The Reality Conspiracy (18 page)

The vehicle slowed down, pulled over, came to rest beside her. The man inside leaned over and unlocked the passenger door.

Lucy pulled the door open. She saw red hair, a crew cut. The man was smiling at her.

Neither spoke as Lucy got in, but somehow she knew the man's name was Herbert Gold, and just like her, he was heading, up to Canada.

Burlington, Vermont

"M
r. Barnes, right this way, please . . ."

Alton felt his face redden as the receptionist led him into Dr. Bradley's office. Looking around, he expected to discover some eccentric-looking wild man with Coke-bottle glasses, wearing a white coat.

Instead, he saw a pretty young woman.

That can't be the doctor
, he said to himself,
she's just a kid. What can a kid tell me about all this crap I'm going through?

She smiled warmly and stood up, extending her right hand. "Mr. Barnes, I'm Karen Bradley."

He wiped his sweaty palm on his green work pants before shaking hands. At least folks around here were polite enough to call him Mister Barnes. Doc Sparker's nurse started calling him "Alton" the first time they'd met. He didn't like that; it wasn't right, it wasn't good manners.

"Please sit down, sir, make yourself comfortable."

Alton felt oddly oversize, awkward as a bear in the presence of this young lady. She was so different from him: youthful, poised, graceful, and highly educated with all her fancy diplomas papering the wall. Rich too, he guessed, like all doctors. Why, she was even good-looking with her long red hair and bright blue eyes. He took a careful step toward the stiff-looking chair in front of the doctor's desk.

Dr. Bradley stepped out from behind her desk, motioning toward a pair of easy chairs next to a wide window that overlooked Lake Champlain. "I think we'd be more comfortable over here."

Alton noticed a vase of cut flowers on the coffee table that separated the two chairs.
Roses
, he could smell them.
Nice
, he thought.

Each took a seat. Alton looked out at the lake; Dr. Bradley looked at Alton.

Immediately he felt beads of perspiration leaving cold trails as they rolled down his sides. Stinging droplets of salty sweat from his forehead seeped into his eyes, irritating them, filling them with tears. She's going to think I'm crying, he thought, brushing the moisture away with the backs of his hands.

"We can open the window, if you like . . . ."

"No. I'm okay. But thanks."

Alton crossed his legs, trying to look comfortable and at ease. The doctor was watching his foot; it was vibrating up and down like a tap dancer's.

"You're a little nervous to be here, aren't you, Mr. Barnes?"

"No, I—" he caught himself before he lied. "Yeah, but it ain't you. miss. I was nervous before I come in."

She smiled sweetly. "And how long have you been feeling this nervousness?"

"How long? I can tell you exactly when it started: last fall, first day of huntin' season. But it's got a lot worse since then."

"Would you say you have always been a nervous person, Mr. Barnes?"

He thought about it, thought of his childhood on the farm, thought of school and of the time he dropped out from the tenth grade. He thought of the army, the war, the torture, the death of his parents, the years in a custodial position at the high school. "No, not always, I guess. I mean, no more'n the next fella."

"But the nervousness has gotten worse lately; is that right? Ever since hunting season you've been getting more nervous?"

"Yeah. It's gettin' so bad I can't sleep at night. Never had that problem before. Used to sleep like a baby. Now I get to feelin' scared, like somebody's watchin' me. I imagine awful things. An' pictures, ugly awful pictures roll around in my head so fast I can't shut 'em off. Then, during the next day I'm tired. No energy. Not worth a good goddamn."

He looked away, down at the carpet. "Excuse me, miss."

"It's all right, Mr. Barnes. Swearing is perfectly all right. Please go on."

He still didn't look her in the eye. "And I'm cranky, too; get mad about nothin'. And whenever I do get a little sleep. I have these dreams, these awful wicked nightmare dreams. I have to fight 'em hard in order to wake up."

"The dreams, do they have anything to do with hunting season?"

