The Judas Child

by Carol O'Connell

  “Physical problems? No,” said William. “Perfectly normal. He was the boy Susan should have become—but for some accident of chemistry in the womb. There’s a theory that the zygote only divides because it’s detected a flaw and wants to slough off the damaged—”

  Ali tinged her fork against a glass. A bit gauche in Mortimer’s view, but effective. “Could we get back to the autopsy report?”

  “Initially,” said William, “I withheld the most bizarre aspects out of compassion for the family.”

  Ali seemed unconvinced. “And the father was powerful—influential.”

  “That was never a factor.” The surgeon’s tone was scolding.

  And Mortimer thought William was right to admonish her, for there was quite a distinction between taking graft and the lesser crimes of pomposity and a ruthless rush to publish. He sipped his wine without really tasting it, hardly listening to William anymore.

  “Why should I have made the Kendall twins into a freak show for the tabloids?”

  “You didn’t need a full autopsy,” said Ali. “A rape kit might have cleared Paul Marie. A surviving sample for DNA—”

  “We didn’t do DNA tests. They weren’t admissible evidence in those days. And the semen was from a nonsecretor, so why bother to keep—” And now William realized he had just confirmed the molestation, and he slowly closed his mouth.

  Myles picked up the conversation. “Ali, you can’t type blood from a nonsecretor, but the priest was also a nonsecretor. His own lawyer went along with all of this. Less hostile pretrial publicity if they left out the rape.”

  “There was full disclosure.” William had recovered his composure. “Nothing was done under the table.”

  “But none of the autopsy evidence survived, did it?” She had her answer in the ensuing silence.

  Mortimer wound one thin hand around the neck of the wine decanter, debating whether or not he could pour with a steady hand. “They also found Paul Marie’s fingerprints on the child’s bracelet. That was rather damning.”

  “Not necessarily.” Ali stared at her uncle over the rim of her wineglass. “Susan used to hide things under the cushions of the choir pews. I think it gave her an excuse to go back to the church after choir practice. She probably had a crush on the priest. Every girl in the choir did. He had the most beautiful eyes.”

  Mortimer Cray longed to fill his glass again, to surpass a sick man’s allotment of alcohol. But the vessel was made of fine crystal. If his hand should tremble—

  Myles Penny reached out and took the decanter. He held it carelessly for a moment, almost as a hostage in an attempt to engage Mortimer’s eyes, but the psychiatrist only stared at his empty glass. Myles relented and filled the wineglass almost to the brim.

  “I can well believe the child was in love with the priest.” William was on the defensive again. “You’re the expert, Ali. Pedophilia is a disease of seduction, is it not?”

  “Sometimes.” Though Ali spoke to William, her eyes were on her uncle. “But it’s a one-sided affair. The child is revolted by the molestation. Isn’t that right, Uncle Mortimer?”

  He wondered what his niece was playing at, and what was the precise meaning of her unspoken subtext. He chose his words with care. “Sometimes young children exhibit seductive behavior, most often quite innocent. But I suppose one might speculate on the child’s awareness of this behavior.”

  “Maybe your patients are coloring your logic, Uncle Mortimer. One patient in particular?”

  Mortimer ignored her question and sipped his wine with real thirst. “William is right. The priest had a fair trial.”

  William Penny edged his chair closer to Ali’s. “Tell me you’re not on some fanciful mission. You don’t want to get that animal out of jail, do you?”

  “I don’t believe the animal ever went to jail,” she said.

  Two more red drops fell from Mortimer’s glass to stain the white linen, and he regarded them with a little terror, as though they had come from his own body, and he had been caught in the distasteful act of dying in public.

  “I think the monster is still out there, still killing.” She delivered this line with just a shade of anger. “I’ve got data on a lot of children. It always happens just before the holidays.” And now she stared at the wine stains on the white cloth, as though they had just reminded her of another matter. “Uncle Mortimer? I have to lecture the task force tomorrow. Any theories on the missing girls?”

