First You Make a Stone of Your Heart

"She said something about a large black creature taking one of the employees into the water, then something green, a green glow, taking them away. She really wasn't all that coherent, Mr. Callahan, so I'm not sure if that's exactly what she observed or not."

"You said she hallucinates, Doctor? Is she psychotic or schizophrenic, something of that nature?"

"Something like that," the physician repeated casually, offhandedly, as if that diagnosis was out of bounds for this discussion.

"Do you think I could talk with her?"

"As I said, Mr. Callahan, she's heavily sedated."

"Is she conscious?"

"Yes. Yes, she is."

"Then I'd like to speak with her. Now, please."

"Do you have a warrant, Officer?"

"Do I need one, sir?"

"Well, you see, I also happen to be Dev's -- well, you see I am now also her guardian, so I have a direct say in the matter."

Callahan nodded. "I see. Does she play the piano?"

"Yes. She's quite good, actually. Why do you ask?"

"We had a moment out there, sir. Something almost personal, and it had to do with playing the piano."

"Do you play?" the physician asked quietly, almost kindly.

Callahan nodded. "She asked if I played Debussy, and when I replied Gershwin she said that was even better."

"Indeed. She didn't mention that earlier." The physician stood aside and led the way deeper into the house. "My name is Peter, by the way. Peter Weyland. Won't you come in?"

A little off balance now, Callahan smiled at the change that had come over Weyland as they walked into the house; he could see into the living room from the foyer and his eyes went to a massive concert grand in the far corner of the gilded room. Next to a corner that seemed to be all glass, the Steinway was bathed in pure light -- then he saw the piano was in a small, glassed-in atrium surrounded by broad-leafed palms and spongy ferns -- and Callahan had never seen a more seductively majestic setting to sit and play in his life.

Almost dumbfounded, when he turned to express his admiration he found that Weyland had disappeared.

But a moment later he came back, only now with Devlin in hand.

And she was hardly recognizable, Callahan thought. Hunched over, sallow and gray, the young woman he'd seen the night before was gone now, subsumed by and inside the confines of whatever world her medications granted. Her slippered feet shuffled along unsteadily and her auburn hair was an unkempt, windblown mess that seemed wildly out of place inside Weyland's elegant house.

But then she saw Callahan standing in the foyer.

She stood straighter in an instant and her face brightened, color returned, and when she smiled at Callahan he felt the strength of her in his bones. Suddenly and quite unbidden, he walked up to her and she held his eyes in her own and the house was alive with strange magic inside a slowing movement of time. After she came to Callahan she reached out and took his hands again, but this time she clasped them together inside her own, then brought them to the side of her face.

"Gershwin?" she whispered to him.

"Yes. He's always been my favorite."

"Show me."

"What? Now?"

"Please?"

So Harry walked through the leafy atrium and over to the Steinway; after he got comfortable he began fingering an extremely simplified rendition of Summertime, but just a few bars...then he blew into an explosive phrasing of the Rhapsody...a real window-rattling romp...before he settled into the oppressively languid Second Prelude, playing through to the end -- then he turned and looked her in the eye: "And what would you tell me?" he asked, wondering what she might choose to tell a story of her own.

And after she sat beside him she addressed the keyboard and closed her closed eyes before she drifted into Schwarzwald's Second -- but as she meandered into the second bar he stopped her.

"Please, no," he whispered, "anything but that."

"Why?" she asked, concerned by the pain she felt in his eyes.

"She's -- Imogen Schwarzwald is my mother."

"What?"

"Imogen," he struggled to add, "is my mother."

"Callahan?" she sighed. "Oh yes, I remember now. What was it like? To grow up with that music all around you?"

His mind drifted to the green house in the avocado grove, the blackberry brambles -- and the storms that buffeted their lives when she played... "I'm not sure I could find the words," he started to say, but then he looked away. "It was...a complicated life."

"So, that's where Gershwin comes from. Point--counterpoint, wouldn't you say?"

"I guess maybe it's obvious now, but then again I've always been an open book."

"I doubt that very much," she whispered, then she leaned into him, placed the side of her face on his shoulder in a way that felt oh-so-familiar. And yet oh-so-strange.

Then, perhaps out of guilt Callahan looked around the massive living room for her father, but he had simply left the room and had, once again, disappeared. And now not even the nurse was present. "Would you mind telling me about the medications you're taking?" he asked.

