Vulpes was proud of the minicomputer. It was basically a modem with a keyboard and he had made it from scratch. He was even prouder of the transmission box. He had waited patiently for more than a year until one of the purchasing department's computers had gone down. He suggested waiting until Saturday to repair it, when nobody was in the office. The guard had waited outside, sitting in the sun. Vulpes had dismantled the portable phone and sketched the circuitry. It had taken him five months, getting a piece at a time with his regular orders so they wouldn't become suspicious, to get the materials he needed. It took another four months to duplicate the radio phone in the purchasing office. Basically it was nothing more than a dialling device for the modem.
He looked back across the quad at the office. Verna stood up, nodded, and placed the portable phone on its stand. She took her purse and left the office. Vulpes turned the microcomputer on and typed MODEM. It hummed for a second and then ENTER appeared in the small screen. He typed in a phone number and waited. The numbers blinked out and after a few seconds the word CONTACT blinked three times. He began typing.
ARE YOU THERE, HYDRA?
YES, FOX, AS ALWAYS.
IT IS TIME.
OH, THANK YOU, FOX.
ARE YOU READY?
YES, FOX, ALWAYS READY.
HAVE YOU RESEARCHED THE LIST?
ALL FOUR OF THEM.
AND?
TAKE YOUR PICK.
EXCELLENT, AS USUAL, HYDRA.
THANK YOU, FOX. WHO SHALL IT BE?
DO YOU HAVE A CHOICE?
WHATEVER MAKES YOU HAPPY, FOX.
I THINK…
YES?
I THINK FT WILL BE TONIGHT.
OH, FOX, TONIGHT! THANK YOU. THANK YOU, FOX.
HYDRA?
YES, FOX.
YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO AFTER?
OH YES, FOX, I KNOW WHAT TO…
SOMEONE COMING. DO NUMBER THREE.
NUMBER THREE! YES, YES, FOX, YES!
SOON…
Vulpes typed END on the screen and the screen blinked off. His heart was beating in his mouth. His penis was erect. He sat down, leaning forward so his face was hidden by the VCR cover. He was panting. And then suddenly he was released. He gasped, blew out a long breath, and finally sat up straight. He took several deep breaths and hummed very slowly to himself, reducing the tempo of his humming until it was a mere rattle in his throat. His heart slowed to normal. He sighed.
He disconnected the small box and removed the tray from his toolbox. He wrapped the minicomputer and the transmission box in lead foil and placed them in the bottom of the chest, covering them with tools. There, it's over for now.
Thirty-One
The pilot put the twin-engine plane down on a grass strip in a little town called Milford in southern Indiana. There was no Tony in a Cadillac to greet him, so Vail and St Claire rented a car at the small airport and drove six miles south across the Flatrock River to the Justine Clinic. The hospital was a pleasant departure from the Daisy. It was shielded from the highway by a half-mile-deep stand of trees, at the end of a gravel road. As Vail and St Claire burst out of the miniforest, Justine spread out before them, looking more like a collective farm than a mental hospital. A cluster of old brick buildings surrounded a small lake. A tall, brick silo stood alone and solitary, like a sentinel in the middle of the sprawling field that separated the facility from the woods. A tall chain-link fence behind the buildings on one side of the lake formed what appeared to be an enormous playground. Several children were hanging on a spinning whirligig, while a woman in a thick red jacket sat nearby reading a book. A boat dock with a tin-roofed boathouse at its end stretched out into the lake and a floating raft drifted forlornly about twenty yards from the shore. It was a pleasant-seeming place, unlike the cold, foreboding penal-colony atmosphere of the Daisy.
'Looks like a summer camp I went to once when I was a kid,' St Claire said.
'Somehow I never thought of you as a kid, Harve,' Vail said.
'I was about nine. Damn, I hated it. We had to swim in this lake, musta been forty below. M'lips were blue the whole two weeks I was there.' He paused to spit out the car window. 'What's this guy's name again?'
'Lowenstein. Dr Fred Lowenstein. He's the director.'
'Sound like a nice-guy?'
'He was very pleasant on the phone.'
'And she wouldn't talk to you, huh?'
'Her secretary said she was in a meeting, so I asked for the director.'
