Night Visions (8 page)

F
rank drives Sam to the sleep clinic, grateful that she is talking of inconsequential paperwork and neglected e-mail. Of anything but her sleeplessness and the anxiety it's causing her, which only gets worse as she talks about it. He always knew her to be a champion sleeper. No car alarm or barking dog could wake her in the middle of the night. She slept through movies, books, classes, long phone conversations. She even dozed off once while kissing him. Once—after an eighteen-hour trip to Versailles without sleep. For Sam, sleep had been like oxygen, easy to come by. Eight to ten hours a day. What changed? Was the past that she had worked so hard to block out catching up with her? Was he to blame for moving?

No. She abandoned him. He might have moved, but she withdrew her heart. His moving just made it easier.

His first night in D.C. was spent on a cold hardwood floor wrapped in a sleeping bag with a broken zipper. His friend's studio apartment near Dupont Circle had a futon couch, an enormous television, and a broken floor lamp from Target. Three
bottles of Rolling Rock and a half-empty container of Grey Poupon were in the fridge.

He listened to the sounds around him for a long time before falling asleep. Rain tapping lightly against the window. His friend snoring like a congested old man. Then a dream woke him.

A dream that his heart looked like the surface of the moon.

They arrive at the clinic, and Sam introduces him to Dr. Clay. They decided in the car that Frank would tell him about Phebe's murder, but he hesitates at the sight of Clay's tired, sagging eyes. The long white coat accentuates his bony frame, and his gray-brown hair, more gray than brown, is disheveled.

They stand, facing each other. A triangle of silence.

“I'm sorry to have to tell you this…,” Frank begins, but he isn't fully conscious of the words, just that Dr. Clay recoils as if slapped in the face. His mouth slightly open, his eyes blinking steadily.

Frank asks some questions, but can tell from his answers that Dr. Clay didn't really know Phebe. Does he know Sam any better? Probably not. Frank wonders if this detachment helps him do his job.

A nurse enters the room to prep Samantha. Dr. Clay nods.

“If we're going to keep on schedule,” he says halfheartedly, “you need to get ready.” He turns to Frank. “Can you give us a minute?”

“Actually, I'll just come back tomorrow. Thanks.” He looks at Sam and adds, “Good night.”

She smiles sadly, and Frank wonders if she is thinking of Phebe, the long night ahead, or him.

 

Frank drives away from the clinic, passing familiar streets and turning into the shadows of windy neighborhoods. He is just driving now. Not wanting to stop or slow down. The night air is cold, but he keeps the window down, listening to the rush of fast-moving air and the clamor of city noises.

He turns another corner quickly and sees Saint Peter's Church, where he found Samantha just a few days ago. He has not driven here consciously, but he is not entirely surprised either. He considers going inside. The car engine hums as he looks at the church's looming spires and Brobdingnagian oak doors. He hasn't been inside a church in almost fifteen years, he thinks.

After Susanna died, he had no need for churches.

 

Strangled by a necktie and old pants that had been fitted to a younger waistline, Frank's father looked as uncomfortable as he must have felt. It was already about eighty degrees at eleven-thirty in the morning, when the service began at the chapel of Holy Cross Cemetery.

The green, well-manicured hills of the cemetery rose up for miles, and in every direction Frank could see thousands of homes surrounded by high-rises and billboards and telephone wires. The sprawl of a city named for angels. The cloudless sky offered no relief from the heat. Only a slight breeze cooled the sweat on his forehead. Frank remembers smiling and greeting cousins he hardly knew, uncles and aunts he had forgotten, and some of Susanna's friends, most of whom he had never met. The organist played Gershwin's “Summertime,” and the chords sounded flat as they drifted into the dry, dusty air.

When the chapel was finally ready, men and women from the mortuary orchestrated the service like ushers at a concert. They handed out programs and carnations, escorting each customer to a seat with steady arms and gentle voices. Men and women dressed in suits. Smiling. Reassuring. Death was their job.

The organ continued groaning wistfully about summertime as the pews filled.

Everyone had agreed on Gershwin. It was the easiest decision of the day.

 

When Frank was eight, his father had taken him and Susanna to the tide pools just north of Malibu Beach. He drove with Susanna next to him in the front seat, Frank sitting beside her. As they got closer to the coast, Frank stuck his head out of the window like a puppy and let the stinging-cool air redden his cheeks. He tasted the salt in the wind. The last act of Gershwin's
Porgy and Bess
started playing on the radio as they pulled off the highway. Their father wanted them to listen carefully, so they were quiet for the rest of the drive, even Susanna.

