Blackwood Farm (36 page)

“I sat back in the easy chair and closed my eyes. My body was lulled and humming. There was a time of silence. Perhaps five or more minutes. But he was still there. He was kneeling right beside me, but I couldn't look at him.

“ ‘Who
was
the stranger?' I asked. I opened my eyes. ‘I've asked you over and over. Who was he?'

“ ‘I don't know,' he responded. The sound of the monotone voice was literally dreadful.

“ ‘Where is the stranger?' I asked.

“ ‘I don't know,' he responded again. ‘If I knew, I would find him and hurt him. I don't know everything.' On it went, flat and low. ‘I know lots more than you think I do.'

“I said nothing. I was too afraid. I tried to feel love, not because I wanted to love him but because I was going mad. By tomorrow I might be roaring mad.

“ ‘I want you to leave me now,' I said. I looked into his eyes. ‘I want you to leave me to think, you understand me?'

“ ‘You think you can command me,' came that monotone voice. The lips were slightly disconnected from it. ‘You can't command me,' he said. ‘But for love, I'll leave you alone. Beware of what they do to you here.'

“ ‘Don't frighten me anymore,' I said.

“ ‘I don't want to frighten you,' said the voice. ‘But you must understand they want to change you. They want to make you so you can't see or hear me.'

“ ‘That can't be done,' I whispered. ‘Go now. I must be alone. Don't you ever want to be alone?'

“No answer.

“ ‘Where do you go when you're not with me?' I asked.

“No answer.

“ ‘Tell me,' I said. ‘Where do you go when you leave? Or do you stay with me, invisible, just watching and learning?'

“No answer.

“I felt him leave. I felt a change of temperature in the room. I heard things stirring, the paper tissue ruffled in its box, the creak of the bed, the faint rattle of the Venetian blinds, then nothing.

“I made the Sign of the Cross. What was I going to do? Where was I going to go to find someone who would understand this? Hell, I needed someone to tell me what to do.

“I went into the bathroom and washed the slimy semen off my legs. I washed my hands. Then I came back, and I took my rosary out of the nightstand. Big Ramona had found it for me. It was a garnet rosary from my First Communion. Lynelle's gift. I started to say it.

“But I couldn't meditate on the mysteries. I thought of the stranger. What if he came back to Blackwood Manor? If the Hermitage was destroyed, what would he do? I pictured him, those fiery dark eyes. How perfectly furious he had been, pivoting wild as a dervish as the broken glass assaulted him.

“And if I went to sleep, I'd dream of Rebecca.”

21

“GOBLIN WAS
on time for the meeting with the panel of psychiatrists. He was my faithful duplicate again, and the look of contempt and boredom had vanished from his face. He put his arm around me and I could see that he was afraid of what was to happen with the panel.

“As we entered the room—Goblin, me and Aunt Queen—I felt for one moment: What could it be like if I were to trust these people? If I were really to make an appeal to them? Could they help me, not with some cooked-up psychiatric diagnosis but with an active assault on Rebecca and Goblin and on the panic that had driven me to the Hermitage? Could they be a party to my efforts to fight the trespasser?

“My own sheer disloyalty to Goblin, born out of a brand-new fear, put me to shame. But, not being able to read my mind, for all his new attainments, he had no clue of it.

“I quietly demanded that a chair be placed beside me for Goblin to sit, and I laid my hand on his knee and felt him relax. I glanced at his profile and found his eyes chilly as he looked at the panel. I told the panel that, though they couldn't see him, Goblin was sitting to my left and that he was looking at them and hearing everything being said by us.

“As for the panel, I was soon certain that it was impossible to expect anything exceptional from any member of it, and the examination was largely an uneventful half hour.

“Two of the doctors were young, sterile and heartless men, interns, I figure, and the one woman on the panel seemed tentative and overeager to please, and the chairman of the board was a big heavyset doctor who seemed himself to be suffering from terminal depression.

“Winn Mayfair was there and he studied me in dignified silence. His was by far the most interesting face.

“I told them quickly, and dryly, my whole story. I kept back nothing except the most recent and private details of my erotic relationship with Goblin. Of his heroics I made much. Of our sexual contact, I said nothing. When I described my love affair with Rebecca and the burial of her remains, the visits of the Mayfair Medical lab to the Hermitage and the attendance of the FBI, they looked to Aunt Queen, who confirmed what she could readily.

“ ‘You do realize,' said the heavyset head doctor, ‘that no fingerprints whatsoever were found in the bathroom where you were supposedly attacked. Nothing on the walls, the lavatory or on the pieces of glass that could be examined.'

“I hadn't known, and I was bitterly disappointed that I had to be told such a thing in these circumstances.

“ ‘The trespasser didn't touch anything but me,' I said quietly, my face burning with restraint. ‘The glass was in fragments.'

“ ‘You also know,' said the chairman of the panel, ‘that your housekeeper Ramona didn't see this intruder, and none of the guards on your property saw him either.'

