Dr. Schoenfeld smiled gently. “It’s all right, Nancy. I understand. Go on.”
She hesitated. You understand? she thought. That simple remark—the kindness of his tone—actually brought tears to her eyes. She regarded him carefully. You understand?
And, well, yes: he did seem to. This young Dr. Thomas Schoenfeld. Judging by his face: the soft brown eyes, the boy’s mouth hidden in the doctorly black beard. Judging by the concerned way he leaned toward her. The way he nodded encouragingly. He seemed ready to listen anyway, ready to give it his best shot. She wanted to throw her arms around him and tell all. Weep into his tweed shoulder. Move to a cottage where he would be her father and Mrs. Anderson, the fat black nurse outside, would be her mom. God, she thought, to have someone actually understand!
“Well, like I said,” she went on—more quickly now, pushing down the tears. “Like I said, I heard a voice, okay? From nowhere. And it was telling me to shoot someone. I mean, I know it sounds so awful but … and then later, in the park later, I heard all the beggars there saying things and …” She shook her head, trying to find the words.
“Go on,” he said—and yes, his voice was gentle, kindly. Understanding. Yes. “What were they saying? Go on.”
“Jesus. Jesus,” Nancy whispered. “They were all saying that someone was going to die. I mean, that’s what I heard them say. All right? They said that someone was going to be killed at eight o’clock tonight and that I had to be there. And the thing was … the thing was …”
It was true! It was all true.’ They are going to kill him. At eight o’clock. At the Animal Hour. I do have to be there! It’s all true, Doctor!
But no. No, she didn’t say that. She couldn’t say that. She mustn’t. Even if he was the Gandhi, the Schweitzer of psychiatry, it didn’t matter. Even he could understand only so much. And yet …
And yet, as she sat there, jammed into her little chair, her little space between desk and doorway, between the doctor and the wall, she suddenly felt certain of it. It was true. What the beggars had told her. It was all exactly right. Someone was going to die. At eight o’clock. At the Animal Hour. And for some reason, for some reason just beyond her reach, she did have to be there. It was urgent. It was everything.
“Anything else?” said Dr. Schoenfeld. And he said it so sweetly, so patiently, that she really did hunger to tell him. To tell him everything, unburden everything. She ached up into the pillowy depths of those brown peepers of his, half a doctor’s, half a boy’s. Maybe he would understand, she thought.
But she shook her head quickly. “No. No, that’s everything. I just got so scared, I took out the gun. I don’t even know where the gun came from. I don’t even know what happened to it.”
That was a lie, of course, and she felt bad about it. She knew perfectly well where the gun was and that she should tell him, but… Well … That ol’ debil gun. That bad, bad gun. She would need it, wouldn’t she? Yes. At eight o’clock.
“Can you remember anything preceding all this?” the doctor asked her now. “I mean, before the subway. Anything that might have set it off? Can you remember what you were doing yesterday, for example?”
“Well, yeah,” she started. “I mean, sure, I was … I was …” Oh no! Her jaw hung slack. Her silence poured out of her mouth like dust. What was she doing yesterday? She couldn’t remember. There was just nothing there. Yesterday, the day before—it was all darkness. “I … I …”
The doctor waited another moment for her to continue. Then he nodded. He leaned back in his seat. He steepled his fingers, doctorly. He said: “Nancy. I want you to know, first of all, that I understand how frightened you must be.”
“Wuh … I … Jesus,” she said. “I mean, you’re telling me.”
He gave a snort at that. He nodded. “But these things are not … entirely inexplicable.”
Her next exclamation died aborning. She could only look at him. “They’re not?”
“No, absolutely. I mean, what we’re dealing with … goddamn it!” The phone again. He yanked it to his ear. “Yes? I don’t know, I’m with a patient, I can’t talk now. Yes.” He hung up. “God!” Shook his head. “You want my job?”
“Uh … No. No, thanks.”
“Good. At least you’re not really crazy.”
Nancy surprised herself with a laugh. She looked at this young doctor of hers with something like wonder. Could he really have some answers for her?
