Bill Pronzini - Savages

“I’ve heard of it. And?”

“Well, I’ve been thinking. From what you told me about the firebug case Jake was involved in up north, I’ll bet that’s what was operating there-folie a deux. Strong, domineering woman infects a weaker, less intelligent friend and lover with her insanity and together they commit public outrages-arson, murder, false imprisonment, torture. Contributing factors of sexual perversion, if you can call it that, and religion and rebellion against parental authority. It’s not exactly a classic case, but it does have a lot of the elements.”

“If you say so. What’s your point?”

“My point,” she said, “is that in a way you were dealing with a case of folie a deux at the same time-you and Tamara and I. How’s that for a crazy coincidence?”

It was early Thursday afternoon and we’d just finished having lunch at the Gold Mirror, her favorite neighborhood Italian restaurant. She was on her second glass of red wine, which always makes her a little flakey and unpredictable.

“What case?”

“The Mathias case, of course.”

“I don’t want to talk about the Mathias case.”

“Just let me tell you my theory and we’ll drop the subject.”

“All right. How do you figure it’s another folie a deux?”

“Well, it’s obvious when you think about it. A brilliant sociopath, Mathias, cares so little about his dying wife that he wishes her dead sooner so she won’t interfere with his business plans, and communicates this to another sociopath with a similar bent and an inferior intellect, Drax, who acts on it.”

“Not intentionally and not on direct order.”

“Doesn’t matter. Drax was infected just the same.”

“The two of them may be sick, but they’re not delusional.”

“They are if they think they’re normal.”

“No religious or sexual motivation or rebellion,” I said.

“You could make a case that hero worship is a form of latent sexuality.”

“Now you’re really reaching.”

“Anyhow, Drax wouldn’t have gone to see Nancy Mathias that night if he wasn’t infected to some degree with his boss’s psychosis. Wouldn’t have killed her, accidentally or otherwise. Subconsciously he was carrying out Mathias’s wishes, and he covered up the crime to protect Mathias as well as himself.”

“My wife, the wannabe shrink.”

“Be scornful if you want, but I like my theory. Parallel cases of folie a deux.”

“With opposite resolutions.”

“I know, but that doesn’t change the psychological implications.”

No point in arguing with her after two glasses of red wine. Pretty soon I said, “You know, you can make anything fit any concept if you try hard enough.”

“I suppose that’s true.”

“Folie a deux, for instance. You could say we suffer from a form of it ourselves. We have a close relationship and I’m crazy in love with you and my madness has infected you and made you crazy in love with me. A couple of delusional nutcases.”

“Delusional?”

“Okay, just plain nuts.”

“I won’t argue that. So which of us is dominant and which the weaker intellect?”

“Sometimes it’s me; sometimes it’s you. We’re democratic nutcases.”

“You have a point,” she said. “There’s plenty of sexual motivation, too. Even what some bluenose types might consider perversion, now and then.”

“Let’s not get started on that topic again.”

“Why not? It’s on both our minds.”

“Premature, that’s why.”

“Only by a week or so. Besides, I can’t help it if I’m caught in the clutches of the mania you infected me with.”

“I’m still not sure we ought to rush back into things.”

“We’re not rushing; we’re easing into it. Kind of like foreplay.”

“Kerry…”

“Oh, don’t be stuffy. It’s my decision to make, or don’t you think so?”

“Not if you’re hurt by it.”

“I’ve been hurt by a lot worse and you know it. The decision is mine in any case.” She smiled suddenly. “My folly a do or folly a don’t, you might say.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. You just leave everything to me. It won’t be spur-of-the-moment, either. I’ll give you plenty of advance warning.”

“What for?”

“So we can arrange for Emily to sleep over at a friend’s.”

“Why is that necessary?”

“If we’re alone,” Kerry said, “think of all the noise we can make.”

Some things, like Kerry’s breast cancer, do work out pretty much as you want them to. Other things take a sudden bizarre twist and tie off loose ends in ways that you didn’t see coming at all.

I’d told Celeste Ogden that there was nothing she or anybody else could do to prevent Anthony Drax from getting away with the murder of her sister, or Brandon Mathias from getting away with his tacit role in the crime. But she proved me wrong. Dead wrong.

Nine days after our last meeting, she waited in the RingTech parking lot for the two men to come out together and emptied her husband’s 9 mm Beretta into their bodies-seven rounds at point-blank range. Drax died at the scene. Mathias died six hours later at a Palo Alto hospital.

She did it for Nancy, she told police calmly and matter-of-factly. She couldn’t bear the thought of them going unpunished; they were evil, pitiless men who did not deserve to live. Nancy would not be able to rest in peace as long as they were alive, and neither would she. She’d spent three sleepless nights thinking about it, summoning her courage. And then she’d destroyed them.

And destroyed herself at the same time.

And left me feeling partially responsible, an unwitting catalyst in my own right, when I heard the news.

Justice?

You tell me.