Prentis

Chapter 3 of the science fiction crime thriller Freak

Freak

Chapter Three

Prentis

Abram was all-in by the time he made it home Sunday night. The family had spent the weekend in a very pricey Big Bear lakeside cabin: Abram, a drunken bundle of post-interview nerves, had recklessly outbid a group of contractors over the Internet. The isolation and gorgeous view did little to save him; all over that weekend he was plagued by inexplicable feelings of persecution, by bouts of anger, and by creeping malaise. But, once in the womb of family, he hadn’t touched a drop.

Traffic on the long drive back had moved at a crawl, with the 405 out of the Valley socked in, predictably, clear to Sunset. Compounding Abram’s misery were his wife’s on-again, off-again headaches, Archie the golden Lab’s delayed reaction to a road kill snack, and the kids’ insistence on playing ad nauseam a newly released cutesy pop CD. So his first move home was to head for his basement office, where he pulled a Tupperware thermos and chilled glass from the little Post-it-peppered refrigerator. In the thermos was pre-mixed Piña Colada, his sole mood enhancer. He automatically rewound the answering machine. Abram got a lot of calls even on weekends and holidays.

The first message was a request from Nelson Prentis for a call back. Abram fast forwarded. The requests became increasingly urgent. When he felt somewhat relaxed he set down his glass and dialed the DA’s home phone. The anxious voice broke in halfway through the first ring. “Larry?”

“I got your messages, Nelson. All of ’em.”

“Where in Christ have you been? Our man’s escaped from the del Rey substation.”

Abram sighed explosively. For a moment his skull was socked in by cement. He pushed himself forward in his chair and very steadily drained his glass. Though hairs were standing on the back of his neck, his voice was both professional and nonchalant. “Well, well. I’ll be damned. How did he do it?” Every aspect of his attention was now focused solely on his right eardrum.

“That’s what I want to know, that’s what everybody wants to know. Damn you, Larry, that’s what I’ve been calling all weekend for!” Prentis matched his friend’s sigh. “Out with it! What happened during your little in-house interview?”

Abram tried to let go. But how to describe that extraordinary meeting and still come off as a rational observer...and just why in hell should it be anybody else’s business, anyway? He was aware of a real resentment, of a spark of rage, even--but Prentis was his best friend; they’d always shared information. Abram shivered as if a cup of ice water had just been poured down his back. Being evasive would only arouse suspicion. Tell the man what he wants to know, and nothing else. Tread lightly and spin well. Abram pressed his lips against the mouthpiece, details of the interview becoming increasingly fuzzy as he spoke. Gradually his voice took on the tenor of a monotone. And the farther he allowed his mind to drift, the drier that monotone grew. “Well...I spoke with him a while, tried to get some background. He’s a really decent guy, Nellie; good sense of humor, easy to talk to. We chatted a bit about the Angels and Dodgers, just to loosen up, but he kept going back to his feelings about the poor and homeless in Venice, and how he’d like to make a real difference, if only he could. He even recited some of his quasi-utopian poetry for me; nothing groundbreaking, but definitely heartfelt. There’s a real optimist in there, buddy. Anyhow, I’ve accepted his offer of a cash retainer, so as soon as he’s back in custody I’ll be representing him.”

“About that cash--”

Abram sat bolt-upright. “I haven’t spent it, haven’t banked it, haven’t touched it! Okay? And I’m not about to divulge its whereabouts. Mr. Vilenov told me he was feeling particularly harassed, and needed someone he could trust.” He wiped his brow with a sleeve. “Anyway, I can tell you it’s unmarked, and in all denominations.”

“Now hold on a minute, Larry. When you called me on Friday you were all over the place. Remember? You kept yapping about how urgent it was to clear this guy, and we never did get around to the money’s origins. You wanted me to understand what a nice guy he was, and how very important it was that he be released immediately. Jesus. You begged me to talk to the Chief, then to go to the mayor. You even asked me to lean on the station. You worked in every argument you knew before appealing directly, and shamelessly, to the strength of our friendship. What a daft speech.” Abram could almost feel Prentis shaking his head with amusement. “You must’ve been drunk off your a*s, buddy.”

With the sudden relaxation in tension Abram’s entire body crashed, leaving him limp and spent in his chair. He tried to jog his memory. It was like poking a bruise. “I...I don’t remember a whole lot about that conversation, Nellie. Just you getting hot.”

“Don’t call me like that at the office again, period. Enough said. So. Where did you go after you hung up?”

“I had to get away, Nelson, and fast. Don’t ask me why. You know the family does Big Bear twice a year. I decided to make it three times this year.”