Dr. Schoenfeld rolled his chair to the side a little now. He reached out past her cheek to the edge of the door and swung it shut. Oh, that was good. She liked that. The click of the door. The privacy. She was a human being, after all. She faced him gratefully as he rolled back into place before her. He leaned forward again, elbows on his thighs. He peered deeply—warmly—at her. She peered back, her lips parted. Waiting for him to tell her.
“Nancy,” he said slowly. “I want to be totally honest with you. All right? I mean, you are not the usual customer we have coming in here. You understand? You strike me as a very intelligent, very responsible person. I see no reason to jolly you along or sugarcoat things for you or anything like that.”
She nodded. Waited.
Dr. Schoenfeld clapped his hands together three times softly: pop, pop, pop. He marshaled his thoughts. Gave her the moment to prepare. And then he let her have it. “I can’t make a complete diagnosis after just one interview, obviously. There are tests we have to do and … other questions to ask and so on. But right now, I would say it’s a pretty damn good bet that what you’re experiencing is an episode of schizophrenia.”
He waited for her reaction. She had none. She felt nothing. Only her confusion. She was still waiting for the news. “Schizophrenia?” she said—but only because he seemed to expect her to say something. “You mean like … a split personality?”
He smiled quickly. “No, no, no. That’s … you know, that’s just a popular misuse of the term. That’s something very different. Schizophrenia is a very general term—it’s so general, in fact, we don’t really like to use it anymore but … it’s a general term for a series of mental disorders characterized by … oh … auditory-command hallucinations—which means voices telling you what to do. Fixed delusions, like ‘Someone’s going to die at eight o’clock.’ Memory lapses. Just various other manifestations like the ones you’ve been experiencing. Do you understand?”
Well … no. No, she didn’t. A series of mental disorders. It didn’t register. She just sat there, feeling nothing. Gazing at him. Waiting for him to tell her what had happened to her, where her life had gotten to.
And then it dawned on her.
Schizophrenia. Sure, she had heard of that. Schizophrenia was what street people had, homeless people. People who muttered to themselves on the street. That was, like, mental illness. She started to smile. “Yes, but …” Not me, she was going to tell him. You don’t mean that I have this. “But … But that’s, that would …” That would mean I’m mentally ill, she wanted to say. As in sick, as in crazy. You don’t mean I’m schizophrenic? I have a life. I’m a real person. I have friends. I have parents, things …
But he did. He did mean her. She could see it in his eyes, in the sympathy in his eyes. He was pitying her. He was gazing at her warmly and thinking, Tough break. Poor kid. Thank God it’s not me. Jesus. Jesus! She couldn’t speak finally. Not at all. She could only shake her head at him.
“I know,” he cooed. “I know. It’s very scary. But things are a lot different now than they used to be. All right? We have new drugs and … new methods of dealing with the disease.”
The disease! Jesus Christ! Nancy kept shaking her head. New methods of dealing with the disease? Listen to him. He was trying to sound optimistic. He was trying to give her hope. But she could see it, right there in his eyes: He had no hope. This was not a hopeful situation.
“Can this … I mean, can this just happen?” she said. “I mean, you’re walking along and then, poof, you’re a schizophrenic. I mean, that doesn’t sou
nd … I mean …”
He nodded. “Yes. Yes, it can just happen. It does just happen. Unfortunately. Right around your age. Ordinary people—oh, shit.” Burreeeep, went the phone. He deflated. Sank back in his chair. Lifted the handset wearily. “Hello. I’m with a patient now. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Okay. I can’t deal with that now. I’m with a patient.” He hung up. “Sorry.”
She was silent a moment. Her mind was racing. Darting down every possible avenue, looking for a way out of this. “You mean, this is like … You mean there’s no cure for this. Is there?” she whispered. “That’s what you’re telling me. I’m just going to be this way.”
