Victims (26 page)

“How old was he?”

He shifted in his chair. “Young.”

“Pre-adolescent?”

“Eleven,” he said. “You can see how we were faced with a unique set of circumstances. He had his own room in G with an atmosphere that emphasized treatment, not confinement. You remember the array of services we offered. He made good use of our programs, caused no trouble whatsoever.”

I said, “His crime justified Specialized Care but his age complicated matters.”

He shot me a sharp look. “You’re trying to draw out details I’m not sure I’m willing to offer.”

“I appreciate your talking with me, Dr. Cahane, but without details—”

“If I’m not performing to your satisfaction, feel free to walk through that door.”

I sat there.

“I apologize,” he said. “I’m having a difficult time with this.”

“I can understand that.”

“With all due respect, Dr. Delaware, you really can’t understand. You’re assuming I’m waffling because of medico-legal constraints but that’s not it.”

He poured yet more bourbon, tossed it back. Tamped white hair, succeeded only in mussing the long, brittle strands. His eyes had pinkened. His lips vibrated. He looked like an old, wild man.

“I’m too old to care about the medico-legal system. My reservations are selfish: covering my geriatric buttocks.”

“You think you screwed up.”

“I don’t think. I know, Dr. Delaware.”

“With patients like that, it’s often impossible to know—”

He waved me quiet. “Thanks for the attempt at empathy but you can’t know. That place was a city. The director was a do-nothing ass and that left me the mayor. The buck stopped at me.”

Tears filled his eyes.

I said, “Still—”

“Please. Stop.” The soft voice, the sympathetic look. “Even if you are being sincere and not using rapport to crack me open, sympathy without context churns my bowels.”

I said, “Let’s talk about him. What did he do at eleven that his home state couldn’t handle?”

“Eleven,” he said, “and every bit a child. A small, soft, prepubescent boy with a soft voice and soft little hands and soft, outwardly innocent eyes. I held his hand as I led him to the room that would be his new home. He clutched me with fear. Sweaty. ‘When can I go back?’ I had no comforting answer but I never lie so I did what we mind-science types do when we’re flummoxed. I veered into bland reassurances—he’d be comfortable, we’d take good care of him. Then I used another tactic: peppered him with questions so I wouldn’t have to provide answers. What did he like to eat? What did he do for fun? He turned silent, and slumped as if he’d given up. But he marched on like a good little soldier, sat on his bed and picked up one of the books we provided and began reading. I stuck around but he ignored me. Finally, I asked if there was anything he needed and he looked up and smiled and said, ‘No, thank you, sir, I’m fine.’ ”

Cahane winced. “After that, I resorted to cowardice. Inquiring periodically about his progress but having no direct contact with him. The official reason was it wasn’t part of my job description, by that time I was essentially an administrator, saw no patients whatsoever. The real reason, of course, is I had nothing to offer him, didn’t want to be reminded of that.”

“He confused you.”

Instead of responding to that, he said, “I did keep tabs on him.
The consensus was that he was doing better than expected. No problems at all, really.”

Bracing his hands on the arms of his chair, he tried to get up, fell back and gave a sick smile. When I moved to help him, he said, “I’m fine,” and struggled to his feet. “Bathroom.” Tottering, he trudged through the doorway that bisected his bookshelves.

Ten minutes passed before a toilet flushed and sink-water burbled. When he returned, his color had deepened and his hands were trembling.

Settling back down, he said, “So he was doing fine. Then he wasn’t. Or so I was told.”

“By Marlon Quigg.”

“By a senior staff member who’d been informed by an intern who’d been informed by a teacher.” He sighed. “Yes, your Mr. Quigg, one of those breathlessly idealistic young men who thought he’d found a calling.”

“What did he report?”

“Regression,” said Cahane. “Severe behavioral regression.”

“Back to what brought the boy to you.”

“Dear God,” said Cahane. He laughed oddly.

I said, “Anatomical curiosity?”

His hands pressed together. He mumbled.

I said, “What was his original crime?”

Cahane shook a finger at me. I expected reproach. The finger curled, arced back toward him, hooked in an ear. He sat back. “He killed his mother. Shot her in the back of the head as she watched television. No one missed her at the farm where she cleaned barns because it was the weekend. She didn’t socialize much, it was just her and him, their home in Kan— They lived in a trailer at the edge of the farm.”