  The psychiatrist only shook his head, and she went on. “No? Well, I’m guessing this pedophile doesn’t have a police record. Too smart and too knowledgeable to get caught.”

  “Most of them are never caught. Even the ones with quite ordinary brains get away with it for years—forever.” He now recalled that this had been the main thrust of Ali’s Ph.D. dissertation, and she was hardly going to forget it. Was she setting him up for—

  “True,” she said. “But this one’s far from the ordinary pervert. There’s a strong element of sadism extending beyond the victims. And he doesn’t go for the most vulnerable child—that’s another departure. He goes for the challenge—takes the girls in broad daylight. I think he likes the risk, or maybe there’s more to it. Uncle Mortimer, wouldn’t you say he was almost begging to get caught? Sound like any local man you know? Perhaps in a professional—”

  “You know better than to ask about my patients, Ali.”

  “So you are treating a pedophile.”

  “I’m not so easy to entrap.” He hastily smiled an apology to William, who had been entirely too easy.

  “Well, she made a good guess.” Myles turned to Ali. “So your man is sadistic? He’d never miss an opportunity for torture, would he? Imagine what his confession would do to the shrink he unloaded on. What fun for a sadist.”

  “A priest would be safer,” said Mortimer. “Under certain circumstances, the law can compel a psychiatrist to testify.”

  Myles shook his head. “Only a psychiatrist could really appreciate the details.”

  Mortimer kept his silence, disinclined to engage Myles, the more clever of the brothers, though less successful in his medical practice. And this was yet another bit of evidence that the world had come loose from its rational moorings. The ordinary minds excelled, and the extraordinary lagged behind. The Kendall boy once had the promise of a brilliant future, but he had become a common policeman. Ali should have been an anonymous file clerk, not a college professor with a Ph.D. And that damned priest should have grown old in obscurity. Mortimer wondered if he might spend his remaining days writing a paper on the universe pulled inside out, the reversal of reason, the death of logical progression.

  And where is the winter? He turned to the glass wall and the green plants just beyond it. There should be two feet of snow in his garden. What was the Lady Nature thinking of to be so late? What else might be wrong with the world?

  Myles picked up the dragging end of the conversation. “What if you were a child killer’s confessor, Mortimer? Would you shield a bastard like that?”

  Mortimer only stared at the last drops of wine in his glass, but he could feel Myles’s eyes on him. In peripheral vision, he caught the quizzical tilt of the doctor’s white head.

  By the time Dodd appeared, all real conversation had ended, dying off to banal small talk. While the servant cleared away the debris of decanter and wineglasses, Ali walked William out to the car, and Myles Penny lingered awhile to stand by the glass wall with his host.

  Mortimer was preoccupied by the dregs of his burgundy and one drop of red on the cuff of his white shirt. And now Myles also fixed upon this spot, pointing to it.

  “So what does that remind you of, Mortimer?”

  The psychiatrist averted his eyes from the stain and from the man who hovered close by—too close. Mortimer could sense the intense scrutiny of every gesture and perhaps even his thoughts, for Myles was a canny observer.

  “I know why you’ll never tell.” Myles’s voice had the tone of a tentative foray. “It�
��s not the threat of ruin for exposing a patient. It’s pride, isn’t it? Your ethics, your rigid laws and rules for a life. The heart is my brother’s territory, but I’d say you’re practicing the religion of a man who’s about to have a massive coronary.”

  Mortimer gave no sign that he had heard any of this, though every word was true. Since he had ceased to take his medication, he could even roughly figure the timing of his final heart attack.

  Rouge parked his old Volvo at the main entrance to St. Ursula’s Academy. The front of the immense redbrick institution was even more imposing than the lakeside view. Four white columns supporting the portico marked it as a serious temple, and atop the black shingles was a cupola of wood and glass, the architect’s idea of a formal hat. The only light and gentle elements were taped to the second-floor classroom windows: bright paper silhouettes of Christmas angels, snowflakes and bells.

  Rouge glanced at his watch. He was fifteen minutes early for his appointment with Eliot Caruthers, the school’s director.

