When the Bough Breaks

by Jonathan Kellerman

  We looked at each other.

  In the absence of competing stimuli the pain in my arm took over. I winced, and she saw it.

  She got up, soaked a paper towel in warm water, came over and swabbed the wound. She poked around in one of the boxes and found sterile gauze, adhesive tape and hydrogen peroxide. Tending to me like Florence Nightingale, she bandaged the arm. The craziness of the situation wasn't lost on me--minutes ago she'd tried to kill me, now she clucked maternally and smoothed down the tape. I stayed karate-wary, expecting her to revert at any moment to murderous rage, to dig her fingers into the inflamed flesh and take advantage of the blinding pain to jab me in the eye.

  But when she was finished she returned to her seat.

  "The papers," I reminded her.

  More poking around. But quick. She knew exactly where everything was. A sheaf of papers bound with a thick rubber band found its way into my hand. There were veterinarian's bills, rabies vaccination records, Kennel Club registration--the dog's full name had been Otto Klaus Von Schulderheis out of StuttgartMunsch and Sigourn-Daffodil. Quaint. There were also diplomas from two obedience schools in L.A. and a certificate stating that Otto had been trained as an attack dog for defensive purposes only. I handed the papers back to her.

  "Thank you," she said.

  We sat across from one another, pleasant as school chums. I took a good look at her and tried to work up some genuine animosity. What I saw was a sad-looking Oriental woman in her forties, her hair chopped China-doll short, sallow, frail, homely in baggy work clothes and shabby as a church mouse She sat, hands in lap, docile. The hatred wouldn't come.

  "How long have you been living here?"

  "Six months. Since Stuart's death."

  "Why live like this--why not open up the house?"

  "I thought this would be better for hiding. All I want is to be alone."

  She didn't make much of a Garbo.

  "Hiding from whom?"

  She looked at the floor.

  "Come on. I won't hurt you."

  "The others. The other sick ones."

  "Names."

  "The ones you mentioned and others." She spit out a half-dozen other names I didn't recognize.

  "Let's be specific. By sick you mean child molesters--all those men are child molesters?"

  "Yes, yes. I didn't know it. Stuart told me later, when he was in prison. They volunteered at a children's home, took the kids to their houses. Did sick things with them."

  "And at your school, too."

  "No! That was only Stuart. The others never came to the school. Only at the children's home."

  "La Casa de los Ninos. Your husband was a member of the Gentleman's Brigade."

  "Yes. He told me he was doing it to help children. His friends recruited him, he said. The judge, the doctor, the others. I thought it was so nice of him--we didn't have children of our own--I was proud of him. I never knew what he was really doing--just like I didn't know about what he did at the school."

  I said nothing.

  "I know what you're thinking--what they all thought. That I knew all along. How could I not know what my own husband was doing in my own house? You blame me as much as you blame Stuart. I tell you, I didn't know!"

  Her arms went out beseechingly, the hands saffron talons. I noticed that the nails had been gnawed to the quick. There was a desperate, feral look on her face.

  "I did not know," she repeated, turning it into a self-punishing mantra. "I did not know. He was my husband but I did not know!"

  She was in need of absolution but I didn't feel like a father confessor. I stayed tight-lipped and observed her with forced detachment.

  "You must understand the kind of marriage Stuart and I had to see how he could have been doing all of those things without my knowledge."

  My silence said Convince me.

  She bowed her head and began.

  "We met in Seoul," she said, "shortly after the war. My father had been a professor of linguistics. Our family was prosperous, but we had ties to the socialists and the KCIA killed them all. They went on rampages after the war, murdering intellectuals, anyone who wasn't a blind slave to the regime. Everything we owned was confiscated or destroyed. I was hidden, given to friends the day before KCIA thugs broke into the house and slit the throats of everyone--family, servants, even the animals. Things got worse, the government clamped down harder. The family that took me in grew frightened and I was turned out to the street. I was fifteen years old, but very small, very skinny, looking twelve. I begged, ate scraps. I--I sold myself. I had to. To survive."

  She stopped, looked past me, gathered her strength and continued.

  "When Stuart found me I was feverish, infested with lice and venereal disease, covered with sores. It was at night. I was huddled under newspapers in an alley at the back of a cafe where the GIs went to eat and drink and find bar girls. I knew it was good to wait in such places because Americans threw away enough food to feed entire families. I was so sick I could barely move, but I waited for hours, forcing myself to stay awake so the cats wouldn't get my dinner first. The restaurant closed shortly after midnight. The soldiers came out, loud, drunk, staggering through the alley. Then Stuart, by himself, sober. Later I found out he never drank alcohol. I tried to keep quiet but my pain made me cry out. He heard, came over, so big, a giant in uniform, bending over me saying "Don't worry, little girl." He picked me up in his arms and took me to his apartment. He had lots of money, enough to rent his own place off base. The GIs were on R and R, celebrating, making lots of unwanted babies. Stuart had nothing to do with those kinds of things. He used his place to write poetry. To fiddle with his cameras. To be alone."

