The Man Who Loved Women to Death (27 page)

D
EAR HOAGY,

Funny, isn’t it, how sometimes the work just erupts right out of you and other times you can’t make it happen no matter how hard you try? I had no problem writing chapters two and three, for example. But this chapter I just couldn’t seem to lick. I don’t know why. I guess if I knew why then I would have been able to lick it, right? Boy, what a doof I am sometimes!

This chapter you are holding, chapter 4, was originally supposed to be chapter 2. I started it more than a week ago. When I ran into trouble with it I decided to set it aside for a few days. I remember you said once in an interview that it’s important to keep on working, and so that’s what I did. I wrote the next chapters out of order and changed the dates around. I hope this doesn’t confuse you. I didn’t think it would much matter. The main thing is that the problem worked itself out. At least I think it did. I’m still not a hundred percent sold on the way this one ends. It feels a tiny bit sudden to me. If you have any ideas for improving it, please advise. You are the master. I am an apprentice.

Which reminds me: In response to your personal ad, which I am absolutely positive you did not write yourself, I’d just as soon keep our relationship the way it is. Especially since it would appear that the police are running your life now. Which I have to tell you really pisses me off. And you do not want to be around me when I am pissed off. But I have decided to forgive you. You probably had no say in this matter. They run everyone’s life, even yours. They were certainly all over the place at Barney Greengrass for our supposed meeting, weren’t they?

Really, who do they think they are fooling?

I have to say, in all modesty, that I’m quite pleased with the progress we’re making. Didn’t I tell you this would be big? Your phone should start ringing with mega-dollar offers any second now. Why, the
Daily News
ran twelve whole pages just on ME yesterday! And last night I dropped into Pete’s Tavern for a beer and I heard these three women going on and on about some guy and
—
guess what
—
they were talking about ME! What a trip! I guess you’re used to that. Hearing strangers talking about you. But for me this was a first. It excited me.

What do you think of Keanu Reeves? For the movie, I mean. I was thinking he would make a really good me. Who do you see in the role of you? I was thinking about Kevin Costner, or is he too bland? How about Alec Baldwin? Too oily?

I’ll be watching the
Times
every day for word from you on the offers that are coming in. I can’t wait, Hoagy.

Yours truly,

the answer man

p.s. Johnny Depp as Lieutenant Very, am I right?

4. the answer man changes channels

New York City, December 7

Friend E—This particular one was sitting cross-legged on the carpet in the Meditations section of that big Barnes and Noble on Broadway and West 82nd Street. Biggest damned bookstore you’ve ever seen, E. Not to mention one total female mosh pit. I’m talking motherlode here, thousands and thousands of square feet of hopelessly lonely career honeys searching for their white knight. Or their black knight. Or their brown or yellow knight. Or any color of knight at all. Just so long as he has a clean dick and doesn’t sell drugs for a living. They have a coffee bar there even. No alcohol though, which I consider a big mistake. Without some Chardonnay going down, these honeys seemed all the more grim and desperate to me. At least the wine gives them, however briefly, the illusion that they are glad to be alive. These girls, whew, I could see the tombstones in their eyes.

She was reading some piece of shit called
14,000 Ways to Stay Happy.
I eased on over to her and said It would make a lot more sense if they wrote a book called
14,000 Ways to Stay Unhappy,
don’t you think? Presenting myself as some sad, lonely jerk in search of suckling at her breast.

What’s my motto, E? Do I have to say it again? Didn’t think so.

And, besides, she did have herself a pair of them inside of that black sweater. She was a skinny little thing otherwise. Wore an oversized man’s tweed jacket over her sweater, looked like it came from a secondhand store, black leggings and a pair of clogs. She was young, 23 tops. Had long, shiny black hair she wore in braids, freckles, a cute little turned-up nose, a big dimply smile. Said her name was Francie Sherman.

Right away, I knew what I wanted to do with Francie.

