Spark: A Novel

  Dr. Rose pointed at bright and dark patches with a pencil. “As you can see, you’ve had some profound damage in the ventromedial area of the cortex—this section integrates signals from other parts of the brain to generate social reactions.”

  “And then there’s the amygdala.…” Dr. Tollner said.

  “Correct.” Rose pointed his pencil again. “You might not be able to see that. It’s about the size of an almond. But the amygdala helps us recognize threats and generates an emotional response. The sensory pathways to your amygdala have been destroyed. They may heal over time, but you’ve had some profound damage there.”

  “But I can talk and walk around the hospital.…”

  “Yes, I know. I bet you could play a round of golf, too. But there have been some problems caused by your injuries, which Dr. Tollner will discuss.”

  Tollner pushed down the computer screen, as if the dark areas of my brain were a distraction. “Mr. Davis, you are suffering from a neuropsychiatric disorder called Cotard’s syndrome. It’s named after a French neurologist who first described the condition in 1880. Patients like you exhibit the delusional belief that they are dead or somehow empty inside.”

  Tollner stopped speaking for a moment and all three Human Units stared at me. I realized that there was some significance in this moment, but I couldn’t understand its meaning. Not knowing what to say, I remained quiet. And the two silences contemplated each other.

  “Cotard’s syndrome explains your abnormal thoughts and actions. Your brain identified your mother and your girlfriend, but you couldn’t generate emotions with that act of recognition.”

  “You know you should feel, but you can’t feel,” Dr. Rose said.

  “Correct,” Tollner said. “This disconnect has to be explained by your consciousness—so you’ve come up with the delusional idea that you don’t exist.”

  “I’m sure that it must be very frightening,” Mrs. Shapiro said.

  “I’m not frightened at all.”

  “Yes. You’ve lost your sense of fear,” Dr. Rose said. “The ventromedial area of the cortex reacts to danger and helps us make moral decisions. This is a neurological issue, Mr. Davis. But you’ve come up with a supernatural explanation.”

  Once again, there was a moment of silence as the two doctors and Sandy Shapiro glanced at each other.

  “So how do you feel about all this?” Mrs. Shapiro asked with a soft voice.

  “I have explained my condition to Dr. Tollner. My Spark exists and my Shell reacts to stimuli. The rest is darkness.”

  “But that’s wrong,” Dr. Tollner said, slapping the word onto the table. “That’s a delusion.”

  “I’ve been transformed,” I said. “Perhaps you’re frightened of death, Doctor. But it doesn’t bother me anymore.”

  Dr. Rose held up one hand like a traffic cop stopping a line of cars. “Cogito, ergo sum. Ever hear that phrase? A French philosopher named René Descartes wrote that a long time ago. Cogito, ergo sum means ‘I think, therefore I am.’ ”

  Dr. Tollner shook his head. “Paul, I don’t know if this is helpful.”

  “Let me run with this, Steven.…” Dr. Rose looked back at me. “So this Spark of yours is thinking. Isn’t that right, Mr. Davis?”

  I nodded.

  “The fact that you’re thinking proves that you’re alive.”

  “Cogito—” I said, trying out the word. KO-gee-toe.

  “—ergo sum,” Dr. Rose answered.

  “I am thinking,” I said. “But that doesn’t mean that I exist as a Human Unit.”

  Tollner put his hand on Dr. Rose’s shoulder. “There’s no need to continue this discussion, Paul. It’s a waste of time to debate reality with psychotics.” He turned back to me. “You’re checking out of the hospital tomorrow, Mr. Davis. We’re going to give you ninety-day prescriptions for the drugs you’ve been taking here at the hospital.”

  “You should keep taking an antipsychotic medication called Souzan,” Dr. Rose said. “It will dull or lessen the immediacy of your delusions.”

  “And we’ve all agreed that you should stay on Taldor,” Mrs. Shapiro explained. “I also take a low dosage of that medication … every day. It’s an antianxiety drug that will make you feel calm and even-tempered.”

