The Sculptor

by Gregory Funaro

  That is until he read Slumbering in the Stone.

  The Sculptor, however, would argue that it all began with his return to St. Bartholomew’s. It was a week after his mother’s funeral, on the very same day the eighteen-year-old Christian spoke with his father’s lawyer—a kind old gentleman who would facilitate the sale of his father’s software company and make The Sculptor a millionaire many times over. It was then that the lawyer explained to him the details of the accident and about his mother’s affair at the country club with a tennis pro named Damon Manzera—a once promising young player whose career was cut short by injury, and who the lawyer said was only a few years older than Christian himself. Thus, it was after his meeting with the lawyer that the young man named Christian wandered without thinking back to St. Bartholomew’s, searching like a zombie in the fog for something to guide him.

  And so it was that—even though he was nowhere near to understanding the bigger picture of it all quite yet—the young man who would one day become The Sculptor had his first awakening before the Pietà, standing there gazing down at Michelangelo’s masterpiece as he had done in his mother’s arms so many times, so many years ago. However, it was not the statue itself, but the plaque at its base that—like a chisel to a block of marble—cracked Christian’s mind with the understanding of why fate had brought him there that day.

  Dedicated in memory of Filomena Manzera

  Manzera. Damon Manzera.

  Yes, how many times had the boy named Christian sat in that very same church with his mother, listening to Father Bonetti assure the congregation that our time in this world served some greater purpose of which together we all played a part, that all of mankind’s lives were intertwined, that “Everything was connected.” And after some poking around, the young man named Christian learned that the family who had bestowed upon St. Bartholomew’s their gift of the Pietà was in fact the same family who had bestowed upon the world the tennis pro Damon Manzera—the tennis pro who had killed his mother and turned his father into a vegetable.

  And just as the young man named Christian understood that fate had brought his mother and the tennis pro together at the country club in some divine connection to the Pietà—a divine connection that had to do with him, with a mother’s love for her son—the young man named Christian also understood that fate had now brought him and the tennis pro together, too.

  Oh yes. Christian understood all too well what he had to do next.

  And so, after he finished up at Phillips Exeter, between visiting his father at the care facility and going full time to nursing school, the young man named Christian began building up his body—first at the gym, then in the cellar of his parents’ home—all the while his mind focused clearly on the duality of his purpose: the caring for his father and his revenge on Damon Manzera. And after the former was safely back at home, for years Christian followed the latter, learning his movements and waiting patiently for a sign from fate that it was time.

  Ironically, it all came together so quickly in the end. Damon Manzera, who was still teaching tennis at the country club—and who himself had become quite the drinker after a failed marriage—had moved back temporarily with his parents on Love Lane, where he spent many a warm summer evening in the backyard drinking beer and swimming in the Manzera’s in-ground pool. If Damon Manzera ever thought about his former mistress, if he ever felt guilty about the part he played in her death, he gave no sign of it to Christian, who for four years had spied on him nearly every day with his binoculars.

  And so, with the permission of fate, the young man named Christian snuck into the Manzeras’ backyard through the woods, hopping the high stone wall just after dark and waiting among the trees until Damon Manzera was good and drunk. He did not yet have the night vision goggles or the tranquilizer rifle that he would later use on Tommy Campbell; he did not even have to wrestle the tennis pro under control as he had done when he dragged poor Michael Wenick down the drainpipe. No, for the young man who would soon become The Sculptor, his first murder was somewhat anticlimactic; and in the end he simply lifted the unconscious Manzera off his lounge chair and drowned him with no more effort than it would have taken him to wash the dishes.

  Christian was able to hop from the diving board and into the woods without leaving even a single footprint on the cement. When in the weeks that followed it became apparent that he had actually gotten away with his murder of Damon Manzera, the young man named Christian began to feel empty. Yes, the man who was to become The Sculptor wanted to kill again; he wanted to kill more Damon Manzeras—so much so that he actually got an erection when he thought about it.

  Indeed, for all his intellect, for all his self-awareness, the young man named Christian never quite understood why—when he was younger, when he was away at Phillips Exeter—he had never shown much interest in girls. He would not get hard when he looked at them in class and would certainly not “jerk off” like his classmates did to the pornographic pictures that were so often passed around. True, sometimes he found his hands absently wandering to his groin late at night when he thought about his mother, but the only time he really got hard was when he thought about his male classmates, when he would see them with their shirts off or coming out of the shower stalls, upon which Christian would quickly avert his eyes so as not to become aroused in front of them.

  There was only one other boy at Phillips that Christian knew felt the same way—an “experienced” boy who took Christian under his wing, and with whom he would sometimes sneak away to places hidden; places where they could kiss and be naked against each other; places where they could take each other’s penises in their mouths, or insert them in each other’s behinds. With the death of Christian’s mother, however, all that stopped; and long after Christian moved back to Rhode Island, the young man struggled with his desire for male company and the guilt that somehow his homosexuality had contributed to both his mother’s death and his father’s vegetative state.

