Shock II Page 12

  'He tried to jump,' she said, 'He tried to kill himself.' Her voice was fitful, hoarse.

  'All right.' Jennings drew away the rigid quiver of her arms and tried to raise Lang's head. Peter gasped, recoiling from his touch, and bound himself again into a ball of limbs and torso. Jennings stared at his constricted form. Almost in horror, he watched the crawl of muscles in Peter's back and shoulders. Snakes seemed to writhe beneath the sun-darkened skin.

  'How long has he been like this?' he asked.

  'I don't know.' Her face was a mask of anguish. 'I don't know.'

  'Go in the living room and pour yourself a drink,' her father ordered, 'I'll take care of him.'

  'He tried to jump right through the window.'

  'Patricia…'

  She began to cry and Jennings turned away; tears were what she needed. Once again, he tried to uncurl the inflexible knot of Peter's body. Once again, the young man gasped and shrank away from him.

  'Try to relax,' said Jennings, 'I want to get you on your bed.'

  No,' said Peter, his voice a pain-thickened whisper.

  'I can't help you, boy, unless - '

  Jennings stopped, his face gone blank. In an instant, Lang's body had lost its rigidity. His legs were straightening out, his arms were slipping from their tense position at his face. A stridulous breath swelled out his lungs.

  Peter raised his head.

  The sight made Jennings gasp. If ever a face could be described as tortured, it was Lang's. Darkly bearded, bloodless, stark-eyed, it was the face of a man enduring inexplicable torment.

  'What is it?' Jennings asked, appalled.

  Peter grinned; it was the final, hideous touch that made the doctor shudder. 'Hasn't Patty told you?' Peter, answered.

  'Told me what?'

  Peter hissed, apparently amused. 'I'm being hexed,' he said, 'Some scrawny - '

  'Darling, don't,' begged Pat.

  'What are you talking about?' demanded Jennings.

  'Drink?' asked Peter. 'Darling?'

  Patricia pushed unsteadily to her feet and started for the living room. Jennings helped Lang to his bed.

  'What's this all about?' he asked.

  Lang fell back heavily on his pillow. 'What I said,' he answered, 'Hexed. Cursed. Witch doctor.' He snickered feebly. 'Bastard's killing me. Been three months now - almost since Patty and I met.'

  'Are you -?' Jennings started.

  'Codeine ineffectual,' said Lang, 'Even morphine -got some. Nothing.' He sucked in at the air. 'No fever, no chills. No symptoms for the AMA. Just - someone killing me.' He peered up through slitted eyes. 'Funny?'

  ''Are you serious ?'

  Peter snorted. 'Who the hell knows?' he said, 'Maybe it's delirium tremens. God knows I've drunk enough today to - ' The tangle of his dark hair rustled on the pillow as he looked towards the window. 'Hell, it's night,' he said. He turned back quickly. 'Time?' he asked.

  'After ten,' said Jennings, 'What about -?'

  'Thursday, isn't it?' asked Lang.

  Jennings stared at him.

  'No, I see it isn't.' Lang started coughing dryly. 'Drink!' he called. As his gaze jumped towards the doorway, Jennings glanced across his shoulder. Patricia was back.

  'It's all spilled,' she said, her voice like that of a frightened child.

  'All right, don't worry,' muttered Lang, 'Don't need it. I'll be dead soon anyway.'

  'Don't talk like that!'

  'Honey, I'd be glad to die right now,' said Peter, staring at the ceiling. His broad chest hitched unevenly as he breathed. 'Sorry, darling, I don't mean it. Uh-oh, here we go again.' He spoke so mildly that his seizure caught them by surprise.

  Abruptly, he was floundering on the bed, his muscle-knotted legs kicking like pistons, his arms clamped down across the drumhide tautness of his face. A noise like the shrilling of a violin wavered in his throat, and Jennings saw saliva running from the corners of his mouth. Turning suddenly, the doctor lurched across the room for his bag.

  Before he'd reached it, Peter's thrashing body had fallen from the bed. The young man reared up, screaming, on his face the wide-mouthed, slavering frenzy of an animal. Patricia tried to hold him back but, with a snarl, he shoved her brutally side and staggered for the window.

  Jennings met him with the hypodermic. For several moments, they were locked in reeling struggle, Peter's distended, teeth-bared face inches from the doctor's, his vein corded hands scrabbling for Jennings' throat. He cried out hoarsely as the needle pierced his skin and, springing backwards, lost his balance, fell. He tried to stand, his crazed eyes looking towards the window. Then the drug was in his blood and he was sitting with the flaccid posture of a rag doll. Torpor glazed his eyes. 'Bastard's killing me,' he muttered.

