"I have no reason to believe him right now," I said. "His psychological profile, his prior history of violence, his lying on the standardized tests you administered here-all of it puts whatever he says in grave doubt. I suppose the shocking thing would be if he admitted the crime."
"Agreed," she said. "But you seem troubled. What's on your mind?"
I knew I was sitting with someone trained to listen to the music between spoken words. "I feel for him," I said, hoping that would be a sufficient explanation. "Like his father told me, Billy isn't evil, he's ill."
"And on that score, could you be helpful to him in court? Does he meet the criteria for an insanity plea?" Mossberg asked.
"He certainly has a history of terrible trauma," I said, "going all the way back to his childhood in Russia, witnessing the murder of his parents. A case could be made that he lost the emotional ties that bind the rest of us. Without empathy, without conscience, he might not have any brake on his primal feelings-including being pathologically jealous of new children in the family. He may have lashed out as a reflex, rather than a premeditated act. To put it in" legal terms, he may 'lack the substantial capacity to conform his behavior to the requirements of the law.' "
"That rings true," she said. "His psychological testing would support that."
I looked into Blue Dog's golden eyes. "Just out of curiosity," I asked, "did Billy have a physical examination when he was admitted?"
"He refused," Mossberg said. "We didn't see a reason to press him on it. He's been quite healthy-from a medical standpoint-according to his father." She paused. "Is there anything in particular you're concerned about?"
"Billy has quite a few welts on his back," I said, looking at Mossberg. "Some are scarred over. Others are fresh."
She nodded. "That would be consistent with what Mr. Bishop told me," she said. "Apparently, Billy has the habit of whipping himself with a belt-along with his cutting, biting, and hair-pulling. I've understood all of that as an outgrowth of his self-hatred. He makes attempts to channel his violence inward, but it inevitably spills over, and he strikes out at others."
"Mr. Bishop hadn't told me about the belt," I said. "Just the other behaviors."
Mossberg shrugged. "Maybe it slipped his mind. He may not have thought it was as important to let you know, given that you wouldn't normally be doing a physical examination."
"That's probably right," I said. It was equally possible that it had "slipped" Darwin Bishop's mind because he didn't think I would find out about it.
"How did he come to show you his back to begin with?" Mossberg asked.
"Very much by accident," I fibbed. "He took off his shirt to intimidate me. He's a strong kid and he looks it. For a minute there I thought he might attack me."
"I'll keep that at the front of my mind," she said. "I bruise easily." She winked. "Is there any other way I can be helpful to you?"
"Will you be assembling Billy's other medical records?" I asked. "I understand he's been treated by other psychiatrists."
"We've sent out the relevant requests," she said. "I'll be sure to call you with anything we get our hands on."
"That could be a big help," I said.
I grabbed a quick lunch at a greasy spoon and hailed a taxi. I was anxious to get my hands on information about Darwin Bishop's 1981 conviction for assault. I'd had luck getting case records before at the Office of Court Administration, way downtown on Beaver Street, just below Wall Street, a couple blocks from Battery Park.
"Let's take Second Avenue, headed downtown," I told the cab driver. I opened the window a few inches to let out the odor of stale smoke that was making me hold my breath.
"Why Second?" he said, without turning around. "The FDR. Faster." He had a European accent I couldn't quite place. Maybe Russian.
I glanced at his photo ID, mounted to the dash, next to a white plastic Jesus. His name was Alex Puzick. He looked about sixty years old. His eyes were weary. His face was half-shaven. He wore a white shirt that had yellowed at the collar and along the shoulder creases. "I want to make a quick stop at the River House," I said. "It won't take me more than a minute."
He answered by throwing the car into drive and barreling across 67th Street, then down Second Avenue.
As I half-watched the endless parade of copy shops, boutiques, groceries, and electronics stores, my mind kept wandering to Tess Bishop, Brooke's surviving twin. Because I wasn't more than fifty-fifty on Billy's guilt. And that left even odds that a killer was still loose on the Bishop estate.
I wondered if I could move the Department of Social Services office on Nantucket to take custody of the child until the murder investigation was further along. But the likelihood of DSS intervening, given the District Attorney's exclusive focus on Billy, was slim.
The key might be a direct appeal to Julia Bishop to place her daughter in a safer environment. I knew that wouldn't be without risk; if she shared my suspicions with her husband, he would almost certainly shut the door completely on me-and North Anderson.
I was still weighing the idea of talking openly with Julia when the cab driver glanced over his shoulder. "Live here?"
"No," I said. "I live outside Boston."
"What brings you?"
"I'm a psychiatrist," I said. "I have a patient in town."
He stared into the rearview mirror, studying me several seconds. Then his gaze settled back on the road. "They bring you in from Boston," he said, "you must be good."
"I've been at it a while," I said.
He nodded to himself. A few more seconds passed. "You treat schizophrenics? You've had schizophrenic patients?"
"Many times."
He nodded to himself again, but said nothing.
"Why do you ask?" I said.
"I have a daughter," he said. "Twenty-six years old."
"She has the illness?"
"Since seventeen," he said. He took a hard left onto 52nd Street. "My only child."
I stayed silent. I was feeling the reluctance I always feel before embracing another life story-as if mine might finally slip its binding and get lost amidst the thousands of disconnected chapters floating free inside me. I looked out the window again.
"Her name is Dorothy," Puzick said. "She's in Poland, with her mother. Warsaw."
Now the life story had a name and a hometown and a mother and a father. And those slim facts were enough to dissolve my reluctance to hear more. If I were a rock, I would be pumice-rough on the outside, permeable to the core. "How do they come to be there, and you here?" I asked.
"I left them," he said simply. "Bitch!" He swerved to avoid an old woman stepping off the curb. "I left them," he said again.
"Why?"
"I fell in love with an American. I didn't want to be married anymore." He shrugged. "I left, and Dorothy was nine years old." He suddenly pulled the car over to the curb. "River House."
I opened the door to the cab, but sat there. "Nine years old," I said.
His brow furrowed. "Go. See what you have to see. I wait here for you."
I pulled myself out of the cab. I walked to the sidewalk, lined with black, chauffeured limousines, and looked through the open gates of the River House, their immense wrought frames anchored in limestone pillars marked "Private" and capped by carved eagles, heads turned, staring at one another. Past the eagles, a cobblestone driveway separated a magnificent courtyard with flowering gardens from the entrance to the building, flanked by two doormen standing under a massive, hunter green awning.
The scene spoke of timelessness, security, elite tranquility.
I looked up at the building itself, which ran an entire city block. It was about fifteen stories high, the first three stories of limestone and the rest of brick, covered with ivy in places. The corner penthouse Darwin Bishop and his family called home was a duplex that boasted a series of two-story pillars and a terrace that had to be a thousand square feet or more, its innermost wall lined with enormous slate slabs.