Alton was surprised. "Yup. Yup, that's right."

"So maybe we should start at the beginning, don't you think? Why don't you tell me about hunting season. Tell me everything you remember. After that we can talk about what's happening in these dreams of yours."

Alton cleared his throat and settled back in his chair. He took a deep breath and realized he was starting to calm down. Maybe this doctor was just a pretty young gal, but she sure was easy to talk to. Leaning slightly forward in her chair, she seemed truly interested in every word that he said. By God, he was almost ready to level with her, but before he could go on, he had to check something. "You ain't gonna tell nobody about this. That's what Doc Sparker told me. Is that right?"

"Absolutely. Whatever we talk about in this room is private. It's just between you and me, and it's strictly confidential. I won't even give my notes to the secretary to type if you don't want me to."

Alton held her gaze for a minute, searching those deep blue eyes for a suggestion of treachery and finding none. He nodded once, emphatically. "Okay then, that's good." Alton locked his fingers together and rested them on his stomach. He closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, he started talking.

"T
ell you the truth, miss, what I remember 'bout huntin' season's pretty much what I seen in the papers. It was in all of 'em, you know:
Free Press
,
Herald
, all of 'em.

"I'm talkin' about the disappearance of my friend Stuart Dubois. Stu and me, we always went out first day together. First day huntin', first day fishin', didn't matter one bit, we was out there.

"Stu, he's a little bit older'n me. Not much, fifteen, twenty years, mebbe. An' we been friends a good long time. I think of him like an older brother, mabbe even, you know, kinda like a father in some ways. That sound kinda funny, does it? I guess it prob'ly does.

"We was in that stretch of woods up behind Stu's place. An' jes' like always we split up: Stu goes one way, I goes another.

"Pretty quick, after we put some distance between us, I hears Stu yellin' an' cryin' out to high heaven. Sounds like he hurt himself or somethin'. God, but that was a frightful sound. Stu's wailin' away like he's sufferin' wicked and's half scairt out of his wits.

"I go runnin' in that direction when the shoutin' stops. I keeps goin' though. Pretty quick I find Stu's rifle in the snow. That give me a funny feelin', 'cause . . . well, I can't imagine Stu puttin' down a weapon like that, not in the snow. That ain't the way Stu treats a firearm.

"And I see his tracks headin' up this little slope, so I follows him. Then, 'bout eight, ten feet up—goddamnedest thing I ever seen—them tracks jest stop. Jest plain stop, like some big ol' eagle'd swooped down outta the sky and carried Stu off.

"Now, next thing I done—

"You sure all this is off the record? I mean, I ain't gonna lie; I ain't gonna hold nothin' back. That's the promise I made myself when I decided to come here. I figure they ain't no point in holdin' nothin' back. See, the way things been goin' lately, I'll do most anything to put a stop to it. But what I got to say, well, it's gonna sound crazy as hell from here on in, and I know it.

"Okay. Good. I 'preciate it. B'cause, ya see, I never told the police or game warden about them tracks. I brought 'em up to the site and everythin', jest the way I'm supposed to, but by the time we got there, well, the snow had melted off, so there wasn't nothin' to show but wet ground and Stu's rifle.

"And I didn't tell the police what happened next, neither. See, I'm standin' there with Stu's weapon in one hand, mine in the other, and I'm callin' out for him. I'm lookin' around like crazy, an' callin' out for Stuart. An' then . . . then . . .

"Excuse me, ma'am, but this is the tough part. See, I'm lookin' around, but there's no place Stu coulda gone. I mean, cripes, it's a wide-open clearin'! Trees all around, sure, but none close enough to jump to. Didn't have to look up to know nothin's up there. Nothin' but spindly little branches way up overhead. Had to force myself to look up. That's 'cause there's no place else to look. And when I did, it was jest as if the sun was right up above my head. There's this bright white light jest floatin' up there, hangin' in the air up above the treetops. It's weird, too, 'cause you'd expect a light bright as that would be makin' big black shadows on the ground. But it wasn't makin' shadows, and it wasn't makin' noise. But it was there, I swear to God, it was there and I seen it.

