CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

OBSERVING A LIFELONG HABIT, HE WAITED UNTIL THE PRECISE moment to leave for his appointment. This moment was Monday noon, April 13th, New York time, making it nine A.M. in California. He thought in terms of time like that now. In distinct three-hour differences.

He took advantage of comparative calm to release his hold over the hotel room he now called home, before closing its door and heading for the elevator. He did not allow himself to acknowledge his anxiety until he had actually reached the street. He shook his head wearily. In the past twenty-four hours he had been attacked first by a fit of jealousy, then fear, then concern, finally depression.

With his head lowered, Ron Talon shoved his hands deep into his pockets and began to walk. The restaurant was located on Seventh Avenue, not far from his hotel. The rain had eased up around eleven, leaving a fresh mist through which occasional thin drops fell. By the time he had reached the restaurant, the sun had complete command of the day.

The brass plate next to the impressive cut-glass doors read: “The Shamrock.” Ron was barely inside when he was met by a small pixie-type man dressed in a loud blue suit. The man smiled.

“Ron Talon. Right?”

“Yes.”

“Welcome, sir! And right this way.”

Ron found himself strolling effortlessly through a small room which reeked with an effusive air of Ye Olde English Pub, catering to serious drinkers, hangers-out and others who, for reasons of their own required privacy and intimacy, hid away in the back booths—mainly in twosomes. It had been this way since 1921, and the little guy had seen no reason to break with age-old tradition. The pub had first been his great-grandfather’s brainchild, and then inherited and nurtured right on down the line.

The little guy finished his quick briefing with, “We also serve cold beer by the tap at a fair price.”

Dr. Luther rose to the occasion with a footnote. “And the food borders on great!” He extended his hand with energy, “Hello. Ian Luther.”

“How are you?”

“Hungry!” Luther grinned.

After a chat with the owner of the place, the waiter and the bartender, Luther ushered Ron up to a line of chromium hot tanks that contained what was without a doubt gastronomic delight, All eyes were on Luther as he ordered unselfconsciously, but graciously: salad, corned beef and cabbage, boiled potato and some sort of cobbler with cream.

“The desserts are primed to annihilate any diet, but, nevertheless, they shouldn’t be passed up,” he said pleasantly, but did not push the point. Together they made their way through the line. Ron’s mind really wasn’t on the chocolate eclair that was gingerly tossed in his direction.

What troubled Ron as they came back to their table was exactly why Luther had taken such immediate and personal interest in Chandal’s problems. Although Ron had suggested financial remuneration, Luther had seemingly taken no notice. He was available, he wanted to help, he could drive into the city this afternoon, and he had suggested the pub as a convenient meeting place.

Why? Ron thought silently and watched as Luther delicately and precisely cut into the corned beef. He studied Luther’s face for a moment. The penetrating blue eyes Chandal had spoken of, the furrowed brow, the sharp nose, the heavily lined face that seemed as if it had been carved from a piece of rough wood—they were all there.

But Ron’s impression of hardness and cool reserve that he had gleaned during phone conversations didn’t seem to match the man who now smiled at him from across the table while salting his potato. Everything about him was open and warm: the pleasant voice, the impish glint in his eyes, the cordial but rather envious air he conveyed.

“Your roast beef looks superb. I usually have that myself.” He kept his gaze fixed on Ron’s plate for a moment, then looked up and said, “Did you have any problem finding the place?”

“No. It seems it’s famous.”

“Infamous would be more like it.”

Both men laughed. Luther waited a moment, hoping Ron would continue the conversation, but Ron was too distracted to be responsive.

“I wondered if I’d ever hear from you again,” Luther went on. “When you’re in my particular line of work, you get a lot of phone calls, you know. But I’m delighted you felt free to ask me to meet with you—delighted. I care about my patients. Past or present.”

