A Case of Need: A Novel (24 page)

“Ah, John. Do you know any Albinoni?”

“No,” I said.

“Then you don’t know the adagio.”

“I’m afraid not.”

“It always makes me sad,” he said, dabbing his eyes. “Infernally, infernally sad. So sweet. Do sit down.”

I sat. He turned off his record player and took off the record. He dusted it carefully and replaced it in the jacket.

“It was good of you to come. How was your day?”

“Interesting.”

“You’ve looked up Bubbles?”

“Yes, I did.”

“How did you find her?”

“Confusing.”

“Why do you say that?”

I smiled. “Don’t analyze me, Fritz. I never pay my doctor bills.”

“No?”

“Tell me about Karen Randall,” I said.

“This is very nasty, John.”

“Now you sound like Charlie Frank.”

“Charlie Frank is not a
complete
fool,” Fritz said. “By the way, did I tell you I have a new friend?”

“No,” I said.

“I do, a marvelous creature, most amusing. We must talk about him sometime.”

“Karen Randall,” I said, bringing him back to the point.

“Yes, indeed.” Fritz took a deep breath. “You didn’t know the girl, John,” he said. “She was not a nice child. Not at all. She was a mean, lying, unpleasant little child with severe neuroses. Bordering on psychosis, if you ask me.”

He walked into the bedroom, stripping off his sweater. I followed him in and watched as he put on a clean shirt and a tie.

“Her problems,” Fritz said, “were sexual in nature, stemming from a repressed childhood with her parents. Her father is not the most well-adjusted man I know. Marrying that woman is a perfect example. Have you met her?”

“The present Mrs. Randall?”

“Yes. Ghastly,
ghastly
woman.”

He shuddered as he knotted his tie and straightened it in the mirror.

“Did you know Karen?” I asked.

“It was my misfortune to do so. I knew her parents as well. We first met at that marvelous, glorious party given by the Baroness de—”

“Just tell me,” I said.

Fritz sighed. “This girl, this Karen Randall,” he said, “she presented her parents with their own neuroses. In a sense she acted out their fantasies.”

“What do you mean?”

“Breaking the mold—being sexually free, not caring what people said, dating the wrong kinds of people, and always with sexual undertones. Athletes. Negroes. That sort of thing.”

“Was she ever your patient?”

He sighed. “No, thank God. At one point it was suggested that I take her, but I refused. I had three other adolescent girls at the time, and they were quite enough. Quite enough.”

“Who asked you to take her?”

“Peter, of course. He’s the only one with any sense in the family.”

“What about Karen’s abortions?”

“Abortions?”

“Come on, Fritz.”

He went to a closet and found a sports coat, pulled it on, and tugged at the lapels. “People never understand,” he said. There is a cycle here, a pattern which is as easily recognizable, as familiar, as an MI.
¹
You learn the pattern, the symptoms, the trouble. You see it acted out before you again and again. A rebellious child chooses the weak point of its parent—with unfailing, uncanny accuracy—and proceeds to exploit it. But then when punishment comes, it must be in terms of the same weak point. It must all fit together: if someone asks you a question in French, you must answer in French.”

“I don’t understand.”

“For a girl like Karen, punishment was important. She wanted to be punished, but her punishment, like her rebellion, had to be sexual in nature. She wanted to suffer the pain of childbirth, so she could compensate for breaking with her family, her society, her morality … Dylan put it beautifully; I have the poem here somewhere.” He began rummaging through a bookshelf.

“It’s all right,” I said.

“No, no, a lovely quotation. You’d enjoy it.” He searched for a few more moments, then straightened. “Can’t find it. Well, never mind. The point is that she needed suffering, but never experienced it. That was why she kept getting pregnant.”

“You talk like a psychiatrist.”

“We all do, these days.”

“How many times did she get pregnant?”

“Twice, that I know of. But that is just what I hear from my other patients. A great many women felt threatened by Karen. She impinged upon their system of values, their framework of right and wrong. She challenged them, she implied that they were old and sexless and timid and foolish. A middle-aged woman can’t stand such a challenge; it is terrifying. She must respond, must react, must form an opinion which vindicates herself—and therefore condemns Karen.”

“So you heard a lot of gossip.”