He didn’t look at her. He looked down at his desk. He gestured at the papers on the imitation wood desktop. “Well … Sometimes … Listen … sometimes there’s only one attack. Sometimes it doesn’t get any worse at all. There’s an incident like this and then … nothing. It’s very mysterious. You can’t really predict …”
“Oh …” It was a little gasp from her parted lips. She shook her head at the cigarette burn on the floor, her old friend. “Oh … Oh …” Sometimes it doesn’t get any worse. That’s what he’d said. And that meant that usually it does get worse. Didn’t it? Usually the voices became louder, that’s what he was saying. The delusions became stronger. The good periods, the clear periods, got shorter and shorter. And then after a while … She just couldn’t take care of herself anymore. That’s what her mother would say, crying into her handkerchief. And her friends would shake their heads and say, She was such a nice person. It’s just so awful. And she—she could see herself. She would scrape along the sidewalk beneath their windows. Her eyes on the middle distance. Her hair in tangles. Her clothes in rags. The handsome men in suits would swerve to avoid her. The women in dresses from Bergdorf’s would shake their heads and look away. She would come out at midnight, live from midnight to midnight. Sleeping in doorways. Muttering in the dark, to the dark, or shouting suddenly: “The Animal Hour! Someone is going to die! At eight o’clock! At eight o’clock!”
“But it’s true,” she whispered, clenching her fists, clenching her teeth. “I swear. It’s all true. It’s all going to happen.”
And Dr. Schoenfeld’s pity—the way he cocked his head, pursed his lips—it scorched her to her marrow. It was a martyrdom.
“Come on, Nancy,” he said after a moment. She heard his chair squeak. She was dimly aware that he was standing over her. With his patched tweed jacket and his black knit tie. And his sanity. And his freedom. He reached down to her and touched her arm. She jerked away—what did he know about it? “It’s all right,” he said softly. “We have to do some tests on you. It’s going to take about three days. All right?”
He took her by the arm again. This time, she let him. He drew her out of the chair. Onto her feet. She stared up at him with pleading eyes. It’s all true. Really. I swear it. Please. Help me.
“We’re gonna get in touch with your family,” Dr. Schoenfeld said. “Meantime, we’ll get you a nice room. A view of the Empire State Building even. Pretty fancy stuff for a newcomer, but I’ve got some pull. All right?”
He smiled down at her and she gazed up at him, clinging to the kindness in that smile. She nodded her head.
“Good,” he said. He patted her arm. “Now come on. I’ll introduce you to the gang.”
She nodded again. Then she drove her knee up into his testicles with all the strength she had.
She hadn’t known she was going to do this until she did it. She hadn’t had the slightest idea. And when she had done it, she could only stand there, waiting, as if she expected him to respond.
There was a long, queer moment when everything was just the same. The doctor continued to smile down at her, his hand on her arm, the kindly little crinkles at the corners of his eyes. Then, very slowly, the crinkles disappeared as his eyes widened. His whole face seemed to slowly expand. His mouth opened. His eyes blew up like balloons. He made sounds: “Uh … uh …” These little expulsions of air. And very, very slowly, his hands moved to his groin and his body bent forward. He turned—slowly—away from her. Groped for his desk with one hand, holding his groin with the other. He knocked papers off the desktop. They flapped and fluttered to the floor. His hand tipped over a pencil holder and the pencils spilled out with a clatter. “Uh … uh …” He kept making that soft little noise.
Nancy stood through all this, gaping. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I have to, I have to be there, she thought. The doctor groped across the surface of his desk, clutching his groin, doubled over.
And she realized he was reaching for the phone.
Oh, don’t … Quickly, she stepped around behind him. Took up a position just at his back with her feet planted firmly. She clasped her two hands together. Pulled them back—as if she were raising an axe over her head. And then she swung down at him as hard as she could.
She grunted as her clasped hands connected with the back of his head. Dr. Schoenfeld’s face was driven down into the desktop. His nose was crushed against the imitation wood. Blood burst from either side of his face, little red sprays on the white papers around him. His body went limp. He slumped onto his desk. He slid backward, hitting the chair as he fell. He dropped to the floor at her feet. The chair tipped over on top of him.
“Shit!” Nancy said. She looked up suddenly.
Bureeep. Burreeep.
It was the goddamned phone again.
“Fernando Woodlawn. You never heard that name.”
Detective Mulligan was sitting now, tilted back in a swivel chair. His feet were propped on the edge of the desk in front of him, his trench coat hanging down around his seat. His profile was to Perkins, and it seemed to the poet that the cop was suddenly weary. His eyes blinked lethargically, the batteries running down.
