The Traveller (58 page)

By why him and not me?

Where is he?

‘So, doc, what’s bugging you? You look like you’ve got one foot in the grave.’

‘Yeah. You gonna take us with you?’

This prompted nervous laughter from the room. , Martin Jeffers looked up and saw that it was Bryan and Senderling asking the questions. But all the men’s faces wore the same impatient inquisitiveness.

His first reaction was to ignore the questions and try to launch the group into another direction. That would have been the proper technique. After all, the group’s focus should be on themselves, not on the group leader. But at the same time he was filled with an insistent anger that told him to throw away all the precious tenets of his profession and rely, for a moment, on the street smarts of the men.

Do I look that bad?’ he asked the assembly.

There was a momentary silence. The direct question surprised them. After a moment Miller growled from the back of the room:

‘Yeah, you look bad. Like something’s on your mind…’

He laughed cruelly.

‘… which sure is a change.’

Again quiet dominated the room until Wasserman sputtered:

‘If you d-d-d-don’t f-f-f-feel so hot, we c-c-c-can come back tomorrow …’

Jeffers shook his head. ‘I feel fine. Physically.’

‘So what is it, doc? You got some kind of emotional flu?’ This was Senderling, and Bryan laughed with him. That was a good image: emotional flu. I’ll use that, someday, Jeffers thought.

‘I’m concerned about a friend,’ he said.

There was a pause before Miller jumped back in. ‘You’re a hell of a lot more than concerned,’ he said. ‘You’re worried sick. Hell, I ain’t a doctor, but I can see that. Something a lot more, huh? More than just concern?’

Jeffers didn’t answer. He searched the eyes, glowing about him, and thought the twelve men were like some damned jury waiting for him to slip and convict himself from his own words. He fixed his eyes on Miller.

‘Tell me,’ he said, filling his voice with insistence. ‘Tell me how you got started.’

‘What do you mean?’ Miller replied, shifting in his seat.

Like all sex offenders, he hated a direct question, preferring to be queried in some oblique fashion so that he could control the route of the conversation. Jeffers thought they were all probably taken aback by bluntness.

‘I want to know how you got started doing what you do.’

‘You mean, the, uh …’

‘That’s right. What you dp to women. Tell me.’

The room had gone completely quiet. The forcefulness of Jeffers’ demand had stopped all of them. He knew that

he was violating established procedures. But suddenly be was tired of rules, tired of waiting, tired of passivity

‘Tell me!’ His voice was raised louder than it had ever been within the confines of the day room.

‘Hell, I don’t know …’

‘Yes, you do!’ Jeffers eyed all the men. ‘You all know. Think back! The first time. What went through your mind? What started you?’

He waited.

Pope broke the silence. Jeffers looked at the older man, who stared back with obvious hatred for anyone who probed at his memory. ‘Opportunity,’ he said.

‘Please explain,’ Jeffers replied.

‘We all knew who we were. Maybe we hadn’t quite said it to ourselves yet. Maybe the words hadn’t formed in the head, the way they do, but still, we knew, you know. And so it became a matter of waiting for the right opportunity. The demand was there, doc. You know you’re gonna do something, you know. It’s gonna happen. It just needs the right — I don’t know what do you call it — circumstances …’

He saw heads start to nod in agreement.

‘Sometimes’ — it was Knight, interrupting — ‘once you make the decision to be what you are, it like takes over. You just start looking. Looking and looking and looking. Nothing’s gonna come along and change anything, because it’s already all set. You’re looking. And when you find what you’re looking for …’

‘I s-s-s-still hated it,’ Wasserman interrupted jerkily.

‘So did I,’ said Weingarten. ‘But that didn’t mean a thing.’

‘Right.’ It was Pope again. ‘It didn’t mean nothing …’

Parker: “Cause once you’re started, it’s happening, man.’

Meriwether: ‘Whether you hate it, or you hate yourself, or hate the person you’re going to do it to, it makes little difference.’

Martin Jeffers absorbed the men’s words.

‘But the first time …” he started, only to have Pope jump in.

“You don’t understand! The first time is only the firs-time it happens physically! In your head, man, in your head, you’ve already done it a hundred times! A million!’

‘To whom?’ Jeffers asked.

‘To everyone!’

Jeffers thought hard.

