by Cal Moriarty
‘She has passed?’
Clark could almost feel them all hold their breath, waiting for confirmation of what they already knew. He nodded. ‘Yes, sir.’
No, sir. Three bags full, sir.
‘May the Lord Prophet take pity upon her soul.’
‘Amen.’
‘And your father lives in Phoenix now?’
Shame it’s not further south. Say, hell.
‘Yes, sir. That’s correct. He remarried. A widow. Her late husband was in charge of a Mission down there.’
They all nodded. Obviously, that was also in the briefing papers.
‘You’ve recently joined the Canyon Road Mission?’
‘That’s correct.’
As he’d expected they had done their homework. Sure, Gudsen and the Rooks had helped get him in the door, but he knew he had to be the real deal. His version of it.
‘Where did you worship before?’
‘Where my parents worshipped their entire married lives.’
‘The Lumina Mission?’
‘Yes, sir. Since my marriage a few years back, I’ve been working hard, out on the road, trying to build my business, take care of my family. I worship where I can – in any town where there’s a Mission. Sometimes, when I know attending’s not going to be possible, I give thanks in my car.’ Thanks for what, Clark didn’t say. But mostly thanks to K-ZLV for pushing their radio signal across the desert.
‘It’s hard to keep bread on the table.’ That was Browne. Hard to keep food on their table and out of his belly.
‘Yes, sir, it is. But we still want to have a large family. I was an only child. I don’t want my son to be.’
Approving smiles all around. The bigger the family the better. Every one a tribe of instant believers. Just add water.
They soon moved on, asking Clark all about how he discovered the Bible and how he felt on discovery of the Testament of Faith hidden within it. So he told them the story, and was sure to punctuate his words at least several times with his punchy little soundbites:
Testament of Faith.
The find of a lifetime.
Testament of Faith. Our faith.
Our Faith.
At various points in his monologue Clark noticed that along the length of the table, most of the Disciples were leant forward in anticipation of the next part, although he knew that they would have already received a blow-by-blow account from either Peter Gudsen or Rod Rook. Or both. Did the Disciples fear Clark’s narrative might have a different outcome? Clark knew that their obvious investment in the story meant that either the Bible or the Testament itself – or even both – had been verified by Peter and his academic collective at the Faith library. Unless, of course, the Order of the Twelve Disciples were toying with him like a vengeful cat plays with a mouse right before it eats it alive.
He was right not to relax. They wanted to ask more questions. Unsurprisingly, no one mentioned the Bible. Obviously the note written on lilac letterhead by Dora and Bertha had sufficed to verify that and they didn’t want to dwell on its existence. ‘What doesn’t kill you’ was holding up the Testament and looking directly at Clark. ‘It’s an interesting artefact.’ He made it sound like something they’d dug up in a temple in Luxor.
‘Yes, it is,’ said Clark.
‘My Brother Disciples have requested I ask you how much you’d want for it. Would twenty thousand suffice?’
‘Twenty thousand. Oh no.’
The Disciples’ faces set harder.
‘I couldn’t take money from the Church.’
Their faces relaxed again. And he saw what must pass for a smile on the Supreme Leader’s face.
‘Before you sup from the bowl’ spoke again. ‘Mr Houseman, that’s mighty generous of you.’
Clark spoke quickly, he didn’t want his ‘generosity’ mistaken for charity. ‘No, no money. Instead, I thought we could trade the Testament for documents from your library collection? I took the liberty of checking with Mr Gudsen and you have a couple of copies of each of the documents I’m interested in, so it wouldn’t deplete the Faith’s collection.’
‘And what would be their value?’
‘No more than twenty-five thousand. Retail.’
Laidlaw looked at the Supreme Leader. He silently nodded and almost simultaneously the Disciples were up, swarming Clark – no handshakes, but lots of back claps and warm thank yous.