“Okay, my friend. That gap is filled. Now for the sixty-four thousand dollar question--and same as always: totally off the record. I’ll concede to keeping the money’s whereabouts your little secret. Just tell me, Larry. Tell me. How does some guy off the street, with no social security card and no visible means of support, acquire the cash to hire one of the county’s top defense attorneys? Come on, already. Give.”

Abram’s features twitched and his voice again waxed monotonic. His eyes slowly glazed while his mind dealt out words and images in real time. His flat, nearly unbroken speech was occasionally punctuated by increasingly skeptical “Mm-hmm!”s from his friend.

“Said it was his father’s legacy. Apparently papa didn’t trust banks. The old man was a local salvager and handyman who humped like a dog day and night, saving all he could. He stashed this cash away for over twenty years, working himself right into the grave in the process. Told the boy its location on his deathbed. Ever since, Mr. Vilenov’s lived frugally in the South Bay, eking out his means by sleeping on the beach and accepting a meal every now and then at St. John’s. He works off and on, sweeping up and such, for small cash, but he’s never had bona fide, gainful employment. He also scavenges for cans and bottles around the Marina, making a few bucks a day. Let’s see now...what else? Well, he likes Jesus and small animals, sailboats and roller skates. Never married, no dependents. He was totally in the dark about the Purly incident, and blushed like a schoolgirl when I explained the charges in depth.

“It seems Purly took pity on him one day, when she found him shivering in his old sleeping bag on the beach. She hired him, out of kindness, to do small jobs around her apartment, and let him use her shower once a week. She cooked his meals and sewed up his tattered old jeans. It gave her purpose, Nelson. Eventually a friendship grew around their common needs, though it never progressed beyond the platonic. He’s way too shy. All the same, he feels very protective toward her.”

There was a long pause. Abram tapped on the mouthpiece, wondering if the line was dead.

“Larry,” came the DA’s careful voice. “You and I are not talking about the same guy here.”

“I interviewed him, Nelson. Not you.”

“So you did. But the man I’m discussing is a fugitive, has been filmed receiving fellatio from a completely confused woman, and has, on looks alone, launched a reign of terror among the South Bay’s female population.”

Abram whistled softly and pulled at his drink. Ron Rico rum, light. Very tropical, very soothing. “That’s some pretty tough stuff, Nelson. Sure he’s a fugitive. But the real issue here is station security, right? You yourself said you don’t have the slightest. If I’d been jailed without cause proper, and I was scared, and somebody left the gate open, well...I might walk too. I don’t know.”

“He’s still a fugitive. And there were a total of six other prisoners detained at the time of his disappearance, none nearly as charming as you make your boy out to be. For some reason they’re all still in custody.”

“And how do these gentlemen account for Mr. Vilenov’s absence?”

“They can’t. They don’t have the foggiest.”

Abram snorted. “So there you go. They don’t know, you don’t know, I don’t know. What do you want from me?”

“A little insight, Larry. For instance, there’s the very graphic video evidence of a man suspected of being a serial rapist, caught on camera in the act of sodomizing a woman--”

“Marilyn Purly is not a witness to anything! She’s a total space case. And the taped evidence we went over prior to my interview with Mr. Vilenov is inadmissible and wholly inconclusive, and you know it. Even were it admissible, how would we establish just whose ugly butt that was? How could we be certain those people on the tape are not actors, and the front room not a set?”

“The tape is a live recording, not a dupe. You know that. And why wait until now to bring this up? What’s happening to you, man?”

“Nelson, this whole thing is bogus! What proof can you offer that a pre-recorded tape wasn’t inserted and its signal exported to your surveillance equipment?” Abram’s smile was pugilistic. “Nelson, old buddy, old pal o’ mine, how in the world do you plan to elicit testimony from a site where all who were present can’t remember a thing?”

“Ah, Jesus.”

“Give me a break, Mr. Prosecutor. You don’t usually reach like this. Oh--and what was that other little thing? A panic in the city? Vilenov runs amok?”

Abram could hear the DA’s fingertips drumming on his broad oak desk. “Let me guess, Larry. A couple of ’Coladas?”

“Just the one,” Abram said, reaching for the thermos. “Make that two. It’s still the weekend.” He filled his glass. “But seriously, what were you saying about a scare?”

“Haven’t you turned on the TV? Can’t you find a newspaper rack?”

“Like I told you, I’ve been camping.”

“Okay then. Let me fill you in. After Vilenov escaped, every man at that station was disemboweled, yet not one claimed to have a clue. They’ve all been relieved, and an interim crew set up in their place. Right off the bat that turned out to be a bad idea; the new man in charge didn’t handle the transition at all well. He allowed s**t to slip through that the regulars at del Rey would never let get by. That station’s solid, and proud of it. And even as this new man’s busy tucking in butts, a bunch of innocuous little events are turning the mess into a disaster.

