The Sleepless (43 page)

Dr Rice had stopped screaming; but his blood hadn’t stopped pumping out. The carpet beneath his chair was dark and soaking. He was shaking. In fact he was almost jumping up and down in his seat. 

‘Call an ambulance!’ Victor snapped. He yanked off his necktie and bound it around Dr Rice’s left ankle, and knotted it, and pulled it ferociously tight. The flow of blood decreased from a steady, arterial pumping to a slow, thick crimson ooze. Victor dragged off Dr Rice’s flowery silk necktie and tied a tourniquet on his right ankle, too, until that had stopped bleeding. 

Michael said, ‘Ambulance is on its way.’ 

The first young man was already crawling onto his feet. Michael shouted at him, ‘Stay where you are!’ 

‘Are you kidding me?’ the young man retorted, although his voice was thick with concussion. 

‘Just stay where you are, you’re under arrest.’ 

‘Oh ... is that it?’ the young man mocked him. ‘Do I have the right to remain silent? Do I have the right to be represented by an attorney? Do I have the right not to stay here while you hand me out all of that boring flatulent ageist bullshit?’ 

‘You stay where you are,’ Michael warned him. 

Defiantly, the young man went for the door, but Michael immediately stepped across, snatched hold of his arm, and smashed him up the against the wall. 

He was immediately ashamed of himself. He hadn’t needed to act so violently. He may have looked underweight; and he wouldn’t have been any match at all for anybody who was seriously intent on hurting him. But he was fit; and he had a certain hardness; and, apart from that, he was coming to terms with all of those human bodies that had fallen out of the sky over Rocky Woods. He was discovering a sense of courage that was well over and above anything that had been required of him by the Plymouth Insurance Company, if only they had understood it. 

He glanced at Victor and Victor’s eyes were gleaming and Michael knew that he felt the same. They had unofficially appointed themselves the Clean-Up Crew. 

‘Who sent you here?’ Michael demanded, of the first young man. 

‘Nobody ... no one,’ the young man replied. His accent was oddly stilted, a little like Salem or Marblehead or even further north, practically English. 

‘Call the ambulance again,’ said Victor, pressing his hand over Dr Rice’s forehead. ‘He’s going into shock.’ 

‘Hold on,’ Michael warned the first young man. He picked up the phone and punched out 911. He repeated his call for an ambulance. 

‘You want another ambulance?’ 

‘Of course not, for Christ’s sake, just tell the first ambulance to step on it.’ 

‘Sir, believe me, they always do.’ 

Michael put down the phone. As he did so, the first young man said, ‘We’ll have to go now.’ 

‘What?’ Michael retorted. ‘You’re staying here.’ 

‘I’m sorry, we have to go.’ 

‘You’re going to stay and that’s final.’ 

The young man lowered his head and turned his back. For a split second, Michael really believed that he was going to do what he was told. But then he whipped around so fast that Michael didn’t even see him, and struck Michael on the collarbone with something hard and heavy – a paperweight, maybe, or a doorstop, whatever he had managed to scoop up. 

The pain exploded in Michael’s shoulder like a bomb blast. He fell back against Dr Rice’s desk, tried to catch his balance, couldn’t, and dropped onto one knee. The second young man, almost simultaneously, had kick-boxed Victor in the left-hand side of his ribcage. Then both of them ducked out of the office door, and dodged right towards the back of the building. 

Victor screamed, ‘Look after him! Watch his breathing!’ and went after the two young men like a terrier. Michael heard the building’s back door being kicked open, followed immediately by the ringing of an alarm bell. He heard running and shouting. 

Rubbing his bruised shoulder, he climbed to his feet and stood close to Dr Rice. Dr Rice’s eyelids had been flickering in shock, but now he opened them, and stared at Michael in agonized recognition. 

‘The medics are on their way,’ Michael reassured him, taking hold of his hand. 

‘Hope they’re bringing some Crazy Glue,’ whispered Dr Rice. 

‘Don’t worry ... you’ll survive. You may not even lose your feet. It’s fantastic what they can do with microsurgery.’ 

