Webber made a low whistle, like there you go.
She looked into the school some more. Apparently endowment revenues were down, faculty and programs getting cut. Grumett had large class sizes and had been taking on quite a lot. Bit busy for a serial killer.
She went back to his Amazon page. “This one’s called The Myth of You. Sounds like something from JoJo Moyes.” She read aloud from the product details section. “Published by Boxcar Press, sold exclusively on Amazon . . . Here’s the blurb for it: ‘In his ground-breaking work, Dr Grumett illustrates how the concept of individual agency — a sense of authorship over our lives — falls apart upon inspection. What we think, what we feel, even what we do are responses to environmental factors and physiological processes we have no control over. Healing, Grumett demonstrates, is possible when we stop heaping “blame and shame” upon ourselves, but seek to understand the conditions shaping our lives.’”
“Sounds like the kind of book that’d drive most libertarians nuts,” Webber said.
It also sounded familiar. If she had Archer’s notes from his call, she was sure she’d find something very similar. Maybe Grumett was their guy after all.
Her phone buzzed and she took the call from Blanchett, who claimed the internet links sent to Archer’s phone pointed to two separate videotaped lectures from Grumett. They’d been uploaded to YouTube by a user called Storm Brewer.
“Both lectures are from his abnormal psych class and they’re pretty dry,” Blanchett said. “In the first one he talks about social pressure, or something. In the other one he talks about the brain — a billion neurons, a trillion connections, yadda yadda — scientists are finding more mental states with specific, physical correlates. I wrote this one down, he says: ‘Nature is patterns and anything you let win the internal argument grows. You literally build yourself that way, forming new architecture in the brain via neuronal connections.’”
It not only echoed her own study of psychosis, but for the first time she thought she might have a clearer picture of the philosophy lurking in the cryptic words of Ted Archer’s caller — the nature of the mind wasn’t to be a source of liberation and individual agency, but to hold us hostage.
Blanchett said, “I can send you clean links from my own computer.”
“Do that.”
She skimmed the first video. Webber leaned close and listened with her. Grumett said, “. . . And so we’re not as much the thinker of our thoughts as we are their observer. You’re not selecting thoughts from some encyclopedia in your head — more like you’re in the batting box and they launch at you like mechanical pitches.”
“Huh,” Webber said.
“Mostly we’re guided by feelings,” Grumett said on screen, “and the preponderance of our feelings has to do with social concerns, social connection, status, finding a mate. Our thoughts basically serve these feelings, cluster around them. But we don’t select these feelings — they’re coming from modules in the brain deeply embedded by millennia of evolutionary biology. Our thoughts comport in reaction to them, and then our actions follow our thoughts.’”
Kelly glanced at Webber, who said, “You know what my dad told me once? He goes, ‘You’re not going to figure it all out, so don’t bother trying.’”
“And then you hooked up with the BU.”
“Sons are supposed to trouble their fathers, right?”
She called up the second video. Same Grumett, maybe a few pounds lighter, hair a little lower around his ears, otherwise another classroom lecture.
“Understanding the role of identity is key to psychotherapy. We say things like ‘me,’ ‘myself.’ And really, I think, we truly believe that we’re the authors of our lives. How could we not? That ethos is everywhere in society — the hero’s journey. Right, so maybe we understand that there are certain things beyond our control — the weather, or maybe an illness we have — but for the most part we believe we’re responsible for everything which happens to us. But now here’s the kicker — there is a huge body of scientific evidence, countless experiments in social science, which show us exactly how easily we can be tricked, how we’re influenced in ways we’re not cognizant of, and how easily the mind can be manipulated . . .”
The video glitched as her phone vibrated with an incoming text. We got him, Orzo wrote. And a minute later they were walking out with a man in a V-neck sweater and pleated pants, his expression inscrutable as Orzo showed him to the back of an unmarked police car.
* * *
When Dixon arrived at Auburn PD, Kelly told him, “I want to bring in Chief Broward.”
“Why?”
“I’d actually like him to sit in place of you,” Kelly said.
Dixon’s silence demanded a reason.
“He’s less intimidating,” Kelly explained. “We want Grumett comfortable. And if he wants to, to dominate. Let’s give him that chance.”
Broward said he’d be there in twenty minutes. She spent the time setting up the conference room the way she wanted it while Grumett waited in the lobby. Orzo wheeled in a comfortable swivel chair from his own office that she placed at the head of the table. She set the camera on the other end, collapsing the tripod legs down to their smallest length so that the apparatus sat on the table surface. Then she opened the blinds on the windows overlooking the parking lot and some trees beyond. Orzo would sit on his right, Kelly on his left a bit further away, and Broward across from her, beside Orzo.
She was in her element now.
“All good?” Orzo was watching.
She looked over the arrangement and then up at the ceiling. “Something we can do about the lights?”
“What do you want?”
“Dimmer.”
“I can take out some of the fluorescents.”
Orzo got a deputy in the room with him and a step ladder and spent several minutes taking two of the fluorescent bulbs out of the ceiling and closing it all back up. Dixon and Webber were on the other side of the one-way mirror.