'He knows what's goin' on?'
'Vaguely.'
They pulled up to what appeared to be the main building, a sprawling brick barn of a place with a slate roof, and parked beside several other cars on a gravelled oval in front of the structure. Gusts of wind whined off the lake and swirled into dancing dust monkeys as they got out of the car. A young boy in his early teens was hosing down a battered old pickup truck nearby.
'We're looking for Dr Lowenstein,' Vail said to him. 'Is his office in here?' The boy nodded and watched them enter.
The lobby of the building was an enormous room with a soaring ceiling and a great open fireplace surrounded by faded, old, fluffy sofas and chairs. The receptionist, a chunky woman in her late forties with wispy blue-grey hair held up by bobby pins, sat behind a scarred maple desk angled to one side of the entrance. A Waterford drinking glass sat on one corner of her desk stuffed with a half-dozen straw flowers. Behind her, a large Audobon print of a cardinal hung slightly lopsided on the wall. The only thing modern in the entire room was the switchboard phone.
'Help you?' she asked pleasantly.
'Martin Vail to see Dr Lowenstein. I have an appointment.'
'From Chicago?'
'Right.'
'Boy, didn't take you long't'get here,' she said, lifting the phone receiver.
'The miracle of flight,' St Claire said, his eyes twinkling.
She looked at him over rimless glasses for a second, then: 'Doc, your guests are here from the Windy City, Uh-huh, I mentioned that. It's the miracle of flight. 'Kay.' She cradled the phone. 'First door on the right,' she said, motioning down a hall towards an open door and smiling impishly at St Claire.
Lowenstein was a great moose of a man with burly shoulders and shaggy brown hair that swept over his ears and curled around the collar of a plaid shirt. The sleeves were turned up halfway to his elbows and his battered corduroy pants had shiny spots on the knees. He had a pleasant, ruddy face and warm brown eyes, and there was about him a pleasant, haphazard attitude unlike the measured mien of the pipe-smoking Woodward. He was sitting at a roll-top desk, leaning over a large yellow butterfly mounted on a white square of cardboard, studying it through a magnifying glass. A cup of tea sat forgotten among stacks of papers and pamphlets that cluttered the desktop. He looked up as Vail tapped on the door frame.
'Dr Lowenstein? Martin Vail. This is Harve St Claire.'
'Well, you certainly didn't waste any time getting here,' he said in a gruff rumble of a voice.
'We have a twin-engine Cessna available when the occasion demands,' Vail said. 'An hour beats driving for three hours.'
'I would say.' He put down the magnifying glass and offered a calloused hand that engulfed Vail's.
'Pretty thing,' St Claire said, nodding to the mounted butterfly.
'Just a common monarch,' Lowenstein said. 'Found it on the windowsill this morning. Thought the kids might enjoy studying it. Can I get you anything? Tea, coffee?'
'No thanks,' Vail said.
Lowenstein sat back at the desk and swept a large paw towards two wooden chairs.
'I appreciate your help on this, Doctor,' said Vail. 'I wouldn't have bothered you except that Molly wouldn't take my call.'
'I understand the nature of your problem, Mr Vail, but I don't know a hell of a lot about the Stampler case. It's my feeling that you and Molly need to address the problem. I'm also certain she would have refused a meeting if you had reached her by phone.'
'Why?'
'Molly had a breakdown
four years ago. A combination of exhaustion, depression, and alcohol. She was a patient here for a year and a half.'
'I'm sorry, I had no idea…'
'She overcame the major problems. There were some side effects. She was agoraphobic for about a year. Lived on the grounds. Wouldn't leave. To her credit, she overcame that, too. Has a little house down the road. Bought herself a car. She's working mainly with children now, and quite successfully. Avoids pushing herself. She's a brilliant woman, as you know. Graduated magna cum laude from Indiana State. A very compassionate lady.'
'I know that, sir,' said Vail. 'She did a remarkable job on the Stampler case.'
'That's what I'm driving at. I think it left its scars.'
'In what way?'
'I've never been quite sure. She was, uh, very subdued when she first came back. Didn't want to talk about the experience for a long time. In fact, never has except in the most clinical terms. It's certainly not an experience she cares to relive.'
