Vince remembered that all too well. When he and Laura had gotten engaged, he’d made a last ditch effort to patch things up with his Mom. Things had been rocky ever since he left home for college and they’d only grown worse. But when he’d told her he was getting married she’d gone, in a not-so subtle term, bugshit crazy. She’d gone into her “Jesus talk,” rambling about Original Sin and how the prophecies were being fulfilled and that he was surely serving the Devil. Then she told him that she never wanted to hear from him again; if he was going to go this far in defying her, in denying what the Lord had offered him, she wanted no part of him. She hated him. And then he’d slammed down the phone, cutting off her hateful, spiteful voice. Laura had been sitting beside him on the couch when he made the call, and when he hung up the phone he’d looked up at her, his throat locking up and the tears springing up into his eyes. His mother…hated him. “She…sh-she,” he’d stammered.
And then Laura had taken him in her arms as he cried.
Vince tossed the memory back in the files of his mind as he talked to Brian. “You’re right. I guess I’m just over-rationalizing things. She really was…well, a shitty person toward the end there. I guess I’m just feeling…I don’t know…required to grieve for her. You know what I mean?”
“Of course,” Brian had said. “Because under any other circumstances you would grieve. You would feel mournful. But in your case there’s no reason to if you don’t feel any grief. And there’s no reason for you to feel guilty over your lack of grief. Laura’s passing was understandable. And if I kick the bucket before my time, you better cry and mourn over my casket as well.”
Vince had laughed. Brian could lift your spirits when you were feeling at your lowest, and this morning proved to be no exception.
“So I take it you’ll be taking the next few days off?” Brian had asked.
“Yeah, I gotta take care of this.” Brian had been his manager a few years before. Now he handled the Middle-East division and reported to the Director of Finance, much as Vince himself did. Vince handled the U.S. division. Their boss, a man who Brian once remarked to Vince looked remarkably like Hubert Humphrey, was currently vacationing in the Cayman Islands. Rumor had it he was with his secretary, a blonde twenty-two year old with a pair of mangos a man could die for.
“Okay, no problem,” Brian had said. “Steve is out for three weeks frolicking in the Caymans with Sarah anyway. He probably won’t even be checking his voice mail. I’ll cover for you.”
“Thanks, Brian.”
“Listen, if you need to talk?”
“Of course. I’ll call you.”
“Okay. See you when?”
“Monday morning, hopefully.” It was already Wednesday, and he figured he would try to arrange for a small service for his mother on Friday and fly back to Irvine on Saturday. He quickly outlined his itinerary for Brian. “If I do get in Saturday, I’ll call you. Maybe we can get together Sunday.”
“Good deal. See ya.”
The traffic near his aisle began to move down the plane and the elderly woman quickly moved in place. Vince followed and made his way down the aisle, the remnants of this morning’s conversation with Brian already a faint memory. He felt drowsy. If he could just get through the next few hours the first thing he was going to do was check into a motel, take a sedative, and crash. He could deal with Chief Hoffman and the task of arranging his mother’s belongings tomorrow.
As he walked out of the plane and down the concourse of Philadelphia International Airport past people greeting loved ones, he never felt so alone in all his life.
THE HOUSE LOOKED the same as when he first left home fifteen years ago.
He pulled up to the side of the road and stopped the car. Behind him, Chief Hoffman pulled in and Vince got out of his rented Toyota Hatchback. The Pennsylvania weather was warm, the air clean and fresh. The sky was a deep blue, dotted by scarce clouds. Rolling hills dotted the countryside beyond his mother’s house, which sat alone on a patch of land surrounded by fields of corn. A farm rested half a mile down Mill Lane, where his mother’s house stood. He turned his attention to the house as a flood of memories threatened to break loose. Tom Hoffman approached him, hands on his hips, eyes squinted against the mid-morning sun.
