Along Came a Spider

for,” he said. His face had been drawing tighter and tighter as he spoke. The veins in his neck protruded. Light sweat rolled over his face.
    “They punished me because I couldn’t remember… ,” he said.
    “Who did? Who punished you?”
    “My stepmother mostly.”
    That probably meant most of the damage had happened when he was very young, while his stepmother did the disciplining.
    “A dark room,” he said.
    “What happened in the dark room? What kind of room was it?”
    “She put me there, down in the basement. It was our cellar, and she put me down there almost every day.”
    He was beginning to hyperventilate. This was extremely difficult for him, a condition I’d seen many times with child-abuse victims. He shut his eyes. Remembering. Seeing a past he never really wanted to encounter again.
    “What would happen down in the basement?”
    “Nothing… nothing happened. I was just punished all the time. Left by myself.”
    “How long were you kept down there?”
    “I don’t know… I can’t remember everything!”
    His eyes opened halfway. He watched me through narrow slits.
    I wasn’t sure how much more he could take. I had to be careful. I needed to ease him into the tougher parts of his history, with the feeling that I cared, that he could trust me, that I was listening.
    “Was it for a whole day sometimes? Overnight?”
    “Oh, no. No. It was for a long, long time. So I wouldn’t forget anymore. So I’d be a good boy. Not the Bad Boy.”
    He looked at me, but said nothing more. I sensed that he was waiting to hear something from me.
    I tried praise, which seemed the appropriate response. “That was good, Gary, a good start. I know how hard this is for you.”
    As I looked at the grown man, I imagined a small boy kept in a darkened cellar. Every day. For weeks that must have seemed even longer than that. Then I thought about Maggie Rose Dunne. Was it possible that he was keeping her somewhere. and that she was still alive? I needed to get the darkest secrets out of his head, and needed to do it faster than it’s ever done in therapy. Katherine Rose and Thomas Dunne deserved to know what had happened to their little girl.
    What happened to Maggie Rose, Gary
? Remember Maggie Rose?
    This was a very risky time in our session. He could become
    frightened and refuse to see me again if he sensed that I was no longer a “friend.” He might withdraw. There was even a chance of a complete psychotic break. He could become catatonic. Then everything would be lost.
    I needed to keep praising Gary for his efforts. It was important that he look forward to my visits. “What you’ve told me so far should be extremely helpful,” I said to him. “You really did a great job. I’m impressed by how much you’ve forced yourself to remember.”
    “Alex,” he said as I started to leave, “honest to God, I didn’t do anything horrible or bad. Please help me.”

    A polygraph test had been scheduled for him that afternoon. Just the thought of the lie detector made Gary nervous, but he swore he was glad to take it.
    He told me I could stay and wait for the results if I wanted to. I wanted to very much.
    The polygraph operator was a particularly good one who had been brought from D.C. for the testing. Eighteen questions were to be asked. Fifteen of those were “controls.” The other three were to be used for scoring the lie detector test.
    Dr. Campbell met with me about forty minutes after Soneji/ Murphy had been taken down for his polygraph. Campbell was flushed with excitement. He looked as if he might have jogged from wherever they had staged the test. Something big had happened.
    “He got the highest score possible,” Campbell told me. “He passed with flying colors. Plus tens. Gary Murphy could be telling the truth!”

CHAPTER 49

    G
ARY MURPHY could be telling the truth
!
    I held a command performance in the boardroom inside Lorton Prison the following afternoon. The important audience included Dr. Campbell from the prison, federal District Attorney James Dowd, a representative from the governor of Maryland’s office, two more attorneys from the attorney general’s office in Washington, and Dr. James Walsh, from the state’s health board, as well as the prison’s advisory staff.
    It had been an ordeal to get them together. Now that I had succeeded, I couldn’t lose them. I wouldn’t get another chance to ask for what I needed.
    I felt as if I were back taking my orals at Johns