  He walked around the side of the building and up the gravel path to Mrs. Hofstra’s cottage. This week, each of the small group homes would hold only one scholarship child and a housemother. All the students with real families would be gone over the holidays. Though it was early afternoon, the sky was overcast and dark. Warm yellow house lamps and multicolored Christmas tree lights glowed in the cottage window. David was standing on the front stoop, bundled up in a parka that bulged with layers of sweaters. One gloved hand rested on the brass doorknob.

  “David!”

  The boy jerked his hand away from the knob, as if caught in the attempt to steal it. And now he gaped at the policeman.

  “Sorry,” said Rouge, drawing closer. “I didn’t mean to startle you.” He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the baseball card. “I thought you might want this back.”

  David reached out and accepted the card. He looked down at it, admiring his new autograph.

  “So you like baseball?” A stupid question, but where else to make a beginning?

  David nodded, his eyes still cast down on the card in his hand.

  “What position do you play?” Ah, now they had a problem. This question required words. But at least David was looking at him. That was progress.

  The door opened, and Mrs. Hofstra stood in a warm cheery rectangle of light. “Well, Rouge Kendall. What a nice surprise.”

  By her voice and her smile, he knew she was pleased but not surprised to see him again. In his student days, he had lived at home with his parents. Only the boarding students had been charges of the housemothers. But over the years at St. Ursula’s, these women had all become more than mere acquaintances. When Susan’s death had driven his own mother to the solitude of her locked bedroom, Mary Hofstra had rocked him for hours while he cried for his twin. Every one of the housemothers had been kind to him, sensing his needs, knowing when to hold him and when to leave him be. Each of them had nourished him with endless amounts of honey and peppermint tea. He knew all the kitchen tables of all the cottages, and to this day, the scent of peppermint called up memories of love and pain.

  “Hi, Mrs. Hofstra. I was just asking David what position he played on the baseball team.”

  David put one cupped hand to his mouth, and the woman bent down to him so he could whisper in her ear. She smiled at Rouge. “He wants to be a pitcher—like you.”

  “Wants to?” He looked down at David. “What position do you play now?”

  “None,” said Mrs. Hofstra, answering for the boy. “Right now, he plays alone. He’s wonderful at bat. They still have the same old machine in the gym, the one you used for batting practice.”

  David was walking backward into the cottage, his eyes on Rouge until he disappeared behind Mrs. Hofstra’s dress.

  “Nippy weather, isn’t it, Rouge? Come in for a cup of tea.” She turned her head to see David climbing the stairs. In a lower voice, she said, “Don’t be discouraged. It took a month before he’d talk to me. I hope you’ll keep trying.” And now she was drawing him inside with the light pressure of her hand on his arm. “Now don’t you worry. I know all about your appointment with Eliot Caruthers. I’ll just call and tell him you’re with me.”

  He knew the school’s director would wait with endless patience until Mrs. Hofstra was done with her visitor. Rouge remembered the power of the housemothers. They had the last word on the treatment of children, boarders and townies alike. Many a punishment had been averted by being on the good side of this particular woman. The faculty always deferred to Mrs. Hofstra, a consummate artist in the mothering trade.

  When he was seated at the kitchen table, he noted that nothing had changed but the brand names on the cereal boxes. It might be the same old copper kettle on the stove, and he imagined the flame burning beneath it as eternal. Teas with fruit and candy names filled the cupboard shelves, for this was Mary Hofstra’s secret ingredient for healing all wounds. One long thin hand grazed the tins, as though she might be reading the contents with her fingertips.

  She had her back to him when he asked, “What’s wrong with David?”

  “He’s very shy,” she said, without turning around.

  “It’s more serious than that.”

  “If you need the medical jargon, Rouge, it’s called Selective Mutism.”

  “And that means—”

  “That he’s very shy.” She plucked a tin from the shelf and opened it. “A psychiatrist recommended drug therapy. But I don’t much care for the idea of drugging a little boy, so I had Mr. Caruthers fire that woman.”

