The Fregoli Delusion (11 page)

13

Hank’s phone went directly to
voice mail when Karen called. As she left him a message explaining her next
steps, Karen remembered he was attending the Jarrett autopsy. One of Easton’s
firm rules was that everyone attending a procedure in his Little Kingdom must
turn off their electronic devices before approaching The Presence or suffer the
consequences, up to and including permanent banishment. It was one of the very
few times Karen could think of when Hank was not reachable by phone.

Traffic on the main artery from
Midtown to Granger Park was fairly heavy, so she obeyed the posted speed limits
through necessity rather than by choice. It was already two o'clock in the
afternoon, as a result, when she pulled up in front of the big iron gate and
got out to punch the button on the intercom box.

“Parris residence,” a female voice
responded.

“Detective Stainer, GPD. Here to
see Brett Parris.”

“Thank you, Detective Stainer. One
moment please.”

Damned polite, for sure. She
wondered whether or not it was a computer-generated voice. Could an actual
person sound that inhumanly friendly? She stared through the bars of the
wrought-iron gate at the mansion at the end of the long, looping driveway.
Christ, these people lived well. A minute dragged along. She examined the gate
and wondered whether she could shoot her way in if she had to, but it was
obviously electronic and she wasn’t sure where to put her bullet.

“Detective, this is Walter
Parris,” the intercom finally spat. “May I ask the nature of your business with
Brett?”

“Yeah, howdy, Mr. Parris. Just
wanted a quick chat with him. Is he home?”

“He is, but perhaps it's something
I could help you with instead.”

Jesus fucking
Christ
. “Just
a few easy questions, Mr. Parris. Nothing to worry about. Nothing I need a
warrant for, or whatever.” She made an effort to swallow her frustration.
“Look, believe it or not, I'm on his side. I just came from his shrink, Dr.
Caldwell, and she filled me in on stuff. I don't want to upset him, just
confirm a few things.”

One steamboat, two steamboats,
three steamboats—

The gate clicked softly and popped
open. “Please close the gate behind you before you drive up, Detective.”

“Okey doke, Mr. Parris,” she
drawled, hoping it would grate on his nerves. “I'm beholdin' to yuh.”

The front door of the mansion
opened as she walked up the front steps. A woman in a maid's uniform smiled as Karen
stepped into the front hallway. “Mr. Parris is waiting through the first door
on your right, Detective.”

Damned if she wasn't an actual
human being, after all.

Walter Parris gestured her to a
chair. “If you don't mind waiting, Detective, Brett is busy at the moment. It's
a regular appointment, but he should be finished in a few minutes.”

“His APRN? Mona Jensen?”

“Yes. I assume Dr. Caldwell filled
you in on his home care program.”

“She mentioned it.” Karen sat down
and crossed her legs, running a hand over her thigh. Her dark blue jeans were
nearly new and spotless but these people, damn them, made her feel like she
spent all her time pushing a shopping cart piled high with dumpster pickings.
“How’s he been lately? The last few weeks, I mean.”

“I’m not sure how to answer that
question,” Walter replied, not trying to hide his irritation. “He’s
schizophrenic. One of the principles by which schizophrenics live their lives
is that there’ll be ups and downs, and there’s no step-by-step process to
recovery. Tomorrow might be a good day or it might be a bad day. If it’s a good
day, he tries to build on it. If it’s a bad day, he tries to learn something
from it. You say you’re on his side. You could start by not making foolish
assumptions or over-simplifying his condition.”

“I’m not making any assumptions,”
Karen grated, “I’m just asking how he’s been doing lately. Jesus. How about his
ratio of good to bad days over the last two weeks, then? Think you could answer
my question that way? Fifty-fifty? Sixty-forty? Seventy-thirty?”

A noise in the doorway behind
Karen drew Walter’s attention. “All done, Mona?”

