The Madman's Tale (80 page)

Francis repeated over and over, “I’m okay, I’m okay, help him,” although he was not altogether certain that he
was
okay, but it was the only thought that penetrated his exhaustion and relief. Big Black took everything in with a single immense glance, and seemed to understand what had taken place there that night, and he bent over Peter’s form, pulling back the tatters of the Fireman’s shirt, revealing the extent of his wound. Little Black pushed to Francis’s side, and quickly, expertly, did more or less the same, examining him for injury, despite Francis’s headshaking and protests.

“Hold still, C-Bird,” Little Black said. “I need to make sure you’re okay.” Then, he whispered something else, as he nodded his head toward the Angel’s body, “I think you done good work here tonight, C-Bird. No matter what anyone else says.”

Then he seemed satisfied that Francis wasn’t badly wounded, and he turned to help his brother.

“How bad is it?” Gulp-a-pill demanded, leaning over the two attendants, staring down at Peter.

“Bad enough,” Big Black answered. “He needs to get to the hospital right now.”

“Can we carry him upstairs?” Doctor Gulptilil asked.

Big Black didn’t reply. He merely reached down, and with two massive arms cradling beneath Peter’s limp form, he lifted the Fireman from the cold floor and with a heave and a grunt, carried him up the stairs to the power plant’s main area, like a groom carrying his bride over the threshold. He walked slowly, steadily to the front door, then gently knelt down just inside and lowered Peter’s body. “We need to get the Fireman help right away,” he said, turning to Doctor Gulptilil.

“I understand that,” the medical director was saying. He had already seized an old black rotary dial telephone from a desktop, and was dialing a number. “Security?” he said briskly, when the line was connected. “This is Doctor Gulptilil. I need another ambulance, yes, that’s correct, another ambulance, and I need it immediately at the power plant. Yes, this is a matter of life and death. Please make that call instantly, if not sooner.”

Then he hung up the telephone.

Francis had trailed after Big Black, and was standing next to Little Black,
who was speaking to Peter, urging him over and over to hang on, that help was coming, reminding him that this wouldn’t be the right night to die, not after all that had taken place, and what had been accomplished. His steady, reassuring tone brought a smile to Peter’s face, which managed to reach past all the gathered hurt and shock he felt, and the sensation of his life dripping from his side. He didn’t say any words, however. Big Black cradled Peter’s head, and then took off his white attendant’s jacket, folded it up and began to apply it to the gash in Peter’s side. “Help is on the way, Peter,” Doctor Gulptilil said, bending toward the Fireman, but whether the wounded man heard this or not, neither he, nor any of the others could tell.

Doctor Gulptilil took a deep breath, surveyed their solitude, and then started to calculate fiercely in his head, trying to assess the damage that had been done that night. That it was a mess, the medical director understood, was a minimalist’s statement of the events that had transpired. All he could see was a dizzying array of reports, inquiries, harsh questions with perhaps some very difficult answers, all awaiting him. He had an out of control prosecutor on her way to the local hospital with terrible wounds that no emergency room doctor was going to remain silent about, which meant policemen at his door within hours. He was staring down at a patient of significant notoriety and of substantial interest to many people, bleeding on the floor, clinging to life mere hours before he was supposed to be shipped off to another state in secret. And then he had a third patient very dead, and just as clearly killed by this notorious patient and his schizophrenic companion.

He had recognized that third patient, and he knew that a hospital file existed with his own handwriting on the jacket that stated unequivocally: Severe Retardation. Catatonic. Prognosis Guarded. Long Term Care required.

He knew also there was a notation that the dead man had been released for several weekend furloughs in the custody of an elderly mother and aunt.

The more he thought, the more he realized that his career hung in the balance of what he decided to do in the next few moments. For the second time that night, he heard a distant noise of sirens, which added urgency to his thinking.

Doctor Gulptilil breathed in sharply. He looked down at Peter and said, “You will live, Mister Fireman.” He said this not knowing whether it was true or not, but knowing how important it was. Then he looked up at the Moses brothers. “We need for this night not to have happened,” he said stiffly.

The two attendants quickly glanced at each other, then nodded.

“Going to be hard to make people not notice some,” Little Black said.

“Then we need to make them notice as little as possible.”

Little Black bent his head toward the basement, where the Angel’s body remained behind. “That body’s going to make things tricky,” he said. He was
speaking quietly, as if guarding his words carefully, understanding that this was a moment of some importance. “That man back there, he was a killer.”

Doctor Gulptilil shook his head, speaking a little like he might to a grade school class, emphasizing some words. “There’s no real
evidence
to support that. All we know for certain is that he tried to assault Miss Jones earlier tonight. For what reason, we have no idea. And, more critically, what he has done on some other occasions, in other locations, well, that remains a mystery. It has no connection to us, here tonight. Unfortunately, what is not a mystery is that this patient was pursued and then was murdered himself by these two patients. Now, they may have been justified in what they did …”

He hesitated, as if waiting for Little Black to complete his sentence. This, the smaller brother did not do, and so Doctor Gulptilil was forced to finish it himself.

“… But perhaps they were not. Regardless, there will be arrests. Headlines in the newspapers. Perhaps an official inquiry. Certainly a state inquest is a strong likelihood. Criminal charges are a possibility. Nothing is likely to be the same for some time …”

Doctor Gulptilil paused, watching the expressions on the two brothers’ faces. “And perhaps,” he added quietly, “it might not be merely Mister Petrel and the Fireman who conceivably would face charges. The people who helped allow this disastrous night to take place, they, too, might find their jobs in jeopardy …”

Again, he waited, carefully measuring the impact of what he said on the two attendants.

