by Rob Byrnes
“Okay, this is ridiculous. If it’s hollow there has to be—” He stopped, spotting movement in the shadows near the rear of the auditorium, not far from where Leonard sat in the truck. The men disappeared back into the bushes.
“Merribaugh,” said Chase, as the Cathedral’s chief operating officer passed under a light and crossed the loading dock before disappearing into the building.
“What was he doing out here?” Grant looked up the cross. “You think he was coming from the cross?”
Chase nodded. “Probably hiding the stash they raked in tonight.”
Moments later they were creeping through dark bushes until they reached the spot where they’d seen Merribaugh emerge. It was Farraday, out from behind the wheel and therefore out of his comfort zone, who finally found the windowless door at the far end of the building. It was locked, but Grant dipped into his pocket, found what he needed, and had them past that obstacle in less than twenty seconds.
$ $ $
Tap tap tap.
Leonard was sitting nervously in the darkness, half-covered with a moving pad. He didn’t like being left alone, so his thought upon hearing the taps against the side of the truck was that his partners in crime had returned. He felt great relief.
Until Captain Joseph Enright’s face appeared in the window, just inches away. Leonard screamed and scrambled to push down the door lock but wasn’t fast enough, and he half tumbled from the seat as Enright flung open the door.
“Hello, Mr. Platt. I figured we’d see you again one day. I just hadn’t imagined it’d be so soon.”
$ $ $
The windowless door led to a basement storage room. Above them, they heard applause as the curtain went up on the second act of The Sound of Music.
Grant pulled the flashlight from his rear pocket and ran the light once around the room before shutting it off. It was totally empty. He’d sort of hoped they’d find the money there and could forget that nonsense about the cross, but no.
“Okay, so we found a basement. Which isn’t the same thing as finding a way into the cross. You sure about this?”
“No,” Chase confessed. “But it’s an idea, and we don’t have any more of those.”
Even in the darkness, Chase could feel Grant frowning. He distracted himself by blindly groping the nearest wall, hoping against hope that he’d somehow find a way into the cross.
“Maybe Merribaugh came from somewhere else,” said Farraday’s voice from the darkness. “Maybe he was out back takin’ a leak.”
“Maybe,” Chase said. He might have said more if his hands hadn’t suddenly found a handle sticking out of the wall. When he thumped it, he heard hollowness. “Grant, shine the flashlight over here!”
Once illuminated, Chase saw his hand was wrapped over a metal handle attached to a wooden door, both painted a cement-gray to match the cinderblock walls of the basement. It wasn’t perfect camouflage, and maybe it wasn’t supposed to be, but it served the purpose of visually blending the door to the wall.
He turned the handle, assuming it would be locked. It wasn’t.
The door slowly swung open, and Grant followed its arc with the flashlight.
It was a tunnel, and it led out of the basement in the direction of the Great Cross of the Virginia Cathedral of Love.
“Huh,” said Grant. “Maybe I should pay more attention to your hunches.”
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Captain Joseph Enright slapped the nightstick against his palm just hard enough to make the impressive wood-against-flesh noise, but not hard enough to hurt. As he’d hoped, Leonard Platt flinched and grew a shade paler.
“You need to start answerin’ my questions, Platt. Otherwise, you gonna get an opportunity to feel this nightstick fo’ yourself. Now, what’ja do with Officer Cason?”
By now, Leonard figured Cason was the security guard who was bound and gagged in the back of the panel truck. He wasn’t about to give that up to Enright.
“I don’t know this guy.”
Whap went the nightstick into Enright’s palm.
“Then tell me what you’re doin’ here. And who’s with you?”
“I’m here alone. I just got…uh…nostalgic.”
Whap! Enright winced; that one sort of hurt. He tried to shake the pain out of his hand without Leonard Platt noticing.
“What if I tell you I don’t believe you, Platt? ’Cause I truly don’t.”
Leonard swallowed hard. “Are you going to call the cops?”
