“All right,” Johnny said. “But not right out here. Come on.” He turned, and Steve followed him around the side of the garage. There were a couple of big white buckets there, turned over. Johnny sat on one, Steve took the other. The sun beat against the white wall, casting off heat.
Johnny said, “Do we still have a right to free speech in this country?”
“Of course,” Steve said.
“I’m not so sure. Race is one example. You can’t talk about race unless it’s along politically correct lines. Eldon just wants to be able to say what he thinks.”
“Like he wants to ship blacks back to Africa?”
“First of all, Steve, that’s what a lot of the blacks themselves were saying back in the sixties. Eldon just agreed with ’em. They were burning down cities then. Killing cops. Rioting in the streets.”
“They?”
“Blacks.”
“That is classic bigotry.”
“You think this country is better off with all the ‘la-la and let’s hold hands’? You think we got racial harmony? Go to any college, and what do you see? The blacks with the blacks, Latinos with Latinos. Come on. And in the joint it’s a lot worse. It all breaks down that way eventually.”
“But you can’t have a country that way.”
“We don’t have a country now! And that’s all Eldon is saying.”
“What are you saying?” Steve asked. “That’s the important thing.”
Johnny paused a long moment before answering. “I’m also a work in progress, Steve.”
Steve folded his arms across his chest. “When I came and saw you in prison that first time, you said, ‘I bless the world.’ Remember?”
“I bless the entire world,” Johnny said. “That’s the last thing John Wilkes Booth wrote.”
“So you’re cool with what your father wrote?”
“He read that to me as a kid, like a bedtime story. That stuff stays with you.”
“Is it with you now?”
“Does it matter so much to you?”
Steve thought about it. “It does.”
“Then do me a favor.” Johnny touched Steve’s arm. “Walk with me a little. Work with me. And in the process, make some good money. What’s wrong with that?”
Nothing he could think of at the moment.
“Make a leap of faith,” Johnny said.
Faith. He thought of Gincy then, and the Zipper. Only this thing Steve was experiencing wasn’t faith in God, but in Johnny LaSalle. It had to be faith. What else could it be? Johnny was his brother because Steve wanted to believe it.
In a way, this whole thing would be like the opposite of kicking an addiction — one day at a time.
“I think it’s time for you to meet the old man,” Johnny said.
“Eldon?”
“Eldon.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Steve’s nerves took a jolt. The prospect of meeting the great patriarch made him feel like the Scarecrow granted audience with the mighty Oz.
“You drive up around three,” Johnny said. “I’ll show you around Beth-El.”
“Beth-El?”
“That’s what we call our compound in the mountains.”
“Compound? It sounds like Superman should be living there,” Steve said.
Johnny smiled. “What makes you think he doesn’t?”
THIRTY
First Johnny had to finish his workday, and Steve had to wonder what sort of world he was getting involved with. Involved wasn’t the right word. On the one hand he was a lawyer doing a job. He needed the job. He needed the client and the money. By working for Johnny, he wasn’t endorsing anything Johnny believed. If Steve were a doctor and Johnny came in for treatment, Steve would have to help him. When he defended a criminal he was bound by the canons of ethics to defend the person with zeal. Doing so wasn’t the same as endorsing the crime.
He walked away from the shop, toward town, figuring to get a Subway sandwich or something, when Neal ran up from behind.
“Hey,” Neal said.
Steve turned.
“You’re starting to get the picture, right?” Neal said.
“What are you talking about?”
“Johnny. He’s a prophet, you know.”
“Prophet?”
“Yes. Someone who gets direct revelation from God. That means you have to listen to him.”
The poor guy. He had that look in his eyes, the gullible-follower look. Steve knew that in prison culture there are two kinds of people, and only two. Those who rule and those who get stomped. The stomped only feel protected when they’re hooked up with the strongest ruler. If they find him, they can become loyal to the point of giving up their minds. That’s what Neal smelled like to Steve.
They’re dangerous, these types, because if you cross the ruler, you cross them.
He was in front of Steve now and didn’t move.
“Is that all?” Steve said.
“You don’t believe.”
“I’m going to get a sandwich. You want one?”
“You have to listen to me. If you don’t, you could miss out.”
Steve slapped Neal’s shoulder. “Thanks anyway, man, I — ”
“He had a prophecy about you.”
Dead seriousness in Neal’s face. Steve waited.
“Johnny said you would come. He said you would bring deliverance.”
“Johnny said that?”
Neal nodded.
“What did he mean, deliverance? From what?” Steve said.
“I don’t know. But you’re here, aren’t you?”
“I’m here because you gave me ten thousand dollars.”
“No, you’re not. You’re here because God meant you to be here. He made you to be here.”
“How did you get here, Neal?”
He didn’t answer.
“I mean, how did you meet Johnny LaSalle, get hooked up with him?”
Still didn’t answer. Which ticked Steve off. “You meet him in prison?”
“It’s not important.”
“Let me decide that.”
“I’m not important. The only thing that matters is Johnny. He’s got the anointing and you’ve got to help him. Don’t mess up. If you do, it’ll be bad.”
