Hanging Time

49

Camille’s eyes darted wildly around the room. She could hear them, and she could speak if she wanted to. She wouldn’t speak though. No matter what. She wouldn’t ever tell them the secret, even if they sent her to prison for the rest of her life. She didn’t want to think about prison. Milicia said in prison they’d do bad things to her. Really bad.

The beating of Camille’s heart sounded like thunder. It was hot. She worried that the place they put Puppy was even hotter. The big one said they had a special place for Puppy, would give her back when they were finished. She didn’t believe him. She stared at him, willing a knife to enter his throat. He was fiddling with something on the table. The other one was staring at her as if she were a witch. Beads of perspiration dotted her forehead.

Yes, I am a witch. A very bad witch.

She gnawed at her bottom lip. They told her to cooperate. She shivered.

“Okay, got it.” The one who had taken Puppy away nodded at the one who grabbed her off the street.

“All right, let’s begin. Would you state your name.”

Camille unclenched her jaw, releasing her lip. She licked it carefully, sticking her tongue way out. He said some things into the microphone. She didn’t listen to what they were.

“Uh, your name.”

She didn’t answer.

“Would you like something to drink?”

“Camille,” she said suddenly.

“Ah. Camille what?”

“Camille Honiger-Stanton.”

Camille sat back, gathered her bottom lip back into her mouth, gnawed on it while her eyes blinked open and closed. There, she told them.

“Where do you live, Camille?”

“Hmmm.”

“Can you tell us where you live?”

Camille watched the tape recorder. She counted softly to thirty.

The taller man looked at the smaller one. Camille noticed that he had a big mole on his face. Black.

“Ten fifty-five Second Avenue.”

“Okay, good. Are you married or single?”

Camille giggled. He was going to die soon. She could see it happening. The mole on his face was cancer. She didn’t like being so close to it, having to look at it. Quickly she combed her hair over her face with her fingers until it was a dense curtain she couldn’t see through. That was better. She sat back in the chair.

“Uh, Camille?”

“Who’s calling?”

“Um, it’s Lieutenant Braun.”

“Did you know you have a mole on your face?” Her voice came from behind the curtain.

There was a brief pause before he answered. What the hell was this? He decided to humor her.

“I didn’t know. Where is it?”

“Underneath your eye.”

Camille moved her hair enough to see the man with the mole lift his hand to his cheek. She tossed her hair back, leaning forward suddenly to look closer.

“There.” She stuck her finger at his face.

The man recoiled. The word “Christ” jumped out of his mouth.

“Did you know those kind of things cause cancer?”

He looked wildly at the other guy. “Roberts, do you see a mole?”

“No, sir.” The other man didn’t look, but he was smiling a little.

“I don’t have a mole on my face.” But he was a little uncertain now.

“Oh, yes, you do,” Camille said angrily. She reached into a pocket in her dress and pulled out a small artist’s notebook with a pen stuck in the spiral binder. She took out the pen and flipped the pages until she came to a clean one.

“What’re you doing?”

Braun was alarmed. Every movement the woman made was jerky, ungainly, weird. He was afraid she might stab him with the pen. He reached over to take it away.

She moved it out of his reach. “I’m drawing your face is what I’m doing. Don’t disturb me, I’m concentrating.”

She stuck her tongue deep in the side of her cheek. It bulged out, distorting her face.

“Camille, we have to concentrate on these questions,” Braun said. His eyes were nervous now, flitting back and forth from Camille to the guy sitting next to her, guarding the tape machine.

Camille didn’t look up. She pounded her left hand on the table irritably. The recorder jumped.

“Don’t interrupt. I want to preserve this moment.”

“Jesus,” Braun muttered under his breath.

Then he was silent for a while, watching her pen move in swift strokes across the paper. It didn’t take a genius to see that she wasn’t drawing anything.

He looked at his watch. “It’s getting late. You must respond to these questions.”

Camille laughed. His eyes were rolling all over the place, looked about to jump out of his head.

“What are you laughing at?”

He looked upset.

“What’s so funny?”

Camille directed her pen at his eyes and poked across the table in their direction not far enough to touch him but far enough to make him nervous.

“It’s all in the eyes. You can see it all in the eyes.” She stared at him, her eyes blinking quickly open and shut. Then she dropped her gaze to her drawing, became absorbed by it. She nodded and fell silent.

Horrified, Braun looked at the woman with her head bobbing up and down.

“Okay, that’s it.” He gestured to Roberts to turn off the tape. He got up, his hands rubbing the skin around his eyes and above his cheekbones, turned his back on the table where Camille sat like an insect, a big insect, with hair sticking out from her head like crimped red filament wire. Cold. Weird.

“Get Woo in here.”

“Yes, sir.” Instinctively Roberts reached for the tape recorder and took it with him.

Braun followed him quickly to the door. “Stay here,” he told Camille. “We’ll be right back.”

But she wasn’t listening to him. She was thinking about Puppy and how frightened Puppy must be.

Camille didn’t know how long she was there before a different person, a woman, came in. The woman took a look at her and said, “Stop that” very sharply.

Camille growled and continued biting at her arm.

“You can’t do that.” April approached her matter-of-factly and pried the arm out of Camille’s mouth. A little blood oozed out of the places where she had chewed some holes in it. The bitten arm looked raw, as if it should be hurting quite a bit.

“There’s no need for that,” April said.

Camille gnashed her teeth, snapping at the air now.

“I guess you’re having some trouble, huh?”

“Rrrrrr.”

“I’m April Woo. You’re acting like a dog. I’d guess you’re worried about your dog.” April stood there with one hand on her hip. She was used to crazy. It happened all the time. The police department could do it to anybody.

“Would you feel better with your dog in here?”

Camille stopped growling and fell silent.

“Will you talk to me if I bring you the dog? What do you say?”

“Yes,” Camille whispered. “I’m better with Puppy.”

What was so hard about that? April leaned out the door and talked to the officer who was standing outside. He hadn’t been doing his job. The woman should not have been allowed to mutilate herself while in police custody.