The Tower

by Simon Toyne

  She let go of the gate and allowed herself to slump down the last few feet to the cold earth. The smell of the earth filled her nostrils as her head made contact with the ground. Then she gave in to the welcome relief of oblivion, closed her eyes and let the darkness take her.

  44

  The Reverend Fulton Cooper was shorter than Shepherd had expected but he displaced the air like a much larger man. He was standing in the middle of a large room that had been converted into a TV studio, talking to a tall reed of a man clutching a clipboard and wearing headphones. The studio was basic, just three cameras on wheeled tripods with wireless transmitters plugged in the back feeding a signal directly into a large iMac in the corner. Including the laptops the telephone operators were using there was maybe less than twenty thousand dollars' worth of technology on display. No wonder the Reverend could afford to base his church in a million-dollar mansion. He was broadcasting to the world with a miniscule overhead and no taxes to pay.

  ‘Gentlemen.’ Cooper finally turned his attention to them, all smiles and open arms. ‘My apologies for the wait. As you can see I am rather busy, but I am more than happy to be of assistance if I can.’ He stayed where he was, inviting them to come to him, establishing the power structure.

  Franklin didn’t move. ‘And we surely appreciate that,’ he said. ‘Is there maybe somewhere more private we could talk?’

  Cooper’s smile widened. ‘I have nothing to hide from any of these people: we can talk about anything right here in this room.’

  ‘All right,’ Franklin said. ‘How’s your catching?’

  The smile slipped a little. ‘I don’t get your meaning?’

  ‘Your catching,’ Franklin repeated, then his arm shot forward sending something arcing through the air. Cooper took a step back, his smooth veneer further ruffled by the unexpected move and swatted the object away with his left hand, sending a plastic key ring skittering across the floor of the studio.

  ‘You’ll never make the team catching like that,’ Franklin said, finally taking a step forward. ‘Did you know only around ten per cent of the population are left-handed? Also most people use the same hand to do everything like throw, catch – write threatening postcards to NASA.’

  The smile returned but it didn’t quite make it to Reverend Cooper’s eyes. ‘Take twenty minutes, everyone,’ he announced to the room. ‘Gregory, can you run infomercials on a loop until I’m finished with these gentlemen?’ He turned back to them. ‘Why don’t we sit down,’ he gestured towards two sofas in the middle of the studio arranged around a low table with a laptop on it. ‘Miss Boerman, if you would be so kind as to bring us a large pot of coffee.’

  ‘Coffee!’ Franklin said. ‘Now there’s an idea.’

  They settled in the sofas and sat in silence while the room emptied, Cooper busying himself with his cell phone in a way that suggested whatever was on his phone was far more important and deserving of his attention than they were. Shepherd didn’t mind. It gave him the chance to study him up close: he found him vaguely fascinating. His head seemed too big for his compact body and every facial gesture seemed amplified. He also hummed with a restless energy that combined with his carefully combed silver hair and expensive colour-matched suit to make him come across like a high-powered corporate executive or a senator with his eye on higher office.

  ‘If you could switch your phone to silent and leave it on the table while we talk,’ Franklin said, ‘I would appreciate it.’

  Cooper looked up.

  ‘This is an informal interview but an important one and I don’t want you to be distracted while we talk.’

  Cooper obeyed, reluctantly laying his phone down next to the laptop.

  ‘Mind if I smoke?’ Franklin asked, producing his pack of cigarettes.

  Cooper’s frown deepened. ‘I believe smoking inside any public building is illegal.’

  Franklin tapped a cigarette out and popped it between his lips, reaching a finger inside the pack to fish out his lighter. ‘That’s true but I believe the deeds to this house are in your name, which makes it a private residence. A man can do whatever he likes in his own home.’

  ‘I’m afraid I must still insist that you do not smoke.’

  Franklin shrugged, returned the cigarette to the pack and laid it on the table next to Cooper’s phone. ‘Your house, your rules.’

  The door closed as the final person left and Shepherd reached into the laptop case to pull out copies of the postcards sent to Kinderman and Douglas.