“He stayed with her corpse.”

Nod.

I went on, “Once he was sure she was dead he used a knife.”

“Knives,” said Cahane. “From the kitchen. Carving tools, as well, a Christmas gift from her. So he could whittle. He used a whetstone she’d employed when she slaughtered chickens that she brought home for their dinner. She used to slaughter the birds in front of him, wasted nothing, reserved the blood for sausage. When the police finally found her, the stench was overpowering. But he didn’t seem to mind, displayed no emotion at all. The police were stunned, didn’t know where to take him and ended up using a locked room at a local clinic. Because the jail was filled with adult criminals, no one knew what would happen to him in that environment. He didn’t protest. He was a polite boy. Later, when one of the nurses asked him why he’d stayed with the body he said he’d been trying to know her better.”

I described the wounds Shearling had left on Quigg.

He said, “The troopers who brought him also brought crime scene photos from the trailer. When I’m feeling remorseful about something, I dial those images up and make myself downright miserable. The home was a sty, utter disorder. But not his room, his room was neat. He’d decorated the walls. Anatomical charts. Hanging everywhere. Where a child that age would obtain such things baffled me. The police hadn’t been interested enough to ask but I pressed them and they made inquiries. A physician, a general practitioner to whom the boy had been taken far too infrequently, had befriended him. Because he seemed like such a
good
little boy with his interest in biology. Might very well make a
splendid
doctor, one day.”

“What do you know about his mother?”

“Reclusive, hardworking. She’d moved to town from parts unknown with a two-year-old, got the job cleaning barns and kept it. The trailer she lived in was at the far end of a wheat field. Owned by the farmer and she was allowed to live there gratis.”

“Was there evidence of premeditation?”

“He shot her while she was watching her favorite TV show. Apart from that, I couldn’t say.”

“Any remorse?”

“No.”

“How was she discovered?”

“On Monday she didn’t show up for work. The first time she’d ever missed, she was dependable, you could set your clock by her. She had no phone so a farmhand went to check, smelled the stench, and cracked the door and saw her. The boy was sitting next to her. Exploring. He’d fixed himself a sandwich. Peanut butter but no jelly.” He smiled. “The details policemen put in their reports. They found a few smudges on the charts in his room, didn’t know what to make of that. My guess is he was looking for confirmation. Between what was on the chart and what he’d … palpated. Her intestines, in particular, seemed … of interest.”

I said, “Homeschooling himself in biology. Kansas couldn’t deal so you got him.”

“Several institutions were solicited and refused. We accepted him because I was arrogant. I’m sure you’re familiar with V-State’s history, all those terrible things carried out in the name of medicine. By the time I got there—the reason I went there—all that had been expunged and we had a well-justified reputation for being humane.” He studied me. “When you were there did you find indications to the contrary?”

“Not at all. I got great training.”

“Glad to hear you say that. Glad and proud … there was the notion that he wouldn’t be safe in Kansas. Too much notoriety.”

“What caused Marlon Quigg to be concerned?”

“I’m sure you recall the beauty of our grounds.”

Apparent non sequitur. I nodded.

He said, “
Pastoral
was a term I heard bandied about quite often. Abundant flora
and
fauna.”

I said, “Animals. He trapped them. Resumed exploring.”

“Small animals,” said Cahane. “Analysis of the bones identified squirrels, mice, lizards. A garter snake. A stray cat. Birds, as well, we never figured out how he caught them. Caught any of them. He was clever enough to conceal his handiwork for months. Found a quiet
spot behind a remote storage shed, conducted his experiments, buried the remains and tidied the ground. He’d been allowed to leave the ward for two hours a day, once in the morning, once before dinner. From the body count, we estimated he worked with one creature a day.”

Tidying. I thought of the clean dirt at Marlon Quigg’s kill-site. “How was he discovered?”

“Young Mr. Quigg had grown suspicious and chose to follow him one evening. The chosen creature was a baby mole.”

“What made Quigg suspicious?”

“The boy had grown uncommunicative, even surly. Should someone else have noticed? Perhaps. What can I tell you?”

