by Michael Beck
"Mole has checked all the victim's backgrounds and, so far, has been unable to find anyone who fits into any of those categories," I said.
"If his male victims are good men, how is he choosing his female victims?"
"Well, except for Susie Hanlon, they're all young teenagers," said Bear.
"Yes, but it's more than that. I don't think they are random choices. He chose the men for a particular reason; they all led good, moral lives. If he is so fussy about the men, wouldn't he be the same for the girls?"
"The police have identified three girls so far. Susie Hanlon disappeared three days before my parents. She graduated from St. Francis Prep in Fresh Meadows, New York, was eighteen years old, and disappeared walking home from dance practice. Her age seems to make her the odd one out.
"Leah Spence disappeared five days prior to the Symonds murder. She was thirteen, went to Elmont Memorial Junior High in Elmont, New York, and went missing while walking home from a sleepover. Annabelle Simpson was also thirteen, and was reported missing five days before Abrahams was killed. She went to William Carr School in Whitestone, New York, and was reported missing after practice at her local soccer club. Leah was African-American, the other two were Caucasian. Susie was Roman Catholic; Leah and Annabelle weren't members of any church. All were taken during the daytime along suburban streets. No neighbors reported anything amiss."
"So all of the girls disappeared when they were away from home?" said Faith.
"They were all walking and on their own," I agreed.
"Anyone driving past could have offered them a lift," Faith said. "They were easy targets."
"My girls would never get into a car with a stranger," said Bear. "What were they thinking?"
"Exactly what the men were thinking." Faith's tone was hard. "Don't you see? Just as the men invited the killer into the house, so did the girls willingly accept a ride from this nut."
"He can't appear much like a nut. Everyone seems to trust him," Bear observed.
My cell rang. I checked caller ID. Fulton. I switched him onto speaker.
"We've found another murder victim. Jason Milne. He died twenty-three months after your parents. He was burnt to death in a house fire after he left a candle burning. Well, that was the original cause of death, but he has a clean incision extending from his clavicle to his sternum, just like the other victims."
"How did you find him?"
"We're checking any suspicious deaths caused by fire that have occurred every two years after your parents' death. We exhumed this body yesterday, after talking to the family. Apparently, the guy was a safety nut and the wife always thought it strange that he would leave a candle burning. Oh, and get this. Milne was on the committee of his local church and was the president of his local high school's parent association. Another good guy. It looks like you were right."
"Any damage to the back of the skull?"
"No. And there was no heart. The body had been in the ground too long. It was only bones."
"Crap."
"Yeah. But you know what doesn't decompose?"
"What?"
"Metal."
"You found another metal disc?"
"Damn oath we did."
"What did it say?"
"M721. We're getting closer, Tan. I can feel it. It's all starting to come together. We're going to find this sicko."
"What aren't you telling me?"
The line was silent for a moment. "Tan, we've got a strong lead which we're running down. We've found a guy who wrote negative letters to your father's church and was a helper at one of Symonds' camps for disadvantaged kids. He looks good."
"What's his name?" I said roughly.
"We'll be bringing him in soon for questioning. We're still running a few things down and I don't want you going off half-cocked."
"What's his name?"
"It's better if you don't know at the moment. Leave it with me. Tan, you know you can trust me."
He hung up and we all stared at the cypher Bear had written on to the whiteboard. There were now two cyphers there.
L645 M721
L645 was the number found inside thirteen-year-old Leah Spence's heart, which was then placed in the body of Symonds, the victim with the ant-bite allergy.
M721?
"Mole, can you--"
"Here," said Mole and a picture of a teenage girl appeared on every screen. She had brown eyes, short dark hair and there was a birthday cake on the table in front of her. I counted the candles. Thirteen. "This is the only teenage girl reported missing in the New York City area in the week prior to Milne's death who was never found. She disappeared walking home from a friend's place on a Saturday afternoon in Glendale, Brooklyn."
"What took you so long?" said Bear.
"What was her name?" I said.
"Mary Longley."
"That can't be a coincidence. The letters must stand for the girl's names," said Faith. "L for Leah. M for Mary. The numbers must be some kind of coded reference to each particular girl. We just have to work out what the numbers mean."
"So this guy, Jason Milne, was killed two years after your parents," said Bear. He picked up a whiteboard marker and added Milne and Mary Longley to our list, which now looked like this.
"Two years between each of the known murders," Bear pondered.
"If he strikes every two years, that's four more males and four more girls unaccounted for." Faith only said what we were all thinking.
"Something else," said Mole.
"What?" I said.
"Do you know someone named Bailey?"
"It sounds familiar. I'm not sure."
"It should sound familiar. He was the parish priest at your church."
"Oh, right. I remember." A picture of a tall, strong man with a beak nose flashed through my mind. "What about him?"
"Guess who was on the same Youth Council as Abrahams?"
"Father Bailey?"
"Yes."
"He baptized me," I whispered.
"Well, you might be lucky he didn't drown you."
