Gerald Davis: A Murder Too Personal

“Care for a toot?” the professor asked as he offered me a joint.

“Thanks,” I said and waved it off.

He lit the joint carefully and inhaled deeply.

I watched Garbarini in the candlelight. He had regular features, wide-set eyes and a relaxed manner, to say the least. His eyes were hypnotic-the way they hardly blinked.

There were five other people in the room in various stages of impairment. A man and a woman were lying on pillows next to me on the floor. Another couple of indeterminate sex were fondling on a sofa. They were oblivious to my presence. A girl sat on a chest up against the wall. She was in the lotus position with her eyes closed. She had an untroubled expression on her face. I couldn’t tell if she was sleeping or not.

I sat there for a long time. I knew you weren’t supposed to disturb the natural rhythm of the universe, or something like that, but I was getting edgy. That’s what happens when you put a type A in a nest of tranquillity.

I tried to be one with the spirit.

Finally, after what seemed to be the length of a Grand Opera with two intermissions, the professor spoke. “Our door is always open.”

“What?” I shouted.

“We welcome everyone. Anybody who wants to join us can enter.”

“I’m glad to hear that. I certainly am,” I said and leaned over toward him. “Was Alicia a member of your group?”

“What?” he said.

“Alicia,” I repeated. “A member of your group?”

He shifted closer to me on the floor and spoke into my ear in a tone slightly higher than a whisper. “Our family,” he corrected me. “I liked to think of Alicia as a convert. She was one of my proudest achievements. Here I was able to take an exemplary member of the secular society and mold her into a seeker of eternal verities.”

The stereo was making such a racket I could only hear every second word he was saying. “Can you do me a favor?” I said. “Can you turn down the music?” I was trying as hard as I could to be polite.

He nodded eagerly. “It would make me very happy to be able to honor your request.”

The professor rose slowly and shuffled over to the stereo. It took him about three times as long as it should have to do this. Everything took longer than it should have. It looked like he was moving in slow motion. He lowered the volume with a careful movement. Then he stepped into the kitchen, took something from the refrigerator and came back to me.

I could make out two bottles in his hand. “I never imbibe alcoholic beverages,” he said.

There are a couple of people on the face of the earth who follow this practice, I know. But I was hoping I wouldn’t encounter them right here and now.

“I hope you understand,” he said.

I was trying real hard to.

“This is all I have at the moment. One of my disciples brought it today. It is completely organic.”

At least I could hear him now. I took a bottle. The label said root beer. The professor produced an opener.

I took a long drink of the swill. It was cold, but that was all I could say for it. The stuff tasted like bark and twigs-and it wasn’t even fermented.

“Professor Garbarini,” I said, trying to get the conversation back on track. “What would you say was Alicia’s greatest area of interest?”

“Yes,” he repeated, “her interest…her interest…her interest.” It sounded like a mantra. “I was glad to have Alicia with us. Everyone liked her. I always try to have as many people here as possible. This is not an ashram, of course, but many visitors stay here from time to time. The door is never locked.”

I nodded. “Tell me more,” I said.

The professor stared into the candle flame and took a deep puff on the joint. “I am a teacher of metaphysics, as you know, and I always like to have many souls surrounding me. My students enjoy coming here. Sometimes there are only two or three, sometimes ten or twelve. We listen to music, we smoke hashish, we make love to each other, we talk about serious themes. Ideas which have been discussed since the dawn of civilization. I’m sure Socrates and his students lay about in this way in the baths, debating these selfsame subjects. But they drank wine instead. This is a very close group. We love each other. We express our love in physical ways. Members come and go but the core remains. I am the Master, yes, that is true. But many interesting concepts come from the students.”

He stopped rambling and stared at the flame. I didn’t know how to get information out of him. It was like trying to grab the fog.

Just as abruptly as he stopped, he started up again. “Even when I’m not here, when I’m teaching or walking, people are always here. You might say it’s like an open house.”

Yes, I might say that.

“Did you have sex with Alicia?” I asked.

He looked at me like I just stepped off the shuttle from Mars.

“Alicia and I expressed our physical love for each other, yes,” he said. “But that is not unusual. I express my physical love for all my disciples and they express it for me. I believe you must empty your prostate every day. That is healthy. It does not matter who the receptacle is. The male essence or the female essence or those who express both essences in their nature.”

“What kind of lover was Alicia?” I asked.

“That was her problem. You know, each person has give and take within. Alicia would give but she would not take. A woman must always take, but Alicia would not take.”

I was beginning to see a vague outline of what he was getting at.

“Was Alicia a good disciple?”

“She was one of my best, except that she would not take. She threw herself into metaphysics as if it were an obsession. She was obviously seeking a yang for her yin.”

“You mean a man?” I asked.

He shook his head slowly, almost sadly, and wagged his finger the way you would at a kid who wet his pants. “Don’t be so literal. A yang is not necessarily a man. It is a complement to what is lacking in her being.”

“And tell me what was lacking in her being.” I was starting to feel like an untutored jackass.

“This we are not privileged to know. One can never know the inner soul of another person. One only sees the superficial exterior which may often be misleading.”

He paused and put his hands over his eyes. “Kundelini…searching for Kundelini.”

“What?”

“Kundelini,” he repeated.

What in the pluperfect hell was he talking about?

Just about this time, with the incense and the bayberry and the music and the pot smoke and that goddam root beer, I was starting to develop a major headache. A really serious headache. I had an intense craving for a very tall, very cold glass of beer-any beer from any brewery in Northern Europe or the United States.

“Tell me,” I tried again. “Would you have any idea why someone would want to kill Alicia?”

The professor knitted up his brows so that twin furrows ran up his forehead. He concentrated his gaze on the flame. “Alicia was not contented. She had not reached spiritual peace.”

I thought of the people I knew. Neurotic New Yorkers and people trying to become neurotic New Yorkers. “Many people haven’t reached spiritual peace,” I said. “What does that have to do with her death?”

“This unfortunately I cannot tell you.” He looked at me intently. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to be sincere or if he was just having me on.

I tried again. “Do you know who supplied her with cocaine?”

“No.” He shook his head. “We do not use cocaine. The only narcotic we use is hashish, in keeping with our beliefs.”

This guy was the master of blue smoke and mirrors. In a whole lifetime of years, I’d seen few his equal.

“Tell me, who was Alicia’s best friend?”