“I heard a lot of fear.”

He smoked his cigar. The room was filled with sunlight and blue smoke. He sat on the bed and began pulling on his shoes.

“Frankly,” he said, “after a while I began to resent Karen myself. She went overboard, she did too much, she went too far.”

“Perhaps she couldn’t help it.”

“Perhaps,” Fritz said, “she needed a good spanking.”

“Is that a professional opinion?”

He smiled. “That is just my human irritation showing through. If I could count the number of women who have run out and had affairs—disastrous affairs—just because of Karen …”

“I don’t care about the women,” I said, “I care about Karen.”

“She’s dead now,” Fritz said.

“That pleases you?”

“Don’t be silly. Why do you say that?”

“Fritz …”

“Just a question.”

“Fritz,” I said, “how many abortions did Karen have before last weekend?”

“Two.”

“One last summer,” I said, “in June. And one before that?”

“Yes.”

“And who aborted her?”

“I haven’t the slightest,” he said, puffing on his cigar.

“It was somebody good,” I said, “because Bubbles said that Karen was only gone for an afternoon. It must have been very skillful and nontraumatic.”

“Very likely. She was a rich girl, after all.”

I looked at him, sitting there on the bed, tying his shoes and smoking the cigar. Somehow, I was convinced he knew.

“Fritz, was it Peter Randall?”

Fritz grunted. “If you know, why ask?”

“I need confirmation.”

“You need a strong noose around your neck, if you ask me. But yes: it was Peter.”

“Did J. D. know?”

“Heaven help us! Never!”

“Did Mrs. Randall know?”

“Hmmm. There I am not certain. It is possible but somehow I doubt it.”

“Did J. D. know that Peter did abortions?”

“Yes. Everyone knows that Peter does abortions. He is
the
abortionist, believe me.”

“But J. D. never knew Karen had been aborted.”

“That’s correct.”

“What’s the connection between Mrs. Randall and Art Lee?”

“You are very acute today,” Fritz said.

I waited for an answer. Fritz puffed twice on his cigar, producing a dramatic cloud around his face, and looked away from me.

“Oh,” I said. “When?”

“Last year. Around Christmas, if I recall.”

“J. D. never knew?”

“If you will remember,” Fritz said, “J. D. spent the months of November and December in India last year working for the State Department. Some land of goodwill tour, or public health thing.”

“Then who was the father?”

“Well, there is some speculation about that. But nobody knows for sure—perhaps not even Mrs. Randall.”

Once again, I had the feeling that he was lying.

“Come on, Fritz. Are you going to help me or not?”

“Dear boy, you are immensely clever.” He stood, walked to the mirror, and straightened his jacket. He ran his hands over his shirt. It was something you always noticed about Fritz: he was continually touching his body, as if to assure himself that he had not disappeared.

“I have often thought,” Fritz said, “that the present Mrs. Randall might as well have been Karen’s mother, since they are both such bitches in heat.”

I lit a cigarette. “Why did J. D. marry her?”

Fritz gave a helpless shrug and fluffed a handkerchief in his pocket. He tugged his shirt cuffs down his jacket sleeves. “God only knows. There was great talk at the time. She comes from a good family, you know—a Rhode Island family—but they sent her to a Swiss school. Those Swiss schools will destroy a girl. In any event, she was a poor choice for a man in his sixties, and a busy surgeon. She grew rapidly bored sitting around her cavernous home. The Swiss schools teach you to be bored in any case.”

He buttoned his jacket and turned away from the mirror, with a final glance over his shoulder at himself. “So,” he said, “she amused herself.”

“How long has this been going on?”

“More than a year.”

“Did she arrange Karen’s abortion?”

“I doubt it. One can’t be sure, but I doubt it. More likely it would be Signe.”

“Signe?”

“Yes. J. D.’s mistress.”

I took a deep breath and wondered if Fritz was kidding me. I decided he wasn’t.

“J. D. had a mistress?”

“Oh, yes. A Finnish girl. She worked in the cardiology lab of the Mem. Quite a stunner, I’m told.”

“You never met her?”

“Alas.”

“Then how do you know?”

He smiled enigmatically.

“Karen liked this Signe?”

