Barbara Michaels - The Dark on the Other Side

Not even the cat, for whom he felt a sneaking fondness compounded with envy, could distract him from the black current of his thoughts. How the hell could he write a biography of a man who was as hag-ridden as Gordon Randolph without tearing the man’s soul to bloody shreds? Especially if he went on in this vein of half-baked mysticism. Evil deeds, evil men, he had said-but Evil, in the abstract? If there was evil in the beautiful house, it had to emanate from some living individual.

There weren’t that many candidates. The revolting old woman, Andrea, was one of them; she was a constant visitor, and she was crazy as a loon. Michael wondered how genuine her belief in witchcraft was. Ninety-nine percent, he thought. What other hang-ups did she have? Certainly the old woman’s blend of malice and superstition was not a healthy influence; but how profoundly had it really affected Linda Randolph? Had Andrea implanted her own insane ideas, or merely strengthened neuroses that had already begun to form? Even insanity has its own brand of logic. The paranoid schizophrenic may kill a complete stranger, suddenly and seemingly without cause; but in terms of the murderer’s delusion, his action makes perfectly good sense. As the object of a widespread conspiracy aimed at his life and reason, he is only acting in self-defense when he kills one of the conspirators. Was that why Linda had attacked her husband? Could such a delusion have been planted by a third party-such as Andrea?

Then there was Briggs, the fat little man who looked like a moribund pig. Physiognomy was not a science. Under his pale, pudgy façade, Briggs might have the soul of a saint. But Michael doubted it. Briggs’s feelings toward the Randolphs were obvious. He idolized his employer and resented-because he desired-his employer’s wife. Which was natural. Randolph had been modestly vague about the circumstances that had brought Briggs to his present post, but Michael had got the impression of persecution, a miscarriage of justice, the loss of a profession for which the man had prepared all his life. Briggs wasn’t the type to square his shoulders and march back out into the arena after someone had kicked him where it hurt. Randolph ’s offer of a job might, literally, have saved his life. No wonder the little man admired his boss. His attitude toward Linda was equally comprehensible, if less attractive. Malice-plenty of it. Michael wondered whether Gordon was too damned high-minded to see how his secretary felt about his beautiful wife. But Briggs’s brand of feeble frustration was not evil, not in the sense Michael meant.

Randolph? Michael dismissed that hypothesis not because of Randolph ’s charm and talent but because of a fact that stood as solidly as Mount Everest. Randolph was genuinely, desperately, in love with his wife. Although Michael had interviewed a lot of people, he couldn’t always tell the truth from the assumed; but in this case he would have staked his reputation on the genuineness of Randolph ’s feelings.

All of which led straight back to the most obvious source of evil. Linda herself.

Now, there, surely, he was out of his depth and could candidly admit the fact. God damn it, he wasn’t a psychiatrist. Nobody but a professional had the right to speculate about a mental condition as severe as Linda’s. He couldn’t even consult a professional. It would be an unforgivable violation of friendship.

But the idea remained, dangling like a shiny toy in the forefront of his mind, and for a few minutes he played with it. Often in his biographical research he had talked to Galen Rosenberg about the personalities of his subjects. Rosenberg had been one of his father’s best friends, and Michael would have appreciated his pithy comments even if he had not been one of the top psychiatrists in the east. His humility and his sardonic sense of humor were as great as his all-embracing tolerance. It was a pity Gordon couldn’t convince his wife to see Galen. If anyone could help her…

Michael shook his head. He was busy-bodying again, and if he had learned anything in the course of his thirty-three years, it was the futility of trying to force help on people who didn’t want it. No, he couldn’t discuss the case with Galen, not even under pseudonyms. His problem was not Linda’s neuroses, it was a question of his own professional competence. Could he do a decent job with Randolph ’s life without mentioning the fact that Randolph ’s wife had tried to kill him? Another of those simple questions that weren’t simple at all.

The answer, like the question, could be phrased with paradoxical simplicity. Michael realized, with a slight shock, that the answer was not the one he had hoped to get. He was a professional, and a good one; on that theme he had no false modesty whatever. Already sentences were framing themselves in his mind, possible lines of investigation were taking shape; the subject fascinated him as a problem, all personal ties aside. Oh, sure, there would be sticky moments, places were he would have to walk carefully, but they were only part of the challenge of the job. He could do it, all right. And he wanted to do it. And he didn’t want to do it.

Michael bounded to his feet with a snarl, knocking two issues of Mad, an American Historical Review, and approximately two weeks of the New York Times off the coffee table, and evoking an answering growl from Napoleon, who was crouched on the rug by the front door. It was his favorite place. What he was waiting for, Michael never knew, though he wasted a lot of time speculating. Other cats? Not people. Napoleon hated people, all people, and departed via the window whenever a visitor approached.

“Why the hell I don’t get a nice friendly dog, I don’t know,” Michael said aloud. “I could talk to it and get an answer now and then. I can’t even kick you to relieve my spleen. You’d wait till I was asleep and then come in and tear my throat out. Who do you think you are, squatting there by the door? A watchdog? A lion? A vulture? God damn it, I hope that old saw about animals reflecting the personalities of their owners isn’t true. You make me look like some kind of nut.”

Having thus relieved his spleen, he stalked toward the bedroom, shedding coat, tie, and shirt as he went. Napoleon settled back on his haunches muttering to himself. The eerie sound followed Michael all the way into the bedroom, and he kicked the dresser in passing. Why couldn’t the cat purr like an ordinary feline? This sound wasn’t quite a growl, but it certainly wasn’t a purr; Napoleon never expressed approval in that traditional fashion. He never expressed approval at all. He just sat around muttering to himself. A helluva pet for a poor miserable bachelor…

No pets. No animals at all, on the whole expansive twenty acres of Randolph ’s estate. Surely that was not coincidental. You’d expect a man like Randolph to ride and hunt, to keep dogs.

Michael turned out the light and pulled the crumpled sheet up to his chin. He liked to consider himself above such considerations as physical comfort, but his uncooperative body remembered the smoothness of the sheets at the Randolph house, and the yielding yet firm surface of the mattress. Surely this mattress had grown another lump since the last time he slept on it. He wriggled, trying to find a smooth spot. No use. The damned mattress grew tumors, like protoplasm…

There was no clue to Randolph ’s personality in the absence of animals; that was a pretty corny old cliché. A lot of nice people didn’t like dogs. There were such things as allergies, too. And…of course. Linda Randolph’s neurosis had to do with animals. Randolph couldn’t have a dog on the place when the sight of an imaginary one sent his wife into fits. So much for the subtle analytical biographer’s insight.

Michael gave up his search for comfort and lay staring up at the ceiling, hands clasped under his head. The dirty yellow light from the street filtered in through panes grimy with city dirt, past the cracks in the wooden slats of the ancient blind. Sounds filtered in, too-the soft drizzle of the rain and the hooting, honking blare of traffic. Even at this late hour there were cars on the city streets. Soon the trucks would begin their nightly deliveries, but he wouldn’t hear them; his ears had become inured to the grind of brakes and the vibration that was gradually eroding the fabric of buildings and pavements. He was used to the sounds and the grime and the press of human beings. They were part of his habits; without them he probably couldn’t work. Yearning for apple blossoms and fresh country air and crocuses (crocuses?) pushing their tender green tips through the damp brown earth-sentimental nonsense, that was what it was. A nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live there.