Patterson, James - Alex Cross 1 - Along Came A Spider

Everybody around the table laughed except Scorse. Sampson had nicknamed him the Funeral DirectorDigger Scorse. He was dedicated and professional, but usually not a lot of laughs.

“Very fucking funny, Alex,” Scorse finally said. “That's VFF.”

“Can you get in to see him again?” Jezzie asked me. She was as professional as Scorse, but a lot nicer to be around.

“Yeah, I can. fie wants to see me. Maybe I'll even find out why in hell he asked for me down in Florida. Why I'm the chosen one in his nightmare.”

Along Came A Spider

CHAPTER 47

WO DAYS LATER, I wangled, another hour with Gary Soneji/Murphy. I'd been up the previous two nights rereading multiple-personality cases. My dining room looked like a carrel at a psych library. There are tomes written about multiples, but few of us really agree on the material. There is even serious disagreement about whether there are any real multiplepersonality cases at all.

Gary was sitting on his hospital cot, staring into space, when I arrived. His shoulder sling was gone. It was hard to come and talk to this kidnapper, child-killer, serial killer. I remembered something the philosopher Spinoza once wrote: “I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them. ” So far, I didn't understand.

“Hello Gary,” I said softly, not wanting to startle him. “Are you ready to talk?”

He turned around and seemed glad to see me. He pulled a chair over for me by his cot.

“I was afraid they wouldn't let you come,” he said. “I'm glad they did.” “What made you think they wouldn't let me come?” I wanted to know.

“Oh, I don't know. It's just... I felt you were someone I might be able to talk to. The way my luck's been going, I thought they would shut you right off.”

There was a n;divet6 about him that was troubling to me. He was almost charming. He was the man his neighbors in Wilmington had described.

“What were you just thinking about? A minute ago?” I asked. “Before I interrupted.”

He smiled and shook his head. “I don't even know. What was I thinking about? Oh, I know what it was. I was remembering it's my birthday this month. I keep thinking that I'm suddenly going to wake up out of this. That's one recurring thought, a leitmotif through all my thinking. ”

“Go back a little for me. Tell me how you were arrested again,” I said, changing the subject. “I woke up, I came to in a police car outside a McDonald's. ” He was consistent on that point. He'd told me the same thing two days before. “My arms were handcuffed behind my back. Later on, they used leg-irons, too.”

“You don't know how you got into the police car?” I asked. Boy, was he good at this. Soft-spoken, very nice, believable.

"No, and I don't know how I got to a McDonald's in Wilkinsburg, either. That is the most freakish thing that's ever happened to me.

“I can see how it would be.”

A theory had occurred to me on the ride down from ashington. It was a long shot, but it might explain a few things that didn't make any sense so far.

“Has anything like this ever happened to you before?” I asked. “Anything vaguely like it, Gary?”

“No. I've never been in any trouble. Never been arrested. You can check that, can't you? Of course you can.”

“I mean have you ever woken up in a strange place before? No idea how you got there?”

Gary gave me a strange look, his head cocked sli htly. “Why would you ask that?”

9 “Did you, Gary?”

"Well... yes.

“Tell me about it. Tell me about those times when you woke up in a strange place.”

He had a habit of pulling on his shirt, between the second and third buttons. He would pull the fabric away from his chest. I wondered if he had a fear of not being able to breathe, and where it might have come from if he did.

Maybe he'd been sick as a child. Or trapped with a limited air supply. Or locked up somewhere-the way Maggie Rose and Michael Goldberg had been locked away.

“For the past year or so, maybe more than that, I've suffered from insomnia. I told that to one of the doctors who came to see n-w,” he said.

There was nothing about insomnia in any of the prison workups. I wondered if he'd told any of the doctors, or simply imagined that he had. There was stuff about an uneven Wechsler profile, indicative of impulsivity. There was a verbal I.Q. and a performance I.Q., both through the roof. There was a Rorschach profile that reflected severe emotional stress. There was a positive response to T. A.T. card # 14, the so-called suicide card. But not a word about insomnia.

“Tell me about it, please. It could help me to understand. ” We'd already talked about the fact that I was a psychologist, besides being A really crackerjack detective. He was comfortable with my credentials. So far, anyway. Did that have anything to do with his asking for me down in Florida? He looked into my eyes. “Will you really try to help me? Not trap me, Doctor, help me?”

I told him that I'd try. I'd listen to what he had to say. I'd keep an open mind. He said that was all he could ask for.

“I haven't been able to sleep for a while. This goes back for as long as I can remember,” he went on. “It was becoming a jumble. Being awake, dreams. I had trouble sorting one out from the other. I woke up in that police car in Pennsylvania. I have no idea how I got there. That's really how it happened. Do you believe me? Somebody has to believe me.”

“I'm listening to you, Gary. When you've finished, I'll tell you what I think. I promise. For the moment, I have to hear everything you remember.”

That seemed to satisfy him.

"You asked if it's happened to me before. It has. A few times. Waking in strange places. Sometimes in my car, pulled over along some road. Sometimes a road

I've never seen, or even heard of before. A couple of times it's happened in motels. Or wandering the streets. Philadelphia, New York, Atlantic City one time. I had casino chips and a complimentary parking ticket in my pocket. No idea how they got there."

“Did it ever happen to you in Washington?” I asked.

“No. Not in, Washington. I haven't been in Washington since I was a kid, actually. Lately, I've found I can ficome to' in a conscious state. Completely conscious. I might be eating a meal, for example. But I have no idea how I got in the restaurant.”

“Did you see anybody about this? Did you try to get help? A doctor?”

He shut his eyes, which were clear chestnut brownhis most striking feature. A smile came across his face as he opened his eyes again.

"We don't have money to spend on psychiatrists. We're barely scraping by. That's why I've been so depressed. We're in the hole over thirty grand. My family is thirty thousand in debt, and I'm here in prison.

He stopped talking, and looked at me again. He wasn't embarrassed about staring, trying to read my face. I was finding him cooperative, stable, and genet ally lucid. I also knew that anybody who worked with him might be the victim of manipulation by an extremely clever and gifted sociopath. He'd fooled a lot of people before me; he was obviously good at it.

“So far, I believe you,” I finally said to him. “What you 9re saying makes sense to me, Gary. I'd like to help you if I can.”

Tears suddenly welled in his eyes, and rolled down his cheeks. He put his hands out to me.

I reached out, and I held Gary Soneji/Murphy's hands. They were very cold. He seemed to be aft-aid.

“I'm innocent,” he said to me. “I know it sounds crazy, but I'm innocent.”

I didn't get home until late that night. A motorcycle eased up alongside the car as I was about to pull into my driveway. What the hell was this?