  ‘Recognize these?’ Franklin asked.

  The Reverend took them and studied them, his eyes struggling to focus, his vanity preventing him from wearing reading glasses. ‘Of course I recognize them.’ He looked up and smiled. ‘Those are the shining words of Genesis.’

  Franklin returned the smile but there was no warmth in it. ‘Do you recognize the handwriting?’

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘Because it’s mine.’

  Silence stretched out in the empty room. The sofa creaked as Franklin leaned forward. ‘Care to tell us why you sent them?’

  Cooper opened his mouth to reply but the door opened and Miss Boerman reappeared carrying a tray of coffee. She moved the laptop to one side and placed it on the table, careful to avoid the documents and other items on the table. Cooper waited until she had left. ‘Do you believe what is written in the Bible, gentlemen? Are you men of faith? Because if you know your Scripture then you will not be blind to the clear signs that judgement day is upon us. I saw that those telescopes were an insult to the Lord, modern-day versions of the Tower of Babel, symbol of man’s pride in seeking to gaze upon the face of God, and I prayed to Him saying, “Lord, I know we have offended you, what would you have me do in your blessed name to make amends?”’

  ‘And he told you to send death threats?’

  Cooper smiled like a gambler with an ace in the hole. ‘Death threats? I sent no death threats.’

  Shepherd reached into the case and handed over copies of the final letters sent to both Kinderman and Douglas. ‘Then maybe you can explain these.’

  Cooper took them and held them at arm's length taking his time to inspect them before handing them back. ‘If you recall I admitted I did write those cards. But these are letters, and they have been typed not written.’

  ‘So you’re saying you did not send these?’

  ‘I did not.’

  Franklin leaned further forward, his voice dropping in a way that was both conspiratorial and menacing. ‘Quite a coincidence, though, don’t you think, them both making reference to the exact same thing.’

  Cooper chuckled. ‘I don’t think I am the only one who has read the Bible and paid heed to the teachings of the good book. Let me ask you something, gentlemen. If you were aware that a heinous crime was being committed would you not seek to prevent it from taking place? Are you not, as law enforcement officers, duty bound to uphold the law? Well I follow the highest law there is, a law that is second to none. So, yes, I will admit I did send those cards, I saw it as my duty to remind those people of the danger of what they were doing, but I did not threaten anyone, as God is my witness I did not do that. Nor am I responsible for the events that have succeeded in toppling these towers.’

  Franklin stiffened. ‘What events?’

  Cooper looked surprised. ‘Well now, surely you know.’

  ‘Know what?’

  Cooper leaned forward and tapped something into the laptop. ‘I don’t know if you were trying to keep a lid on it but I’m sure you are aware, news travels awful fast these days.’ He turned the screen round for them to see. It showed a Twitter feed, new tweets appearing almost every second, all using the same hashtags:

  WDW Kate @WebbieWorld349

  Explosion at Marshall Space Center. James Webb telescope destroyed? Latest. ow.ly/c5mK #NASA #HUBBLE_WEBB

  Letitia Potorac @metaevolve

  #NASA $8bn space telescope sabotaged? fb.me/1B49ZI2yW
>
  Ira Upinski @eyeupinsky

  #NASA #HUBBLE Space Telescope knocked out of orbit, several sources confirm: bit.ly/wRNi0c

  ‘It appears my prayers have been answered and the good Lord has once again confounded the vain attempts of mankind to know His mystery. Your prompt appearance here and the nature of your questions merely confirms to me that these rumours must be true. They are true I take it – the Hubble telescope has been disabled and its successor destroyed?’

  ‘Yes,’ Shepherd said.

  ‘Well how about that. Thank you, gentlemen, thank you kindly. You have just given me the theme for the second part of today’s show. Now if you have no further questions I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to take your coffee elsewhere. I am in the middle of a live broadcast here.’ He began to rise.

  ‘I have a question,’ Shepherd said. ‘Why didn’t you sign the cards?’

  ‘Because I was quoting the Bible: I would not presume to sign my name after the words of the Lord.’

