"Miss Dawes, I'd like you to meet Dr. Jonathan Crane," said Judge Fadden. Rachel tried to compose her features in some pleasant arrangement, but there was no disguising her enmity toward the judge. "Dr. Crane is the assistant director of Arkham Asylum, and a very talented young psychiatrist," he continued. Rachel started to rise from her chair in the Gotham Law club, and found herself brought up short by the weird beauty of the man in front of her.
"No, don't get up," said Dr. Crane with a slight smile on his pillowy lips. His gaze through his glasses was both intent and dreamy. Rachel half smiled and extended her hand to him.
"And this is Miss Rachel Dawes. After putting herself through law school at Gotham University working as a paralegal in the DA's office, she has now fully joined their ranks. I look forward to seeing you argue, my dear," said Fadden unctuously. Rachel smiled blandly at him, her eyes cold. He was bent as, well, Alfred probably would have said "bent as a nine bob note". Rachel shied away from thinking of Alfred, of Wayne manor, and most of all of Bruce Wayne. Gone these two years, and if anyone had heard from him, they had not mentioned it to her.
"So young, and so accomplished," said Dr. Crane, in a voice that slid up her spine like a caress. He held her outstretched hand in his still, and she felt his fingers, cool and smooth, against hers.
"I could say the same for you," she said, grinning and lowering her chin a little. Dr. Crane's face wore an expression that couldn't decide whether to be modest or supercilious. He held her hand a moment longer before Judge Fadden guided him off to meet some of the other lawyers in the club.
"How do you stand it, Alfred?" Rachel asked. They stood together in the corner of the Wayne Tower's grand ballroom. Wayne Enterprise's philanthropy department threw this fundraiser every year, and every year the glitterati of Gotham turned out in their finest for $500 a plate and more to dance and be seen.
"Master Bruce will return, Miss Dawes," said Alfred quietly. "The Wayne name will not be reduced to this; be certain of it." Rachel smiled sadly at him for a moment, when she felt a cool touch on her arm that sent a pleasant shiver over her bare shoulders. She turned and saw Dr. Crane, looking like his namesake in elegant black and white. He had something of the stillness of that bird, a feeling that he would wait patiently and calmly until the moment came for action.
"Miss Dawes," he said, and let his touch on her arm linger just a moment too long, "lovely to see you again."
"You too, Dr. Crane," she said with a genuine smile.
"Would you care to waltz?" he asked. She turned to give her excuses to Alfred, but he had already gone. She sighed to herself—Alfred was always quick to absent himself at these parties whenever a young man came around. He did not want her pining over Bruce, she supposed.
Dr. Crane turned out to be an abstracted dancer, competent enough, but Rachel could tell he took no joy in it. "So, how do you know Judge Fadden?" she asked after a moment of uncomfortable silence. Dr. Crane pursed his lips for a moment.
"I really shouldn't say," he said, considering, "but then, I suppose you could find out easily enough." Rachel raised an eyebrow. "His son is a patient of mine," Dr. Crane continued. "It is a sad story, too much, perhaps, for such a lovely evening. And such lovely company," he added after too long a pause.
"I don't mind," she said quietly "I wouldn't be where I am if I turned away from sad stories." They were similar in height, and Rachel felt a moment of shock when his lambent blue eyes turned up toward hers.
"You know, sometimes I feel worse for my criminal patients than any others. Others, when they are cured, come out having hurt only themselves, but the criminally insane—" he spoke the phrase with a certain distaste "—they come out wracked with guilt, and will never be the same. George Fadden was an undiagnosed psychotic. If only he had been diagnosed earlier." Dr. Crane sighed and seemed to droop as if the thought weighed heavily on his slim shoulders.
"What did he do?" asked Rachel, shocked.
"Killed his girlfriend and their unborn child." Dr. Crane took his hand from her waist to push his glasses up his nose, and then replaced it.
"That's terrible," she said.
"Yes, for everyone involved," said Dr. Crane. "I have my differences with Judge Fadden's courtroom record, but the man and his family have suffered."
"That doesn't excuse—" Rachel started then checked herself. "No, you're right, no one should have to suffer that." Dr. Crane gave one of his little closed mouthed smiles, and pulled her in a little closer.
