Reprisal

"Forensics go over him?"

"Yeah. Scraped his fingernails, vacuumed his clothes, the works." t

"He's beep Miranda'd?"

"About three times, in front of witnesses."

"And he hasn't asked for an attorney?"

"He hasn't even asked to take a pee. He don't speak and don't do a goddam thing you tell him to, but watch this."

The cop pulled Lom to his feet and he stood there without moving. He pushed him back into the chair and he stayed seated. He got Lom up on his feet again and pulled him forward. After a couple of stumbling steps he began to walk in a straight line. The cop let him go and he kept on walking, right into a wall. Then he stopped walking and stood with his face against the wall.

"Guy's a fucking robot."

Re

"This him?" he asked the priest when he arrived.

Father Ryan's gentle features twisted into a snarl.

"You filthy—!

He lunged for Lom's throat and it took everything Kolarcik and the other uniform had to hold him back. Lorn didn't even flinch.

The cop was right: Lorn was like a fucking robot.

"I'll put that down as a positive ID," Re

As the priest was led away, Re

"Take our friend down to the emergency room and have them give him the once-over. I don't want anyone saying we didn't see to his medical needs while he was in custody."

He glanced at his watch. Two A.M. Christmas already. And he hadn't called Joa

He hurried to a phone.

The ER doc caught up to Re

"Hey, Lieutenant—"

"It's sergeant."

"Okay—Sergeant. Where the hell did you find that guy?"

This doc was young, in his thirties, had long dark hair, an earring on the right, and a neat beard. Looked like a rabbi. The name-tag on his white coat said A. STEIN, M.D.

"Lorn? We've got him for attempted murder. Maybe murder, too, if we ever find his wife, so… Why are you shaking your head?"

"There's no way your Mr. Lorn is going to stand trial for anything."

Re

"He died?"

"Might as well have. He's as good as brain dead."

"Bullshit! He's faking it, acting like he's got that disease, cata—cata-something."

"Catatonia. But he's not catatonic. And he's not faking. You can't fake what he's got."

"So what's he got?"

Stein scratched his beard. "I'm not sure yet. But I'll tell you one thing: His neurological exam puts him on a level somewhere between an earthworm and a turnip."

"Thanks, Doc," Re

Stein's reddening face told Re

"Okay, wiseass. You come with me. I want to show you a few things."

Re

"Where's Havens?"

"The cop? I sent him for coffee."

"You left a suspect here alone?" Re

"Mr. Lom's not going anywhere," Stein said. He pulled a penlight from his coat pocket and stepped around to the far side of the gurney. "Come on over here and take a look at this."

Re

"Look at his pupils. Look how wide they are." Stein flashed the beam of his penlight into each eye, back and forth, one and then the other. "See any change in them?"

The pupils didn't move a hair.

"Fixed and dilated," Stein said. "Now watch this."

He touched his finger to Lom's left eyeball. Re

"You don't need a medical degree to know that's not normal," Stein said. "Now check this out. Watch his eyes."

He grabbed Lom's head with both hands, one at the chin and one at the crown, and rotated it back and forth a few times, then moved it up and down like a nodding marionette. Lom's eyes never moved in his head; his gaze remained fixed straight ahead, staring whichever way he was turned.

"We call that 'doll's eyes.' It means his brain's in deep shit. He's got no higher brain function—nothing above the brain stem, if that much. He's a turnip."

"And he couldn't be faking it?" Re

"No way."

"How about drugs? What'd the blood tests show?"

Stein looked away. "We didn't do any."

"You mean to tell me you've got a guy you're calling brain dead and you haven't checked to see if he's full of H or blow or ice?"

"We couldn't get any blood out of him," Stein said, still looking away.

An icy-fingered hand began a slow walk down Re

"Oh, shit. Not another one."

"You know about the kid too?" Stein said, looking at him now. "I guess everybody in the hospital's heard. What the hell's going on, Sergeant? Somebody brings in a bloodless mutilated kid who can't be anesthetized, and you cops bring in this… this zombie with no pulse, no blood pressure, no heartbeat, yet he sits, stands, and walks. I couldn't find any blood anywhere in him—I even stuck his femoral artery, or at least where I thought his femoral artery should be. We cathed his bladder for urine but wound up with a dry tap. This is getting scary."

"Maybe he's brain damaged," Re

Stein brightened.

"We can do better than that. We can get an MR—and we can get it stat."

Re

"You're not fooling me, pal," he whispered as he leaned over him. "I'm going to break up your little game and see that you pay for what you did to that kid."

Re

Re

Which was just great. As if this case weren't already twisted enough, he had to have some Houdini-type trance artist as a prime suspect.

Stein came down the hall and dropped into the seat next to him. He was carrying a pair of X rays. He didn't look so good but he managed a smile.

"Standing guard?" Stein said.

"Actually, I'm sitting."

Re

Sounded like Star Trek stuff to Re

"I'm telling you, Sergeant, Mr. Lom is not going to take a walk. Anywhere."

"And I'm telling you he gri

"Uh-uh. That was a random muscle twitch."