The Night Church Part 7

"No, sir."

"Yeah. Some d.a.m.n screwed-up rookie." Mike looked through his bifocals at Jonathan. "Let's get on with it."

"Remove any metal objects from your pockets and roll up your sleeves, please."

Mike stood at the far side of the room with his fingers hooked in his belt loops. His lips were pursed, his face tightly controlled. His eyes were too calm. He was preparing himself for the worst.

Jonathan said nothing about the poor rookie, who was still lurking in the hall. Fortunately Mike couldn't see him from where he was standing. All the young cop needed was an argument with Mike Banion.

He could feel the young cop's eyes on him, watching from just beyond the edge of the light. Idle eyes.

Lucky young cop, with nothing to worry about except some d.a.m.n file.

The operator rubbed Jonathan's wrists with electrostatic gel and affixed the straps, then bound the device's belt around his chest. He flipped a couple of switches and graph paper began spewing out of the plotter. Next there was a test routine to confirm that the styli were rolling correctly, "What is your name, please?"

"Jonathan t.i.tus Banion."

"Your age?"

"Twenty-two."

"Occupation?"

"a.s.sistant professor, New York University."

"Are you a h.o.m.os.e.xual?"

"Cut the c.r.a.p! Don't ask him a.s.shole questions."

"Sorry, Mike! Sorry! It's routine in rape cases."

"Try another tack, boy."

The operator cleared his throat. "Do you like girls?"

"Yes."

"Have you ever hit a girl or hurt a girl in any way?"

"Not that I remember."

"Do you go to church on Sunday?"

"No."

"Do you bathe?"

"Yes."

It was coming soon. They usually popped in the big one after a few innocuous questions so that fluctuations in the graph could be more easily read.

"Do you have a driver's license?"

"Yes."

"Did you rape Patricia Murray?"

"No."

"Were you present when she was raped?"

"No."

Silence descended. Jonathan had the happiness of watch-ing Mike's face go from tight misery to relief.

The needles hadn't even burped. But his own mind was just as full of questions as before. Even as he was taking the test he was growing more sure that this polygraph was the wrong instru-ment. There were more sensitive ways of getting to the truth than measuring whether or not a person thought thought he was lying. he was lying.

Jonathan's outer self obviously believed that he was inno-cent. But was that enough? There are other, deeper selves in all human beings, selves that are never meant to be seen by the person riding the surface.

A simple polygraph might not detect trouble deep down in a man, where his serpents crawl.

"As clean a test as I've ever seen, Inspector. The kid's not lying. He didn't do it. I'd stake my reputation on it."

Slowly Mike began to smile. He clapped his hands to-gether. His eyes began to twinkle. Then, abruptly, he s.h.i.+fted to a more grave expression. No celebrations now, not appro-priate. "Okay. I guess you want to get to that hospital right away, don't you, Jonathan?"

Jonathan stood up. He wished he could be as easily convinced as Mike.

Scientist, test thyself.

In the privacy of his own lab, deserted for the summer, he might find a deeper answer than the simple police equipment offered.

But not now. He knew that Mike would object violently to a trip to the lab. And he would too, for the moment. He was needed at the hospital. And he was longing to be there, more as each moment pa.s.sed.

The polygraph operator made his way out of the room. Jonathan started to follow, but Mike stopped him.

"Just hold on a second. I can't go with you; I got too much to do on this case. I just want to say-oh, Johnny, wow. What the h.e.l.l can I say?"

"I love you too, Dad." Jonathan kissed his stepfather's cheek, giving expression to the emotion that filled and also frightened his stepfather. Mike in response shook his hand with almost comic solemnity.

"Good enough. I've a mind to send you over to the hospital under escort. Get you there in two minutes."

"I can take a cab, Dad. And don't kill yourself while I'm not watching over you. Remember to get some sleep."

They went through the tiled halls again, back to the grinding elevator, and this time the desk sergeant didn't even look up as they pa.s.sed. On his way down to the corner to get a cab Jonathan realized it was still too early to find one around here. He would have to take a bus.

Standing at the bus stop with nothing to do but wait, all his energy seemed to drain from his body. He felt like he had been awake for a month. He could conceive of going home, getting into bed, and sleeping until noon.

How dare he even consider that when Patricia needed him?

Needs me? He'd known her for exactly twelve hours. But, yes, she did need him. She would be all alone in that hospital right now, maybe losing her life. . .

"She really had an effect on you, for a new girl." Mike had come up behind him. "I'm avoiding a reporter,"he said sheepishly. "Church rapes are big news. I'll drive you."

"No, I need some time to get myself together. Just about bus ride time."

"What's she like, Johnny?"

"What can I tell you? I fell in love with her. She's wonderful."

