Jonathan Kellerman - The Web

"Did Hoffman bring girls there?"

"Not that I saw. His only lust is for power."

"And when Jacqui gave birth to a fair-haired baby he figured it out."

"A beautiful baby- a beautiful woman."

"Was it only Aruk you fell in love with, Bill?"

He smiled. "Jacqui and I- she's a very strong woman. Independent. Over the years we've reached an understanding. A fine friendship. I believe it's been good for both of us."

Thinking of the oil over the mantel, I said, "Strong- unlike your wife. Did Barbara have a history of depression?"

He nodded. "She'd been chronically depressed for years, taken shock treatment several times. In fact, the trip to Hawaii was for her to consult yet another psychiatrist. But she never showed up for her appointment. Probably spent her time drinking with Hoffman instead. He sensed her vulnerability, told her what I'd done, and the next morning she walked into the ocean."

Some of his weight shifted onto the wounded arm and his breath caught. I helped him find a comfortable position.

"So you see, that's the hold he has over me: keeping it secret from Pam. I killed her mother and so did he. In that sense we are partners. Rams locking horns, just as you said. Beautiful analogy, my friend- are you offended by my thinking of you as a friend?"

"No, Bill."

"All these years, I've yearned to expose him. Convinced myself the reason I haven't done it is the kids' safety. Then, tonight, you began asking questions and I was forced to confront reality. I acquiesced because I knew it would ruin Pam. I sent her away because I was overwhelmed and guilty, but also because I didn't want her here on the chance that she and Dennis… so what happens? She comes back. And it starts…" He grabbed my arm and held tight. "What do I do? There's no escape."

"Tell her."

"How can I?"

"In due time you'll be able to."

"Men have mistreated her because I abandoned her! She'll despise me!"

"Give her some credit, Bill. She loves you, wants to get closer to you. Being unable to is the biggest source of her pain."

He covered his face. "It never ends, does it?"

"She loves you," I repeated. "Once she realizes the good things you've done, gets to really know you, she may be willing to pay the price."

"The price," he said weakly. "Everything has its price… the microeconomics of existence."

He looked up at me. "Is there anything else you need to know?"

"Not unless there's something else you want to tell me."

Long silence. The eyes closed. His lips moved.

Incoherent mumbles.

"What's that, Bill?"

"Terrible things," he said, barely louder. "Time deceives."

"You've made mistakes," I said, "but you've also done good." Ever the shrink.

His face contorted and I took his cold, limp hand.

"Bill?"

"Terrible things," he repeated.

Then he did sleep.

It was a big beautiful room in a big beautiful hotel. One glass wall looked out to white beach and furious surf. Yesterday, I'd seen dolphins leaping.

The three walls were koa panels so densely figured they seemed to tell a story. Crystal chandeliers hung above black granite floors. Up in front was a banquet table laden with papayas and mangoes, bananas and grapes, and thick, wet wedges of the kind of orange-yellow, honey-sweet pineapple you get only when you harvest it ripe.

Sterling silver coffeepots were set every six feet, their shine blue-white.

Other tables, too, round, seating ten, interspersed around the hall. Hundreds of men and a few women, eating and drinking coffee, and listening.

Robin and I watched it on TV, from a suite upstairs. Room service and suntan lotion and every newspaper and magazine we could get our hands on.

"Here he goes," she said

Hoffman stood up at the center of the big table, dressed in a mocha suit, white shirt and yellow tie.

A banner at his back.

He talked, paused for applause, smiled.

The banner said: PACIFIC RIM PROGRESS: A NEW DAWN.

Another one-liner. Laughter.

He continued talking and smiling and pausing for applause.

Then he stopped and only smiled.

Something changed in his eyes. A shutter-snap flicker of confusion.

If I hadn't been looking for it, I probably wouldn't have noticed.

If I hadn't been looking for it, I wouldn't have been tuned to C-Span.

The camera left him and swung to the back of the room.

A tall, gaunt old man in a brand-new charcoal-gray suit walked toward the front.

Next to him walked a woman I'd known first as Jo Picker, then as Jane Bendig, official-looking in a navy-blue suit and high-necked white blouse. For the last three days she'd worked nearly twenty-four hours a day. The easy part: using Tom Creedman's computer to send bogus messages by e-mail. The hard part: convincing Moreland he could redeem himself.

The doctors and psychologists at the medical center had helped some. Examining the kids with care and compassion, assuring the old man they were clinicians, not technocrats.

Jane shared her grief with him, talked numbers, morality, absolution.

Eventually, she just wore him down.

Now he walked ahead of her.

Behind the two of them, six men in blue suits flanked a massive black thing, like pallbearers.

Black thing with legs, a shuffling variant of the circus horse.

Stirring and confusion at the other tables, too.

Moreland and Jo kept marching. The black cloth seemed to float in midair.

Some men next to Hoffman began to move, but other men stopped them.

Zoom on Hoffman's face, still smiling.

He mouthed something- an order- to a man standing behind him, but the man had been restrained.

Moreland reached Hoffman.

Hoffman started to speak, smiled instead.

Someone shouted, "What's going on?" and that seemed to shake Hoffman out of it.

"I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, this man's quite disturbed and he's been harassing me for quite a-"

The men in blue suits flicked their wrists, and the black cloth seemed to fly away.

Six soft, misshapen people stood there, hands at their sides, placid as milk-sated babies. Ruined skin highlighted mercilessly by the chandelier. The doctors at the medical center had established that only UV was a threat. The black sheet protecting them from the stares of gawkers.

Gasps from the room.

The blind one began bouncing and waving his hands, staring up at the light with empty sockets.

"My God!" said someone.

A glass dropped on the granite and shattered.

Two blue-suited men took hold of Hoffman's arms.

Moreland said, "My name is Woodrow Wilson Moreland. I'm a doctor. I have a story to tell."

Hoffman stopped smiling.

A few days later, on the plane back to L.A., it hit me.

First-class flight, seats like club chairs, the Defense Department's generosity allowing Spike's crate a seat of its own.

Dinner had been salmon stuffed with sole mousse. I'd indulged in half a bottle of Chablis and fallen asleep. Robin had finished only a third of a glass, but she'd drifted off too. Now her head was heavy on my blanketed shoulder.

Sweet sleep, but I came out of it thinking about Haygood- who he'd been as a child. Was there a mother out there who'd mourn him?

Stupid thoughts, but inevitable. I tried to shake myself out of it, thinking of the good I'd been part of.

Ben freed. Some limited hope for Aruk.

The "kids" liberated and well cared for.

Moreland hospitalized, too, and evaluated. No Alzheimer's, no obscure neurological disease, just an exhausted old man.

I'd visited him an hour before we left. He hadn't told Pam or Dennis yet.

Holding back. His entire life, after the paradise needle, a struggle against impulse.