Death Match

Lash put the transcript aside. He didn’t need to read any more: he knew exactly what it was Maureen Bowman saw.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a couple happier. It was just about the same thing, word for word, Lindsay Thorpe’s father had told him, with those hollow, haunted eyes, at the restaurant in New London. The same thing everybody had told him since.

What had gone wrong with this couple? What had happened?

Lash’s experience with pathology had two very distinct periods: first as a forensic psychologist with the FBI, studying violence after the fact; and then later, as a specialist in private practice, working with people to make sure violence never became a necessary option. He had worked very hard to keep the two worlds separate. Yet here in this house he felt them drawing together.

He dropped his gaze to the other envelope: the one imprinted Property of Eden Inc. Proprietary and Confidential. He unwound the sealing thread, opened the flap. Inside were two unlabeled videotapes. Lash slid them out, balanced one in each hand for a moment. Then he rose and walked to the television console. He turned it on, inserted one of the tapes.

A date resolved on the black screen, followed by a long scroll of numbers. And then a face appeared suddenly, larger than life: brown hair, penetrating hazel eyes, handsome. It was Lewis Thorpe, and he was smiling.

The first step in any application to Eden was to sit before a camera and answer two questions. Besides the scant biographical information, these initial tapes of the Thorpes were the only material Mauchly had supplied him with.

Lash turned his attention to the tape. He had watched it and its mate several times before. Here in the Thorpes’ own house he would watch them one last time, in hopes the surroundings would somehow render up the co

“Why are you here?” an off-camera voice was asking.

Lewis Thorpe had a frank, disarming smile. “I’m here because something is missing in my life,” he said simply.

“Describe one thing you did this morning,” the off-camera voice said. “And why you think we should know about it.”

Lewis thought for just a moment. “I finished translating a particularly difficult haiku,” he said. He waited, as if for a response. When none came, he went on. “I’ve been translating the work of Bash — o, the Japanese poet. People always think translating haiku must be easy, but in fact it’s really, really hard. It’s so dense, yet so simple. How do you capture that wealth of meaning?” He shrugged at the camera. “It’s something I started doing in grad school. I’d taken a lot of Japanese courses, and I was really taken with Bash — o’s book, Narrow Road to the Interior. It’s the story of this journey he took through Japan’s northern interior four hundred years ago. But, of course, it’s also about his own… Anyway, it’s a short work, laced with haiku. There was one in particular, a famous one, that I struggled with, kept putting off. This morning, on the taxi coming here, I finally finished it. Sounds fu

It was hard to reconcile the handsome face with that other one, shown in the police photos: the yawning mouth, the wide unseeing eyes, the dark lolling tongue.

Sudden fade to black. Lash withdrew the tape, slotted in the other.

Another scribble of numbers. Then Lindsay Thorpe appeared on the monitor, thin and blonde and deeply ta

“Why are you here?” the off-camera voice asked again.

Lindsay paused for a moment, looked away. “Because I know I can do better,” she replied after a moment.

“Describe one thing you did this morning. And why you think we should know about it.”

Lindsay looked back at the camera. And now she smiled too, displaying perfect, gleaming teeth. “That one’s easier. I took the plunge, bought my round-trip ticket to Lucerne. There’s this special tour group taking a one-week hike through the Alps. It’s kind of expensive, seemed like a bit of an extravagance, especially on top of the fee for…” Her smile turned a little shy. “Anyway, I finally decided I was worth it. I recently ended this relationship that just hadn’t been working out, and I wanted to get away, maybe get a little perspective on things.” She laughed. “So I put the ticket on my Visa this morning. Nonrefundable. I leave the first of next month.”

The tape ended. Lash removed it and shut off the player.

Five months after these interviews, the Thorpes were married. They moved here not long after. The most perfect couple anyone could remember.

Lash dropped the tapes into the envelope and started for the door. As he opened it he paused to turn back, asking once again for an answer. When the house remained silent, he shut and locked the door carefully behind him.

SIX

Cruising at thirty-five thousand feet on his way back to New York, Lash inserted his credit card into the seatback slot, plucked the air-to-ground phone from its handset, and stared at it a moment. What does an expert do when something makes no sense? he thought. Simple. You ask another expert.

His first call was to directory information; the second to a number in Putnam County, New York.

“Weisenbaum Center,” came a clipped, efficient voice.

“Dr. Goodkind, please.”

“Who may I say is calling?”

“Christopher Lash.”

“Just a minute.”

Among private psychologists, the Norman J. Weisenbaum Center for Biomedical Research was both revered and envied for the quality of its neurochemical studies. As Lash waited through ethereal, New Age music, he tried to picture the center in his mind. He knew it was located on the Hudson River about forty-five minutes north of Manhattan. No doubt beautiful, with impeccable architecture: the center was a darling of both hospitals and pharmaceutical companies, and was lavishly funded.

“Chris!” came Goodkind’s cheery voice. “I can’t believe it. I haven’t heard from you in, what, six years?”

“Must be that long.”

“How are you enjoying private practice?”

“The hours are better.”

“I’ll bet. I always wondered when you’d give up riding with the cavalry, settle down in some nice, lucrative town. You’re practicing in Fairfield, right?”

“Stamford.”

“Yes, of course. Close to Greenwich, Southport, New Canaan. All full of rich, dysfunctional couples, no doubt. Excellent choice.” Old U. Pe

“You hear much from Shirley?” Goodkind asked.

“Nope.”

“Shame you two split up. It didn’t have to do with, what, that Edmund Wyre business, did it? I read about that in the paper.”

Lash was careful to keep his voice from betraying the pain that, even three years later, mention of that name could evoke. “No, nothing like that.”

“Horrible. Horrible. Must’ve been rough on you.”

“Wasn’t easy.” Lash began to feel sorry he’d called. How could he have forgotten Goodkind’s curiosity, his love of prying into the personal affairs of others?

“I picked up that book of yours,” Goodkind said. “Congruency. Excellent stuff, though of course you were writing for the unwashed.”