Victims (21 page)

“I had no idea she was aware of it.”

“Quite aware. She read about some case in the paper and remembered you. We were having lunch and she pointed to your name. Quite tickled, really. ‘This was one of my trainees, Trude. Bright boy,
very inquisitive. I kept him away from the nasty stuff but apparently I only whetted his appetite.’ ”

“Any idea what she was protecting me from?” I said.

“I assumed the dangerous patients.”

“In Specialized Care.”

“Mother felt they were untreatable. That nothing psychology or psychiatry had to offer could put a dent in personality issues of that severity.”

“Did she herself ever work with patients there?”

“If she did, she never shared that,” said Trude Prosser. “Not only was she ethical, she avoided talking to us about work, in general. But she was at V-State for years, so it’s possible she circulated there. How much time did you spend with her, Alex?”

“A memorable month,” I said.

“She was a wonderful mother. Father died when we were young and she raised us by herself. One of my brother’s teachers once asked her what the secret was to raising such well-behaved kids, did she have some kind of psychological formula?”

She laughed. “The truth is, at home we were wild animals but we knew enough to fake it on the outside. Mother nodded gravely and told the woman, ‘It’s very simple. I lock them in a root cellar and feed them crusts and stagnant water.’ The poor thing nearly fell over before she realized Mother was having her on. Anyway, sorry I can’t help more.”

“This is going to sound strange, but did the issue of question marks ever come up?”

“Pardon?”

“A child who drew question marks. Did your mother ever allude to something like that?”

“No,” she said. “Really, Mother’s patients never came up, period. She was ironclad about confidentiality.”

“Did she ever mention a teacher named Marlon Quigg?”

“Marlon,” she said. “Like the fish. Now, that I can say yes to. I remember
the name because it became a bit of family entertainment. Mag—my brother—was home from college and had quickly regressed to being a loudmouthed oaf. So when Mother announced that someone named Marlon was coming over, could we please make ourselves scarce and not intrude, it was an obvious cue for Mag to get obnoxious. Insisting to Mother we should ply Mr. Fish with tuna salad and watch him wax cannibalistic. Of course Ava—my sister—and I thought that was hilarious, though we were old enough not to act like blithering idiots. But Mag brought that out in us, when he was home, we all regressed. And of course that spurred Mag on and he began making more terrible puns—Marlon had no sole, Marlon was getting crabby, what a shrimp. Et cetera. When Mother stopped laughing, she demanded that we not show our faces until the poor boy left because he was a teacher at V-State going through a rough patch and needed some bucking up.”

“She called Quigg a boy?”

“Hmm,” said Trude Prosser. “It was long ago, but I believe I’m recalling accurately. He wasn’t of course, he must’ve been a man. Being a teacher. But perhaps his vulnerability made her think of him as a child. Anyway, we knew better than to mess with Mother when she was waxing clinically protective, so we went to a movie and by the time we got back, it was just Mother in the house.”

“Did Quigg ever show up again?”

“If he did, I’m unaware. You’re wondering if something happened back then that ties in to his murder? Some homicidal patient killed him after all these years?”

“Right now the investigation’s pretty much dead-ended so we’re looking at everything. Is there anyone else I might talk to who’d remember those days at V-State?”

“Mother’s boss was a psychiatrist named Emil Cahane. I think he was the assistant director of the hospital, or something along those lines.” She spelled the name. “I met him a couple of times—Christmas parties, that kind of thing. He came for dinner a few times. He was older than Mother, would be well into his eighties by now.”

“Did you know any of her other students?”

“She never brought students home. Or talked about them. Until she pointed out that article in the paper, I’d never heard of you.”

“So no staff person ever visited other than Marlon Quigg and Dr. Cahane?”

“Dr. Cahane coming for dinner was more social,” she said. “Besides that, nothing.”

“She told you Quigg was having a rough patch.”

“That could mean anything, I suppose. But now that I think about it, for Mother to bend her rules it must’ve been serious. So perhaps you’re onto something. But someone bearing a grudge that long? Goodness, that’s grisly.”

I said, “Your brother and sister also called me back. Think they might have something to add?”

“Mag’s a bit older so perhaps his perspective would be different, but by then he really wasn’t around very much. Ava’s the youngest, I doubt she’d know anything I don’t but give her a try.”

