Shame

by Alan Russell

  “Try.” The word sounded like a croak.

  “He was going to recite some poem to me.”

  “Which?”

  Dana felt Elizabeth’s imploring in the squeezing of her hands.

  “I don’t...I was just so frightened.” A moment’s pause, and then: “He told me the title. It was something about felons.”

  Your Felons on Trial in Court, she thought. Gray had once told her it explained his epiphany and his evil.

  “Why?” she asked.

  He looked at her, showed his large white teeth. “Fellow I know said there was this philosophy professor who once asked that question on a final exam. Three-hour final it was, and all the students were scribbling furiously, taking up all that time to answer that question, all except one fellow who wrote: “Why not?”

  “Why?” Elizabeth asked again.

  “People are going to tell you it was my childhood and my mother. But I don’t believe that.”

  “Do you feel things?”

  “Finish your sentence, E-Liz-a-Beth.”

  His exaggerated way of saying her name always made her smile. It succeeded again. “What do you mean?”

  “‘Do you feel things,’ you asked. But the unsaid part was, ‘like a normal human being?’ And my answer to you is that I feel things even more than a so-called normal human being.”

  “Then why?”

  “Because hell’s tides continually run through me. Whitman. If I weren’t so set on being cremated, I’d probably ask for the last few lines of his poem to be chiseled into my tombstone.”

  “I’d like to hear them.”

  “Is it that you want to hear the words or that you want to be able to write, ‘On Tuesday the eighth, Shame recited another one of Whitman’s poems to me’? People seem to be all excited about the fact that I read books and enjoy poetry.”

  “Most murderers don’t like poetry. Most murderers don’t have an IQ of one sixty-three.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. You’re not going to try to make me into something other than what I am, are you? I’m no tragic figure, and I’m not anything special. Your book’s going to be a failure if it paints me as anything other than what I am.”

  “And what are you?”

  “I’m the exact opposite of a tree.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I never set roots, I never gave the world shade, I never warmed a room, I never filled a table with fruit or nuts, and I never stretched for the sky. Instead of nurturing nests, I destroyed them.”

  “So the exact opposite of a tree is death?”

  “No. The exact opposite of a tree is worse than death.”

  “Do you like being an enigma?”

  “What I don’t like is being given a nobility I don’t have. I knew someone who knew someone who served with that Birdman of Alcatraz. Burt Lancaster made him seem all noble in that movie, but the truth of the matter is, he was a horrible human being who just happened to like birds. And just because he cared for his birds, people wanted to believe there was some deeper humanity in him. It’s like you trying to make something out of this poetry thing.”

  “What are the words that will never be on your tombstone?”

  The air came out of his nose, an amused exhale. He shook his head, but Elizabeth knew it was show. She waited on his words. He acted as if he had all the time in the world, and yet he was due to die in less than a week. As he started reciting, his voice became softer, almost wistful.

  “Inside these breast-bones I lie smutch’d and choked,

  Beneath this face that appears so impassive hell’s tides continually run,

  Lusts and wickedness are acceptable to me, I walk with delinquents with passionate love,

  I feel I am of them—I belong to those convicts and prostitutes myself,

  And henceforth I will not deny them—for how can I deny myself?”

  She awoke to the past and the present both clinging to her. It took her a moment to realize the vibration was coming from her cell phone.

  “Excuse me,” Elizabeth said, letting go of Dana’s hands and reaching for her cell phone.

  She looked at the number, then said, “I have to leave.”

  The exact same words, Elizabeth remembered, that she’d said to Gray Parker after he had finished reciting that poem to her.

  26

  HALF THE TABLES at Jimmy Sun’s Red Dragon were occupied, something Elizabeth didn’t expect at two in the morning, but with the bars just closed, she suspected the restaurant had acquired unofficial after-hours club status. Voices were loud, the volume fueled by the offerings of the recent last call. The crowd was mostly young. Judging by all the tantalizing smells coming from the kitchen, they were also hungry.