"I'm sorry to have upset you," he said quietly. "Would you like to take some air on the balcony." Rachel nodded and allowed him to lead her off the dance floor. The ballroom was seventy stories up, near to the top of Wayne Tower, and it was chilly on the balcony. Rachel shivered in her backless dress, and Dr. Crane obligingly draped his jacket over he shoulders.
"It looks so peaceful from up here," he said, echoing her thoughts. After a moment he took her hand. "You and I know the truth, though." Rachel pulled his jacket around herself and looked down into the misty streets.
hr
"Yes, I'll testify on his behalf," said Dr. Crane. Perotta waved his hand impatiently. He was a relatively intelligent lieutenant in Falcone's organization, but that wasn't saying much.
"Yeah. Sure you will," Perotta said lazily.
"But . . .," continued Dr. Crane, trailing off.
"But what," said Perotta. He did not make it a question, and leaned menacingly across the table toward Crane. He gazed back at the thug for a moment, before continuing.
"I have a small request, for you, or your boss," he said without flinching.
"I can handle it, but why should I?" Perotta asked, leaning back and cracking his knuckles.
"I don't want the case in front of the new ADA. Her inexperience could prove useful . . . but I think it might make an enemy of her, too soon." Dr. Crane steepled his hands and cocked his head to one side. Perotta shrugged.
"Her, huh? Too easy. The DA's office owes us favors out the wazoo. Of course, this means you owe me . . ." Crane smiled unpleasantly and inclined his head toward Perotta.
"Of course."
Rachel was only mildly surprised when a messenger delivered a note written in a spidery hand asking for her attendance at dinner. There was something otherworldly, or perhaps just old-fashioned about the good doctor, and Rachel smiled when she looked at the note. Compared to Bruce, Dr. Crane was a little effete, but then Bruce was kind of a bull in a china shop. It might be nice to spend time with a man so controlled. There was something under that beautiful, cold exterior, Rachel thought, and she shivered with anticipation. She scribbled an assent on the back of the note and handed it back to the messenger.
The restaurant named on the note was new and fabulously expensive restaurant in upper Gotham just where the good neighborhoods started to give way to the slums that led into the Narrows. When she arrived she noticed that the décor was cool and clean, with frosted glass floors and tables, and black sable upholstery and blue light filtering down through the translucent ceiling glass, and she smiled to herself, thinking how well Dr. Crane had chosen surroundings to match himself.
He met her at the bar where the drink specialties were, of course, ice-cold vodkas, fruit infused, and served in glasses that looked like modern sculptures. "Sorry about the location," said Dr. Crane when he arrived, "I had to choose something close to the asylum in case I have to go back quickly." He patted the pager at his belt. "And anyhow, I like the atmosphere here. It is soothing, after the madhouse." He gave her a slightly mad grin to match the words, and she smiled uncomfortably.
"Thank you for the invitation, Dr. Crane," she said after a moment.
"Certainly, Miss Dawes," he replied gravely. He extended his arm to her, and she climbed down off the stool. "I wish you would call me Jonathan," he said as a waitress guided them to their table. Rachel laughed shortly.
"I don't know if I can," she said. "You don't seem that casual." She tried to laugh coquettishly, but something in his demeanor forbid it. "You could try calling me Rachel first."
"Rachel," he said quietly, after he helped her into her seat. She flushed a little, without knowing why.
"I guess that's okay," she said with a flirtatious smile. They talked with surprising ease over dinner. He laced his conversation with frequent, self-deprecating smiles, and spoke about a childhood that sounded comfortable, but lonely, and his years in school, excelling, but still isolated from his classmates.
"They were there to party," he said, with an ironic emphasis on the word, "but that never held much attraction for me." He looked down at his food for a moment then back up at her, so the icy blue of his eyes shocked her again. "I think, because I always knew what I wanted, and some of them never will."
"I understand," she said, her heart going out to him. "I was too busy working my way through school to have time for any of that. It is lonely." She put her hand out to cover his.
After dinner he walked her to the curb and they lingered there a moment. "I had a lovely time, Rachel," he said. They stood face to face and eye to eye there. Steam rose from the manhole covers and the light from the streetlamps filtered eerily around them.