Stepping on the slick, uneven rocks, they looked into the clear water of the tide pools. Susanna held Frank's hand as the waves rushed in. The white foam disappeared, and they watched the sea anemones, crabs, and purple starfish until the breaking white waters covered them again.

Father waited in the car until the opera ended.

 

The doctors had diagnosed Susanna's tumor as malignant almost five years ago. They removed her left breast, and for a while she lost most of her hair. The hair would grow back.

Unlike Samson, her boyfriend at the time, Frank didn't blame God. Samson took his name's biblical origins seriously and never cut his hair above shoulder length. But that didn't matter. According to Susanna, he once tried lifting weights in the gym where they met, but his grasshopper-thin arms could hardly raise the bar above his chest. When Susanna died, he felt that God had betrayed him, that he hadn't given Samson enough strength to protect her.

No one was that strong.

Samson sat next to Frank during the service. His hands rested heavily in his lap. Like Frank, he was weeping.

 

Now Frank places both hands on the steering wheel. Avoiding the stare of Saint Peter, whose white marble body stands in the
courtyard, watching all those who enter, Frank looks one last time at the architecture, then notices a homeless man sitting in a dark corner of the entryway. He pulls something around his shoulders, a blanket or sleeping bag, Frank assumes, for warmth.

Empty churches are cold, lonely places, he thinks, and once again the night air rushes into the car and against his face.

MONDAY

S
he wakes abruptly, wondering if she has slept at all.

“Almost seven hours,” Dr. Clay tells her. He seems pleased, but his manner has changed. He looks like someone burdened by a secret he can't tell. She wonders if he'll say something about Phebe. Will he lose sleep because of what happened? Perhaps there are nights when no one should sleep, she thinks. When one should think about loss in order not to forget it. Samantha feels guilty for sleeping soundly after Phebe's death.

She says good-bye quickly and leaves the building.

 

Samantha's cubicle in the Oakland Legal Clinic is not impressive. She hasn't decorated it with pictures of family and friends. She hasn't cut out cartoons from newspapers and taped them to the corners of her computer screen. As a staff attorney, she thinks she should have a private office—to interview clients, to concentrate on her casework. So she protests in silence by not
getting too comfortable. It doesn't change anything, but it makes her feel better.

She is behind from taking Friday off but feels somewhat better after sleeping through the night without visions. Seventeen pending case files are stacked ominously in piles across the desk. She should start by reviewing and summarizing medical records for three clients in need of disability benefits. She also has several estate documents to prepare. But every time she opens a file, she sees Phebe.

The phone rings.

“Hey, babe, how y' doin'?”

“Don!” She is relieved it's not a client. “How are things?”

“Good. Just giving my grad students hell. You know, the usual.”

“I'm sure they love you.”

“Well, I wouldn't say that, but I'm perfectly happy living in denial. Anyway, I found some interesting material on that piece you asked me about—the
Goldberg Variations.
”

“Yeah?”

“Supposedly, a man named Count Keyserlingk commissioned it from Bach in the early 1740s. He was an insomniac who wanted a musical soporific. So Bach wrote this piece—a theme and variations—and the count had his musician-in-service, Johann Goldberg, play it for him at all hours of the night.” He pauses for a moment, then adds: “And I thought getting tenure sucked.”

“Insomnia,” she echoes.

“Yep.”

“Did it work?”

“Did it work?” he says, surprised by the question. “I don't know. It's a pretty long piece; maybe it bored him to sleep.” He laughs.

“I mean, is there any record of the count's response to it?”

“Not that I know of, but I only did a preliminary search.”

“Can you find out if there is more to the story?”

“Sure, I can talk to a few people, check a few sources—”

“That would be great, Don. I'd really appreciate it.”

He pauses, then asks, “So when are you going to let me in on the secret? You said this has to do with a case you're working on. How so?”

She sighs. “Where to start…”

“How about ‘Once upon a time'?”

“All right….”

 

For the next two hours, Samantha works halfheartedly on three cases and watches the phone, once again waiting for Frank to call. She begins a will for one of her HIV clients, but now Catherine's face looks back at her from the computer screen. Samantha's head starts to pound. She turns away from the screen, closing her eyes for a moment, then decides to step outside.

