The Red Pages
By William Griner
Interviewers who sought out Patrick Jane for a subject fell into two categories.
Skeptics made a pretense of building rapport. Then they launched a barrage of questions at Jane, assuming that with their relentless probing, they would expose and skewer Jane, proving to the world that they were smarter than this man who had once so arrogantly billed himself to captivated audiences as a great seer into the beyond.
Tricks tended to be the fans. After falling under the spell of Jane's sea-blue eyes, golden locks and young Robert Redford smile, they wanted a different trophy from their skeptical associates in the business. Those interviewers craved the connection, needed to dredge some new facet of Jane to the surface – and share that morsel with the masses.
It was taking more time than usual this morning for Jane to categorize Gilda Weld. Maybe the recent changes in his professional and personal life, which Weld had openly expressed curiosity about, had short-circuited his radar.
Maybe Weld had cast a spell of her own.
She had proven her intelligence by not insulting Jane's. If she made any attempt to hide her true agenda, Jane would see it and turn Weld's ambitions against her, reflexively, then dismissively. The fact that this tall, well-dressed woman asked simple, open-ended questions and waited for answers intrigued Jane. It didn't hurt that she was beautiful.
Maybe Jane was playing along because he bored easily and was investing time to see what the game was. In any case, he was at least talking, so Weld, who had opted to take notes on a canary colored legal pad instead of using a recorder, raised her pen to interrupt Jane only when it was necessary. She did so now.
"Say that name again."
"Cho," Jane repeated. "First name Kimball, all spelled just like it sounds."
Talking about friends had caused Jane to smile, genuinely smile, for the first time in the half hour since Weld had engaged him. At one point he had talked to her while simultaneously flipping through a phone book, which she assumed was supposed to antagonize her. Since she had Jane's full attention, she encouraged him to continue.
"He's still working out of the Texas field office, catching bad guys for the feds," Jane volunteered. "In return, the feds are teaching Cho how to loosen up."
The attempt at humor was lost on Weld. She referred back to her notes. "With … Riggs?"
Jane, with a light touch of impatience, shook his head. "Wayne Rigsby," he said, inflecting the last name, "and Grace Van Pelt still operate a digital surveillance firm. C'mon, keep up."
"Not everyone has a memory like yours, Mr. Jane."
"They could if they wanted. Most people allow themselves to get distracted with nonsense. A clear memory would probably be a curse for them."
"I guess it takes a special person to turn the powers of observation into something lucrative."
If Weld's remark cut Jane, he didn't show it. Sitting back, crossing his legs, he stared up at the paneled ceiling before allowing his eyes to drift back down to the interviewer. When Patrick Jane focused on you, really focused, he made a person feel as if they were the only one in the room with him. In the whole world. Just you and him and Jane's scalpel mind.
"What do you want me to say? You got me, I'm a bad man – but you knew that already. A con artist? I freely admit it. I was never a psychic because – wait for it – psychics don't exist. Direct quote." With a shrug, he seemed to detach himself from a lifetime of separating the gullible from their money. "And, pardon my candor, but if I could truly tap into 'the other side," as I once called it, believe me when I say I'd rather be talking to someone else."
"Let's not –"
Jane interrupted. "Isn't this the big reveal that you wanted?"
"Old news."
"The CBI?" he asked, referring to the California Bureau of Investigation.
"On a personal level, I wanted to discuss –"
"Lisbon."
The way that Jane said the name made Weld arch one eyebrow in response. Yes, it was difficult to read her subject, but she was learning to follow his lead. Patrick Jane would talk about what Patrick Jane wanted to, and that was that.
"Based on your description of Teresa Lisbon," Weld said, "I wouldn't have put the two of you together."
Jane relaxed. In some ways he wasn't so different from any other celebrity who wanted to write the narrative. As long as he was in control, he wouldn't use the scalpel.
"I think that when we first met," Jane said, "we had the same idea about each other."
"Please elaborate."
"When I walked through the door to the CBI, the agents there, including Lisbon, were just a means to an end for me. I needed to tap their resources. They would help me with my goal, and then I'd walk away. Lisbon had no illusions about me. Virgil Minelli," Jane said, referring to a now retired special agent in charge of the CBI, "convinced her that I could be useful to the good guys. We cleared the cases I consulted on, everyone was happy, and in my off time I pursued my hobby investigation."
Weld knew this part of the story. Jane, in his previous life as a psychic, had consulted with police who were desperate to catch a serial killer dubbed "Red John" for the way he left sad faces drawn on walls in the victims' blood. During a televised interviewed, Jane taunted the killer. In retaliation, Red John killed Jane's wife and daughter.
Jane had chased phantoms for six years. It must have eaten away at him that, for all of his skills, Red John had managed to stay ahead of him, leaving bodies and bloody faces in his wake.
"For years, all that I thought about was what I would do when I caught Red John. It would only take me two bullets."
"Two?" Weld asked.
