Lori, p.19
Lori, page 19
PRISCILLA FAIRMOUNT
1947-1968
And the voice. The muffled voice rising to her from within the grave-calling her down, down to the darkness below.
But at least it hadn't forgotten. "Happy birthday!" the voice murmured. "And happy deathday too!"
THIRTY-ONE
Rush-hour traffic was a nightmare. But then, everything seemed to be a nightmare, from Russ's Happy birthday to the words uttered by the voice. Her voice, coming from inside her head. Happy deathday. Was that where death was hiding-inside her head?
Lori had to know. Calling Dr. Leverett didn't help because the other voice, the real voice with the clipped Jamaican accent, could only tell her that the doctor was out. "He expects to stop by sometime around six before leaving for home," the receptionist told her. "You might try reaching him then. If you wish to leave a message-" But Lori left no message; this was something that couldn't wait. She couldn't wait, not on her birthday, not on her deathday. If the voice was right, she had only a few hours left. And if the voice was wrong, then she was really going bananas no matter how much they tried to reassure her. You're so knowledgeable about words, so here's a neologism for you. Banana split, meaning schizoid.
And if she did suffer from a multiple-personality disorder, she had to talk to Dr. Leverett before the voice spoke to her again. Or was all this just a continuation of her nightmare?
If so, the man in the Hawaiian shirt seemed to have departed from her dream; there was a bumper-to-bumper procession of cars visible in her rearview mirror after she got onto the freeway, but no grey Honda. If indeed there had ever been one pursuing her.
If. Everything was if now. If she could talk to Leverett, if he could come up with a logical explanation, if she wasn't crazy-and if she could only endure crawling along with this traffic before she did go crazy, then perhaps the nightmare was only a nightmare after all.
One thing was certain: she couldn't wait. And even if she managed to call while he was at the office or received a return call from him later, it wouldn't be enough. It's too easy to be evasive on the telephone, just as Russ had been regarding Ben Rupert and the yearbook. Or had he really intended to tell her when he called from Acapulco? That was another thing she had to discuss with Leverett, face-to-face.
That's why she hoped to arrive at Leverett's office before he did; when he came in she would be ready and waiting. Because she had to know now, and there wasn't time for any more if. When she finally came off the exit ramp of the San Diego freeway, inched along Santa Monica Boulevard, and turned right on Bedford, cars were still pouring out from the parking facilities and she had no problem finding a space on the second level of the structure directly across the street from Dr. Leverett's office.
But after jaywalking through the stoplight-stalled southbound traffic and enjoying the luxury of an otherwise empty elevator, it was then that the problem confronted her.
Dr. Leverett's office door was locked.
Knocking and rattling the doorknob changed nothing. Lori consulted her watch; the time was exactly six-thirty. She hadn't counted on the trip taking her this long. Could Leverett have come and gone already? Why hadn't she had sense enough to leave a message? Because she had no sense, and it was the realization of this that had brought her here. Now she'd have to fight her way back home and put in a call to his answering service. She could phone it from downstairs, but there was no way of giving them a set time after which he could return her call at the apartment.
Nothing is easy. When was the last time she had seen a film or teleplay in which the hero or heroine dialed or got a wrong number? That only happened in real life-along with the hundreds of other petty aggravations, annoying inconveniences, and the climate of general confusion which distinguished it from nightmare, though only to a degree.
All of which wasn't helping her a bit right now. And she needed help, but not from voices over the phone, voices inside her head, voices from inside the grave. Tony, where are you?
She turned, shaking Tier head. Better to rephrase the question. Lori, where are you? Where are you coming from, where are you going, and when are you going to stop acting like some feminist's version of Hamlet!
Now was as good a time as any to begin. And while she was at it, she might just as well learn a little patience when confronting the nuisances which are everyone's daily lot.
It was a good resolution, and she kept it all the way back to the elevators. It was there that she pressed the Down button and got an immediate response: the clang of a signal and the flashing light of an arrow pointing upward.