  She seemed to lose track of time and space, and stared absently at the dark wooden walls.

  "He took you to his place," I prompted.

  "For five weeks he nursed me. He brought doctors, bought medicine. Fed me, bathed me, sat at my bedside reading comic books--I loved American comic books because my father had always brought them home to me from his travels. Little Orphan Annie. Terry and the Pirates. Dagwood. Blondie. He read them all to me, in a soft, gentle voice. He was different from any man I'd ever met. Thin, quiet, like a teacher, with those eyeglasses that made his eyes look so big, like a big bird.

  "By the sixth week I was well. He came into bed and made love to me. I know now it was part of the sickness--he must have thought I was a child, that must have excited him. But I felt like a woman. Over the years as I became a woman, when I was clearly no longer a child, he lost interest in me. He used to like to dress me up in little girls' things--I'm small, I could fit into them. But when I grew up, saw the world outside, I would have nothing to do with that. I asserted myself and he withdrew. Maybe that was when he started to act out his sickness. Maybe," she said in a wounded voice, "it was my fault. For not satisfying him."

  "No. He was a troubled man. You don't have to bear that responsibility," I said, not with total sincerity. I didn't want it all to deteriorate into a wet session of self-recrimination.

  "I don't know. Even now it seems so unreal. The papers, the stories about him. About us. He was such a kind man, gentle, quiet."

  I'd heard similar pictures painted of other child molesters. Often they were exceptionally mild mannered men, with a natural ability to gain rapport with their young victims. But of course it had to be that way: kids won't flock to an unshaven ogre in a soiled trenchcoat. They will be drawn to Uncle Wally who's so much nicer than mean old Mom and Dad and all the other grownups who don't understand. To Uncle Wally with his magic tricks and neat collection of baseball cards and really terrific toys at his house and mopeds and video recorders, and cameras and neat, weird books... "You must understand how much I loved him," she was saying. "He saved my life. He was American. He was rich. He said he loved me too. "My little geisha' he called me. I'd laugh and tell him "No, I'm Korean, you silly. The Japanese are pigs!" He'd smile and call me his little geisha again.

  "We lived together in Se
oul for four months. I waited for him to get off-base on leave, cooked for him, cleaned, brought him his slippers. Was his wife. When his discharge papers came, he told me he was taking me back to the States. I was in heaven. Of course his family--there was only a mother and some elderly aunts--would have nothing to do with me. Stuart didn't care. He had money of his own, trust funds from his father. We traveled together to Los Angeles. He said he'd gone to school there--he did go to medical school, but flunked out. He took a job as a medical technician. He didn't need to work, it was a job that didn't pay much, but he liked it, said it kept him busy. He liked the machines--the meters and the test tubes--he was always a tinkerer. Gave me his entire paycheck, as if it was petty cash, told me to spend it on myself.

  "We lived together that way for three years. I wanted marriage, but couldn't ask. It took me a while to get used to American ways, to women not being just property, to having rights. I pushed it when I wanted children. Stuart was indifferent to the idea, but he went along with it. We married. I tried to get pregnant but couldn't. I saw doctors, at UCLA, Stanford, Mayo. They all said there was too much scarring. I'd been so sick in Korea, it shouldn't have surprised me, but I didn't want to believe it. Looking back now, I know it was a good thing we did not have any little ones. At the time, after I finally accepted it, I became depressed. Very withdrawn, not eating. Eventually Stuart couldn't ignore it any longer. He suggested I go to school. If I loved children I could work with them, become a teacher. He may have had his own motives, but he seemed concerned for me--whenever I was sick or low he was at his best.

  "I enrolled in junior college, then college, and learned so much. I was a good student," she recalled, smiling. "Very motivated. For the first time I was out in the world, with other people--until then I'd been Stuart's little geisha. Now I began to think for myself. At the same time he drifted away from me. There was no anger, no resentment that he put into words. He simply spent more time with his camera and his bird books--he used to like to read books and magazines on nature, though he never hiked or walked. An armchair bird lover. An armchair man.

  "We became two distant cousins living in the same house. Neither of us cared, we were busy. I studied every spare moment, by now I knew I wanted to go beyond the bachelor's and get a credential in early childhood. We went our own ways. There were weeks when we never saw each other. There was no communication, no marriage. But no divorce either--what would have been the point? There were no fights. It was live and let live. My new friends, my college friends, told me I was liberated, I should be happy to have a husband who didn't bother me. When I became lonely I went deeper into my studies.

  "I finished the credential and they gave me field placements at local preschools. I liked working with the little ones but I thought I could run a better school than those I had seen. I told Stuart, he said sure, anything to keep me happy, out of his way. We bought a big house in Brentwood--there always seemed to be money for anything--and I started Kim's Korner. It was a wonderful place, a wonderful time. I finally stopped mourning not having children of my own. Then he--"

  She stopped, covered her face with her hands and rocked back and forth.