There was some kind of musical instrument case on the floor next to her. Also a zippered leather portfolio. I said Are you a musician? And Francie said Yes, in this life I am. And I said This life, what do you mean? And she said I am a very spiritual person. With the help of a channeler, I’ve been able to uncover a lot about my past lives. I did the cave thing, for instance, thousands and thousands of years ago. Then I was in Egypt in the time of the pharaohs. And, more recently, I was in the Mafia in Newark in 1952, when I killed my brother in a dispute over drug territory. I feel I’ve been brought back in this life to be a healer. I heal through my flute. So I said Oh really? I play the guitar some. Maybe we could try playing together. And she said Well, I really only play classical. I’m studying at Juilliard. I also do art in my spare time.

Now she unzipped the portfolio on the floor so as to show me some of her art, E. Watercolors of flower petals, mostly. Weird-looking shit done with some kind of a sponge. Francie explained that they were in fact interpretations of her own vagina. You know me, E. I’m no genius. But if this shit was art then we both picked the wrong career.

This wasn’t art. This was a cry for help.

Helluva nice-looking pussy on her, though. In this life, I mean.

She talked about us maybe getting a double espresso at the cafe. But as you know, Friend E, it is not advisable for me to be seen lingering in such places. In fact, we were already hanging maybe a little bit too long where we were, people walking back and forth. All I wanted to do was get her home so I could show her this stranger’s kindness. My hands tingled at the prospect. My instrument burned a hole in my pocket. I told her I had to be heading on out. She said she was walking down to Lincoln Center for some recital. I said I was going in the same direction. We headed on out.

It was a clear evening, not too cold. Still pretty early. I suggested we stroll by way of Riverside Park, it being so peaceful down there by the 79th Street boat basin and everything. She said that would be fine. She felt safe with me. They all do, E. Have you noticed that? It’s a gift I have, no question.

After walking a while we stopped and sat on a bench overlooking the Hudson, which smelled like, well, human shit. Am I the only one who seems to notice that? Do you stop noticing it after you’ve been in town for a few weeks or what? There were a few winterized houseboats with lights on in the boat basin not far from where we sat. That’s pushing it, E. Living on a houseboat in New York in the winter. Got to be a little whacked to do that. But not in a good kind of way. Just in a stupid way. We saw a few joggers go by in the darkness, speaking of whacked. Mostly, we had the park to ourselves.

Francie didn’t seem to be in any huge hurry to get to her recital. Which was just as well, E. Because, between you and me, she wasn’t going to be making it tonight. She pulled her flute out and started playing on it for me, something real soft and slow and boring. It may have been some famous piece of classical music for all I know. You know me, E. My musical education begins and ends with The King. Would have wigged completely without him when I was in the cage. Three hats, a cot and Elvis to get me through my days and nights … Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you.

And then she stopped playing and took hold of my hand and suddenly things turned real ugly. First she started telling me all about how I need to stop suppressing my true inner self. You may remember from group, E, how much I like to be talked to this particular way. Then she said You know, I’m not saying any of this to be critical, I just feel really close to you right now and I sense you’re holding back.

And THEN she was all over me, E. I mean, this Francie went from zero to sixty in no time. Her tongue down my throat. Her fingers working my zipper. And just like that I had totally lost control of the situation. I hate that.

I really, really hate that.

I want to be the one who’s running the moment. It’s MY moment. That’s my purpose. That’s what I do. That’s who I am, you know what I’m saying? Sure you do. But she didn’t. Not even when I said No. She just came at me even harder there on that damned bench. Was all over me. Bitch would have raped me if I hadn’t brained her with her flute, which surprised her more than it did anything else. Weird how they always end up surprised, isn’t it?

Because they asked for me, didn’t they?

They prayed for me, didn’t they?

Now she got mad. Started calling me nasty names. Ruining it. Making it ugly and mean and awful, instead of the something beautiful that it was meant to be. It took a nice, big rock to shut her up. I hit her in the side of her head with it, hard. Then I got out my instrument and I put that poor miserable creature out of her misery. But it was no good, E. It wasn’t right. I was shaking with rage and this weird, animal cry was coming from my throat. This wasn’t me. None of it. This play was busted. Besides which some jogger could come by any minute and see me.