Dr Rice shivered. His nails were very long and dry-ridged, and they dug into Michael’s fingers. ‘They told me that I wouldn’t need feet, where I was going.’ 

‘They were trying to kill you?’ 

‘Of course they were trying to kill me. Just like everyone else who discovers what they’re up to.’ 

‘And what
are
they up to?’ 

Dr Rice gave him a sickly, wavering smile. ‘Believe me, Michael, you don’t want to know.’ 

‘But why did they pick on you?’ 

‘Why do you think? They picked on me because I was the best. They picked on me because I could use my aura.’ 

He winced, and coughed, and for a moment Michael thought that he was going to die, right then and there, right in front of him. 

But after a while he lifted his trembling hand, and wiped his mouth, and said, ‘There are only six or seven of us – as far as I know.’ 

Michael squeezed his hand. He couldn’t bear to look down at his oozing ankles. 

‘Six or seven of what?’ he asked. 

‘Aura-hypnotists. Didn’t you know that? I’m an aura-hypnotist. Something we learned back in the Sixties. Something you can’t understand unless you’ve seen yourself from the outside.’ 

There was a very long silence. Dr Rice lay back in his chair and it was obvious that he was beginning to feel the pain of his amputation for the very first time. He clutched Michael’s hand like a vulture in rigor mortis, and his breathing was shallow and distressed. 

In the distance, they heard the wailing of a siren. 

‘Listen,’ said Michael. ‘They’re on their way.’ 

Dr Rice gripped his hand even tighter. ‘I can’t explain everything – there isn’t time. But take my notebook ... take my Filofax ... desk drawer, top right. And take that book on the shelf next to the Sheeler ... the green one ... ‘ 

The ambulance slithered to a halt outside the office. Michael could see its red lights flashing through the half-closed blinds. 

‘Something else ... ‘ Dr Rice whispered. 

‘It’s all right,’ Michael reassured him. ‘You can tell me later. Let’s just get you into hospital.’ 

‘No, Michael ... there’s something else ... something you have to know ... ‘ 

‘Listen ... forget it. Tell me as soon as you’re well.’ 

But Dr Rice clung to him, and even tried to pull himself up in his chair. ‘The pilot ... ‘ he whispered. 

‘Dr Rice – ‘ 

‘Listen to me!’
Dr Rice interrupted him. ‘The pilot, Frank Coward ... he was one of my patients ... they sent him here for Aura Hypnosis so that I could tell him what to do ... so that Mr Hillary could tell him what to do.’ 

‘I don’t understand,’ said Michael. 

‘Read my diary ... read the books ... then you’ll know.’ 

‘Victor said that Frank Coward could have crashed that helicopter because he was told to, under hypnosis.’ 

‘Well, Victor’s right – whoever Victor is. He’s on the right track, in any case. But listen – ‘ 

At that moment, they heard knocking at the front door, and a paramedic’s voice calling out, ‘Hallo? Anybody there? Paramedics!’ 

‘In here!’ Michael shouted out. 

‘
Please
!’
hissed Dr Rice. ‘
You have to listen
!’ 

‘Bill, this woman’s dead,’ said a voice, in the corridor outside. 

‘
Please
!’
Dr Rice begged, clutching at Michael’s sleeve, the bloody stumps of his ankles thrashing up and down in anxiety. ‘
I’ve done the same to you
!’ 

‘What?’ asked Michael, staring down at him in bewilderment. 

‘I’ve done the same to you. The same as I did to Frank Coward.’ 

‘What do you mean?’ Michael demanded; but Dr Rice didn’t answer. Instead, he groped into his pocket with his free hand, and took something out. Something small, about the size of a quarter, only thicker. He pressed it into Michael’s palm, and then closed his fingers over it. 

At that moment two hefty cropheaded paramedics walked into the office. 

‘Christ,’ said one of them. ‘He’s lost both of his feet.’ 

Michael frantically shook Dr Rice’s arm. ‘What do you mean about Frank Coward?’ he repeated. ‘What do you mean, you’ve done the same to me?’ 

But Dr Rice’s eyelids wavered and drooped, and his head suddenly dropped to one side, his upper lip caught on his canine teeth in the faintest parody of a snarl. 