He saw the men sitting forward, on the edges of their chairs, anticipating his questions. They were alert, interested, excited, more engaged than he’d seen them before. He saw the predatory ridge in their eyes, and thought of all the people who’d seen the same hard look before being smothered, or choked and beaten and then violated.

‘But there had to be something,’ he asked slowly. ‘There had to be some moment, or some word, or something had to happen that allowed you to become what you are …’

He stared hard at the men.

‘Something allowed you. What?’

Again silence. The men were considering the question.

Wasserman stuttered: ‘I r-r-r-remember my m-m-m-mom telling me I’d n-n-n-never be the m-m-m-man my d-d-d-daddy was. I never f-f-f-forgot that, and when I d-d-d-did it the f-f-f-first time, it was all I could t-t-t-think about.’

He looked about the room and his stutter evaporated for an instant:

‘And I damn well was!’

‘Well, it wasn’t anything like that for me,’ Senderling said. ‘It was just I got tired of waiting, you know. I mean there was this one gal in the office, a real tease, you know, and, man, I guess everybody had a piece of her action, so I just took mine.’

Bryan snorted. ‘You mean she wouldn’t go out with you.’

‘No, no, it wasn’t like that.’

The men started to hoot.

Bryan kept at it. ‘She turned you down and so you waited for her in her apartment building’s garage. You told me about it yourself’

‘She was a bitch,’ Senderling said. ‘She deserved it.’

‘Just because she said no?’ Jeffers asked.

‘Right!’

“But why did you decide to do it this time? Other women had told you no, certainly,’ Jeffers asked.

“Because, because, because … well …’

He waited.

‘Because I was alone. My sister and brother-in-law, that jerk, had finally moved out, and I didn’t have to support his lazy ass anymore, or hers, ‘cause all they did was lie around fucking like a pair of fucking rabbits while I was doing all the work and bringing home the fucking paycheck so we could at least eat. And so I kicked ‘em out. And then the bitch wouldn’t go out with me! Christ, she deserved it.’

‘So you were free?’

‘Yeah! Right. Free. Free to do what I fucking well wanted.’

Jeffers looked around the room again.

‘Something freed all you men?’

He saw heads slowly nod in agreement.

‘Talk about it.’

He saw hesitation.

Knight said: ‘It’s different for everyone.’

Weingarten added: ‘It can be a big thing, or a little one, but…’

Knight repeated: ‘It’s different for everyone.’

Martin Jeffers took a deep breath. All is lost, he thought. Then he asked:

‘Suppose it was more. More than just what you’ve done, suppose you went a step further.’

The men seemed to rock under the suggestion.

‘There’s only one more step,’ said Pope. ‘You know what that is.’

‘Why didn’t you?’

‘Maybe some of us have,’ said Meriwether. ‘Not me, you know, I’m not admitting anything. But maybe some of us have.’

‘What would allow you to do it?’

The men didn’t reply.

Jeffers waited. He, too, said nothing.

‘Why do you need to know?’ Meriwether asked.

He hesitated, trying to choose his words carefully.

I need to find someone.’

Someone like us?’ Bryan questioned.

Someone like you.’

‘Someone worse?’ It was Senderling.

Jeffers shrugged.

‘Someone you know well?’ Senderling tried again.

‘Yes. Someone I know well.’

‘And you think he’s gone someplace and you can figure it out, is that it?’ Parker asked.

‘More or less.’

‘Someone real close?’ Senderling asked again.

Jeffers fixed him with a stare and didn’t reply.

‘You figure we can help you?’ Weingarten said.

‘Yes,’ Jeffers replied.

Weingarten laughed. ‘Well, damned if I don’t think you’re right.’

‘This someone,’ Parker questioned, ‘he’s at it right now?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you need to get to him to make him stop?’

‘Yes.’

‘Or something . , .’”

‘Right,’Jeffers said. ‘Stop or something.

‘It’s r-r-r-real important?’ Wasserman jumped in.

‘Yes.’

Miller started to laugh hard. ‘Well, fuck you, doc. This puts things in a whole new light.’

‘Yes, it does,’ Jeffers said. He stared hard at Miller, who instantly stopped laughing.

‘Well, tell us some more.’

Jeffers hesitated.

‘I think,’ he said slowly, ‘that he’s visiting the scenes of some crimes.’

Miller laughed again, but less maliciously. ‘The criminal returns to the scene of the crime?’

