The Lower Deep (23 page)

Mendoza shook his head. "I don't remember leaving the house. I must have been walking in my sleep, as Henninger claims he has done so often."

Oh, Lord, Steve thought. Not another one.

"This is Sunday morning. Correct?"

"Sunday morning, yes." Steve glanced at his watch. "Going on for ten o'clock."

"I've been in Port Roche. That's all I know for sure. I woke up there yesterday afternoon, about six o'clock. No—I shouldn't say I woke up." The Cuban closed his eyes and began shaking his head, as if he might cry. "I was walking along the town's main street, it seems, and a man who knew me stopped me. When he saw something was wrong, he took me to his home. He used to crew for me when I was diving in the channel between Port Roche and Ile du Vent—a young fellow named Vendredi Malfam. I slept at his place last night, and he drove me here this morning."

"Port Roche," Steve echoed. That coastal town a few miles to the west was not as large as Cap Matelot, but was a lot bigger than Dame Marie. "Is your friend Malfam here now?"

"No, Steve. I asked him to come in, but he said he had to get back."

"On a Sunday?"

"He helps out at the church there in some way."

"So you haven't any idea where you may have been from Thursday night until a few hours ago."

"I'm sorry. No."

Steve glanced at Tom Driscoll, who had been sitting in silence, gazing fixedly at Mendoza and apparently hanging on the man's every word. "What do you think, Tom?"

Frowning at the man who had just arrived, Driscoll said, "How do you feel, Juan, other than being puzzled by your loss of memory?"

"As though I've been drunk. I can't believe I did
any drinking, though. I haven't touched any liquor since I came here and found all of you dead set against it." Mendoza hesitated. "I have a fearful headache, though. Feels as if the top of my head is about to break off."

"Welcome to the club," Steve said dryly. "A headache is our badge." He laid a hand on the younger man's shoulder. "Well, all right, Juan. We can talk more about this later. For now it would seem you've had a touch of Paul Henninger's ailment, whatever that is. By the way, he did go to Anse Douce the night you lost him in voodoo town. Some kids found his pajamas there."

"I owe him an apology, then."

"Seems you do. Anyway, go on to bed now, hey?"

Mendoza's gaze shifted from Steve to Tom Driscoll. "You two have been discussing my disappearance?"

"Among other things," Steve said. "Tom feels up to tackling some of the problems again."

"Well"—Mendoza's smile was wan—"now that I'm back, you can cross that one off the list, at least." And looking like a very tired man returning from an experience best left unremembered, he rose from his chair and walked zombielike out of the office.

When he had gone, Steve tried the phone, found it was working, and made some calls. First he called Lieutenant Etienne at the army post to report Mendoza's return. Then he called Louis Clermont and George Benson at their homes.

Learning from George that Alice Benson had also turned up, he was tempted to permit himself
a small measure of optimism. With two of the missing accounted for, perhaps there was hope that Ginny Jourdan would also be found. And—if miracles were in order—even Lawton Lindo.

He was optimistic about the girl. About the missing Azagon patient he was not, perhaps because he could never think of Lindo without recalling Elizabeth Langer's all-too-vivid description of that frightening black hole in the sea.

All day Sunday Roger Etienne and two other men in khaki, with the active help of certain townspeople, continued the search for Ginny Jourdan. By evening, miles of seashore had been covered, as had the many hectares of scrubby flatland south of town. Dozens of Dame Marie's citizens had been questioned in their homes. Local fishermen, anxious to cooperate, had even taken their boats out to comb the sea, using the outboard motors George Benson had obtained for them.

The girl remained missing.

Just before dark, while walking back to town after a visit to the Azagon, Etienne paused to rest for a moment at the cove called Anse Douce. It had been a long day. Seated on a chunk of coral, gazing along the beach, he recalled the night he had found Ginny Jourdan here.

In his mind he could see her now, strolling naked in the moonlight along the sea's edge. At the time he had felt a little disgusted, thinking he had stumbled onto one of the teenagers who occasionally used the cove for marijuana and sex
parties. Calling out to the naked figure to "hold on there, you!" he had hurried to apprehend her.

He still remembered his shock at discovering who it was. Ginny Jourdan naked on a beach at that hour? What, for God's sake, was going on?

Now, suddenly, he again saw something moving at the water's edge, a little distance from where he was sitting. Not this time a nude girl walking, but something in the surf, turning and rolling like the occasional coconut log that came ashore here.

With a shrug he went to investigate, on the odd chance it might not be something so commonplace. On seeing what it really was, he suddenly felt sick.

The thing in the surf was not driftwood. It was the naked body of what had been a man.

For a moment Etienne could only stand there ankle deep in the sea, staring at it. Then he forced himself to wade in deeper and take hold of an arm.

But it was only part of an arm. The hand was missing. And the body was only part of a body, obviously ravaged by sharks or other sea creatures. Peering into the face to see if he knew the man, Etienne saw something squirming in an otherwise empty eye socket and had to wait a minute before he could continue. Then, his lips tightly pressed and chest heaving, he dragged the body up on the beach and headed for town to get help.

Since it was not possible to drive the army jeep this far along the shore, he and a helper would have to carry the corpse to it after bringing the vehicle as close as they could. Not a pleasant prospect, especially at the end of a long and tiring day.

Steve Spence, summoned to the army post by
phone, peered at the dead man and had to turn away. When able to speak, he said woodenly, "Yes, it's Lindo."

"I am sorry," Etienne said. "You were hoping it would not be, of course. But now it seems we have to admit that Elizabeth Langer could be telling the truth about what happened when the
Ti Ma
man
disappeared."