Story of my life. It never fails. Lori shook her head. But I do.
She was just about to press the Down button again when the upcoming elevator halted. The door slid open and Dr. Leverett stepped forward, smiling as he recognized her.
"Talk about coincidences," he said. "I've been trying to get in touch with you for the past hour. I made three calls on the car phone on the way in."
"In?"
"That's right." Leverett nodded. "Remember what I told you about the Fairmount Clinic being condemned back in '83? I got to thinking about that this morning and decided to double-check. I found out something very interesting. Demolition proceedings were halted pending determination of legal ownership. It's my guess that your late attorney may have been involved in trying to gain possession of the property for himself, but one thing is certain- the building is still standing."
Lori stared at him, frowning. "How do you know?"
"Because I've been there myself, this afternoon."
THIRTY-TWO
Maybe it all began when the cleansing tissues started to go to hell. Once upon a time there were two hundred in a standard box. Then the price went up but tissue-count dropped to a hundred and seventy-five. Next thing you knew, the price went up again, even though some boxes only held a hundred and fifty. As if that wasn't enough, they added insult to injury by making the tissues smaller. And thinner. They probably thought most customers wouldn't notice, but they couldn't put anything over on her. She wasn't born yesterday.
Anyone who saw her could see that much. Trouble was, she couldn't see them. The way things were going, it was getting so that she couldn't tell Phil from Oprah. Not that she watched television much anymore since the cataracts got worse.
There was a lot of talk now about improvements in surgery, lasers and all that, but she wanted no part of it, not with the kind of young whippersnappers who handled operations nowadays. Come to think of it, they didn't even do operations anymore. Procedures, that's what they called them since the fees went up. It wasn't just cleansing tissues that had gotten so expensive. Medicare wouldn't cover everything, not one hundred percent, and it wasn't worth paying out a small fortune just to see those talking toilet seats on television.
Besides, the toilet seats weren't talking loud enough for her these days. She'd switched to radio about the time she got the walker. That was right after her second fall, a year ago. Thank God nothing had been broken, but she wasn't about to take any chances. Better to sit home alone with just radio for company than to go into one of those convalescent warehouses with all the Alzheimers and the other terminals. Most of the staff in these snake pits were terminals too; those bedpan-handlers wouldn't know a real nurse if one came up and goosed them with a rectal thermometer.
No, that wasn't the answer. Not for Clara Hopkins, R.N.
So once a week welfare sent over a volunteer to do a little cleaning and run some wash-and-wear through the washer-dryer, along with a few towels and linens. Clara always had a shopping list made out, and the nearest Ralph's was only two blocks away, so the volunteer could be in and out of there while the wash cycle was still making funny noises. Lately, Clara couldn't hear those noises all that distinctly, but what she got from the radio was more than enough to help pass the hours away.
And sometimes it was nice just to sit quietly and think. Think about how many days it had been since the last shopping list had been filled, which items were still left on the pantry shelves, and what ones she might select to assemble a dinner menu. It was ironic in a way, not having a wide variety to choose from. During all those years when she was a practicing R.N., Clara seldom had enough time to do a decent job of cooking. Now she had the time but not the money.
That's why she liked to plan her meals in advance. Even though she was past the stage where she could read cookbooks, She could still improvise, make do with what she had and come up with something that would lend a little variety, at least to her evening meal. Of course it would be nice to have someone to talk to over the dinner table, but there are worse things in the world than being alone.
At least that's what she tried to tell herself now, sitting here in the parlor and waiting for the cat to come scratching at the front-door screen. He'd showed up out of nowhere about ten days ago, and she made her first mistake by feeding him. After that he became a nightly visitor. He always came back at sundown, or almost always, and Clara had to strain to hear the scratching, just as she had to strain to focus on the shadowy outline of his body and the grey question mark of his tail. But at least he was some company for dinner, and long after she had decided what to prepare, the radio remained silent until she could detect her guest's arrival.