A mist has settled over the parking lot, and a cold wind pinches her cheeks. Samantha won't be able to stay long without her jacket, which she left dangling on the kitchen chair in a rush to leave for work. She lingers, hoping the cool air will ease her headache.
Is this a side effect of the treatment?
she wonders.

A sudden pain pierces her ears and temples, as if she were descending too fast in a plane with poor cabin pressure. Everything becomes white.

 

Two red eyes glow in the darkness. No, they are not eyes, she thinks, but doors. Crimson doors. She walks toward them slowly, then climbs a few steps leading to an enclosed porch. Something is waiting in the corner. She can hear it breathing.

The figure steps toward her.

She lifts her arm instinctively, as if a gesture might stop him, and she sees a knife in her own hand.

He takes another step.

She doesn't wait for him to get any closer before lunging at him with the blade.

 

“Sam? Samantha!” The legal clinic's director crouches above her with one knee on the ground. She places her right hand on Samantha's cheek. “What happened?”

“I must have fainted….” She blinks several times.

Julie looks doubtful as she helps Samantha stand. Julie's usual composure and professionalism have been replaced by fear. Helplessness. Thick and powerful, Julie can usually handle board meetings, conference calls, belligerent clients, and disgruntled lawyers. But seeing a friend lying unconscious on the ground rattles her.

“Maybe you should see a doctor. Let me drive you.”

“No, really. I'm all right.”

“Your cases can wait. I'm taking you to a doctor, for Christ's sake.” The assertiveness returns. She takes hold of Samantha's left arm.

“Let me come inside and sit down for a bit. Okay?”

“All right.” She nods and opens the door.

“Thanks, Julie.”

Samantha isn't sure if she is dizzy from the fainting spell or just furious with Dr. Clay for putting her in such danger. She could have been driving, she thinks. Or crossing the street. Skydiving. Taking a shower. There are always stories in the news about people who die from slipping in the shower.

She sits in her cubicle and rubs the back of her neck with both hands. Julie walks by a second time. The phone rings. It takes Samantha a few moments to realize that it's Olivia from the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.

“I'm sorry. What were you saying?”

“Jeez, you're out of it today. Did you hit your head or something?” Olivia laughs.

“In a manner of speaking. What's up?”

“I checked with the volunteer office like you asked. The foundation trained eight new people two weeks ago.”

A pause. “How many women?”

“Um…” She rustles through some papers audibly. “One—Isabella Harris.” She pauses. “Huh, this is strange.”

“What?”

“There's a lot of information missing from her application. She hasn't listed any previous employment or experience. Nothing about her educational background. No one to contact in case of an emergency—”

“What about an address?”

“Yeah, but no phone number.”

“Can I get that from you?”

“Her address? You know I can't—”

“Olivia, I
really
need it.”

She is silent, and Samantha can hear her desk chair squeak from leaning back.

“I'm asking for a favor.”

“How about dinner and drinks one night next week?”

Olivia has been asking her out since the day they met two years ago.

“Sure, anything. Just give me the address.”

“Be careful now. I just might take you at your word.”

 

Samantha knocks on Julie's office door, then turns the knob and steps inside. The desk is immaculate, compulsively organized with color-coded stacks of papers and lethally sharpened pencils.

“I'm not feeling so great after all.”

“I'll take you to the hospital, then.” Julie pushes back from the desk and starts to get up.

“No, that's okay. I already have someone coming to pick me up.”

“Who?”

Samantha hesitates. “Frank.”

“Frank?” Julie grimaces.

Samantha hadn't told her that she was talking to Frank again, and she can see the shock in Julie's face. Julie had watched them steal kisses in darkened movie theaters and hold hands under restaurant tables. She had also watched Sam walk around like a ghost after he left. So she'd done what any friend would do. She'd learned to hate him.

“Are you sure?” Julie says with surprising calm and restraint. “I really don't mind taking you.”

“Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks, though.” She drops her eyes, staring at nothing in particular, then smiles uncomfortably. “I'll call you later today.”

“Okay,” Julie says with a smirk. “Just don't fuck him.”

“
Julie!
”

 

Samantha is waiting in the parking lot when Frank pulls up.

“So what's this emergency you couldn't tell me about over the phone?” he asks as she gets into the passenger seat.

“What took you so long?”