‘Come on, pal,’ said the paramedic, easing Michael away from him. ‘This guy needs all the expert help he can get.’ 

The second paramedic kneeled on the floor and distastefully picked up Dr Rice’s feet. ‘We’ve got to get these into ice,’ he said. ‘Then we’ve got to get this poor bastard into hospital like five minutes ago.’ 

Michael heard another siren outside; then another; then car doors slamming. The police had been summoned. At the same time, Victor came in through the back door, gasping for breath. ‘Couldn’t catch them,’ he panted. ‘They went around the corner by the Copper Kettle and then they just weren’t there any more.’ 

A heavy-bellied cop in a sharply-pressed uniform stepped into the room, too. He blinked at Victor and then he blinked at Michael and then he blinked at Dr Rice. 

‘God Almighty,’ he said. Then, ‘Good God Almighty.’ 

Thirteen 

He met Artur Rolbein at The Rat, on Commonwealth Avenue, which was a dive he hadn’t visited in years. It had everything a dive should have: a smoky atmosphere, pounding music, sticky floors, cheap drinks, and the mix of people that a Martian anthropologist would have taken back to the red planet in his flying saucer to demonstrate the breadth and depth of human civilization, from rambunctious Boston College beer-swiller to ultra-cool brother to giggling Inuit. 

He was running four hours late. The Hyannis police had interviewed both him and Victor for over two hours each, and had only released them on the condition that they travelled no further than the Hub, and that they were available to return to Hyannis at any time for further questioning. 

Dr Rice had been flown to Boston Central for urgent microsurgery. His feet had been packed in ice and were carried beside him in two aluminum boxes. Fortunately for Michael and Victor, he had given police a description of his assailants and had insisted that neither Michael nor Victor had touched him. ‘They came in ... they saved my life.’ 

Artur Rolbein was wedged tightly into a corner table. He was thin and angular, like an architect’s lamp, and his black dandruffy hair was cut into a wavy bowl. His eyes protruded whenever he swallowed, and he had thick, deep-red lips, as if he were wearing make-up. 

Michael asked him what he wanted to drink and he said, ‘Seven-Up.’ 

‘You’re sure?’ 

‘I can’t touch alcohol. It gives me hives.’ 

Michael ordered a Lowenbrau draught. The stereo system was thumping out ‘Perpetual Dawn – The Long Remix’. He took a deep, cold drink, and then he said, ‘I guess I should have talked to you earlier. Your file on O’Brien was very illuminating.’ 

Artur Rolbein sniffed and shrugged and looked away. ‘Well, as I say, I’m not working on O’Brien any longer.’ 

‘You can’t really believe that it was accidental.’ 

‘I’ll believe what it’s safe to believe.’ 

‘And you don’t think it’s safe to suggest that this was premeditated homicide? That John O’Brien was assassinated?’ 

‘It’s not a word I’d bandy around the office, let’s put it that way.’ 

‘Because of why?’ 

‘Because of certain people who come and go.’ 

‘Oh, yes, and who are they?’ 

Artur Rolbein glanced around the crowded dive with theatrical nervousness, as if he were in a play and had been told to ‘act nervous’. 

‘Joe Garboden can tell you more than me.’ 

‘Joe Garboden’s frightened, too, as far as I can tell.’ 

‘Well, so he should be,’ said Artur Rolbein. ‘I mean, you want to die a horrible death, or what?’ 

‘Artur, this is important,’ Michael insisted. ‘You have to tell me what this is all about.’ 

Artur Rolbein took a deep breath, and then he covered his face with his hand, so that his eyes peered out from between his fingers, like a mask. When he spoke, he spoke very quickly, in a low monotonous gabble, and the thumping of ‘Perpetual Dawn’ made it nearly impossible for Michael to hear what he was saying. 

‘You read my file. I made a percentage allowance for fate ... I mean, that’s what insurance is all about. But the odds against the O’Brien helicopter crashing accidentally at a spot on the shoreline where somebody was waiting to kill them were far too great for even a reasonable underwriter to tolerate. And, let’s face it, there’s no such creature as a reasonable underwriter.