Well, the sparring is over anyway, Perkins thought, looking at him. He’s made his decision about me.
The thought was not a soothing one.
“I’ve heard the name,” he said after a moment. “I can’t place it, but I have heard it somewhere.”
Mulligan blinked slowly at the cinderblocks in the far wall. The empty coffee maker there. The skewed, wilted pages tacked to their strip of brown cork. Even the high monotone of his voice seemed to have grown heavier somehow.
“You probably read about him in Downtowner magazine. They did a feature on him a while back. Your brother took the photographs.”
“Yeah? So Zach took his picture. So what? That’s his job. Who is the guy?”
“Woodlawn? Oh, he’s … a lawyer. A big shot lawyer. A big hoo-ha in the city. Into a lot of real estate deals. The navy port. Times Square development. A lot of deals with a lot of pols. Big, big hoo-ha; one of the back room boys.” He seemed to need to gather his strength for a moment before continuing. “He’s also the man that Nancy Kincaid worked for. The dead girl; he was her boss. And … he’s also the man with his Johnson up the masked girl’s ass. The one …” He gestured toward the photographs.
“I know which masked girl’s ass we’re talking about,” Perkins said glumly. “What does this have to do with my brother?”
Mulligan spared him a tired glance. Showed his profile again. “The people who run this city are Democrats,” he said in that flat, mousy voice of his. “Even the Republicans are Democrats; there are no Republicans. If you want to build a building, or win a city contract, or pass a law, or lower your assessment, or park your car in the middle of Fifth Avenue at rush hour, you go to Someone who knows the Democrats. Right? This Someone then tells you what to do: You hire lawyer A because he is the council leader’s brother-in-law; you hire accounting firm B because your local rep used to work there. You don’t need a PR man? Tough shit: The PR man sucks the borough president’s dick so you gotta hire him too. Right? And you make a campaign contribution here and there and finally you get to supply the city with widgets until Jesus comes. Understand?”
Perkins gave a slow nod. Thinking: Hanh? He had definitely lost the thread here somewhere. It was
a little hard for him to focus on a civics lesson when he couldn’t stop obsessing about Zach and the girl in the toilet and what the hell were they asking about Zach for anyway and where was he and was Nana going to have a coronary when she heard about all this and those glassy, china blue eyes staring up at him from the blood-streaked porcelain …
Still, he gave his vague nod. Gestured Mulligan on.
And Mulligan wasn’t looking at him anyway. He stretched a little. Ran his hand over his receding tide of springy curls.
“Right,” he said mildly, always mildly. “Fernando Wood-lawn. He’s the Someone you go to, the Someone who knows the Democrats. All right?”
“Yeah …” said Perkins uncertainly.
“And you go to him and he spreads your money around—but he never does an illegal thing. That’s important. He hires you lawyers you don’t want, and PR men you don’t need, and he contributes to causes you don’t believe in; he helps you get a contract you shouldn’t get or build a building that shouldn’t be there—but not once in any way does he break the law or pass an illegal buck or sidle up to people in the dark or wear sunglasses or anything like that at all. Right? Only greedy people make those mistakes. Not Fernando. All right.”
But it was not all right with Perkins. It sounded serious and he wasn’t following it and what the hell did it have to do with his brother? He blew a long breath out. Brushed back his long black hair. This was worse than Mulligan’s silences. Where the hell was Zach?
“Now.” Mulligan just went mildly on. “For the last six months, Fernando Woodlawn has been spreading around an uncountable number of dollar bills. The idea is he and some other people want to build a complex of buildings called Ashley Towers over by the Hudson. So, if he takes all the necessary steps, which he has, and he wins permission for this complex, which he will, he will have enough jobs to hand out and enough money to pass around so that he will be made the Democratic nominee for governor next year, which means he will be automatically elected because there are no Republicans in sight who can run against him. So here’s tomorrow’s news today: Woodlawn is going to be your next governor. And that’s what’s with Fernando Woodlawn. Which brings us to the Republicans.”
The Animal Hour Page 14