Jane nodded. "One for him …"
A shudder passed through Weld. "And the other would be for you?"
The question lingered in the air like a puff of smoke from a cigarette. Jane finally spoke. "Put yourself in my place. My wife Angela, my daughter Charlotte Anne – yes, Red John killed them, but he did it to get even with me. Two lives taken, just like that, because I thought I was so smart. I couldn't imagine living past the moment when I erased Red John once and for all. There was nothing for me on the other side of that moment but … memory."
Weld pretended to scribble a note on her legal pad.
"Something happened along the way," Jane continued. "That small team of agents at the CBI, the people that were my tools, kept pulling me into their world. I didn't want that, but …" His voice trailed off. "They're good people. True friends. And Lisbon …"
"What about her?"
"Well, nothing in life goes as planned, does it? I caught Red John and killed him with my bare hands. And then, the funniest thing occurred. I ran. Straight to Mexico, getting distance from it all. Men who take off running the way that I did … well, they want to live. That's what I wanted, without even realizing it. Call it curiosity. Maybe I wanted to see how the rest of life played out for Cho, Rigsby, Van Pelt. Some part of me wondered what Lisbon would do. But just that spark was enough. I spent a couple of years in Mexico before the feds found me and offered a similar deal to what I had with the CBI."
"And that gave you another opportunity with Teresa?"
"It did."
Weld set down her canary colored legal pad and looked into Jane's eyes. He blinked, almost shyly, and then a thoughtful smile crept across his face.
"Given all of your insight into human nature, Mr. Jane, how would you describe that turn?"
He sighed dramatically. Patrick Jane, no matter what the setting was, remained a showman at heart, and this room would suffice as another stage.
"Here's your ending," Jane said. "It's all tied up neatly, just another episode of TV. My friends opened me up to the power of possibility. That's what kept me from putting a gun to my head. I miss Angela and Charlotte Anne – I wish I could talk to them now – but they wouldn't want me to waste another life. And Teresa, she made me realize I could love again."
He raised his arms, opened his hands in a "That's all, folks" gesture. Without being told, Weld realized that she would get no further this morning. She exchanged a few parting pleasantries, thanked Jane for his time and exited.
The auburn-haired nurse who was assisting Weld handed her a file from a long cabinet in the corner office. "Here is Mr. Jane's file, Doctor. Oh, and thanks for taking notes the way you did. After what happened to Mr. Jane's family, it upsets him to be recorded."
"The people that he kept mentioning, the CBI agents," Weld said. "I'm assuming they were officers who questioned him after the death of his family?"
The nurse, whose name tag read "Henrietta Busbee," shook her head.
"That's what we thought at first," Busbee said. "Did you notice how Mr. Jane reads through the phone book? Well, he has that amazing memory, and … he picks names at random and then creates stories plugging those names in as characters. So sad. He could be writing movies or TV shows if he didn't … well, you know."
Weld nodded.
"I wasn't expecting this much of a setback. Mr. Jane was making so much progress."
Busbee walked to the open door and peered down the hallway, checking to the left and to the right before returning her attention to the clinical psychologist. "Well, there was an incident. I'm not supposed to know this, but …"
"If I'm going to treat Mr. Jane, I need to know."
"Well, it was a violation of our policies, but apparently, someone paid an orderly to deliver a card to Mr. Jane."
"And that's when the delusions started again?"
"Yes, Doctor."
"This card," Weldon said. "Did you see it?"
"Oh, no, Doctor, but a couple of detectives came around and took statements. They asked a lot of questions here on our floor. The orderly was fired, but before he left, he said that the card was really weird. He must have opened it before he gave it to Mr. Jane."
"What did he say?"
Busbee's eyes widened. "Joey, that was the orderly's name, said there was some writing in red ink, and there was this sad face drawn inside. It was like some sort of sick joke. Mr. Jane apparently ripped it up and flushed it so no one else could see it."
A couple of hours after Weld departed the hospital, Busbee went in to check on Jane and take him his lunch. He didn't like to eat with the other patients.
"Any more mail for me?" Jane asked.
Busbee stopped and looked over her shoulder. "I'll double check just to be sure."
Jane thanked her, and the nurse walked back into the hallway and returned to her station.
From her purse, she pulled out a cell phone that had been given to her as a gift and stowed it in a pocket. Busbee breezed through the door of the women's rest room and, once inside and away from the surveillance cameras on the hospital floor, thumbed in a number on speed dial. A man's voice answered.
"The doctor left?"
"Yes," Busbee answered.
"What did she think?"
"Dr. Weld was really frustrated. Jane acted like they had never even met. Here she was, preparing to release him, and suddenly he's back in fantasy land."
The line died, and Busbee slipped the phone back into her pocket before returning to the floor. She would have to remember to watch the local news tonight, Busbee decided.
Dr. Weld did not realize that she had wandered on to Red John's radar by meddling with Patrick Jane.
That mistake would be corrected tonight when she was paid a visit.
The End