch and the late autumn darkness came around them, but not before Paul caught a glimpse of the old man's face, his lips a tight straight line, eyes distant. Anything but relaxed.

34

T
HEY CAME OVER THE CREST and again the headlights panned the demolished garden and the dark lodge, its wet-looking window plastic bulging and going slack again in a slight breeze, as if the house were breathing. When Paul cut the lights, the blinding darkness seemed to suck into the cab. They both sat in the dark, unwilling to leave the warmth of the car.

"What happened when you guys went out to the shop?" Lia asked. "Did you talk to Dempsey about—?"

"Yeah. He says there are some letters he wrote to Vivien that he'd like to find."

Lia made a little noise in her throat. "Letters of a compromising sort, I take it. So Dempsey and Vivien had an affair."

Paul just looked at her, barely able to make out her silhouette in the blackness.

"I suspected as much, from the way he's been acting about this. All that melancholy, anxiety, his falling out with Vivien—"

"Well, that all blew right past
me.
Anyway, he requested that we avoid reading the letters if and when we come across them. He said he thought we should respect Vivien's privacy more too, not read any letters."

"Well, I'm not
reading
anything much, really. I certainly scan each page to see where it should be filed. It's a very fine line. Anyway, how'll we ever figure anything out? Besides, now the cat's out of the bag, right?"

Paul went to the dark kitchen to call Vivien, leaving Lia in the warmth of the smoking room, sorting papers. He shoved aside some rubble and sat on the counter, blowing steam into air as still and cold as a meat locker. Leaning forward from his seat, he could see the rectangle of bright light around the smoking room door, suspended in the cavernous darkness of the big room. A series of irresistible tics pulled the right side of his face into a snarl, and he waited for them to subside before shining the flashlight on the phone and dialing Vivien's number.

"Oh, Paulie," Vivien said. "Are you calling from Highwood?"

"I am. We just got back from dinner, and I thought I should check in." He brought her up on their activities to date.

"I'm glad you have matters so well in hand," she said when he finished. "I have been worried about . . . everything." There was a reedy, tired sound in her voice, almost a wistful quality. "Recently, I find myself feeling quite ambivalent, Paulie. There's a part of me that misses the place, that looks back fondly and wants to protect all the things I left behind. As I told you, they're the only proof I have that I've ever been young, or married, or a mother." She sighed, then went on. "The other half of me, frankly, is relieved to be out of the lonely castle on the hill, and only too eager to shed the accumulated detritus, the confining shell of my old life."

"Yes, I sense that ambivalence," Paul said carefully.

"And what about your own existential quest? No sign of Rimbaud's disease, I hope? I've wondered if it's contagious."

"No," he said. "No Rimbaud's disease."

"What about the ghosts? I'm curious as to how being at Highwood has affected you."

"I haven't encountered any ghosts, but, frankly, it's not always a lot of fun here. Working here seems to dredge up more of the past than I'm sure I want to deal with all at once."

"Now you know, to some small degree, how I would feel were I to return. Have you found any more of your father's letters?"

"No. Just a newspaper article about his death. It mentioned that he was upset over family problems. I wondered what those might have been."

"You will have to ask Aster, won't you. Of course, I can understand that you might have some reticence to do so."

"Then why'd he do it? Why'd he jump? Why did he leave his family?"

She seemed to consider how to answer him. "Your father was a complex man," she said cryptically. Then her arc of emotion abruptly changed, and her voice became acid again. "Why indeed do men do such things? Ben 'went.'Just as my husband 'went'—in a different way, but just as decisively. In fact, this is something I spoke about with your lovely-sounding wife earlier today."

"About what?"

"About the difficulties a woman encounters when her husband has chosen to 'go.'"

What she was saying didn't make sense. "Wait—you talked to Lia about this?"

"Lia? Oh, heavens,
nolfanet.
I had a lovely talk with her today. I'm sorry—I should have said your
ex-wife,
shouldn't I? But once you've had a child with someone, how could you ever really be
ex
anything? Of course, that may be a sentiment your generation is incapable of feeling."

