Jonathan Kellerman - The Conspiracy Club

He thought about throwing it out unopened. Couldn’t resist temptation and tore the flap so hard the little metal clasp flew off.

No medical reprint inside. Instead, Jeremy extracted a newspaper clipping, crumbling at the edges and browned with age. No identifying marks- the article had been trimmed well below the upper margin- but the tone and the locale suggested a British tabloid.

Vanished Bridget’s Chum Found Murdered

Two years ago pretty Bridget Sapsted left a pub in Broadstairs, Kent, after a night of serving pints only to vanish. Despite extensive police inquiries, the fate of the lovely lass was never discovered. Now a close friend of the pretty brunette has been murdered brutally, and efforts are being made to learn if the fate of one girl is connected to that of the other.

The case took a grisly twist when, early this morning, the body of 23 yr old Suzie Clevington was found by a man walking to work on the outskirts of Broadstairs. Suzie and the vivacious Bridget had been classmates at Belvington School, Branchwillow, Kent, and the two girls had remained fast friends. With aspirations as a dancer, Suzie had spent some time in London and on the Continent, but had returned home recently to seek employment opportunities.

“At this point,” said the principal investigator, Det Insp Nigel Langdon, “we are treating these as independent incidents. However, should the facts warrant, we will pursue them as related.”

In response to rumours that the body had undergone horrible mutilation, Det Insp Langdon would say only that the police could not reveal all the details of the case in the interest of an “efficient investigation.”

Suzie Clevington was described by friends and family as an out-going, friendly-

And there the article ended, cut off in midsentence.

Laser scalpels, female surgery, a dead girl. Mutilation.

A Humpty-Dumpty situation.

This was not a postal screwup.

Someone in the hospital, wanting Jeremy to know .

Who could it be, other than Arthur?

He called Arthur’s office. No answer. Was the old man still caught up in yesterday’s “prior engagement”? The exigent circumstance that had caused the pathologist to flee Tumor Board before the meeting had ended?

Jeremy realized something: All three envelopes had arrived during periods when Arthur had been impossible to reach. What was that, an alibi ?

For what?

Slipping on his white coat, he walked to the faculty office and lied to the secretary- an exceptionally cheerful woman named Anna Colon with whom he’d always gotten along- about having bought a gift for Dr. Chess and needing a home address.

“I didn’t know you two were friends,” Anna said, as she handed over the black-bound Medical Staff binder. Not thinking to ask: If so, why don’t you know his address? Some people were blessed with a trusting nature. Jeremy often woke up in the middle of the night, mistrusting his own existence.

He said, “We’re more like pupil and student. Dr. Chess has taught me a lot, and I wanted to repay the favor.”

“Well, that’s nice. Here you go.”

Not the Victorian house in Queen’s Arms that Jeremy had conjured. An apartment in Ash View- the southern suburbs, far from the water, a good twenty miles out of the city.

Wrong, yet again. Everything about Arthur seemed to be taking him by surprise.

Or perhaps Arthur had given him hints. Ash View had once been farmland and Arthur had spoken, fondly, of agrarian roots.

Birthing calves… a sanguinary process. The old man had grisly sensibilities.

Did he sense that Jeremy shared them?

Because of Jocelyn?

Lately, he’d been thinking more about Jocelyn.

He could talk to Angela, make love to Angela. But Jocelyn.

So gone .

He needed to see the old man.

He hurried to the wards early, saw his patients, hoped he’d shortchanged none of them because his mind was elsewhere.

People smiled at him- familiar smiles, grateful smiles. A wife thanked him, a daughter squeezed his hand and told him her mother looked forward to his visits, he was the one doctor who didn’t hurt her.

He couldn’t be screwing up too badly, fraud that he was.

Tomorrow, he’d do better.

He drove his Nova out of the doctors’ lot just after noon. A rare dry day, but a mournful one, flying-saucer rain clouds looming over the skyline, blackening the roiling waters of the wind-whipped lake. The promised installment of another storm seemed to be bewitching motorists. From the time Jeremy got on the Asa Brander Bridge until he exited onto an industrial road that fed to the southern turnpike, he witnessed multiple driving aberrations, near collisions, and, finally, one accident that bred detours and congestion and foul tempers. Finally, he squeezed onto the toll road, battled traffic for miles before the midday commuter clog dropped off and he was sailing.

Zipping through the flatlands. He’d consulted a map before setting out but nearly missed the obscure left-hand exit that took him past a cemetery big as a town, middle-class shopping, and several retirement communities, each of them touting independent living .

Had Arthur opted for that? Canasta and bingo and accordion concerts, he and the doting wife blending in?

A cheerfully colored sign said Two miles to Ash View . The terrain stepped down a notch: working-class shopping, gas stations, tire dealers, shacks whose scratchy lawns accommodated rusting autos.

A far cry from the splendor of CCC . Whatever that stood for.

Jeremy passed a Dairy Queen and a Denny’s and three hamburger chains. Far cry from foie gras , too.

Independent living by day, gourmandizing by night. Arthur Chess was a man to be reckoned with.

Ash View was empty land and stray dogs and scattered multiple dwellings. Arthur’s address matched a large, flat-roofed, frame house overlooking what had once been a wheatfield and was now just endless acres of grass. The nearest landmark was a quarter mile north, a dormant drive-in theater with a chipped marquee.

The rain clouds turned the flatlands to shadowy moonscape.

Jeremy parked and studied the building. Once elegant, now shabby and subdivided. Not all that different from Angela’s place.

The old man lived in a rooming house. Had chosen to distance himself from the pleasures of the city and who knew what else.

A detached carriage house to the right of the main building had been converted to a four-car garage. Four closed doors, but no locks in sight. Jeremy got out, lifted the left-hand door, and found a Nissan. The next stall contained a Ford Falcon, the third was empty, and the last harbored Arthur’s black Lincoln Town Car.

Prior engagement. The old man had cut out from Tumor Board early and simply gone home.

Jeremy climbed the big house’s cement steps, read the names on the weathered brass mailbox.

A. Chess - no degree listed- lived in Unit Four.

The front door was etched glass- a remnant of bygone glory. Jeremy opened it.

Up the stairs and to the right. The house smelled of corn and curdled milk and laundry detergent. The stairway was steep, guided by a spotless white wooden rail. The walls were textured plaster, the same white, just as clean. Below Jeremy’s feet were weathered pine boards under a well-trod blue carpet. Old wood, but not a single squeak. The building was maintained lovingly.

Arthur’s door was unidentified as such. Okay, here we go.

Jeremy’s knock was met with silence.

“Arthur?” he called. No response. Louder rapping caused the door of the unit across the landing to crack. As he repeated Arthur’s name and appended his own, the crack widened and Jeremy made eye contact with a single, dark iris.