Richard Hawke - Speak of the Devil

“I banged it,” I said. “I’ll live.”

Phyllis sat back in her chair and crossed her legs. “How’s your mother, Fritz?” She added to the body language by crossing her arms. A foot jiggled impatiently.

“She’s fine. She’s out in California visiting a friend.”

“And how is her drinking?”

I took the question in the chest. As intended, I’m sure. “That’s direct.”

Phyllis blinked like a Siamese cat. “You’d prefer not to say.”

“It’s a question of what I think she might prefer.”

“I take it, then, that she’s still wrestling with it. It’s very sad.”

“She’s enjoying her visit with her friend,” I said.

“There’s no need to be defensive, Fritz.”

I gave her a false smile. “You know how it is.”

“Actually, I don’t. Why don’t you tell me?”

“Some other time. You can put me on the meter.”

“That’s not very funny.”

“Then by all means don’t laugh.”

“I was only asking a question,” she said coolly. “I wasn’t intending to probe.” Her gaze broke away from mine. It looked almost like she was purposely showing me her profile, then I realized she was looking down at the newspaper on the glass table. “This is so wretched.” She leaned forward and picked up the paper, scanning the front page. “What has this world come to? I can only imagine the kinds of people capable of acts like these. It’s horrible.”

“Can you?” I asked. “I mean, a person who did something as depraved as either of those killings-could he actually walk around afterward, behaving just as normally as you and me?”

“Absolutely. Psychotics can blend right in. They don’t wear sandwich boards declaring their homicidal rage.”

“That would certainly be convenient for the authorities.”

“And so many of the people you see who do look like they’re ready to pull out a machete in a crowded subway, it’s all bluff and bluster. They wouldn’t actually do it in a million years. It’s all verbal. Their anger is precisely the result of their inability to act. Their impotence. The world has them so tied down and hamstrung that their only tool is to yell or rant or simply start looking like something the cat dragged in. Their social-misfittedness is their attack. Other than that, they couldn’t be less dangerous.”

I pressed. “What if it were one of your patients who commited one of these attacks? Therapists have the inside track, so to speak. If the person was under psychiatric care, do you think his therapist would be able to suss it out?”

“There’s no saying. Could be. And don’t think that after events like what happened yesterday, therapists all around the city aren’t running a mental inventory of their patients to see if any of them have shown the seeds of this kind of violence.”

“Did you run an inventory?”

“There’s no avoiding it.”

“Did you come up with anything?”

“If I did, I wouldn’t share it with you.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to. Not the particulars. No names. But I mean in the abstract. Are any of the people you’re currently seeing capable of something like what happened?”

She gave me a level look and paused before responding. “Yes. I’d say one or two of them are.”

“You practice a dangerous profession,” I said.

“Harlan used to note that as well. He said the two of us probably had deep-seated death wishes.”

“Sure was a cheerful guy, wasn’t he? How about the both of you chose professions so that you could help other people? That has a nicer ring to it.”

She glanced down at the paper again. “There’s no doubt that the police are going to be flooded with calls from people claiming responsibility. Events like these speak to the imagination of unwell people. I could probably launch an entire new practice with the people who are going to come out of the woodwork on this.” She tossed the paper back on the table and leveled me with her ice-blue eyes. New subject. “I want to thank you for coming over, Fritz.”

“What is it you want? When you called the other day, you were pretty tight-lipped.”

“It’s Paul. I think he’s mixed up in something he shouldn’t be.”

“Trouble?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps. Linda thinks he is having an affair.”

“I see.”

“But she’s not sure. His behavior has been somewhat furtive lately. And he is keeping an erratic schedule. Paul tends to shut down when Linda tries to draw him out.”

“Has she put the question to him?”

“No. She’s too nervous.”

“Have you?”

“Yes.”

“Let me guess. He denies it.”

“He gets angry. And yes, he denies it. The problem is, Linda says Paul came home one night last week with a shiner. Maybe you saw.” She tapped her right eye. “He tried to pass it off with a story about getting hit on the street by a bike messenger, but Linda is certain he was lying. Paul is not a good liar.”

“As a mother, that should make you happy.”

“As a mother, I’m concerned about my son. Linda says he hasn’t slept an entire night through in well over a week. He’s scared about something. But we can’t bully him into telling us what he’s up to. He’s a grown man.” She considered me for a moment. “I would like you to look into it, Fritz.”

“You want me to bully him?”

“I think you know what I mean.”

“If he won’t tell you, he sure as hell won’t tell me.”

“I don’t mean for you to ask him.”

“You mean for me to snoop on him.”

Phyllis’s sweater had an oversize turtleneck. She poked a finger into the loose fabric and twisted it as she spoke. “That’s what you do for a living, isn’t it?”

“I don’t snoop on my family for a living.”

“Paul and you are family only in the most marginal sense of the word.”

“There are a hundred other private investigators you could call in for this,” I said. “I can give you some recommendations.”

“But I don’t know what it is they’re going to uncover.”

“If they’re any good, it’ll be the same thing I’d uncover.”

She released the collar. “What I mean is, I don’t know what they’ll do with the information once they have it. I really don’t want strangers rooting about in my son’s personal life.”

“So then you do want me because I’m family.”

She recrossed her legs with military swiftness. “You enjoy being difficult?”

“I’m just trying to get us both on the same page. You want me to snoop on Paul to see why he’s getting into fights and can’t sleep. You want to be able to tell me to keep my mouth shut about it when I find out what he’s up to. And the reason I’m supposed to keep my mouth shut is because Paul and I share the same father. But I’m not supposed to view this as snooping on my own flesh and blood.”

“You could care less about Paul,” she said flatly.

“It might not be an affair. It might be something else. I just need to warn you that investigations don’t always go where the client thinks they’ll go. If I were to uncover something unsavory or illegal, why would I be inclined to keep quiet about it?”

“Because I asked you to.”

“I see.”

“I would be your client. I would be the one paying you for your services.”

“No family favors.”

“I’m not family.”

I gave my head a scratch. “The overall logic is a little shaky.”

“I’ll pay you in cash, if it’s all the same to you.”

“I still accept cash. Fits so snugly in my wallet.”

“Good. Then we have a deal.” She sealed her own conclusion with a sharp nod.

I asked, “Does Paul know that this is why I’m here?”