The Tower Part 19

Jade, who had almost fallen asleep during the last three tapes, leaned forward, suddenly excited. He knew Allander was one to take a challenge. He'd already proved that.

The psychologist spoke loudly, an edge of sarcasm in his voice. "So let me get this straight, Atlasia. You're the holder of human truth. You know the foibles of the human heart, its yearnings, its errors, its desires. And since you know them so intimately, you're not afraid to act on them." He paused dramatically. With interviews, timing was everything, Jade thought. "What makes you so special?" the psychologist continued. "Why should you know any more than I?"

"Any more than you?" Allander sneered, rising to the bait. "You're a personified superego, a walking shadow that's run out of gas. Compare you to me. Hyperion to a satyr. I've lived through more than you can dream. I've lived the fantasies. I'm the only one to do it without a Greek wrap and I don't need any forks for my eyes. Try checking that at the door, Doctor. Let that roll around on your back for a while."

Then he was silent. Just like last time-one outburst and back to silence or dispa.s.sionate interaction.

But that one lapse was all Jade needed. The Greek wrap indicated Oedipus. Allander must have raped his mother. He had raped Darby. That's why Thomas was so unforgiving when Darby spoke compa.s.sionately about her son. Allander had literally fulfilled part of the Oedipal complex.

Jade thought back to the books he'd read on Freud. Freud used the Oedipal myth as the basis for his theory of development. Every boy desires his mother and wants to kill his father. Once the father is dead, the boy can fully possess his mother. Boys must learn to sublimate into other avenues, to break the fantasy in order to live in reality.

But Allander wasn't about sublimation. "What I carve, I'll carve in flesh," he'd said. "What I paint, I'll paint in blood." His reality was fantasy-he'd alluded to this many times. Others sublimate because they are scared of their fantasies. Oedipus put out his eyes when he realized that he'd killed his father and slept with his mother. But Allander wasn't scared to face his fantasy, to recognize it as a part of himself. I don't need any forks for my eyes. He'd already acted on part of it, but he was a perfectionist. He needed to finish the job.

Jade thought about the fact that Allander hadn't molested the children in the house he'd broken into. The children weren't enough of a challenge anymore. He was after a challenge ages old, a challenge that he thought fundamental to all humans. All humans had the yearning, none the courage to act on it. Except him. Except Allander Atlasia.

And though he had stripped her, Allander hadn't raped the mother at the first house, a fact that pointed to his s.e.xual insecurity. Maybe something had gone wrong when Allander tried to rape his mother. Maybe he couldn't go through with it, maybe he was impotent. Whatever it was, something had happened that he was trying to fix after all these years. He was building up his courage for the second round.

And Jade knew right where he was headed.

He picked up the phone and called Dr. Yung. The secretary put him on hold. Jade's knee bounced up and down as he waited.

"Mr. Marlow, I'm so glad you called," Dr. Yung said when he finally picked up. "I was about to call you. I went through some of the materials again and I think I came up with something."

"Go ahead," Jade said.

"On the tape you left with me, he said that Dr. Schlomo-whom you identified as Freud-'just never should have backed off.' I didn't give this much thought at first, but then I went back to it. Freud initially thought the s.e.xual content of his patients' dreams was based in reality, that many of them really had s.e.xual interactions with their opposite-s.e.x parents. But then he switched his position and posited that these thoughts were just fantasies, just wishes.

"I think that's what Allander meant by 'he just never should have backed off.' He thinks Freud was right the first time. That these s.e.xual thoughts are the reality, not the fantasy. Which means he doesn't think you outgrow them."

"But you can act them out."

"Exactly. Now if he's ready to take on the Oedipal complex, we could have a dead father and a raped mother on our hands soon. Or on your hands, I should say."

"His father and mother," Jade said. Dr. Yung was quiet, so Jade continued. "I think there's already a history there that we haven't begun to penetrate. In one of his interviews, he said that he's lived all the fantasies. He said something like, 'I'm the only one to do it without a Greek wrap'-pointing at what Oedipus did. I think he's talking about intercourse. I think he actually raped his mother."

