The Fraternity of the Stone

by David Morrell

  He saw three other pairs of headlights coming toward him. They slowed and stopped in a row behind the Oldsmobile. They too went dark. Three men got out of the cars. As Arlene left the Oldsmobile, Drew joined them on the gravel road.

  “The Lord be with you,” he said to the men.

  “And with your spirit,” they answered as one.

  “Deo gratias.” He studied the men. They were in their middle thirties. Their outdoor clothes were dark, their haircuts conservative, almost military, their eyes direct, disturbingly serene. “I appreciate your help. Father Stanislaw says you’ve had experience.”

  They nodded.

  “For what it’s worth, if everything goes as planned, if there aren’t any accidents, I don’t think your lives are in danger.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” one said. “Our lives don’t matter. The Church does.”

  The Oldsmobile’s passenger door came open. Father Stanislaw stepped from the car. “The equipment’s in the trunk.”

  Arlene had the key. When she opened it, a light went on. Drew blinked in surprise at automatic weapons, magazines filled with ammunition, grenades, even a miniature rocket launcher.

  “You’ve had this stuff in the trunk all the time?” Drew asked, astonished. “You could start a war.”

  “We are at war.” Father Stanislaw’s face was as pale as the sling supporting his arm.

  They reached inside the trunk, taking up assault rifles, inspecting and loading them. The light inside the trunk glinted off a large red ring on the middle finger of each left hand. The rings had the same insignia—an intersecting sword and cross.

  The fraternity of the stone.

  Drew felt a chill.

  “What do you want us to do?” the first man asked, holding the barrel of his weapon toward the dark sky.

  Hiding his increasing astonishment, Drew matched their professional tone. “Adjust the carburetor on each car.” He turned to Father Stanislaw. “How far is the estate?”

  “A mile down the road.”

  “Good enough. The timing shouldn’t be a problem.”

  He finished explaining. They thought about it.

  “Could be,” one said. “As long as he does what you expect.”

  “I know him. Besides, does he have a choice?” Drew asked.

  “If you’re wrong…”

  “Yes?”

  “Nothing. Our part’s easy. You’re the one taking the risk.”

  20

  The van approached the estate’s closed metal gate. Two armed sentries stood beyond it, one on each side, but when the headlights came close enough for the guards to recognize the van, they snapped into motion and opened the gate. “Bring the body back here. I want to make sure it’s disposed of,” Uncle Ray had told his man on the phone. As Drew had anticipated, these sentries were under orders to expect the retrieval team and to let the van through at once. Not stopping, the driver waved in thanks and drove quickly through the opening in the wall, proceeding down a blacktop lane past shadowy trees and bushes toward the large three-story Tudor house in the distance.

  The carburetor on the van had been adjusted, its idling mechanism turned up so high that the engine would race even if the accelerator weren’t pressed. Because the van had an automatic transmission, a driver could leave the gear shift in drive, leap out of the van, and know that the van would follow the direction in which it had been aimed: in this case, down the lane toward the mansion.

  As the driver, clutching a weapon, tumbled smoothly onto the lawn and disappeared into the dark, the van continued surging forward. It bumped up onto a sidewalk and jolted to a stop halfway up the mansion’s front steps. The driver had lit a fuse before leaping out, a fuse that blazed back to dynamite above the van’s gas tank. Now the vehicle abruptly, stunningly, exploded. Its massive roaring fireball, chunks of metal flying, ripped apart the mansion’s entrance.

  The guards at the gate had not yet fully closed it. Spinning, startled, toward the deafening roar, they raised their weapons, rushing toward the blaze in front of the house. At that moment, three other vehicles, their headlights extinguished, crashed through the partly closed gate. Each of these vehicles too had an automatic transmission, each carburetor adjusted to give the engines maximum idle, so that when these drivers also lit fuses and leaped from their vehicles, the cars continued on course, one to the left and two to the right of the blazing van on the steps of the mansion.

  In rapid sequence, the vehicles struck the building’s facade, erupting in a fiery wallop. Windows shattered. Flames roared up the front of the building.

