The Clutter Box

Chapter 10

  I didn’t have to wait long before I got a call from Dr Thorn saying she’d received the data. It all went quite quickly - when Adrian Ward could be bothered, that is.

  I told Bruce “We’d best be getting back to London.” He nodded and, pressing a button on the console screen, we were on our way to our preset destination.

  I wished I’d handled the situation a little better. The whole confrontation caught me off guard and, though I ultimately got the desired result, I would have liked to have presented myself with a bit more confidence.

  I blamed Dr Thorn for dropping me into it unprepared. I didn’t know if I’d get the position in London, I could have ended up back in Birmingham with Ward. It was selfish of her to involve me.

  “I’m glad that’s over with,” I told Bruce.

  Bruce rotated his chair and looked at me, “Did it go smoothly, Sir? You took your time.”

  “Did I? Yes. There were obstacles. I’m not really happy about how it went.”

  “Wish you could redo it all, do you, Sir?”

  “Huh? No, no, I’m glad it’s over. Thorn has the data and that’s the end of it.”

  “Don’t let the little demons get you down, Sir.”

  “You can telepathically tell what's troubling me?”

  “Well, yes, Sir, but that’s not what I meant. I know what it’s like regretting things. I regret how I treated my wife.”

  There was a silence. I felt uncomfortable discussing something that was obviously was still torturing his brain. But then again he did bring it up.

  Awkwardly, I approached the subject, “From what I could tell, from your daughter, your wife loved you very much.”

  “We were always close. We were very happy together. I made every effort to always make her happy.”

  “So, it wasn’t your fault. Whatever drove her to suicide-”

  I stopped myself. What had given me the arrogance to think I should talk about such a sensitive subject, to him. I could see his face breaking up. He buried his face in his hands.

  Looking up again, he spoke. His voice heaving with distress, “My wife, you see, she was driven to death by her other organs - they were suicidal, not her. They told her that she should eat things. Stuff that would destroy her body from the inside.”

  He bit his tongue, still looking at me. I could tell he was trying to gauge how crazy he seemed. Then he stopped caring and continued.

  He said, “They made it a compulsive habit, for her to swallow things, to overdose on pills, to drink cleaning fluid. They drove her crazy until they got what they wanted. What kind of life is it, eh? For them. Her internal organs hated her beautiful brain. We had twenty years of happy marriage.” He paused and looked down at his knees, “It was very sad.”

  I said, “I’m sorry to hear that,” then, after a silence, patted him on his shoulder.

  “You must think I’m mad, talking like this,” he said, looking up.

  “No,” I said. Then, thinking I should offer some personal information to redress the balance, I said, “My telepath says I drove my mother away.”

  He looked up and said, “Yes, I know that, Sir, but you were only eight. It’s her fault, really.”

  That took me aback, “Thanks,” I muttered, guardedly, “You could tell telepathically, right? You’ve not been given access to that data.”

  Bruce seemed to have cheered up now that the conversation had moved on.

  “Of course. Things like that are confidential, I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

  “You scan people without permission?”

  “I don’t scan people, not like normal telepaths do. Dr Thorn says that I get it all direct. Normal telepaths receive the information via an alternative, third hand, mechanism.”

  I told him, “I met my telepath face to face for the first time. That’s why I was delayed.”