Beyond Blame

by Stephen Greenleaf

  “Really? Where?”

  “Here. In Berkeley. At a place the street kids call Hell House.”

  Usser was still uninterested. “I’ve heard of it,” he said absently.

  “He was with your daughter.”

  The statement broke the spell, and Usser seemed to levitate. “What?”

  “Nifton was with Lisa. She seems to see him as her designated savior. She seems to owe him something and to be willing to do about anything to repay the debt.”

  Usser was clearly stunned. His hand rose to his face and tried to rub away the information. “My God. Then it’s true. I … Was Lisa all right?”

  “She was drugged to the eyeballs,” I said bluntly, with a touch of exaggeration. “And rather determinedly self-destructive. She wouldn’t have anything to do with me or with a kid named Cal who used to be her boyfriend and who wants to get her away from the Maniac and his entourage.”

  “Maniac. Why do you call him that?”

  “Because that’s what he calls himself.”

  Usser’s eyes had collected tears. He removed his glasses and swiped at them with the back of his hand. When he spoke again his voice was small and bewildered. “I was afraid of something like this.”

  “Why?”

  “Lisa rejected me, us, so thoroughly she was bound to find some outrageous substitute, a surrogate parent who would be certain to provoke Dianne and me, if not frighten us.”

  “Nifton’s frightening all right,” I agreed. “His face is like Silly Putty, contorting this way and that. He can’t stay still. His tongue keeps flopping out of his mouth. Is all that part of his mental problems?”

  Usser shook his head. “I’m afraid all that is part of the cure. I’ve seen Ronald a few times since he was released, though only from a distance. Still, I’m certain he suffers from tardive dyskinesia, the symptoms being as you described. It’s brought on by overmedication of the chlorpromazine derivatives. The result of such mistreatment is permanent brain injury.” Usser sighed. “I’m a believer in psychoactive medication, but I’m afraid these days it’s all too often characterized by over-optimistic claims of drug companies and overprescribing by the physicians in the field. I’m confident that one day biochemistry will provide most of the answers, but unfortunately that day is still not here.”

  When Usser paused, I changed the subject. “What happened at your place two months ago, Professor?”

  He ended his reverie and frowned.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Two months ago—a month before your wife was murdered—your daughter flipped out and took to drugs and to the streets, your wife began having an affair with her boss, and you began being insensitive to your colleagues at the law school and drinking more than usual. What made all that happen? Did it have something to do with Nifton?”

  Usser shook his head. “No. I … nothing. Nothing happened.”

  His words were a tortured lie. Usser knew I knew it, but he also knew there was nothing I could do about it. I was still thinking of where to take the conversation next when Usser spoke in a thoughtful drone. “Adam Lonborg says I shouldn’t go back to teaching even after I’m released. He says I should find Lisa and enter psychotherapy with her and spend my time putting our lives and our relationship back together.”

  “Doesn’t sound like a bad idea,” I said. “But it’s not going to be easy.”

  “To find Lisa?”

  “That may be the easy part. The hard part will be to convince her that you’re worthy of the effort to patch things up.”

  “You mean because she’s told the police I killed Dianne?”

  “That’s part of it.”

  “But I’m being punished for that, and I will be punished even more. I’ll either be in prison or in a mental hospital once the trial is over. Surely that will be enough to satisfy her. If not to make her love me, at least to make her return to a normal life away from people like that madman Nifton.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  Usser fell silent again, this time not the criminal but the parent, thinking of ways to rescue his daughter from the dangers she was drifting toward, dangers that could sink her. After a minute he looked at me again. “So you’re going to keep on the case?”

  “Unless my clients ask me to drop it.”

  “Will you let me know if you see Lisa again? Will you tell me where to find her?”

  I shrugged. “If it seems right. I can’t promise anything.”

  “But why not? What harm would it do to tell me where my daughter is?”

  “It has to do with why I want to stay on this case. I haven’t liked this thing since the first day. It didn’t make sense; I kept thinking up excuses to get out of it. But while I was waiting for you to get here I finally figured out why it’s always seemed so screwy.”

