Keith Ablow - Compulsion

She shook her head. "Nothing related to law, morality, or punishment." She looked at the report again. "A drawing of a baseball player lying on the ground between bases, clutching his knee, yielded, 'I didn't want to play baseball this summer, but my father made me. It's a stupid game.' "

"He showed no interest in how the man had been injured?" I asked.

"None whatsoever," Mossberg said without looking up. "A third example: When he was asked to describe what was happening in a picture of a man leaving a room, obviously angry, with a woman in tears looking after him, he said, 'She should stop crying. She's loud, and it's hurting his ears. He should go back and make her stop.' "

I cringed at that narrative, remembering how Tess, the surviving Bishop twin, had cried out while North Anderson and I were with Darwin Bishop in his study. Could little Brooke Bishop's wailing have annoyed Billy enough to seal off her windpipe? "Did you question Billy directly about the loss of his sister?" I asked.

"In a general way," Mossberg said. "I asked him what had happened to Brooke."

"And?"

"He said she had stopped breathing."

"Did he show any emotion when he answered?" I asked.

"No."

"Did you sense he was suffering any guilt?"

"He insists he had nothing to do with it," she said.

"But you don't believe him," I said.

"Well… no. Of course not."

"Why not?" I asked.

Mossberg looked at me askance. "I hadn't heard anyone express doubt that Billy committed the crime. Mr. Bishop's wishes were for a secure setting where his son could be held-away from the glare of the media-until trial. I assumed you would be helping to craft an insanity plea."

"Did Bishop say that? He expects Billy to stand trial for murdering Brooke?"

"Very clearly," Mossberg said. "Am I missing something? Is there confusion on Nantucket about whether Billy killed his sister?"

I took a deep breath, let it out. "Less than you might expect," I said.

Laura Mossberg walked me down the hall to Billy's room, a space about the size of her office, but furnished with a smaller wooden desk, a desk chair, and a platform bed. Billy was lying facedown on the mattress, apparently asleep. He was wearing blue jeans and a white T-shirt. A young man about college age sat outside the room, reading a textbook.

"We have Billy on one-to-one observation, around the clock," Mossberg explained. "I should tell you that this unit wouldn't normally provide services to someone with a history of violence like his. We admitted him at the request of our CEO. Mr. Bishop is a major donor to the medical center."

That didn't surprise me. Darwin Bishop's influence obviously reached far and wide. "I won't need more than half an hour with him," I said.

"Feel free to ask for me when you're finished," she said. She started back down the hallway.

I walked into Billy's room. He rolled onto his back, flipped his straight, dirty blond hair out of his eyes, and stared at me. He obviously hadn't been sleeping. "You would be who?" he demanded.

"Frank Clevenger," I said, staring back at him. "I'm a psychiatrist."

Billy's ice-blue eyes sparkled. He was sixteen and looked like a prototype adolescent, at the edge of boyhood and manhood, with fine features that promised to become handsome. The lines of his nose and jaw were almost feminine, suggesting fragility, but in another year or two, as his wiry body filled out, his broad shoulders adding impressive bulk, that hint of femininity would be the very thing that reassured women they could immerse themselves in him, rather than fear him-this Russian-American, bad-boy billionaire's kid. That is, if he wasn't in prison for life.

"My dad sent you," he said.

"Not exactly," I said. "Your father gave me permission to see you. I'm working with the Nantucket Police Department."

Billy sat up, smiled. "He gave me your name before I left home," he said. "Trust me. He sent you."

The bravado in his voice reminded me of Billy Fisk, the teenager I had lost to suicide. I pictured Fisk sauntering around my office during his first visit, talking trash about how much respect he got on the streets. It took me months, and fifty or so meetings together, to get him to back off the tough-guy routine and talk to me about how tough his life had been. I should have taken things even slower. Because I had lost him somewhere on the journey into his pain. I closed my eyes, remembering the call I'd gotten that he had hung himself.

"Still with the program, Doc?" Billy asked.

I opened my eyes. "I'm fine," I said. I noticed Billy's forearms were marred by faded, haphazard scars where he had slashed at himself. "And maybe you're right. Maybe your father sent me, after all." I pulled out the chair from under the desk, turned it toward the bed, and sat down.

"This should be fun," he said.

"Really. Why?" I said.

"I've never seen a police psychiatrist before, just the regular ones."

"And what were they like?" I asked.

"Mossbergs. Every one of them," he said, with a smile full of disdain-his father's smile. "Nice, soft people, who felt very powerful holding the keys to their little locked kingdoms. I keep every one of their names right here." He pointed at his head, made a mock gun of his fist, thumb, and forefinger, and pointed it at me. He pretended to drop the hammer, then winked and let his hand drift to his side.

I hadn't forgotten that Billy was a predator, whether or not he had murdered Brooke. His firesetting and cruelty to animals showed he was intoxicated by his own power-the power to destroy. I wanted him to know that I wouldn't be scared off. "Let's not waste our time on threats," I said. I stood up and walked toward the door, feeling Billy's eyes on me. I reached for the door, pushed it shut. Then I turned around, facing him again. "I know exactly who and what you are," I said.

He rolled his eyes. "You're clairvoyant and over-educated."

"I know about the feeling in your gut-the emptiness."

"Actually, I had a big breakfast this morning," he said. "Courtesy the hospital cafeteria. I'm full."

"Even when you joke about it, it's there. It's always there, gnawing at you," I said.

He looked away, tilting his head. "Let's see… two eggs, sunny-side, hash browns…"

"Some days are worse than others," I pressed. "Some days, you feel so empty it actually hurts."

He flashed that Bishop smile again, but said nothing.

"Maybe you light up a joint and get yourself two, three hours of relief. It never lasts. You've tried cutting yourself, biting yourself, pulling out your hair, probably making yourself vomit now and then, to start feeling something. Anything. Nothing works."

Billy's expression shifted a few degrees away from mockery, toward uneasiness.

I kept burrowing. "There are times you feel so much dead space inside, such a cold, black hole, that you wonder whether you even exist. You look around at other people and wonder if they're real. Maybe they're just pretending to be alive, too."

He shook his head, squinted at me. "How much is my father paying you for this crap?" he asked.

"He's not paying me," I said.

"Then you're an idiot," he said.

"Why's that?"

"Because," he said, "you're doing exactly what he wants you to do. You may as well cash in."

"He's projecting" the voice at the back of my mind interjected. "He's the one who feels bought and paid for."

I listened to that voice and decided to reflect Billy's comment back onto whatever fragile part of his psyche it had come from. "Your dad owns you, champ," I said, "not me."

His face lost every trace of gaminess. "No one owns me," he said, a new loathing creeping into his tone.