  Yet with the murder of Damon Manzera, Christian found himself getting hard when he thought about that, too; and thus he understood that fate had directed him to channel his desire into something much more productive. He began fantasizing, began researching and experimenting with different methods. The idea of epinephrine had appealed to him from the beginning because he knew it would mimic his heart-pounding revelation before the Pietà at St. Bartholomew’s. And when he was ready, when he finally succeeded in producing a highly concentrated solution of the drug himself, the young man named Christian set about finding a proper candidate.

  Gabriel Banford was always to have been the first victim of this new method. Christian had followed him for weeks after spotting him at Series X and planned on waiting for him in the dark of his bedroom. But on the evening that he should have killed him, when he stumbled upon Banford’s copy of Slumbering in the Stone, when fate directed him right then and there to flip to the chapter on the Pietà, the man who would from that day forward call himself The Sculptor wept under the weight of his divine revelation—a revelation that surpassed the one at St. Bartholomew’s. Yes, through this woman Catherine Hildebrant’s analysis of Michelangelo’s Holy Mother and Son—her brilliant articulation of what she called that “parallel trinity” as embodied in the artist’s portrayal of the Virgin herself—the boy, the young man named Christian not only finally understood his love of the Pietà, but also his mother’s love for him.

  So overcome was The Sculptor by his revelation that he left Banford’s apartment in shock. He left the young man alive only to return a week later—after he had purchased his own copy of Slumbering in the Stone and read it cover to cover ten times, after he finally understood the totality of his purpose—that is, why fate had led him to Banford, to Dr. Catherine Hildebrant, and to Michelangelo, that man whose work was to become a template for The Sculptor’s destiny.

  Everything is connected.

  And now, six years later, as he followed the black Trailblazer on Route 95 toward downtown Providence, The S
culptor grinned widely beneath his fake moustache. Yes, even though the FBI was getting close to him, even though they had made the connection between the stolen Pietà and the Manzera family, The Sculptor knew deep down that fate had once again interceded on his behalf. And although he dared not get too close, The Sculptor also had a feeling that behind the tinted windows of the black Trailblazer sat the person for whom he had been searching all morning.

  Yes, something deep down told The Sculptor that he had finally found Dr. Hildy.

  Chapter 44

  It was just after 5:00 P.M. when Markham and Cathy emerged from the Providence Public Library—their heads hung low, their faces drawn. They had spent over an hour searching the periodical databases for information on the death of Damon Manzera. There wasn’t much—the obligatory newspaper blurbs, the obituaries—but nothing that listed the death as suspicious, no evidence of foul play. Indeed, a spokesperson for the medical examiner was quoted many times as being very clear to the contrary, and stated that, at the time of Manzera’s death, the young man’s blood alcohol level was found to have been “dangerously high.” And thus, the coroner had concluded that most likely Manzera either fell asleep in the pool or somehow staggered off its edge into the water. Either way, the official cause of death was listed as accidental drowning; either way, end of story.

  “We’ve now got two options on this end, Cathy,” said Markham, sliding into the Trailblazer. “Either I go back and tell Mrs. Manzera the real reason why I was there, see if I can find out anything else about her son, or we start poking around Manzera’s circle of acquaintances to see if they know anything—maybe start with his ex-wife, or at the country club, the one in East Greenwich where the newspaper articles said he worked.”

  “But Sam, this all happened over ten years ago. Wouldn’t the police have done that already?”

  “I assume so, yes. When we get the police records, we’ll be able to see who they questioned. I can only hope they missed something.” Markham closed his eyes, rested his head back, and sighed. “I don’t know what else to do, Cathy—starting to think this whole Manzera connection to the stolen Pietà was a bad idea. I’m starting to think I don’t know what the hell I’m doing anymore.”

  “It’s in the book, Sam,” Cathy said, taking his hand. “You’re right about that. I know it. Everything we need to catch him is right there in Slumbering in the Stone. You’re just tired, is all. We both are. Why don’t we get some takeout Chinese or something—grab a bottle of wine and call it a day. Tomorrow’s Sunday. We can sleep in for a bit, maybe take a ride down to the coast—official business, of course. After a good night’s rest we’ll both be able to think more clearly. What do you say, Special Agent Markham? Is it a date?”

  Markham smiled, kissed her deeply, and drove off.

  Neither one of them noticed the blue Toyota Camry that had been parked diagonally across the street about a block away.

  It pulled out again behind them.

  The Camry followed the Trailblazer first to a Chinese restaurant in Cranston, then to a nearby liquor store, and finally back to downtown Providence, where the Trailblazer disappeared underneath an office building via a private driveway. And after about five minutes the blue Toyota Camry passed by—did not turn down the driveway like the Trailblazer. No, the driver of the blue Camry could not miss the two big PRIVATE ACCESS ONLY signs; he could clearly see the video cameras and the steel, card-access security gate—thought there might even be a guard or two prowling around as well.

  “So that’s where they’re keeping her,” The Sculptor said out loud.