Dr. Yung was quiet for a long time. "It could be. But we shouldn't take anything he says literally. You never know how much the lines between fantasy and reality have blurred, Mr. Marlow."

"That's exactly what I'm concerned about."

Jade hung up the phone. He had been studying Allander's files ever since he'd gotten back from Dr. Lithemeir's office. The sleep he'd missed last night was starting to affect him. His eyes ached and his head was throbbing. He felt as if he'd just finished a boxing match.

But he was fitting pieces into the puzzle, getting a full picture of Allander's mind. Now that he felt he was really getting to know how Allander thought, he needed a plan. The first killings had happened before he'd been called in on the case. But now the game was live.

His breathing tightened and he felt a sudden heaviness across his shoulders. He was disgusted with its familiarity. A flash of cold tickled across his lower back and he shivered, shaking it off. He was hired to track Atlasia. There would be more bodies before he got to him, but that's just how it worked. They could pile up for all he cared, as long as he let blood in the end.

Allander peered back at Jade from his mug shots, his voice rattling around in Jade's head. Jade looked around the living room and saw only Allander. And corpses.

The pain in his head intensified and he grunted out loud, pressing his fists to his forehead to slow the dull throbbing. He stumbled toward the study, accidentally stepping on the remote control and turning on the TV. Allander's trial tape continued.

The mother of the molested girl sobbed on the witness stand, her cries following Jade down the hall. He banged through the study door and fell into his chair. He took deep breaths, counting them backward. He started with twenty and worked his way down. As he counted, he pulled himself slowly to the desk.

Above his pounding heart, his mind carried him back to a place from his youth, a place that smelled like wood sweepings and burning leaves. It carried him across a field where foxtails waved in the wind, catching the sun in all its yellow splendor and reflecting it back so brightly one needed to raise an arm against the glare.

Four boys cut a path through the high weeds, leaving a small trail behind them as foxtails fell beneath their feet. Looks of preadolescent cruelty sat across their freckled faces. Raised on country breakfasts and yellow school buses, boys like these were too naive to have empathy. All four had the same haircut, a side part with hair flared across in the front so that it spiked up or dangled over their foreheads.

They were voiceless to Jade as they screamed, though he noticed the strain in their necks and the rise and fall of their Adam's apples. With a sweeping aerial view, he saw up ahead to where the children were running.

The field led to an enormous mound with a large scarecrow planted in the middle. The scarecrow's arms cast a fierce shadow from its ten-foot perch. The enormous clothes hanging limply from the wooden frame were the product of hours of Mrs. Joe Allen's work on the sewing machine.

The scarecrow was st.i.tched for the town fair back in '61, and the Allens left it out among the weeds as a sort of eerie landmark about which the locals could weave stories to entertain travelers. Mr. Hollow, they called him. He was surrounded by a circle of rocks, making the mound look like some mystical shrine to an ancient deity. Large crows would settle over the vast span of Mr. Hollow's arms, setting him alive with fluttering motion.

Mr. Hollow didn't come down until '79 when Slick James and a crew of his friends ran him over during a drunken ride in their Ford pickup. He was so big he left a dent in Slick's front b.u.mper and Slick bragged for weeks about the size of the deer he hit on Highway 74.

In the vast expanse of weedland between the four running boys and the scarecrow there was a smaller figure, an animated dot in Jade's view. It was another boy, about eleven years old, whose run was clumsy with fear. A silver chain with medical tags bounced around his neck as he moved.

Jade could see his face more clearly now, the droop of his cheeks, the full upper eyelids, and the lolling lower lip. It was a miracle that his awkward legs found footing at all, but he lurched along with a spastic rhythm. A thin line of drool spun from the r.e.t.a.r.ded boy's lip, draping across his shirt, and he grunted like an animal fleeing a predator.