'Why did you invite us over if she won't speak to us?'
'Because your problem is serious. She's strong enough now to deal with it and put it behind her.'
'Are you her therapist?'
'I have been. She is also a dear friend, has been for fifteen years. Her brother's problems contributed to the breakdown. Are you familiar with that?'
Vail nodded. 'Delayed stress syndrome from Vietnam?'
'Yes. He's catatonic. Never has recovered. Pretty tough to deal with.'
'This is certainly a pleasant atmosphere,' Vail said. 'If she had to suffer through that experience I can't think of a better place to do it. It's certainly a far cry from Daisyland.'
'Thanks. We're not much for show here,' he said.
'So Molly agreed to the meeting?'
'I told her it was a grave situation. No details. She trusts my judgement.'
'Thanks.' Vail and St Claire stood to leave. Vail turned at the door. 'By the way, Doctor, could you describe a psychopath for me? Not in heavy psychotalk, just the basics.'
Lowenstein regarded Vail for a moment, slowly nodded. 'Totally amoral, usually paranoid, harbours great rage - which he can successfully hide. Remember the boy in the Texas tower? Nobody knew how angry he was until he turned the town into a shooting gallery. Psychopaths also tend to consider others inferior, have contempt for their peers, and they're antisocial, pathological liars. Laws don't count to them.'
'Homicidal?'
'Can be. Depends on the extent of the rage. They can also be charming, intelligent, witty, often socially desirable. Why?'
'I think Aaron Stampler fits the profile perfectly.'
'A real charmer, eh?'
Vail nodded.
'Well, that's what keeps us in business, Mr Vail,' Lowenstein said, turning back to his butterfly. 'Second door on the left. She's expecting you.'
Dr Molly Arrington's sitting room adjoined her office and was a study in simple elegance. It was a small room, cosy and inviting, dominated by a forest-green chesterfield sofa with overstuffed cushions and pillows. Two dark-oak Kennedy rocking chairs balanced the searing arrangement and a large antique coffee table held the group together. The walls were papered with a grey-and-white striped pattern. A shaggy blanket with a silly-looking, wall-eyed black and white cow knitted in its centre was thrown over one arm of the sofa and there was a rube vase holding a single, enormous yellow daisy on one corner of the table. Soft light filtered through a single window, forming deep shadows in the corners of the room.
'Hello, Martin,' she said, stepping out of the shadows, her voice just above a whisper. Vail was taken aback by Molly Arrington's appearance. She was smaller than Vail remembered, her once unblemished skin creased with the ridges of time and tragedy, her ash-brown hair streaked with grey and cropped close to her ears. Her pale blue eyes had an almost haunted look. It was obvious that a year and a half in the institution had taken a toll, and yet there was about her an aura of uncompromising stubbornness in the jut of her chin and the brace of her shoulders.
'Hi, Molly. Good to see you again.'
'Ten years,' she said. 'Such a long time. You haven't changed a bit. Come in and sit down.' She smiled at St Claire. 'I'm Molly.'
'Harve St Claire, Doctor. A real pleasure.'
Vail sat on the sofa and St Claire eased himself into one of the rockers and leaned back with a sigh.
'This place is delightful,' Vail said. 'Reminds me of a funky New England prep school. I can understand why you love it here.'
'Fred calls it the campus,' she said. 'I lived out here for a while.'
'He told us.'
'I live in town now. Go shopping, go to the movies,' she said with a rueful smile. I'm not agoraphobic any more.'
'I'm sorry you were ill. I didn't know.'
'Thanks. It was a strange experience, being one of them instead of one of us. Gave me a different perspective on life,' she said, ending any further discussion of her hard times. She took an ashtray from a drawer and put it on the coffee table. 'You may smoke in here,' she said. She seemed so calm, Vail wondered if she was on some kind of tranquillizer.
'Whatever happened to Tommy Goodman?' she asked. 'Is he still with you?'
'Tommy met a wine princess from Napa Valley, got married, and is now the vice president of her old man's wine company. He drives a Rolls and has a three-year-old son who looks like a ferret.'
She laughed, a pleasant, loose kind of laugh, throwing her head back and closing her eyes.
'Tommy a mogul, hard to believe. And you?'