“I appreciate your taking the time.”

“I appreciate your getting me to talk about Mother.”

Dr. Ava McClatchey said, “Trude just called me. At first I didn’t even remember the guy’s visit. Once Trude reminded me of Mag’s stupid fish puns, I got a vague memory but nothing Trude didn’t already tell you. Got a C-section to do. Good luck.”

Dr. Magnus Vanderveul said, “Nope, we went to the movies before the fellow came over and he was gone when we came back. I did start to torment Mother with more fish puns—was he gone because she was into catch and release.” He chuckled. “The look on her face told me to cool it.”

“Upset?”

“Bothered,” he said. “Now that I think about it, that was odd. Mother was Superwoman, it took a lot to bother her.”

CHAPTER
25

I
’d never met Dr. Emil Cahane. No reason for the hospital’s deputy director to have contact with a floating intern.

If I got lucky, that would change soon.

Cahane wasn’t listed in any public directories nor was he a member of the American Psychiatric Association, any psychoanalytic institutes, or scientific interest groups. No active medical license in California; same for the neighboring states. I checked East Coast locales with high concentrations of psychiatrists. Nothing in New England, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, New Jersey. Florida, where Gertrude had ended up.

Nothing.

Well into his eighties
. The worst-case scenario loomed.

Then a search using Cahane’s name pulled up a career achievement award he’d received from the L.A. Mental Health Commission eighteen months ago.

An accompanying photo revealed a thin, hawkish white-haired
man with a crooked smile and a listing physique that suggested a stroke or other injury.

Cahane’s listed accomplishments included his years at V-State, two decades of volunteer work with abused children, foster families, and the offspring of military veterans. He’d researched post-traumatic stress disorder, closed head injuries, and integrated methods of pain control, had endowed a study of the emotional effects of prolonged parental separation at the med school cross-town where he held a clinical professorship.

The same med school had graced me with an identical title.

Twenty years of volunteer work said he’d left V-State a few years after Marlon Quigg.

I phoned the med school, got a receptionist who knew me, and asked for a current address and number for Cahane.

“Here you go, Doctor.”

Ventura Boulevard address in Encino. That had to be office space.

No active license but working? At what?

A woman answered crisply: “Cahane and Geraldo, how may I help you?”

“This is Dr. Delaware calling Dr. Cahane?”

“This is the office of
Mister
Michael Cahane.”

“He’s a lawyer?”

“Business manager.”

“I got this number from the medical school.”

“The medical school—oh,” she said. “Mr. Cahane’s uncle uses us as a mail-drop.”

“Dr. Emil Cahane.”

“What is it exactly that you want?”

“I trained under Dr. Cahane at Ventura State Hospital and was looking to get in touch.”

“I couldn’t give out his personal information.”

“Could I speak with Mr. Cahane?”

“In a meeting.”

“When will he be free?”

“How about I give him your number.” Statement, no question.

“Thanks. Please let Dr. Cahane know that another staffer from the hospital passed away and I thought he might want to know. Marlon Quigg.”

“How sad,” she said, without emotion. “You get to an age and your friends start dropping off.”

The phone rang nine minutes later. I picked it up, ready with my sales pitch for Dr. Cahane.

Milo said, “Petra and I are having a skull session, feel free.”

“When and where?”

“In an hour, the usual place.”

Café Moghul was empty but for two slumping detectives.

Milo’s Everest of tandoori lamb was untouched. Ditto, Petra Connor’s seafood salad.

His greeting was a choppy wave that could be misinterpreted as apathy. Petra managed a half smile. I sat down.

Petra’s a young, bright homicide D working Hollywood Division, a former commercial artist with an especially keen eye and a quiet, thoughtful manner that some mistake for iciness.

She’s got the kind of slender, angular good looks that, rightly or wrongly, imply confidence and imperturbability. Thick, straight black hair cut in a functional wedge is never mussed. Her makeup’s minimal but artful, her eyes clear and dark. She dresses in tailored black or navy pantsuits and moves with economy. Listens more than she talks. All in all, she comes across as the girl everyone looked up to in high school. Over the years, she’d let out enough personal details to tell me it hadn’t been that easy.

