Wolfman - Art Bourgeau (16 page)

"I’m aware of it, I only hope you are. From
the way you described him, he could also be schizophrenic. The
symptoms are often similar, but they're worlds apart in what could
happen."

"He's not schizophrenic."

"How do you know? Have you given him a Minnesota
Multiphase or done any other testing?"

"No, it's too early. His therapy is just getting
underway."

"Then I'm going to keep the book open on whether
he’s schizophrenic, and so should you. But that doesn’t change
things, you’re upset yourself, and you’re letting a very
disturbed person become obsessed with you. Sleeping with him is not
the question, we both know that the wish can have the effect of the
deed. The absence of the physical can be just a salve for conscience.
What I’m saying is that you’re endangering both of you by
continuing with him under the present circumstances. I think you
should withdraw and refer him to another analyst."

She reached for her cigarettes. "That’s not
what Freud would say. He would say the solution to the conflict is
through catharsis — "

"Screw Freud," Charles said, "and
don’t try to cite Jung’s affairs with his patients, either. I’m
talking about what's right and wrong for you and for this patient.
I’m not talking about a relative situation. With the present stress
in your own life, you just cannot help him."

"Charles, please believe me. This time the wish
is not the deed. I’m not going to sleep with him. I want to help
him."

He looked at her for a moment. Finally he said, "I
believe you . . . on both counts, but the best way you can help him
is to cut him loose. Don’t endanger yourself and your patient,
too," he repeated.

She shook her head. This time this wise man was plain
wrong. There was no danger. She was grateful to Charles for the past,
but she’d been wrong to involve him in this situation. It wasn't
something even Charles could take in second-hand. She would help
Loring herself. "I’m sorry. I can't," she said. "To
withdraw would be the real danger." She honestly believed that.
 
 

CHAPTER 12

BRIAN COLLINS quietly slipped on his dark jacket and
left by the back door of the West Mt. Airy twin. His mother had gone
to bed early. She was a sound sleeper and wouldn't miss him. The
night was his, he thought as he stretched in the cold air, looking up
at the sky. There were clouds. It might rain before morning, but the
moon still shone brightly. A bomber's moon was what it was called in
the novel he was reading. That's all he needed, just enough light to
see by. He headed for the garage where he kept his bicycle. He hadn't
been back to the park since the night he encountered the man with the
gun. It was the first time he'd ever shot anyone. Always before they
handed over their money without a fight.

Inside the garage he didn’t turn on the light. He
didn’t need it, the garage was his domain, he knew every inch of it
by heart. His workshop was there, his chemistry lab from years ago,
even a couple of well-worn copies of Playboy and Penthouse. He went
to an old sofa in the corner and lifted one of the cushions. Wedged
there was the gun. He picked it up and twirled it on his finger
cowboy-style. The weight felt good in his hand. The gun was his
proudest possession, even though he couldn’t show it to anyone. It
was exactly like an old West Colt .45 except it was a .22. He’d
taken it and a box of shells from a house on Livesey Street in his
second burglary. That was over a year ago. So much had happened since
then.

Also wedged among the cushions was a pint of Gordon's
vodka. In the faint light he could see there wasn't much left. He
took off the top and drank from it, grimacing from the sterile
non-taste. If he had his choice it would be bourbon, he liked the
brown color and its sweet richness better, but it left a strong odor
his mother could smell on his breath. He replaced the top and wedged
it back among the cushions. What he really wanted was a line or two
of coke, but he'd been out for over a week. Maybe tonight would
change all that, he thought as he jammed the gun into the waistband
of his trousers and zipped his jacket again.

The vodka bottle had been full his last time in the
park, but the shooting left him so shaky he drank almost all of it as
soon as he got back to the safety of the garage, and then paid the
price by being sick and throwing up twice during the night.
Fortunately his mother thought it was a stomach virus and let him
stay home from school the next day. Otherwise he didn’t know what
he would have done.

He pushed his bicycle outside and got on, wishing it
was a car. Someday . . . he thought, as he started to pedal. Right
now things were too tight. He knew the worried look on his mother's
face, and he wouldn’t add to it by asking. The only reason he was
able to go to prep school was because of his father’s checks. A
couple of times when the checks were late he told himself it didn’t
matter, but he knew it did. That’s why he studied so hard.

As he pedaled toward Emlen he thought about the
chemistry he was studying earlier. It was all math, nothing like his
old lab in the garage, and no matter how hard he tried he couldn't
seem to make heads or tails of it. The only reason he continued to
take it was because it would be helpful later when he tried to get
into college.

When he reached Emlen he paused to consider his best
approach to the park. He didn't really think the man he'd shot was a
cop. Every day since he had poured over the papers. There was nothing
in them about it, only about the Hightower killing, and they always
wrote up every cop shooting. But if he was a cop it could mean
trouble in the Valley Green section. They might have it staked out,
so he decided to go to Hortter instead. There was always someone
parking near where it dead-ended at the stables. Maybe one car would
be enough to get him a gram later. That would take about a hundred,
which was reasonable to expect from two people parking. He started to
pedal again.

He was fifteen when he burgled his first home, a
colonial on Allen’s Lane that belonged to friends of his father who
were away on vacation at the time. It was a disappointing experience.
He had no way to dispose of televisions or stereos so he had to
settle for the less than thirty-five dollars he found in a kitchen
drawer. Nowhere near enough to get the Jamaicans to sell him some. It
made him so angry that he poured a gallon of bleach onto the Oriental
rug in their living room. Several cars passed him before he reached
Hortter. Each time he kept his head down so they wouldn't see his
face. All together he'd burgled about fifteen homes before he got up
his nerve to use the gun to hold up people.