“Crime scene tape is still in place,” Tom Hoffman said, nodding at the house. The tape was still up, its harsh yellow standing out like a beacon, proclaiming to anyone who came within sight that this was a CRIME SCENE. “But the homicide detectives have already gone over the place and taken away everything they need, and I got a key. Come on.” He led Vince up the worn walk to the sagging front porch. Vince was still trying to take all of this in; how the house and the land around it really hadn’t changed all that much.
Tom Hoffman inserted the key in the lock and opened the door. He turned back to Vince, who was standing on the porch and looking out at the yard with rapt wonder. “Been awhile, eh?”
“Too long,” Vince murmured.
“I know how it feels,” Tom Hoffman said. “Not much has changed here, Vince. The town’s spread out a little towards Newport Road, and you saw that big shopping center when you drove up 501; that’s all new. Not much else has changed, though. ’Specially your mom’s place and the rest of them.”
Vince turned to Sheriff Hoffman. “The others are still around?”
“Oh, yeah. Couldn’t break that group apart for the world.”
“They still have services at Hank Powell’s place on Owl Hill Road?” Vince asked.
“Yep.” Tom Hoffman took off his hat and squinted at the sun as he looked down the road where they’d come from. He was in his early fifties, of medium build with thick brown hair and craggy features. He looked like the Marlboro Man; rugged, beefy with no hint of fat. In short, a man’s man. His blue police uniform was clean and wrinkle free. His hands were large, his forearms thickly muscled. Tom Hoffman appeared to be the type of man you wouldn’t want to tangle with. “Most of them still live up that way.” He cocked his thumb toward the direction they’d come. “Lillian still lives in that little house behind your mom’s. She’s probably home now. She’s been too upset to return to work.”
“I can only imagine,” Vince said.
“Why don’t you come with me and we’ll have a look around.” Tom Hoffman headed toward the door. Vince turned to follow him. The Chief fished in his pocket for the key, found it, inserted it in the lock. He opened the door and stood aside. “After you.”
Vince took a deep breath and stepped into the house.
Nothing had changed. When he and Mom moved to Lititz, the seventy-year old three-bedroom farmhouse that sat off Mill Lane was weathered and beaten by too many snow storms and neglect. He’d helped mother renovate the house that summer; new shingles on the roof, stripping the old wood off the outer walls and replacing them with more sturdy material, a new paint job. Then they’d done intensive repairs to the interior; more repainting, re-carpeting. When all was done the house was cozy. And with what furniture they’d brought with them from Toronto, most of it antique to begin with, it made the house a throwback to the 1920s. Simple furniture, simple times. It brought a sense of nostalgia and peace. The only thing Vince thought distracted from it were the many religious paintings she insisted on hanging where most families would install more secular decorations. None of them had been taken down; there was a large crucifix over the fireplace, Christ’s face looking forlorn and wracked with pain. Above the worn lavender sofa there was a framed excerpt from that old standby, John 3:13: “For God so Loved the World That He Gave…” In Vince’s bedroom Mom insisted that the “The Wages of Sin are Death” framed slogan remain hanging over his bed. Since Vince was already treading the water of sin in the form of good old-fashioned teenage rebellion—sex, drugs, and rock and roll—he hated waking up to that proclamation every morning. If Mom thought it was going to work in steering him away from the occasional toke with the guys after school or a romp in Kathy Stevens’ bed when her parents were at work, then
she’d been seriously mistaken. At seventeen, with his hormones raging fiercely, he could not have cared less what she would think about his—
“—when you’re done just give me a holler,” Tom Hoffman was saying. He was putting his hat back on his head, heading for the door. “Number’s on my card. Homicide Detectives from Lancaster are coming back today at three and they’ll probably want to speak to you. They know you’re in town.”
Vince started and turned toward Tom Hoffman. He’d been snapped out of his silent reverie but hadn’t missed much. Tom was leaving, so he could get down to whatever business he had to do. “Fine,” Vince said. He held his hand out to Tom. “And thanks. Really. I appreciate everything you’ve done.”
Tom Hoffman’s eyes held his as he shook his hand. His grip was warm and firm. “Don’t mention it,” he said. “Just doin’ my job. And I hope I do it right, because what happened here really bothers the hell out of me.”