Today her lips were pallid and parched, her eyes red-rimmed.
Every hair remained in place but her hands clasped each other with enough force to blanch fine-boned knuckles. One cuticle was raw.

She looked as if she’d been on a long, harrowing journey.

Seeing it
.

She loosened her hands, placed them flat on the table. Milo rubbed the side of his nose. A bespectacled woman came over in a swoosh of red sari silk and asked what she could get me. I ordered iced tea. Petra ate a lettuce leaf and checked a cell phone that didn’t need checking.

Milo dared to fork some lamb into his mouth, grimaced as if he’d just swallowed vomit. He shoved the platter away, ran a finger under his belt, pushed his chair back a few inches, distancing himself from the notion of eating.

He looked at Petra.

She said, “Go ahead.”

He said, “Number Five is a poor soul named Lemuel Eccles, male Cauc, sixty-seven. Homeless street person, crashed in various alleys, one of which served as his final resting place. East Hollywood, specifically: just north of the Boulevard, just shy of Western, behind an auto parts store.”

I said, “Who found him?”

“Private garbage service. Eccles was left next to a Dumpster.”

“Same technique?”

Petra flinched and muttered “Dear God” before looking away. “Patrol knew Eccles, he’s got an extensive record. Aggressive panhandling, shoplifting, drunk and disorderly, creating a disturbance for shoving a tourist, he was in and out of County.”

“Your basic revolving-door juicehead nuisance,” said Milo.

She said, “Obviously, someone thought he was more than a nuisance. To do
that
to him.”

“Not necessarily,” I said.

Both of them stared at me.

“Things we’d consider petty could loom huge in our boy’s mind. Righting wrongs, real or imaginary, gives him justification to act out his body-exploration fantasies.”

Petra said, “People irk him so he
guts
them? Insane.”

Milo patted my shoulder. “Ergo
his
presence.”

She closed her eyes, massaged the lids, exhaled long and slow.

I said, “Glenda Usfel kicked him out of the clinic. Vita Berlin was constitutionally nasty, it’s not hard to imagine her getting in his face. And Mr. Eccles’s tendency to beg with a heavy hand and become rowdy while drunk would fit, too. Most people would walk away. Shearling took another approach. That section of Hollywood’s commercial and industrial. Meaning at night there wouldn’t be a lot of people around. An elderly wino snoozing in the alley would’ve been easy prey. Were there any other wounds besides the abdominal incisions?”

Petra said, “Black-and-blue mark on his upper lip, right under the nose.”

“A cold-cock, like Marlon Quigg, but from the front because Eccles was probably inebriated. Or sleeping in the alley.”

“Could be, but Eccles’s entire body was full of bruises and most of them looked old. Maybe bleeding issues due to alcohol, or he bumped into things.”

Milo said, “To me the lip bruise looked fresher, I’m betting on a cold-cock while he was out of it.”

“Or,” said Petra, “Eccles heard the bad guy approaching, stirred, and got sent back to slumberland.”

“Fine,” said Milo, “once again we’re getting a notion of how but the why’s still far from clear. Not that I don’t buy your theory about overreacting to small slights, Alex. Giving himself an excuse to do what he loves to do. But Marlon Quigg doesn’t fit any of that. Unless you found out he taught Shearling when Shearling was a tyke, rapped his knuckles with a steel ruler or something.”

“Not there yet, but I’m getting closer.” I told them what I’d learned from the Vanderveul children.

Milo said, “Quigg pays her a visit for moral support? That could mean anything.”

“Not in Gertrude’s case,” I said. “She was adamant about separating work from her home life, had never entertained anyone else from the hospital in that manner. So whatever Quigg had on his mind was serious. And she made sure her kids weren’t around to hear it.”

“Heavy-duty therapy.”

“Maybe heavy-duty advice,” I said. “Like telling Quigg to quit the hospital. And shortly after, he did. Left teaching completely and took up a whole new profession and lied to his wife about his reason.”

Petra said, “Something happened at work that freaked him out.”

“What if he came upon a patient committing acts that alarmed him and warned the staff about it? If he was ignored that could’ve been extremely upsetting. If he wasn’t, it could’ve gotten the patient a transfer to Specialized Care and earned Quigg a serious enemy.”