Pilate's Cross

by J Alexander Greenwood

  She whirled around and looked at Pilate, standing before her in his bare feet. “John? What is it? Did Samantha propose or something?” She smiled.

  “Not exactly. Scovill’s on the phone, Kate. He says, uh…”

  “What is it, John? Spit it out,” she said, looking stricken as she noticed the grim, worried expression on his face.

  “He says something happened at Grif’s.”

  In an instant, her expression changed from stricken to terrified, and she was speechless, letting the ice scraper fall to the ground as she mindlessly released it from her gloved grasp.

  “Come inside, Kate. He’s on the phone,” Pilate said.

  “No time,” she said, and then she jerked open her car door. “Tell him I’m on my way,” she said.

  Pilate grabbed her arm and the car door. “No, Kate. You can’t go until you talk to Scovill. Besides, I’m coming with you.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Pilate hastily pulled on his hiking boots, coat, and scarf as he watched Kate talk to Scovill on the phone.

  “Is she all right? Well, what happened to Grif?” she said. “How? How bad?”

  She hung up, and they hurried back to the idling car. “I’ll drive,” he said.

  She didn’t argue.

  As they wheeled onto the state road leading to Goss City, Pilate glanced at Kate. “What happened, Kate?” he asked.

  “Grif’s been beaten half to death,” she said. “Scovill said County Memorial called Grif about eight saying they had an intake. Grif said that would be fine and he was ready. They brought the intake over around nine thirty and couldn’t get an answer at the door or the phone of the mortuary. They tried the house and found Kara there asleep in front of the TV,” Kate said, her voice shaking. “The driver asked Kara where her grandpa was, and she told them he went to the mortuary to take care of business. She knows the drill about Grif’s business. Anyway, then she fell asleep until the driver knocked. The driver didn’t want to alarm her, so he made her some chocolate milk and then called Scovill,” she said. “John, please drive faster if you can.”

  “You got it.” Pilate pressed the accelerator and passed a pickup. “What happened when Scovill got there?”

  “He has a key, which is pretty normal, since the mortuary often doubles as a coroner’s office in a little place like this. Scovill told the driver to stay with Kara. He went in and found Grif in the embalming room. He was…they beat him to a pulp. God. Poor Grif.”

  “Shit,” Pilate said, pressing harder on the accelerator. “Is he…okay?”

  “The driver took him back to County in the hearse,” she said.

  “Nice,” Simon said in Pilate’s head.

  “He’s in the emergency room,” she said.

  “Let’s get Kara first,” Pilate said.

  When they rolled up on the mortuary, the lights from Sheriff Scovill’s truck and a state trooper cruiser flashed brilliantly against the trees, house, and building. The few dejected stalks of a harvested cornfield behind the house played lonely witnesses in the moonlight.

  Kate leapt out of the car almost before he had it in park and ran into the house.

  Inside, Kara sat on the couch, talking with the state trooper as they shared a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  Kate swept her little girl up into her arms. “Are you okay, honey?”

  Kara nodded. “The policeman and I are having a PB and J while we wait for Grandpa,” she said.

  “Thank you, Officer,” Kate said. “Honey, I think we will probably need to see Grandpa later, because…” She looked at the trooper.

  “Because he’s working late—you know, Kara, like we talked about before,” he said. “The sheriff and I are just watching things while he’s working.”

  She nodded and yawned. “Mommy, I’m tired.”

  “Let’s go home, sweetie.” Kate picked her up. “Thanks again, Officer. Uh, while I’m gathering Kara’s things, would you mind telling my friend…uh, how late Kara’s grandpa will be working?” She nodded her head at Pilate.

  “Sure, ma’am.”

  When Kate and Kara were out of earshot, the trooper spoke. “Mr. Nathaniel took quite a beating in there,” he said. “Sheriff Scovill found him on the floor of the embalming room. His face is a bloody mess, but we’re sure he’ll pull through.”

  “Any idea who did it? Or why?”