Karen stood up and turned around.
Mona Jensen was a middle-aged woman with short, mousy hair, broad, flat
cheekbones, and brown eyes. She was about three inches taller than Karen and
fifty pounds heavier. She wore a white long-sleeved blouse, knee-length navy
skirt, and thick black shoes. Karen thought she looked like a school cafeteria
cook the kids would suspect of serving boiled children for lunch. Karen held
out her hand.

“I’m Detective Karen Stainer, GPD.
You’re Mona Jensen, I take it? Brett’s APRN?”

“Yes, I am.” Jensen shifted a
black briefcase to shake hands with Karen. Her grip was firm, but her voice was
surprisingly gentle and soft. She glanced over Karen’s shoulder at Walter.

“Detective Stainer’s investigating
Mr. Jarrett’s death. She wants to ask Brett more questions, but I really don’t
see—”

“Brett’s a witness in a homicide
investigation,” Karen said to Jensen, cutting Walter off, “and we routinely
have follow-up questions for witnesses as an investigation moves along. Nothing
that should upset him. How’s he doing today?”

Jensen said nothing, looking again
over Karen’s shoulder at Walter.

Karen moved out from between the
two of them. She threw Walter a look, hands on her hips, and said to Jensen, “I
asked a simple question, and all I need is a simple answer. How’s he
feeling
today?”

Jensen’s eyes flicked from Walter
to Karen. “I’m not at liberty to have this kind of conversation with you,
Officer.”

“It’s Detective. Okay? Not
Officer. Detective. Stainer. You’re not at liberty. Sure. No problem. We
covered the disclosure thing with Caldwell, and I talked to her before I came
here. How about we cover that off with you right now and get on to the part
where you cooperate with the police in a murder investigation.”

Jensen looked once more at Walter,
who hesitated.

“Christ almighty, Parris,” Karen snarled,
“if it’s okay with his shrink why in hell wouldn’t it be okay with his nurse?
I’m not going to strap him to a fucking rack and torture him, for chrissakes,
we’re just going to have a little conversation. How about we move this fucking
thing along a bit?”

“I’ll thank you to remember you’re
in my home on my sufferance,” Walter replied. “Belligerence and foul language
certainly won’t help your cause.” He looked at Jensen. “Answer her questions.
Within reason.”

“Only if Brett’s willing,” Jensen
said. “Wouldn’t you think?”

“Let’s go ask him,” Karen said,
heading for the door. “Where’s he at?”

“In his rooms,” Walter said.
“Mona, show her the way.”

Karen and Jensen trudged side by
side up the wide staircase.

“You got this gig on a referral
from Caldwell, correct?”

“Yes.” At the top of the stairs
Jensen gestured to the left. “Down here.”

At the end of the hallway they
stopped at a closed door. Jensen raised a hand to knock.

“Just a second,” Karen said. “I
can do the knocking and talking.”

“I’d like to be present.”

“Sure enough, no problem. Just
don’t try to answer questions for him, understand?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t dream of
it.”

Karen looked at her for a long
moment. Then she rapped sharply on the door with her knuckle.

“Brett? It’s Detective Karen
Stainer, with Mona Jensen. Can we come in and talk for a few minutes?”

Silence. Then a faint voice: “Just
a minute.”

They waited for several moments.

The door opened. Brett Parris
looked out through the crack. “Oh, hello. What are you doing here?” His eyes
were focused on her chest, but Karen didn’t take offense, as she might have
otherwise, because she understood it was an eye contact problem typical of
schizophrenics.

“I came to see how you’re doing,
champ. And I brought something for you to look at, if you don’t mind. Is it
okay if we come in and I ask you a couple of things?”

“Do I have to?”

“No, you don’t have to, of course
not. It’s up to you. I’ve got a couple of pics to show you, though, if you’re
interested. I took them myself with my phone. I want you to tell me what you
think.”

“Okay.” He opened the door and
looked at Jensen. “Are you coming in, too?”

“Yes, if it’s okay, Brett. I was
just about to leave, but the detective thought I might want to tag along, so
here I am again.”