Now that she thought of it, it was strange that she hadn't decided what to name this stray after he adopted her. On the other hand, it didn't really matter. As the old saying goes, all cats look alike in the dark. Of course they were talking about sex partners, not dinner partners, but it came down to pretty much the same thing in the end. Maybe there was something wrong with her endocrine balance,. but Clara had never been all that steamed up about her sex life or the lack of it. Way back in the days when she was a student nurse there was always some intern or other who tried to drag her into a broom closet for a quickie, but she would have much preferred being dragged to a fast-food restaurant instead. Or even before. Right then and there she'd decided that all interns look alike in a broom closet, and to hell with it.
So for a long time, even before she turned into a basket case, there had been no man in her life; the only man who came to dinner was a cat without a name.
That's why it was such a shock now to hear the doorbell. The sound was faint, because both the doorbell and her ears needed repair, but it startled her. Cats don't use doorbells. "Anybody home?"
A man's voice. Door-to-door salesmen seldom came around, not in a run-down neighborhood like this. Once in a while there was a Jehovah's Witness or a Holy Roller, but not very often. Whoever it was, she hoped he wouldn't do anything to hold her up from fixing dinner.
"I'm coming," she said, pulling the walker closer and holding it steady as she rose.
Moving across the parlor to the front door, she squinted through the screen at the figure beyond. Tall man, which wasn't all that unusual nowadays. Wearing a jacket, which was.
"Miss Hopkins?"
A young man probably; at least he sounded that way. It almost seemed to her she'd heard that voice before, perhaps on some radio talk show.
"Yes."
"Miss Clara Hopkins?"
"That's right."
"Pleased to meet you. My name's Russ Carter." She was still trying to place him. "You from a radio station?"
"No, but you're close. I'm an investigative reporter-"
"I see." But she didn't see; in fact, she didn't even hear the name of the magazine when he gave it to her. "Speak up, young man," she said. "I'm a little hard of hearing."
"Sorry."
"So am I."
Russ Carter seemed to hesitate before he spoke again. "Mind if I come in for a moment?"
She most certainly did mind. Even without her problems, just living alone in a crummy neighborhood like this was enough reason not to invite strangers into the house. But of course she didn't want to let him know that. Instead she said, "Suppose you tell me what this is all about?"
"Of course." He nodded at her from behind the screen door which separated them. "I happened to run across some information lately, and my editor wants me to do a story on it."
A hype, that's what it was. Just a hype to get into the house. He'd have to do a lot better than that. She might be a senior citizen, but she wasn't a senile one. "What kind of a story?"
"It's about a man who used to be your employer. A Dr. Royal S. Fairmount."
"Roy!" Clara blurted out the name before she could stop.
Beyond the screen, young Mr. Carter nodded again. "You did work for him, then?"
Clara gripped the arms of her walker tightly. "How'd you find me? Where did you get my name?"
"From the listing in a nurses' registry-an old one. Of course I already knew about the clinic-"
Which meant he must know other things too. Clara reached out, fumbling at the latch of the screen door. "Come in," she said.
He entered and she latched the door again behind him. "Thanks," he said. "I'll try not to keep you too long. Just a few questions I thought you might be able to help me with. I'd particularly like to know about an incident involving the Fairmount Clinic-"
"Not here." Turning, Clara moved forward as quickly as the walker permitted and the brown-haired, mustached man followed her. "Why don't you sit over there in the corner where you'll be comfortable?"
It was really her comfort she was thinking about, not his. She didn't want to close the front door in case the cat came scratching at the screen, but she didn't want the neighbors or anyone passing by outside to hear what this Russ Carter had to say. And whatever he might have in mind, he was going to be doing most of the saying; she'd already decided that.
He crossed the room, then stood waiting beside the sofa until she lowered herself into the chair opposite it. As Carter sat down he glanced toward the lamp in the corner. "Want some more light?"
She shook her head. "I don't need it. Hurts my eyes when it's too bright. Photosensitivity."