  Usser frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  “I talked to Jake Hattie for a minute before coming down here. He doesn’t want you to plead insanity, you know.”

  “I know. He told me he’ll withdraw as my counsel if I persist. But what does that have to do with anything?”

  “Jake told me the reason he didn’t want you to plead insanity was because you’re not guilty, and he wants to prove it and get you off.”

  “He’s wrong.”

  “That’s what I assumed until I started thinking about it. And what I finally decided was that Jake’s exactly right. You aren’t guilty. And you aren’t insane and you weren’t on the night your wife was killed.”

  Usser leaned forward and grasped my forearm. “You’re wrong, Mr. Tanner. I’m going to withdraw my not-guilty plea after the preliminary hearing and I’m arraigned again in Superior Court. My only plea will be insanity. By doing that I’ll be admitting that I committed the offense, that I murdered Dianne.” His final words were hollow, as though desperation had eaten away their content.

  “I know that’s what you’re going to do, Professor. But you’re not going to do it because you actually killed your wife. The fact is you didn’t kill her. That’s the only thing that makes sense.”

  “Then why would I be doing this?”

  “That’s a good question. And I think I’ve got an answer. You’re doing this because you’re protecting someone else. You think you can sell your insanity plea to a jury and then talk your way out of the state hospital in a short time and return to a normal life, and in the meantime the police won’t go after the person who really killed your wife.”

  “What person is that?”

  “I’m not sure, but I know who you think did it.”

  “Who?”

  “Your daughter. You think Lisa killed her mother and you’re willing to risk your own incarceration to keep her from being tried for the crime.”

  Usser was shaking his head vigorously, as though to disgorge something horrible that had entered it. “You’re very wrong, Tanner. You’re totally mistaken. I’m guilty. I did it. Why won’t you believe that?”

  I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms. “I’ll tell you what, Professor. I’ll believe it if you can pass a little quiz.”

  “What quiz?” Usser frowned nervously.

  I smiled. “They found the murder weapon yesterday.”

  “Really? The scissors? I didn’t know. No one told me.”

  “The way I see it, if you really killed your wife, you ought to be able to tell me where they found them. Right? I mean, you’re the one who hid them, after all.”

  “I …”

  “Well, go ahead. Convince me. Tell me where you stashed the weapon.”

  Usser started to say something, then stopped. My smile broadened. He bowed his head. “Jake Hattie told me not to discuss the case with you,” he managed finally.

  “I’ll bet he did,” I said: “But I don’t think you could discuss this case with me even if you wanted to. The only thing you can do is make up some nifty little symptoms and mimic some psychotic ramblings you’ve picked up along the way, and use them to convince a jury that you’re
nuts.”

  Usser started to protest, then reconsidered. After another minute he leaned back in his chair and smiled, suddenly confident. “It doesn’t really matter, though, does it?”

  “What doesn’t matter?”

  “Whether you believe me or not.”

  “I suppose it doesn’t,” I agreed.

  “It’s going to work no matter what you do. Do you know why? Because psychiatry is such an infinitely absorbing discipline. Anything and everything is grist for its mill.”

  “How do you mean?”

  Usser’s chuckle was a dry scrape. “You accuse me of planning to manufacture the symptoms of mental illness, to prevail at my trial by feigning insanity. Well, did you know that since 1898 the impersonation of mental illness by a prisoner awaiting trial has been known as the Ganser Syndrome? And that some psychiatrists consider such an impersonation in and of itself to be a manifestation of psychosis?”

  I shook my head, amazed and amused. “So you can’t lose. Even if they show you’re faking, the faking itself may get you off.”

  Usser smiled but remained silent.

  I stood up. “One last question.”

  “Yes?”

  “What film do you watch most frequently on your VCR at home?”

  “You mean commercial film?”

  “Yes.”

  Usser frowned. “What does this have to do with anything?”

