A View to the Curious

As I returned from an earlier pressing engagement, there was barely time to prepare for the interview. In fact, I came in through the back door to be sure to avoid meeting my guest in an other than optimal setting.

I removed my gray wool suit coat, the matching overcoat and my broad-brimmed fedora and hung them on the coat rack in the library. Then I checked myself in the freestanding full-length mirror to be sure I was still presentable. It isn’t every day a guy like me is chosen to represent an entire type.

At six feet two inches and a trim hundred and ninety-five pounds, I look even more imposing when I’m in my overcoat and my fedora, but today the point isn’t to look imposing. I ran my fingers loosely through my sandy brown hair. I keep it fairly short so I can (and I have) fit in on Wall Street.

When I wear glasses, which I would for this interview, I prefer bronze-colored metal frames with rectangular lenses. They make me look a bit less threatening, even with the blue eyes peering through them.

My medium-brown long-sleeved shirt has thin moss-green vertical pinstripes. At the collar and on the cuffs, the pinstripes run horizontally.  My brown leather belt is narrow at three-quarters of an inch because it serves multiple purposes. Behind it, my shirt is tucked neatly into slate gray fine wool trousers that match my suit coat. My socks and loafers also are a warm brown.

Just as I decided I was satisfied with my appearance, the doorbell sounded.

I’d given both the maid and the butler the day off, so I answered it myself. “Hi there.” I proffered my hand.

As my guest shook my hand, he smiled. “Hello. I’m Trent Green.”

The slight scent of garlic filled the space between us, and mouthwash. I nodded. “Yes, yes I thought so. I’m Charlie Task.” I smiled and stepped aside, still holding the doorknob, and gestured along the entry hall. “Please come in.”

Trent stepped over the threshold and I closed the door, then turned the deadbolt with a solid click.

Exerting as little pressure as possible, I put my hand on the small of his back as if to guide him along the hallway, then moved it as if on second thought. Everything I did was designed to gain his confidence. He thinks he knows who I am, so he’s fearful. I want to allay that fear, at least for now.

“I’m glad you’ve come,” I said. “Your phone call intrigued me. I’m not sure it’s ever been done before, has it? I mean, outside of a penitentiary?”

He actually grinned and met my gaze. “I don’t think so.”

I nodded lightly, then gestured again, this time with my chin. “The library is ahead on the right, through that double doorway. Please excuse any mess. It’s Sunday, and the maid likes to have this day off, as does my butler and cook. The maid attends mass at St. Mary’s, probably to atone for the unclean thoughts she entertains about my butler.”

He laughed.

We stopped just outside the doors to the library. “I’m not sure what all you want to know, but you might as well have a partial tour as long as you’re here.” I met his eyes and smiled. Might as well keep him on edge. “I’m sure you don’t want the full tour.”

“No, no,” he said just a bit too quickly. “I don’t want to intrude.”

Good boy.

“Whatever you’re willing to share is fine, Mr. Task. I appreciate your time and your... well, your willingness to be candid.”

Candid? Did I say I was going to be candid? My bad. I raised my right hand and placed it gently on one door, as if caressing it. “Well, this is the library, as I mentioned, and it’s my favorite room in the house. Every detail of this room is perfect in my estimation.

“For example, these exquisite doors were created, sized and carved in Milan.” I turned a bit and caressed one of the oversized doorknobs. “And these hand-carved crystal doorknobs came from Russia.”

“Wow,” he said, and nodded, obviously just being polite.

I turned the doorknobs and pushed the doors open. As I stepped aside, again I gestured with a sweep of my right arm. “Come in, come in.”

I guided him toward my desk, which was ahead and slightly on the right. I stepped past him and ran one hand lightly over the leading edge, then looked at him. “It’s polished mahogany. Each drawer is as deep as the desk, and there are various compartments. I had the whole thing, desk and chair, designed to suit my particular lifestyle and to aid me in the tasks I need to perform while sitting there.”

I gestured toward the inlaid black leather blotter. “The center-front is two and a half inches lower than the rest. I can’t tell you how much that helps when I have to spend long hours on my laptop either researching or communicating.”

He frowned. “You communicate via email?”

I smiled. “Ahh, the interview has begun.”

A bit of color crept up his neck. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to just blurt it out like that. I just thought in your line of work— I mean, in what I’ve heard is your line of work—”

And what line of work would that be, pray tell? But I let him off the hook. “I understand. If I’m in the line of work you think I’m in, communicating via email might be less secure than would be prudent.”

The color was still there, and it had almost reached his face. “Yes,” he said, managing not to stammer. “And thanks. I meant no offense.”

“Of course. Actually any mundane communications come and go via my Gmail account. For anything I want to keep secure, I communicate via a messaging service called Vaporstream. Are you familiar with the term ‘metadata’?” 