“We didn’t do anything wrong,” Big Black said. “And neither did Francis and Peter …”

“Of course,” Doctor Gulptilil said quickly, shaking his head back and forth. “Morally, certainly. Ethically? Of course. But legally? Everyone did the right thing, I’m quite positive. I can see that. But others, ah, that would be outside investigators, I’m less sure how they might perceive these quite terrible events.”

They were silent, then Doctor Gulptilil spoke quickly. “I believe we need to think creatively. And as quickly as possible. We need,” he repeated, “
for as little of this night to have happened as possible
.” And, as he said this, he pointed toward the basement.

Little Black could see this, as could his brother. Wordlessly, the two brothers seemed to comprehend what was being asked of them. Both men nodded.

“But if that man ain’t dead,” Little Black said, “then C-Bird, and the Fireman, why no one likely to look at them again. Or us, either, for that matter.”

“Correct,” Doctor Gulptilil said stiffly. “I think we understand each other fully.”

Little Black seemed to think hard for a moment. Then he turned to his brother and to Francis and said, “You come with me. We’ve still got some work to do.”

He led them back toward the basement, turning once to Doctor Gulptilil, who now was bent over Peter, holding his hands over the Fireman’s wounds, stanching the pulsing flow of blood with Big Black’s jacket. “You should make the call,” Little Black said.

The medical director nodded. “Hurry,” he said. Then, as Francis watched, Doctor Gulptilil left Peter’s side momentarily, and went back to the desk, where he picked up the telephone and dialed a number. After a second or two, he seemed to take a deep breath, and he said, “Yes. State Police? This is Doctor Gulptilil at the Western State Hospital. I need to report that we have had one of our more dangerous patients escape from the hospital grounds this night. Yes, he appears to be armed. Yes, I can provide you with a name and description …” He glanced back at Francis and he made a gesture with his arm, as if to urge him to hurry. Outside, in the distance, the sound of the ambulance accompanied by the security staff was getting closer.

Rain spit on Francis’s face, seemingly contemptuous of what had happened. Or perhaps, Francis thought, as if determined it could wash away the past hours. He was unsure. A wild wind bent a nearby tree back and forth, as if it were shocked at the procession passing by in the middle of the night.

Big Black was in front, the Angel’s body tossed over his broad back like a misshapen dark duffel bag. Right behind him, Little Black quick marched through the night, two shovels and a pickaxe in his arms. Francis brought up the rear, hurrying when Little Black urged him forward. Behind them, Francis could hear the arrival of the ambulance in front of the power plant, and on a distant wall he could see the reflection of its flashing red emergency lights. A black security car had pulled in, as well, and its headlights carved a white arc out of the deep midnight world. But the three of them were out of the direct line of sight, and maneuvering through the darkness, using the weak residue of light to find their way deep into the corner of the hospital grounds.

“Be quiet,” Little Black said, although this was an unnecessary admonition. Francis looked up into the midnight sky above, and thought he could make out rich seams of ebony, as if some painter’s hand had decided the night was not dark enough, and had tried to add even greater streaks of black.

When Francis looked back down, he immediately saw where they were heading. Not far away was the garden where he’d planted flowers at Cleo’s side. Now he was at her side, once again. He followed the Moses brothers past the rickety metal link fence into the small cemetery, where Big Black grunted and
swung the Angel’s body to the ground. It thudded, and Francis thought he ought to feel sickened by the noise, but that, to his surprise, he wasn’t. He looked at the man and thought that he might have passed by him in a corridor, in a dining room, on a pathway or in the dayroom a hundred times when he was alive, and never known who he really was until that night. And then, he shook his head in contradiction and thought this couldn’t possibly be true, that if he’d ever once looked directly into the Angel’s eyes, he was certain that he would have seen there what they had seen that night.

Big Black seized one of the shovels, and stepped to the side of the small mound of freshly dug dirt that marked where Cleo had been lain to rest the day before. Francis stepped to his side, took up the pickaxe, and without saying a word, lifted it above his head, and sunk it down into the moist ground. He was a little surprised at how easily they were able to carve away the soft earth of Cleo’s grave. It was, he thought, as if she’d been expecting their arrival that night.

Behind them, out of sight, paramedics were fighting hard for the second time in the past few hours. It wasn’t long before all three of them heard the urgent sound of the ambulance starting up, then racing across the mental hospital grounds, heading fast toward the nearest emergency room, precisely as it had done earlier, at the same breakneck speed, following the identical bumpy path.

As the noise of the siren faded, they were left with simply the muffled sound of their shovels and the pickaxe assaulting the muddy ground. The rain continued, soaking them thoroughly, but Francis was barely aware of any discomfort or even the suggestion of cold. He felt a blister forming on his hand, but ignored it, as he swung the pickaxe over his head time and again, and felt it bite into the earth. He had gone someplace well past exhaustion, into a locale dominated by what he knew he was trying to do that night and understanding that whatever chance anyone had, it would rest beneath the ground.

Francis was unsure whether it took an hour or longer to dig through the earth down six feet, to where the dull steel of the cheap coffin that held Cleo’s body was finally exposed. For an instant or two, raindrops seemed to beat a drummer’s tattoo against the lid, and Francis oddly hoped that the noise hadn’t disturbed the queen’s sleep.

Then he shook his head and thought
She would like this. Every empress deserves a slave in the afterlife
.

Big Black wordlessly tossed down his shovel. He looked at his brother, and Little Black joined him in lifting up the Angel’s body by hands and feet. Stumbling a little, sliding in the muddy ground, the two attendants maneuvered over to the side of the grave, and then, with a push, dropped the Angel down upon the coffin top, with a muffled thud. Big Black looked up at Francis, who
was standing at the edge of the hole, hesitant, and this time the attendant said, “No need to say a prayer over this man because there ain’t no prayer in this world strong enough to do him any good where he’s heading.”