  “We’re pairing Taldor with an antidepressant drug called Moxiphin,” Dr. Tollner said. “Take your medication and stay away from alcohol and street narcotics. It’s possible, over time, that your brain may heal itself.”

  The woman who said she was my mother wanted to drive me back to New York, but I refused to answer her phone calls. It looked like I was just going to walk out of the hospital, but Mrs. Shapiro found an orderly named Isaiah Liggins who wanted to visit a sister who lived in the city. For a small sum of money, he agreed to drop me off at my apartment.

  Isaiah was a solid mound of flesh and bone who stayed quiet during our trip down the thruway. Two large hospital envelopes remained on my lap. One envelope contained hospital invoices and the contents of my blood-splattered wallet; the other was filled with enough pills for seven days of medication.

  We arrived in Manhattan around six o’clock in the evening and Isaiah double-parked in front of a brownstone on East Seventy-Eighth Street. “This is it,” he announced. “This is where you live.” Then he led me over to an entry door. There was a doorbell panel with brass buttons. The name J. DAVIS was held captive beneath a clear Plexiglas shield.

  “You okay?” Isaiah asked. “The nurses started talking about you last night when they learned that I was driving you down to the city. You’re the dead man, right? At least you think you’re dead. Maybe you’re crazy or maybe you’re just jumping ahead a few years. Everyone’s going to die eventually. And then the wicked got to face God and all his angels on Judgment Day.”

  “So now what do I do?”

  “Mind if I look at your stuff?” Isaiah opened up one of the envelopes and shook out a few keys. “This here looks like your front-door key and these two will probably let you into your apartment. So go inside, walk upstairs, and start your life again.”

  I inserted the gold key into the lock and opened the entrance door. When I walked inside, the door closed behind me, but Isaiah shouted through the glass, “Take care of yourself, my brother! God watches us all!”

  Sitting in the café across the street from my hotel, I drank some bottled water and watched a soccer match on my computer. A year ago, I had downloaded a software application that turned the soccer ball into a point of red light. Usually, I would just watch the ball and ignore the players.

  My computer beeped softly and I slipped on my headset. “You have a FaceTime request coming from the United States,” Edward said. “Do you want to accept the call?”

  FaceTime was a webcam software application. It was on my computer, but I rarely used it. I switched off the soccer game and glanced around my table to see if anyone was watching. It was close to midnight and the café was almost empty. A young couple paid their check while an African man with tribal scars cut into his cheeks started to mop the floor.

  “Yes. Switch it on,” I told Edward.

  A moment later, Miss Holquist appeared on the screen. She was holding her tablet computer with one hand and the image wasn’t stable. “Can we talk? Are you in a secure place?”

  “Yes.”

  “This afternoon, I spoke to our client in India. Your meeting went well. He said you were very calm and efficient.”

  “Did you receive my e-mail?”

  “Yes, I did.” Miss Holquist smiled. “I’m glad that you checked with me.”

  “He wanted me to meet with three customers.”

  “Yes. I know. That request is a bit unusual, but he’s an important client.”

  Miss Holquist shifted the tablet around and I briefly saw a standing lamp and the back of a couch. It looked like she was sitting in her apartment.

  “I am authorizing the sales presentation requested by the client.”

  “Three?” I asked
.

  “Yes, all three.” She smiled again. “Obviously, you’ll be paid an additional fee for the extra work.”

  “This might be a difficult assignment.”

  “I understand that. Be careful, be organized, and take your time. I’ll contact our friends in Paris. You’ll get equipment for your presentation in a few days.”

  “This might be—”

  “I’m sure you’ll solve the problem, Mr. Underwood. You’re my best employee.”

  I heard voices in the background, and Miss Holquist turned toward someone who wasn’t in the picture. “Just get my credit card and call them,” she said. “My purse is on the kitchen counter.” Miss Holquist returned her attention to the tablet screen. “Normally, I’d tell anyone visiting Paris to go to a three-star restaurant or an art museum. But that’s not you, is it? You’re a very basic person. Take care, Underwood. Let me know what’s going on.”