"Now here's somethin' else pretty damn strange: that's all I can remember. The light, then nothin'. Ain't that funny? My memory jest stops right there. Don't remember leavin' the woods, don't remember callin' the police or the Fish and Game boys. Everything I seen and done between spottin' that light and when Ted Mavis showed up at my house with his deputy and the game warden is a total and complete blank. It jest ain't there."

When Alton stopped talking, he looked the young doctor right in the eye as if he were defying her to say his story was not true. She didn't pull her eyes away, and her facial features gave no indication that she questioned any of it.

"Look . . . I know how it sounds, miss, but what do you think? You think I might be crazy?"

She leaned forward and put her soft hand on top of his. "No, Mr. Barnes. You're not crazy; we don't even have to think about that or talk about it. Crazy is simply not in the picture." She leaned back in her chair, her eyes never leaving his. "Next we're going to start finding out what actually happened that day in the woods. We'll also talk about all the things that have happened between then and now. We're going to find out what it is you can't remember, and we're going to discover why you can't remember it. Does that sound okay to you?"

"Yes, ma'am, it does. That's what I come here for."

"Good. So how about we get started right now. Can you tell me how your life has changed since that day in the woods?"

"Changed?"

"Yes. You've already explained that you feel more nervous than before, and that you feel you get angry too easily. But what else has changed? For example, do you smoke more than you used to—"

"Don't smoke. Never did."

"—or have you been drinking more alcohol than you used to? Have you sought out other people, or have you avoided them? That kind of thing."

"Well, one thing sure, I'd like to be doin' more for Daisy—that's Stu's wife—but I keep avoidin' her. I guess it's because I got nothin' to say that can comfort her, ya know?"

"Do you think Mrs. Dubois blames you for what happened to her husband?"

"Blames me? Oh no, ma'am; it ain't that. Daisy ain't like that. It's me. I'll plan to go over there, take her grocery shoppin' or somethin', then I'll bury my nose in a book and forget all about everythin'."

"A book . . ."

Alton paused to think about that. "Yeah," he said slowly. "You know, I been readin' an awful lot lately. I can't say if I'm doin' it to forget my troubles or to try to understand 'em."

"That's a very good question, Mr. Barnes. What kinds of things have you been reading?"

Alton ran his hand across his mouth, stalling a little so he could decide whether he should tell her.
What the hell
, he thought,
if she laughs at me now, I'll just get up, walk right out of here, and never come back
. He cleared his throat. "Well, ma'am, it's the kinda readin' I never had much use for before. But now . . . well, it started with them little newspapers, the kind, you know, like at the supermarket checkout. Then I started usin' the library, then I started buying hardcovers at fifteen, twenty bucks a whack."

"What kind of books, Mr. Barnes?"

"They're strange books, ma'am. I been readin' all about ghosts, and flying saucers, and magic. Crazy stuff, you know?"

Montreal, Quebec

I
n the guest room at Hospital Pardieu, Father Sullivan threw a handful of tourist brochures on top of his packed suitcase. He dreaded the two-and-a-half-hour drive back to the United States, though he didn't know exactly why. Perhaps it was because he had to leave everything unchanged.

Permanent Vegetative State
. God, it sounded grim. But, finally, Sullivan had come to accept it. He could do nothing for Father Mosely.

This morning, to lighten his spirits, he and Father LeClair had strolled along Boulevard St. Laurent, once the east-west dividing line of the city's English and French populations. In time the barrier obscured, as a vast cultural melting pot took shape: Italian, Portuguese, Jewish. Polish, and Greek, coming together like many distinct personalities within the same body.

The city is so alive
, Sullivan thought.