“Yes. They were good friends. Rather close in ages, actually.”

I ignored the implications in that.

“You see,” Fritz continued, “Karen was very close to her mother, the first Mrs. Randall. She died two years ago of cancer—rectum, I think—and it was a great blow for Karen. She never liked her father much, but had always confided in her mother. The loss of a confidante at the age of sixteen was a great blow to her. Much of her subsequent … activity can be attributed to bad advice.”

“From Signe?”

“No. Signe was quite a proper girl, from what I’m told.”

“I don’t get it.”

“One of the reasons Karen disliked her father was that she knew about his propensities. You see, he has always had women friends. Young ones. The first was Mrs. Jewett, and then there was—”

“Never mind,” I said. I had already gotten the picture. “He cheated on his first wife, too?”

“Wandered,” Fritz said. “Let us say wandered.”

“And Karen knew?”

“She was quite a perceptive child.”

“There’s one thing I don’t understand,” I said. “If Randall likes variety, why did he remarry?”

“Oh, that’s quite clear. One look at the present Mrs. Randall and you’d know. She is a fixture in his life, a decoration, an ornament to his existence. Rather like an exotic potted plant—which is not far from the truth, considering how much she drinks.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” I said.

He gave me an amused, askance look. “What about that nurse you have lunch with twice a week?”

“Sandra is a friend. She’s a nice girl.” As I said it, it occurred to me that he was astonishingly well informed.

“Nothing further?”

“Of course not,” I said, a little stiffly.

“You just happen to run into her at the cafeteria on Thursdays and Fridays?”

“Yes. Our schedules—”

“What do you think this girl feels about you?”

“She’s just a girl. She’s ten years younger than I am.

“Aren’t you flattered?”

“What do you mean?” I said, knowing exactly what he meant.

“Don’t you derive satisfaction from talking with her?”

Sandra was a nurse on the eighth-floor medical service. She was very pretty, with very large eyes and a very small waist, and a way of walking …

“Nothing has happened,” I said.

“And nothing will. Yet you meet her twice a week.”

“She happens to be a welcome change from my work,” I said. “Twice a week. A rendezvous in the intimate, sexually charged atmosphere of the Lincoln Hospital cafeteria.”

“There’s no need to raise your voice.”

“I’m not raising my voice,” I said, lowering it.

“You see,” Fritz said, “men handle things differently. You feel no compulsion to do more than talk to this girl. It is enough that she be there, hanging on your every word, mildly in love with you—”

“Fritz—”

“Look,” Fritz said. “Let’s take a case from my experience. I had a patient who felt a desire to kill people. It was a very strong desire, difficult to control. It bothered the patient; he was in constant fear of actually killing someone. But this man finally got a job in the Midwest, working as an executioner. He electrocuted people as his livelihood. And he did it very well; he was the best electrocutioner in the history of the state. He holds several patents, little techniques he has developed to do the job faster, more painlessly. He is a student of death. He likes his work. He is dedicated. He sees his methods and his advances much as a doctor does: a relief of suffering, an improvement, a bettering.”

“So?”

“So I am saying that normal desires can take many forms, some legitimate, some not. Everyone must find a way to deal with them.”

“We’re a long way from Karen,” I said.

“Not really. Have you ever wondered why she was so close to her mother and so estranged from her father? Have you ever wondered why, when her mother died, she chose the particular mode of behavior she did? Sex, drugs, self-humiliation? Even to the point of befriending her father’s mistress?”

I sat back. Fritz was being rhetorical again.

“The girl,” he said, “had certain stresses and strains. She had certain reactions, some defensive, some offensive, to what she knew was going on with her parents. She reacted to what she knew. She had to. In a sense, she stabilized her world.”

“Some stability.”

“True,” Fritz said. “Unpleasant, nasty, perverse. But perhaps it was all she could manage.”

I said, “I’d like to talk with this Signe.”

“Impossible. Signe returned to Helsinki six months ago.”

“And Karen?”

“Karen,” Fritz said, “became a lost soul. She had no one to turn to, no friends, no aid. Or so she felt.”

“What about Bubbles and Angela Harding?”

Fritz looked at me steadily. “What about them?”

“They could have helped her.”

“Can the drowning save the drowning?”