In the distance, another boy ran down a countryside path into a quaint two-story home. He carried a baseball bat across his shoulder, his glove hooked on the end of the bat through the wrist hole. The boy looked tough; he was definitely a sc.r.a.pper, and he wore a baseball hat c.o.c.ked defiantly backward on his head.

The screen door slammed behind him as he casually loped into the house. His eyes were green, as green as emeralds. Jade looked into his eyes and his pulse raced.

A pair of hands grabbed him, nails digging into his arms. The face of a woman, distorted with rage and fear. G.o.dd.a.m.nit, where's your brother? I told you to watch your brother! Over her shoulder as she bent to swat his face, the boy could see a bedroom door open, a frayed cord dangling from the doork.n.o.b. Behind the swinging door, yellow-and-pink striped wallpaper-the wallpaper of a circus tent-was visible, suited to a child much younger than eleven. On the floor a small music box lay on its side, thrown down in the child's rage at being trapped alone in his room. A brightly colored porcelain circus tent was glued on top of the lid. The woman's hand drew back to land another blow on the boy's reddened cheek.

The images scattered dreamlike across Jade's mind, every detail unfolding with excruciatingly slow clarity as the scene started to come apart.

The slap of his hand on the desk brought him back to reality. Jade shook his head as he raised it from the desk. He had been counting. Forward or backward, he didn't know, but he was on 153.

The box of pens and pencils faced him and he ran his fingertips across it. He had to move, had to keep moving. There was still a lot of digging to be done at the Atlasias', with Darby in particular. He pushed himself back from the desk and stood up, walked out of the study, and closed the door behind him.

After a minute, he came back in, picked up the phone, and dialed.

"Yeah. Travers. I'm heading back to the Atlasias.' You coming? Yeah, whatever. I just want a driver."

36.

D A R B Y had greeted Jade and Travers coolly, but with forgiveness in her smile. We're all doing our jobs here, her smile said. Let's not forget that. She had just come in from a visit with neighbors and she was breathless. She seemed always to be slightly breathless, Jade thought.

Now he and Travers sat side by side on a brown couch, facing Allander's parents as cla.s.sical music played softly in the background. It was a shame to interrupt the peaceful sound with words. Especially these words.

As soon as Jade said Allander's name, the makeup came out again. Darby turned away, looking into a small mirror. Arching her eyebrows, blushing her cheeks, painting her lips.

"Mr. Marlow, you have a propensity for ruining my afternoons," she said with a wicked grin.

Jade didn't respond.

"Oh, come now. I'm just teasing you. Since you're down here to make me miserable, you should at least allow me the occasional tension breaker."

"All right. Fair enough." Jade was being gentle. He found that he liked Darby and Thomas more each time he saw them. He wondered why. It might have been the sad but honest life they had managed to put back together for themselves. Like resurrecting a house after a tornado blows through, he thought.

"I need to ask you a few questions about Allander's childhood."

"Why?" Darby asked. "Is it really necessary to get into all this?"

"Well-" Travers started.

"Yes, I'm afraid so," Jade said, shooting Travers a warning look. "I'm trying to get a profile of how he thinks. I need your help."

"And why . . ." Darby's voice trailed off.

"Should you help me?" Jade finished. "Because you don't want him to kill more people. Because you feel responsible every time he does. Because he should be caught. Because you know you agree with me."

He was going out on a limb, but he thought he was right. He and Darby stared at each other for a long time, momentarily forgetting that Thomas and Travers were in the room.

"You're going to kill him," Darby said simply. "And you want me to help."

"I don't know if you've been watching the news, but-"

"Please, Mr. Marlow," Darby said, cutting him off sharply. "Let's not play these games. I am well aware of what is going on and you are well aware that I am. So why don't you reconsider how you're going to ask for our help."

Jade sighed and rubbed his forehead. He noticed a hint of a smile on Travers's lips.

"Look, Darby. My job's not exactly a picnic-"

"Oh. That's right. You have to make the difficult decision to sacrifice people you hardly know."