  The teakettle’s whistle beckoned her to the stove. “Now David and I work on it the old-fashioned way. He’s encouraged to speak, even rewarded for it, but there is absolutely no pressure. If he feels threatened, he withdraws and his therapy is set back.” She looked at Rouge over one shoulder, smiling sweetly as she poured scalding water into the tea mugs. “So, if you have something like that in mind, my dear—I won’t allow it.”

  The implied threat hovered between them, though her voice was eminently civil. Even now as an adult, he knew better than to get on the bad side of a housemother. He reverted to the childhood practice of enlisting her in his cause. “So, how do I get him to open up with me?”

  “Don’t worry, Rouge. I’ll be encouraging that. I know how much he wants to talk to you. I drove him to the police station this morning. I gathered your meeting with him was unsuccessful.”

  They spent the next few minutes basking in the peace of the cottage, dunking their tea bags in companionable silence. Even before he smelled the aroma from the mug, he knew it would be peppermint heavily laced with honey.

  “David is making good progress,” Mrs. Hofstra confided. “He makes more eye contact now, and he talks to most of the boys who board with me. But he won’t speak to any of his teachers, and he never talks in class. On the bright side, he seems highly motivated to talk to you, dear.” And this pleased her. “It’s going to take some time and patience is all.”

  “I don’t have time, Mrs. Hofstra. Do you know any shortcuts?”

  She leaned forward, and with only a trace of suspicion, she studied his face, perhaps looking for deviations from the child she had known. “There is a way.” And now she smiled. So she must have found him unchanged—still her own Rouge.

  “It’s a matter of trust, my dear. You have to imagine what it’s like to be David, and then create a comfort zone for him. Listen carefully.” Her wrinkled hand lay over his, warm but featherlight and dry as a covering of paper. “If you take a more direct approach, he’ll retreat so far inside himself, you’ll never reach him again—you’ll get nothing.”

  Rouge was not surprised that St. Ursula’s director remembered him so well. Twins tended to linger in the mind, particularly when one of them was found murdered.

  “How have you been, Rouge?”

  So it was to be “Rouge,” not “officer” nor any other grown-up title. And of course, he would address the elder man as Mister or
sir; some things never changed.

  Eliot Caruthers was the same inscrutable Santa Claus in a three-piece suit. And like the doctor’s mythic double, one would say his bearded face was timeless rather than old. The hair had gone from gray to snow white, but it was still a basic bird’s nest of lost pencils sticking out at dangerous angles. Now Mr. Caruthers recalled where he had left one of them, and he plucked it out from behind his ear to tap it on the desk as a prompt for Rouge. School was still in session between them. The director had asked a test question, and he was waiting on a response.

  How have I been?

  Well, he had been treading water for most of his life—life after Susan—and he was very tired. “Oh, I’ve been just fine, Mr. Caruthers. And you?” He looked at his watch, hoping this would convey that a policeman’s time was slightly more important. And now he came straight to the business at hand. “What can you tell me about Gwen Hubble?”

  “Only what’s in her file.” Mr. Caruthers’ attitude said he took no offense at Rouge’s brusque manner. In fact, he took no notice of it at all.

  “So Gwen wasn’t a standout in any way?”

  The director opened the bulky manila folder on his desk blotter and looked down on the glossy color photograph clipped to the paperwork. “She’s certainly one of the prettiest children I’ve ever seen. Sometimes I think beauty is a sufficient gift. An intellect in a beautiful child seems almost ostentatious, don’t you think?”

  Rouge sensed the invitation to another level of dialogue. He elected to ignore it. “Other than that pretty face, you’re saying Gwen Hubble is ordinary?”

  “We don’t have ordinary students here.” The director betrayed only the lightest sign of impatience with this former pupil. “Don’t you remember your own entrance exam?”

  “You just don’t feel like cooperating?”

  Now the director smiled. “Under certain conditions, I have every intention of exchanging confidences with you.”

  So nothing said is to leave this room. Rouge continued to stare at the man in silence.