“Let me ask you something. I’m sure Johnny won’t mind you telling me about your organization.”
“What’s the question?”
“I did some reading up on Eldon LaSalle.”
“So?”
“He’s quite a controversial figure.”
“All great men are.”
“He’s been tied to things like the so-called Christian militia movement.”
Neal smiled and shook his head. “Man, that is such a crock. You know what the problem is? People don’t know how to think for themselves. They basically buy into all the lies the government tells them, or TV tells them. It’d be funny if wasn’t so sad.”
“But why would people even say that if there wasn’t some basis?”
“Look, man, there’s been people trying to peg us for something ever since the Master put stakes down here.”
“Master?”
“Enlightened Masters are rare, and Eldon LaSalle is one of them.”
“What’s an Enlightened Master do, Neal?”
“Enlightens, fool. He has been given the true Word.”
“Who gave him the true Word?”
“God. Who do you think?”
“How do you know it was God who gave him the true Word?”
“You have to be around him to find out. Once you meet him, you’ll know. You won’t even question it. And once you know, man, you’ll never be the same.”
That’s what I’m afraid of.
“And Johnny,” Steve said. “You say he has some appointment?”
“Anointing. He’s going to carry on after the Master is gone. It’s like Jesus and his apostles.”
“There were twelve of them, weren’t there?”
“Johnny don’t need nobody else.”
Neal put his finger on Steve’s chest. “You best remember that. You can’t stay the same. You stay the same and you die. You got to get in the fight. There’s good and evil and light and darkness, and if you don’t line up on the right side . . .” He didn’t finish the sentence, but made a fist.
Then he turned and walked back toward the shop. Steve wondered if he’d just been threatened. Or merely confronted by a guy who had pretty much given up his own personhood to a “prophet.”
It was now two thirty in the afternoon. Soon it would be time for a friendly visit with Eldon LaSalle.
Steve’s stomach did a few half gainers thinking about it.
Steve munched a six-inch turkey breast sub in the corner of a small Subway shop on Main Street. It didn’t go down without a fight. He didn’t feel much like eating, tried not to think about the strangeness of it all, but there wasn’t any way to avoid it. Prophecies about Steve Conroy, the deliverer? It sounded like something out of Ghostbusters. Maybe he’d tell Johnny he was the Key Master and be done with it.
What if his brother was certifiable? Lost in delusion? What then? Would it be better if he’d never heard from Johnny in the first place?
There was a mussed-up newspaper on an adjoining table. The Verner Herald. Steve gave it a quick look, trying to get more of a sense of the place. Small-town stuff. A book fair coming up at the local library. A man named Howard Lochner had landed a twenty-five pound rainbow trout in a local mountain lake. Almost a record, they said.
The door swung open and a bit of LA walked in. Two black kids wearing basketball jerseys. One was the purple and gold of the Lakers. The other was a New Jersey Net. Neither one was exactly Verner attire.
Steve watched them, but not as hard as the manager of the store, a short man with a comb-over who perspired from the forehead. He kept his eye on them as they took their time looking at the menu and cracking a joke only they were in on.
A funny kind of tourist, Steve thought.
He went back to the paper. Exciting stuff. Green Valley Elementary was starting in a week. The president of the PTA, Kitty Bates-Rooney, was looking forward to an “awesome year” because of “the most dedicated teachers in the county, who are already at work preparing for the kids.”
And then she mentioned how everyone was rallying behind Joyce Oderkirk at this “very difficult time.”
Joyce Oderkirk.
Steve pushed the last of his sandwich in his mouth and washed it down with now watery Pepsi. He asked the skinny kid at the cash register the way to Green Valley Elementary. He had to ask again because the kid kept taking glances at the two new customers.
But he finally gave Steve the information in a voice that cracked twice.
THIRTY-ONE
“My name’s Conroy. I wonder if I might speak with Joyce Oderkirk?”
The woman gave Steve a suspicious look. “Are you a reporter or something?”
“No.”
“What then?”
“I’m a lawyer.”
Wariness dug deeper into her eyes. “You know she’s suffered a terrible loss, don’t you?”
“I do. I knew her husband.”
“I’m sorry. It’s awful. Two little girls. I don’t know how Joyce does it, but she’s here and she’s — ” The woman stopped as if she’d just revealed a state secret.
“Please,” Steve said. “I think she’ll want to see me. If you could tell her I’m here.”
“What’s it about?”
“If you don’t mind, ma’am, that’s personal. But important.”
She shrugged, but her shoulders fought it. She told Steve to wait and went to an inner office. He looked at a framed picture of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., speaking at the famous Washington rally. The “I have a dream” speech. He wondered if Johnny LaSalle went to school here, if he looked at this same picture, if his elementary mind was molded more for racism by his father than inclusion by his teachers.
The woman returned and, tight-lipped, said, “She said she would see you. Room twelve.”
Steve found the room at the end of a row, near the chain-link fence typical of the penitentiary look favored by California elementary schools. Even in Verner. The blue door under a rusty 12 was open.