And then they parted, almost instinctively, and the Supreme Leader stepped forward and kept moving forward until the great lump of a man had clutched Clark in a papal embrace, squeezing the life out of him, before he planted a kiss on each cheek. The words ‘Bless you’ in one ear, and ‘for you are a true Brother’ in the other. He clasped Clark’s hands in his own and said the Blessing of the Light. As he did, the other Disciples and Clark joined in.
‘In the beginning was the Lord
And the Light
The Lord and the Light
Who we could not see
Because we were blind.
We were blind.
Until our Prophet Robert Bright
Opened our eyes unto the Light
Unto the Light.’
‘Father,’ said Clark with his hands still firmly clasped inside the Leader’s.
‘Yes, my son.’
‘I have been approached by the Real Faith.’ All murmuring in the room stopped dead at the mention of the Faith’s rival church. ‘Somehow the Bright family Bible has come to their attention. They want to buy it.’
‘What doesn’t kill you’ stepped forward now. Still at the Supreme Leader’s right side. ‘Did they say how much they would pay?’
‘A figure of ten thousand was touted.’
Indignant murmurings from the Disciples.
Clark continued, best to ratchet up the tension as soon as possible, go for the jugular: ‘They want to display it in their museum, back in Reno.’ Clark could almost feel the entire room turn back to look at the Bible, which was still sat in front of their leader’s empty place at the table. The Supreme Leader squeezed Clark’s hands tighter.
‘Whatever they have offered, our offer will be greater and truer. We are the one true Faith.’
‘Thank you, Father. If it’s possible I would very much like to have occasional access to the Faith library? It would prove useful for my private study – and, after this find, I’m hoping people will begin to offer me other Faith documents to buy. It would be useful to help assess those documents in their proper context.’
‘Indeed. I’ll let Brother Peter know to arrange it and, also, collection of the documents you desire.’
‘Thank you, Father.’
‘I’ll have a check cut for you this afternoon, Brother Clark, for the Bible. Stop by anytime,’ said ‘What doesn’t kill you’.
‘Make it for fifteen thousand, Brother Alan, as an acknowledgment of our Brother’s loyalty,’ said the Supreme Leader.
‘Thank you, Father,’ said Clark, bowing his head like a true supplicant.
Almost like a vapor, they vanished through a side door, leaving Clark alone in the vast room.
Clark looked up at the elaborately painted ceiling depicting man’s flight through the stormy, starry heavens from the planet Lumina to planet Earth. Clark thought of the most popular Faith sermon, the one where the Supreme Leader is God’s representative on earth – how this gave him God’s sight to see man’s lies and deceit and how God had given his permission to destroy those who would deceive.
Clark threw out his arms in surrender and awaited the fate of the deceiver.
Nothing happened. Just like he knew it wouldn’t.
He picked up his attaché case and made his way towards the exit.
25
November 2nd 1983, noon
Faith HQ
They have their own questions, he could tell. But he bet they wouldn’t answer until he had asked them whatever questions he had. They could wait. But so could he. And he wasn’t in the mood to take any of their bull
.
It was just supposed to be a meeting with Laidlaw, but there they all were – lined up like the defense at the Superbowl. And he was going to have to run the line. Dodge their blocks, like the cop version of Joe Montana.
He took out his notebook. If they wanted to present an official front, well, he could match them. Good job they couldn’t see it was page after blank page.
They all looked pretty settled. He figured they had met before he arrived. Talked amongst themselves, briefed the Supreme Leader, and taken a vote on how best to proceed. There were a few options how that might go:
a) They’d provide no information, just questions;
b) Some information, some questions; and, more likely,
c) Nothing but a thick wall of silence.
They’d already given away their main game plan: that it was important to them, really important, or they wouldn’t have fielded their best team, let alone their star player. ‘Marty, we’re glad you could come.’ Was Laidlaw trying to make out like they’d invited him, rather than inviting himself?
‘I’m glad you could see me.’
‘We were just discussing how concerning it is that no one’s been apprehended in this matter and barely a couple of hours ago, another bombing.’
So that’s how they wanted to play it.
‘Well, Mr Laidlaw, gentlemen, that means we have something in common. In fact, I’m of the belief that the Faith might be able to assist the investigation.’