"I would if I knew what they are?"

"Your father? He doesn't tell you?"

She shook her head, but she hesitated now, evading him. "No. I'm not really interested."

"What are the side effects?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"I was wondering, do they keep you from playing?"

"Oh, that. Sometimes. I think more than anything else they make me sleepy, and then I can't concentrate. And sometimes my fingers feel heavy, like they're made of lead."

"I can't imagine what that must feel like," he said. "To be cut off from something so elemental."

"You do understand, don't you?" she whispered, now rubbing up against his shoulder in a very feline gesture of acceptance.

"I think I would feel lost without music, but I wouldn't want to presume..."

"You don't have to."

"Inspector Callahan?" Doctor Weyland said as he came back into the room. "Have you been able to talk about last night's troubles?"

Callahan pulled away from Devlin and stood. "No sir. This isn't going how I expected."

"I dare say," the physician muttered caustically. "Perhaps you should come by in the morning. I'll have Devlin up and ready to go by nine."

Callahan knew a dismissal when he heard one, so he nodded and sighed before he turned to her again. "Perhaps, if you feel up to it in the morning we could walk down to the water, or maybe over to the yacht club..."

"Better yet, Callahan," the physician said, "why don't you come out with us. We were planning on a day out on the water, so come by around nine or so and when the tide turns at eleven, well, why don't you count on spending the afternoon with us?"

Callahan nodded. "If it's still alright with you, I would like to come by at nine -- and I'll need to come with another detective."

"Yes. That's probably best."

Harry could feel her disappointment -- but worse still, he was sure she could feel his own. Something wasn't right about all this, and he knew it. If word of his behavior today got back to Captain Bennett, his career in homicide would be over. And his dismissal would be justifiably swift.

Yet he drove back to the bureau trying to understand what had just happened to him. Inrushing feelings for a girl he didn't know, overwhelming dendritic impulses flowing from notes in a score to a hazy shade of memory he could barely fathom as his own.

What was she doing to him -- if not casting a spell...?

He turned on Bryant then turned hard onto Harriet Street, then into the lot and he sat there for a few minutes, watched Charlie McCoy pulling his radar gun from a saddlebag as he talked to Captain McKay. He shook his head at the thought then wondered how his old friend managed to keep riding and working Traffic now that he'd turned 50.

"And what the fuck are you gonna do when you turn 50, numb-nuts?" he asked the eyes in the rearview mirror.

Callahan tried to shake off the sudden funk he'd found himself in; he climbed out of the puke green Ford and crossed the street and walked into the main lobby, flashed his badge at the unseen soul behind the black glass and was buzzed into the sacrosanct bowels of the building. He grabbed a bottle of Coke then rode up to the fourth floor in silence, lost in the fog. Bennett was in his office working on his stomach ulcer, while Frank DiGiorgio and Carl Stanton were at their desks pounding away on ancient gray Underwood typewriters, filling in the blanks of another senseless death.

"Callahan!" Bennett growled, his voice rattling the windows. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Steinhart, then at the Weyland residence -- talking to that witness."

"Find out anything at the aquarium?"

"No, nothing. Everyone there was all wound up about some kind of pre-historic fish someone found in Africa. A coelacanth, I think they called it. Ugly fucker, too."

"Uh-huh. A Doctor Weyland called, wanted to confirm your interview with his daughter tomorrow -- on some fucking boat. You wanna tell me what's goin' on?"

"The girl, the witness, is apparently schizophrenic," Callahan sighed as he recalled her shuffling gait, "and she was heavily sedated. The doctor, her father, thought I might have better luck talking to her in the morning."

"Uh-huh," Bennett said, not at all pleased with the way Harry had spent his day. "So let me get this straight. You wanna go sailing tomorrow? On the taxpayers' dime?"

Callahan shrugged. "I have plenty of OT, Captain. You wanna call it comp-time?"

"Not if you're interviewing a witness in an official capacity. I mean, I assume this will be official, right?"

"Yessir."

"Take Carl with you. He looks like he probably owns a pair of boat shoes..."

"Ah, c'mon, Captain," DiGiorgio chimed in, "can't I go?"

"You?" Bennett sneered. "Shit, Frank, if you stepped on a fuckin sailboat and the fucker would probably rollover and then I'd have to write up another report..."

