Part 23 (1/2)

”Probably some borderline he treated, just calling to let people know she's still alive. Or maybe there's substance to these legends,” Anton remarked.

”What do you mean?”

”Well, the whole psychiatrist gone bad. Supposedly, and I hate to gossip, but he was caught sleeping with a patient. I don't know the details, but it's the kind of thing that you'd lose your license over, at least today. Back then, it was looser. Maybe that's who called.”

”Interesting. So who was the allegedly slept-with patient?”

”No clue. I don't even know how much of that is accurate.”

”Who would?” Barrett asked.

Anton took a swig of his coffee. ”You might give George Housmann a call.”

Barrett's interest perked at the name of the legendary forensic psychiatrist, who had recruited her, and then retired. ”I didn't know he was still around,” Barrett replied.

”In a manner of speaking. They made him emeritus and put him out to pasture right before you came. But back then, if anyone was going to be disciplined, George would have been front and center holding the whip.”

___.

The second she was back in the office, she tracked down Housmann's number. Three hours later she stood outside his Upper East Side apartment and rapped on the door.

”Dr. Conyors,” a slight, silver-haired man dressed in gray flannel slacks, white s.h.i.+rt, navy blazer, and red silk tie greeted her in the hallway. ”It's so nice to see you.” He c.o.c.ked his head forward, as though he were examining her through the thick lenses of his black-rimmed gla.s.ses. ”Oh, but I'm forgetting ... come in.” And as he turned to lead her into his apartment, he stopped. ”Please wipe your feet.” He motioned toward a textured rubber pad in front of his door. Barrett stepped onto the soft squishy surface.

”There's a fast-drying fluid that destroys anything alive on the bottom of your shoes.” He explained. ”People carry all sorts of disease on the bottoms of their feet; horrible things that can live as spores for decades, just waiting for their chance. I'd rather not have them in my home.”

Barrett complied, and wondered if this man, who had been a trailblazer in the field, and whom she'd met only once before when she had interviewed for the fellows.h.i.+p at the clinic, would actually be of any use.

”I'm so sorry to hear about your husband,” he offered.

It surprised her that he even knew, ”Thank you.”

”He was a musician, wasn't he?”

”Yes.”

”With the symphony?”

”Yes,” she wondered at his interest. Had she mentioned Ralph at the interview those many years back? And then the smell hit, an antiseptic odor she a.s.sociated with hospitals and prison infirmaries. She glanced down a long hallway, its floors covered in freshly waxed linoleum. Not what she expected in a pre-war building where hardwood floors were featured prominently in every real estate ad.

”Tragic.” He led her inside. As she trailed behind the stooped octogenarian, she stole glances inside seamlessly joined gla.s.s-fronted bookcases that lined both walls. It reminded her of Jimmy's magnificent library, only here the cases were made of steel and seemed more appropriate for an inst.i.tution than someone's home. Dr. Housmann stopped and turned back to face Barrett. ”I don't get many visitors these days, please forgive the mess.” And he slid back the paneled pocket doors that led into his living room.

Barrett blinked as her pupils shrank to pinpoints under the a.s.sault of bright sun that spilled through eight floor-to-ceiling windows that faced east and south.

Housmann watched his guest's reaction, ”It's something isn't it? My wife had the whole thing curtained off, but after she died, I did away with all that. Sunlight fights depression.”

”You have amazing views,” she commented, taking in the vista that included the Empire State Building and the East River.

”I've had this apartment for over fifty years,” he said. ”We got it when we were married. Please sit.” He motioned toward a grouping of 1950s metal-framed leather chairs that had once been red and were now a sun-washed pink. ”So, you had some questions about Dr. Mayfield?”

”Yes, you were the director of the forensic center when he was there.”

”Correct,” Housmann pursed his thin purplish lips together. ”An unpleasant business.”

”I'm working with one of the patients who I believe he interviewed for his studies on deviant s.e.xual behavior.”

”It's interesting how someone's research can mirror their own peculiarities,” he replied.

”In what way?”

”You're quick. That's good. I hope we have a chance to talk about some of your papers. I have to tell you that I think they're quite good, but that there are areas where you've missed some fundamental causalities.” He pushed a strand of long white hair back over his thinning pate and tucked the end under his collar. ”But I know that you've come for other reasons ... curious, that after all these years, you're the first to ask about Mayfield. I suppose that like myself, anyone who was around during that time would just as soon forget ... Mayfield didn't think that the rules applied to him. That was his undoing. All in all, a messy business. If I weren't such a dinosaur I wouldn't even talk to you about it, but at this point,” he clicked his tongue, ”I can't see that it matters. It's ancient history. You said you're meeting with one of his test subjects, which one?”

Barrett hesitated.

”Good girl,” Housmann remarked, ”you're wondering if this is a breach of confidentiality or not. Don't worry, I'm still on faculty, we can look at this as supervision. What we say here goes no further, correct?”

”Yes, and thank you. I've been meeting with James Cyrus Martin.”

Housmann perked, his watery blue eyes peered intently at her through the magnifying surface of his convex lenses. He shook his head, about to say one thing, but only commenting, ”Morris Kravitz was one of my students ... I was so sorry to hear about his death; he wasn't an old man.”

”I've taken over the case,” Barrett replied, but not wanting to divulge the emerging facts around Morris Kravitz's murder.

”Why did you take it?”

Housmann's question stopped Barrett. ”It seemed like an interesting case.”

”If you're going to lie to me, we should stop.”

”The money.”

”Thank you,” he said. ”After all, we're talking about one psychiatrist who went down a wrong road, and I have a sick feeling that before we're done today, we'll see that particular path is well traveled.” Housmann looked at the floor and then back at Barrett. He tapped a finger against the polished-chrome arm of his chair. ”The question that I have to answer is, can you be trusted? I'd like you to start by presenting the case and then tell me exactly what brought you here.”

Barrett wondered if this wasn't a waste of time, and that all she was going to accomplish was filling a lonely old man's afternoon.

”Well?” he asked.

And for the next fifteen minutes she presented a detailed account of her work with Jimmy Martin, ending with the late-night phone call that set her on the path of Gordon Mayfield.

”That was very clear, and fascinating,” he said, having interrupted her only twice for minor points of clarification. ”What is your diagnostic impression of your patient?” he asked.

In spite of herself, Barrett warmed to Dr. Housmann. He reminded her of what she had most enjoyed about her training: the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. ”Jimmy's diagnostic picture is complex,” she said. ”From the time of his arrest through ten years at Croton he carried a diagnosis of schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder-bipolar type.”

Housmann snorted derisively. ”What do you think?”

”I think our DSMIV has a hard time with people like Jimmy,” she commented, citing the diagnostic manual used by all psychiatrists.

”Having survived DSM versions one through four, you have to forgive me for taking a jaundiced view of the Chinese menu school of diagnosis. It's fine for Egg Foo Young, but falls short when it comes to people. So tell me how you think about your patient, if you don't believe he has schizophrenia or that other garbage-pail label.”

Barrett cracked a smile as she listened to Housmann's diatribe. ”Jimmy has a core defect in his personality. As to whether it's a nature or nurture thing, it's impossible to separate, and purely academic in relevance. Both of his parents exhibited polymorphous perverse and antisocial behaviors. Did they teach him that or was he born that way?”

”As you say,” Housmann commented, ”it's academic.”