  Her face disappeared. Silence. I stared at the blue screen until an elderly waiter shuffled over to the table with the bill.

  “Everything finished,” he said. “Terminée.”

  The next morning, I turned on my computer and made a new list with Power-I. It made my actions appear logical and orderly.

  Mr. Pradhani had given me a Paris address and photographs of Jafar Desai, his wife, Nalini, and their little boy, Sanjay, that had been taken at a family wedding. Number 15 Rue de Tournon turned out to be a former palace built in the classical style that was a half block away from the Luxembourg Gardens. The building’s entrance was wide enough for a horse and carriage, and it was framed by two Greek columns. Both wood doors were open, revealing a cobblestone courtyard where a few cars were parked on one side. Three floors of windows looked out on this courtyard, but their gauzy curtains concealed what was going on in the rooms.

  This is when I encountered my first problem. There were six names on the brass doorbell panel near the entrance, and none of them said “Jafar Desai.” This building had once been something historical, but now six wealthy families occupied the different suites. This meant that I couldn’t just visit one apartment with a gun and shoot whoever answered the door.

  So how was I supposed to confirm that Jafar and his family actually lived in the building? I couldn’t place a Sentinel on the busy street, and all the NO PARKING signs meant it wasn’t feasible to wait in a rental car. Fortunately, the Café Tournon was a hundred yards up the sidewalk. If it wasn’t raining, I could sit at an outside table on a rattan bistro chair and watch the entrance until my targets appeared.

  But the café created a second problem. Most Human Units want a logical reason for your continued presence in their location. An official-looking clipboard and hard hat provide an instant answer to most questions, but that wasn’t going to work on the Rue de Tournon. That morning I bought a cane with a silver handle at an antique shop near the river, and then placed a stone inside my shoe. I was limping when I returned to the café, and the different facial expressions stored on my phone indicated that the waiter displayed sympathy. Now there was a logical explanation for why this crippled foreigner was going to sit in a café for several hours, ordering bottled water and leaving a big tip.

  None of my targets appeared that first afternoon, and I wondered if Mr. Pradhani had given me the right address. The next morning, I arrived early at the café and sat at a table that gave me a clear view of the building. At 8:40 a.m., a black Citroën pulled up and a young man with close-cropped hair jumped out. He pressed a button down on the door buzzer panel, said something into the speaker, and then waited on the sidewalk with both hands stuffed into the outside pockets of a raincoat. This young bodyguard remained at his post—alert and waiting—until Jafar Desai walked through the archway and got into the car.

  With the right kind of weapon, I could probably neutralize both men in less than a minute. The moment the car arrived, I would leave the café and limp down the sidewalk. I’d draw the gun and begin shooting when Jafar appeared. But how would I deal with the mother and child? What about surveillance cameras? And where would I go after I finished the assignment? The police would respond immediately and I needed to find a location where I could change my appearance.

  I left the café and wandered around the neighborhood until I found a possible hiding place. Saint-Sulpice was a large white church with mismatched towers that were supported by a double colonnade. It looked like two Greek temples had been stacked on top of each other. I climbed the wide staircase, entered the building, and found myself in a cross-shaped room defined by a line of white arches. Light streamed in from the large overhead windows and one beam of light, coming from the east, was clear and distinct.

  I circled the interior, gazing up at a church organ placed on a balcony above the entrance. Statues of saints stood in front of the gold and silver pipes, and it felt as if they were staring down at me. Just behind the altar, I found what I was looking for—a row of confessionals waiting for priests and sinners. After I killed everyone, I would come here and hide in one of these small, enclosed booths.

  The church was filled with long rows of creaky chairs for worshipers. Sitting on the left side of the altar, I studied the painting on the domed ceiling. Angels had grabbed the Virgin Mary and were taking her somewhere. I liked all the free space above me and the light and the sound of heels clicking across the stone floor. My perfect church would resemble this place—minus chairs, statues, and people. The stained-glass windows would show dogs at play.