"Hey, fuck you very much, Skipper," DiGiorgio replied, grinning.

"And the horse you rode in on, Fatso," Bennett grumbled. "And don't call me skipper!"

"Right -- Skipper!"

"Stanton!" Bennett growled. "You free tomorrow?"

"No sir. Court, 0800."

"Fuck. Well Callahan, looks like you're taking me sailing tomorrow. Pick me up here at 0700 and we'll go over to the diner and get breakfast."

Harry nodded, then he looked away and sighed, because it suddenly looked like tomorrow was going to be a very long day.

C1.4

The water in the yacht club's marina looked to be about the same color as the sky, a deep cerulean blue, and there was not a cloud in the sky -- anywhere Callahan looked. There were, however, whitecaps all over the bay and a crisp 25 to 30 knot wind was funneling in through the Golden Gate. Callahan looked out over the bay and could see that the few sailors who had ventured out seemed, as far as he could tell, to have their hands more than full. Callahan and Bennett looked at one another with their eyes wide open now, and both seriously regretted popping by Bennett's favorite diner for pancakes and eggs before heading down to the marina.

Callahan recognized Dev Weyland standing up on the front of a sleek looking sailboat, and when their eyes met she waved at him.

"Wow," Bennett smirked, "now I know why you've taken such an interest in the case, Harry. Sheesh, she's a knockout!"

And Callahan had to admit that, right now, standing out there in the sun and the wind she looked as pretty as any woman he'd ever seen. Long chestnut hair, a great smile and even greater legs, Callahan returned her wave and tried to match the excitement he felt in her smile, but then he remembered her drugged out shuffle the day before and he realized this had to be one of her good days.

"Just be careful, Captain. Her father said he'd 'have her ready' for the day, so I assume that means medicated."

"Did he tell you what her condition is?"

"No sir, but he did say she hallucinates, and that implies schizophrenia...?"

Bennett shrugged. "Usually, but not always."

Peter Weyland was waiting for them at the head of the pier, and after he opened the locked gate he walked ahead of Callahan and Bennett out to his boat -- hardly acknowledging their presence as he waved at other skippers making ready to go out. Weyland guided them along a narrow finger pier that divided two slips, and simply pointed at the boxy little steps used to gain access to the deck of his boat.

"That's just a beautiful boat," Bennett said. "Look at those teak decks!"

And once the beauty of his 'yacht' had been recognized -- and acknowledged -- Weyland's demeanor changed in an instant. Now his face registered pleasure and pride, and Callahan noted a little smile of satisfaction on Weyland's face as he led them into the boat's cockpit. "Yes, teak," he finally said. "I think it's Burmese teak, however the yacht was built in Finland. Dev? You ready up there?"

"Yes," Devlin said, still smiling at Callahan.

"Harry, if you wouldn't mind taking the wheel for a moment...?"

"What? Me?" a stunned Callahan said.

"Yes, you! You're not afraid, are you?"

Callahan had never sailed anything larger than a battleship in the bathtub of the house in Potrero Hills, but he hopped behind the wheel and stared at Weyland as the physician stepped forward and removed a dock line from it's cleat on the pier.

"Okay Dev, cast off now! Callahan, see the lever on the right side of the binnacle?"

"The what?"

"The wheel? Pull it back towards you about an inch, until you feel the boat moving back a little."

Pulling the lever back put the motor "into reverse" -- and pulling the lever further back made the boat go faster...in reverse -- so Callahan looked around and made sure the boat was backing out of the slip in a reasonably straight line...and then it hit him. This was a test. Weyland was testing him, watching how he responded to an unexpected challenge, so he took a deep breath and let his instincts take over.

'Okay...there's only one way out of here and after I back out of this slip I've got to turn right, which means the back of the boat has to go left...'

He turned the wheel to the left and right and settled on left and he felt the boat slowly back out to the left.

"Okay, now move the lever to the middle and just let her coast along for a moment. Right. Good. Now, slip the lever forward about an inch and see what happens."

"Got it," Callahan said, though in truth he still didn't have the slightest idea what he was doing.

"Okay, straighten out the wheel and look where you're going...and keep right in the middle of the channel here..."

Callahan straightened up and looked ahead, trying to guesstimate the width of the channel, and then he saw an instrument that was showing their depth. "This gauge says seven feet...is that right?"