  Shepherd nodded. ‘Also I’m wondering why the cards all have different postmarks?’

  Cooper shrugged. ‘I travel a lot. I guess I must have posted them wherever I found myself to be.’

  ‘Could we see a copy of your schedule going back to May?’

  ‘For what purpose exactly?’

  ‘It would help us match your whereabouts with the postmarks and confirm your story.’

  Cooper hesitated. ‘I’ll get the office to send you over a copy.’ Franklin produced a card and handed it over. The Reverend took it and flipped it over in his soft, manicured hands then fixed the smile back in place and gestured towards the door.

  ‘It’s been a pleasure, gentlemen. I’m sorry I could not be more helpful.’

  The gate clanged shut behind them on the snow-covered street. ‘You think he sent the letter?’ Shepherd asked.

  Franklin reached into his pocket, pulled out his rumpled packet of Marlboros and tapped out a cigarette. He cupped his hand against the cold and fired up a battered Zippo that looked like it had been rescued from a car wreck, sucked the flame into the cigarette then let out a long stream of smoke. Despite everything they had been through in the last twelve hours or so this was the first time Shepherd had seen him smoke. ‘If it wasn’t him then he knows who did.’ Franklin took another deep draw, the cherry glowing bright and red against the soft, silent white of the street. ‘I got an instinct for these things. That’s why I wanted to come here and look the man in the eye. That was a nice touch at the end there, by the way, asking him about the cards.’

  Shepherd shrugged. ‘I was just yanking his chain a little.’

  ‘It showed good instincts. Pushing a man’s buttons, knocking him off centre, sometimes that’s all it takes to start cracks forming, and the cracks show you where the weaknesses are.’

  Shepherd looked out into the street. ‘Didn’t get us anywhere though, did it?’

  Franklin took a final deep pull on his cigarette then dropped it to the ground, crushing it with his shoe. ‘Not yet.’ He studied the building, spotted a gap between the mailbox and the wall and crammed his empty pack of cigarettes into it. ‘But you can’t just toss in a line and expect to haul out a fish straight away. You need to learn a little patience, Agent Shepherd.’ He stepped into the snow, heading for the corner.

  Shepherd followed, tilting his head down against the weather. ‘Where we headed now?’

  ‘Police station up on Westside, but we’ll need a ride there. You got your phone handy?’ Shepherd pulled it out of his jacket pocket. ‘Call a cab and get it to pick us up at the Fast and French on Broad Street in twenty minutes.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘The nearest place we can get some goddam coffee.’

  Reverend Cooper watched them leave, following them with his eyes until they disappeared in the snow. Behind him he heard the door to his private office open and he listened to the approaching footsteps. He waited until they were close enough then turned suddenly, shooting out his arm to catch Miss Boerman’s face hard with the back of his hand. She was knocked sideways by the force, crashing against his desk and knocking a phone to the floor as she scrambled to recover. Cooper was already on her, grabbing her throat with one hand and pulling the other back to strike her once more.

  ‘Don’t you EVER do something like that again.’

  She closed her eyes but made no move to get away. Cooper’s hand curled into a fist as his rage balled up inside him. He wanted to break her nose and see her spitting teeth through split lips. He wanted to hear the snap of her fingers and her cries of pain. He wanted to …

  He stepped away, breathing heavily as he fought to master the demons that used to be the master of him. Now was not the time to let the devil back in.

  ‘Get out,’ he said. She stood up, straightening her suit jacket, the red marks of his fingers already rising up on her white cheek. ‘Tell the studio to be ready to broadcast in five minutes and close the door on your way out.’

  He waited until she had gone, then picked the phone up off the floor and dialled a number from memory. Outside in the street the footprints of the FBI agents were already being rubbed out by the steady fall of snow. If only the men who had made them and the threat they posed were as easy to erase. Then again – maybe they were.

  The phone clicked as it connected. Then Carrie’s brittle, little-girl voice answered.