‘I suppose.’

Miller grinned. ‘Maybe it’s a cliche, but it’s not so stupid. Crimes become memories, you know. And everybody likes to visit their pleasant memories.’

‘Pleasant?’ Jeffers questioned.

The men in the group laughed and snorted.

‘Haven’t you learned anything here?’ Miller asked. The rapist’s voice was rife with sarcasm. Jeffers ignored the question and Miller continued: ‘Everything’s turned around for men like us! We love what we hate. We hate what we love. Pain is pleasure. Love is hurt. Everything’s skewed about and upside down and backwards. Can’t you see that? Christ!’

And suddenly he could.

‘So,’ Miller said, and the men around him joined their heads in nodding agreement, ‘look for a memory that’s filled with all the worst. And that will be the best.’

Jeffers took a deep breath, scared of the thoughts that started to gather and form, like great storm clouds in his imagination. He looked up as Pope, grizzled, tattooed, filled to completion with anger and hatred and irrevocable in his antipathy to the world, spoke in a low, awful voice:

‘Look for a death or departure. They’re the same. That’s what cuts you loose. Someone dies and you’re free to be yourself. It’s simple. It’s fucking simple. Look for a death.’

The first image that flitted into his head was the darkness trapped in the trees on the night they were abandoned in New Hampshire. I went there, he told himself. I went back to that memory and he was nowhere to be found! That’s where he was supposed to be and he wasn’t.

But another image forced itself into his mind.

Another night.

And not a departure, but a death.

He slid his head into his hands, ignoring the way the men grew silent in the room around him.

I know, he told himself.

I know where my brother is going.

Jeffers looked up at the ceiling, and the white paint seemed to spin about, dizzyingly, for just an instant. How could you not have seen it? he said to himself. It’s clear. It’s obvious. How could you be stumbling about so blindly? Anger, sadness, hope, and despair all rushed through his body. He knew he had to get there, he knew he had to leave right away. Time suddenly bore its great weight down

on top of him and he felt trapped in its vise grip. He exhaled slowly, gathering himself together. He looked out at the men, whose eyes were alive, expectant.

‘Thank you,’ he said.

He stood up.

‘There will be no more sessions. Not for a few days. Check the ward announcements for their resumption. Thank you again.’

He saw a great surge of angry disappointment in the men. They are curious, he thought. They like to gossip and be in the know as much as anyone. He would not apologize, and, instead, he ignored the murmuring, excited sounds from the group, pitching headlong into the darkest nights of his own memory. I know, he said to himself again. I know.

He thought of the detective waiting for him in his office.

She will be watching. She will be alert for any change.

For an instant he felt a terrible sadness.

Then he turned from the men and walked steadily out. As he closed the door, he heard their excited voices join together. He shut them from his mind, concentrating on the importance of the next hours. He toughened himself inwardly. Be careful. Show nothing, he told himself. Show nothing at all.

Martin Jeffers stepped quickly away from the door, and the voices faded. He picked up his pace as he headed through the wards. His walk became a quick march, and, finally, a jog, his shoes making a slapping sound as they hit the linoleum floor. He ignored the surprised eyes of patients and staff as he broke into a run, his breath coming hard, oblivious to everything save the knowledge that vibrated in his head. I know, he repeated, over and over. I know.

He slowed as he entered the corridor where his office was located. He waited, catching his breath, thinking of the detective again. Then, composed, he slowly walked the last hundred feet, devising his escape.

Detective Mercedes Barren was standing, staring through

the window, when Martin Jeffers entered the room. He beat her to the punch:

Anything happen? Any news?’

She hesitated. ‘That was my question for you.’

He shook his head, avoiding her glance momentarily. He

stiffened himself. Meet her eyes, he insisted inwardly. So rhe aised his head as he took a seat behind his desk. No,’ he told her. ‘I’ve heard nothing. I told the switchboard operator that I was to be paged for any call, regardless of whether I was in a session or not. So far, nothing.’

Detective Barren dropped into a seat across from him.

‘What about at your home?’

‘I left the answering machine on.’ He picked up his telephone and opened the desk drawer, producing a small black device. ‘It’s got one of those playback thingamijigs,’ he said. ‘We can check.’ He dialed his home phone number and put the electronic instrument to the receiver. There was a series of squeaks and beeps before the tape started to play.