The Alienist - Caleb Carr [82]
There are moments in life when one feels as though one’s walked into the wrong theater during the middle of a performance. I was suddenly aware of some very odd chemistry at work among Laszlo, Mary, and Sara. I couldn’t have put a label on it, not if I’d been paid; but as I pulled a bottle of good French cognac from the bottom drawer of my desk and added some of it to my still-steaming coffee, I became increasingly aware that the air in the large room had suddenly become charged. This instinctive feeling was confirmed when Mary, Stevie, and Cyrus came out of the kitchen and Kreizler asked for his key back. Mary returned it reluctantly, and then I caught her shooting Sara a quick, angry scowl as she went out the door with the other two. No doubt about it—there was a subtext to all this activity.
But there were more important issues at hand, and with Mary, Stevie, and Cyrus gone, the rest of us were free to begin trading thoughts on them. Kreizler went to the chalkboard, which he had divided into three general areas: CHILDHOOD on the left-hand side, INTERVAL in the center, and ASPECTS OF THE CRIMES to the right. In their proper areas Laszlo began to jot down the theories that we had come up with on the roof of Castle Garden, leaving a small space for any salient insights that the Isaacsons might have had since we left them. Kreizler then stood back to review the list of details; and though it offered, to my way of thinking, evidence of a good night’s work, Laszlo seemed to find it wanting. He tossed his bit of chalk up and down, shifting from one foot to the other, and finally announced that there was one more significant factor we must make note of: in the top right-hand corner of the board, under the heading ASPECTS OF THE CRIMES, he chalked the word WATER.
That baffled me; but Sara, after giving it some thought, pointed out that every one of the murders since January had taken place within sight of a large amount of water—and the Zweigs had actually been deposited in a water tower. When I asked if that wasn’t just a coincidence, Kreizler said that he doubted so careful a schemer as our killer left very much to coincidence. Laszlo then walked to his desk and pulled an old leather-bound volume from one stack of books. As he switched on a small desk lamp I braced myself, expecting some lengthy technical quote from the likes of Professor Mosso of Turin (who, I’d recently learned, was doing groundbreaking research in measuring the physical manifestations of emotional states). But what Laszlo read, in a quiet, tired voice, was something quite different:
“‘Who can understand his errors? Cleanse thou me from secret faults.’”
Kreizler switched off the desk lamp and sat back down. I took a blind stab and guessed that the quote was from the Bible, to which Laszlo nodded, remarking that he never ceased to be amazed at the number of references to cleansing that could be found in religious works. He was quick to add that he did not necessarily believe that our man suffered from a religious mania or dementia (although such afflictions had characterized more mass murderers than almost any other form of mental distress); rather, he was citing the quote to indicate, somewhat poetically, the extent to which the killer was oppressed by feelings of sin and guilt, for which water was the usual metaphorical antidote.
That remark stuck in Sara’s craw. In a troubled, somewhat impatient voice she noted that Kreizler persistently returned to the notion that our killer was aware of the nature of his actions, and desired apprehension—yet at the same time the man continued to go out and slaughter young boys. If we accepted the supposition of his sanity, then we were left with the nagging question of what possible satisfaction or benefit he could be deriving from the butchery. Before replying to this pointed observation, Laszlo paused, considering his words carefully. He knew, as did I, that it had been a long and