Paul felt tumbled off balance. Calling Janet—during ten years of marriage, he wasn't sure he'd ever so much as mentioned Vivien to her.

"Why did you want to talk to Janet?"

"Why indeed would I do that? I didn't. She called me." Vivien's voice hardened further. "It seems she wanted to know some details about your employment at Highwood. Such as how long you were likely to remain employed and how much you were getting paid. It sounded as though you two were not on the best of terms at the moment. If I were you, Paulie, I would consider looking into legal advice. You know what I'm talking about."

Paul felt his breath go out of him.
Child custody.
Janet's making calls could only mean she was planning something ugly.

He realized he hadn't said anything for some time when Vivien spoke again. "Are you there, Paulie?"

"I'm here."

"Oh, good. One never knows, at Highwood—so often the lines go down."

Paul slid off the counter and began to pace at the end of the telephone cord, his boots crunching on the broken china littering the floor. He remembered what he'd learned about dealing with Vivien and Royce: fight back. Slip the punch, counter hard. "Vivien, I'd like to keep Mark, and my marriage situation, and any existential problems you think I have, out of our discussions. I'm here to do a job. That's all."

"Calm down," Vivien said, a note of command in her voice. "Do you feel I'm being intrusive? How do you think I feel—my whole life spread out for you and your little girlfriend and who knows how many others to paw through? You have no doubt seen many things I would just as soon keep private. I rather enjoy the idea that we're a little more even now. I never solicited any contact with your wife—your
ex
—and frankly, I'd just as soon not be drawn into your tawdry affairs. You can spare me your righteous indignation."

He wondered how she would react if he told her he'd seen Royce, if he told her what Royce had said about her, but he restrained himself. It was one thing learning to spar with these Hoffmanns; it was another thing entirely to become one of them.

Suddenly the light changed in the kitchen, and Paul turned to see Lia at the open smoking room door, light spilling from behind her and silhouetting the sweet woman-shape of her body. She made jabbering motions with her hands, then stepped back inside.

"Vivien, I'd like to get going now. It's after midnight here."

"I'd much prefer we didn't end this conversation on such a sour note, nephew."

"Wouldn't that be nice."

"I had so hoped we could chat about something more pleasant. Our neurological hobby, for example. I've decided I have a problem with my glucocortinoids. They're the chemicals you manufacture to cope with stress or crisis. But too much in your bloodstream can be bad for you—high blood pressure and so on."

"Vivien, I'd love to talk with you about this, but it'll have to be some other time."

"You should look into glucocortinoids, Paulie. They're very interesting."

"I'll do that." The heat of Paul's anger had given way to a chill, and he wanted only to get back into the warm room with Lia.

"Yes, do. Sometimes these things run in families." Suddenly she burst into full-throated laughter, startling him. She gained control over herself with difficulty. "Good night, nephew," she said, and hung up.

After midnight, too late to call Janet. No sense in making her angrier than she already was. It would have to wait until morning. He took a few deep breaths to calm himself, then crossed the main hall to the smoking room. Lia sat in one of the wing chairs, eyes shut, hands crossed in her lap.

"I thought you'd never finish," she said, not opening her eyes.

"Yeah. Well. She seemed to want to yak at me. I'm sorry. Find anything interesting in here?" They unconsciously tended to speak in low voices in here, he realized, as if not wanting to attract attention to their presence in the empty house.

"I didn't do much. Got too tired." Lia yawned. "Same stuff I've been looking at all day—old bills, newspaper clippings, how-to pamphlets on raising bonsai. Oh, and medical papers. Apparently Vivien liked to correspond with doctors."

"Tell me about it," Paul said dryly.

They brought the lantern with them through the wrecked house, Paul uncomfortably aware of how its hiss deafened him. The harsh white light threw monstrous shadows on the walls as they crossed the main room. It was a relief to get into the simplicity of the carriage house, to dowse the noisy lantern and light a candle.

They undressed and got into the sleeping bags. Paul had just snuffed the candle when the telephone in the lodge began ringing. He groaned, Lia got up on one elbow. They listened to the ringing, on and on, in the darkness. It rang forty-three times.