Poking his head in, Steve saw a woman sitting at an old-fashioned wooden desk on the other side of the room. “Mrs. Oderkirk?”
She looked up. “Yes. Come in.”
The room was done up in fourth- or fifth-grade style. Steve couldn’t really tell the difference. Pictures of all the presidents lined the wall like a ring of imperial heads. Except one was missing. Steve glanced at the vacant spot as he offered his hand to Joyce Oderkirk. She took it without standing up.
“One of your presidents is missing,” Steve said.
“Oh,” Joyce Oderkirk said. “Yes.”
“Let me guess,” Steve said. “I used to know them.” He took a step to the left and saw that it was the one after Millard Fillmore and before James Buchanan. “Oh man,” he said. “This is going to be tough.”
Joyce Oderkirk said nothing. She was about thirty, with black hair and light almond skin, maybe Mediterranean blood in her background. Pretty.
“I’ll guess Harrison,” Steve said.
Glumly, Joyce Oderkirk shook her head. “Pierce.”
“You lost Franklin Pierce?”
“Brenda said you were a friend of Larry’s.”
“Not a friend exactly.”
Joyce frowned. “She said you were in business together?”
“Let me explain,” Steve said. “I had called him to help me locate an autopsy record. When I came out here to see him, I found out he’d been killed.”
“That’s not what you told Brenda. I thought you were a friend — ”
“I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.”
“There was no misunderstanding.” She glared. “You purposely . . . who are you?”
“My name is Steve Conroy. I’m a lawyer. I’m — ”
She stood up. “I don’t want to talk to you.” She looked frightened, like Steve might be wearing a wire or carrying plutonium.
“I’m not here on a legal matter,” Steve said. “I just wanted to see how you were doing.”
“Why?”
How to explain the coincidence of her husband’s dying at the same time he was being retained by a brother with nefarious connections? How to phrase a remark that wouldn’t deepen her grief, but would prompt her to give him a word worth having?
He thought about leaving the poor woman alone. She didn’t need to think foul play was involved. Thought about it, then stayed.
“I just wanted to know, that’s all,” Steve said. “Larry seemed like a nice guy, and . . . well, that’s all.”
She paused, considered, then sat back down, folded her hands on the desk like one of her students might. “I’m sorry. It’s just been so hard.”
“I understand.”
“There wasn’t a better-liked man in this whole community.” She started to tear up, but fought the breakdown like someone who’d been doing nothing else for the last couple of weeks. “He was not reckless. I just can’t imagine he’d drive off the road like that, unless something caused it.”
“Maybe an oncoming car.”
She shook her head. “That was my first thought. I went to the exact spot it happened. I looked up and down that stretch of road and I didn’t see skid marks of any kind. I can’t imagine there wouldn’t have been some marks.”
“Could be something was in the road. A deer maybe.”
Mrs. Oderkirk actually smiled a little, looking at her hands. “It’s funny you should say that. There was one thing Larry always told me, something he said his father taught him. About animals in the road. He said you just have to hit them. You just have to, if you can’t stop, otherwise you could swerve and hit another car. And as much as we love animals, Larry said, we have to love people more.”
Now she was crying softly. “I never could follow his advice. Even if it was a little
squirrel.” She pulled open a drawer and withdrew a tissue, dabbed her eyes.
Steve gave her a moment. “Mrs. Oderkirk, you mentioned that Larry was well liked. I can see that, having just talked to him on the phone. He seemed that kind of person.”
“He was.”
“Can you think, though, of anyone who might have had something against him? He was a deputy sheriff, after all. Maybe somebody he arrested one time?”
“I suppose that’s possible. Anything’s possible.” She met his eyes directly. Hers were brown and dark. “You don’t suppose?”
“Can I ask, does the name Eldon LaSalle mean anything to you?”
Her wet eyes widened. “Of course it does. Not in a good way.”
“Why’s that?”
“He doesn’t exactly reflect well on the community.”
“Might Larry have had some dealings with him? Maybe a run-in with him or one of his followers?”
She shook her head. “He never mentioned anything like that. That crowd pretty much keeps to itself. Owen . . . Sheriff Mott, he seems to have found a way to keep things in order.”
“Where do these followers hang out?”
“I don’t know, I don’t think about them.”
“You haven’t heard anything?”
“Why are you asking me these questions?” she snapped. “What’s your business here?”
“I have a client who lives here.”
“Who?”
“I can’t really say.”
Cogs turned in her head. “Do you have something to do with the LaSalles?”
Steve said nothing.
“You’re trying to get information from me.” She got to her feet again. “Get out, please.”
“I assure you — ”
“I’ve said all I’m going to say.”
“Mrs. Oderkirk — ”
“Please leave.”
“Can I at least leave you my card?”
“No.”
Steve put one down on her desk anyway. “Thank you for your time,” he said, and walked out.
THIRTY-TWO
Sheriff Owen Mott was leaning on his cruiser just outside the school’s front gate.
“I guess you like it here,” he said. He still wore his pants tucked inside his boots. For some reason Steve found this comical, but he kept himself from laughing.
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