The Door To December Part 30

'Who?' he repeated.

She said, 'I don't know. I really, really don't. I'd tell you if I did. I swear. Anything you want, I'd tell you.'

This time he believed her. But he didn't let go of her face. 'I know Melanie McCaffrey endured a lot of mental and physical abuse in that gray room. But I want to know ... Christ, I don't want to know, but I've got to know ... was there s.e.xual abuse too?'

Regine's mouth was somewhat compressed by his grip on her chin and jaws, so her voice was slightly distorted. 'How would I know?'

'You would have known,' he insisted. 'One way or the other, you would have sensed a thing like that, even if Hoffritz didn't talk to you much about what went on in Studio City. He might not have talked about what he was trying to achieve with the girl, but he would have bragged about his control of her. I'm sure of that. I never met him, but I know him well enough to be sure of that.'

'I don't believe there was anything s.e.xual about it,' Regine said.

He squeezed her face, and she winced, but he saw (with dismay) that she liked it nonetheless, so he relaxed his hand, though he didn't let go of her. 'Are you sure?'

'Almost certain. He might have liked ... to have her. But I think you're right: He would have told me that, if he'd done it, if he'd been with her like that...'

'Did he even hint at it?'

'No.'

Dan was profoundly relieved. He even smiled. At least the child hadn't been subjected to that indignity. Then he remembered what indignities she had had endured, and his smile quickly died. endured, and his smile quickly died.

He let go of Regine's face but stayed beside her on the couch. Gradually fading red spots marked where his fingers had pressed into her tender skin. 'Regine, you said you hadn't seen w.i.l.l.y in more than a year. Why?'

She lowered her eyes, bent her neck. Her shoulders softened even more, and she slumped further into the corner of the sofa.

'Why?' he repeated.

'w.i.l.l.y ... got tired of me.'

That she should care so much about w.i.l.l.y made Dan ill.

'He didn't want me any more,' she said in a tone of voice more suited to announcing imminent death from cancer. w.i.l.l.y not wanting her any more was clearly the worst, most devastating development that she could imagine. 'I did everything, anything, but nothing was enough ...'

'He just broke it off, cold?'

'I never saw him after he ... sent me away. But we talked on the phone now and then. We had to.'

'Had to talk on the phone? About what?'

Almost whispering: 'About the others he sent around to see me.'

'What others?'

'His friends. The other ... men.'

'He sent men to you?'

'Yes.'

'For s.e.x?'

'For s.e.x. For anything they wanted. I do anything they want. For w.i.l.l.y.'

Dan's mental image of the late Wilhelm Hoffritz was growing more monstrous by the minute. The man had been a viper.

He not only brainwashed and established control of Regine for his own s.e.xual gratification, but even after he no longer wanted her, he continued to control her and abuse her secondhand. Apparently, the mere fact that she continued to be abused, even beyond his sight, gratified him sufficiently to maintain an iron grip on her tortured mind. He had been a singularly sick man. Worse than sick: demented.

Regine raised her head and said, not without enthusiasm, 'Do you want me to tell you some of the things they made me do?'

Dan stared at her, speechless with revulsion.

'I don't mind telling you,' she a.s.sured him. 'You might enjoy hearing. I didn't mind doing those things, and I don't mind telling you exactly what I did.'

'No,' he said hoa.r.s.ely.

'You might like to hear.'

'No.'

She giggled softly. 'It might give you some ideas.'

'Shut up!' he said, and he nearly slapped her.

She bowed her head as if she were a dog that had been cowed by a scolding master.

He said, 'The men Hoffritz sent to you - who were they?'

'I only know their first names. One of them was Andy, and you've told me his last name was Cooper. Another one was Joe.'

'Scaldone? Who else?'

'Howard, Shelby ... Eddie.'

'Eddie who?'

'I told you, I don't know their last names.'

'How often did they come?'

'Most of them... once or twice a week.'

'They still come here?'

'Oh, sure. I'm what they need. There was only one guy who came once and never came back.'

'What was his name?'

'Albert.'

'Albert Uhlander?'

'I don't know.'

'What did he look like?'

'Tall, thin, with a ... bony face. I don't know how else to describe him. I guess you'd say he sort of looked like a hawk ... hawkish ... sharp features.'

Dan had not looked at the author's photograph on the books now in the trunk of his car, but he intended to do so when he left Regine.

He said, 'Albert, Howard, Shelby, Eddie ... anybody else?'

'Well, like I said, Andy and Joe. But they're dead now, huh?'

'Very.'

'And there's one other man. He comes by all the time, but I don't even know his first name.'

'What's he look like?'

'About six-foot, distinguished. Beautiful white hair. Beautiful clothes. Not handsome, you know, but elegant. He carries himself so well, and he speaks very well. He's ... cultured. I like him. He hurts me so ... beautifully.'

Dan took a deep breath. 'If you don't even know his first name, what do you call him?'

She grinned. 'Oh, there's only one thing he wants me to call him.' She looked mischievous, winked at Dan. 'Daddy.'

'What?'

'I call him Daddy. Always. I pretend he's my daddy, see, and he pretends I'm really his daughter, and I sit on his lap and we talk about school, and I-'

'That's enough,' he said, feeling as if he had stepped into a corner of h.e.l.l, where knowing the local customs was an obligation to live by them. He preferred not knowing.

He wanted to sweep the photographs off the table, smash the gla.s.s that shielded them, pull the other pictures off the mantel and throw them in the fireplace and light them with a match. But he knew that he would be of no help to Regine merely by destroying those reminders of Hoffritz. The hateful man was dead, yes, but he would live for years in this woman's mind, like a malevolent troll in a secret cave. Dan touched her face again, but briefly and tenderly this time. 'Regine, what do you do with your time, your days, your life?'

She shrugged.

'Do you go to movies, dancing, out to dinner with friends - or do you just sit here, waiting for someone to need you?'

'Mostly I stay here,' she said. 'I like it here. This is where w.i.l.l.y wanted me.'

'And what do you do for a living?'

'I do what they want.'

'You've got a degree in psychology, for G.o.d's sake.'

She said nothing.

'Why did you finish your degree at UCLA if you didn't intend to use it?'

'w.i.l.l.y wanted me to finish. It was funny, you know. They threw him out, those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds at the university, but they couldn't throw me out so easily. I was there to remind them about w.i.l.l.y. That pleased him. He thought that was a terrific joke.'

'You could do important work, interesting work.'

'I'm doing what I was made for.'

'No. You aren't. You're doing what Hoffritz said you were made for. That's very different.'

'w.i.l.l.y knew,' she said. 'w.i.l.l.y knew everything.'

'w.i.l.l.y was a rotten pig,' he said.

'No.' Tears formed in her eyes again.

'So they come here and use you, hurt you.' He grabbed her arm, pulled up the sleeve of her robe, revealing the bruise that he had spotted earlier and the rope burns at her wrist. 'They hurt you, don't they?'

'Yeah, in one way or another, some of them more than others. Some of them are better at it. Some of them make it feel so sweet.'

'Why do you put up with it?' do you put up with it?'

'I like it.'

The air seemed even more oppressive than it had a few minutes ago. Thick, moist, heavy with a grime that couldn't be seen, a filth that settled not on the skin but on the soul. Dan didn't want to breathe it in. It was dangerously corrupting air.

'Who pays your rent?' he asked.

'There is no rent.'

'Who owns the house?'

'A company.'

'What company?'

'What can I do for you?'

'What company?'

'Let me do something for you.'

'What company?' he persisted.

'John Wilkes Enterprises.'

'Who's John Wilkes?'

'I don't know.'

'You've never had a man here named John?'