  There were no singles sitting in the restaurant, no sign of Sue.

  “Just one?”

  The accented voice made Elizabeth jump. Her close call with death had her on edge. An older Chinese woman with thick glasses hustled out from behind the maître d’ stand.

  “No. Someone will be joining me.”

  The woman impatiently motioned for Elizabeth to follow her. At the first vacant table she dropped the two menus. “Enjoy your meal,” she said, her parting words sounding more like a command than a pleasantry. The table was too exposed for Elizabeth’s liking and too near an exuberant party. She moved herself over to a booth.

  A busboy brought a pot of tea. Elizabeth poured herself a cup. Blowing on the steaming tea, she took a few grateful sips. She cradled her hands around the cup, glad for its warmth. On the wall nearest her were pictures of celebrities who had apparently dined at the Red Dragon. Elizabeth tried to put names to the familiar faces but found she could match very few of them. Something had to be wrong with her life, she decided. She was more familiar with the FBI’s Top Ten list than she was with Hollywood’s.

  A face came between Elizabeth and one of the pictures, a pretty face, dark and sensuous. “Ms. Line?”

  “Sue?”

  They shook hands, and the woman took a seat. She looked flustered. “Confession’s supposed to be good for the soul, isn’t it?” she asked.

  Elizabeth barely had time to nod before the woman continued. “My name’s not Sue, Ms. Line. I gave you a fake name. Caleb didn’t want me to give my real name. I figured that since I’m part Sioux Indian, it would be clever of me to call myself Sue, though I’m not feeling very clever right now.”

  “Maybe we should reintroduce ourselves. I’m Elizabeth Line.”

  “Lola Guidry.”

  They shook again. “I don’t exactly know how to start this conversation,” Lola said, “but I suppose we should begin at our impasse. Earlier tonight you wouldn’t tell me whether or not Caleb attacked you. You said you had reservations.”

  “I still do. I don’t know you.”

  “I’m Caleb’s voice while he’s in hiding.”

  “So you say.”

  “I know things he would have only told a confidante. I know that the two of you talked on several occasions. I know that the murdered girl left at the Presidio was the same girl that worked at the counter of the doughnut shop where the two of you talked. I know that you gave Caleb one of your Shame books and audio-books on an MP3 player. I know you were supposed to be looking through your files to try and figure out who from the past might be committing the murders. And I also know you made a promise to help Caleb’s wife and children. But what I don’t know is whether he was the one who tried to kill you.”

  “Your knowing all these things,” Elizabeth said cautiously, “still begs the question of why Caleb isn’t the one talking with me.”

  “I’ll be glad to tell you why, but first you’re going to have to meet me halfway.”

  Elizabeth thought about her options for a moment, then relented. “He didn’t attack me.”

  Lola sighed in relief. “But why...?”

  “I didn’t want to drive my attacker into hiding. I thought it possible that he was the murderer. After what happened tonig
ht, I’m all but convinced of it.”

  “What happened tonight?”

  “What happened to give and take?”

  Lola raised her hands, signaling for patience with her long, artistic fingers. “When we first talked,” she said, “you asked me why Caleb wasn’t the one questioning you, and I told you that he was afraid to go out in public.”

  Elizabeth remembered. That had contributed to her own reluctance to be forthcoming. Sue’s answer had rung as true as the name she had given.

  “The truth is that Caleb was tied up—literally. When I heard those reports that he had attacked you, I didn’t know what to do. So he volunteered to be tied up until I talked with you.”

  “Is he still tied up?”

  Lola shook her head. “I came home and found him gone. It looked like a tornado had gone through my place. There was blood everywhere, and I lost it when I saw the bloody knife. I screamed. Luckily, my neighbors weren’t home. Because it suddenly occurred to me that the whole mess wasn’t the sign of some struggle but just Caleb’s trying to get free.”

