He flipped a page. “He was five-foot-eight, weighed one-seventy, brown eyes, brown hair. His treatment was three months in duration.”
“Al Hunt wasn’t admitted until that following April,” I reminded the psychiatrist. “They wouldn’t have been patients at the same time.”
“Yes, I believe you’re right. An oversight on my part. So we can strike him.”
He set the file on his ink blotter as I gave Marino a warning glance. I knew he was about to explode, his face as red as Christmas.
Opening a second file, Dr. Masterson resumed, “Next we have a fourteen-year-old male, blond, blue-eyed, five-foot-three, one-fifteen pounds. He was admitted in February 1979, discharged six months later. He had a history of withdrawal and fragmentary delusions, and was diagnosed as schizophrenic of the disorganized or hebephrenic type.”
“You mind explaining what the hell that means?” Marino asked.
“It presented as incoherence, bizarre mannerisms, extreme social withdrawal, and other oddities of behavior. For example”–he paused to look over a page–“he would leave for the bus stop in the morning but fail to show up at school, and on one occasion was found sitting under a tree drawing peculiar, nonsensical designs in his notebook.”
“Yeah. And now he’s a famous artist living in New York,” Marino mumbled sardonically. “His name Frank, Franklin, or begin with an F?”
“No. Nothing close.”
“So, who’s next?”
“Next is a twenty-two-year-old male from Delaware. Red hair, gray eyes, uhhhh, five-foot-ten, one-fifty pounds. He was admitted in March of 1979, discharged in June. He was diagnosed as suffering from organic delusional syndrome. Contributing factors were temporal lobe epilepsy and a history of cannabis abuse. Complications included dysphoric mood and his attempting to castrate himself while reacting to a delusion.”
“What’s dysphoric mean?” Marino asked.
“Anxious, restless, depressed.”
“This before or after he tried to turn himself into a soprano?”
Dr. Masterson was beginning to register annoyance, and I really couldn’t blame him.
“Next,” Marino said like a drill sergeant.
“The fourth case is an eighteen-year-old male, black hair, brown eyes, five-foot-nine, one-forty-two pounds. He was admitted in May of 1979, was diagnosed as schizophrenic of the paranoid type. His history”–he flipped a page, then reached for his pipe–“includes unfocused anger and anxiety, with doubts about gender identity and a marked fear of being thought of as homosexual. The onset of his psychosis apparently was related to his being approached by a homosexual in a men’s room–”
“Hold it right there.”
If Marino hadn’t stopped him, I would have. “We need to talk about this one. How long was he at Valhalla?”
Dr. Masterson was lighting his pipe. Taking his time glancing through the record, he replied, “Ten weeks.”
“Which would have been while Hunt was here,” Marino said.
“That’s correct.”
“So he was approached in a men’s room and lost his cookies? What happened? What psychosis?” Marino asked.
Dr. Masterson was turning pages. Pushing up his glasses, he replied, “An episode of delusional thinking of a grandiose nature. He believed God was telling him to do things.”
“What things?” Marino asked, leaning forward in his chair.
“There’s nothing specific, nothing written here except that he was talking in rather bizarre ways.”
“And he was paranoid schizophrenic?” Marino asked.
“Yes.”
“You want to define that? Like, what are the other symptoms?”
“Classically speaking,” Dr. Masterson replied, “there are associated features which include grandiose delusions or hallucinations with a grandiose content. There may be delusional jealousy, extreme intensity in interpersonal interactions, argumentativeness, and in some instances violence.”
“Where was he from?” I asked.
“Maryland.”
“Shit,” Marino muttered. “He lived with both parents?”
“He lived with his father.”
I said, “You’re sure he was paranoid versus undifferentiated?”
The distinction was important. Schizophrenics of the undifferentiated type often exhibit grossly disorganized behavior. They generally don’t have the wherewithal to premeditate crimes and successfully evade apprehension. The person we were looking for was organized enough to successfully plan and execute his crimes and escape detection.
“I’m quite sure,” Dr. Masterson answered. After a pause, he added blandly, “The patient’s first name, interestingly enough, is Frank.”
Then he handed me the file, and Marino and I briefly looked it over.
Frank Ethan Aims, or Frank E., and thus “Frankie” I could only conclude, had left Valhalla in late July of 1979 and soon after, according to a note Dr. Masterson had made at the time, Aims ran away from his home in Maryland.