  “Don’t look like they took anything, though they rifled through the desk in his office,” the trooper said. He was in his twenties, wearing a crew cut and a nametag that read “Hulsey.” He flipped open a small, pocket-sized notebook. “The safe was open, and there was cash left in it. But again, nothing seemed to be missing.”

  “This kind of thing happen a lot around here?”

  “Hell no,” Hulsey snorted. “Scovill sounded pretty spooked when he called me on the radio.”

  “So you think Grif’s okay?”

  “Well, I meant to say he’s stable, but long term, I couldn’t say. He was semiconscious when Scovill got to him. I don’t know what he said.”

  Kate walked back in with Kara’s book bag flung over her shoulder and Kara hugging her neck. “John, we need to get Kara home,” she said, the ease and comfort of their earlier lovemaking obliterated from her face. “Or do we need to go somewhere else?” she said, meaning the hospital.

  “No. Everything is okay on that end,” he said. Kate looked relieved. “Good.”

  Heavy boots stamped on the front porch. The door opened after a couple of quick, cursory knocks, revealing Sheriff Scovill. He nodded to everyone. “Kate, he’s fine. Go on home. We can talk about this tomorrow morning. I know you want to get Kara to bed,” he said.

  Kate nodded and walked past him to the door. She turned and looked at Scovill and Hulsey. “Thank you so much,” she said.

  “Trooper Hulsey is gonna follow you home, Kate.”

  Hulsey nodded and dutifully put on his hat and zipped his coat.

  “Mr. Pilate, I could use your help, if you don’t mind hanging back.”

  Pilate and Kate looked at Scovill, then back at each other. “It’s okay, ma’am. I just need to ask him some questions.”

  “Morgan, John was…with me,” Kate whispered, trying not to wake Kara.

  Scovill looked at the floor. “I know, Kate, but I need to talk to him. I’ll make sure he gets back to Cross okay.”

  Pilate smiled. “Go on home, Kate. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

  Kate looked at Pilate, smiled weakly, and carried Kara to her car, Hulsey in tow.

  Scovill glanced at Pilate, then out the window. “She’s a special lady, Mr. Pilate.”

  “Yes, she is.”

  “She’s had to take a lot of shit from people, what with her being so pretty.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What people?”

  “Several. Lindstrom put the moves on her a while back.”

  “I see.” Pilate’s fists balled at his side. Yet another reason why Lindstrom doesn’t like me, he thought.

  “She handled him okay,” Scovill said. “That girl shot him down in flames, just like the arrogant jackass deserved. It was funny as hell, if ya ask me.”

  “Good.”

  Scovill moved his head to the right at an odd angle, enough to make his neck pop. “Come on over to the mortuary and see what they did,” he said.

  “Sheriff…” Pilate said. “Yup?”

  “Isn’t this a bit, uh…irregular? I mean, you’re asking a civilian you hardly know to be a party to not one, but two crime scenes.”

  “Yes, it is irregular, but it ain’t illegal or immoral, is it?” “I suppose not.”

  “I’m a lawman, and I know not. Now come on.”

  Pilate wordlessly followed Scovill into the mortuary. They went through the lobby to Grif’s office, which had clearly been ransacked.

  “Man,” Pilate said.

  “It only gets better,” Scovill said. “Come downstairs.”

  Scovill led Pi
late to the door marked “Private.” It opened into a room with filing cabinets, a small elevator just large enough for a gurney, and a door marked “Authorized Personnel Only.” Scovill opened the door and went down some creaky wooden stairs that had been painted a sickly shade of green.

  The odor of a cocktail of chemicals assaulted Pilate’s nostrils. The room was poorly lit; the overhead lighting had apparently been smashed in the brawl earlier. Moonlight flooded in through three small basement windows lining the back wall.

  Leaning against a piece of equipment that looked like something that would be used to remove bodily fluids, Scovill glanced at the arterial diagram pinned to the wall. He gestured at three prep tables. Two had bodies covered in white sheets, and the other was enclosed in a body bag; that bag presumably held the body of the night’s new intake, a corpse from the nursing home whose arrival may have saved Grif Nathaniel’s life.

