Now the big guy was standing up for Carl Landry. All in a day's work for the veteran, older officer deYampert, the heart and soul of the NOPD detective bureau.
26
Pure instinct is as rare as musical genius, medical miracles, white tigers, an Einstein or a pure heart.
With the exhumation now a bust, the investigation went grinding slowly forward at the precinct, deYampert and Sincebaugh meticulously going through the caretaker's damnably frustrating records for anything whatsoever that might explain the disappearance of the Surette body. But nothing was surfacing from the moldy, crumbling records, which in effect were eight-by-five cards in shoe boxes. The city sure knew where to spend its money; the computer age hadn't caught on in the cemetery game, at least not in the city cemeteries.
Sincebaugh's telephone rang amid the clutter, and he dove for it, delighted over the disturbance. Ben almost caught the call, but as always Alex was quicker on the draw. “Yeah, Detective Sincebaugh.”
“ I know you're not Dr. Desinor's greatest fan, Alex, but-”
“ Whataya talking about, Captain?” he said.
Landry started again. “I know you don't like Dr. Desinor or what she stands for, Alex, but you also, apparently, don't like to be left out of the loop.”
“ What's going on now, Captain?”
“ Why don't you meet me at Dr. Longette's office this afternoon at two, and don't be late.”
“ I've got these records to comb through, Captain, and last bloody thing I need right now is a shrink in my face.”
“ Not past noon, you don't.”
“ Come again?”
“ The records, they're all gone bye-bye by then. The lawyer Livingston'll be here by then.”
“ So much for that avenue; hell, it's eleven thirty-five now. When the hell do we get to do our jobs, Captain?”
“ We don't have any choice, Alex. So, just be chill-civil, okay?”
Alex smiled at this Landryism. Carl had a way with words. “I'll be my chillin'-civil best, Carl. Now, what's this about Dr. Longette's office? What the hell's deYampert been telling you? Christ, Captain, I really don't have the friggin' time for a shrink, and I sure as hell don't need a shrink, and-”
“ Longette's not going to be looking at you. The shrink's for her!”
“ Her?”
“ Dr. L for Dr. Desinor, yes.”
“ Whataya mean?” Alex was confused. “He's going to examine Kim?”
“ As an aside, without her knowledge, yes, but the main event which she's agreed to-”
“ You've asked her to submit to what, a psychological evaluation? How'd you get her to submit to-”
“ No, no! Will you just listen? She called me, asked if I could suggest a good hypnotist. She wants to be put under.”
“ Under hypnosis…” He recalled her having said something about being hypnotized in order to recall what her own visions had been during her last trance, but he'd assumed she was just talking to hear herself or to impress him. She was full of surprises.
Landry continued to explain. “So she can reveal all that she saw last night at the Marie Dumond murder scene.”
“ Are we still jacketing this guy as Marie Dumond?”
“ It's all the name we have so far, unless you prefer John or Jane Doe. Take your pick.”
“ So Dr. Longette's going to be operating when?”
“ Operating,” Landry repeated with a laugh. “It's called regression therapy. Anyway, Dr. Longette's going to perform the… the surgery at two. Now, do you or don't you want to be on hand?”
He hesitated. Longette was good. Did Kim Desinor know what she was letting herself in for? If anyone could damage her credibility, it was Longette. Maybe now Alex would have an ally for his case against using psychics in police detection, particularly this psychic on this, his case, but at the same time, on an emotional level, he truly didn't want to see Kim hurt. Still, if she were a fraud…
“ Okay, I'll be there. I'll bring Ben, if he wants to be on hand.”
“ Fine… should prove interesting.”
“ Yeah, maybe…”
“ Alex, none of this psychic business was my idea, but I have to admit, the woman puts up one hell of a front. If you recall, it was she who first called into question the identity of the Surette body this morning at Number 27.”
“ So she did and so she does… put up one hell of a front, I mean. But she told me you called her in on the case.”
“ Not hardly; I argued against it. Stephens found her somewhere, rammed her down my throat. 'Fraid I wasn't much more polite with her than you at first. Well, see you at two, Alex.” Landry hung up, and Alex stared across the room while Ben stared back at him with a what-in-hell look on his horse face.
“ She's going to go under regression therapy with Dr. Lon-gette.”
“ Really? The psychoanalysts' answer to Michael Jordan? Talk about hang time…”
Alex only shrugged, knowing Ben was right. Dr. James Aubrey Longette wouldn't be so easily taken in by the cunning and chicanery of a phony psychic.
“ A strange sensation…”
“ What kind of sensation, Kim?”
“… has overtaken my mind…”
“ Yes?”
“… know I'm going to die… that I'm about to be killed… fear… the fear is like an enormous, pounding muscle inside me, exploding up through me.”
“ Fear.” Dr. Longette's whisper was a penetrating knife that dug into Kim Desinor's unconscious mind.
“ Not fear of dying… fear of being forgotten… wrong to die here, like this… as… as Marie Dumond. My family so far away…they don't know about Marie…”
Kim Desinor was perspiring profusely as she spoke in a hypnotically induced trance produced by Dr. James Aubrey Longette; her beautiful features distorted by some pain from deep within, she seemed to speak to the rhythmical hum of Longette's tape recorder alongside the couch where she lay. Longette worked out of two offices, practicing psychiatric medicine for St. Christopher's Episcopal Hospital in the heart of the city and here at NOPD headquarters, moonlighting as a police shrink, doing an in-depth study of police under stress which he hoped to see published in Scientific American or Psychology Today by the end of the year under the title “No More RoboCops.” Beyond his manuscript, he had definite plans for the Oprah TV show and the Montel Williams program, hosted by a person he much admired. From there, he decided, the sky was the limit. But the police work which he'd taken on with a mild interest had become a passion, and he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to completely walk away from it; not that it was glamorous-far from it. But it was gamesmanship, involving every level of the psyche and the emotions; it was Clue, only for real, three-dimensional Clue.
Longette was trained in hypnotism and regression therapy. He moved about the room as he spoke to and responded to Kim Desinor, ever aware that they were being watched by Captain Landry, Alex Sincebaugh and Ben deYampert through a one-way mirror he'd had installed on his arrival here. Longette was something of a showman himself, and for cases involving criminals, or for something like this, he wasn't about to pull the curtain over the portal. Longette was a tall, imposing man-living up to his name. Elegant in his mannerisms, and as handsome as he was black, he brought to mind a darker version of the singer/actor Harry Belafonte. Impeccably dressed, he looked