  They laid him on the bed and covered up the sluggish twitching of his body.

  'Killing me,' said Lang, 'Black bastard.'

  'Does he really believe this?' Jennings asked.

  'Father, look at him,' she answered.

  'You believe it too?'

  'I don't know.' She shook her head impotently. 'All I know is that I've seen him change from what he was to - this. He isn't sick, Father. There's nothing wrong with him.' She shuddered. 'Yet he's dying.'

  'Why didn't you call me sooner?'

  'I couldn't,' she said, 'I was afraid to leave him for a second.'

  Jennings drew his fingers from the young man's fluttering pulse. 'Has he been examined at all?'

  She nodded tiredly. 'Yes,' she answered, 'When it started getting worse, he went to see a specialist. He thought, perhaps his brain - ' She shook her head. 'There's nothing wrong with him.'

  'But why does he say he's being -?' Jennings found himself unable to speak the word.

  'I don't know,' she said, 'Sometimes, he seems to believe it. Mostly he jokes about it.'

  'But on what grounds -?'

  'Some incident on his last safari,' said Patricia, 'I don't really know what happened. Some - Zulu native threatened him; said he was a witch doctor and was going to - ' Her voice broke into a wracking sob. 'Oh, God, how can such a thing be true? How can it happen ?'

  'The point, I think, is whether Peter, actually, believes it's happening,' said Jennings. He turned to Lang. 'And, from the look of him - '

  'Father, I've been wondering if -' Patricia swallowed. 'If maybe Doctor Howell could help him.'

  Jennings stared at her for a moment. Then he said, 'You do believe it, don't you?'

  'Father, try to understand.' There was a trembling undertone of panic in her voice, 'You've only seen Peter now and then. I've watched it happening to him almost day by day. Something is destroying him! I don't know what it is, but I'll try anything to stop it. Anything.'

  'All right.' He pressed a reassuring hand against her back. 'Go phone while I examine him.'

  After she'd gone into the living room - the telephone connected in the bedroom had been ripped from the wall - Jennings drew the covers down and looked at Peter's bronzed and muscular body. It was trembling with minute vibrations - as if, within the chemical imprisoning of the drug, each separate nerve still pulsed and throbbed.

  Jennings clenched his teeth in vague distress. Somewhere, at the core of his perception, where the rationale of science had yet to filter, he sensed that medical inquiry would be pointless. Still, he felt distaste for what Patricia might be setting up. It went against the grain of learned acceptance. It offended mentality.

  It, also, frightened him.

  The drug's effect was almost gone now, Jennings saw. Ordinarily, it would have rendered Lang unconscious for six to eight hours. Now - in forty minutes - he was in the living room with them, lying on the sofa in his bathrobe, saying, 'Patty, it's ridiculous. What good's another doctor going to do?'

  'All right then, it's ridiculous!' she said, 'What would you like for us to do - just stand around and watch you -?' She couldn't finish.

  'Shhh.' Lang stroked her hair with trembling fingers. 'Patty, Patty. Hang on, darling. Maybe I can beat it.'


  'You're going to beat it.' Patricia kissed his hand. 'It's both of us, Peter. I won't go on without you.'

  'Don't you talk like that.' Lang twisted on the sofa. 'Oh, Christ, it's starting up again.' He forced a smile.

  'No, I'm all right,' he told her, 'Just - crawly, sort of.' His smile flared into a sudden grimace of pain. 'So this Doctor Howell is going to solve my problem, is he? How?'

  Jennings saw Patricia bite her lip. 'It's a - her, darling,' she told Lang.

  'Great,' he said. He twitched convulsively. 'That's what we need. What is she, a chiropractor?'

  'She's an anthropologist.'

  'Dandy. What's she going to do, explain the ethnic origins of superstition to me?' Lang spoke rapidly as if trying to outdistance pain with words.

  'She's been to Africa,' said Pat, 'She - '

  'So have I,' said Peter, 'Great place to visit. Just don't screw around with witch doctors.' His laughter withered to a gasping cry. 'Oh, God, you scrawny, black bastard, if I had you here!' His hands clawed out as if to throttle some invisible assailant.

  'I beg your pardon - '

  They turned in surprise. A young Negro woman was looking down at them from the entrance hall.

  'There was a card on the door,' she said.