  “Humor me.”

  “Well, I … Reds, I suppose. I watch it once a month or so. Why?”

  “I don’t know,” I said truthfully.

  TWENTY-TWO

  I left the courthouse and headed for my car. In the park across the street a line of vans and buses—all old, all piled high with bedding and camping gear, all stuffed with people dressed in the flowing, flowery garb of the hippies of yesteryear—were spilling their occupants into the park. The mood was festive and communal. I stood and watched and wondered what was going on. When I noticed a street cop walking my way, I decided to ask him.

  He looked over at the park and grinned. “Dead Heads,” he said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Fans of the Grateful Dead. The rock group? See, the Dead’s giving a concert in the Community Theater on Halloween, and the faithful are starting to gather. By Halloween night the park will be full of them. Some of them follow the Dead all across the country, coast to coast.” The cop paused. “Reminds me of the old days,” he went on thoughtfully. “Too bad, in a way. Not much that’s nice goes on in the streets anymore. Just the heavy stuff—drugs, muggings, trashings, like that. Hardly ever come across a crowd just having fun. Me, I wish the Dead would play here every week.”

  The cop saluted me and moved on down the street. I found my car and drove to another park, the one laid claim to in the name of the people back in 1969.

  It was pushing noon. The stand of pine trees in which the Maniac and his dancers had gamboled the night before was now devoid of homesteaders. Daylight revealed unwelcome truths—that the ground was littered and parched, the flora anemic and forlorn, the atmosphere pathetic and obsolete, the odor heavy and cloying. I wandered in and out of the little grove for several minutes, making sure the nighttime denizens had all withdrawn, then made my way to the log that marked the hole where Lisa Usser had hidden her mysterious horde.

  I rolled the log aside and began to dig with my bare hands. It was easy going. The dirt was dry as dust, a lumpy loam of pine needles and twigs and leaves, plus the occasional bits of broken bottles, plastic wrappers, aluminum cans and the other nondegradable artifacts of modern urban life. The smell of decaying garbage enveloped me like a tent. At the bottom of the hole I found two things.

  The first was the videotape cassette of Reds. I picked it up and dusted it off and held it to the light. There didn’t seem to be anything at all unusual about it: I took out the cartridge and confirmed that’s all it was, then replaced it in its case. I still couldn’t figure it, unless what was wound onto the cassette reel wasn’t Reds at all but something else; something, perhaps, that identified Dianne Renzel’s killer.

  The second item was the little cedar box that Lisa’s grandmother had retrieved for her at the Usser house the day before, the box containing the decorated fingernails that Bart Kinn had laughed at so disdainfully. I opened the lid. The nails were still there, painted in black and orange, silver and purple, the ominous colorations of mystics and the occult. I couldn’t figure the fingernails, either. I put the box and the cassette tape aside and pawed around in the dirt for several seconds longer, until I was certain nothing else of interest was buried there, then filled in the hole and took the booty to my car.

  The thing to do was find a video recorder and take a look at Reds. Peggy, my secretary, had one, but she lived in the city and it would take a couple of hours to drive over there and arrange to use it. I thought I’d seen a recorder somewhere at the law school, in Elmira Howson’s office, if memory served. She’d grouse about my using it, but the only other alternative was to go back to Usser’s house, wait for him to get home if he wasn’t there already and watch the tape with him. That one I didn’t like so well, since I had a feeling what appeared on the screen wouldn’t be nearly as cute as Warren Beatty. But before all that there was someone I wanted to talk to.

  I stuck the box and the tape under the front seat, locked the car and walked back to Bowditch Street and headed two blocks north, to the yellow stucco duplex that housed the Berkeley Community Crisis Center.

