Night Visions (17 page)

I
n front of Meredith's apartment, someone sifts through a shopping cart filled with plastic bags and aluminum cans. Samantha notices the shoulder-length black hair, leathery skin, and hands cracked and blistered from years in the sun. As she gets out of the car, the figure smiles at her, then goes back to work. He has oddly feminine features. A small nose, tight lips. His left eye is cloudy and unnervingly still. Hanging from his neck, he wears a silver pendant of two snakes joined together. She smells smoke and urine on his clothes.

Frank hurries up the front steps.

She starts to follow when a voice seems to whisper suddenly in her ear.

“She's not in danger.”

She turns, but the man is already pushing his cart in the other direction. The wheels grind and squeak, as if reluctant to move.

“Meredith?” Frank calls out, ringing the bell a second time. He knocks impatiently, then tries the door. It slides open.

Samantha is afraid of what the unlocked door might mean.

The living room is sparsely furnished with a black leather couch, two matching chairs, and a television. A bouquet of sunflowers fills an indigo vase on the coffee table, and a framed print of a woman standing alone in the wings of a theater hangs on the far wall. Samantha steps closer. Edward Hopper's
New York Movie.
The hardwood floors shine from a pungent cleaner that still lingers in the warm air. An ironing board blocks the entryway to the kitchen.

Frank calls out again, but no one answers.

An oversized table and an exercise bike make the living room feel crammed. The
Chronicle
is open to the section with movie listings, and an unfinished cup of coffee has been placed carefully in the center of a coaster. The mug is still warm. On the other side of the room, a narrow staircase leads to the lower level, and Samantha walks downstairs without waiting for Frank. The space gets darker with each step. At the bottom of the steps, a bookshelf crowds the wall to her right. At the end of the hall, there are two closed doors across from each other, and having to choose between them makes her feel like a game-show contestant. She opens the one to her left, calling out Meredith's name. Her voice cracks.

The small bedroom smells like potpourri and vanilla-scented candles. A sliding glass door leads only onto a sunless porch, yet it still manages to brighten the room. A few clothes are scattered on the floor by the closet, and the bed is made. Samantha sees Meredith's smile and scarred lip in various pictures on the nightstand and dresser. She stands on a long sandy beach with friends, beneath the Eiffel Tower, and at the Hard Rock Café in London. One man appears frequently, and in a separate frame engraved with
I love you, Pete
, she kisses his cheek. They look happy.

In the corner, several papers clutter the writing table, and Samantha walks over to it. The loose sheet on top is handwritten.

“What the hell are you doing!” Meredith stands at the door with Frank by her side.

“Uh, looking for you. We were—I was—”

“Reading my letter.” She steps toward Samantha, taking the sheet from her hand.

“I'm sorry…. It's beautiful.” Samantha stands still, arms at her sides.

“It's private,” Meredith says softly.

“Meredith,” Frank interrupts, “as I was saying upstairs, we think you might be in danger.”

She faces him and stands quietly.

“Almost everyone connected with Dr. Clay's study has either disappeared or been killed in the last week,” Frank continues. “We want to put you into protective custody. A patrol car will be here any minute.”

“You're a cop?” She turns to Samantha, obviously shocked at what she thinks is another betrayal.

“No, I'm…I'm kind of like a consultant.”

“A consultant? Were you lying to Dr. Clay about your sleep disorders? Did you know we were in danger?”

“No! I haven't been able to sleep for months—” Samantha looks at Frank, pleadingly at first, then back to Meredith. She pauses.

“Sam?” Frank asks.

“Neither could Dr. Clay, could he?”

“What?” Meredith looks confused.

“Did Dr. Clay have sleeping problems?”

“Yeah, I think so. Every once in a while he complained about not getting enough sleep.”

“What about you?”

“No. Never.”

“Then why do you work at a sleep clinic?”

“It's an internship for one of my electives. I'm getting my master's in nursing at UCSF. Why—”

“What do you know about Dr. Cooper? What kind of doctor is she?”

“Actually, she's a psychiatrist. What does—”

“Why would a psychiatrist be asked to fill in for Dr. Clay?” Samantha interrupts.

“Well, they're friends.”

“That doesn't make her qualified to conduct the study.”

“You don't need to specialize in sleep disorders to administer the treatment. Anyone could do it.”

Someone knocks loudly on the door upstairs. “Hello? Ms. Bogart? San Francisco Police Department.”

“We're down here. Hold on!” Frank yells, then hurries upstairs.

“I've got to go too. The police are going to keep an eye on you
for a few days.” Samantha moves closer to Meredith, who looks down at the letter in her hand.

“It's going to be all right,” Samantha continues, trying to sound reassuring, but she can't tell if the words are for Meredith or herself.

“You shouldn't have read my letter.” Meredith's voice is quiet, and something about it recalls the way Father used to express his disappointment in her, calmly, succinctly.

“I'm sorry,” Samantha says.

“Me too.”

Samantha watches Meredith turn and walk up the stairs.

 

Outside, Frank leans against the car with his arms crossed in front of his chest. He watches the police car as it pulls away with Meredith in the backseat.