“That depends.” Enright thought about whacking the nightstick into his palm again, then thought maybe he’d wait until the stinging stopped. “Depends on what Merribaugh wants me to do with you. Don’t matter much to me. I could call the cops…” He leaned close to Leonard. “Or I could just take you back to the marsh, if you know what I mean.”
A shudder swept through Leonard. He did indeed know what Enright meant.
$ $ $
At the end of the tunnel was a metal staircase heading in only one direction: up. Grant trained the flashlight above them, throwing light across a tightly wound circular stairway that wrapped around and around as it climbed through the center of the cross.
“There’s your squiggle,” said Grant.
“Spiral,” said Chase.
Grant wasn’t in the mood. “Squiggle or spiral, it’s all the same thing. It was a drawing, not a doodle.” He worked the flashlight up and down the metal stairs. “A drawing of this.”
“Meaning I was right,” said Chase.
“Yeah, you were right about the squiggle.”
“Spiral.”
Farraday, standing a few yards behind them, said, “I hate to interrupt your cute domestic argument, but you’re burning the clock. And since we already know we don’t have a lot of time…”
They started climbing.
They’d barely gotten under way when Grant heard Farraday’s voice somewhere behind him in the dark. “Lambert, what the hell are you trying to do? Kill Me?”
“This cross is like two hundred feet high, and you’re tired after twenty steps?”
Farraday took a few deep breaths. “I want to go back downstairs. I didn’t sign up for stair-climbing.”
“None of us did.” Grant calculated in his head. “But it’s only like climbing twenty stories in a building. Not too bad.”
“I drive,” Farraday panted. “I’m a ground-floor kind of guy.”
Granted nodded, not that Farraday could see in the dark. “Tell you what. You stay behind and Chase and I will go up and look for the loot. If it’s here, that is.”
$ $ $
Security officer Chris Cason finally managed to spit out the gag and was gnawing at the packing tape binding his wrists.
He wasn’t exactly sure what was going on, but he had a good guess. Dr. Hurley had long predicted that the forces of evil would try to silence the true believers. No doubt that was what was coming to fruition. These brutes had come to steal and…terrorize?
They had already stolen the Desk of Christ, and they had designs on the Great Cross. Both were the holiest symbols of the Cathedral. They had also blasphemed and exhibited homosexual tendencies. Those facts pointed in one direction, and only one direction.
Atheist homosexual terrorist criminals were attacking the Virginia Cathedral of Love. Maybe they were even planning to blow it up on this holiest of days, the day the True Christian version of The Sound of Music brought God’s word to His people.
Chris Cason had been on the planet for thirty-eight years and had not yet lost his virginity, let alone become fruitful and multiplied, but he would give up all that—give up his life—to save the Cathedral and God’s children. He would even postpone the completion of Ant! until the afterlife.
His teeth ripped into the tape and tore off a tiny piece. At this rate, it would only take two or three hundred more bites and he’d be a free man…
$ $ $
“And then there were four.” Waverly took yet another glimpse at his watch and looked back at the tw
o fresh-faced FBI agents who moments ago had pulled behind them and were now standing outside his window.
They were a half hour behind schedule. At some point soon, they’d have to move.
He looked back to Tolan. “Six more agents should be here, but I’m getting bored. You think we can handle it with four?”
Tolan popped some peanuts in to his mouth. “It’s a church, Patrick. And this is a financial crime. This won’t be one of our tougher assignments.”
Waverly nodded and looked out the window at the other agents. “Follow us.”
$ $ $
The staircase was compact. Whoever had designed it—and Grant figured it had to be Merribaugh, since he did the planning around the cathedral—had made sure it was efficient, but unobtrusive. A dozen steps up, a yard-long landing in case you needed a rest, and then another dozen steps.
Grant and Chase had lost count of how many of those short landings they’d passed at some point around the twelfth. That was a problem; they had no idea how far they’d climbed, or how far they had to go, not to mention what they’d find when they got there.