“I was waiting for those dental records when you called.” He reaches for a manila envelope in the backseat and hands it to her. “We have a match—Father Morgan.”

She thinks about the tooth she found at the crime scene and shudders. Holding the clear plastic X-ray up in her right hand, she's not sure what she is supposed to see. The black-and-white outline of teeth, some bright with fillings. It crackles with each
bend, like twigs in a fireplace. “What happens now?” she asks quickly.

“I'm catching a flight later to Salt Lake. I'll talk to some of Morgan's friends, then stop at the restaurant where Catherine had dinner. Maybe one of the waiters will remember seeing them there. So what's going on with you?”

“I talked with Don today, and you're not going to believe this. The Bach piece we found at both crime scenes was written as a kind of soporific.”

Frank is silent, and she adds, “To cause sleep.”

“I know what
soporific
means.”

“Phebe was an insomniac. What if Father Morgan was too?”

“I don't think it really matters.”

“Why not?”

“We found Catherine's fingerprint on that CD.”

“That doesn't make her a killer.” She hears an almost defensive quality in her voice and realizes that Frank doesn't understand the frustration, the anger that comes with not being able to sleep.

“It puts her at two crime scenes.” Frank adjusts his seat, uncomfortable with the steering wheel pressed so close to him. “Has it occurred to you that she may be guilty? That she may have killed Father Morgan and Phebe?”

“A fingerprint isn't a hell of a lot of evidence, and it sure doesn't explain how a thin, five-foot-six girl from North Carolina managed to string up two people.”

“She may not be acting alone,” Frank says evenly.

She considers his words but thinks,
No, she
is
alone—tired, scared, haunted by nightmares, and desperate for help. Like me. Like me.
She hands Frank a piece of torn paper.

“Who's ‘Isabella Harris'?”

“I think she might be Catherine.”

“
What?
” he asks.

“Olivia just called and told me about this woman who started volunteering at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation two weeks ago. Her application is filled with gaps—no information about her background, no family or friends mentioned, only an address.”

“That doesn't make her Catherine.”

“No. It just makes her our best lead.”

 

In the thick fog, the flashing red lights of Coit Tower look like muted stars. The chill seems to seep through the windshield as they drive slowly up Aquavista Way. Samantha strains to see each number: 1534, 1536, 1536½, 1538, 1540. A gray cat, its fur matted from the moist air, darts across the street and scurries alongside a duplex with peeling beige paint.

“That's it.”

Frank pulls into the driveway and turns off the engine. The windshield wipers stop diagonally across the glass, and Samantha can see her reflection cut in half by the blade. He reaches into the backseat for his satchel and pulls it into his lap. He takes out a holstered gun.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“I'm licensed to carry a firearm.” He doesn't look at her as he closes the bag and removes the keys from the ignition.

“Don't give me that crap. I'm not going up there if you're bringing a gun.”

“Fine. Stay in the car.” He gets out and shuts the door quickly.

Samantha watches him pull back part of his thin black leather jacket and fasten the holster to his belt.

She is behind him now, stepping cautiously on the stone path that leads to the front door. It is lined with cracks that look like creases on an open palm. The prolonged rain and lack of sun have made several stones slippery with moss, and the thick bushes appear stiff and lifeless. A black mailbox underneath the doorbell reads “1542.”

“It must be around back,” he says.

She follows Frank along the side of the house. Olive trees line the dirt path, and the saturated leaves brush against her face and hair as she pushes past the branches. They walk the length of the house before reaching a small patio with dirty white plastic chairs, a rusty barbecue, and a small bowl filled with cat food. Everything appears old and unused: carelessly scattered garden tools, a bicycle with no seat and two flat tires leaning precariously against the fence, an orange road sign lying on top of three black plastic garbage bags. Samantha reads it aloud as they climb the steps to the back door—“Dangerous Crossing.”

Frank takes out his gun and signals her to be quiet. Samantha worries that her pounding heart will give them away until Frank knocks with the back of his fist. The number 1542½ has been painted carelessly on a brass slot in the door, and the uncollected mail sticks out through an opening at the base of the jamb.

“Hello? Is anyone home?” He tries the handle, and the door swings open quickly and easily. “Isabella?”

A sudden hiss. Samantha freezes. Frank pivots toward the sound.

Nothing at first, as their eyes adjust to the darkness. Then, movement in the corner behind them. The gray cat with matted hair and yellow eyes cowers, then darts away.