“Seems this fellow tenant of Purly’s, a Frederick Mars, called Channel 5 on the day of Vilenov’s arrest. He felt your prospective client was getting a raw deal by being set up. Mars was the sole holdout in that tenants’ committee I told you about. An intern at Channel 5, one Miss Chica Hernandez, took Mars’s phone call and got her hands on the station’s copy of the committee’s petition. Smelling a story, she starts making phone calls.”

“So what did Mars see that made him--”

“Wait. It gets better. Turns out Chica’s boyfriend is a junior deputy temping at the Marina substation, and this deputy leaks that there’s a shakeup because of an escape. He only knows it was some spooky guy brought into custody that day, but Chica puts two and two together, and drives out to see her boyfriend on his break. Here the details get a bit fuzzy, but it’s certain that intrepid little Chica somehow got a look at Vilenov’s mug shot, popped a camera out of her purse during a distraction, and sashayed into 5’s studio with a full-face snapshot of Vilenov. The station ran the shot with a byline by Chica herself on the six o’clock, and by six-fifteen the station was so inundated with phone calls they had to bring in extra operators.

“It turns out that Vilenov, Larry, is no stranger to a whole lot of people, nearly all of them women. By seven o’clock every TV station, every radio talk show, and every newspaper was fielding reports of past abuses. The L.A. media are absolutely infatuated with the man who’s come to be known as ‘The Houdini Rapist’.”

Abram picked up his TV’s remote unit, switched on the set and hit the mute button.

Immediately the ice-cold visage of Nicolas Vilenov slammed him back in his chair. It was like taking a spike in the forehead. He switched channels. This time a talking head had center stage, and the booking photo was in an upper right-hand corner inset. He tried another channel. Vilenov, full screen. He clicked again. Vilenov. Abram began surfing channels rapidly, and Vilenov’s face became a magic lantern image, animated by his leaping thumb. The screen’s erratic details were incorporated into a jerky blur; all that remained constant were Vilenov’s steady, piercing eyes. Abram hit the off button. Though the screen instantly went dark, two pale gray orbs lingered in the field. The orbs dimmed and passed.

“Larry?”

“I’m here, Nelson.”

“By eight o’clock that evening Purly’s apartment complex is a rubberneck’s Mecca, and everybody who couldn’t make the party is at home glued to the tube; primed, reamed, and ready for the next player in their chain of fascination. Enter the dragon.

“This particular reptile steps on stage as the buildings’ landlady--a great beast of a woman who insists all queries concerning ‘her property’ and ‘her people’ be directed solely to Her. Larry, she’s the security guard from Hell; partitioning the public, eyeballing everybody, demanding credentials. The media love her. She’s got this carnival-like, palm reader quality. A born storyteller. And when she gets on TV--this big fat woman with all the braids and the gestures and the eighteen pounds of junk jewelry--the camera just can’t get enough of her. She starts right off with tales of the macabre; you know the sort: porch bulbs flickering, demonic laughter, black cats arching and hissing, and anybody with ten minutes and a television is spellbound. Next morning, Saturday, she sets up this big table with a black and gold zodiacal tablecloth, right in front of her apartment by the sidewalk. Suddenly you’d think you were at Woodstock. The nonstop weekend flow is a nightmare for law enforcement, but it’s this landlady’s fifteen minutes, and she knows that so long as she’s on her own property she’s free to make the most of it. She’s a canny one, Larry. Right after this whole big scene broke she was approached with options for T-shirts and mugs and the like, but she knew she had to keep face. So the old fraud claimed she was above making a quick buck, swearing her only object was to exorcise her buildings. Apparently she covertly employed a concessions manager, because that same afternoon her wares were popping up all over the place. And once reporters went after her puppet tenants she jumped right on them. In a jiffy she had them all under her umbrella, making sure they said exactly what she wanted; always passing the ball, always referring to her as ‘Ma’am’. She’s grooming these tenants for the media, Larry. They’re ordinary folks; retirees, college kids, welfare mothers--people who’ve never in their lives imagined so much excitement, and who are all so conditioned, and so camera-shy, they’ll say whatever she wants if it’ll get them out of the spotlight. And once they’ve stammered themselves dry, there’s this great, pregnant silence. The matriarch rises ominously from her extra-large folding steel throne, the sole focus of every lens. Then, speaking to the camera in measured tones, she tells all the rapt little housewives exactly what they want to hear: the Devil is stalking them; an invisible, irresistible, horny as all get-out satyr who’s going to mesmerize them--remove their Christian guilt complexes, if you will--by forcing them to orgasm while their indifferent hubbies are off pursuing silicone secretaries. A sense of infidelity, just like in fantasy, becomes okay if you’re not responsible. It’s all very primal: poor helpless woman raped by nasty monster. And digs it! You know what I’m talking about, buddy? The ‘victim’s’ sexual gratification justified. But where was maritally-celibate, totally inconsiderate husband when Evil Rapist was repeatedly doing oh-so innocent, frantically humping housewife? Who knows? Ask his bimbo secretary.”