  As the drivers scurried back to shadowy cover, they fired their automatic weapons, strafing the blaze that obscured the house. They riddled parked cars, rupturing tires, shattering the grilles of a Rolls-Royce and a Mercedes. Tracer bullets made gas tanks explode. Burning gasoline spewed across the pavement. The assailants threw grenades at the guards who raced down the lane from the gate. The guards flew backward, landing motionless on the road. More grenades followed, this time aimed at the mansion.

  Arlene, who’d leaped from one of the vehicles, used a portable rocket launcher. The model, an RPG-7, was a favorite of terrorists because it was only slightly longer than a yardstick; and because it weighed only fifteen pounds, she could carry it easily when she leaped from her moving vehicle. Its projectiles were 3.3 inches wide, capable of piercing 12-inch-thick metal armor. One by one, they blasted impressively into the mansion, blowing out one entire corner.

  Now guards raced from the building, some of them screaming in horror, flailing at their fiery clothes. The reflection of the blaze off night clouds could be seen, it was later reported, fifteen miles away. The powerful blasts rattled windows in the nearby town. The entire front of the mansion began to sag. Defensive automatic weapons rattled from adjacent buildings to which the guards had raced. Throughout, the attackers kept shifting their position, firing, reloading, shooting, throwing grenades, making the assault force seem huge, gradually pulling back.

  Two minutes had passed.

  21

  Drew wasn’t with them. On foot, he stalked toward the estate through the dark, along the rocky shore of the Bay. Two days ago, Father Stanislaw had studied the perimeter of the grounds, noting the small yacht moored at a dock. As soon as the fireballs erupted from the house at the top of the slope, the three guards who patrolled the beach swung toward the startling brilliance and charged up the wooden steps toward the rattle of gunfire. His dark clothes indistinct against the black water, Drew raced along the rocks of the shore. He rushed down the dock and onto the boat.

  There he hunched below deck. Thirty seconds later, he saw figures scurry down the wooden steps from the house. Waves lapped the hull of the yacht. It tilted slightly starboard, then port.

  Though he hadn’t seen Uncle Ray for six years, he recognized the elegant, well-dressed silhouette hurrying down the steps. He also recognized the silhouette of a second man, distinctive because he wore a cowboy hat. And that man Drew hadn’t seen since 1968. My, my, Drew thought. You must be in your sixties, Hank Dalton. I’ve got to give you credit. You ought to be retired by now. But I guess it’s in your blood. You can’t give up the game.

  Ray and Hank reached the beach before the others. They paused on the dock. “All right,” Ray told the guards who’d come with him, sounding as smooth as ever. “You know where to go. Use the dark and disappear. Don’t try to fight them. They’ve won. But our turn will come. Just remember, I appreciate your loyalty. Good luck to each of you.”

  The guards spun toward the automatic gunfire at the burning mansion on the hill. They hesitated only a moment before they separated, disappearing into the dark. Ray and Hank rushed down the dock, their footsteps rumbling hollowly, and hurriedly cast off the mooring lines, climbing onto the yacht. Behind them, on the bluff, another explosion shook the night. Ray darted forward to start the engines. The stern sank slightly as the screws gained traction. Then the yacht evened out, gaining speed, cutting through wav
es, roaring toward the dark of the Bay.

  Standing at the rear of the yacht, surveying the battle zone, Hank braced his hands on his hips, his cowboy hat profiled against the rising flames on the hill. “Shitfire. Who’d have figured?” he muttered. “I taught him too good.”

  In all the years since ’68, Drew had thought of Hank as eternal. This sudden realization of how students could one day outmatch their teachers was shocking. Is that what it means to get old? There’s always someone better coming along, because that person is younger?

  And it felt so easy. All Drew did was creep forward from the below-deck hatch and nudge Hank. That’s all. Nudge him. A gentle tap on Hank’s shoulder, and Drew discovered that his former master…

  (In those days, I thought you were God. I went to sleep in fear of you. I trembled when you spoke.)

  …was only human. Hank tumbled gracefully into the Bay. His cowboy hat floated. Splashing, coughing, he came up.

