He put his kit in the back of the car and then got in and reversed up Tamara Laurence's driveway. He would head to North Sydney to catch the ferry to St John's anyway and trust that somehow he would find himself at Carl Smotes's door and Carl Smotes would welcome him. He got to the highway and put his signal on to turn left, and as he made the turn, he saw an RCMP cruiser turning right onto the access road that led down to Mackie. There had been a single man inside the car, and he could have been doing anything on the access road; he could even live down there. But did cops take their cars home for the night? Simon contemplated this as he continued down the road, and then finally, his instincts telling him not to go on, he did a U-turn on the empty, darkened highway. He drove back down the access road, looking for the cruiser parked somewhere, and by the time he got within half a kilometre of Tamara's, he was fairly certain where the car had gone. He turned off his headlights and drifted in toward the trees at the top of her driveway and saw, down to his left, through the bare branches, the headlights of the Mountie's cruiser illuminating the front of Tamara's house. He was trying the door and talking on a cellphone.
Simon tried to figure out who had led the police here. He went over in his mind all of the houses he'd been in over the past two months. There had been no witnesses and he'd left no trace of himself in any of these places. He'd taken from these houses and destroyed any paper correspondence he'd had with his hosts, and he'd meticulously erased any emails to or from himself that he found remaining in their computers. Could Tamara have warned someone? What did she do after she'd discovered him out cold behind his car on Saturday night? Did someone catch her taking blood from the hospital and decide to look into it? Surely she hadn't called anyone; if she had he wouldn't have woken up in her basement with tubes sticking out of him. He was at a total loss to explain what he was seeing. At this moment, the officer was kicking in Laurence's door with the flat of his boot, and the next, he was inside the house. Simon put the car in neutral, got out, and put his shoulder into the open doorframe, pushing the car forward silently. When he'd crossed the open driveway, he jammed his foot against the emergency brake and the car stopped there, blocking the way onto Mackie Road. Then he retreated to the trees beside the driveway and waited.
A minute later, he saw the policeman burst from the doorway of the house and stumble toward his car. Simon heard, '– blood everywhere –' and he crouched down and toed a discarded piece of cinderblock, then felt its heft in his hand. The cop was in his car now; he was coming back up toward the road. Honking. Simon could feel the man's fear and rage. The officer got out of the car, the cellphone pressed to his ear; he said, 'There's no one in it,' and Simon rose out of the dead scrub and stepped soundlessly onto the verge of Tamara Laurence's driveway. When he struck the officer on the back of the head with the block, the man spun to him, as if his name had been called, and Simon swung the weight into the man's face for good measure, and he fell there, at Simon's feet, like a broken branch.
The cellphone had smashed against the side window of his car, cracking the glass. It lay in the roadway and began ringing. Simon watched it until it fell silent. Then he picked it up, opened it, and checked the call log. The numbers for the incoming call and the one the officer had last dialled were the same: it was in the 705 area code. Somewhere in Ontario. He chose the number, pressed 'send', and almost immediately, the phone was answered. An anxious voice said, 'DI Micallef here. Nevin? Are you all right?'
'No,' said Simon. 'He's not.' There was backup coming. He returned to his car, hearing the voice in his hand calling to him in a tiny, furious voice. There was no time left at all. He would not be going to North Sydney now, nor Newfoundland. Everything was ruined. He hurled the phone out the window and watched it bust to pieces on the road behind him.
Two hours later, he was out of Nova Scotia, his eyes switching back and forth from the road to the rearview mirror, but there was no one behind him; he was unknown again and going to ground. Whoever this Micallef woman was, he presumed she was massing her energies to the east, where he was expected, if she wasn't already another step ahead of him and had deduced the actions he was undertaking at this very moment. There was no way out of the province but by the coastal highway, but once he reached New Brunswick, it was his intent to abandon the highways altogether and stay on private roads, side highways and logging roads. New Brunswick was a couple of cities, a handful of towns and a great deal of forest. December was encroaching and camping was not an option that appealed to him, but until he could think of what he must do next, he was going to have to be invisible. Outside of Amherst, he veered onto 126 and headed straight up toward the centre of the province.
He quickly switched onto smaller roads and all the little oases of light provided by towns and gas stations vanished and he was in a consuming darkness. The roadway seemed fit for only one car heading in one direction, but even at this time of night, he saw, once or twice an hour, headlights shivering in the distance, light snipped into bits by the trees until they appeared full-force in front of him, and he would have to pull over as far as he could to the right to ensure both he and the oncoming car could pass. It was harrowing driving. Four hours into it, he felt himself descending into grief, imagining that he could have been almost all the way to North Sydney by now, almost to the ferry, and in that other life, he would still be clinging to the faith that he would get to Carl Smotes in time. Now he knew who would get to Carl Smotes. He imagined whoever was sent to collect the dying man would have a warrant to search his place and even if Smotes had gone over his house as carefully as most of his hosts did, the police would still find something, and whatever holes that yet existed in their investigation would begin to fill in. Simon always found something after his men and women were gone: some small correspondence, something missed on a hard drive, and he would erase, or burn, or bury; he would leave these places pristine. But Carl Smotes, crippled with tumours and barely able to walk, would be taken now from his home and brought somewhere for his own safety and it was his fault, it was his own fault that this had happened. He had ignored some warning from somewhere and now he was in full flight. He cried out in his car, screaming his anguish, his disgust with himself; he smashed his fists into his skull until the roadway appeared to separate into two paths, two light-strewn paths wending through the forest. He wept and screamed until his throat was raw. And at two in the morning, exhausted by his grief, he finally pulled over and hid the car in among the trees.
