THE MULE
2
‘Tell her to relax and go back.’ Velvet-voice said smoothly.
I told the woman exactly that. She instantly lay back down in the chair, resting the gun across her lap, like John-bloody-Wayne.
‘She can be up again in a flash, and will be if I don’t tell you the key words that will stop her from shooting you in five minutes.’ I was told.
I glanced at my watch, and then held the phone closer to my head.
‘I suggest you listen, Mister Wallace. She’s a mule and won’t remember a thing when she wakes up. She’ll simply go home and cook dinner for hubby and the kids. That’s why I chose her-to show and prove to you what can be done, irrespective of what you might have been taught or believe you know from experience. Have I impressed you enough to take me seriously in anything else I might want to say to you?’
A bloody nut case-a fruit-bloody-loop. Why did I always get the nuts?
‘Yes,’ was all I said.
‘Good. Then listen carefully. If one million dollars just for you sounds interesting you can tell her to go home now, and don’t hang up on me. If it doesn’t interest you, you can tell her anyway and I’ll send a different mule back tomorrow. Then we’ll go through the same thing all over again. What’s it going to be?’
Just what I needed… Madam Corlione from the Mafia with a bloody offer I couldn’t refuse. I looked at the entranced woman.
‘You can go home now.’ I told her.
She opened her eyes and smiled as is nothing at all had happened out of the ordinary. I wondered what her hubby might think if she pulled that stunt with him the next time he put the hard word on her when she wasn’t in the mood. She rose from the chair. After putting her shoes back on and tightening her belt she left my office without so much as a backward glance. I heard the door slide shut in the waiting room-a bad-hair day. That what it was alright-a bloody bad-hair day. Jesus.
‘What exactly do you want?’ I asked, keeping my voice calm and exercising every muscle in my face.
‘That’s better. Does the money interest you?’ She asked.
‘Not really.’ I said, telling the truth.
‘We knew it wouldn’t, Mister Wallace, but we had to check. Thank you for being honest.’
‘Okay.’ I said. ‘You’ve had your fun. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got patients-real ones, who are silly enough to believe they need my help. Nice joke and all that, and I am very impressed, but the fun’s over. Have a nice life!’
With that I hung up the phone and lit a smoke. Christ. I walked out to the waiting room and locked the door. Then I walked back and closed the door between it and my office. I wanted to be alone to think. I made myself a half-cold cup of coffee, wondering all the time what the hell was going on. I started to rationalise.
A mule was industry talk for a somnambule: a person who could achieve deep trance state in hypnosis easily, and, once there in that state could be instructed to do anything, feel anything, and see anything. Then they could be awakened without any recall of the event whatsoever. I’d only come across a few in my time as a Hypnotherapist, but I knew what they were capable of, or, could be made capable of.
Drawing deeply on the cigarette I figured that either someone was playing a very elaborate game with me, or, it was all as Velvet-voice had told me, but why? I sloshed down the lukewarm coffee, feeling the sugar coat my teeth instantly. Hell. Why should I worry about Velvet-voice killing me. The coffee, the cigarettes, or the sugar would do the job for her. Her? Who was she? A woman therapist? My mind raced instantly, but no female therapists came to mind. And what was the plot, really? The money trick hadn’t worked. Besides, she said they hadn’t expected me to be interested anyway, so what were they interested in? They? Why did I assume it was a ‘they?’ I finished the cigarette and the coffee at the same time, none the wiser for my attempt at a brain drain. Jesus. I didn’t need this rubbish.
As I sat there musing with my thoughts I played with the idea of ringing her back. Maybe that’s what she was waiting for-for curiosity to get the better of me. It was starting to. What the hell, I figured, then dialled the number. I could hear the receiver pick up, but no one answered. Suspicious type, old Velvet-voice-no problems.
‘ Hello?’ I ventured first. It was my phone call after all. May as well speak and get on with it. Then I might get somewhere.
‘What took you so long?’ Came the smooth voice.
I was calmer now, back to my old smug self and over the initial shock and confusion, or so I thought.
‘Well, I’m forty seven years old.’ I said evenly. ‘I figure the way I smoke and drink coffee with too much sugar that I haven’t got too much time left to find out why you’ve gone to so much trouble just to tick me off!’
I wasn’t mad. I was cool, but I wanted to get across the impression that I wasn’t very happy about the whole thing. Christ. Not very happy? What an understatement.
‘That was not my intention. I just wanted to show you what a mule was capable of, in the right hands.’ Velvet-voice told me coolly.
‘I am aware of what they are capable of.’ I retorted angrily.