CHAPTER 51
I remembered going to St. Mary's church every Sunday morning when I was a kid. Dad always wore his best suit and mom a nice dress. It was the only day of the week that Jade wore a dress and I a collared shirt. The church was always full, back seats first, front seats last.
No one wanted to be up front during one of Father Bailey's sermons. His fire and brimstone sermons were legendary. He would pin you to the hard, wooden seat with his intense brown eyes, making you feel like he could see every sin in your soul. You couldn't relax and daydream or try to check out what the hottest girl from school, Anne Murphy, was wearing. If Father Bailey caught your eyes wandering or detected any inattention, you were gone. Heaven forbid if you started feeling sleepy and the old eyelids started getting heavy. That one hour always felt like a lifetime in solitary.
Father Bailey had been like the poster boy for the priesthood: tall, with the body of a wide receiver, a riveting speaker. The last time I saw him was at my parents' funeral, looking properly sorrowful in a patriarchal way.
Now, as I entered the church, rage coursed through my body at the thought that the man who might have killed my parents had had the effrontery to stand in front of me and pray over their bodies. Cupid was sick but if Bailey was Cupid, that added a whole new dimension of gloating evilness to his crime.
How had I missed it? Could someone commit such a deed and show absolutely no sign of it?
I hadn't been inside a church since my parents' funeral. Their deaths had confirmed what I had begun to suspect. There was no god. Life was random and justice was only for the living.
The church seemed smaller than I remembered, and most of the pews were half empty. I was even able to get a seat at the back. The congregation seemed older. Where were all the families and young kids? It looked like a seniors' convention.
A priest, so young I doubted he had started shaving, was saying Mass. Mole had told me that Father Bailey was semi
-retired but still helped out. I found that hard to accept. Father Bailey was the kind of person you expected to see around forever. He never seemed to age.
The congregation began to make their way to the front of the church to receive communion. At the head of one line was the young priest, at the other was a priest I didn't recognize. But then I realized I did.
Father Bailey.
But so different from the Father Bailey in my memory. His hair, which had been thick and black, was now completely silver, receding and so thin I could see his scalp. He had always stood tall and straight, like a soldier at attention. Now he was stooped as if he were perpetually bowing. He was still tall but the muscle had fallen off him. His shoulders were bony and he was emaciated. His hooked nose gave him a vulture-like appearance.
I did a quick calculation. He could only be about fifty-eight.
Without thinking, I found myself in Bailey's line. Soon I was standing in front of him. I don't know what I expected. Some flash of recognition? A shocked pause with the realization his number might be up? A glint in his eye that tried to mask the evilness underneath?
None of this happened.
Father Bailey lifted the host in a huge hand that trembled slightly. "The body of Christ," he said. Despite his looks, his voice was still strong and deep. He placed the host in my hand.
In the old days he would have placed the host directly on my tongue. I almost gagged at the thought of his hand touching me. I dropped the white wafer into my pocket as I returned to my seat.
When the Mass concluded the young priest stood at the exit doors, greeting each of his parishioners. Father Bailey had disappeared through a side door near the altar. I went to the front of the church, knocked on the door and entered the Sacristy. I had been in the Sacristy once when I was about ten and it was exactly like I remembered. A huge cabinet with wide, shallow drawers dominated the room. Vestments, linens and other ecclesiastical paraphernalia were visible. Two beautiful mahogany wardrobes stood next to a wash basin, used for the washing of sacred items. One wall held a beautiful stained glass window depicting the Last Supper. In front of it was a chunky black desk.
Father Bailey had lifted his stole from around his neck and was laying it carefully on the cabinet when I entered.
"Yes? May I help you?"
"Hello, Father. Do you remember me? I'm Mark Tanner."
"Mark Tanner? Of course, Mark. How good to see you. How are you? It's been a long time, hasn't it?"
This came out rather strangely, as if it was more a question than a statement. He shook my hand, and even though I'm no shrimp my hand disappeared inside his. Oddly, one side of his face was smooth and the other side was bristly, unshaven.
"Good, Father. How are you?"
"Getting old, Mark, I'm afraid. Getting old. God plays no favorites where that's concerned. Too bad for us old priests, eh?"
"You can't be that old. What are you? Fifty-eight?"
"Fifty-nine... No, I turned sixty earlier this year."
"You've been at St. Mary's all that time?"
"Yes, I have enjoyed my time here. These days I just help out. It's Father Simone's parish now."
His answers seemed quite natural and I detected no tension at my presence. Surely, if he was Cupid there would be some sign?
"You must get bored then, having all that extra time. What do you do with yourself?"
"I help out at Masses, do lots of home visits to some of our elderly parishioners and sometimes help with Bible classes."
"I suppose you have time to go on different committees outside the parish now?"
Father Bailey lifted his long, sleeveless chasuble over his head. As he did, his sleeve fell back revealing a likeness of an angel holding a sword on his forearm. The likeness was formed of ugly, white, raised scar tissue. The kind of scar tissue that a knife would leave. He dropped his arm and quickly pushed his sleeve down.
"Yes. I'm like an old dog. Once I get used to a place I don't like to move."
