Heartstone

“This whole technique, making the subject see what is happening on a movie screen, lends itself to the creation of fantasies.

“And listen to some of the other things Hollander tells her,” Dr. Paris said, turning to pages in the transcript he had marked with paper clips.

“Here, in Tape #8, just after he administers the amytal for the first time, he tells her that she can ‘forget,’ ‘remember’ or, and this is the important one, ‘misremember’ as her personality needs require.

“Or on Tape #10. ‘Tell us what you remember and don’t worry about what’s true. What you remember will be true.’ Those are open invitations to confabulation.

“And there is one thing more that convinces me that there is a high possibility that Esther’s story is the product of her imagination.”

“What’s that?”

“I find the whole theory that she developed amnesia because of the trauma of seeing Walters murdered unacceptable. This girl has been exposed to violence throughout her life. She discusses seeing her father stab her mother. And there was the incident where the police chased her after the miniature golf robbery. Her father shoots the pet dog she loves and makes her watch. Yet we have no amnesia. No, I…”

The phone rang. It was after five and Mark’s secretary had left. He answered it.

“Is this Mr. Shaeffer?” a woman asked.

“Yes.”

“You’re the one that’s defending that Coolidge boy?”

“Yes.”

“I got some information on the case about how they tortured Esther.”

“Excuse me?” Mark said, not sure he had heard the woman correctly.

“Esther wasn’t at no murder. She was made to say that by the police.”

“I see,” Mark said, wondering how he could end the conversation, which was turning out to be one of the numerous crank calls he had received since the start of the trial. “How do you know that the police tortured Esther?”

“I seen what they done. I’m her mother.”

The short, thin man who answered the front door walked with a slight stoop. His naked chest was covered with thick hair, in contrast to his head, which was bald except for a fringe of dark hair that started just in front of his ears and worked its way around the back of his skull. A rounded, protruding jaw and disproportionately long arms gave him a slight resemblance to a chimpanzee.

It was bright and su

“I’m Mark Shaeffer. Mrs. Taylor asked me to see her.”

“She’s inside in the bedroom,” the man answered belligerently, as if the request was an insult. He had a can of beer in his right hand and he wiped the sweat from his chest with his left.

“Who is it?” A voice called from the rear of the house.

“She’s in the back,” the man said. Mark expected to be escorted to the bedroom, but the man went back to his ballgame, leaving Mark to search out the source of the voice.

Mrs. Taylor was a mountain of flesh propped up on a mound of pillows. Her fleshy face was the color of pale candle wax and her gray hair was unkempt. Bottles of pills and potions sat on the nightstand alongside a reading lamp and some confession magazines. A portable television set tuned to a soap opera was perched on a second nightstand.

“Sit down,” she said, indicating a chair piled high with dirty clothing. “Just push ’ em off. Make that son of a bitch husband of mine do some work.”

The last sentence was said in a voice loud enough to be heard in the rest of the house. The only sound from the living room was a broadcaster’s voice a

“I’m sorry I ain’t up. I’m under a doctor’s care.”

Mark nodded sympathetically.

“You said you had some information about Esther Pegalosi,” Mark prodded.

Esther’s mother shook her head.

“I should never have let her talk with that cop,” she said half to herself. “Cops always bring trouble.”

“What officer was that?”

“That, uh…Shindler. He’s the one who tortured her.”

“When did this ‘torture’ happen, Mrs. Taylor?”

“In ’61, when it first happened. Now she’s a big TV star. But no one came to interview me. I couldda told them a thing or two. That girl’s lyin’ cause of what he done to her.”

“What exactly did Detective Shindler do to her?”

Mrs. Taylor shut her eyes and let her head sink into the pillows. She seemed to have lost interest in the conversation.

“You got a cigarette?” she asked.

Mark shook his head and this seemed to a

“Get me one from the drawer,” she said, indicating the end table with the TV. “You can turn that thing off.”

Mark walked around the bed and switched off the set. He handed a cigarette to Mrs. Taylor, who ripped a match out of a matchbook and lit up.

“Esther was never on that hill,” she said after a moment. “They scared her so bad she’d say anything.”

“How did they scare her?”

“With the picture. You know, she had nightmares from that picture until she moved outta the house and that was years after. I was go

“What picture is this?” Mark asked, feeling himself growing impatient.

“Shindler took her to the station house and showed her a picture of that Walters kid’s face after it was bashed in. It was disgustin’. She used to wake up screaming.”

“Did you ever ask her if she had seen Richie murdered?”

“Of course. She never seen it. That’s what she said every time. Only she said Shindler tried to make her say she was there. And when she wouldn’t, he showed her the picture.”

“And this happened in 1961, right after the murders?”

“Yeah. That girl’s been brainwashed. I can tell that. Ever since she seen that picture she’s been different. Only the one thing she always denied was that she seen that boy murdered.”

“I can’t do it,” Esther cried. Shindler held her tightly, fighting down the impulse to strike her.

“It’s all lies,” she sobbed.

“It is the truth, Esther. You told me and you told Dr. Hollander. If we thought that you were lying, we wouldn’t let you testify.”

He tried to sound calm, but he had been in turmoil since her call. She was hysterical and he was afraid she would try to kill herself again. All during the harried ride to her apartment, he thought about the years of pla

“I don’t know what’s real and what you put in my head.”

“I didn’t put anything in your head, Esther. You were there…”

“No.”

“And you saw Bobby and Billy Coolidge beat Richie Walters’s head until it was a mass of blood and torn flesh…”

“No.”

“And then they took that girl and raped her and strangled her…”

Esther’s sobbing grew wilder and she began to shake.

“And you’ll testify to that, Esther…”

“Oh, God.”

“Or I’ll leave you and you’ll never see me again. Do you understand?”

He lifted her chin and made her look into his eyes. She didn’t want to. She was afraid of the fire. She could see hell there. But he forced her to look and held her chin in his hard, callused hand so that she could not avert her eyes. She wanted to die. Her body trembled and her face was tracked by tears.

“Please don’t,” she begged.

“Never see me, Esther. You’ll live alone and die alone.”

“No,” she sobbed and sank slowly to her knees, catching the thin fabric of his slacks, burying her head against his knees.

He looked down at her kneeling figure and felt only disgust.