“I know what you mean,” Vince said.
“I understand you and your mother weren’t very close,” Tom Hoffman began. “From what I gathered in talking to Lillian, you and your Mom have been estranged for ten years or so. Is that right?”
“Yes.”
“We’re still checking things out around here,” Tom Hoffman continued. “That’s one of the things you have to do in a homicide investigation. The most likely suspects to come up are usually those that are closest to the murder victim. In this case, Lillian and the rest of your Mom’s church friends are the most viable suspects, since they were the only ones your mother associated with. But there’s just nothing there to connect any of them. A lot of them may be nutty in their religious beliefs—hell, I think they’re nuts and I’m a rock-solid Christian myself—but there’s no way they could have done such a thing. The very idea that Maggie was murdered was enough to get them to assemble for an emergency prayer session at Reverend Powell’s house. Lillian was just beside herself with grief. They not only don’t display the signs of guilt or suspicious behavior, but the physical evidence isn’t there. Vincent Caruthers and John Van Zant were both at home with their families that night; Lillian was on the phone with her sister; a few of the others in their little congregation were with the Reverend preparing for a Bible study. The only person alone that night was your mother. That’s why we think it was a home-invasion robbery.”
Now all the questions that had been on his mind since hearing about his mother’s death wanted to spill out. He’d held back as long as possible, especially since meeting Tom forty minutes before at the station. At that time the Chief had given him information on when the coroner would be finished with his report, and when Vince could claim the body. He’d also given Vince the names and phone numbers of his mother’s friends so that he might contact them with funeral arrangements. They hadn’t talked about the specifics of the murder at all. Now that they were alone, away from the hustle and bustle of the police station, there was so much he wanted to know.
“You told me over the phone that it appeared to be a robbery gone bad. I’ve been mulling that scenario over in my mind since last night when you called me and I just don’t get it. Don’t get me wrong, I realize people are killed in home invasion robberies all the time…especially in L.A. and other big cities. But…”
“To have it happen in a rural community like Lititz Borough is something you just can’t fathom,” Tom Hoffman finished for him, nodding. He hooked his fingers through the belt loops in his slacks and regarded Vince seriously with his dark eyes. “That’s an understandable position. It’s true, we don’t have much to speak of in the way of crime in Lititz. You should know that yourself, having lived here for a while. But it happens. And when it does, especially when it’s a murder like this, it becomes the talk of the town for the next ten years. We just don’t get that kind of crime in communities like this. Christ, everybody in Lancaster County is still talking about the Laurie Snow murder and that happened eight years ago!”
“Which I suppose brings me to my next question,” Vince said. He crossed the living room to the small kitchen that his mother had spent long hours toiling over pot roasts, cakes, and pies for church bake sales. “Do you have any suspects in mind? Could it have been anybody local?”
“That’s a possibility, although I doubt it.” Tom Hoffman looked a little uneasy as he stood in the center of the living room. “Don’t get me wrong, Vince. We have exactly one bad boy here in Lititz. Guy by the name of Steve Anderson. Steve is nineteen years old and is a hopeless excuse for a man. When he’s not serving time for shoplifting and grand auto theft or assault and battery, he usually spends time in our drunk tank for disorderly conduct. He did two years in a Lancaster Youth Facility when he was sixteen for beating another boy so bad that the victim lost an eye and was permanently brain damaged. His parents are alcoholics—his dad is on disability from a work injury as a welder at the Harley plant in York, and his mother is a sorry excuse for a woman. There are two older children who haven’t fared much better; the older son left home four years ago and is living in Baltimore, doing what, I don’t know. The daughter, from what I gather, works as a stripper in Philadelphia and has a few prostitution convictions. The family had a fairly nice home, but they lost it when the parents of the boy Steve beat up sued them and won. It wasn’t long after that when Steve’s father lost his job at the plant. They’ve been gettin’ by on public assistance since then. Anyway, to put it as bluntly as I can, the minute I stepped in your mother’s bedroom and saw what had been done to her, Steve Anderson was the first person I thought of who could have done such a thing. I came this close to heading down to the trailer the Anderson’s have moved to and arresting Steve myself.” He held his thumb and forefinger up, emphasizing how close he’d come to hauling Steve Anderson’s white-trash ass to jail the night Maggie Walters was killed. “But then Guy King, my deputy, talked some sense into me. The…well, the things we found in your mother’s bedroom was what Guy convinced me that somebody like Steve wouldn’t have the sophistication to do.”