  “I never asked you, Hank! Can you swim?”

  “You son of a bitch!” Hank sputtered.

  At the wheel, Ray spun in alarm. Drew pointed the Mauser at him. “Be very careful, Uncle. Keep your hands on that wheel. I wouldn’t want to have to kill you. We still need to talk.”

  In the churning water, Hank kept sputtering, yelling obscenities.

  “That’s the stuff, Hank. Keep up your spirits. You’re close enough to shore—you can make it. Remember what you taught us? Get a fire going—find dry clothes. You don’t want to die from hypothermia!”

  As Hank’s wave-tossed body receded in the distance, Drew—his Mauser steady—never took his eyes from Ray.

  “That’s right, Uncle, keep your hands where they are. On that wheel. Because, believe me, I’m out of patience. For a moment there, I almost hoped you’d give me an excuse to shoot. But you didn’t. So. What I think—” Drew stalked angrily forward “—is, now we talk.”

  At the house on top of the bluff, one last explosion shook the night, its flames reflecting eerily off the clouds. The rattle of automatic weapons dwindled as the yacht continued into the dark of the bay. A few seconds later, the rumble of the engine obscured the shots completely. But the shots would soon be stopping anyhow, Drew thought. Arlene and the three men would be pulling back. They’d forced Ray out of the house, and now they’d have to disappear before the police arrived.

  Ray glanced from Drew toward the burning mansion on the bluff, its aura receding into the distance. Night enveloped the yacht.

  Drew reached inside his coat and pulled out a packet of C-4 explosive, holding its Play-Doh shape in front of the control panel’s lights so Ray could see it. “I assume you recognize my incentive for conversation.”

  Ray’s pupils widened.

  Drew set the plastique on top of the control panel, removed a timer and detonator from his coat, and attached them to the explosive. He twisted the crank on the timer. Eight minutes. It began to tick.

  “So,” Drew said, “that ought to give us plenty of time for a chat. If not…” He shrugged.

  “You’d be blowing yourself up, too.”

  “At the moment, as tired as I am, as sick of running—” Drew exhaled “—I don’t really care.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  Drew studied Ray—tall and slender, with a lean, handsome face and deep blue eyes that glinted from the control lights. He’d be in his late fifties now, but he looked fit and youthful. His short, sandy hair had hints of silver through it, but these only made him seem more distinguished. Beneath his open topcoat, he wore an impeccably tailored gray suit, an immaculate white shirt, a striped club tie. His shoes were custom-made, Italian. His topcoat, Drew realized with anger, was brown camel’s hair, the same type of coat that Ray had worn the Saturday morning in October in 1960 when he had come to the playground in Boston where Drew had mourned for his parents, for his ruined life.

  Now it was October again. Boston again.

  Drew’s jaw muscles hardened.

  “Oh, I believe you’d kill me,” Ray said. “What you did to my house—or what your friends did to my house—is thoroughly convincing. You’d shoot me, yes. But blow us both up? Take your life with mine?”

  Drew’s voice was thick. “You still don’t understand.” The timer kept ticking. Drew glanced at it. Less than seven minutes. “You need to ask yourself why I would want to live. Give me a reason.”

  Ray frowned, unsettled. “Well, that’s obvious. Everybody wants to live.”

  “For what? Why do you think I entered that monastery? From the time I was ten, I hated my life. The last happy moment I knew was the second before I saw my parents blown to pieces. Everything after that was desperation.”

  “But you got even for what happened to them. I helped you get revenge!”

  “It sure as Hell didn’t bring me peace. There was always another terrorist to kill, another fanatic to punish. But others showed up to take their place. There’d never be an end. And what did I accomplish?”

  Ray looked baffled. The timer kept clicking. He swallowed.

  “I thought I was right to get even for my parents. The terrorists think they’re right to attack governments they feel are corrupt. How many rights can there be, Ray? In the name of what I thought was right, I did the same thing I condemned them for. I murdered innocent people. I became the enemy I was hunting.”

  “The timer,” Ray said.