Abram had to break in. “Nelson, on most days I’d be more than happy to entertain a twisted philosophy based on a daily dose of assaultive scumbags and the women who love them, but--”

“But...back to our story: Dissatisfied housewives are descending en masse on the landlady’s table, as giddy with the moment as she. Sex is in the air. Local ratings skyrocket. And believe me, it sure doesn’t hurt that this Marilyn Purly is a total knockout. Yet the only relevant issue is some at-large pervert who’s about to be lionized by a retentive society--turned into a romantic figure hunted by a world so uptight with its own sexual repression it’s almost horny for a Judas goat.”

“Remarry, Nelson, remarry! I must have told you a thousand times. You were never like this when you had an anchor.”

“Larry, I’m putting it straight for you: there’s a real danger of this jerk being turned into a kind of modern, persecuted Don Juan. They’ll airbrush his booking photo--Oprah and her ilk will present him as the prey instead of the predator. And the ‘You go, girl; you vent against that evil Mr. Rapist’ mindset will quickly peter out. Why? Because the housewives aren’t really mad at this sick prick. They’re pissed at a very witting evil: the hubbies who somewhere along the line lost interest in them. They’ll transfer. Just you watch. In an almost surreal way they’ll get back at hubby and his hypothetical office bimbo by rooting for the rapist.”

“Alleged rapist,” Abram sighed. “Now look, Nelson, I’ll concede Vilenov’s no pretty boy, and I’ll even admit the public’s reaction is understandable, but there’ll be a real backlash to all this dumping on some poor guy just because of his looks. You’re right on one count, but for the wrong reason. What we’ve genuinely got here is a martyr in the making. When he’s brought in, and the public gets a peek at the gentleman behind the image, he’s not gonna be the heavy.” He sipped thoughtfully, and found his drink oversweet. “And yes, there’ll be lawsuits.”

“Okay, buddy. You can address your flocks whenever you’re ready. Right now, Vilenov’s a fugitive, and that’s all that matters. And when he’s apprehended, Larry, I know you’ll be right there on the tube with me, and you’ll speak eloquently on his behalf. And a big part of me prays you’re right--that the complaints of all these women are much ado about nothing. But if what I know in my heart is true, I’m gonna see this ugly SOB put away permanently. Excuse me, Larry, but was that chocolate milk and Newsweek your little angel picked up at Barry’s on his way to Purly’s? You go ahead and argue all you want about videotape and testimony to the contrary. But I’m gonna tell you something man-to-man here: your client stinks like s**t warmed over. And if you really intend to represent him, you’d better make damned sure he saved all that cash he says his daddy left behind. He’ll need it. Every cell in my body tells me he’s going down, and for good.”

“Okay, Nelson. Point made.”

“So what’s your move?”

“I’d like to interview Purly while her memories are fresh.”

“They’ll still be collecting samples.”

“And there’s that holdout tenant.”

“Frederick Mars, no middle. Upstairs in the twin building. Number 11.”

Abram took it down in his notepad.

“You might also touch bases with Scarboro. But I’m warning you, right up front, to be extremely critical of anything you get from her.”

“I’m always critical.”

“I know you are, buddy. Thanks for the call-back. And let me know your read on that whole daffy setup.”

Abram put down the receiver, killed what was left in the thermos, and switched on the TV. Vilenov’s face leaped right out at him. Abram instantly muted the sound and pushed himself out of his chair. Halfway to the refrigerator he stopped, disturbed by the way Vilenov’s projected eyes seemed to be following him across the room. He tiptoed to the wall plate and switched off the light.

Now the darkened room was lit only by the pallid face of Nicolas Vilenov with its floating gray eyes. The eyes followed him back to his chair, watched him recline, held him where he sat. A sudden psychotic loathing remade Abram’s expression, cramped his fingers and toes and radiated throughout his body. For a moment he couldn’t breathe or swallow. He wanted to smash something, kill somebody. His hand, flailing on the table, came back holding the slim remote unit. He raised it slowly and aimed it at the set. The eyes tugged at him, swelling in their sockets.

Abram hit the off button and the room plunged into utter darkness.

“Bang,” he said.