  While I was designing a church in my mind, the room began to fill up with women wearing dresses and pearls and men wearing suits and neckties. Each family group had brought along a girl or boy with a white smock covering their best clothes. The children were going to be confirmed and accepted into the church.

  Now the organ at the end of the church began playing—deep sounds from the large pipes and high notes from the smaller pipes that swooped and glided like birds through the air. People stood up when a procession of priests and altar boys entered the church, followed by an elderly man wearing a scarlet robe. People sang and spoke from the altar—all in French, of course—and I stood up and sat down with them as if we were all pleasure bots posing in a store window.

  After a half hour of these activities, the old man stood in the ornate pulpit wearing a red cardinal’s hat. He began talking slowly, and then his voice gained energy as he pointed his fingers and waved his hands. The old man spoke, but no one answered him. He was a small red dot within a dark, echoey space.

  The next morning, I arrived at the café and ordered a bottle of water. This time Jafar appeared at 8:48. The bodyguard kept his hands in his pockets until Jafar got into the car.

  As I counted out the money for my bill, I saw Nalini and Sanjay pass through the archway and stroll down the sidewalk. Nalini carried a toy sailboat under her arm while her son walked with a five-foot-long bamboo pole that had a metal hook on one end.

  Limping with the silver-handled cane, I followed them up the street and through the gates of the Luxembourg Gardens. It had rained the night before and the gravel pathway was dotted with little puddles of rainwater. Every time Sanjay encountered a puddle, the boy would stop for an instant and then hop over this obstacle.

  I dislike parks with hills and rocks and raggedy trees. But the Luxembourg Gardens had been arranged in an orderly, symmetrical pattern. There were straight paths, clipped hedges, and planting beds edged in stone. Here and there, the park designers had placed marble statues of gods and goddesses gazing off into the distance.

  The center of the park was a large, octagonal-shaped pool near the Luxembourg Palace. On this cold morning, only a few children were trying to sail toy boats on its bright green surface. Moving slowly, as if both mother and son were performing a ceremony, Nalini placed the boat in the pool and Sanjay gave his vessel a push with the bamboo pole. I felt as if the entire world was frozen at that moment. The palace, the pool, the boat, and the dead man standing beneath a leafless tree had become a memory fixed in time.
Then my Shell breathed in and the rusty gears of the clock squeaked and shuddered and began moving again.

  A gust of wind ruffled the surface of the pool. The sails of the toy boats billowed out and Sanjay’s boat began to cut through the waves. Both Nalini and Sanjay were transformed by this event. Smiling and chattering to each other in Hindi, they circled the pool. Just before the boat was about to crash on the other side, the little boy stopped it with the pole and sent it off in another direction.

  I watched them play with the boat for ten minutes or so, and then I sat down on a park chair and switched on my computer. When I checked my e-mail, I found a message sent by someone working for the Special Services Section.

  // We have heard from our supplier in Paris about the equipment necessary for your sales presentation. The supplier will meet you at the Arc de Triomphe this evening at 2200 hrs. He will be carrying a red umbrella.

  I glanced up from the computer. The wind had died and now the sailboat was becalmed in the middle of its circular ocean. Nalini and Sanjay sat down on a bench and waited for something to happen.

  When I left Marian Hospital, Dr. Tollner gave me a piece of paper that listed the three most important aspects of my outpatient treatment:

  • Take your daily medication.

  • Meet every week with a therapist.

  • Resume normal activities in familiar surroundings.

  The drugs I had swallowed at the hospital made my Spark feel frozen and restrained—like a bright yellow tennis ball captive in a block of ice. Because my Spark couldn’t move, my Shell was slow and apathetic.

  So I threw all the pills down a storm drain and, in a small way, probably lessened the depression and anxiety of the fish swimming in the Hudson River. Within a week or two my Spark began to rise and fall within me like a fragment of dust in a beam of sunlight. Without the drugs, I could think faster and react to events around me.