  'Of course; we'd forgotten.' Jennings was on his feet now. He heard Patricia whispering to Lang, 'I meant to tell you. Please don't be biased.' Peter looked at her sharply, his expression even more surprised now. 'Biased?' he said.

  Jennings and his daughter moved across the room.

  'Thank you for coming.' Patricia pressed her cheek to Dr. Howell's.

  'It's nice to see you, Pat,' said Dr. Howell. She smiled across Patricia's shoulder at the doctor.

  'Had you any trouble getting here?' he asked.

  'No, no, the subway never fails me.' Lurice Howell unbuttoned her coat and turned as Jennings reached to help her. Pat looked at the overnight bag that Lurice had set on the floor, then glanced at Peter.

  Lang did not take his eyes from Lurice Howell as she approached him, flanked by Pat and Jennings.

  'Peter, this is Dr. Howell,' said Pat, 'She and I went to Columbia together. She teaches anthropology at City College.'

  Lurice smiled. 'Good evening,' she said.

  'Not so very,' Peter answered. From the corners of his eyes Jennings saw the way Patricia stiffened.

  Dr. Howell's expression did not alter. Her voice remained the same. 'And who's the scrawny, black bastard you wish you had here?' she asked.

  Peter's face went momentarily blank. Then, his teeth clenched against the pain, he answered, 'What's that supposed to mean?'

  'A question,' said Lurice.

  'If you're planning to conduct a seminar on race relations, skip it,' muttered Lang, 'I'm not in the mood.'

  'Peter.'

  He looked at Pat through pain-filmed eyes. 'What do you want?' he demanded, 'You're already convinced I'm prejudiced, so - ' He dropped his head back on the sofa arm and jammed his eyes shut. 'Jesus, stick a knife in me,' he rasped.

  The straining smile had gone from Dr. Howell's lips. She glanced at Jennings gravely as he spoke. 'I've examined him,' he told her, 'There's not a sign of physical impairment, not a hint of brain injury.'

  'How should there be?' she answered, quietly, 'It's not disease. It's juju.'

  Jennings stared at her. 'You - '

  'There we go,' said Peter, hoarsely, 'Now we've got it.' He was sitting up again, whitened fingers digging at the cushions. 'That's the answer. Juju:

  'Do you doubt it?' asked Lurice.

  'I doubt it.'

  'The way you doubt your prejudice?'

  'Oh, Jesus. God: Lang filled his lungs with a guttural, sucking noise. 'I was hurting and I wanted something to hate so I picked on that lousy savage to - ' He fell back heavily. 'The hell with it. Think what you like.' He clamped a palsied hand across his eyes. 'Just let me die. Oh, Jesus, Jesus God, sweet Jesus, let me die.' Suddenly, he looked at Jennings. 'Another shot?' he begged.

  'Peter, your heart can't - '

  'Damn my heart!' Peter's head was rocking back and forth now. 'Half strength then! You can't refuse a dying man!'

  Pat jammed the edge of a shaking fist against her lips, trying not to cry.

  'Please!' said Peter.

  After the injection had taken effect, Lang slumped back, his face and neck soaked with perspiration. 'Thanks,' he gasped. His pale lips twitched into a smile as Patricia knelt beside him and began to dry his face with a towel. 'Greetings, love,' he muttered. She couldn't speak.

  Peter's hooded eyes turned to Dr. Howell. 'All right, I'm sorry, I apologize,' he told her curtly. 'I thank you for coming, but I don't believe it.'

  'Then why is it working?' asked Lurice.

  'I don't even know what's happening!' snapped Lang.

  'I think you do,' said Dr. Howell, an urgency rising in her voice, 'And I know, Mr. Lang. Juju is the most fearsome pagan sorcery in the world. Centuries of mass belief alone would be enough to give it terrifying power. It has that power, Mr. Lang. You know it does.'

  'And how do you know, Dr. Howell?' he countered.

  'When I was twenty-two,' she said, 'I spent a year in a Zulu village doing field work for my Ph.D. While I was there, the ngombo took a fancy to me and taught me almost everything she knew.'

  'Ngombo?' asked Patricia.

  'Witch doctor,' said Peter, in disgust.

  'I thought witch doctors were men,' said Jennings.

  'No, most of them are women,' said Lurice, 'Shrewd, observant women who work very hard at their profession.'

  'Frauds,' said Peter.

  Lurice smiled at him. 'Yes,' she said, 'They are. Frauds. Parasites. Loafers. Scaremongers. Still - ' Her smile grew hard. ' - What do you suppose is making you feel as if a thousand spiders were crawling all over you?'