Amenities over, Luther settled back to eat until finally Ron turned the conversation to Chandal, and Luther regained his voice. Both men stepped carefully into the subject. Luther jabbed, Ron hooked. After what might be considered “round four,” Luther leaned back in his chair, dabbed his lips with his napkin and commented effortlessly, “I was never really convinced Chandal was ready to leave Lakewood.”

Ron blinked. “Then why was she released?”

Luther forked another piece of corned beef and chewed thoughtfully. At length he replied with a certain amount of irony, “Mental health, Mr. Talon, is largely a nebulous opinion held by each examining psychiatrist. In order to be released from a state institution, the patient has to satisfy an entire Board of Examiners. Chandal passed this test with flying colors.”

“Are you on this Board?”

“I’m a staff psychiatrist. I make recommendations to the Board. Generally they give serious consideration to what I have to say. In this particular case I should have stated my point a bit more clearly but I was never really certain there was any reason to hold her. It was just an intuition. That wasn’t enough for the Board.”

The automatic quality of Luther’s response set Ron back for another lengthy moment before he said, “What about her amnesia? Surely that should have swayed them.”

“Very few psychiatrists believe in amnesia. At least, as far as you perceive the definition of the word.”

“You mean they thought she was lying?” Ron asked bluntly.

“Not exactly. But they did feel that she knew precisely what had happened during her stay at the brownstone and chose not to remember. They labeled her amnesia functional, rather than organic, and attributed her condition to an emotional block and the inability to withstand the rigors of reality. Nothing more.”

“It sounds to me like the Board of Examiners is full of crap,” Ron said confidentially. He tried to surround the remark with a smile, but his lips refused to cooperate.

Luther laughed, his chest falling in and out in deep lunges. “I have told them so in other words many times,” he said, then added on a more serious note, “still, she did display the usual signs of functional amnesia and all its classical phases. Complete dissociation, closely resembling somnambulism. Then a period of lightened oblivion, and then a return to full-functioning consciousness. At this point they saw no need to detain her.” He smiled. “Believe me, you have no idea how normal, clean and wholesomely bright Chandal can appear when in the comparable company of the truly mentally ill. I think you can see that Chandal was a prime candidate to be returned to the world. Especially as she had maintained a job in the library for some months, effortlessly and in good spirits.”

“I guess,” Ron grudgingly acquiesced and turned to gaze about the pub more out of confusion than anything else. Bright green plastic mats failed to conceal the streaks of grease on the wooden table tops, nor the sawdust and cigarette butts strewn about the floor. Sunlight poured in through begrimed stained glass, migrating in long flashes across the room to a small cluster of sports pictures above the row of liquor bottles behind the bar. It seemed a perfect setting for a Eugene O’Neill play. Ron could almost see the illusive Hickey from The Iceman Cometh propped on the bar, involved in one of his many pipe dreams, relentlessly driving each man to test his illusions in action.

Still, the pub had its charm, Ron concluded, doggedly keeping his mind on Luther’s smooth-flowing voice which seemed to be covering an abnormally wide field of topics, ranging from the fire at the brownstone, to the fact that shock and/or guilt complexes might have arisen from Chandal’s being the only survivor of the fire.

“Good God,” Ron cried. “She can’t blame herself—”

“On a conscious level, no. But there is no telling what a person may think when pressed by the divisions in themselves. Divisions mean choice. There are alternatives and Chandal, like all people, had to select one or the other. Stay in California and build a future, or return to New York and relive her past. I’m afraid she has made the more dangerous choice of the two.”

“But why? What would make her come back here?”

Luther paused. “Perhaps a desire to seek self-punishment. An absolution of sorts.”

“Punishment for what?”

“For surviving. Three people died in the fire that night. Her husband and the two sisters who owned the building. Only Chandal escaped with her life. It’s altogether possible she now blames herself for causing the fire. For killing her husband. The very quality of thinking the same thing over and over again makes us doubt that this thing was ever not so, whether real or imagined, or that there was any time in which it could not have been so. The past is a construction of our imaginations. Our memories change with us. Whether we are to blame or not makes no difference; we assume the guilt. It becomes our responsibility, brought on by our living too much in the past.”

