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When The Bough Breaks

On the eighth day of this funereal existence Milo appeared at the door wanting to ask me questions. He held a notepad in his hands, just like an analyst. Only he didn't look like an analyst: a big, droopy, shaggy haired fellow in slept - in clothes.

"Dr. Alex Delaware?" He held up his badge.

"Yes."

He introduced himself and stared at me. I was dressed in a ratty yellow bathrobe. My untrimmed beard had reached rabbinic proportions and my hair looked like electrified Brillo. Despite thirteen hours of sleep I looked and felt drowsy.

"I hope I'm not disturbing you, Doctor. Your office referred me to your home number, which was out of order."

I let him in and he sat down, scanning the place. Foot - high stacks of unopened mail littered the dining room table. The house was dark, drapes drawn, and smelled stale. "Days of Our Lives" flickered on the tube.

He rested his notepad on one knee and told me the interview was a formality for the coroner's inquest. Then he had me rehash the night I'd found the body, interrupting to clarify a point, scratching and jotting and staring. It was tediously procedural and my mind wandered often, so that he had to repeat his questions. Sometimes I talked so softly he asked me to repeat my answers.

After twenty minutes he asked:

"Doctor, are you all right?"

"I'm fine." Unconvincingly.

"Oka - ay." He shook his head, asked a few more questions, then put his pencil down and laughed nervously.

"You know I feel kind of funny asking a doctor how he feels."

"Don't worry about it."

He resumed questioning me and, even through the haze, I could see he had a curious technique. He'd skip from topic to topic with no apparent line of inquiry. It threw me off balance and made me more alert.

"You're an assistant professor at the medical school?"

"Associate."

"Pretty young to be an associate professor, aren't you."

"I'm thirty - two. I started young."

"Uh - huh. How many kids in the treatment program?"

"About thirty."

"Parents?"

"Maybe ten, eleven couples, half a dozen single parents."

"Any talk about Mr. Hickle in treatment?"

"That's confidential."

"Of course, sir.

"You ran the treatment as part of your job at - " he consulted his notes - "Western Pediatric Hospital."

"It was volunteer work associated with the hospital."

"You didn't get paid for it?"

"I continued to receive my salary and the hospital relieved me of other duties."

"There were fathers in the treatment groups, too."

"Yes." I thought I'd mentioned couples.

"Some of those guys were pretty mad at Mr. Hickle, I guess."

Mr. Hickle. Only a policeman could be so artificially polite as to call a dead pervert sir. Between themselves they used other terms, I supposed. Insufferable etiquette was a way of keeping the barrier between cop and civilian.

"That's confidential, Detective."

He grinned as if to say Can't blame a fella for trying, and scribbled in his notepad.

"Why so many questions about a suicide?"

"Just routine." He answered automatically without looking up. "I like to be thorough."

He stared at me absently, then asked:

"Did you have any help running the groups?"

"I encouraged the families to participate - to help themselves. I was the only professional."

"Peer counseling?"

"Exactly."

"We've got it in the department now." Noncommittal. "So they kind of took over."

"Gradually. I was always there."

"Did any of them have a key to your office?"

Aha.

"Absolutely not. You're thinking one of those people killed Hickle and faked it to look like suicide?" Of course he was. The same suspicion had occurred to me.

"I'm not drawing conclusions. Just investigating." This guy was elusive enough to be an analyst.

"I see."

Abruptly he stood, closed his pad and put his pencil away.

I rose to walk him to the door, teetered and blacked out.

The first thing I saw when things came back into focus was his big ugly face looming over me. I felt damp and cold. He was holding a washcloth that dripped water on to my face.

"You fainted. How do you feel?"

"Fine." The last thing I felt was fine.

"You don't look wonderful. Maybe I should call a doctor, Doctor."

"No."

"You sure?"

"No. It's nothing. I've had the flu for a few days. I just need to get something in my stomach."

He went into the kitchen and came back with a glass of orange juice. I sipped slowly and started to feel stronger.

I sat up and held the glass myself.

"Thank you," I said.

"To protect and serve."

"I'm really fine now. If you don't have any more questions…"

"No. Nothing more at this time." He got up and opened some windows; the light hurt my eyes. He turned off the TV.