Silence.
Marty looked along the line at each and every one of them. Stone. Cold. Silence.
Laidlaw leaned forward. ‘And why, may I ask, do you think that?’
‘Because Peter Gudsen, a man who no one has a bad word to say about, is lying in the morgue.’
‘Brother Peter.’
‘May his soul be brought into the light.’
‘Amen’ all along the table.
A delay and then a somber, baritone ‘Amen’ from the Supreme Leader.
‘From what I gather, from speaking to folks, Mr Gudsen was a high-flyer? Maybe, even a future leader.’
‘He was well-regarded. Yes.’
‘Anything else would be improper speculation.’ Marty recognized the speaker, David Arbuthnot.
‘I’m told that Mr Gudsen might have been in the habit of conducting business late at night, here, at your offices.’
‘We couldn’t possibly discuss Faith business.’
‘I didn’t say it was Faith business.’
Touchdown.
‘But you may have a point, Mr Laidlaw – it was very late. Our witness saw him, a little after ten pm. I doubt the Faith have need to conduct their usual business that late. He appeared to be meeting a young man outside here – a couple of weeks back.’
‘It may well have been library business.’
‘The library open that late?’
‘No. But Brother Gudsen was one of those responsible for it. Sometimes he worked late.’
‘Did he have a key?’
‘No. We have twenty-four-hour security out front.’
Did they now? That was new.
‘And the young man? Any idea who he might be?’
‘One of the Faith’s PhD scholars, perhaps? They come from all over the world. Many like to assist in the library, cross-checking indices, that kind of thing.’
Sounds a hoot.
‘Care to give me some names?’
No one spoke.
‘Specifically the name of the young man who met Mr Gudsen after ten pm on Wednesday,’ Marty feigned looking at the pages. Luckily his memory wasn’t as blank. ‘Wednesday, October 19.’
Silence.
As game plans go, silence was pretty lame. He had his own game plan. One which should unseal their lips. If it didn’t, he might find himself on permanent suspension from the department.
‘I’d like to tell you gentlemen a story.’ They looked surprised. He didn’t wait for permission to continue. ‘When I was a rookie, in LA, back when my dad was still alive, I worked the beat down in Chinatown. One night there was a bombing at an illegal gambling den above a long row of restaurants, hugely popular places with locals and tourists, everyone. Three people dead including a pregnant cocktail waitress. When we did the door-to-door of all the restaurants, no one was saying anything and looked like they’d rather we tore out their tongue. What could we do? We couldn’t even speak the language. So, I went to our Captain and told him, “It’s a wall of silence.” And you know what he said to me? “Money talks, son. Money talks.” I think, he’s gonna bribe them. Maybe the little guys, the waiters, the chefs. Someone might take our dime, spill and run. But no. He’s got other ideas. Within an hour, he had fifty guys pulled off every other case in town: day shift and night shift. Everyone with a day off? It’s cancelled. Report for duty. He closed down the entire block around Chinatown. No one could get in, no customers, no deliveries, and all the restaurant owners had for company was the smell of rotting trash. Turns out the Triads don’t much like losing money, their cut of thousands of covers a day. Plus booze, plus gambling, plus drugs and hookers. The silence lasted less than eighteen hours before we got an anonymous tip which collared us our bombers and their paymaster.’
‘What are you saying, Marty?’
‘I’m not saying anything, Alan.’ Forget that Mr Laidlaw crap. ‘It’s just a story. Told for the interest of those here present.’
Alan, arms folded, leaned forward on the table. He looked like he was going to say, ‘Don’t you come in here, to our House, and threaten us, you son of a . . .’ but he didn’t speak.
‘I’m just saying. We might find, in the not too distant future, that the safety of the brethren of this good city is in a great deal of jeopardy. Bombs going off all over town and not even one confirmed suspect in our sights. All I’m asking of you gentlemen is that you do what you can to assist me in keeping all our brethren safe. Or we might find it of vital necessity to close down our fair city. Particularly downtown. Starting with a five-block radius of where we’re currently sat.’