“Teachers and nurses spend a lot more time with patients than we do.”

“They do … In any event, faced with a new set of facts, we needed to shift our paradigm but we weren’t sure how. Some of the staff, most vocally Marlon Quigg, agitated for an immediate transfer to Specialized Care. Others disagreed.”

Cahane’s eyes shifted to the right. “I listened to everyone, said I’d take some time and decide. As if I was being deliberative. The truth was I was unable to make a decision. Not only because he posed problems I was ill prepared for. My own life was in shambles. My father had just died, I’d applied for positions at Harvard and UC San Francisco, had been turned down at both places. My marriage was falling apart. There had always been issues but I’d brought them to a head by straying with another woman, a beautiful, brilliant woman but, of course, that doesn’t excuse it. In a pathetic attempt to reconcile with my wife, I booked a cruise through the Panama Canal. Even under the guise of sensitivity I was being selfish, because sailing through the canal was something
I’d
always wanted.”

He picked up his glass, changed his mind, put it down hard. “Twenty-four days on a ship, preceded by several weeks on the Outer Banks of North Carolina because Eleanor hailed from there. I was
away from the hospital for forty-three days and during my absence, someone took it upon himself to deal with the boy. The psychologist who’d come to me with Quigg’s original complaint. He agreed with Quigg, viewed the boy as untreatable and tainted. His term. He was a foolish, authoritarian man, too confident in his own meager abilities. I’d long had my reservations about him but his credentials, though foreign, were excellent. As a state employee he had all sorts of contractual protection, had never made an error that would jeopardize that.”

Cahane’s shaky fingers entangled in his hair. “Then, he did. And now
this
moment has arrived.”

His eyes lost focus. “There I was, on a beautiful ship, dining, dancing. Marveling at the canal.” He poured bourbon, spilled some, studied the droplets on his sleeve. “Dear God.”

I said, “The boy was sent to Specialized Care.”

“If only that was all of it,” said Cahane. “That man, that overconfident
ass
, decided—on his own, with no evidence or prior discussion—that the boy’s problems were primarily hormonal.
Glandular irregularity
was the way he termed it. Like something out of a Victorian medical book. He prepared papers, had the boy transported to a clinic in Camarillo where he was operated on by a surgeon who lacked the judgment to question the request.”

“Thyroidectomy,” I said.

Cahane’s head jerked back. “You already know?”

“A witness described a scar across the front of his neck.”

He gripped his glass with both hands, hurled it awkwardly across the room. It landed on the carpet, rolled. “A complete thyroidectomy for absolutely no reason at all. After a week’s recuperation, the boy was transferred to Specialized Care. The quack claimed he was looking out for the boy—trying to
regulate
his behavior because clearly nothing else had worked. But I always suspected there was an element of base, vicious revenge.”

“You like to operate, Sonny? See how it feels?”

“One of the animals the boy had chosen to explore had been the fool’s unofficial pet. A stray cat that he fed from time to time. Of course he denied that this was all about
helping
the lad. I returned from my cruise, learned what had happened, was horrified, livid at my staff for not intervening. Everyone claimed they’d been unaware. I sat the bastard down, had a long talk with him, told him he was retiring and that if he ever applied for a position at another state hospital, I’d write a letter. He protested, switched to sniveling, tried to bargain, ended up making a pathetic threat: Anything he’d done had been under my supervision so I wouldn’t escape scrutiny. I called his bluff and he deflated. He was over the hill, anyway. Pushing eighty.”

He smiled. “Younger than I am today. Some of us rot more quickly than others.”

“Foreign credentials,” I said. “From where?”

“Belgium.”

My chest tightened. “University of Louvain?”

Cahane nodded. “A fussy little twit with a fussy, comical Teutonic accent who wore ridiculous bow ties and slicked his hair and strutted around as if he’d kissed Freud’s ring.”

“What was his name?”

Unnecessary request.

Cahane said, “Why the hell not? His name was Shacker.
Buhrrrn-
hard Shacker. Don’t waste your time looking for him, he’s quite dead. Suffered a heart attack the day after I fired him, collapsed right in the hospital parking lot. No doubt stress was a factor but those sandwiches he brought to staff lunches couldn’t have helped. Fatty pork and the like, slathered with butter.”