She briefed Broward when he got there and they brought in Grumett. Kelly directed him to sit at the head of the table. He looked older in person, his face now filled with confusion as he took his chair and placed his hands flat on the table, as if he were about to take a lie detector. Which it might come to.
“Okay,” she said. “Recording is on. My name is Agent Kelly Roth, with the FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit based in Stafford, Virginia. The time now is 2:05 p.m. We’re presently at the Auburn Police Department in Auburn, New York in the department conference room. If I could just have each of you identify yourselves for the purposes of the digital recording that’s being made.” They completed the formalities.
“Mr. Grumett, I just want to state for the record that you’ve been presently given no caution and I want you to understand that your being here today is voluntary — that means if you don’t want to talk to us you don’t have to. You’ve waived counsel and are here on your own. We’re interviewing you as a potential witness. Do you understand that?”
“Yes.”
“The reason that we’re here today is because your mobile phone was found. Do you know where we found it?”
He looked at each of them and said, “I have no idea. I thought I’d misplaced my phone Friday night. I got all the way home from the school and realized I didn’t have it and I went back to the school. I asked the night custodian and he said he’d already been through my classroom and office and hadn’t seen it.”
“What did you think?”
“I thought maybe one of the students might’ve taken it. I hate to say that, but I don’t know what else. I retraced my steps to the parking lot — twice. I turned my car inside out.”
“Your car is a 2017 Honda Fit.”
“That’s correct.” He glanced at the men again. “Where did you say the phone was found?”
“I haven’t yet.”
He shifted in his seat a little. “Was my phone . . . ? I don’t understand why I’m here.”
“I�
�d like to get to that in just a minute. First I just want to reestablish a few more basics. You’re a psychology professor at Wells College, is that correct?”
“Yes. Correct.”
“You were previously interviewed by Auburn police on April twenty-seventh. Has anything significant about your position at the college changed since then?”
“No, I wouldn’t say so. I still teach the introductory course in psychology, an abnormal psych class and an upper-level course in psychotherapy.”
“I’ve seen some of your lectures online. Did you upload those yourself?”
“I upload the whole lectures initially, but then some of those videos get cut up and reposted by other people since they’re free to distribute.”
“Okay. Again, you’ve been previously interviewed and provided a statement in April, but we’d like to just go over things again, so some of it may feel redundant to you.” She folded her hands. “Could you describe for us your relationship to Tammy Haig?”
Grumett’s back was arrow straight, his hands still palms-down on the table in front of him. He made direct eye contact with Kelly. “She was my student.”
“For which class?” Kelly asked.
“Introduction to Psychology.”
“And when was the last time you saw her?”
“On April twenty-fifth, during my twice-a-week Intro to Pysch evening class.”
“What did you do right after class that day?”
“I went into my office, checked my email, packed up and went home.”
“Where you live alone.”
He looked at Orzo. “I’m sorry . . . I thought you checked my phone records?”
“We did,” Orzo said. “Agent Roth,” he said, turning to Kelly, “as you may already know, Mr. Grumett’s phone records showed that he placed a phone call to his daughter in Buffalo at eight thirty-two the evening of the twenty-fifth and the duration of the call lasted twenty-eight minutes. That’s a hardwired phone, a landline.”
“That’s right,” Grumett said. “Wasn’t that when she died? Eight thirty? I was on my home phone.”
“Thank you. Yes, I’m aware. As I said, we’re going to cover some of the same ground. I appreciate your patience. Anything unusual about that last class? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“No.”
“How did Tammy Haig seem to you? Did she seem to be under any kind of stress?”
“No. Tammy was . . . should I answer more fully or just answer yes or no?”
“I encourage you to share as much as you like.”
“Tammy was an active student, lots of class participation.”
“Did you have any sort of relationship with her outside of the classroom?”
“No.”
Kelly let the moment linger, watching him. “Not any sort of extracurricular activity? A school club or some sort of organization, nothing?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Did you ever see her in your office?”
“She came in once. She’d been out sick for two classes in one week and she wanted to catch up.”
“And she couldn’t just do that from the classroom? Meaning, she couldn’t pick up any assignments she may have missed in class? Or online?”
“No. I had to give her the notes which were back in my office. It was five minutes, maybe less.”
“Did you know Mrs. Haig was pregnant?”
Grumett swallowed. His eyes seemed to redden around the edges. “I did not.”
“And you never did anything socially with her — never got a coffee, never shared a lunch in the cafeteria, anything like that.”
“I didn’t hurt Tammy Haig.”
She waited again, giving Grumett time to reveal something. He was trembling. “Mr. Grumett, you wrote a book?”
“Yes . . . I’ve written more than one.”
“I have a digital copy here of one called The Myth of You. I’m going to show it to the camera a moment.” Kelly pulled her iPad from her bag and faced the screen toward the camera, revealing the cover. She listened to the sounds of the people breathing and turned her gaze back to the teacher. “Can you talk a little bit about it?”
Grumett was caught off guard, as if he hadn’t expected the book. “Would you like me to summarize it?”
“Please. That would be good.”