  For the first time since he'd entered the apartment, Jennings saw a look of fear on Peter's face. ' You know that?' Peter asked her.

  'I know everything you're going through,' said Dr. Howell, 'I've been through it myself.'

  'When?' demanded Lang. There was no derogation in his voice now.

  'During that year,' said Dr. Howell, 'A witch doctor from a nearby village put a death curse on me. Kuringa saved me from it.'

  'Tell me,' said Peter, breaking in on her. Jennings noticed that the young man's breath was quickening. It appalled him to realize that the second injection was already beginning to lose its effect.

  'Tell you what?' said Lurice, 'About the long-nailed fingers scraping at your insides? About the feeling that you have to pull yourself into a ball in order to crush the snake uncoiling in your belly?'

  Peter gaped at her.

  'The feeling that your blood has turned to acid?' said Lurice, 'That, if you move, you'll crumble because your bones have all been sucked hollow?'

  Peter's lips began to shake.

  'The feeling that your brain is being eaten by a pack of furry rats? That your eyes are just about to melt and dribble down your cheeks like jelly? That -?'

  'That's enough.' Lang's body seemed to jolt as he shuddered so spasmodically.

  'I only said these things to convince you that I know,' said Lurice, 'I remember my own pain as if I'd suffered it this morning instead of seven years ago. I can help you if you'll let me, Mr. Lang. Put aside your scepticism. You do believe it or it couldn't hurt you, don't you see that?'

  'Darling, please,' said Patricia.

  Peter looked at her. Then his gaze moved back to Dr. Howell.

  'We mustn't wait much longer, Mr. Lang,' she warned.

  'All right!' He closed his eyes. 'All right then, try. I sure as hell can't get any worse.'

  'Quickly,' begged Patricia.

  'Yes.' Lurice Howell turned and walked across the room to get her overnight bag.

  It was as she picked it up that Jennings saw the look cross her face - as if some formidable complication had just occurred to her. She glanced at them. 'Pat,' she said.
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br />   'Yes.'

  'Come here a moment.'

  Patricia pushed up hurriedly and moved to her side. Jennings watched them for a moment before his eyes shifted to Lang. The young man was starting to twitch again. It's coming, Jennings thought. Juju is the most fearsome pagan sorcery in the world -

  'What?'

  Jennings glanced at the women. Pat was staring at Dr. Howell in shock.

  'I'm sorry,' said Lurice, 'I should have told you from the start, but there wasn't any opportunity.'

  Pat hesitated. 'It has to be that way?' she asked.

  'Yes. It does.'

  Patricia looked at Peter with a questioning apprehension in her eyes. Abruptly, then, she nodded. 'All right,' she said, 'but hurry:

  Without another word, Lurice Howell went into the bedroom. Jennings watched his daughter as she looked intently at the door behind which the Negro woman had closeted herself. He could not fathom the meaning of her look. For now the fear in Pat's expression was of a different sort.

  The bedroom door opened and Dr. Howell came out. Jennings, turning from the sofa, caught his breath. Lurice was naked to the waist and garbed below with a skirt composed of several coloured handkerchiefs knotted together. Her legs and feet were bare. Jennings gaped at her. The blouse and skirt she'd worn had revealed nothing of her voluptuous breasts, the sinuous abundance of her hips. Suddenly conscious of his blatant observation, Jennings turned his eyes towards Pat. Her expression, as she stared at Dr. Howell, was unmistakable now.

  Jennings looked back at Peter. Due to its masking of pain, the young man's face was more difficult to read.

  'Please understand, I've never done this before,' said Lurice, embarrassed by their staring silence.

  'We understand,' said Jennings, once more unable to take his eyes from her.

  A bright red spot was painted on each of her tawny cheeks and, over her twisted, twine-held hair, she wore a helmet-like plume of feathers, each of a chestnut hue with a vivid white eye at the tip. Her breasts thrust out from a tangle of necklaces made of animals' teeth, skeins of brightly coloured yarn, beads, and strips of snake skin. On her left arm - banded at the bicep with a strip of angora fleece - was slung a small shield of dappled oxhide.

  The contrast between the bag and her outfit was marked enough. The effect of her appearance in the Manhattan duplex created a ripple of indefinable dread in Jennings as she moved towards them with a shy, almost childlike defiance - as if her shame were balanced by a knowledge of her physical wealth. Jennings was startled to see that her stomach was tattooed, hundreds of tiny welts forming a design of concentric circles around her navel.