  “These are Mr. and Mrs. Nathaniel, whom I believe you have already met.” Scovill walked away from the bodies toward a small desk. There were blood spatters all around it and on it, and crimson splotches on the paperwork that sat on its surface. “Looks like they beat hell out of Grif over here,” Scovill said.

  “They?”

  “Well, well…a regular Jim Rockford, ain’t ya?” Scovill said. “Yeah, I think it had to be at least a couple of guys. Grif didn’t have any marks on his knuckles, so I’m sure somebody held him while the other one punched him. He couldn’t fight back.”

  “Crap,” Pilate said. “Why do you suppose they did it?” “Robbery.” Scovill said, monotone.

  “Oh come on,” Pilate said.

  “You’re right. Not robbery,” Scovill said, bending over and using his ink pen to look under papers on the desk.

  Pilate surveyed the room. “This has to have something to do with the crypt break in.”

  Scovill stood up straight, facing Pilate. “To think, you only have a master’s degree in English lit. You’d be a hell of a criminologist.”

  “Thanks.”

  Scovill walked over to a closet door behind the desk and checked the knob; it was locked. He moved around the room, looking at shelves of embalming chemicals, mortician’s wax, and other accoutrements of the trade.

  “Mr. Pilate, if you were to wonder what the hell was going on—which I am sure you are—what would you think about all this?” He continued his orbit around the room, peering at the cold crematorium door.

  Pilate cleared his throat. “Well, I’d have to think Grif Nathaniel is mixed up with some bad people.”

  “Now you’re just irritating me,” Scovill said. “Come on, college man. Spill it. What do you really think?”

  “I think somebody must want something really bad— something they think Grif has. They want it bad enough to desecrate a grave, tear up a mortuary, and try to beat it out of him. I just wonder who that could be and what it is that they want.”

  “If you were to think about who those people might be, who would you suspect?”

  “Who has the most to gain or lose from a secret Grif might be keeping?”

  “Now you’re getting somewhere,” Scovill said. “The question is, did these people get what they were after?”

  “Only Grif can answer that,” Pilate said, folding his arms across his chest.

  “True. Come on.” Scovill hurried up the stairs and exited out the back door of the mortuary. Pilate followed him into the cold.

  “What are you doing?’

  Scovill surveyed the cornfield. “The hearse driver didn’t pass anybody on the road when he came out here. I think our culprits walked here and back.”

  Pilate looked at the desolate field. “Through the cornfield?”

  “Well, the road is the only way in for a vehicle.” He pointed at the road and the lights of Goss City to the south.

  “Going north, that road leads to Vetsville, about forty miles away. Goss City is a mile and a half the other direction. There’re a couple creeks and several cattle fences that would make it tough to go that way unless they stuck to the highway, but it’d be nearly impossible to go that way unseen. That leaves the cornfield, about a two-mile hike to Cross as the crow flies.”

  “To Cross,” Pilate repeated. “Can you see any tracks with your flashlight?”

  “Nope. Too dark out here,” he said, zipping his coat up closer to his neck against the cold. “I can look tomorrow.”

  “Okay,” Pilate said. “Should we go talk to Grif?”

  “Already did,” Scovill said, looking back at the house.

  “I thought he was incoherent,” Pilate said.

  “In a way, I almost wish he were,” he said. “What?”

  Scovill turned around toward the door. “Come on. Let’s get back inside.”

  The pair trudged back in.

  Scovill unzipped his coat and sat down with a heavy sigh in the lobby, right under the painting of Martin Nathaniel.

  “Mind if I smoke?” Pilate said, sitting opposite him and lighting up even before he had permission.

  Scovill shrugged. “Mr. Pilate, there’s a reason I asked you to stay. It’s because of what Grif told me when I got here.”

  “Well, I thought it was odd of you, to say the least,” he said, exhaling.

  “When I found Grif, all he could get out was something about, ‘They’re going to kill Kate and Kara if they don’t get it’ or something like that, and then he passed out,” he said.