  Despite her new hair color, despite her Jackie Onassis sunglasses, The Sculptor had recognized Dr. Hildy outside the library as soon as she stepped out from the Trailblazer. And while he had waited for her and the unknown FBI agent to finish their research inside—research he knew had to do with the tennis pro, Damon Manzera—The Sculptor concluded he needed to put his David on hold.

  It was all right. He had done that before with his Pietà, when he finally understood the scope, the message of his work as something beyond himself, when he finally understood that, in order to really wake the world from its slumber, no material other than Tommy Campbell would be worthy of his Bacchus.

  Yes, The Sculptor did not mind adapting; he did not resist changing his plans if he felt the hand of fate leading him someplace else.

  But exactly where did fate want him to go next?

  The Sculptor needed time to think and figure out how he would dispose of Dr. Hildy—perhaps this FBI agent, too. But unlike before, when he could take his time, when his work was still unknown to the world, The Sculptor knew now that the clock was ticking. Yes, he had to move quickly—had to get to Hildebrant and the FBI agent before they got to him. But how? It was much too risky under the present circumstances to try to take them at that fortress in downtown Providence—especially since The Sculptor had no idea what it looked like inside.

  And so, as The Sculptor drove away from Providence, he resigned himself to wait for the right opportunity to take them on the outside.

  The Sculptor smiled, for he knew deep down that fate would bring him and Dr. Hildy together very soon.

  After all, fate had never let him down before.

  Chapter 45

  “I thought we agreed we were going to take a break today,” said Cathy.

  She stood in the doorway to their bedroom—naked, save for the button-down shirt of Markham’s which she wore drawn tightly around her. They had spent that Sunday together driving along the coast—had ended up in Newport and strolled along the cliff-walk before taking in a late lunch at a restaurant overlooking the harbor. Upon their return to the safe house, the fax from Rachel Sullivan had already arrived: the coroner’s report, as well as a list of names taken from the East Greenwich Police investigation on the death of Damon Manzera—both requested by Sam Markham the evening before. Cathy had made the FBI agent promise to let them wait—convinced him that nothing could be done with the information until the following morning. And after another evening of wine and lovemaking, the once shy art history professor could not help but feel a certain amount of pride that her feminine wiles had won out yet again.

  “It’s 12:15,” said Markham. “Ante meridiem. Technically it’s now tomorrow—haven’t broken my promise to you, have I?”

  “I guess not. But you woke me up.”

  “Sorry.”

  Dressed in only his underwear, the FBI agent lay on the sofa in the common area—which also consisted of two recliners and a television, two desks complete with computers and printers, a copier and a fax machine, as well as an entire wall dedicated to the twelve video monitors that continually displayed surveillance from the building’s exterior, its second and third floor corridors, as well as its parking garage.

  Sullivan’s fax lay scattered about on the floor—cast aside by Markham in deference to his copy of Slumbering in the Stone. Cathy sat down beside him.

  “What’s got your attention now?” she asked.

  “Wasn’t able to learn much from the fax, so I started reading again about David.”

  “And?”

  “I guess the thing that keeps jumping out at me is how tall the statue is—seventeen feet, you say?”

  “Yes. You can’t really grasp its size, its magnificence until you see it in person.”

  “But the way it was sculpted—the head and the upper torso, the hands slightly out of proportion to the lower half of the body—you say in your book you think this was intentional on Michelangelo’s part?”

  “Yes. There are a number of theories about this. As I’m sure you’ve read, the enormous block of Carrara marble from which David was originally sculpted had already been worked by a couple of other artists—one of them being a student of Donatello—and then ended up being neglected in a courtyard for almost thirty years before the twenty-six-year-old Michelangelo was commissioned to finish the project in 1501. Some scholars believe that Michelangelo had to work from a figure
that had been blocked out earlier. However, I believe that the marble wasn’t nearly that far along when Michelangelo got to it. And as the guild that originally commissioned the statue had intended for it to sit atop the buttress of a cathedral—a plan that was later abandoned—when viewed from below, the proportions of David would be correct.”

  “It took him a little over three years,” said Markham, reading. “And the statue ended up being installed outside the entrance to the Palazzo Vecchio.”

  “Yes. A representation of the biblical David whose defeat of Goliath and the Philistines came to symbolize the triumph of the Florentine Republic over its rival city-states, Michelangelo’s David was initially placed outside the Palazzo Vecchio—a fortresslike palace that served as the old seat of civic government in Florence. It’s hard to believe, isn’t it? Hard to believe nowadays that the Florentines would have allowed what has become the most famous statue in the world to be subjected to wind and weather and pigeon poop before moving it indoors to the Galleria dell’ Accademia almost four hundred years later.”

  Markham was silent—his eyes fixed on a photographic detail of David’s waist.

  “You’re thinking about where he’s going to display it, aren’t you?” said Cathy. “You’re thinking about what to do in case we don’t catch The Michelangelo Killer before he creates his David.”

  “Actually, I’m thinking about where he’s going to get his material.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We know from our investigation thus far that no young males with a physique resembling the statue of David have been reported missing—a physique one can assume the killer will have a hard time finding among the population of male prostitutes from which we now know he’s drawn.”