Since then things were much more profitable. Now he
could afford cocaine on a regular basis with even a little extra to
share. No doubt about it, he thought, his life had taken a turn for
the better. Gone was that feeling he wasn't good enough. He was king
of the hill whenever he wanted to be. Who cared if he didn’t play
football. He had plenty of friends, people at school who eighteen
months ago wouldn't give him the time of day.

He even had a girlfriend . . . blonde, sophisticated,
good-looking. Traci was her name. On Saturdays she would take him to
the Germantown Cricket Club or to parties, not that any of that
mattered much to him. Not when compared with the pleasure of getting
high. That was what really counted, getting to the edge and holding
it. A little coke, when that started to get out of hand, a mouthful
of vodka or a toke or two on a joint, then a little more coke. Fine
tuning, that's what it is, he thought, and the world’s a better
place for it.

At Hortter he turned right. What he was doing wasn't
wrong. If those fatheads in Washington would wake up and legalize
marijuana and cocaine, it wouldn't be so expensive. Everyone knew the
stuff wouldn't hurt you. Hell, half of the people in Congress used
it. It was just their hypocrisy that kept them from doing the right
thing.

He crossed Wissahickon Avenue and slowed down. It was
only a few hundred yards to what he thought of as his private
"fishing hole." He stopped and hid his bicycle up the hill
in the woods where no one would see it and went along on foot. In a
few moments he saw that fish were present this evening in the form of
a station wagon with imitation wood paneling, the kind a family would
use. He was sure they had no business here.

Over the year most of the cars he held up had no
business here. Many of them were gays, which pleased him. They were
never any trouble. It was almost like they enjoyed it. Not like the
tough-looking guy with the gun. Cop or no cop, his car should have
been a tip-off, an old beat-up Camaro. Only a hard ass would drive a
car like that. It was a mistake he would not let himself repeat in
the future.

He thought about the shooting. It was the most
exciting thing he’d ever done, even though in his panic he’d run
off without the loot. The fact that there was no mention of it in the
papers showed him that the man wasn’t dead, but he didn’t care
either way. Not any more. Pulling the trigger was easy, and it was
fun. He would do it again without hesitation.

His watch said midnight. He wondered what they were
doing now in the car. Timing was so important. The part he liked best
was jerking open the car door and seeing the look on their faces. He
smiled at the thought of it. Tomorrow night at the basketball game he
would have a gram, maybe two, and everyone would get well. Even
Traci, if she was especially nice. He pulled the gun from his
waistband and spun the cylinder, making sure it was loaded. With a
nod to himself he started for the car, thinking he was just keeping
with tradition like Billy the Kid or Jesse James, or the guy he’d
been reading about lately . . . Charles Manson. All the people who
saw society for the crock of shit it was.

Crouching slightly, he moved closer, being careful
where he stepped. Surprise was the key to the whole thing, that and
the gun. A few more steps brought him to the rear fender on the
driver's side. He was almost trembling with excitement. This was the
part he really dug.

The light came on inside the car when he jerked open
the door, and he got a good look at the two people in the front seat.
A man and a woman. The woman's blouse was open and her pants were
down. The man's fly was open, and they were kissing and touching each
other all over.

The woman let out a little scream when she saw the
gun. The man turned around, angry and scared at the same time.

"What the hell — —" Then he saw the
gun, too.

Brian smashed the man's ear with the gun, and the
fight went out of him. Brian smiled at how ridiculous the man looked,
all exposed like that.

"Don't hurt us, please," the woman said,
trying to cover her breasts.

He grabbed the man's hair and pulled him out of the
car. His experience with the tough-looking man had taught him one
thing . . . don’t be so easy with them. He made the man lie down on
the road beside the car.

"
Please stop. We'll do whatever you want,"
the woman said. He looked at her in the light. The frightened look on
her face turned him on. "Move your hands, I want to see you,"
he said.

The man on the ground tried to get up. Brian kicked
him in the face.

"No, stop. I’l1 do it." She moved her
hands and sat there for him. Her body wasn’t as good as he'd
thought.

"Give me your purse."

She slid it across the seat. He took it and pulled
the keys from the ignition, tossed them on the road somewhere ahead,
then he took her wallet out of her purse and turned to the man on the
ground. "I'll take yours now, Slim.’

The man reached into his back pocket without trying
to get up again. Brian took it from him. It was one of those nylon
wallets with a Velcro flap. He hated that kind of wallet and thought
about kicking the man again but didn't. Instead, he pointed the gun
at him and cocked it. The sound of the cylinder turning was sweet.
The man lay still at his feet. Brian wondered what he was thinking.

The woman leaned across the seat, her breasts
swaying.

"Please . . . I’ll do anything you want . . ."
Tears were streaming down her face.

Brian smiled. "This is just to let you know that
now I know where you live. If you tell anyone about this, I’ll come
for you and I’ll kill you."

"We won’t . . . I promise . . . we won’t . .
. Dear God, just go . . ."

He thought about staying around and toying with them
a little longer but knew it was a risky idea. He turned and started
up the road, glancing back at them as he went. The woman was out of
the car and on her knees trying to help the man. He knew she was
telling the truth. They would be no trouble. A few hundred yards into
the darkness he turned and climbed the hill into the woods where his
bicycle was hidden.

It had been a good night. He paused long enough to
take the money from the wallets, then throw them away. With the
moonlight only filtering through the trees he couldn't see how much
he’d gotten, but time enough for that later.

He pushed the bicycle, moving deeper into the woods.
There was a path nearby that he knew would take him back to
Wissahickon Avenue without meeting up with his victims again. It was
one of the things he liked best about this spot. As the wheels of the
bicycle turned they made a soft, clicking sound, not unlike the
cylinder of his revolver. The clicking sounded out of place in the
woods. He paused for a second to listen for the sound of the car
engine that would mean his victims were on their way. He heard
nothing.