"Look, G.o.dd.a.m.nit." Jade pointed at her, and Thomas leaned back. "That is not fair and you know it. You want to stop playing games? Let's cut the one-upmanship."

Darby nodded, her mouth shifted to one side. "You're right. That was unwarranted. I apologize."

For a moment, Jade wasn't sure how to respond. Then he nodded his acceptance. "I know that you and Thomas want to help end this," he said. "However painful it may be, I'm going to need you to open up." Of course, he knew that what he really needed from them involved more than just "opening up," and he had a suspicion that Darby knew, too, but there was a sort of unspoken agreement between them to take things one step at a time.

They locked eyes for a long time as Darby thought. "I will help you," she finally said, "if you promise not to kill him. If you promise to bring him in alive."

Standing suddenly, Jade threw his arms up and walked away from Darby. "Jesus Christ!"

"Look, Jade, I think-" Travers said, but Jade waved her off violently.

He turned and approached Darby, his hands and voice shaking with intensity. "Do you know what that means for an investigation like this?" he asked. "It's like sending me into a war zone with my hands tied." He realized that he was coming dangerously close to pleading.

"Do I know what it means?" Darby asked coldly, her eyes indignant.

Jade's sigh sounded like a growl. He turned and walked toward the fireplace, having a heated dialogue with himself under his breath. He ran his hand through his hair, stopping to grip the top of his head with his fingers.

"Mr. Marlow," Darby said calmly to the back of his head. "I think we both know you don't have much choice. You need our cooperation. We might as well begin."

Jade turned around. "Fine," he said shortly. "Fine. I'll try to bring him in alive."

"You will not try to bring him in alive, Mr. Marlow. You will bring him in alive. Don't equivocate on that point."

"I'll bring him in alive," Jade repeated, feeling like a punished schoolboy.

Darby stood and approached him, her head c.o.c.ked, looking deeply into his eyes, asking if she could trust him. "Do you promise?"

"What the h.e.l.l? You have my word. You want me to swear on a Bible?"

She shook her head. "No," she said. She reached out and tapped the outline of the silver chain under Jade's shirt. "On this."

At first Jade thought she was joking, but her eyes were dead serious. He matched her expression and nodded solemnly. "All right." He glanced at Travers, who had a puzzled expression on her face. "I promise."

"His childhood," Darby said, picking up the conversation as if there had been no interruption, "was turbulent, often frightening."

"Let's start with physical disorders. Anything major?"

"No. He got sick a lot, but nothing serious. Just the flu and colds and things. He wet the bed until he was twelve. Does that count?"

Jade wasn't surprised. He knew from his training in psychology that many disturbed criminals had had bed-wetting problems when they'd been younger. Jade figured he'd probe further to see if anything else turned up.

He nodded. "Predictable. Any pyromania?"

Darby looked surprised. "Yes."

"And?"

"He liked to set things on fire," Thomas said. "Toys, shoes, branches. He'd sometimes get mesmerized by the flames and burn his hand. We thought it was all fairly normal 'boys-will-be-boys' behavior until-"

Darby shot him a glare and he stopped mid-sentence. He sat down on the fireplace with a small grunt and began tracing the pattern of the rocks.

"Until what?" Jade asked.

The Atlasias looked at each other. Thomas's eyes implored her to speak. "Honey," he said. "We talked about this."

"All right. Fine." Darby looked at Jade and forced a laugh. "We already agreed that if I could exact my promise from you, we'd try to help. More. More than we have in the past."

"I . . . well . . . good," Jade said dumbly. Travers looked at him affectionately. He could have killed her for it.

"So what happened?"

"I came upon him one time in the backyard," Darby said. "I remember I was all dressed up-a silk outfit. We were heading to the symphony benefit dinner. It's something we did every year as a family. It was really important to us, still is."

"And?" Jade asked impatiently.

"Just because we're trying to share these things with you does not mean they're easy, son," Thomas said. "Give her some time. She's-we're trying."