Boy Crucified

by Jerome Wilde

  She fell silent, flicked her cigarette out the window.

  “It just gets to me,” she said. “People in positions of authority and trust, like priests and bishops. How can they do this? How do they get away with it? What’s going on in their minds? I just don’t get it. How could you be so stupid as to think you won’t eventually get caught? And how do these parents feel, sending their kids to a Catholic school thinking they’re getting a good education and they’re going to be safe, and then their kids are pulled out of basketball practice so they can be raped and given a mindfuck too?”

  She tried to get hold of herself. “You must think I’m quite unprofessional. Maybe I’m just tired of this.”

  “It’s easy to get tired of it,” I said.

  “Yes. I didn’t start putting it together until yesterday, when Frankie’s name and picture were on the news. I was planning to see you first thing this morning, since you didn’t call me back, but then Eli Smalley came up dead.”

  “What else did Eli tell you?” I asked.

  “Well, he said this sort of stuff happened lots of times, at least once a week. Brother Leo came and got him and told him the bishop needed to ‘see’ him. He was instructed to tell anyone who asked that he was helping the bishop type up a book manuscript, since he was good at typing. I asked him if he knew of anyone else who might be going up to ‘see’ the bishop, and he said he did, but he wouldn’t give me their names. He didn’t want them to get in trouble. He said the bishop kept pressuring him to enter religious life and become a brother, but he didn’t want to. He said the bishop was getting angry, because he had been asking him to do it for months and Eli kept refusing. The bishop told him he had a vocation to the religious life and couldn’t deny what Our Lord wanted, or some bullshit like that. The boy didn’t want to be a brother and was afraid he was going to be forced to join the monastery. I think that’s why he talked to me, because he was hoping maybe I could help him, maybe if the bishop got in trouble, he wouldn’t have to join the monastery or something like that.”

  “So he was abused on several occasions?”

  “Once a week, that’s what he said. At least once a week. And not just by the bishop either. Brother Leo also participated, from time to time. He also said that sometimes another boy was brought up to the room, and they were forced to do things while the bishop watched. Sometimes they took pictures or made videos of the boys. He said he was so ashamed of himself, he didn’t dare tell his mom and dad. He didn’t want them to know what he’d been doing. I tried to explain to him that he wasn’t at fault, but he wouldn’t listen to me. He said the only thing he could do was go to confession, but how could he go to confession and tell the priest what he was doing and who he was doing it with? That’s when Bishop James started hearing his confession.”

  “Bishop James?”

  She nodded, making a face.

  “That’s what I told you,” she said, lighting up another cigarette, “about as Catholic as a whorehouse.”

  “What else have you heard?”

  “I’m just getting started, Lieutenant. Chillicothe is a small place, and we don’t have a lot of funds for this kind of stuff, and I’m getting pressure from all sorts of places. Nobody wants another Waco, not in this neck of the woods. With these religious groups, we have to go slow, and we’ve got to be very careful. Like this crucifixion thing. I’m sure you’ve heard about it. If they do it voluntarily, I can’t do a thing. If you’re an adult and you want to be crucified, well, that’s not against the law, as long as it’s understood that you’re not going to die from it. You can do any kind of penance you want. Just because some group has weird religious practices, that don’t mean we can interfere. And if they’ve stepped over the line, then we have to give them the benefit of the doubt, issue a warning, and just hope it doesn’t happen again.”

  “The brother who gave you these names,” I said to her, “the one in charge of the boarders—you’re sure he was Brother Boniface?”

  She looked through her notes, nodded. “Yes. Brother Boniface. My impression was that he was a pretty nice guy.”

  “He’s the main suspect in these killings,” I said.

  “I find that a bit surprising,” she replied. “He didn’t strike me as the murdering kind.”

  “They never do,” I said.

  “I know that too. Even so, he seemed like a genuinely kind sort of man. When I heard he was a suspect, I was surprised. Now don’t get me wrong. I’ve investigated a lot of cases, especially parents, and they can smile at you and seem so sweet and so nice and so caring, but there’s something about the guilty ones. You can see it in their eyes. It doesn’t matter what kind of act they put on, the eyes just don’t lie. Even if they swear they’re innocent on a stack of Bibles, if I see that look, I know they’re not, and I’ve never been wrong yet. Anyway, I didn’t see that look in this guy’s eyes. I had the feeling he really cared about these kids, but he wasn’t in the position to be telling me what he knew. He certainly didn’t strike me as a killer.”