“Again, I was hurt that Aunt Queen had not told me these things before, but I swallowed hard on my anger and simply shrugged.

“ ‘Dr. Winn Mayfair can tell you,' I said. ‘My injuries weren't self-inflicted.'

“We had come to an impasse.

“Then the doctors put the same routine questions to me that child psychiatrists had used years ago, with a few new wrinkles, such as, Did I hear voices? Did Goblin ever tell me what to do? Did I ever suffer blackouts? Did I know my own IQ? Had I no interest in attending college? I gave simple answers. I wanted it to be over.

“At last Winn Mayfair asked me in a very quiet and respectful voice whether or not he and the others could do anything for me. Did I perhaps have questions for those who'd been questioning me?

“I was completely taken aback by this. I never expected anything so friendly or reasonable. Common sense told me to stop and think this over. But then I heard myself responding:

“ ‘No, I think this has gone on long enough. I presume you will confer and send us word of your diagnosis?'

“ ‘We'll do that, if you like,' said Dr. Winn. ‘We thank you for coming.'

“ ‘You talk like I'm a specimen,' I said, ignoring Aunt Queen's little gasp. ‘Was I brought here for your sake or mine?'

“Dr. Winn was unfazed by the sharpness of my tone.

“ ‘This is a teaching hospital, Quinn,' he said. ‘It's reciprocal what goes on. As for your diagnosis, let me tell you now it's perfectly obvious that you're not a manic-depressive, a schizophrenic or a sociopath. Those are the ones that worry people.'

“He rose to his feet—a signal to all those present—and this time he shook my hand and ‘applauded' my patience.

“The two antiseptic young men vanished, the woman went with them, the huge, heavy, depressed captain of the team wished me good luck, and Aunt Queen said jubilantly that we could now go up to the rooftop Grand Luminière for a nice supper.

“Goblin remained locked to my side, and in the elevator going up to the roof, I felt his right arm tight around me.

“I was calculating; I was going to break in Mr. Nash Penfield right. I wasn't going to let him find out about all this in some delicate manner.

“The restaurant proved a marvelous surprise. Even Aunt Queen's glowing compliments had not fully captured it. We were quite high up over New Orleans, which was great, and huge arched windows were open everywhere to the glowing afternoon around us. There was a colonnade along the east side, where one could stroll in the open air, along a balustrade with Tuscan columns. And within the circular room itself, between the vast windows, there were rich paintings in heavy ornate frames—a sampling of art from all different centuries.

“I noticed the Dutch art right away. ‘My God,' I said to Aunt Queen, ‘we're surrounded by Rembrandts.'

“ ‘No, dear, they're all fakes, or reproductions, as Rowan Mayfair likes to put it. They were commissioned especially for the restaurant, but don't you worry. You'll be in Amsterdam soon enough, seeing some of the originals.'

“ ‘What a dazzling idea,' I said. ‘Bringing it all here for people who don't want to go wandering.'

“ ‘Now, now, toots,' she said. ‘Don't fret about wandering. There's Nash. He's already at the table. Please follow me.'

“I took the measure of the restaurant before I took the measure of the man, and saw that all manner of people in all manner of dress were seated at the white draped tables. Lots of patients in wheelchairs were dining with family members, it seemed, and many tables had people who appeared dressed for a night on the town, and then there were uniformed doctors and nurses.

“All the tables were round but they varied in size, and ours was set for four, which immediately delighted me.

“In summary, I knew it to be a boldly homogenized and democratic place, yet a place of genuine beauty and refinement, and my heart went out to the woman who had designed it.

“The windows were full of the sun-streaked sky, and I could see the twinkling lights of the two river bridges shining wonderfully in the dusk. I loved it.

“But now it was time to see Nash and to introduce him to Goblin.

“The man who was helping Aunt Queen with her chair was taller even than me (at that time), probably by about two inches. He had wavy black hair with a lot of gray at the sides, and he was dressed in a fine spring suit of blue-and-white seersucker.

“His eyes were pale blue and he had rather deep lines in his face, giving him a bit of a jowled look, but he was in fact slender. His expression was entirely wise and sympathetic, and he took my hand in his warmly.

“ ‘You're Nash,' I said. ‘I thank you for helping with my computer.'

“His voice came with a depth and color that any man would envy. In fact, it had an effortless professional sound to it that was charming.

“ ‘I'm delighted to meet you, Quinn,' he said. ‘I understand Goblin is with you?'

“We were getting off on the right foot. I presented Goblin to him immediately and I noted Goblin's cold stare as Nash tried his best to be courteous to something he couldn't see.

“We were immediately seated in a nice open circle, and when the waitress approached, I told her that an invisible personage was seated to my left, and that he would be having the same meal I would be having.

“She was horrified.

“Aunt Queen gave her immediate approval of the plan before the young woman could laugh or make some odd remark. And Nash immediately commented on the heavy silver of the table setting.

“I ordered a double vodka martini, with plenty of olive juice and olives, and that went over very well, too, thanks to Aunt Queen immediately ordering the same and one for Goblin, and asking to see the wine list.

