The Unquiet

Chapter XXIV

I lost track of time. Hours became minutes, and minutes became hours. My skin itched constantly from the touch of the sacking, and the sense of impending suffocation was never far away. Occasional whispers emerged from the shadows, sometimes close by, and sometimes farther away. Once or twice I began to doze, but the tape across my mouth hindered my breathing and almost as soon as I fell asleep I would wake again, breathing heavily through my nose like a thoroughbred after a long race, my heart rate increasing, my head straining away from the pillow as I struggled to draw in more oxygen. Twice, I thought that something touched my neck before I awoke, and the contact was so cold that my skin burned. When that happened, I tried to work the burlap off, but Merrick had secured it well. By the time I heard the front door open and close, followed by the heavy, deliberate tread of footsteps upon the stairs, I was completely disoriented, but even with my senses confused I was aware of presences receding, moving away from me as the stranger approached.

Someone entered the bedroom. I felt body heat close to me and smelled Merrick. His fingers worked at the tape around my neck, and then the sack was removed and at last I was able to see again. Small white suns exploded in my field of vision, so that for a moment Merrick ’s features were indistinguishable to me. His face was a blank visage upon which I could paste whatever demon I chose, constructing an image of all that I feared. Then the spots before my eyes began to fade, and he was once again clear to see. He looked troubled and uncomfortable, no longer as assured as he had appeared when I had first awoken to find him by my bed, and his gaze drifted to the darker corners of the room. I noticed that he no longer stood with his back to the door. Instead, he seemed to be trying to keep it in sight, as though he were afraid to leave himself vulnerable to an approach from behind.

Merrick stared down at me, but he did not speak. He tugged at his lower lip with his left hand while he thought. There was no sign of my gun. Finally, he said: “I done something tonight that maybe I ought not to have done. It’s what it is, though, for good or ill. I got tired of waiting. Time has come to draw them out. It’s going to cause you some trouble, mark me, but you’ll get out of it. You’ll tell them what happened here, and they’ll believe you, in the end. In the meantime, word will spread, and they’ll come.”

Then Merrick did something strange. He walked slowly to one of the bedroom closets, my gun now visible where it was tucked into his belt, and rested his left hand against its slatted door, his right drawing the Smith 10. He seemed almost to be peering through the slats, as though convinced that someone was hidden inside. When at last he opened it, he did so warily, slowly easing it open with his left hand and using the barrel of the gun to explore the spaces between the jackets, shirts, and coats hanging within.

“You sure you live here alone?” he asked.

I nodded.

“It don’t feel like you’re alone,” he said. There was no hint of a threat, no sense that he felt I had lied to him, only a deeper unease at something he did not understand. He closed the closet door softly and walked back to the bed.

“I got nothing against you personally,” he said. “We’re even now. I believe you do what you think is right, but you got in my way, and I couldn’t have that. Worse, I think you’re a man who lets his conscience bother him, and conscience is just a fly buzzing in your head. It’s a nuisance, a distraction. I got no time for it. Never did.”

He slowly raised the gun. The muzzle regarded me blackly, like an empty, unblinking eye.

“I could kill you now. You know that. Wouldn’t cost me much more than a drop of sorrow. But I’m going to let you live.”

I breathed out hard, unable to suppress a feeling that bordered on gratitude. I was not going to die, not at this man’s hands, not today. Merrick knew the sound for what it was.

“That’s right, you’ll live, but you remember this, and don’t you forget it, now. I had you in a mortal grip, and I set you free. I know the kind of man you are, conscience or no conscience. You’ll be all fired up about how I came into your house, how I hurt you, humiliated you in your own bed. You’ll want to strike back, but I’m warning you that the next time I have you under the gun, I won’t waste a breath before I pull the trigger. All of this will be over soon enough, and then I’ll be gone. I’ve left you with enough to be thinking about. You save your anger. You’ll have cause enough to use it again.”

He put away the gun and reached, once more, for his little satchel. He removed a small glass bottle and a yellow rag, then unscrewed the cap from the bottle and doused the rag with its contents. I knew the smell. It wasn’t bad, and I could almost taste the sweetness of the liquid. I shook my head, my eyes growing wider as Merrick leaned over me, the rag in his right hand, the stink of the chloroform already making my head swim. I tried to buck my body, to lash out at him with my legs, but it was no use. He gripped my hair, holding my head still, and pressed the rag against my nose.

And the last words I heard were:

“It’s a mercy, Mr. Parker.”

I opened my eyes. Light streamed through the drapes. There were needles piercing my skull. I attempted to sit up, but my head felt too heavy. My hands were free, and the tape was gone from my mouth. I could taste blood upon my lips where its removal had torn the skin. I leaned over and reached for the water glass on the night table. My vision was blurred, and I almost knocked it to the floor. I waited for the room to stop spi

The sound of the doorbell woke me. The texture of the light had changed. It must have been past noon. I stood, supporting myself against the bathroom wall until I was sure that my legs would not buckle beneath me, then staggered to the chair where I had left my clothes the night before. I pulled on jeans and a T-shirt, threw a hooded top on to ward off the cold, then tentatively walked barefoot down the stairs to the door. Through the glass, I could see three figures standing outside, and there were two unfamiliar cars in my drive. One was a Scarborough P.D. cruiser. I could tell by the colors.

I opened the door. Conlough and Frederickson, the two detectives from Scarborough who had interviewed Merrick, were on my doorstep, along with a third man whose name I did not know, but whose face I remembered from Merrick’s interrogation. It was the man who had been talking to the FBI man, Pender. Behind them, Ben Ronson, one of the Scarborough cops, leaned against his cruiser. Usually, Ben and I would exchange a few words if we passed each other on the road, but now his face was still and without expression.

“Mr. Parker,” said Conlough. “Mind if we come in? You remember Detective Frederickson? We have a few questions we’d like to ask you.” He indicated the third man. “This here is Detective Hansen from the state police over in Gray. I guess you could say he’s in charge.”

Hansen was a fit-looking man with very black hair and a dark shadow across his cheeks and chin that spoke of too many years of using an electric razor. His eyes were more green than blue, and his posture, relaxed yet poised, suggested a wildcat about to spring on easy prey. He was wearing a nicely cut dark blue jacket. His shirt was very white, and his dark blue tie was striped with gold.