"Yes."

"Except, of course, she said the man swimming was sucked down into that hole she talked about. Obviously he wasn't."

Realizing the other was only thinking aloud, Steve did not reply.

"I wish to God we knew what really happened out there that day," the lieutenant said then, drawing the sheet back over the dead man's rav
aged face.

W
hile the search for Ginny Jourdan intensified, Steve Spence had to think, also, of his many duties at the Azagon. Not all of his time could be devoted to the handful of patients most involved in what was happening.

In fact, more of his time than before had to be given now to those who seemed not to be directly affected. The tales had traveled all through the retreat. Patients were afraid.

On Monday, the day following the discovery of Lindo's body, he began the morning with a lecture to a group of patients on the physiological problems they were struggling with. At least, the lecture began that way, with slides to show graphically what took place when alcohol entered the bloodstream. But toward the end, questions from some of his listeners turned it into something else. Into a struggle on his part to explain what was going on.

News somehow traveled swiftly in a place such as this. St. Joe peasants were not the only ones who had a
telédiol,
it seemed. Most of the Azagon's patients had known about Lindo's disappearance. Now some of them knew his body had been found. Some were also aware that others under the Azagon's roof were behaving strangely, and they wanted answers.

The lecture over—and from his point of view a failure—Steve went on to other things. New patients had arrived in the past few days. He met with them one-on-one, asking them to talk about themselves. What were their good qualities as they recognized them? What were their troublesome ones? Their goals? Their spiritual beliefs? More often than such people realized, their spiritual state of mind was reflected in their physical state.

After lunch that Monday, a little weary, he called on Paul Henninger and found the manager sitting up in bed, reading a St. Joseph newspaper. On a chair beside the bed was a tray containing the sick man's noon meal, apparently untouched.

"Have you read this story about the boat that was lost?" Henninger said. "It's quite good."

The paper arrived daily in Dame Marie by Camion, and the shopkeeper who received it sent several copies by messenger to the Azagon. Unfortunately for most of the patients, it was in French. But Henninger read French, and with some difficulty so did Steve.

"I saw it," Steve said. "Haven't had time for it
yet. Paul, I'm sorry, but I have to tell you we haven't been able to find a replacement for you yet. It's not easy here to find anyone with the necessary experience, as I'm sure you know."

A look of something like fear briefly touched the manager's face. "Doctor, I don't want to quit. Not now!"

"What?"

"I've been thinking it over. Everyone here has problems. That's what the Azagon is all about, isn't it? And if I can't find out what's wrong with me here, what chance would I have on the outside?"

"But—"

"Dr. Driscoll came to see me this morning and said he was sure he could help me. No, no, Doctor, I don't want to leave!"

Steve stepped back and frowned at him. "Are you sure? You were eager enough to get away from here before."

"I was wrong. I hadn't thought about it enough. Anyway, I don't like unfinished business. If I left without knowing what's behind these problems of mine, I would never be wholly rid of them."

"All right." Steve turned to direct his frown at the tray of food. "What's wrong with your lunch?"

"Taste it, please."

Taking a bit of roast pork in his fingers, Steve nibbled at it and made a face. Puzzled, he said, "But wait. The rest of us had pork for lunch, and it wasn't laced with garlic like this."

"That's what it is? Garlic?"

"Seems to be."

"I wondered. Every mouthful of food brought
to this room for the past three days has been so spicy I couldn't down it. Have they lost their minds in the kitchen?"

"Every meal of yours is like this?"

"Inedible, as far as I'm concerned. And I'm puzzled. I thought the cook was rather fond of me. That I was a special pal of his, in fact."

"Damn it," Steve said. "I told him to cut down on the garlic, and I thought he had. At least, the food in the dining room has been better. I'll talk to him again." He looked at his watch. "Might as well do it right now."

Ti-Jean Lazaire was not in the kitchen, however. Nor was he in his quarters. Coming upon Circée Orelle in the downstairs hall, Steve asked the husky housekeeper if she had seen him.

Waving a dustpan in one hand, she replied with startling vehemence, "No, I haven't! But if you look in Mr. Morrison's room, you just might find him messing around in there!"

"What are you saying?"

"This morning, when I went in there to tidy up, I found him snooping around and had to order him out. He looked mighty guilty at being caught there, too, I can tell you."

"He's not supposed to be in the rooms. What exactly was he doing?"

"I haven't the slightest idea. But you just wait a minute, Doctor." Marching down the hall to a closet where she kept her brooms, Orelle jerked the door open with nearly enough force to tear it off its hinges. Snatching something from a shelf, she marched back and handed Steve a jointed
wooden rule, folded. "I found this at Mr. Morrison's window!"

"A carpenter's rule?" Steve turned the thing over in his hands and peered at it closely, but found nothing to distinguish it from any other such tool. "You mean he'd been measuring the window and left it behind when you ran him out of there?"

"I can't say what he was doing. But it was there on the sill and it doesn't belong to Mr. Morrison."

"Apparently it doesn't belong to Lazaire either." Steve was frowning now at initials burned into the wood with some kind of marking device. "Who is A.V.R.?"

"There's no one here with those initials."

"A.V.R. . . . No, I don't believe there is. Well,
commère,
if you see Lazaire, please tell him I want to talk to him." And as he went on down the hall to his office, Steve found himself remembering the measuring tape he had found at the window of Lawton Lindo's room, and the burned-out candle on the bureau there, at the time of the lawyer's disappearance.