At each landing, Grant would swing the flashlight around for a few seconds while they searched the concrete walls for a place Hurley and Merribaugh could hide seven million dollars. Not finding it, he’d turn it off and they’d continue their ascent through the core of the Great Cross. They had no idea what was going on outside. For all they knew, the cops were out there. Or worse, the entire congregation, armed with torches and pitchforks and determined to defend Hurley and Merribaugh to the death in the name of Jesus or whatever.
“How much more you figure we have to go?” Grant finally asked as the muscles in his legs cramped a bit.
Chase took a moment to find the words he wanted. “Near the perpendicular part, I think.”
“The perp—You mean where the cross crosses?”
“I was trying to avoid the ‘cross crosses’ thing, but yes.”
Grant rested one hand on the railing and took a deep breath as he massaged a thigh muscle. “Why there?”
“Remember the spirals on the drawing?”
“You mean the squiggles? Yeah.”
Chase wasn’t in the mood to revive that argument. “Those squiggles spilled into the cross-section. Meaning…”
Grant got it. “Meaning hiding place.” He took another deep breath and said, “Okay, let’s get climbing.”
$ $ $
Two black SUVs turned off Cathedral Boulevard and swept past the guard shack, knocking down the sandwich signs telling playgoers where to park. They proceeded along the six-lane drive as it wound past the cathedral and auditorium before coming to a stop in front of Cathedral House. Waverly and Tolan, leather badge holders in hand, led the other agents up the front steps and into the building.
The elderly guard, still on post at the front desk, looked up at them, saw their badges, and nodded. He was beyond the point of questioning anything that happened around him.
Still, Waverly had to say it, so he did. “FBI. I’m Special Agent Waverly, this is Special Agent Tolan. And these are…” He forgot the names of the junior officers. “They’re with us.”
The guard nodded again. “I figured you’d be coming. Soon as Captain Enright caught Mr. Platt on the grounds, I knew the authorities would be getting involved.”
“Mr. Platt? Leonard Platt?”
“Yessir. It’s been a bit strange around here lately, what with the people I think I see and those noises I think I hear…”
Ignoring him, Waverly said, “Take us to Captain Enright.”
$ $ $
Another landing. Grant trained the flashlight on the wall and—after the brief right / left sweep they’d perfected over the previous forty landings—both he and Chase gasped and simultaneously said, “This is it!”
On both sides were open passages. They had reached the point where the Great Cross crossed. Chase’s hunch had been correct.
And, in fact, Chase waited a moment to hear Grant say those words of approval and appreciation. When it was clear he wasn’t going to say them, Chase said it himself.
“Good job, Chase! You found seven million dollars!”
“Let’s get to work,” was the terse reply. “I’ll be happy to celebrate when I actually see some cash.”
$ $ $
In the security office, which took up significant space in the basement of Cathedral House, Patrick Waverly stared at the video monitor, watching one view cut to another for several long moments before he spoke.
“Nice setup they have here. Wouldn’t you say this is a nice setup, Agent Tolan?”
“It is a nice setup,” said Tolan.
Keeping his eyes on the monitor, Waverly said, “Don’t you think this is a nice setup, Captain Enright?”
Enright, seated in a chair with his hands handcuffed securely behind his back and guarded by the junior agents, snarled sourly but said nothing.
“You don’t feel like talking, Enright? That’s a shame.” He turned to Leonard. “And Mr. Platt! We meet at last.”
“How do you know my name?” asked Leonard, one hand on the zipper of his coveralls. He was even more nervous than usual, but relieved that he—unlike Enright—hadn’t been handcuffed.
Waverly smiled and his cheek dimpled. Leonard, despite his fear, couldn’t help but be put at ease. “You’re legendary, Mr. Platt. Isn’t he, Agent Tolan?”
Tolan muttered something through a mouthful of peanuts.