  I got up and put a hand on her shoulder.

  "Please don't do that. It's not right. I tried to have Otto kill you." She lifted her face, dry and unlined. "Do you understand that? I wanted him to kill you. Now you are being kind and understanding. It makes me feel worse."

  I removed the hand and sat back down.

  "Why the need for Otto, why the fear?"

  "I thought you were sent by the ones who killed Stuart."

  "The official verdict was that he killed himself."

  She shook her head.

  "No. He didn't commit suicide. They said he was depressed. It was a lie. Of course when he was first arrested, he was very low. Humiliated and guilty. But he bounced out of it. That was Stuart's way. He could block out reality as easily as exposing a roll of film. Poof, and the image is gone. The day before he was arraigned we spoke on the phone. He was in high spirits. To hear him talk, the arrest was the best thing that ever happened- to him--to us. He'd been Til, now he would get help. We'd start all over again, as soon as he got out of the hospital. I could even get another school, in another city. He suggested Seattle and talked of our reclaiming the family mansion--that was how I got the idea to come here. /

  "I knew it would never happen. By then I'd decided to leave him. But I went along with the fantasies, saying, yes, dear, certainly, Stuart. Later we had other conversations and it was the same thing. Life was going to be better than ever. He was not talking like a man about to blow his brains out."

  "It's not that simple. People often kill themselves right after an upswing in mood. The suicide season is spring, you know."

  "Perhaps. But I know Stuart and I know he didn't kill himself. He was too shallow to let something like the arrest bother him for a long time. He could deny anything. He denied me for all those years, denied our marriage--that's why he could do those things without my knowing about them. We were strangers."

  "But you know him well enough to be sure he didn't commit suicide."

  "Yes," she insisted. "That story about the false phone call to you, the picked locks. That kind of scheming isn't--wasn't Stuart. For all his sickness he was naive, almost simple. He wasn't a planner."

  "It took planning to get those children down in the cellar."

  "You don't have to believe me. I don't care. He's done his damage. Now he's dead. And I'm in a cellar of my own."

  Her smile was pitiful.

  The lamp sputtered. She got up to adjust the wick and add more kerosene. When she sat back down I asked her: "Who killed him and why?"

  "The others. His so-called friends. So he wouldn't expose them. And he would have. During our last visits he'd hint around. Say things like, "I'm not the only sick one, Kimmy' or "Things aren't what they seem with the Gentlemen." I knew he wanted me to ask him, to help him spill it out. But I didn't. I was still in shock over losing the school, wrapped in my own shame. I didn't want to hear about more perversions. I cut him off, changed the subject. But after he died it came back to me and I put it all together."

  "Did he mention anyone by name as being sick?"

  "No. But what else could he have meant? They'd come to pick him up, parking their big soft cars in the driveway, dressed in those sport jackets with the Casa insignia. When he'd leave with them he'd be excited. His hands trembling. He'd come back in the early hours of the morning, exhausted. Or the next day. Isn't it obvious what they were doing?"

  "You haven't told anyone of your suspicions?"

  "Who would believe me? Those men are powerful--doctors, lawyers, executives, that horrid little Judge Hayden. I wouldn't stand a chance, the wife of a molester. To the public I'm as guilty as Stuart. And there's no evidence--look what they did to him to shut him up. I had to run."

  "Did Stuart ever mention knowing McCaffrey from Washington?"

  "No. Did he?"

  "Yes. What about a child named Gary Nemeth. Did his name come up?"

  "No."

  "Elena Gutierrez? Morton Handler--Doctor Mor ton Handler?"

  "No."

  "Maurice Bruno?"

  She shook her head. "No. Who are these people?"

  "Victims."

  "Violated like the others?"

  "The ultimate violation. Dead. Murdered."

  "Oh my God." She put her hands to her face.

  Telling her story had made her sweat. Strands of black hair stuck to her forehead. "So it continues," she said mournfully.

  "That's why I'm here. To put an end to it. What else can you tell me that would help?"

  "Nothing. I've told you everything. They killed him. They're evil men, hiding their ugly secret under a cloak of respectability. I ran to escape them."

  I looked around the dingy room.

  "How long can you continue this way?"

  "Forever, if no one gives me away. The island is secluded, this property
is hidden. When I have to go to the mainland to shop I dress like a cleaning maid. No one notices me. I stockpile as much as possible to avoid making too many trips. The last one was over a month ago. I live simply. The flowers are my one extravagance. I planted them from seed packets and bulbs. They occupy my time, with watering, feeding, pruning, re-potting. The days go by quickly."

  "How safe can you be--Towle and Hayden have roots here."

  "I know. But their families haven't lived here for a generation. I checked. I even went by their old homes. There are new faces, new names. There's no reason for them to look for me here. Not unless you give them one."