“The sophistication?” Vince raised an eyebrow at that. What was so sophisticated about murder?
“Yeah,” Tom Hoffman took off his hat again and rubbed the top of his head with his right hand. He looked slightly queasy. “Did you ever hear about the incident in Arkansas a few years ago regarding the murder of three little boys? Eight years old I believe they were. Three teenagers were caught and ultimately convicted in their deaths.”
Vince shook his head. “No.” Watching the local news was about the most he digested when it came to the world’s atrocities.
“It happened in a community similar to Lititz. The boys had been sexually mutilated and sodomized. Then they’d been brutally slashed with a knife. The murders were committed in a gully, off in the woods. The murder weapon was found six months later, but it’s questionable that’s even the weapon used. Anyway, what led the police to their suspects was that they were regarded as local riff-raff, much in the way Steve Anderson is. Only these guys—kids, actually, ’cause they were no more than seventeen or so when it happened—were nowhere near the scum Steve Anderson is. Their biggest sin was that they were into heavy metal music.”
Vince knew what was coming. “They were swept up in a witch hunt.”
“Right. They were forced to confess and recanted their confessions during the trial. But the prosecution had them. Here they were, long-haired, rock and roller kids and they were the perfect scapegoats. The prosecution successfully branded these young men as Satanists and claimed that the crimes were ritual murders, despite the fact that the evidence said otherwise. The community this happened in is very conservative, and the jury bought it. The prosecution fed on the jury’s fear that these kids were ruthless devil worshippers and that they must be stopped. So they’re currently on death row.”
“And your deputy didn’t want you to react in the same way?” Vince ventured.
“Correct,” Tom Hoffman said. “But here’s where the similarities in both cases end. Whi
le the men convicted in the Arkansas case definitely had the sophistication to make the murder appear cult related if they wanted, there was no cult related evidence left at the scene to present such a theory. Steve Anderson, on the other hand, has no knowledge or understanding of cults, much less religion in general, and wouldn’t know a pentagram from a hole in his head.” Tom Hoffman paused, eyeing Vince gravely. “Are you sure you want to hear this?”
“For God’s sake, yes!” Vince exclaimed.
“This murder is a cult,” Tom Hoffman said.
The words hung in the air with their grave clarity. Vince looked at Tom Hoffman with a sense of puzzlement. “What do you mean?”
“You sure you won’t be squeamish?” Tom Hoffman cut off Vince’s impending question.
“No.” He was more curious now than ever before, yet he could feel his stomach grow heavy with dread.
Tom Hoffman regarded him warily. Then he turned toward the rear of the house. “Okay, follow me.”
Vince followed Tom down the short hallway toward his mother’s bedroom. The door to the bedroom was closed, and Tom paused to cast one more look at Vince as if to say, are you ready for this? Are you sure you can handle this? Vince’s expression told Tom that he was ready. Tom nodded, gripped the door knob with his left hand and opened the door.
Vince followed Tom into his mother’s bedroom, the crime scene where she met her untimely demise. The drapes over the windows were drawn, making the room shroud-like, the shadows the furniture cast even darker and longer. Tom reached for the light and chased the shadows away with a flick of the switch. Vince blinked and almost stepped back in horror from the scene in front of him.
The double bed his mother had kept as far back as he could remember was missing, along with the small bureaus that flanked both sides. There was a dried pool of blood on the floor where the bed would have sat, and a spray of blood on the wall where the headboard of the bed would have rested. Toward Vince’s right was a large bureau with a mirror over it. Toward his left was a small chest where he knew she kept her embroidery and crocheting equipment. There was a small closet next to the chest.
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