“Why? Is he saying he was invited in?” My mouth has gone dry.
“He’s saying quite a lot of things,” Berger replies.
“Biggest bunch of fucking bullshit you ever heard,” Marino says in disgust. “But then I knew that right off the bat. I go to his room late last night, right? Tell him Ms. Berger wants to interview him and so he asks me what she looks like. I don’t say a word, play the asshole along. I tell him, ‘Well, let’s just put it this way, John. A lotta guys have a real hard timeno pun intendedconcentrating when she’s around, know what I mean?’ ”
John, I numbly think. Marino calls him John.
“Testing, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five,” a voice sounds on the tape, and a cinder-block wall fills the screen. The camera begins to focus on a bare table and a chair. In the background a telephone rings.
“He wants to know if she has a good body, and Ms. Berger, I hope you’ll excuse me for making reference to it.” Marino oozes sarcasm, still furious with her for reasons I don’t yet fully understand. “But I’m just repeating what the piece of
shit said. And so I tell him, ‘Geez, it wouldn’t be right for me
to comment, but like I said, the guys can’t think straight when she’s around. At least straight guys can’t think straight.’ ” I know damn well this is not what Marino said. In fact, I doubt Chandonne asked about Berger’s appearance at all. More likely, the suggestion of her sexy good looks came from Marino, to bait Chandonne into talking to her, and as I recall the crude comment Marino made about Berger when we were walking out to Lucy’s car last night, I feel a rush of resentment, of anger. I am fed up with him and his machismo. I am sick of his male chauvinism and crudity.
“What the hell is this?” I feel like hosing him off with cold water. “Do female body parts have to enter every goddamn conversation? Do you think it’s possible, Marino, that you might focus on this case without obsessing over how big a woman’s breasts are?”
‘Testing, one, two, three, four, five,” the cameraman’s voice sounds again on tape. The telephone stops ringing. Feet shuffle. Voices murmur. “We’re gonna sit you at this table and chair right here.” I recognize Marino’s voice on tape, and in the background someone knocks on a door.
“The point is, Chandonne talked.” Berger is looking at me, palpating me with her eyes again, finding my weaknesses, my inflamed spots. “He talked to me quite a lot.”
“For whatever that’s worth.” Marino angrily stares at the TV screen. So that’s it. Marino might have helped induce Chandonne into talking to Berger, but the truth is, Marino wanted Chandonne to talk to him.
The camera is fixed and I see only what is directly in its view. Marino’s big gut comes into the picture as he pulls out a wooden chair, and someone in a dark blue suit and deep red tie helps Marino steer Jean-Baptiste Chandonne into the chair. Chandonne wears short-sleeved blue hospital scrubs and long pale hair hangs from his arms in tangles of wavy, soft fur the color of pale honey. Hair splays over his v-necked collar and climbs up his neck in repulsive, long swirls. He sits and his head enters the frame, swathed in gauze from mid-forehead to the tip of his nose. Directly around the bandages, the flesh has been shaven and is as white as milk, as if it has never seen the sun.
“Can I have my Pepsi, please?” Chandonne asks. He wears no restraints, not even handcuffs.
“You want it topped off?” Marino says to him.
No answer. Berger moves past the camera and I note that she is wearing a chocolate brown suit with padded shoulders. She sits across from Chandonne. I see only the back of her head and shoulders.
“You want a refill, John?” Marino asks the man who tried to murder me.
“In a minute. Can I smoke?” Chandonne says.
His voice is soft and heavily French. He is polite and calm. I stare at the television screen, my concentration flickering. I experience electrical disturbances again, post-traumatic stress, my nerves jump like water hitting hot grease, and I am getting another bad headache. The dark blue-sleeved arm with the white cuff reaches into the picture, setting a drink and a pack of Camel cigarettes in front of Chandonne, and I recognize the blue-and-white tall paper cup as coming from the hospital cafeteria. A chair scrapes back and the blue-sleeved arm lights a cigarette for Chandonne.