  45

  Gabriel was one of the last to be evacuated from the Public Church. Arkadian had stood by his bed the whole time, a guardian angel in a spacesuit, giving a running commentary on what was happening: equipment being packed up and shipped out, patients being transferred from beds to stretchers so they would fit on the ascension platform and be easier to carry through the narrow tunnels once they were inside the mountain. He kept laying his gloved hand on Gabriel’s chest, like a father reassuring his son, finding the one spot where there were no electrodes or tubes coming in or out of him.

  And then it was Gabriel’s turn to go.

  Arkadian stepped back as four suited orderlies got to work on him. They gave him a shot to settle him and undid the straps that bound him to the bed, clearly in a rush to get this thing over with. Gabriel felt himself slipping into a half slumber.

  ‘You hang in there, OK.’ Arkadian’s face appeared over him, his voice muffled by his contamination suit. ‘I’ll buy you lunch when you come out.’

  Gabriel tried to respond, say something flippant and brave like they did in the movies but his mouth was no longer working and his eyes flickered shut.

  He felt and heard the clatter of wheels over the flagstoned floor as they moved him then the air cooling as he neared the door. He forced his eyes open and saw the vaulted ceiling and ecclesiastical paintings slide away above him to be replaced by night skies and stars. He picked out Draco, the constellation that had led him and Liv to the lost place in the desert, the place where he had last seen her. He wondered if she was still there, waiting for him, looking up at the same stars. As he stared up he spotted something else, a new star, brighter than all the rest, travelling across the sky. He watched it sliding across the night then a beam shot out from it, blinding him, and making his stretcher-bearers turn their heads away. It held on them for a few seconds, long enough for the news cameraman in the helicopter to get a good shot, then it moved away, the sound of the rotors chopping the air and sending cold air down onto Gabriel’s burning skin.

  They passed through another stone arch onto the embankment and the Citadel came into view, a monumental darkness that blocked out the stars as they drew closer. The hollow bang of wooden boards replaced the scuff of feet on stone as they reached the bridge leading to the ascension platform. The mountain was so close now it blocked out half the sky. Tears leaked from Gabriel's eyes as they placed him on the platform. Arkadian appeared above him, his mouth forming words that he couldn’t hear, then he disappeared, ushered away by the orderlies.

  The sound of wooden battens banging into place echoe
d through the night as the guardrails on the edge of the platform were put back in place then a bell rang high in the mountain. The ropes securing each corner of the platform creaked then the platform lurched and lifted off the ground.

  Gabriel looked straight up at the night, half-filled with stars and half black. He could see the tribute cave high above, dark and wide like a huge black mouth, growing larger as it sucked them closer. He thought of what he was leaving behind, all the sorrow and regret: his father found and gone, his mother gone too, and the woman he cared most for in the world, the one he felt bound to protect at all costs, abandoned and alone like he was. And all because of this mountain, this hateful mountain.

  The ascension platform rose higher, lit from time to time by the searchlight from the hovering news helicopter, then it passed into darkness as it entered the tribute cave and banged to a halt.

  The last time Gabriel had been here was in the dead of night, alone, unannounced and armed. Now he was strapped tight to a stretcher, his senses dulled by the sedative, his body wracked with a disease that had robbed him of both strength and freedom. And there were people everywhere.

  Two monks loomed over him, their surgical masks looking sinister against their cowled and bearded faces.

  ‘Bring the patients this way,’ a voice commanded from somewhere inside the cave. ‘We have a place prepared.’

  The two monks hoisted him up and carried him off the platform, the air closing in on him and the sound deadening as they moved out of the cave and deeper into the mountain.

  They began to descend, bumping down narrow corridors. Gabriel could feel his temperature climbing in the trapped, stuffy air and sweat trickled down inside the tight bindings, further torturing his already screaming skin. Something started to disconnect inside him. He had held on for so long, using the focus of getting here to drive him; now that he had finally made it he had nothing left. A small part of his lucid mind registered the relief of it. He took a breath and whispered something, too quiet for anyone else to hear: ‘Goodbye, Liv.’ Then a howl erupted from him as he finally let go and was carried screaming into the heart of the mountain.