Leonard didn’t like any of this, but—as long as he wasn’t handcuffed and didn’t seem to be the person the FBI was looking for—tried his best to tolerate it.
Plus, he thought, this Agent Waverly was kind of cute. Leonard knew he was nothing special himself, but Waverly had called him legendary, so…
“Cool,” said Leonard.
Waverly returned his attention to the monitor. “Hey, Enright, how do I change the channel on this thing? I want to lock it in so it’s not jumping around on things that don’t interest me.”
Enright sat, stone-faced except for the sneer on his lips.
“Guess you got your answer, Waverly,” said Tolan. “Captain Enright certainly isn’t doing anything to make things easier on himself.”
Waverly shook his head at Enright. “Well, I guess I can appreciate that. If we were in the Secret Service, we’d take a bullet for the president, right?” Tolan nodded. “So Enright here is willing to take one for a corrupt preacher. Which is almost the same thing in principle. Not in reality, but in principle.”
Tolan sat on the chair in front of the monitor. “Let me see if I can figure out how to work this.” He toggled a switch and the view was now the interior of the auditorium. There was no audio, but they saw Baptist Maria singing stage-center. “Look at that! I’m an electronic genius.”
“You certainly are, Ollie.” Waverly stared at the screen for a moment. “You get a lot of people here, don’t you, Enright?”
Silence.
“I figured he was going to say that.”
“And there’s the Reverend Mr. Dennis Merribaugh.” Tolan pointed to the monitor as Merribaugh’s grainy black-and-white image appeared in the back of the auditorium.
“They say the camera adds ten pounds. Which in his case looks more like thirty.” Waverly looked at Enright. “Sorry, Captain. Cheap shot.” To Tolan, he said, “Now see if you can find Hurley.”
Enright finally spoke. “You wanna tell me what this is about? Even though you’re the FBI, there are rules. You can’t bust in here and hold me hostage.”
Not taking his eyes off the monitor as he cut to different cameras, Tolan said, “You are being temporarily detained, Enright.”
“Captain Enright.”
“Whatever. This way, when we arrest Hurley and Merribaugh—”
“What?!” Enright’s face was purple. “I’ve never heard’a such a—”
Waverly talked over him. “This way, you can’t warn them that we’re here.”
Enright’s face tu
rned from purple to plum. “This is an outrage! This is an attack on the church by the federal government!”
Waverly sized him up. “You see, Enright, these rage issues are why we had to handcuff you.”
He might have said more if Tolan hadn’t announced, “Found Hurley.”
And Hurley was indeed on the screen, looking completely befuddled and more than a little bit angry.
“Captain Enright, where is this camera?”
Enright wouldn’t answer.
But Leonard did. “That’s Hurley’s office. On the second floor.”
“Of this building?”
“Yes.”
Special Agent Patrick Waverly smiled. This was going to be too easy. Hurley would be detained within minutes. After just a few weeks. He and Tolan would have wrapped up a huge case…and made a lot of people on Capitol Hill very relieved and very happy.
So relieved and happy the Bureau wouldn’t have to worry about full congressional funding for decades. Nothing would please the Director more than not having to testify before Congress.
Or that was his plan, until a disheveled man in a guard uniform, bits of brown packing tape stuck to his clothes and lips, burst through the door, screaming something about atheist homosexual terrorist criminals.
Waverly and Tolan exchanged glances. Nailing Hurley was important, but stopping a terrorist attack trumped it.
They knew what had to be done.
$ $ $
Gone!
How could it be…? But it was. It was gone!
Dr. Oscar Hurley had excused himself from The Sound of Music—a performance he was deeply, truly hating—and walked back to his office for no reason other than to get away from the show and his congregation for an hour or so. Maybe he’d shower…maybe take a nap…maybe even call his Francine. If she hadn’t fallen into another sugar coma, she might want to chat for a while.
Whatever he’d do, it would be von Trapp-free, and that could be only a good thing.