Weyland nodded. "A little more to the left for about fifty feet, then come right just a little."

Callahan's gut was churning now, but the feeling was indescribable. He looked ahead then checked the expression on Weyland's face then checked their depth on the gauge. "Still showing seven feet...okay, 6.9...6.8..."

"Okay, start a gentle turn to the right, and add a little power. See the knot meter?"

Callahan found it. "Got it!"

"Accelerate to 5 knots, but not a bit faster."

"Right!"

But now it was Bennetts turn to watch -- and he couldn't help but think that this psychiatrist was playing Callahan like a fiddle. Not simply testing him, but judging his usefulness -- and Bennett had been around his type in the Navy long enough to know where this usually led. Bennett wouldn't have cared one way or another, but Callahan was investigating a homicide, or a potential homicide, and watching the way Weyland was twisting Callahan's perception, knocking him off balance, was making his old 'cop on the beat' instincts sing-out like a canary's.

"Alright...good," Weyland called out. "Straight ahead another fifty yards then a hard left, and don't let her run away from you when we clear the breakwater!"

By this point Callahan could see where the water was deeper just by looking at the colors off to the left. Shallower water was lighter colored, almost sand colored in places, while deeper water in the basin was greener -- yet as he turned hard to the left the water ahead turned blueish-green, then a deeper blue, and the depth gauge quickly dropped from ten feet down to 15, then 25 feet.

Then they cleared the breakwater off to their left and that unobstructed wind funneling through the Golden Gate slammed into boat, and Callahan felt a new pressure through the wheel -- and as the boat began to slide off to the right he countered with left input on the wheel...

"Okay Harry...see the left tower on the Golden Gate? Head right for that, and keep her pointed exactly at that tower..."

Callahan turned the wheel and he watched as Dev and her father raised the sail on the mast, and it began flailing about like it wanted to beat itself to death...

"Okay Harry, turn a little to the right..."

And as quickly the sail turned rock hard...

Then father and daughter raised the sail up front.

And now it felt to Callahan like he was riding on the back of a caged beast that had just been released from its shackles, and not only did the boat take off like a rocket it was now leaning over so far that water was rushing right along the edge of the deck...

Then Weyland was by his side, first shutting down the engine then trimming the sails; winching them in and letting them out bit by bit until they were both rock hard and pulling the boat along like a freight train...

"See Angel Island over there?" Weyland asked, pointing past Alcatraz Island to the oak covered islet. "The right side there, that's Point Blunt...steer right for that."

Callahan noted the boat wasn't leaning over quite so much now, but as Weyland began fiddling with the sails again the speed began to creep up, hitting 7 knots within a few hundred yards then stretching for 8 knots...and Callahan could feel it then...the boat was no longer a simple machine...she felt more like a thoroughbred racehorse running free at a dead gallop and everything around him was literally humming as the boat's speed increased.

A gust slammed into them and the boat leaned hard to the right, the right edge of the deck disappeared under water for a moment -- until Dev let out one of the lines -- and then the boat straightened up a little...but now their speed was edging over 8 knots and heading towards 9 and the sensation of speed was intoxicating, exhilarating...but no, Callahan thought, it was beyond exhilarating, beyond anything he'd ever experienced before...

And then Dev was standing beside him, leaning into his shoulder again...

"I feel like we're flying," Callahan said into her ear...

"I know...you can almost imagine what a gull must feel out here..."

Callahan noticed a freighter coming out from under the Bay Bridge, and then another coming in through the Golden Gate, and he started judging his own speed while he tried to guess how fast the freighters were closing...and suddenly little alarm bells started going off in his mind -- because to his unpracticed eye it looked like all three vessels were going to arrive at the same point out there near Alcatraz -- at the same time.

But Callahan also saw that Weyland was looking at the two freighters and performing the same calculation -- and Weyland didn't seem the least bit fazed.

Another gust slammed into the boat and this time Weyland looked at Callahan and smiled. "A little starboard...uh...to the right now, Harry."

And Callahan could feel an immediate difference. When a gust hit and the boat leaned way over, turning away from the gust lessened its impact and the boat sailed more upright, so as the gust passed he turned back to the left and the boat started to lean again, and it felt like they were going faster, too. And no one had adjusted the sails. 'Interesting,' Callahan said to himself. 'What happens if I turn more to the left?'