He shifted in the swivel chair, unfolded his hands and gestured with them as he spoke. “Um, the basis of that book takes concepts from neuroscience and applies them to psychotherapy. From a psychotherapy perspective, we work a lot in removing layers from a person in order to get at a root problem, and this idea that identity is somewhat illusory is . . . I’m sorry, I’m a little nervous.”
“That’s okay.”
He sighed and then he blushed. “I’m not very good extemporaneously. That’s why I write. I’m kind of an introvert.”
“I understand. Me too.” She looked at the digital book cover. “I haven’t had a chance to read much of it yet.”
“Well, you bought it, that’s what matters, right?” He grinned and looked around to see if the humor was appreciated. Meeting somber gazes he said, “Sorry. A little publishing joke.”
“Please continue if you can.”
“Okay. Ah, well, the title was really . . . a title has to be catchy. Of course, there’s a ‘you,’ given a certain conventional definition of that. But it’s also a bit mythical, in the Joseph Campbell sense of the hero archetype. That’s where I took that from. And from the perspective of neuroscience, there’s no ‘you’ actually in your brain, no little person in there riding around. There’s a million things you’re not in control of — your body makes white blood cells, digests food, produces serotonin, all of these physiological processes in your body you have nothing to do with . . . should I keep going?”
“I guess I’d like to know what the aim of the book is. Besides selling a few copies.” She offered a smile.
“Well, okay — so there’s the broader sense that you didn’t choose your circumstances, your childhood, and these can lead to opportunities and challenges all on their own. So in the book I’m taking all of this and weaving it into the psychotherapy techniques established by Freud, Jung, and Breuer. But the ultimate idea is to call us to compassion. For ourselves and for others.”
Kelly glanced at the other cops. Grumett’s summary seemed to have had a sedative effect on them — Orzo looked sleepy, Broward a bit lost.
She swiped the iPad screen until she was back at the book blurb and read it out: “‘Healing, Grumett demonstrates, is possible when we stop heaping “blame and shame” upon ourselves, but seek to understand the conditions shaping our lives.’”
Grumett said, “Exactly. A lot of the things that a person in crisis is going through — mood disorders, chronic behaviors — when they attach their identity to these things, the problems tend to compound, because then there’s shame.”
“So you’re taking these concepts and applying them in a therapeutic way.”
He blushed again and looked at his hands. “I was a therapist for fourteen years before teaching. I encountered many people who feel shame for not living up to expectations. The idea is to look at the factors driving our thoughts and actions. And in my clinical experience, it’s worked. It’s worked particularly well in cases of past trauma.”
This was close to home and she felt flustered for a moment.
Grumett had found his rhythm. “Once we identify the trauma we can start to let go of repressed emotions. Let go of attachment. I think I was always building toward this book — to bring these concepts to the wider public.”
“You must’ve gotten some criticism. Some of what you’re talking about could sound a bit like you’re saying there’s no good or evil, just bad wiring that can be fixed. Therapy, even science, maybe, instead of religion. And then on the other side I’m sure there’s a neuroscientist or two out there claiming you’ve hijacked hard science for something softer, more philosophical.”
He was warming to her, r
elaxing his rigid posture. “Absolutely. I’m in the crossfire. That was a concern.”
“Ever had someone threaten you?”
“No . . . not threaten . . .”
“Not a student or former student, or anyone upset with your philosophy? What about online?”
“Nothing in person. I get trolled online, sure — I’ve gotten my share of angry emails. Some of the harshest rebukes came from veterans, from writing about the military.”
Orzo seemed to come back to life. “You write about the military?”
“As an analogy, yes. The military tends to strip a person of their individuality. Shave their heads, put them in uniforms, trains them to march and respond to commands, until all that’s left is a number to distinguish them. When you deconstruct a person, when you pull away gender and race and creed, what’s left?”
Kelly leaned back. “But is the point of the book to have people deconstruct themselves? Is that part of the — say, process?”
He scrutinized her. “The point of the book is to call us to compassion. For ourselves, for other people . . .” Grumett broke eye contact and looked at Detective Orzo. “I’m sorry, I thought this was about my phone? Does my book have anything to do with what happened to my phone? Or Tammy Haig?”
“Mr. Grumett,” Kelly said, “I appreciate that, and we’re getting there. But we’re doing well here. I like talking to you about this. Let’s just stick with it for one more minute.”
He focused on her again. “Okay. My apology.”
“This notion that we don’t have much control over our lives — doesn’t that risk giving certain people a kind of license for bad behavior? ‘Oh, it wasn’t me, it was just the things that shaped me.’ And they go on to assault, or maybe to murder, and they feel blameless?”
Grumett just watched her with his eyes getting wet, like he’d been wounded. He lowered his head and made a nod. “Okay . . . I understand now.”
“What do you understand?”
He lifted his face toward her. “The ethics of criminology come into play here. And that’s why I’m here — because of my book. You think someone might have read and misinterpreted . . . Or you think I did something?” His gaze flitted between the other detectives. “And I’m sorry, but — where is my phone?”
The Husbands Page 17