Samantha waves, but Meredith doesn't turn around to see. “At least she let me help her pack.” The words sound as if Samantha were asking a question.

“She'll be all right,” he says.

Samantha turns, nodding and lowering her eyes.

“So why all the questions about Dr. Cooper?”

She raises her face eagerly to his. “I don't think the killings are about this study or Dr. Clay. They're about people with severe sleep disorders.”

“What's the difference?”

“Other clinics may be targeted.” She stands, clasping her hands in front of her nervously.

“You mean now that you and Meredith are being protected.”

“I don't think Meredith is in any danger. She's not an insomniac. She doesn't suffer like the killer does, so she can't be martyred for it.”

“Martyred?”

“After the count lost his ability to sleep, he tried to take sleep
away from those around him. He wanted others to suffer in the same way. He kept his servants up till all hours. He—”

“None of that explains why the killer started with Dr. Clay's study,” Frank says abruptly. He doesn't want to hear any more about Goldberg or the count's curse. “There has to be a reason.”

“‘
She's not in danger.
'” Samantha mutters, then looks up the street. The homeless man is bent over a garbage can at the end of the block. “How did he know?”

“What?”

“Hold on.”

She jogs toward the homeless man, watching him as he finishes searching through the garbage can and starts pushing his cart around the corner. When Samantha reaches the side street, she half expects to see no one, but he is standing there, perfectly still, as if he has been waiting for her.

“Hi.” She stops. “Uh…did you say something to me back there?” Now that she stands in front of him, waiting, she feels foolish.

Silence.

“I think you said, ‘She's not in danger.'” Samantha continues. “What did you mean by that?”

His cloudy eye focuses directly on her, and the snakes around his neck glisten in the sunlight.

“Does the name Goldberg mean anything to you?”

He grabs her hands suddenly, almost violently. She wants to pull away, but his grip is too strong. He wrenches her palms upward, looking at them intently.

“You've been marked.”

“What!” She yelps, twisting her arms and shoulders. She tries to inhale but feels a heaviness on her chest, as if something is wrapped around her, squeezing.

He stares at her stomach, and she looks down. The bottom
two buttons of her shirt have come undone, exposing part of her scar.

“It's destined to find you.”

“No,” she whispers. She pulls back hard, unsure about what is more terrifying—his words or his icy grip.

Samantha hears footsteps behind her, then Frank's voice.

“Sam?”

She finally yanks her hands free, but the man continues to look down, as if they were still there. She is breathing heavily now.

“I don't understand,” she says.

“Buses go everywhere.” With those words, his eyes become sorrowful, not penetrating. The man turns around and starts pushing his cart again. The wheels grind and squeak. Cans and bottles rattle against each other.

W
hat are you thinking?” Frank looks straight ahead as he talks, fidgeting slightly.

“This music on the radio. I heard a story about it once in a music history class. It's kind of a sad love letter.”

 

Mozart's Mass in C Minor was a piece written not for God but for two women, her instructor said. At twenty-one, Mozart fell in love with Aloysia Weber, a soprano with an angelic voice and shapely legs. Though his passion for her was bigger than the Munich Opera House, his purse was small. She ended their courtship, saying that he needed to make his mark, to become a success. Only then would she marry him. In the meantime, she promised to wait.
“I'll always love you, Wolfgang,”
she told him. But a short time later, she announced her engagement to an actor. With a battered heart, Mozart turned to Constanze, Aloysia's younger sister. In her arms, he found solace and eventually love—not the kind that ignites fires and starts wars, but the kind that offers shelter from a storm. He wrote the Mass for their wedding day, and Constanze sang soprano. Filling the church with her
voice, she must have suspected that the lilting, mournful melodies were more a testament to what her husband had lost in Aloysia than to her or Christ.

Aloysia could have sung it better.

Mozart could have loved Constanze better.

 

“Like Meredith's?” Frank looks straight ahead as he speaks.

“What?”

“Her letter.”

Samantha lowers her eyes guiltily. “She said that love isn't about the right person, it's about the right moment. Do you think that's true?”

“It depends on the night,” he says glibly, then laughs.

The sound of it makes Samantha smile. She watches him, waiting for an answer as he looks in the rearview mirror and changes lanes.

“For me”—his voice is cheerful but cautious—“love is cleaning the apartment…brushing your teeth, dressing nicely, that kind of stuff.”

“Personal hygiene?”

“It's about being a better person. Or at least trying to be.” He pauses. “The tricky part is finding someone who makes you want to keep trying.”

“Did I make you feel that way?” Samantha is surprised by her own question.

Frank hesitates before answering. “Yes, you did.” The truthfulness of the words makes them hard to say, and he wonders how she feels about hearing them.

Samantha wants to tell him that he did the same for her and that she doesn't deserve such a beautiful compliment. She has let him—let both of them—down. But as always, when it comes to her heart, she struggles with words.

They turn onto the street with the clinic, and Samantha is
relieved. The building glows orange-red in the light of the setting sun, and a police car is parked at the curb in front of the entryway. Frank pulls into a space across the street, and they both get out of the car quietly. He follows her across the street.