  Students swarmed around me, arms cradling books, faces bright and cheerful, clothing clean and neat and new. A throwback to the fifties, in attitude as well as fashion. They say the only thing they’re interested in is making money. No public service, no Peace Corps, no crusade for the right to anything more than a Volvo and an Apple and a sure supply of sushi. But the kid in front of me wasn’t one of those. He had a Mohawk haircut and a chicken bone through his nose. The sign on the back of his leather jacket read IF VOTING CHANGED ANYTHING IT WOULD BE ILLEGAL. As I trotted up the steps to the crisis center the kid looked back at me and shook his head. “They can’t stop it, man. No one can stop it.”

  “Stop what?”

  “The Holocaust. That’s the crisis, man. In another year we’ll all be Day-Glo cinders. So get high and fly, man. Morituri te salutamus.”

  The kid waved and trotted off, not obviously anxious over the prospect of nuclear annihilation. I wasn’t sure I was all that bothered by it myself. The vulnerability is democratic, at least, as opposed to Vietnam, where we paid the blacks and the country boys a few hundred bucks a month to do the dying for the rest of us. I opened the door and went inside, wondering how Dianne Renzel had managed to fall victim to a crisis when she was an expert at resolving them.

  The waiting area was sparsely furnished and empty but for a single woman sitting in the corner, whimpering, her face buried in her hands. The only other person in view was the receptionist, a woman of graduate student age sitting behind a simple plywood counter while she managed to talk on the phone and type at the same time.

  I looked for Pierce Richards’ office but I didn’t see it. Two doors led off the waiting area, but they were closed and unmarked. While I waited for the receptionist to give me directions I looked through the leaflets on the counter. They advised the center’s clients on everything from the legal rights of battered women to the free food at the Berkeley Emergency Food Project and the free lodging at the Berkeley Support Services Emergency Shelter.

  The receptionist laughed a nice laugh into the telephone. Her typing was stark and dreadful, reminding me somehow of the young boy’s forecast of atomic incineration. I was oddly relieved when she stopped typing and hung up the phone and looked at me critically, as if to gauge what particular crisis this old guy was suffering from. Before she could dismay me with a guess, I told her my name and that I was there to see Mr. Richards.

  “He’s with someone right now,” she replied. “Can I help you?”

  I shook my head. “I’ll wai
t. It’s a personal matter.”

  I started to take a seat in the waiting area, then remembered the whimpering woman and stayed where I was and read another leaflet. The receptionist gave me an inquiring look. Her name tag labeled her as Sandra. She wore her brown hair straight, her cotton clothing simple, her ears pierced by silver hoops. She was surrounded by forms and files and a Rolodex the size of a tire, and she was still trying to figure me out. I had a hunch that if I gave her another hour she’d come up with something more fundamental than anything I’d managed to find in the forty years I’d been working at it.

  “I was wondering,” I said when the silence became embarrassing. “Do you keep records of everyone who comes in to the center?”

  The girl smiled. “We try. We’re pretty good if they stay long enough to receive counseling. The hard ones are the in-and-outers. They run in, complain about something or someone, then run out before we can complete the intake record, let alone do anything for them. Those we don’t have anything on. Unless they’re regulars. Some people show up every time the rent is due, or their period comes, or the moon is full. Around here a full moon means a full house. Do you believe in astrology?”

  I shook my head.

  “What’s your sign?”

  “Cancer.”

  “Hmmm.”

  I laughed. “What’s that mean?”

  Her eyes twinkled back. “Nothing. Just hmmmm. You’re here on some kind of business, aren’t you?”

  “Yep.”

  “Is Mr. Richards in trouble?”

  “I don’t know. Is he?”

  She shrugged and flipped her long brown mane with a twitch of her head and neck. “I hope not. He’s a wonderful man. A saint, really, don’t you think?”

  I tried to remember whether I knew of any saints who had slept with another man’s wife. When I couldn’t think of one, I asked Sandra why she thought Richards might be in trouble.

  “I don’t know. He’s just so honest, you know? I figure one of these days all that honesty is going to get him busted.”

  “That’s a little cynical, isn’t it?”

  Sandra glanced around the office. “You spend much time here, and see what life does to people, what people do to people, and it’s hard not to get cynical. But I fight it.”