Time to break for daylight, make something happen.

I hid her under a bunch of leaves. Prayed nobody came by walking their dog for a while. Went straight to my jack rack, got what I needed, stashed it in my long duffel. Waited until it was late and I was sure no one would be out. Then I went back there. She was right where I’d left her, undisturbed. I finished the job. Then I came back and showered and changed. Hit a couple of spots I know. Drank some shots and some beer and felt better. But not happy. I wasn’t feeling happy, E. Because Francie ruined it. I tried to perform an act of kindness and goodness and she ruined it.

But, hey, there’s always next time, right? I mean, you got to keep a positive attitude or you’ll go crazy or something, right?

You hang in there, Friend E. I’m trying my best at this end. Sometimes they just make it kind of hard on a man, that’s all.

Your pal, T

p.s. I don’t know what this says about me but I really, really don’t like to lose control of the situation

I
T TOOK TWENTY MEN
two hours to find her. Francie Sherman was buried in a grove of trees a hundred yards from the boat basin, two feet down, with dead leaves heaped over her crude grave. She had been down there in that cold ground for at least a week.

I waited on a bench overlooking the river while they searched, hands buried deep in the pockets of my greatcoat, Lulu curled between my feet. It was a gray, blustery day. The water was choppy and foul. Romaine Very was around, but he didn’t bother to say anything to me. He knew I was there. He’d known Francie was there, too. Or somewhere. A Juilliard classmate had reported her missing the same day as the failed rendezvous at Barney Greengrass. Said no one had seen or heard from her in days. Said she was slender and pretty and possessed a most fetching smile. But it wasn’t until Chapter Four came in the mail two days later that Very or anyone else knew where to find the answer man’s second victim.

There was no whoop of triumph when they did. Just a quickening of footsteps as they gathered around the grave. Followed by a ghastly silence. One young patrolman staggered over to a trash can and was sick in it.

She was missing her head and her hands. They’d been chopped clean off with an ax or a hatchet or something that did the job like an ax or a hatchet. The two question marks, in Revlon Orange Luminesque, were drawn on the inside of her right forearm.

They did keep searching. Must have turned over every leaf in Riverside Park. But Francie’s head and hands were nowhere to be found. Her parents, who drove in at once from Cranston, Rhode Island, identified her by a birthmark on her right hip and an X ray of her left leg, which she had broken skiing in New Hampshire when she was twelve. The pin was still in there.

No one who worked or shopped at the Barnes and Noble on Broadway and West Eighty-second Street remembered seeing Francie Sherman sitting on the floor in the Meditations section reading a book called
14,000 Ways to Stay Happy.
Which does happen to be a real book. And which did enjoy a brisk upsurge in sales, thanks to all the free publicity. No one remembered her, period. It’s a big store, lots of people coming and going. Plus, over a week had gone by. There was no reason anyone would remember seeing her sitting there. No reason at all. There had been nothing special about Francie Sherman in life. Only in death.

As for the answer man, this was something new and entirely disturbing. He hadn’t mutilated a victim before. I suppose it was the savagery of it, the pure evil that this innocent victim’s headless and handless corpse represented. I can’t say for sure. All I know is that the story lifted right off after this, soaring up into that rare air where only the choicest few, like O.J. and Susan Smith and the Menendez brothers, Erik and Lyle, can live and breathe. The answer man became front-page news all over the world. And that meant every greasy lawyer and agent and bottom feeder in the business wanted their shot, their share, their piece of the action. And now.

Four major publishing houses were already right in the middle of it. Before Francie’s headless body was found, the bidding had climbed to $2 million for what was, to date, less than forty pages of a work-in-progress by an unknown author. God, I love the book business sometimes. I said I would have to contact my “partner” to get his feedback. And I did. I placed a personal ad on the front page of the
Times,
duly cleared by Feldman, that read: “My hands are untied. I am talking to you. What is our price? And will we stop this if we get it?”