 

Unimaginative furniture fills Dr. Clay's office: brown leather chairs, oak bookcases, a brass lamp with a green shade. The black stapler and tape dispenser were clearly purchased at the same office supply store. Framed nautical prints hang on the walls. The desk is uncluttered. A few folders have been left in discreet piles, and a Post-it note sticks to a pyramid-shaped clock encased in glass: Lunch with Mike at 12:45. Today's date is scribbled across the top.

The officer who took them upstairs stands in the doorway. He watches as Frank goes through the file cabinet and Samantha studies the papers on Dr. Clay's desk.

They work in silence for a long time.

“Take a look at this,” Frank says and hands her a manila folder. The label reads “Samantha Ranvali.” “You said before that someone else was supposed to be in this study but never showed up. Did Dr. Clay ever mention a name?”

“No,” Samantha says distractedly. She stares at her name, seeing it, for the first time, as evidence in the case. She feels uneasy opening the file and suddenly recalls Don's words from the other day:
What if you're next on the list, Sam?

“Well, there has to be a record somewhere.” Frank walks over to the desk and starts checking the drawers.

“It feels weird reading my file.”

“It's better than reading other people's mail.”

“Thanks,” she says sarcastically.

The first few pages of health insurance forms are followed by notes on Samantha's medical history and a page of handwritten comments by Dr. Clay.

“What?” Samantha's jaw drops slightly.

Frank looks up.

“Listen to this. ‘Samantha has responded well to treatment. This has improved her disposition, making her less resistant and argumentative.' He wrote that after my first day here.”

“So?” Frank notices a wry smile on her face.

“My
disposition
? I am not resistant and argumentative.”

“Yes you are.”

“No I'm not.”

He laughs, then adds, “Maybe he meant it as a compliment.”

“That's not a compliment.” She tilts her head sideways and raises her eyebrows.

Frank is silent for a moment as he pulls out a file from the bottom drawer and sits in the desk chair. “‘Endymion's Circle,'” he reads the label, and holds it up for Samantha to see. “Why would he hide this away?”

Frank spreads open the file on Dr. Clay's desk. Samantha stands close behind him now, resting her hand on his right shoulder as she leans forward.

“Here's a list of the four participants in the study,” Frank says.

“Gabriel Morgan,” Samantha reads the fourth name.

Frank turns slightly to look up at her. “So that's how Catherine found out about the study. She must have met Morgan at the restaurant in Salt Lake and followed him to San Francisco.”

“Because she was sick like Max.” Samantha steps back and looks warily at the officer, who is picking at one of his fingernails.

“What do you mean?” Frank spins around in the chair to face her.

“That's how her roommate described it. Catherine was worried that she was getting sick like Max. If he cut her that night on the bridge—” She pauses, looking at Frank nervously. “After Max died, she couldn't sleep. Maybe she was becoming violent like him. She hears about this study from Father Morgan and thinks Dr. Clay can help.”

“That doesn't explain why she ran away.”

“Maybe it does….” Her voice trails off, then she looks into Frank's eyes. “She may have run to protect her family and friends.”

“From whom?”

“Herself.” She almost whispers the word.

Frank stares, confused.

“Dr. Clay's study targeted people who were experiencing extreme cases of parasomnia.”

“You said that was like sleepwalking.”

“It can also result in violent behavior. I think the killer may be acting in a parasomniac or semiconscious state.”

“That's ridiculous,” he says with noticeable irritation. “First of all, Catherine didn't hurt anyone. Second, people don't commit murder in their sleep.”

“During sleep, we go through various stages,” she starts earnestly. “The most important is REM sleep. That's when we dream. It's an outlet for our anxieties and fears. In this state, your brain is active, but your body can't move. It's like a safety mechanism. It prevents you from acting out. But people who suffer from parasomnia don't reach REM sleep—that's why they can walk or even hurt someone.”

“Look,” he cuts into her explanation. “Somehow the killer knew about Catherine's connection to Father Morgan and this study. That made her a target. We need to find out who had access to this office and these files.”

“I agree, but that doesn't mean that Catherine—” She brings her hand up to her mouth. “Maybe the curse manipulates people in their sleep. It would make sense.”

“To a mental patient, maybe.” Frank says, shaking his head. “Christ, Sam, enough with curses and disgruntled musicians. Catherine is a victim, just like Father Morgan, just like Dr. Clay, just like Phebe.”

“Fine. But if the killer is acting in a parasomniac state, he might not know that he is the killer.” She turns and walks to the file cabinet.

Frank watches her silently. For six months, sleeplessness has been her curse. The thing that has rendered her powerless, like a ship without sail or engine, tossed by waves and sharp winds. Moving only with some unseen current. He wonders if the Goldberg story gives her hope, the ability to blame something other than herself for so many relentlessly sleepless nights. Maybe she needs the fantasy.

Frank's phone rings. He uses an unmarked pad on Dr. Clay's desk to write down two addresses. Samantha turns.

“Well?” she asks.

“Snair has search warrants for Dr. Cooper's and Arty's homes. The police are already inside. We should probably go to Arty's place first. It's closer.”

“All right.”

Frank follows Samantha uneasily through the door and past the officer, certain that each of them is traveling alone.