False Memory

to the experts not merely with a pragmatic degree of hope but also with something uncomfortably close to faith.
    All right, okay. So what? If he could just have Martie back in charge of herself as she had been, healthy and happy, he would humble himself before anyone, anytime, anywhere.
    Still all in black but with purple Barney on her arm, Martie left the hematology lab hand-in-hand with Dusty. An MRI scan was next.
    The corridors smelled of floor wax, disinfectant, and a faint underlying scent of illness.
    A nurse and an orderly approached, rolling a gurney on which lay a young woman no older than Martie. She was connected to an IV drip. Compresses had been applied to her face; they were spotted with fresh blood. One of her eyes was visible: open, gray-green, and glazed with shock.
    Dusty looked away, feeling that he had violated this stranger’s privacy, and he tightened his hold on Martie’s hand, superstitiously certain that in this injured woman’s glassy stare was more bad luck poised to jump, quick as a blink, from her to him.
    Tweaked and crinkled, the inscrutable smile of Closterman rose Cheshire-like in Dusty’s memory.

    45
    From dreamless sleep, the doctor woke late, refreshed and looking forward to the day.
    In the fully equipped gym that was part of the master suite, he completed two full circuits on the weight-training machines and half an hour on a reclining, stationary bicycle.
    This was the sum of his exercise regimen, three times a week, yet he was as fit as he had been twenty years ago, with a thirty-two-inch waist and a physique that women liked. He credited his genes and the fact that he had the good sense not to let stress accumulate.
    Before showering, he used the telephone intercom to call the kitchen and ask Nella Hawthorne to prepare breakfast. Twenty minutes later, hair damp, smelling faintly of a spice-scented skin lotion, wearing a red silk robe, he returned to the bedroom and retrieved his breakfast from the electric dumbwaiter.
    On the antique sterling-silver tray were a carafe of freshly squeezed orange juice kept cold in a small silver bucket full of ice, two chocolate croissants, a bowl of strawberries accompanied by supplies of brown sugar and heavy cream, an orange-almond muffin with a half cup of whipped butter on the side, a slice of coconut pound cake with lemon marmalade, and a generous serving of french-fried pecans sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon for nibbling between other treats.
    Though forty-eight, the doctor boasted the metabolism of a ten-year-old boy on methamphetamines.
    He ate at the brushed-steel and zebrawood desk where a few hours ago he had studied his father’s disembodied eyes.
    The jar of formaldehyde was still here. He had not returned it to the safe before retiring for the night.
    Some mornings, he switched on the television to watch the news with his breakfast; however, none of the anchormen or anchor-women, regardless of the channel, had eyes as intriguing as those of Josh Ahriman, dead now for twenty years.
    The strawberries were as ripe and flavorful as any the doctor had ever eaten. The croissants were sublime.
    Dad’s gaze settled languishingly upon the morning feast.
    A formidable prodigy, the doctor had completed all his education and opened his psychiatric practice while still in his twenties, but though learning had come easily to him, well-heeled patients had not, in spite of his Hollywood connections through his father. Although the film-business elite loudly proclaimed their egalitarianism, many harbored a prejudice against youth in psychiatry, and they were not ready to lie down on the couch of a twenty-something therapist. To be fair, the doctor had looked much younger than his age— still did—and could have passed for eighteen when he hung out his shingle. Nevertheless, in the movie biz, where the sight of someone wearing his heart on his sleeve was more commonly encountered than the name of even the most spectacularly successful fashion designer of the moment, Ahriman had been frustrated to find himself a victim of such hypocrisy.
    His father had continued to provide generous support, but the doctor had been increasingly reluctant to accept his old man’s largesse. How embarrassing it was to be dependent at twenty-eight, especially considering his considerable academic achievements. Besides, as open as Josh Ahriman’s wallet had been, the allowance that he provided was not sufficient for the doctor to live in the style he desired or to