"Me too . . . Jonathan," she said then blushed. He smiled at her awkwardness.
"I can drive you home," he said, "but I really must go check on some things at Arkham first. I can call you a car . . . ." Rachel demurred. "I won't have you taking the subway home this late," he said insistently.
"I do it every night," she protested.
"Not tonight." Rachel did not usually like being managed, but something about the finality of his words silenced her. "Or you can come with me, and take a tour, if you're up for it." Rachel felt that his words were some obscure challenge, and she jerked up her chin.
"Of course. I'd love to see where you work." The inside of his car seemed close and claustrophobic, and Rachel began to regret the vodka she had consumed at dinner. At the time, the warmth had been seductive, but now the walls of the car seemed too near, and she felt her head spinning. Outside the windows of the car, the faces of Gotham's grimmest inhabitants rose up like revenants. Rachel shuddered and looked over at her companion instead. He drove carefully, but unconcerned, as if he could be taking a drive in the country for all the difference it made.
Rachel swallowed hard. "How can you work up here?" she asked.
"It's not easy, but I don't have much choice," he said as he pulled the car into the garage beneath Arkham. "The asylum pays quite a bit of money for protection, both legal and otherwise." He looked at her ruefully. "I hope you're not disappointed in me to learn that."
"No," she said cautiously, "sometimes you just have to get along without making waves." Dr. Crane smiled to himself at that, and Rachel wondered why.
Arkham Asylum was enveloped in an odd smell, a miasma of old hospitals and something worse underneath, a scent of smoky decay. Rachel squared her shoulders as she followed Dr. Crane into the building, and tried to ignore it. He showed her to his office and asked her to wait a moment while he checked on some of the more fractious inmates.
She sat down in his chair, a sturdy thing of leather and wood that felt a hundred years old, like much of the rest of the office, the ancient typewriter, the sheaves of yellowed paper bound with twine on the bookshelves. Even the phone was an old rotary made of scarred black plastic. He should spend less money on protection, more on redecoration, she thought, a little hysterically, although the more sober part of her lauded him for putting every bit of the budget into caring for the inmates.
She did not remember, later, falling asleep, or even drifting off, but next thing she knew . . . she stood in a field as a storm closed in around her . . . no, it was a dark cave, like the one Bruce fell into on that fateful day . . . and there was Bruce, standing stern and forbidding, his back to her, no matter how much she screamed, he wouldn't help her up . . . she was on a train hurtling through Gotham City, heading toward the dark maw of Wayne Tower, and a thug with a knife advanced on her, and her body betrayed her, freezing immobile with fear . . . and she woke to Dr. Crane's voice and his hands shaking her shoulders.
She sat up sobbing, and looked wildly around her. Dr. Crane kneeled on the floor next to the desk and looked up at her, his eyes wide and imploring. "It's alright, Rachel," he said, as he stood up and put his arms around her. She rested her head against his chest as her heartbeat slowed. He stroked her hair softly, then cradled one of his hands against her cheek and tilted her face up toward him. "It was only a dream. Are you feeling better now?" Rachel nodded unsteadily, and Dr. Crane put his finger to her lips. "Good. I'll get you home now."
They drove in silence as she tried to keep her breathing under control, keep panic from overwhelming her again. At the door of her apartment building he came around to her side of the car and helped her out. "I'm sorry, Rachel," he said as she dug in her purse for the keys. She looked up at him, and he ran his hands through his thick black hair, the only messy thing about him. "I shouldn't have taken you there. Forgive me?"
"Nonsense," she said, still with a slight tremor in her voice. "I shouldn't have had so much to drink." She half smiled at him. He leaned in and pressed his lips to hers softly, for a quick moment that still left her dizzy.
"I'm so glad to hear that," he said. Dr. Crane bowed his head slightly and walked back to his car, as she opened the door to her building. Rachel walked up the stairs, slowly, uncertainly. In the dim light of her bathroom she took off her makeup. Underneath the base and blusher, her face looked pale and sallow. She poured herself a glass of water and took down a book to read, curling up in an armchair near the window, unable to face the dreams that might be waiting for her in bed.