“Yes.”

“Well, when I use Vaporstream, the message streams and disappears. No metadata is created in the first place, so there’s nothing for the message to leave behind.”

A question sprang into his eyes.

I said, “Actually, several major corporations use the service as well. It’s completely legitimate. You won’t have any problem finding it online.”

I turned and directed his attention to the rest of the room. I pointed toward the corner. “To continue the tour, the fireplace over there keeps the place snug. The floor to ceiling bookshelves hold my favorite books, but they also serve to further insulate the room, for both temperature and noise. The rug in front of the fireplace, the one we’re standing on and the one over there in the seating area are faux fur.”

“Wow, they look real.”

I looked at him and laughed lightly. “Yeah, well... my adventurer friend Nick Porter offered to provide me with real ones, but the only animal that deserves to be hunted down and killed is the human. Of course, the authorities might frown on human rugs, don’t you think?”

His eyes grew wide.

I grinned broadly. “It’s all right, really. I’m joking.” I indicated the sitting area. “Shall we sit?” As we walked, I said, “The settee is an antique. It’s more for show than sitting, but feel free to take any of the chairs.”

The settee had walnut appointments and was padded in a quilted green brocade. Before it on the faux fur rug was a low cocktail table. On the other side of the rug were three plush warm-brown leather wingback chairs, a small occasional table next to each. Each table had a small cardboard and cork coaster on it. I put them there for decoration as much as for practical use. Each has a different logo on it from a brewery or distillery and I find them artful.

He chose the chair on the right, so I took the one on the left, facing him at an angle. I crossed my left leg over the right at the knee and rested my elbows on the arms of the chair. My fingertips touched lightly just in front of and beneath my chin.

We sat, we chatted, we sipped coffee.

He played his role, which was being himself.

I played my role, which was fitting in with him being himself.

The only thing we didn’t have was that mutual unspoken agreement that passes between Normals, that mutual understanding that we’d both play our roles and act satisfied when it was all over. I can’t do that. I can mimic the body language and the sounds and even the emotions, but I can’t convey completely that I’m experiencing the emotions, even fake emotions, because I’m simply not.

After a time he spoke at some length about various theories of psychopathy, then offered me the floor. He nodded sagely as I noted that all of those theories, each in its turn, was trying to blame the “problem” on one major factor and that there was no single major factor. In fact, what might be the driving cause of psychopathy in one individual might not affect another individual at all.

Then, when that parry-thrust-parry session finally wound down, with no warning he fell silent. He looked at the floor, then he looked past me at the fireplace. He glanced around at the shelves of books, and finally turned his head back to me. He put his left elbow on the arm of the chair, leaned forward slightly and put his chin between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand. 

A strange look came over him, and quietly, without the slightest hint of manipulation, he said, “Charlie, you know, I’d really like you to tell me, straight out, what it’s like to be you. I’d really like to know.”

I looked at him for a long moment. I let him know with that look that I thought maybe I could trust him, and that’s something I hadn’t felt from a Normal for a very long time. Then I said, “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure,” he said.

I could swear light was dancing in his eyes, probably reflecting off the wings of the butterflies fluttering in his stomach. Finally I nodded. “What it’s like,” I said. “Well, what it’s like.” I paused. “It’s a curiosity, really. It’s a sense that if you’re found out, you’ll be put on display like any other curiosity. General Tom Thumb. Any bearded lady in any sideshow anywhere. Any elephant man. Any psychopath.

“I also call it a curiosity because only the curious want to know what it’s like. Even some others like me want to know how I came to be who I am because we all came to it by a different path. What snapped my circuit off cleanly might not affect anyone else. And then too, we’re all different in how it affects us, living without emotion. Some make up for experiencing zero true emotions with an overabundance of misdirected compassion.”

I shrugged. “We each have our own brand of crazy, I guess.

“But most of the curiosity seekers aren’t people like me. Most of them are like you. Most of them are Normals. Your type always have been willing to shell out a few bucks to see that sideshow freak. They want to gawk and prod. They want to go home with the knowledge that they’ve tiptoed up to the edge of insanity, maybe even teetered a bit on the brink themselves, then pulled back without getting burned or taking the long drop.”

I shifted in my chair and grinned. “Of course, the big thing is that they want to go home.” I paused and let the grin fade. “They want to do all of that, experience everything, but they want to do it in relative safety. That’s why most people would be more comfortable with all of this in a book instead of sitting in my library.” I locked him in my gaze. “You can’t piss off a book, after all.”

His lips quivered the tiniest bit. “You— I haven’t— Have I—”

I continued to stare into his eyes. “And if you happen to catch a book staring at you as if it wants to plunge a knife repeatedly into your chest, thrusting it into your chest over and over and over while praying it won’t strike heartmeat too soon and thus end your agony and its ecstasy, you don’t really feel the urge to run, probably.” I relaxed. “Because it’s a book.”