‘You don’t have any authority to do that,’ Browne chimed in.
‘You’re right. I don’t.’
‘So how are you going to make that happen? We won’t allow it,’ said Laidlaw.
They wouldn’t allow it. Of course. They owned the city. Or thought they did. ‘I was hoping for your co-operation. I obviously made a mistake.’ Marty started up out of his chair and began a slow move to the door. ‘I don’t think you gentlemen have quite gauged the mood out there. People are scared to send their kids to school. What’s going to be next? One of your Followers’ kids? A school bus? The public of Abraham City don’t like to be scared, looking over their shoulder. That’s other cities, not this one. That’s why they left other cities, sought sanctuary here. And what people really hate is when those who profess to protect them turn away from them in their hour of need. They look to you to set an example.’ He wanted to finish with ‘A good one,’ but thought that might be overdoing it. Instead, he stood facing back into the room, his hand on the door handle. ‘We’ve already got the public asking when we’re going to get Federal help. And when the Feds come riding over the mountain a five-block lockdown will be the least of your problems.’
There was no answer. He watched them looking up and down the line at one another. He knew that he had hit a nerve. Even the threat of closing downtown, or any part of it, would make their Followers think that those who were supposed to be watching over them had lost control of their own city and with it the safety of their flock. And that might make their Followers have doubts about the Faith and its regard for them. A fidgety, newly questioning flock and the Feds on the doorstep were not what anyone at that table wanted.
Marty watched as the Supreme Leader wrote a note on a piece of paper and then another one. He passed one along the table to his right, the other to his left. Each Disciple would read it.
Marty tilted his head to the ceiling. He’d only been in this room once befo
re. A lifetime ago. He had never forgotten the clouds on the ceiling and how he wanted to pull one of the cotton candy shapes down and climb onto it and float back up to its stars and away to another galaxy. His father had been furious when, finally, they’d found him in here just as a Disciples’ meeting was about to start. Marty could see he was mad inside, but he wouldn’t have got mad in front of the other Disciples. Wouldn’t have wanted to jeopardize his chances of ever becoming Supreme Leader. A dream Edward Sinclair had had since a little boy. But God had other plans. After an almost slavish devotion to the Faith for almost fifty adult years, Edward Sinclair had died a long slow death of pancreatic cancer. Whatever God was looking down on him had obviously wanted him to endure pain, right up until the closing second of his life. Marty didn’t know why God was so vengeful: for apart from his consistent, but fleeting outbursts of anger, Edward Sinclair had mostly been a benign father and husband. He had saved all of his passions for the Faith.
Several times over the course of his father’s illness Marty had been called back the thousand miles from college at UCLA as the Disciples held Last Prayers at Edward’s bedside, downstairs in the family’s living room, where what passed for a hospital room-cum-hospice had been mocked up, his father insisting he wanted to die at home. Marty thought Edward was having the last laugh at his colleagues’ expense. ‘See, you idiots, I didn’t make it to Supreme Leader, but I got you at my beck and call anyhow.’ Marty wondered how many times the Disciples would get woken from their beds to shuffle silently out in the middle of the night to administer the Last Prayer, and then another and another, before one of them slipped Edward a morphine overdose. They must have been relieved when, in a twist of medical fate – or was it divine intervention – he had died of a heart attack alone at daybreak one cold October morning as everyone else in Abraham City was preparing for Sunday Service.
Just a few hours later, a temporary – and eventually permanent – successor from the Supreme Chamber was chosen to replace him. Alan Laidlaw, Sherri’s father. By that time, Marty was at police college and had to get special permission to take forty-eight hours off to attend the funeral and listen to the reading of a will that left everything Edward Sinclair owned to the Faith, with the exception of the house, which was to be held in some kind of Faith-held trust, and which his mother was allowed to live in until her death. The Faith didn’t have to wait long to stake their claim on the Sinclair family home. Joyce Sinclair died a few months later from kidney failure.