“I remember that. Really disgusting.”
“No kidding, Doc. Anyhow, the guy that owns the funeral home handling this boy’s burial? He got spooked by that Memphis stuff. Had hidden cameras installed in all the embalming rooms. So when I showed up yesterday, asking who had access to the kid’s body, he puffs up, all proud, and says, ‘Here, let’s take a look.’ He calls up the footage on his computer with me sitting right there. Doc, you should’ve seen that man’s face when it showed this gal — his employee, mind you — slicing off the kid’s finger. That man was shitting bricks. Probably still is. I’m guessing the kid’s parents are gonna sue the pants off him.”
“I wouldn’t worry too much about his pants,” I said. “Most funeral homes have huge insurance policies. That’s one reason funerals cost so damn much.” I looked again at the mug shot. “So she’s in custody. She talking? About Satterfield?”
He made a face. “Nah, she’s all lawyered up. My guess is, she’ll end up trying to cut a deal. And maybe the D.A. will require cooperation as part of that.” I frowned, and he went on. “Meanwhile, I’m thinking I might take a little road trip over to Clifton. South Central Correctional Facility.”
“To see Satterfield?”
“See him. Talk to him. Rattle his cage a little. Have a frank, man-to-man chat in a private interview room.” He began to nod slowly, a dark glint in his eyes, his fingers clenching and unclenching rhythmically. “Suggest that it’s not a good idea to bother you and your family.”
For a moment, I allowed myself to imagine what I suspected Decker himself was imagining: Decker, built like a linebacker, beating the crap out of Satterfield. I imagined it, and I liked it. I liked it a lot. I felt myself yielding to the idea, being taken over by it. It was as if I were spellbound, enchanted by the siren song of violent vengeance. It almost seemed as if I myself were the one slamming Satterfield’s face against a cinder-block wall, kicking Satterfield’s splintering ribs. Suddenly my fantasy took an unexpected and horrifying turn. During a split-second pause in the carnage, Satterfield managed to turn his face toward me, and through the bloody lips and the broken teeth, he grinned at me: a mocking, malicious, complicit grin. “Gotcha,” the grin seemed to say. “How do you like it, becoming me?”
“No!” My voice — my shout — startled me from my waking dream. Was I shouting at Satterfield, at myself, or at Decker? I had no idea.
Decker stared at me. “Doc? What’s wrong?”
I felt a shudder run through me. “Nothing. Sorry. Just… probably not a good idea to go see Satterfield. But, Christ, that guy is still under my skin. Like some dormant virus, or a cancer cell — lurking, biding its time, you know?” He nodded. A thought struck me. “Know much about shingles?”
“Roofing shingles?”
“Medical shingles. The disease.”
“Not much,” he said. “Old people get it, right? Very painful, I’ve heard.”
“Ever have chicken pox, as a kid?”
“Sure. Itched like crazy.”
“The virus that caused it? You’ve still got it,” I said. “When your immune system kicked in, it killed most of the virus, but not all. Some of it survived; it’s hiding at the base of one of your spinal nerves, coiled up like a snake. One day when you’re fifty or sixty or seventy, something reactivates it — nobody really knows how or why — and it comes slithering out.”
Suddenly Decker grabbed the edge of my desk with both hands. He went pale and began to breathe in quick, sharp pants; sweat beaded on his forehead and began to run down his face. His eyes were wide and wild, staring with an expression of utter horror at something that was either miles away from my office, or deep within himself.
“Deck? What’s the matter?”
“Kev,” he whispered, then — louder: “Kevin! No!”
I leaned across the desk and squeezed one of Decker’s forearms. The muscles were clenched so tightly, his arm felt like a bar of cast iron. Then I realized what must have happened. Decker’s younger brother, Kevin — a bomb-squad technician — had died while searching Satterfield’s house for explosives: killed not by a booby trap, but by a deadly snake, a fer-de-lance, that had been set loose in the house. Comparing Satterfield to a lurking virus — and then comparing the virus to a snake — must have taken Decker back to the scene of his brother’s death. It was as if I had poured gasoline on Decker’s memory, then held a lighted match to it, and I cursed myself for my stupidity. “Hey, Deck,” I said, squeezing his arm tighter. “Deck, can you hear me? It’s Bill Brockton, Deck. We’re here in my office at Neyland Stadium.” I waved my other hand in front of his staring eyes, but it had no effect. Trying to get his attention, I began snapping my fingers near his face, moving the hand slightly from side to side, all the while calling his name. His body was now trembling, as if shivering hard, and I had visions of his heart giving out or an aneurysm in his brain bursting. I’ve got to get him out of this, I thought, and in desperation, I began tapping his cheekbone with my fingertips. He seemed not to notice, so I tapped harder, still to no effect, and then I began to slap him gently—the sound of one hand clapping, I thought absurdly — still calling his name and telling him mine. I was beginning to despair — wondering whether to call 911 or someone in the Psychiatric Department at UT Medical Center — when he reached up and seized my wrist, with a grip that felt like a vise, and brought my hand down to the desk. “Deck,” I said, struggling not to cry out. “Deck, it’s Bill Brockton. Can you hear me, Deck? I need you to hear me. I need you to stay with me, Deck. Come back from wherever you’ve gone. Come back to Neyland Stadium, to my office by the north end zone.”
At that moment my phone rang. With my free hand I reached to answer it, but just before I did, I noticed that Decker’s eyes had flickered at the sound, so I decided to let it keep ringing, in hopes that somehow the phone would manage to reel him back from wherever he’d gone. Keep ringing, I prayed, and it did: two times; three; four. By the fourth ring, his eyes seemed to be coming into focus, searching for the source of the sound. “That’s the phone on my desk ringing,” I said. “It might be Kathleen, my wife, calling me. You remember Kathleen, don’t you, Deck? Remember that lunch we had at Calhoun’s?” I caught myself just in the nick of time — just before saying “right after Satterfield’s trial?”—and changed course to say, “You remember that huge pile of rib bones we left on the table?” The phone was still ringing. “You wouldn’t believe how much my phone’s been ringing lately, Deck. The FBI thinks I screwed up a case in San Diego, and I have about fifty reporters wanting to interview me about what a dumb-ass I am.”
He blinked and seemed to be trying to get his bearings. I kept talking. “I have another fifty wanting to tar and feather me for disrespecting veterans — using them in our research at the Body Farm.” He blinked again, then turned to look at me, his expression suggesting that he vaguely remembered me but couldn’t quite place me. I plowed ahead, encouraged that he seemed to be heading in the right direction, namely, the direction of sanity. “I’m afraid they might try to shut down the Body Farm, Deck. I know the police understand how important our research is. So do prosecutors. But bureaucrats and politicians? I’m not sure they know or care. What should I do, Deck? How do I protect the work I care about?”
“I don’t know,” he said, then: “Sorry, what? I think I spaced out for a second there. What were we talking about?”
“Beats me, Deck,” I said. I nodded at the phone — still ringing, now for at least the twentieth time — and added, “That damned thing just won’t quit ringing. Made me forget whatever it was I was saying.” He nodded, looking almost normal now, so I ventured, “Hey, Deck?”