Along Came a Spider (Alex Cross #1)(53)

“Tell me about it. Tell me about those times when you woke up in a strange place.”

He had a habit of pulling on his shirt, between the second and third buttons. He would pull the fabric away from his chest. I wondered if he had a fear of not being able to breathe, and where it might have come from if he did.

Maybe he’d been sick as a child. Or trapped with a limited air supply. Or locked up somewhere—the way Maggie Rose and Michael Goldberg had been locked away.

“For the past year or so, maybe more than that, I’ve suffered from insomnia. I told that to one of the doctors who came to see me,” he said.

There was nothing about insomnia in any of the prison workups. I wondered if he’d told any of the doctors, or simply imagined that he had. There was stuff about an uneven Wechsler profile, indicative of impulsivity. There was a verbal I.Q. and a performance I.Q., both through the roof. There was a Rorschach profile that reflected severe emotional stress. There was a positive response to T.A.T. card #14, the so-called suicide card. But not a word about insomnia.

“Tell me about it, please. It could help me to understand.” We’d already talked about the fact that I was a psychologist, besides being a really crackerjack detective. He was comfortable with my credentials. So far, anyway. Did that have anything to do with his asking for me down in Florida?

He looked into my eyes. “Will you really try to help me? Not trap me, Doctor, help me?”

I told him that I’d try. I’d listen to what he had to say. I’d keep an open mind. He said that was all he could ask for.

“I haven’t been able to sleep for a while. This goes back for as long as I can remember,” he went on. “It was becoming a jumble. Being awake, dreams. I had trouble sorting one out from the other. I woke up in that police car in Pennsylvania. I have no idea how I got there. That’s really how it happened. Do you believe me? Somebody has to believe me.”

“I’m listening to you, Gary. When you’ve finished, I’ll tell you what I think. I promise. For the moment, I have to hear everything you remember.”

That seemed to satisfy him.

“You asked if it’s happened to me before. It has. A few times. Waking in strange places. Sometimes in my car, pulled over along some road. Sometimes a road I’ve never seen, or even heard of before. A couple of times it’s happened in motels. Or wandering the streets. Philadelphia, New York, Atlantic City one time. I had casino chips and a complimentary parking ticket in my pocket. No idea how they got there.”

“Did it ever happen to you in Washington?” I asked.

“No. Not in Washington. I haven’t been in Washington since I was a kid, actually. Lately, I’ve found I can ‘come to’ in a conscious state. Completely conscious. I might be eating a meal, for example. But I have no idea how I got in the restaurant.”

“Did you see anybody about this? Did you try to get help? A doctor?”

He shut his eyes, which were clear chestnut brown—his most striking feature. A smile came across his face as he opened his eyes again.

“We don’t have money to spend on psychiatrists. We’re barely scraping by. That’s why I’ve been so depressed. We’re in the hole over thirty grand. My family is thirty thousand in debt, and I’m here in prison.”

He stopped talking, and looked at me again. He wasn’t embarrassed about staring, trying to read my face. I was finding him cooperative, stable, and generally lucid.

I also knew that anybody who worked with him might be the victim of manipulation by an extremely clever and gifted sociopath. He’d fooled a lot of people before me; he was obviously good at it.

“So far, I believe you,” I finally said to him. “What you’re saying makes sense to me, Gary. I’d like to help you if I can.”

Tears suddenly welled in his eyes, and rolled down his cheeks. He put his hands out to me.

I reached out, and I held Gary Soneji/Murphy’s hands. They were very cold. He seemed to be afraid.

“I’m innocent,” he said to me. “I know it sounds crazy, but I’m innocent.”

I didn’t get home until late that night. A motorcycle eased up alongside the car as I was about to pull into my driveway. What the hell was this?

“Please follow me, sir,” said the person atop the bike. The line was delivered in nearly perfect highway-patrol style. “Just fall in behind.”

It was Jezzie. She started to laugh and so did I. I knew she was trying to lure me back to the land of the living again. She’d told me I was working too hard on the case. She reminded me that it was solved.

I continued into the driveway and got out of the old Porsche. I went around to where she had curbed her motorcycle.

“Quitting time, Alex,” Jezzie said. “Can you do it? Is it okay for you to quit work at eleven o’clock?”

I went inside to check on the kids. They were sleeping, so I had no reason to resist Jezzie’s offer. I came back out and climbed on the bike.

“This is either the worst or the best thing I’ve done in recent memory,” I told her.

“Don’t worry, it’s the best. You’re in good hands. Nothing to fear except instant death.”

Within seconds, 9th Street was being eaten up under the glare of the single motorcycle headlamp. The bike sped down Independence, then onto the Parkway, which can be ridiculously curvy in spots. Jezzie leaned into every curve, buzzing by passenger cars as if they were standing still.