'I'm the district attorney.'
'You're kidding.'
'Afraid not. Harve, here, is one of my top investigators. He helped track down Pancho Villa.'
'I ain't quite that old, ma'am.' St Claire chuckled.
'Naomi?'
'Still running the ship.'
'I know about the Judge, he was a friend of my aunt's. How sad. He was such a gentleman. Always had that fresh carnation in his lapel.'
'I miss him a lot,' Vail said. 'It's not as much fun any more.'
'What?'
For a moment, Vail seemed stumped by the question, then he said, 'Everything, I guess.'
She got up and walked across the room to a small refrigerator in the corner. 'How about a Coke or some fruit juice?'
'Sure, I'll take a Coke.'
'Same, ma'am,' St Claire said.
'Okay in the bottle?'
'Only way to drink 'em,' St Claire said with a smile.
She opened three bottles, carefully cleaned the tops of them with a paper towel, wrapped the bottles with linen napkins, and brought them back. She sat down and lit a cigarette.
'This involves Aaron Stampler, doesn't it? Your coming here?'
'Yes.'
'Are they letting him out?'
'How'd you guess?'
'Well, it's been ten years…'
'What's that mean?'
'They could have effected a cure in that time.'
'There's no way to cure Stampler.'
'You thought so ten years ago.'
'I wanted to know that if he was cured, he would be freed, not sent to Rock Island to finish his sentence. But I never figured it would happen.'
'What's the diagnosis?'
'Ever heard of a resulting personality?'
'Of course.'
'His psychiatrist claims he has developed a new persona named Raymond Vulpes. Aaron and Roy, it seems, have gone to that great split-personality place in hell.'
'That's pretty cynical, Martin. Don't you ever feel some sense of redemption, knowing that you saved him?'
'No.'
'Why, for heaven's sake?'
'Because I don't believe him. I don't believe there ever was a Roy and I think Raymond is a figment of Aaron's imagination, not his psyche - aided by Woodward's ego.'
'Sam Woodward? He's his doctor?'
'Has been for almost ten years. You know Woodward?'
'Only by reputation.'
'Which is…?'
'
Excellent. He's highly respected in the community. You think Aaron Stampler tricked Sam Woodward and you and me and the state psychiatrist, the prosecutor, the judge - '
'All of us. Yes, I believe that. I believe he's a raving psychopath and one helluva actor.'
'That's impossible, Martin.'
'You remember telling me the instant before Roy first appeared to you, the room got cold and you couldn't breathe? Do you remember that?'
'Yes, I remember that quite well. I had never experienced anything quite like it.'
'It happened to me when I walked into the room and met Stampler - or Vulpes - for the first time in ten years. It was like an omen. Like I was in the presence of tremendous evil. Nothing like that ever happened to me, either.'
'Anticipation. You obviously have a vivid memory of my description. You expected it and - '
'It happened before I saw him. I didn't even know he was in the room.'
There was a pause, then she asked, 'Did you have any sense of anxiety when you went up there?'
'I was uncomfortable.'
'About seeing Aaron again?'
'That may have been a small part of it. Mainly, I don't like Daisyland.'
'You're not supposed to like it, Martin. It's not like going to the theatre.'
'That's not what I mean. There's a… I don't know… a sense of hopelessness about the place.'
He was leading her up to the reason they were there, trying to get the dialogue flowing easily, renewing her trust in him, and not doing too well.
He turned to St Claire. 'Harve, do you mind stepping outside for a minute?' The old-timer excused himself and left the room.
'What I'm about to tell you would normally violate the confidentiality between client and lawyer,' Vail said, 'but since you were his psychiatrist, I can tell you with immunity. You're also bound by confidentiality.'
He told her about Aaron's last words to him after the trial.
'He wasn't kidding,' Vail said as he finished. 'I think his ego had to let me know.'
'Why didn't you tell me at the time?'
'Why? Hell, it wouldn't have done a bit of good. Stampler could have stood on the courthouse steps five minutes after the trial and told the world he was sane and he killed those three people in cold blood and there's not a damn thing anyone could have done about it. He pleaded guilty to three murders and his sentence was passed and final. Nothing could have changed that, Molly, it's called double jeopardy.'