  “We’ll come to that. Relax. For now, I want to explain about the monastery. I’m sure you’re anxious to know about it. As soon as I realized what I’d become, I wanted to leave the world and its horrors, to let the madness go on without me. Let the world blow itself to Hell for all I cared. The monastery gave me refuge. But you destroyed it. You forced me back to the horrors. And for that, I can’t forgive you.”

  Six minutes.

  “What I am, Ray, is a sinner. But you’re a sinner, too. You made me what I am.”

  “Now just a second. Nobody forced you. You wanted my help!”

  “You manipulated me into joining Scalpel. You know what I think? Sometimes, in the blackest part of my mind, I think it was you who ordered the death of my parents.”

  “I loved your parents!”

  “So you say. But isn’t it interesting how many different motives there might have been for killing them? A fanatical Japanese might have decided to blow up my parents in revenge for the atomic bombs we dropped on Japan, as a way of showing us how much we weren’t wanted there. Or the Soviets might have killed my parents to increase the tension between Japan and America, to jeopardize the new defense treaty and keep America away from Southeast Asia. Or maybe someone like you had the bright idea to blow up my parents and blame it on the Japanese, as a way of shaming the Japanese into stopping their demonstrations.”

  “That isn’t true! I never—!”

  “Someone, for one of those twisted motives, did! Maybe it wasn’t you. But you were ready enough to have me kill that boy and his parents in France. To me, you’re no different than the self-righteous bastard who did kill my parents. If I’m a sinner, you’re a sinner. And I think it’s time we atoned for our sins, don’t you?”

  Ray stared again at the timer. Less than five minutes now.

  “Drew. For Christ’s sake…”

  “Yes, that’s right. Now you’re getting it. For Christ’s sake.”

  Suddenly exhausted, he felt himself tremble. The yacht rumbled farther into the blackness of the Bay. Behind, the blaze of the house had diminished to a glow.

  “You don’t think I’d blow myself up with you?” Drew asked. “The way I feel right now, I can’t think of a reason not to.”

  “No.” Ray’s eyes flickered with sudden hope. “You can’t. You don’t dare. It’s suicide. You’d automatically damn your soul to Hell.”

  “Of course. But I deserve to go to Hell. Certainly you do. Because of the hit on the monastery. Because of Janus and the attacks on the Church.”

  “But wait a minute, Drew. There isn’t really a Hell. What
are you talking about?”

  Drew’s exhaustion intensified. He could hardly listen.

  “There’s no God, Drew. You’ve got your mind confused by superstition. Shut off that timer. Please. Let’s talk.”

  “We are talking. No God? No Hell? Do you feel like gambling, Ray? What do you say we find out?”

  “No!”

  “That’s too bad. Because I’m in a gambling mood. I have to be honest, though. You’re right. I don’t intend to commit suicide.”

  “Then you’ll shut off the timer?”

  “No. I’ve got something else in mind. A test. Just before the yacht explodes, you and I are going over the side.”

  “We’re miles from shore! That water’s freezing! We’d never be able to swim to—”

  “Maybe. That’s what I mean by gambling. There was a time, back in the Middle Ages, when they tested to see if someone was a sinner by throwing that person into freezing water and forcing him to stay there for hours. He passed the test if God allowed him to live. What I’m thinking is, if we die in the water, God wasn’t happy with us. But it wouldn’t be suicide. Because God’s in control now. If He allows us to survive, if He lets us make our way to shore, it’ll be a sign that He isn’t angry. He’ll be giving us the chance to save our souls.”

  Ray trembled. “You’ve gone crazy.” He stared at the cold, dark water. At the timer. Almost three minutes. “What do you want to know? Just turn off the—!”

  Aiming the Mauser, Drew shook his head. “It depends on what you’ve got to say. I’ll even be generous and help you get started. Scalpel, Ray. In 1980, because you’d exceeded your authority, because the program was dangerously out of control, you were forced to resign from the government. Scalpel was disbanded. So you founded the Risk Analysis Corporation.”

  “How did you learn—?” Ray stared at the timer. “All right, yes, a private intelligence service.”