“Nash asked for a glass of plain soda water, remarking that he had finished a lifetime of drinking earlier than one might have expected.

“The waitress departed in an anxious flurry.

“Then Nash began to introduce himself, his slow, careful sonorous voice telling of how he and Aunt Queen had met in Europe, where Nash had been shepherding a group of high school students on a tour of the Continent.

“This was apparently Nash's summer job throughout graduate school at Claremont College in California, but he was now finished with all course work for his Ph.D. and needed only to write his dissertation.

“Subject? A thorough investigation as to whether Charles Dickens had ever been edited, and what effect modern editing standards might have had on his work, with heavy reliance on an examination of how Dickens' writings had been abridged in England and America.

“I was immediately interested, and also attracted to this deep-voiced man with the gray at his temples, and I felt I could have listened to his easy eloquence for hours. In fact, I longed to do so. He had a natural wide-eyed expression when he spoke and an inveterate politeness that was totally disarming.

“But Aunt Queen quickly cut in to express her immediate desire: that as soon as Pops' will was read, we go on to Europe. Of course Nash agreed with her that I was the perfect age for the Grand Tour, and I believed Nash when he told me that I would never quite again be as impressionable as I was now. Then he turned to Goblin, and, trying to lock eyes with something parallel to me, asked Goblin what he thought of the travel proposal.

“I took Goblin's right hand, which felt heavy and warm, but he showed me nothing but that cold profile again and he was utterly silent.

“ ‘Goblin, what do you think? Do you remember our trip to New York?' The question came out of my mouth before I could realize that it was a blunder. Goblin had gotten weaker and weaker in New York, until he was scarcely more than a sheer phantom.

“ ‘Goblin, we won't do anything that's bad for us,' I said. ‘Here, look at this martini.' I held up the glass for him. And then I took a swallow of it myself. ‘Here's to you, Goblin. We're together. We're going home to the house tonight. We're through with this hospital and anybody and everybody that would have worked for our separation.'

“Of course this long speech was entirely audible to Nash and Aunt Queen, and Aunt Queen picked up the gist immediately.

“ ‘Come, Goblin,' said Aunt Queen, ‘certainly you want to go to Europe. We'll have so much fun together.'

“Again, I tried to elicit some reaction from him, but I couldn't. He wasn't playing at eating his food or drinking his drink, and he stared at Nash as if he was the enemy.

“ ‘No, Goblin, he's not!' I leaned towards him. I whispered. ‘He's good for us. Remember how Lynelle was good? That's how this man is. I knew it the moment he started talking to us.'

“Of course Nash and Aunt Queen could hear this, and Aunt Queen said at once: ‘I'm so supremely overjoyed. Quinn, dear, don't drink that martini too fast. The wine I've chosen is excellent.'

“Goblin continued to stare forward.

“ ‘Never mind him for now,' I said. ‘I think the hospital stay has exhausted him. Nash—I presume you do want me to call you Nash' ('Oh, absolutely,' he replied) ‘—we've just been through a peculiar ordeal upstairs and—.'

“Before I could say more I heard Goblin's ominous monotone: ‘Europe, I can't,' he said. ‘Too far for me. You remember New York. You talk like a fool. Goblin Quinn one person.'

“It was clear that no one else could hear him.

“ ‘I know,' I replied aloud. ‘I understand. All right. We'll think on it.'

“ ‘I once thought,' he went on in the same chilling voice, ‘Europe existed in pictures and stories. Then Aunt Queen called from Europe, we saw movies of Europe, Lynelle taught you about Europe. Europe is real and far away. No going to Europe. No. Do this and we split apart. Quinn Goblin one person.'

“My anxiety was cresting. Plates of steaming food were being set down, wineglasses filled, and all the world of this restaurant saw me whispering to empty space, but I had no intention of weakening.

“ ‘Just listen to this man,' I said. ‘Listen to Aunt Queen. It doesn't mean we have to go.' I leaned closer to him, dropping my whispering even lower. ‘I'm just humoring them, you see, I have to do it. Nash can be my teacher at Blackwood Farm. We'll be together. Goblin, look at me.'

“ ‘No, I don't want to look at you,' he replied. ‘You are sly.'

“ ‘God in Heaven,' I declared in a louder voice. ‘What do you want of me? I'm giving you my total loyalty. Nash, tell him that you can be my tutor at Blackwood Farm. It's possible, isn't it?'

“Nash stared intently at what he thought was Goblin's face, and he wasn't very far off, as I saw it.

“ ‘Of course, I'd be delighted to teach Quinn at Blackwood Farm. The place is beautiful,' he said. ‘Goblin, I'm new here. I want for you to approve of me. I know full well that Quinn will only accept me if you do.'

“ ‘Yes, that's it, that's why we're here!' I said forthrightly. ‘Oh, if you could only see him,' I said to Nash. ‘To me he's as solid as you.' I reached over and took Goblin's right hand. ‘I love you, Goblin. It's love between us.' I kissed his cheek.