“Jesus,” Ron breathed faintly. The idea staggered him.

An old memory cell exploded and spilled its thought into his consciousness. A memory still painful after twenty years. Ron had felt decidedly guilty—guilty?—yes, it was true... when his parents had separated, then divorced. As though he had caused the split-up.

The vague pain that had throbbed subtly beneath Ron’s skull now became sharp and knifelike. Wearily he massaged his right temple, wondering if there would ever again be a moment when he did not have a goddamn splitting headache.

Luther took a long pull on his mug of dark ale and then offered: “The question is... what does Chandal believe now? Why has she returned to New York? Not that that’s unusual under normal circumstances. Did Chandal like California?”

“I guess.” Ron hesitated. “No, not really.”

“Could someone have inspired her to return to New York?”

“I don’t think so. There wasn’t anyone to inspire her. She lived a pretty quiet life out there.”

Luther folded his arms. “How about here in New York?”

“What?”

“Maybe she’d been in contact with a friend in New York.”

“Not that I know of. At least she never mentioned anyone specifically.”

“Before she left, did she seem upset?”

“Not in the least.”

“But you said she didn’t like California. How did you mean that?”

“It’s always that way with actors. When they’re in New York, they wish they were in California. And vice versa.”

“I see.” Luther leaned back in his chair. “Why does it bother you that she lives in New York?”

Ron abruptly felt the current shift between them. Friendly conversation, he realized, had suddenly become a hard-core interrogation. “Dr. Luther, when a girl I care for very much suddenly packs her bags and leaves in the middle of the afternoon without a word—it bothers me!”

“Is that the only reason?”

Ron reached for a cigarette. “I don’t understand.”

“The question is fairly obvious, isn’t it?” Luther leaned forward and offered Ron a light.

“Thanks,” Ron breathed, exhaling a mouth full of smoke with the word. He sat back and thought about Luther’s questions for a moment. “No, I... I’ve thought about it. I mean, since I spoke with you that night. I really never allowed myself to consider Chandal’s past life before that time. She had mentioned Lakewood, of course. What she’d been through. But I guess I just didn’t want to think about it. About her previous illness.”

“And you’re afraid she is ill now?”

“Jesus, I don’t know. You should have seen her the other night. She just didn’t seem to be the same person. I don’t mean in looks, but in the way she acted. The way she spoke. I just mentioned California and it set her off like a torch. She kept screaming about how cameras were X-ray machines and how she wasn’t going to let them look inside of her, and...

Ron stopped suddenly and could see the look that crept into Dr. Luther’s eyes. It was a worried look, a look that told Ron the man had abruptly shifted gears again and now possessed the time-honored look of concern. It was as if his entire expression indicated “what-you-just-said-doesn’t-sound-too-good.”

“Dr. Luther, what do I do? I tried calling her. She doesn’t pick up the phone. I went back to the carriage house on Saturday. Again yesterday. I know she’s in there, yet she won’t answer the door. I have to do something. I just can’t sit around and watch her go to pieces like this.”

“Of course, of course....”

Moodily, Ron dropped his napkin on the table.

“By the way,” Luther offered, “you never actually asked me but I think you should know that I do believe in Chandal’s amnesia. I believe in it absolutely. Only I don’t believe that it’s entirely a functional debility. I believe—and, of course, this is only my personal view—that her amnesia could be of an organic origin as well.”

Before Ron could respond, Luther moved ahead.

“When Chandal first came to Lakewood, she underwent various tests. We checked for an acute infection, an epileptic seizure, a metabolic convulsion. We even thought that perhaps she might have suffered a severe blow on the head. After weeks of testing these were all ruled out. Yet I can’t help feeling that her problem stems from something just as valid as an organic source. Something that is causing her loss of memory.”

“Something?” Ron’s eyes narrowed.

“Causing a blockage. Yes.”

“But what? You said that she’d been tested.”