  “Jesus,” Pilate said. “Who are these people?”

  Scovill shook his head and took off his cap, sliding two fingers around the inside rim, his hand shaking.

  Pilate pretended not to notice. “Well, Grif will have to tell us when he comes to,” Pilate said.

  “I get the strong impression that these people might also kill Kate and Kara if Grif I.D.s them,” Scovill said.

  Pilate stood up. “We need to go to Kate’s…right now.” Scovill made a be-seated gesture with his shaky hand.

  “Trooper Hulsey is waiting there until Lenny can come over and watch them.”

  Pilate sat.

  “Besides,” Scovill added, “they won’t mess with Kate and Kara either way. If they do, Grif most certainly won’t cooperate.”

  “You’re putting a lot of faith in these assholes, Sheriff,” Pilate said.

  “No, just logic,” he said.

  “Thanks, Spock, but I think you’re forgetting that desperate people do desperate things. They seem to lack common sense and logic, don’t you think?” Pilate said. He felt his face and ears reddening in anger.

  “Calm down, Mr. Pilate. We have to keep our heads on straight,” he said. “Tomorrow I’m going over to the hospital to talk to Grif. I will explain that he needs to let me in on some things.”

  “How much of this does Kate know?” “Not much yet, but I’ll tell her,” he said.

  “Let me,” Pilate said. “I think I can talk her out of doing anything crazy.”

  “Kate isn’t the type to go off the deep end, Pilate,” Scovill said. “Just tell her what’s happening and what we plan to do. Also, tell her also to leave this to us.”

  “Who’s behind this?”

  Scovill’s eyes betrayed a flicker of thought. “I have an idea,” he said.

  “It’s that goddamned land deal, isn’t it?”

  “Ah. You been talking to our local conspiracy buff, Derek Krall, huh?”

  “So?”

  “Well, I think the deal may have something to do with it, but I can’t be sure until I talk to Grif,” he said.

  Pilate puffed on the cigarette a moment. “What now?”

  “Well, I’m gonna lock up this here mortuary, run some crime scene tape around the front door, then take you to Kate’s.”

  “Okay, but you have to keep me in the loop,” Pilate said. “That appears to be the plan,” Scovill said.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Scovill dropped Pilate off at Kate’s house in Cross. Deputy Lenny sat in his truck outside, the motor running. Pilate knocked o
n the door and was let in by Kate. She wore a heavy terrycloth bathrobe, and her hand rested on what looked to be a handgun in the robe pocket.

  He hugged her tightly. She gestured for him to take a seat next to a corn-burning stove. The room was cozy; the faint aroma of roasted corn was a welcome change from the sickening smells of the embalming room.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “Kara’s asleep in my room. Coffee?”

  “No. It’ll just make me want to smoke,” he said, shaking his head.

  “Go ahead. It’ll add some variety to the popcorn smell,” she said, rising to fetch the coffee. “Tell me what you know.”

  Pilate explained what he and Scovill had seen and what they thought.

  “So we’re in danger?” she said, her breath choppy.

  “We really don’t think so. They went after Grif because he has something they want. If they hurt you guys, they’ll never get it. That’s Scovill’s thinking anyway.”

  Kate rolled her eyes. “I can’t say I am terribly comforted by that,” she said.

  “Kate, Lenny and I are here. You’re going to be fine,” he said, sitting beside her. “We won’t let anything happen to you or Kara.”

  She nodded, her eyes tearing.

  He put his hand on her knee. “Kate, can you think of anything Grif might know that would make someone want to hurt him to get him to talk?”

  “No. He’s the sweetest man,” she said. “He’s suffered so much loss and pain in his life.”

  “I know,” Pilate said, “but let’s think here. What would make someone break into his parents’ crypt looking for something and then beat him up? What does he have? What does he know?”

  She shook her head. “I have no idea.”

  Pilate didn’t want to agitate her. He leaned back on the couch, exhaling noisily. “Scovill’s going to talk to Grif tomorrow.”

  “I’m going over in the morning,” she said. “Can I go?”

  “You better,” she said.