‘There’s no need to stay upset, Mister Wallace.’ She said slowly, as if she was talking to a child. I hate that at the best of times. ‘I merely wanted you to know you were dealing with an equal, or better.’
My blood began to rise. She had a way of pushing my buttons, and we weren’t even best friends yet.
‘You’ve read the book, haven’t you?’ I stated flatly.
‘Book?’
‘How to win friends and influence people.’ I answered dryly, imagining her unwilling and naked at my feet like a slave, complete with her collar and leash sitting on my lap. Then I heard her laugh suddenly.
‘Very funny, Mister Wallace. But now we are wasting time. And I haven’t got that much of it to waste, I’m afraid.’
‘That makes two of us.’ I answered sharply. ‘You want to tell me what this is all about? I’m sure you could have found a dozen other therapists who would have been only too happy to play games with you.’
‘Happy, yes-the right person? No.’ she said.
‘Come on lady. Let’s get on with it before I move past angry and start to get bored. Okay?’ I told her in a tired tone. ‘Who are you anyway?’ I added quickly, wondering why I hadn’t asked that sooner.
‘All in good time, Mister Wallace.’ Came the rapid and evasive answer.
I listened to the silence. It was deafening, even to someone like me who liked silence.
‘Experimental hypnosis, Mister Wallace. That’s what it’s all about, and we’d like you to be involved-what can be done and what can’t be done.’
‘What makes you think I’m interested? Besides, that doesn’t pay too well, last time I checked.’
‘I know you’re interested, Mister Wallace.’ She came back. ‘And we’d pay you more than you could earn listening to someone’s sexual hang-ups and various problems all day long. Or playing with their minds as you probably do.’
‘We?’ I asked, very suspicious now. Maybe she had bugged my office?
‘There are several of us in the group.’
‘All therapists?’ I asked, my curiosity now rising.
‘Mostly, and a financial backer, of course.’
Alarm bells started ringing somewhere. I knew I should listen to them. I knew I should, but I didn’t.
‘How legal is what you have in mind?’ I asked.
‘In strict legal terms, Mister Wallace, we are doing nothing against the law. Ethics may come into it as far as the ‘‘mules are concerned, but nothing that would end you up in prison.’
Well, that was a relief. I was starting to get bored again, but the bells were beginning to play my song.
‘What sort of money are we talking about?’ I ventured. What the hell? It was my phone call, after all.
‘Three thousand dollars a week, Mister Wallace.’ She said without flinching.
Jesus.
‘Mister Wallace?’
‘Yes.’ I answered flatly.
‘Are you interested?’
‘I don’t know if I’m up or bloody down at the moment!’ I retorted angrily. ‘I’m obviously having a bad-hair day!’
‘I am not trying to make a fool of you, Mister Wallace.’ She said, reading my mind.
‘What kind of experimental hypnosis?’ I asked tiredly.
‘The kind you’d be interested in, Mister Wallace-all kinds.’
This time the silence was deliberately mine. How did she like it? Besides, I didn’t like the way she inferred my interest.
‘Mister Wallace?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you interested enough to meet with me?’
‘How do you know I won’t tear your head off?’ I said dryly.
‘It’s not in your nature to be violent, Mister Wallace. We’ve checked.’
‘When and where?’ I asked, wondering who had checked with me.
‘Here and now.’ Came the rapid answer. Jesus-a comedian.
‘When and where?’ I repeated flatly.
‘At the pier in half an hour.’
Everybody knew where the pier was.
‘Okay.’
‘And, Mister Wallace?’
‘Yes?’
‘It would not be in your best interests to do anything silly. I would know, whatever it was.’
‘Sure.’ I said. The phone went dead in my ear, but the sound of the alarm bells did not.
I lit another bunger and drew heavily on it, then watched as the blue-grey smoke streamed up toward the ceiling, until it became invisible. The pier was only ten minutes from my office. I went there often when I had a problem, wanted to think, or just plain relax. Most therapists have their own therapist. I don’t, which was probably why I was the way I was. I watch the ocean and it doesn’t charge me one-fifty an hour to do it.
I lit a second cigarette in as many minutes, shaking my head in disgust and wondering what kind of experiments she had in mind, or that they had in mind. I was interested in experimental hypnosis, purely from the viewpoint of discovering unknown human performance levels as far as the human mind was concerned, along with giving women back their natural females in their lives, whether they wanted them or not.
I glanced at my watch, wondering where my destiny was taking me next and somehow knowing the excitement that was already building in my conscious mind could either be very good, or very bad. I was ready for either. Time to go, with ten minutes to spare-just a short, brisk walk.