"She's one of Father Goodwin's most pious types. I see you as falling more for the easygoing kind."

"Beggars can't be choosers."

"Beggars? Come on, you must have 'em fallin' all over themselves for you." He grasped Jonathan's shoulder. "You're a h.e.l.l of a good guy. Girls sense things like that."

Jonathan couldn't even smile. The wrong bus came and went, disgorging a rumpled man who seemed astonished to see them.

"Why, if it isn't Mike Banion, waiting for me right on the street corner. Got a scoop, Mike?"

"This is the G.o.dd.a.m.n reporter I was hiding from. The only uneducated man the Times Times has left." has left."

"I'm an inst.i.tution."

"You're still working the blotter after fifteen years. I guess you are sort of an inst.i.tution."

The reporter smiled toward Jonathan. He had very bad teeth. "Terry Quist, at your service. You make it, we break it."

"He means the news. All the news that fits, he prints."

"As long as it's bad. Never accuse me of publicizing good causes, please."

Quist was a thinner, more threadbare version of Mike. He had cigars in the top pocket of his jacket too.

His feet were huge clown feet, encased in shoes that seemed composed of s.h.i.+ne alone. His ropy, weathered face spoke all the cunning of a man who understood the intricacies of city life.

"Terry, I want you to meet my stepson Jonathan. Jona-than, meet Terry Quist."

"h.e.l.lo," Jonathan said.

Terry Quist stared at him as he might at a cobra coiled on the foot of his bed. "He gonna be with us?"

Mike nodded. "Until his bus comes."

"I'm in big trouble. I've got to talk to you privately." When Quist's voice quavered, Jonathan realized that the man was trying to control profound fear. Jonathan found his very presence chilling. His own terror, his awful sense of evil within, was still close to the surface.

"I'll give you ten minutes," Mike told the reporter.

"Your office, please. I might be talkin' about my life, life, Inspector." Inspector."

The bus came as Mike and Terry were entering the pre-cinct house. Sitting alone as it swayed along, Jonathan tried to prepare himself for what he was going to find at the hospital. But he could not. A few hours ago Patricia had dazzled him with her beauty. Now she was the victim of somebody who despised it.

Somebody dark and wicked.

He sucked in breath. For an instant he had wanted to run, just to let his body take over and somehow escape the situation.

He remained on the bus as if frozen to his seat, unable for a time even to move.

By the time the bus reached the huge Art Deco hulk of the Poly, full sunlight bathed the streets, the white walls of the building, the sea of glittering windows. He got up and forced himself out onto the sidewalk. He pa.s.sed through the en-trance to the old building.

Once in the lobby he sought the information desk. It was manned by a fat guard complete with Sam Browne belt and pistol. Queens Poly didn't fool around. It was a hard place, where the borough's desperate emergencies came. This man often confronted people who were crazy with shock and grief.

"I'm trying to locate a woman named Patricia Murray, a rape victim, badly injured."

He consulted a computer printout. "Here-Murray, Patricia, Intensive Care Unit, Ward C, Section Five.That's the fifth floor, end of the corridor."

Jonathan got on an elevator jammed with interns, nurses, and two patients in wheelchairs. It stopped for an interminable time at each floor. At last, though, he arrived at the nurses' station that controlled the ICU.

"I'm here to see Patricia Murray," he said to the nurse at the desk.

"Visiting hours start at nine." She flipped through a file. "Oh. Are you related?"

He lied because he knew he had to. "Yes."

"She may be awake. But you'll have to observe her through the window. No direct contact yet."

He followed the nurse down a hallway cluttered with medical paraphernalia, IV stands, wheelchairs, rolling beds, electronic equipment.

Patricia lay swathed in an olive-drab surgical gown. Her legs were spread and a tent of plastic obscured her head. An OXYGEN IN USE sign flashed on and off above the window that looked into the room. Her whole belly was covered with gauze and bandages, and more bandages were on her arms. Even beyond the evidence of great wounding, it was her absolute stillness that made Jonathan feel the strange, deep anguish of the bereft. Only if she were dead would she be more still.

He stood looking at her, feeling the tears burn in his eyes and a tightness constrict his throat, and wis.h.i.+ng that some-how it could have been different.

What terrible thing had happened last night?

Was he wrong, or had her head slowly turned toward him? With the wrinkled plastic oxygen tent making a clear view of her impossible, it was difficult to tell.

Yes, she had definitely looked his way.

But what was the expression on her face? Was it love, or terror-or was it madness?

He strained and peered at her, but he could not tell. After a few minutes the nurse nudged his elbow, then drew him away.

As he went down the hall exhaustion hit him hard, and with it came a great sorrow. His brief love was destroyed.

He thought of her, lying beneath him in his dream. He crept from the hospital like a guilty man.