  “You think the blood was all his?”

  “I’m sure of it. He had to cut through duct tape, and I guess his pound of flesh as well. I discovered more blood in my bathroom. It was all over my medicine cabinet and all over the bloodied bandage wrappers he left behind. There were also bloodstains on my closet doors.”

  “How long was he left alone?”

  “I was out of my house from half past eight until one.”

  Elizabeth nodded, pursing her lips in thought.

  “The way everything was strewn about makes me think he was in some big rush.”

  The Asian woman who had seated Elizabeth suddenly appeared in front of them. Without wasting time for pleasantries she asked, “What you want?”

  Lola didn’t need to look at the menu. “Cashew chicken,” she said.

  Elizabeth opened the menu, looked for something that could be swallowed easily, and decided on wonton soup. The server grabbed the menus and ran off.

  “What happened tonight?” asked Lola.

  “There was another attack.”

  “Did he kill again?”

  “No, thank God.” Elizabeth fingered her scarf. “He was interrupted for a second time today. But I’m afraid he’s not the kind that gets easily discouraged.”

  “Did anyone see him?”

  “Not well enough to make an ID. He got into a sorority house, but it was too dark for the woman he attacked to get a good look at him.”

  Lola started to fill her teacup. “What sorority?”

  “Kappa Omega.”

  Lola stopped in midpour. “What is it?” Elizabeth asked.

  “There was a telephone book in my kitchen. Caleb had to have left it on the table. It was opened to the Ks.”

  Both of them played with their teacups, neither one looking at the other. “No,” Elizabeth said, breaking their uneasy silence. “This was a planned attack. The killer wouldn’t have been looking up the sorority’s address at the last minute.”

  “You said the attack was interrupted. How?”

  “Someone deliberately set a fire and then set off the sorority’s alarm.”

  Lola offered a word, a hope: “Caleb.”

  “How would he have known?”

  “He’s intuitive. He wouldn’t agree, of course, but he is. He probably saw or heard something that prompted some association. I know he’s been listening to your book. I also know how bothered he was by it. He played some parts over and over again.”

  “What parts?”

  “I don’t know. This morning he was all involved in listening to your book, and I think what he heard upset him. He could hardly sit still while I was dyeing his hair.”

  “You dyed his hair?”

  “He looks like a natural blond now.”

  “You must be a good friend.”

  Lola smiled, as if enjoying a joke. “I must be.”

  “How long have you known one another?”

  “A little over a day.”

  Elizabeth shook her head. “You barely know this man, and yet you sheltered him, disguised him, bound him, and claim to know the workings of his psyche?”

  “I forgot to tell you about our Las Vegas wedding.”

  Elizabeth tried not to laugh, but she couldn’t help herself.

  “Not that it was love at first sight,” said Lola. “The first thing I had to do was get over how much he looks like his daddy. I knew Shame’s face from studying his pictures in your book. I read your book over and over when I was growing up. It was like a rite of passage for me. It taught me how I couldn’t let shame rule my life.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “’Course, knowing Gray Parker from pictures isn’t the same thing as knowing him in the flesh and blood. Maybe to you he and Caleb don’t look all that much alike.”

  “No. They do.”

  “Did you have a problem with that?”

  Elizabeth nodded. “It brought up a lot of old feelings. I couldn’t look at Caleb. It gave me vertigo.”

  “I think I had the opposite problem. I couldn’t keep my eyes off of him. And it wasn’t his good looks that kept me looking but this sadness I sensed in him. I know my helping him must seem crazy, but I didn’t have it in me to turn my back on him. From the moment he walked into my club, it was like I knew we were meant to connect.”

  “What club?”

  “Randy Randi’s. It’s where I perform.”

  “What do you do?”

  “I like to call it cabaret, but the public seems to prefer the term female impersonation.”

  Elizabeth did a double take. The sudden appearance of their food allowed her a chance to pick up her chin from the table.