He didn't feel like eating or making a fire, but he knew his body could give in now. Stripped of his purpose, he felt he could welcome death, or at least not resist it, but he would not let this strange woman who had found him claim him like this. He built a fire and ate two apples he had taken with him from Tamara's house. He could barely force the second one down. He raised his tent under the thin cover of the bare branches, a hundred feet away from the road where he could still hear the traffic. He faced the door toward the fire. It had begun to mist, a cold, sharp rain that came down in reedy gusts. The tent was exactly as cold as the air outside, and by four in the morning, he knew he would not sleep at all, and he came out and stood in the wet, dark cold.
It was a clear night, the stars spread out over the dome of the sky, distant and unharried. This was the light that had been meant for all of them, this eternity was for the unfinished congregation he had been making. Their mouths open, ready to sing the final note, but waiting. He felt his throat thicken with this heartache and he tried to push the image of these bootless dead away. A faint mist covered everything around him. He felt it slowly building on his skin.
He concentrated on the stars. An uncountable heaven of openings. This gazing occupied him for a while; he was aware of time passing. Soon, he would have to change his dressing. He looked down at the cloth. In the pale firelight, the stain was black. He lifted a strip of soaked bandage up toward the flickering glow. It was black, black as starlessness, black as oil. Then he could smell the oil. He brought the drenched cloth to h
is mouth and touched his tongue to it. It was oil. Dark, heavy, sweet, pungent olive oil.
His brother was there.
He stood in the trees on the other side of the fire, the stars behind him boring their light through his body, needles of light piercing him and holding him, lifting him. His feet hung above the dead ground. Simon wept.
Brother, you are the root and trunk and branch and flower.
'Yes,' said Simon.
His brother shone like the word of God. An impossible light. It saw him. I'm dying.
Simon walked across the small clearing to where his brother was. He reached up and stroked the sunken cheek. 'Tell me what to do.'
I'm cold. He took his brother in his arms and carried him to the fire, laid him down in its feeble light. His lips were cracked and dry and his breath came in ragged bursts. Your drugs aren't working any more. I'm getting worse.
'It takes time.'
No. I can feel it. I'm really dying now. The fire against his face seemed to creep inside his skin, to light his head from within. His eyes glowed in his skull. What you're doing isn't working any more.
'I have another preparation.'
I can't take any more of your medicines. Take me to town. For the pain.
'No!' shouted Simon. 'You will not be poisoned by outsiders who know not who you are. Why have we done all this work? Why come to this day if only to give up?' He leaned in and stroked his brother's gleaming brow. 'You will not die.'
But I must die. We knew I must die.
'We're all going to die. Just not today.'
Kill me.
'A little more physick. You'll see. You'll see how it makes you feel.' He pushed himself up from his haunches and went into the tent to retrieve his kit. When he returned, it was as if his brother was barely there. He could see the ground beneath him through his pale skin. 'Hold on. Stay with me, you've got to stay with me.' He prepared the drug and raised him up, held him against his chest. His brother opened his mouth and took the drug and Simon held his mouth closed, pressed his face against his brother's. 'There's another way,' he said. 'You'll see.'
The ghost began to fade against him. Simon felt his arms pass through his brother's chest until they were wrapped around his own body, and he was rocking and sobbing in front of the guttering fire.
19
Monday 22 November, 8 a.m.
Hazel convened everyone in the conference room at 8 a.m. Father Glendinning hadn't slept from the look of him, and he shot a fearful glance at each person as they entered the room. There were Greene, Wingate, Spere and two other officers. Spere had strongly voiced his displeasure at being left out of this part of the investigation, but now he sat silently, waiting. Jill Yoon was sitting behind her projector and her laptop.
'Father,' she said. 'You can begin anytime.'
The priest wearily got to his feet and leaned forward against the tabletop. 'First off, I'm here against my will.'
'Noted,' said Hazel.
'And second, no person should be compelled to engage in activities that run counter to their deepest-held beliefs, which is exactly what—'
'Also noted,' said Hazel, an edge of anger creeping into her voice. 'I want you to tell everyone here what you told me last night at DC Wingate's place.'
Glendinning looked over at Wingate, as if the mere existence of that man's apartment were the cause of all his grief. 'I presume some of you are familiar with the contents of the New Testament?' He glanced around the room with barely concealed disgust, and when it was apparent he was waiting for some form of response, a couple of them grunted their acknowledgement. 'Fine. Now, there's a long history to the Bible, and some of that figures here, in your investigation. So unlike the way you pay attention in church, when you bother to come, you should pay attention to this.'
'Father,' started Hazel, but he rolled over her.