He stepped back and waved them
both in. Karen walked into a small sitting room with two doors on the facing
wall and another door on the right. The furniture was less pretentious than
downstairs, older and more comfortable. There were several framed color
photographs on the walls, including a nice picture of sunflowers, another of a
sewer drain with oil-tinted water flowing into it, and a sunset between office
towers.

“Nice,” she nodded at the
photographs. “Did you take them?”

“Yes.”

“I like them. Good stuff.”

“Thanks.” He pointed at the door
on Karen’s right. “The bathroom’s there, if you need to use it.”

“I’m fine, thanks.”

“Okay.” He stood there awkwardly,
waiting for her to explain what she wanted from him. He was tall and thin. His
wavy brown hair was a little tousled, as though he’d been running a hand
through it. His face was long and bony, his complexion was very pale, and his
forehead was creased in a slight frown. His gold-framed glasses sat halfway
down his thin, pointed nose. He wore a pale yellow shirt under a red sleeveless
sweater, khakis, and moccasins. The sleeves of his shirt were turned up on his
forearms, which were slightly freckled and covered with brown hair.

“I thought this would be your
bedroom,” Karen said, looking around the room. “Do you have a bunch of rooms up
here?”

“Yes.” He pointed at one of the
doors behind him. “That’s my studio. It has the best light in the house.” He
pointed at the other door. “My bedroom’s there. I have a whole little suite
here. Everything except a kitchen, since the kitchen’s downstairs. Obviously.
But she knows that. Something else to say instead.” He glanced toward Jensen.
“Sorry.”

“That’s all right, Brett,” Jensen
said lightly. “Let’s sit down for a minute.”

She lowered herself into a blue
swivel armchair, settling her briefcase against her calf. Brett perched on the
end of the couch closest to her. Karen thought it was probably their usual
seating arrangement. She hoped it wouldn’t affect her ability to steer the
conversation where she needed it to go. Sitting on the couch with Brett was out
of the question, so she chose a chair across from him, on the other side of a
coffee table littered with magazines and photo prints. She sat down, sliding
forward onto the edge of the cushion.

“How are you feeling today, Brett?
Better?”

“I’m good, thanks.”

“That’s great. Terrific. I won’t
keep you. I know we went back and forth yesterday on what happened, and I
really appreciate your help. I know you told us everything you could think of then,
but I just wondered if you might remember something else today, after getting a
good night’s sleep, and all. Did you think of anything else?”

“I thought about it a lot,” Brett
said to his hands, which were clasped tightly in his lap.

“Yeah.” The corners of Karen’s
mouth moved very slightly as she thought of similar conversations with her
mother. At the crime scene yesterday she’d leaned on him very heavily and had
verbally roughed him up, not knowing any better. He’d pissed her off with what
she’d thought at the time was faked dopiness, and she’d been a little slow to
pick up on his condition. After the sidebar with Walter in Hank’s office, she’d
shifted gears and asked her questions differently. He’d been upset, though, and
Walter and their lawyer were very defensive, so the interview hadn’t gotten as
far as she’d wished. She wanted another crack at that brain of his,
dysfunctional and unpredictable as it was, and although she’d never shown her
mother an ounce of patience, she needed to show it now to this guy.

“I’ve thought a lot about it,
too.” She slid back in her chair and crossed her legs, resting her hands
lightly on her knee, then remembered the change in body language would likely
be lost on him, as it was with many schizophrenics. What the hell, Jensen might
pick up on it and be that much less likely to feel over-protective of her
client.

“I wonder if you’d mind describing
to me, one more time, what happened. It might help me figure out a few things.
I imagine you already told Mona about it. She probably said that talking it
through would help you deal with it and learn from it.”

“Yes, that’s right.” He sounded a
little surprised.

“I’m the same way. It’s part of my
job, actually. Talking about something several times is important with a cop
because sometimes small details come out that didn’t come out the first time.
If you describe to me all over again what happened, you might think of
something new. It could help.”