Page 3 of Deja Who
“Who are you?”
“Alice... hmmmm... mmmm... my name... my name is...”
“Who are you?”
“My name is James Clark McReynolds.”
Excellent. Leah crimped the tube. Past memories would come easier now; Rain Down (generic name: reindyne, courtesy of the good people at Pfizer, discovered by accident in 1987 when Pfizer was trying to develop a heart medicine/diet aid) was invaluable for that, possibly more invaluable than Leah or any of her colleagues. But if she kept the IV running wide open, Alice/James/etc. would fall so far down the rabbit hole they’d never make it back.
“My name is James Clark McReynolds.”
“There you go.”
“What?”
“Nothing, Judge McReynolds.” Leah flipped through the chart. DOB February 3, 1862. DOD August 24, 1946. Aquarius, a masculine sign. A fixed sign, with keywords like “stubborn,” “sarcastic,” “rebellious.” American lawyer and, later, judge. Possibly the most vile wretch to ever sit on a Supreme Court bench.
Even by the standards of the time, Judge McReynolds was a gold-plated jerkass, foisted on the unwary by President Taft, and what the hell hadel presidentebeen thinking? Thanks to history’s long memory, and her job, Leah knew exactly: Taftwas thinking what he was saying, and what he was saying was McReynolds had been “someone who seems to delight in making others uncomfortable.” Wasn’t that a terrific quality for any judge to have? Why, it ought to be a mandate! Oh, and lest he hadn’t been clear, Taft also described McReynolds as “selfish to the last degree... fuller of prejudice than any man I have ever known... he has no sense of duty.”
So naturally, the politicians of the time were in full agreement: Hire that man! And keep promoting him. Eventually promote him just to get rid of him. Promote him again. And again. Eventually give him a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the land. Because in politics, shit flows uphill.
Leah was not surprised to find she was not surprised. Her research—hours and hours looking up birth and death certificates, hours on the online juggernaut that was the Insighter database—helped her figure out who Alice was, and who Alice had been. Chart #6116 was leaking McReynolds all over the place. And that wasn’t even the bad news. She had the same thought about almost every patient: if only they’d come to see me sooner. Before she did things she can never undo.
Well. She
(they)
were here now. Leah would help as best she could. Of course, her idea of help and her patient’s idea of help were likely different.
“...the only way you can get on the Supreme Court these days is to be either the son of a criminal or a Jew, or both!” #6116 was ranting in a shrill old man’s voice.
Be glad you didn’t live to see the twenty-first century, McReynolds. African-Americans in Congress, the House, the White House, and theSupreme Court. Jews roam freely, secure in the absurd notion that religion doesn’t have to dictate career paths. Lesbians brazenly being lesbians. Homosexual couples marrying! And then adopting! Legally!
She swallowed her snicker. “Further, Judge McReynolds.” Leah checked the IV crimp. “Go back further. There’s all kinds of stuff in there. You have to dig for it.”
Her voice changed at once; no hesitation, Rain Down was working nicely and #6116 was deep in EffRe (Effortless Recall). #6116 went from a self-confident young woman to a shrill old man to... “My name is Westley Allan Dodd.”
There you go. I cannot tell you how much meeting a serial killer before lunch brightens my Wednesdays.
“Mm-hmm. Tell me all about yourself, Mr. Dodd. This is your chance to be heard.” The thing they all needed. The thing they would kill to get. If she were nicer, she would be sympathetic.
She wasn’t nicer.
Leah skipped past the McReynolds section of the chart. Westley Allan Dodd. DOB July 3, 1961, DOD January 5, 1993. Cancer. An astrological sign of contradictions, as keywords were “loyalty,” “oversensitivity,” “caring,” “self-pitying,” “dependable,” “self-absorbed.” Convicted serial killer and child molester. His execution was the first legal hanging, at his own request, since 1965.
The manner of his death was the least unique thing about him. He also claimed a stress-free, happy childhood of wealth and leisure and his first victims were his cousins, because all ordinary children with happy lives molested their cousins and then went on to rape, torture, and kill other children. “Dear Mom and Dad, happy eighteenth birthday to me. Thanks so much for a carefree childhood and instilling appropriate valuesin me and protecting me from all trauma, but now I’m going to be a sociopath, for funzies. Thanks again!” wrote no well-adjusted teenager ever.
Dodd’s first victims: cousins. All victims: below the age of twelve. Number of victims: over fifty. Attitude toward children in ten words or less: “I’m only nice to the ones I want sex from.”
“...told them, Isaidif I escaped I’d immediately go back to killing and raping kids—”
“They should have taken you at your word, Mr. Dodd. Further now. What is your name?”
“My name is Nathaniel Gordon.”
“You bet it is.” DOB 1834; historical records do not recount exact DOB. But they sure as hell paid attention to his death: May 8, 1862. Nat Gordon, the last pirate ever hanged, and the only slave trader ever tried, convicted, and executed for stealing one thousand slaves. “Real” piracy was punishable by death, but it was hardly ever enforced when the plunder was merely people with dark skin. The paperwork alone hardly made it worth it.
Of the one thousand slaves Gordon stole, 172 were men and 162 were women. According to John Spears, author ofThe Slave Trade in America,“Gordon was one of those infamous characters who preferred to carry children because they could not rise up to avenge his cruelties.” Nice.
Hilariously (to Leah, at least; she knew her job had turned her into a jerkextraordinaireand that people were right to avoid her at parties), Gordon tried to kill himself the night before his execution. The local authorities found that annoying, especially since it meant postponing Gordon’s execution from noon to 2:30 so the guy could recover enough to be murdered by the state. Leah wondered just how that went down: “He wasdefinitely too sick at noon, but now that it’s 2:30 he hasn’t barfed in over an hour and can walk under his own power.” “Great! Let’s go kill him. Good news, Mr. Gordon, you’re well enough to execute.” Or, as Leah preferred to think of it, the classic “well, sir, we have good news and bad news” scenario.
He left behind a mother, wife, and son, but Judge Shipman (a man who almost a century earlier was a hundred times the “justice” McReynolds was) commented on Gordon’s real legacy: “Think of the cruelty and wickedness of seizing nearly a thousand fellow beings, who never did you harm, and thrusting them beneath the decks of a small ship, beneath a burning tropical sun, to die in of disease or suffocation, or be transported to distant lands, and be consigned, they and their posterity, to a fate far more cruel than death.”
“...family to support,” Gordon was whining from the plush couch. “How can it be a hanging crime to move property?”
So! A pirate, a serial killer, and the worst bigot the Supreme Court had ever seen. And Leah was trapped in a room with all of them. All right, “trapped” was inaccurate, since she had obtained patient consent, drugged #6116, and called all her shadows forward.
Wednesdays!