“M-Mr. Task I—”

Almost imperceptibly I began to lean forward. Quietly, I said, “And if it’s a book, Mr. Green, you don’t have to wonder whether it’s serious, or just trying to spook you.”

A hint of an uncertain smile tugged nervously at one corner of his mouth.

I leaned farther forward, my voice dropping to a rasping whisper. “And you don’t have to wonder what will happen if you’re wrong!”

“Oh!” Sweat beads were breaking on his forehead as he leaned back in his chair.

I grinned broadly and settled back into mine. “It’s kind of like that, being me.”

He smiled, took a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it to his forehead a few times. “Y-you had me going there for a moment, Mr. Task.”

“Sorry. Just having a little fun. I guess maybe I was trying to illustrate how it might feel to teeter on the brink without taking that long drop I mentioned a moment ago.” I shrugged. “Anyway, I guess the best thing about having all of this in a book would be that you could always just close it. Hard to shut out a guy who’s sitting right in front of you, isn’t it?

“But no matter. Now let me see... oh, yes. There’s also another segment of Normals, a subgroup who want to believe they’ve drawn close enough to the insanity to live it for a bit, albeit vicariously.

“I mean, those people are out there among you every day, and there are a lot more of them than there are of us. If I were you, frankly those are the ones I’d be concerned about. In their own twisted psyche, they’re the ones who want to believe they could do the things they think I do, get away with them and be unaffected by having done them.”

Again his eyes were wide. “Really?”

“Oh yes, Mr. Green. They are the impostors among you who pretend to be us. Of course, if you look and listen closely, they lack that certain authenticity.” I smiled lightly. “Nuts are nuts, as they say, but peanuts are only legumes.

“But they aren’t really a problem for me. I have guys like that for breakfast. You know, figuratively.”

I grinned broadly. “The ones who tickle me are the serious academic types. You know what I mean. They come around feigning sincerity, telling me they just want to gain a deeper insight into me, maybe help me out of this life I’m drowning in.

“I never quite understood why they always go for the drowning metaphor.

“Anyway, I’m thinking, Wait a minute. I’m a PsyChoPath, remember? Think I won’t lie to you when it suits me? Think I won’t lead you to where I want you to go? Think I won’t spoon feed you conclusions that are just ‘off’ enough to seem real?

“Here, let me give you an example. Say you’re one of those academics who wants to gain a deeper insight into guys like me. If you’re that guy, see, almost invariably you’re lived your life in a clean world. I mean, the closest you’ve come to a sewer rat is shuddering involuntarily when you see a cartoon scientist on Saturday morning holding one of those red-eyed clean white cartoon rats.

“Now think about that for a moment. Is there any possible way that you really want to gain a deeper insight into a guy who would lock a rat in a cage over your stupid academic egg head and then sit back in his recliner, cross his feet at the ankles and snack on potato chips and a peanut butter and strawberry preserves sandwich while he watches the rat eating?” I leaned forward again. “I mean, is there?”

“And why would that guy even want to gain a deeper insight into the mind of a man who would laugh as he watched the guy try frantically to fight off the rat, maybe even bite the rat to make it stop biting him?”

He turned his head to watch me as I got up and paced away, then back, away, then back as I talked.

“And what about biting the rat? How does that help anyway? I mean, he could easily get lucky and bite off its paw or something.”  

I paced away and back again, and he was still watching.

“I mean, can you just imagine the feel of that bristly short fur? And those claws and that small, ragged end of rat foreleg bone scraping against the inside of your cheeks? Ugh!” I continued to pace, but he was glancing toward the door.

“Can you imagine it bristling across your tongue as you struggle not to swallow? And that’s all while the rat, screaming in anguish, is in a frenzy, is tearing at your nose and lips in retribution. Oh! And you know you’d swallow a little of the blood, both the rat’s and yours. You couldn’t really help doing that, could you?”

I paced past him again, turned and paced back. “You might even get lucky and rip out the rat’s abdomen as the claws of his little back feet are digging into your chin, y’know? And he’s just stretching up to take a chunk out of your left eyebrow with his razor sharp incisors. You could bite out his gut then.”

And I hit him with a leather sap. Hard.

He crumpled to the floor.

Well I couldn’t very well let him just leave, could I?

I took him down to the basement, chained him in the far corner and put the cage on his head. Hey, he’s the one who wanted to know, right?

He hasn’t come around yet, but he will.

The rat will wake him up.

* * *

Hey you... you reading this... if you’re still with me, I assume you’re in it for a view to the curious, so hang around.

I’m glad you’re here, really. I think we’ll get along fine, you and I.

Just remember your own limitations.

And remember that I don’t have any.

* * * * * * *