Luther shook his head. “To be perfectly candid, I don’t know. But if we could bring her back. In time. Perhaps then we would be able—”

He compressed his mouth over the rest of the sentence. Ron waited, but he didn’t finish it. He leaned forward suddenly. “Was I mistaken?”

“What?”

“Your roast beef. You’ve hardly touched it.”

Ron sighed. “Don’t mind me. I’ve had a hell of a case of the flu. Everything went out the window, my appetite at the head of the list.” Ron saw Luther’s sharp professional glance and hoped the topic of his health would not develop into a full-fledged subject.

“Well, if you’re finished, then perhaps we might take a walk. It’s really an extraordinary day.”

“That’ll be fine.”

They paid the check and left the restaurant, walking down Seventh Avenue. The street was filled with the heady air of exhaust fumes, hot dogs, and bespoke of a slum in the making. Tenements were stacked like lopsided boxes atop every business imaginable. One thing good about the neighborhood, you didn’t have to leave it. Whatever your needs, it was there, including Beyond Your Wildest Dreams, an X-rated movie playing at the corner movie house.

They walked up 46th Street and through the theater district, heading for Broadway. Neither man spoke very much. There was a traffic jam—an accident or something up ahead—and it took a few sidesteps to get through the gathering crowd.

“I suspect,” Luther said once they reached a clearing, “that you love Chandal very much.” Casually he flicked the next sentence at him, “Do you intend marrying her?”

Ron was caught off guard. “I’d like to,” he managed to stammer, and he could feel himself tense.

Luther nodded. Wearing a blue jersey and tan gabardine trousers, with a rumpled English tweed jacket slung over his shoulder, he sauntered along like a poet of sorts. Without warning, he turned to Ron and said:

“I’d like to try hypnosis.”

“Hypnosis?”

“I know what you’re thinking. Well, you’re mistaken. Hypnosis is not something magical or mysterious. Hypnosis is nothing more than a heightened suggestibility induced by another person. A therapeutic tool. Psychiatrists use it all the time to alleviate the pain and suffering of certain mental disorders.”

“Then why wasn’t it used with Chandal before?”

“It is not an approved method of therapy at Lakewood,” Luther shrugged. “But I’ve had some remarkable results in private practice. Some excellent results. I would like to use a technique called ‘Hypnotic Time Regression.’ Through this process I will be able to bring Chandal back to an earlier time in her life. The period during the brownstone, naturally. One hopes she will experience feelings, images, thoughts, behavior from that period. She will behave just as though she were literally still living in the brownstone. And then perhaps we may be able to discover the cause of her amnesia.”

Ron hesitated for a moment in the roaring bustle of the well-fanned Broadway crowd. Blinking away the hot spot of light that refracted from a store window, his eyes picked up the sudden seriousness in Luther’s face.

“But won’t that be dangerous?” he asked. “Making her relive all that?”

“I will try to avoid prolonged painful memories.” He paused. “The question is, will Chandal allow herself to be hypnotized?”

“I don’t see why not. She must want to remember, or why else would she have returned to New York?”

Both men were walking again. Luther took a moment to glance at his watch, then slipped easily into his jacket. “Consciously telling yourself you want something does not necessarily mean you’re being totally honest with yourself. After all, it’s her own brain that shields her from that information. That is, if her amnesia is functional as the Board insisted.”

“Then you believe there is a chance that she is blocking her own way?”

“Where memory has been lost, it can reappear, with a vengeance, or as a gift. Chandal knows this from our many sessions together. The greatest mental block to hypnosis is the fear of revealing something that the subject does not consciously wish to divulge.” Luther stopped suddenly. “I’m afraid,” he said, “a great deal depends on you. On how strong a relationship you share. If you can persuade her to submit to hypnosis,” he murmured, his face taking on the blankness of a seasoned psychiatrist, “I’m willing to give it a try.”

Ron had no idea why he was suddenly afraid, why he had just almost changed his mind about acquiring Luther’s help. It took a great deal of concentration before he could finally bring himself to say:

“I’ll see what I can do.”