'To begin, the scriptures the New Testament are based on were originally in Aramaic, an early Semitic language. It wasn't a Bible then, just a collection of stories and laws and blessings that were copied out from hand to hand. The first Bible was in Greek, and it collected and organized these writings. The Greek Bible was brought over into the vulgate Latin by Jerome around 400 AD. However, it has always been understood that there was an oral component to the scriptures, and that some fragments were subject to a prohibition. They were never written down, nor were they supposed to be. This spoken component consisted mainly of blessings conferred only on the closest of Christ's disciples. These were meant to travel from mouth-to-mouth, as it were, in the keeping of the high priests. Once uttered, the recipient of the blessing became the keeper of it, and the speaker of the blessing was to offer himself up as a sacrifice. Naturally, the later Christians were eager to rid themselves of these pagan rites, and none of the Greek Bibles have any of these so-called carmina inconcessa in them. Forbidden songs.' He looked about the room to ensure they were following him. Hazel nodded. 'In any case, they begin to turn up in Latin commentaries around the year 800 AD, and of course they are suppressed, but after that, from time to time, they reappear. Never in the Old English, or later translations. But some people are aware of them, it would seem.'
'You are,' said Greene.
'In the seminary, the history of the Bible is taught. There's a great deal of folderol concerning the writing of scripture, a lot of which is very colourful. But most of it is nonsense.'
'Most?' said Howard Spere.
The priest continued. 'The carmina inconcessa have a special power over the imagination of those who know anything about them. Sects have sprung up over them, and the charismatics who founded these sects claim to have access to some terrifying powers.'
'Which brings us to the Belladonna,' said Hazel.
'He started a church,' Greene said. 'We already know that.'
'Well, this is its congregation,' said Glendinning. 'And it has only a single prayer in its Mass. One of the carmina is known as the Libera Eos. When the women went to complete the burial rites at Christ's tomb, they found the tomb empty. And it is said that their holy service, never to be completed, was rewarded by the Holy Ghost with a consecration against death. It's a prayer of resurrection, and in every instance of resurrection investigated by the Church since the time of Christ, it has been said that this Libera Eos has been invoked. The speaker dies instantly, but the blessed are reborn.'
Greene was scrubbing his mouth with his hand. 'Wow,' he said. 'So this ... series of sounds ... ?'
'Yes,' said Glendinning.
'He's way crazy, isn't he?' said Greene.
The priest rounded on him, his face red. 'Whether he is crazy or not is beside the point, Raymond. He's a believer. This church of his is a serious thing.'
'Which is worse than being crazy?'
'That's up to you people,' said Glendinning. 'All I know is that he mustn't be allowed to finish it.'
'Because otherwise ...' said Greene, trying to get the priest to say it himself. 'Because ... if he does, then the world ends and little red men with pointy sticks come and drag us down to the centre of the earth?'
Glendinning was glaring at him. 'Because it's an offence to God, that's why.'
'I thought this stuff was "nonsense",' said Howard Spere. 'Are you telling us now that you believe?'
'There's nonsense and then there's dangerous nonsense. No man should wield such a thing for his own purposes.'
'Jill,' said Hazel. 'Do you want to play us what you have?'
'I've just told you what you have,' said Glendinning. 'It's not necessary to listen to it.'
'There's a division between church and state for a reason, Father,' said Greene. 'I'd like to hear this zombie prayer for one.'
Hazel shook her head at him. 'It's okay, Jill. Let's hear it once.'
Yoon tapped a couple of keys and the projector fired up. A dart of light hit the screen and the focus resolved into the face that had so frightened Glendinning. He turned away from it. 'Ready?' she said.
'Go.'
The face b
reathed in. They heard the voice, intoning. 'Libera ... eos ... de vinculis mo—' it said, and broke off.
'What does it mean?' asked Wingate.
Glendinning kept his face averted. '''Free them from the bonds of death". Once it's completed. There are two more sounds.'
'Tamara Laurence's pictures are coming in,' said Hazel. 'But Father Glendinning says he knows what the last two phonemes are.'
She looked at him, waiting, and finally, with a miserable expression on his face, Glendinning went to the easelboard and pulled on the projection screen. It rattled back up into its frame, and he faced the board and began writing. The digitized face wavered on the back of his coat. When he stepped away, the letters R T I S were on the board. 'I'd be grateful if you men and women would be so kind as to keep yourself from profaning my beliefs by pronouncing what I've written here.' He turned to Hazel, slapping his hands against each other. His face seemed deeply red in the light. 'May I go now?'
She moved silently to open the door, and Father Glendinning was about to hurry out of the room when she put her hand up. 'Is there anything else you think we should know about resurrection, Father? Anything that might help us decode this man's behaviour any more?'
'All I know about resurrection is that I've never seen it happen.'
'But you must believe in it. Isn't it the cornerstone of your faith?'
'And yours, Hazel?'
'Yes, I'm sorry. Mine as well.'
He drew back into the room a little, willing to delay his departure another minute to have a final word on the matter. 'Only those of pure spirit and body can be raised from the dead. Their hearts must be pure and their bodies whole.'
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