When he leaned back, his face was in shadow but she thought she detected a smile beneath the mustache. "Once a nurse, always a nurse," he said.
"That was a long time ago. I retired back in '82."
"And moved here." He nodded. "But at the time I'm interested in, you were living at the Fairmount Clinic."
"In 1967."
"And '68." Carter leaned forward. "Along with Dr. Chase and Dr. Fairmount himself."
"Not all that year," Clara corrected him. "Dr. Fairmount died early in April."
"But according to what I've learned, the clinic remained open until sometime around the end of the year."
Clara shook her head. "I wouldn't know about that."
Apparently she sounded convincing, because he let it pass. "What about Dr. Chase?"
"I wouldn't know about him, either."
"Then I take it you haven't had any contact with him since?" he said. At least that's what she thought he said; it was difficult to hear him clearly, difficult to see him clearly as the shadows gathered in this corner of the room. Not that she really wanted to see or hear him, particularly when he was asking questions like these.
Her safest bet was to nod, but that didn't stop him.
"What I'm really getting at is do you happen to know where I can reach Dr. Chase now?"
"I haven't seen hide nor hair of him in over twenty years."
"You have no idea where he went or what became of him after the clinic closed?"
"None whatsoever." Clara paused for a moment, then
delivered the rest of the message. "I don't want to talk about it any more."
"All right. Suppose we get on to other things. The way I understand it Dr. Fairmount was a widower?"
"Yes, for many years. His wife died in childbirth, and he never remarried."
"He had a daughter, didn't he?"
Again Clara felt safer with a nod.
"Do you happen to remember her name?"
This time a nod wouldn't help and shaking her head wouldn't be enough. "No, I'm afraid I don't."
"Could it have been Priscilla?"
Meaning he knew it all along. Cat and mouse, that was the game she'd have to play now. The trick was to tell him just enough so that he'd ask more questions-questions which would show her just exactly what he knew. Might as well start the game right now. Her move.
"That's it," she said. "Her name was Priscilla. The ' reason I didn't remember is that I didn't see very much of her. Most of the time I worked at the clinic she was away at school."
"Bryant College."
As Carter answered, she realized that he wasn't even looking at any notes. There was no telling how much more he'd already learned-but she had to get him to tell, that was the whole point of the game. Which meant taking risks. Risks like telling the truth, or at least a part of the truth.
"Now that I come to think about it, I did see a little mor eof her after she dropped out of school."
"That was late winter or early spring of '68, wasn't it?"
"Sometime around there. Hard to remember. It's been so long."
"What was Priscilla like?"
Clara chose her words carefully. "Bright. But undisciplined. Her father spoiled her rotten."
Russ Carter leaned forward. "What happened to her after Dr. Fairmount died?"
"I don't know."
"I think you do."
Of course she did, but she wasn't going to tell him. He already knew too much. The cat-and-mouse game worked, but she was losing. "Why do you keep asking all these questions? I told you I don't want to talk about it."
"There's no need to be afraid, not after all this time. The statute of limitations ran out long ago."
"I'm not afraid," she told him. "It's just that I don't remember."
But she did.
THIRTY-THREE
Clara remembered everything; how could she possibly forget the clinic after what happened there? It started with Priscilla, of course. It had seemed like an ideal job at first; the pay was good, and living-in gave her more free time, time she didn't have to waste driving to and from work. Dr. Fairmount had this little guesthouse above the garage in back, just two rooms, furnished, but that's all she needed. And once she came off duty neither he nor Dr. Chase disturbed her except in case of emergency. Both of them were easy to work with, not like the staff surgeons she generally ran into at the big hospitals. She got along well with the part-timers who handled the other shifts; they came and went, of course, so there was never much chance of really getting to know them. She was the only R.N., and as long as they followed instructions that was enough for her. There was some outpatient surgery, mostly under locals, so there was no problem making do with trainees. Most of the patients came for diagnosis or consultation, and there wasn't anywhere near as much of that damned paperwork that Medicare or private insurance companies dump on you nowadays.