  “Who got chicken?”

  “Here,” Lola said.

  Their server hurriedly placed their food in front of them, put down a pot of steamed rice, and then left the bill on a plate beneath two fortune cookies. Lola breathed in appreciatively, then looked up and smiled. Elizabeth averted her glance. She hoped she wasn’t blushing but knew she was. With her fair skin and red hair it always showed. She could never tell a lie without her body giving her away. “Pinocchio syndrome,” she called it. Being honest hadn’t been an option in life but a necessity.

  Her tone terse, Elizabeth said, “I thought you were a woman.”

  “It’s a mistake I often make myself.”

  “I don’t know who I’m angrier at, you or me. You should have told me.”

  “I’m sorry that I didn’t, but if we get to know each other better, and I hope we will, you’ll see that this wasn’t some guest appearance by my feminine anima. What you see is who I am.”

  Elizabeth said nothing.

  “I can understand your being angry with me,” said Lola. “But why be mad at yourself?”

  “For not noticing. I pride myself on my powers of observation.”

  “Sometimes pride gets in the way of seeing. You think you already know the answers. Maybe you needed to encounter a heyoka.”

  “A what?”

  “It’s a Lakota word and sensibility. In my culture, a heyoka was someone who often did things backward or the opposite of what was expected. A heyoka makes people think.”

  “Is that why you dress like a woman?”

  “No. I do it because it’s right for me. ‘I yam what I yam.’”

  “I didn’t expect it,” said Elizabeth. There was less frost in her voice.

  “Without the unexpected, we wouldn’t have nearly as many insights. At my home I have this map of the world. Everything is reversed in it, or at least the opposite as we’re used to seeing it. South America is on top of the world, North America on the bottom, and so forth. It’s all geographically accurate, but the map bothers some people. They don’t like their world changed.”

  “That’s understandable. Most people don’t like being told that down is up.”

  “But that’s not what the map represents. It only shows a picture of the worl
d in another way.”

  “It’s not as simple as that. I once interviewed a concentration-camp survivor. She told me she was haunted by one particular war picture. In my mind’s eye I expected the photo to be some horrible scene of carnage, but it wasn’t that at all: the picture was of Hitler happily playing with his dogs. As far as this woman was concerned, Hitler was the devil, and playing with dogs wasn’t something the devil did. She had a hard time reconciling the happy, smiling face in the picture with all the atrocities Hitler perpetrated.”

  Gray Parker’s picture often bothered Elizabeth in the same way, but she never admitted that. Maybe she was attracted to contradictions. Most of her books had centered on such: the Eagle Scout driven to murder; the beauty queen becoming as ugly inside as she was pretty outside. Milton had shown the way: fallen angels always made for a compelling read.

  They both turned to their food. Elizabeth took small sips of her soup. Though swallowing still hurt, the pleasure of eating was worth the pain.

  Lola noticed the exacting way she was eating. “Did you think you were going to die?” she asked.

  Elizabeth touched her scarf. Lola wasn’t the only one in disguise. “Yes.”

  “And did your life pass before your eyes?”

  “Yes and no. I remember some fleeting images, and I remember feeling some regrets, but mostly what I felt was anger and terror. I wasn’t as brave as I would have liked. But I was stubborn. I just didn’t want to die like that.”

  “How do you want to die?”

  “Not prematurely.”

  “Maybe you picked the wrong line of work.”

  “I’ve considered that.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Regarding what?”

  “Caleb. We have to find a way to help him.”

  “At this point I hope he’ll help himself by surrendering to the police.”

  “He’s not going to do that. He doesn’t trust the police. And he doesn’t expect anything better than a lynch-mob mentality from the public.”

  “If he contacts me, I can’t encourage him to continue being a fugitive. He’s deluding himself if he thinks he can get to the bottom of all this by himself.”

  “He managed to save a girl’s life tonight.”