"I had a friend on a Youth Council over in Dyker Heights in Brooklyn. He said there was a Father Bailey on the council. That wouldn't be you, would it?"
"Dyker Heights? Yes, I think so. The Church was trying to get more actively involved in the community and I was asked to help out. What was your friend's name?"
"Abrahams. Gene Abrahams."
Father Bailey's brow furrowed. "Abrahams? Sorry, I can't place him. See? I am getting old."
I watched closely, but his reaction seemed unfeigned. "And how is your sister, Jemma, these days? She must be eighteen by now?"
"It's Jade and she's twenty. She still hasn't talked since our parents were killed. You remember that?"
"Of course. It was such a terrible, terrible tragedy."
"Yeah. Wasn't it. I never thanked you, Father."
"Thanked me?"
"Yeah. For the service at their funeral. I always meant to thank you for your kind words."
"It was nothing. They were very good people, your parents."
I was startled at his choice of words. Good people. Was this a slip on his part? I tried to read him, but he was gazing away from me, almost abstractedly.
"Death is an awful thing when it comes so suddenly and violently," he said.
"They still haven't caught him, Father. The animal that killed my parents. What sort of man could have done that?"
Father Bailey stared down at his hands, which he was wringing together, his fingers as large as sausages.
"All men have evil in them," he whispered. "In most, the good outweighs the bad. But in some, the evil is too great. They can't contain it and it explodes out."
"Do you think some people are completely evil, Father?"
He stared at me, his brown eyes burning. "Oh yes. Some men are damned forever."
The door opened and the young priest, Father Simone, stuck his head in. "Excuse me. I hope I'm not interrupting. Father Bailey, Sister Immaculata is here to drive you home if you're ready?"
"Oh, yes. Thanks, Father. Well, it's been good catching up with you, Mark. You should come to Mass more often. It might help you."
"Nothing will help me except catching the man who did it."
Father Bailey stopped at the door. "I hope they do," he said quietly. For a moment our eyes held, and then he left.
Was it him?
Was he Cupid?
I didn't know.
But there was something there. Something.
He had used a phrase that struck me as familiar. What was it? Yes. Something about all men having evil inside of them. Where had I heard that before? Then I remembered. Henry Hunter. Ashley Hunter's father. What had he said?
"Who knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men?"
I stood still, chilled, as a thought swept over me like a winter wind. I walked over to the desk in the center of the room. On it stood several candles, two chalices, a bottle of wine and some leather binders. I didn't pay any attention to these. What held my eye was what stood in the middle of the desk.
A Bible. A plain, black Bible.
I pulled out my cell and hit a number. "Mole, what was the number they found in the first heart?"
There was a short pause. "L645."
I picked up the Bible and flicked through to the New Testament. Here it was. We had been wrong. The 'L' didn't stand for Leah Spence.
Luke, chapter 6, verse 45: The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.
I picked up my cell again. "What was the other number?"
"M721."
I flicked through to Matthew and then to Mark. The M didn't stand for Mary Longley.
Mark, chapter 7, verse 21: "For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery."
My eyes locked on the door through which Father Bailey had just exited.
It was him.
Cupid.
I checked myself. I was jumping the gun. Just because he had a Bible didn't make him Cupid. Hell, he was a priest. Every priest had a Bible.
Yes, my mind argued, but how many priests had an association with two of the murder victims?
Only one that I knew of. Father Bailey.
Cupid, of course, could be any person who knew the Bible. A school teacher, a church goer or any religious crackpot. But Bailey had known my father and, despite his protestations, must have had some contact with Abrahams.
I numbly walked back through the church. A gray-haired lady was playing an uplifting hymn on the organ. My thoughts were so somber it could have been a funeral dirge for all the comfort it gave me. Two other ladies were changing the flowers on the altar and a man in a gray suit was walking through the pews distributing hymn books. A blond altar boy, pretty enough to be mistaken for a girl, walked down the main aisle towards me. He was dressed in black and white robes and carried a smoking thurible.
I smiled at myself. You could never leave your past behind. It had been a good fourteen years since I had been in a church and yet somewhere in the recesses of my mind I still knew what a goddam thurible was. The altar boy was swinging the round metal thurible by its long metal chain. Wispy tendrils of smoke curled up towards the stain glass windows.
The boy walked past me and I stopped, frozen to the spot as the smell of incense surrounded me.
I had smelt this before. How could I have forgotten? Perhaps because the smell had been so faint, as ethereal and intangible as gossamer. But I knew I wasn't mistaken. I could still picture myself walking into the kitchen fourteen years ago, rooted to the spot by what I saw. Mom. And the blood. So much blood I had almost gagged on the metallic odor in my mouth. But underneath that terrible odor was another smell. The same incense-charcoal smell that was drifting through this church fourteen years after I smelled it over my dead mother.
I turned and watched the altar boy walk behind the altar and disappear into the sacristy. The weak winter sun shot soft rays of light through the stain-glass windows. I suddenly felt light-headed and closed my eyes. My body felt as thin as paper and I tottered on the spot. I flashed back to a time I had tried to forget.