  Trouble was, they never did.

  “Does ‘11-10’ mean anything to you?” I asked.

  “Eleven ten?”

  “The numbers. 11. Hyphen. 10. They were carved onto Eli’s chest.”

  “Why would they do that?”

  I thought about the statue of St. Francis that had been found at the feet of Frankie Peters. Was there a connection? Was it another clue? Did the numbers stand for a date?

  “And what about Charlie Hopewell?” I asked.

  “Charlie? He was rather puzzling,” she said.

  “In what way?” I asked.

  “I could tell he knew just what I was talking about, but he was not going to play ball. Not at all. Said there wasn’t anything going on and if anyone said otherwise, they were liars. A lot of huffing and puffing, that kid—you know how they are when they’re trying to get you to believe something and you know it’s a big fat lie. He was cute, too, like the other boys—he has blond hair, one of those types. I’m sure the girls love him to death. But he was not about to tell me anything. His body language, though, that was saying something else entirely.”

  “And what about the other kids?” I asked. “You interviewed all of them?”

  “Not hardly,” she said. “You know how many kids are up there? I’ve interviewed about a dozen. Those folks are not what you could call cooperative. They keep putting me off, changing interview times, telling me the kids are not available, blah blah blah. Probably take me the better part of a month or two to interview all those kids. But obviously there’s something going on there. That’s pretty obvious. There’s a reason why Alan Dobsen hanged himself in the choir loft. But this is a religious institution, and they have the right to educate their kids the way they want, so… you know how that is.”

  Indeed I did.

  IV

  “TIME to follow up some leads,” I said to Daniel as we parked in front of the main building at St. Konrad’s. After looking at the sign-out sheets for the monastery’s vans, I had some questions, and planned to start there.

  Daniel said nothing as we skirted the monastery and went out back. He was an incessant note-taker, and, as we walked, he skimmed through his small pad, mumbling to himself.

  In addition to the main building, which housed the monastery and school, there was a separate gym and pool, a mechanic’s shop, a print house, a farm with various farm buildings, and storage sheds all clustered around the grounds, in addition to a cemetery, a football field, a baseball diamond, and more.

  Brother Eustace, the monastery mechanic, looked like his counterparts in the real world: covered with grease; thick forearms gave way to strong hands. His face was rough-looking, and as he watched Daniel and me approach the mechanic’s shop, he did not smile.

  “Brother Eustace?”

  He nodded. He had the front of a van open, working on something or other. Engines were a complete mystery to me.

  “Mind if I ask a few questions?”

&nb
sp; He shrugged, not answering.

  “On Friday, Brother Francis apparently signed out a van and talked to you about its condition, intending to go to Kansas City. Is that right?”

  “You can look at the sign-out sheet.” He nodded his head in the direction of the worktable. There was a clipboard there with sign-out papers on it.

  “But Brother Boniface took the van instead?”

  “Wouldn’t know.”

  “But you’re sure that Brother Francis signed the van out?”

  “You can look at the sign-out sheet,” he said again.

  “I’m asking a direct question, and I’d like a direct answer, either ‘yes’ or ‘no’.”

  He made a face. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “Thank you. Do you mind if I look at the sign-out sheet?”

  He shrugged.

  I walked over to the worktable and picked up the clipboard. Not many trips had been made. Brother Boniface’s was the fourth back. Right after that, Father Alexius had signed out a van. Two days later, Sunday, two of the priests had signed out vans in the early morning, perhaps to take Communion to the sick or visit parishioners. The last entry was for this morning for someone named Brother Christopher, who had signed a van out and had yet to return it.

  “Where did Brother Christopher go?” I asked.

  “Begging run,” the man said.

  “And what would that be?”

  “Begging food. Stores throw out the expired stuff on Wednesdays. We get a lot of donuts, milk, cottage cheese, stuff like that, things we can’t really afford to buy.”

  Oh.

  “How many vans are there?” I asked.

  “Four,” he said.

  He was working on one, and two more were parked in the storage shed, leaving Brother Christopher with the forth.

  Daniel and I started to walk back to the monastery. Brother Eustace cleared his throat. I turned around and saw him standing with a black plastic bag in his hands, giving me a strange sort of look. I walked over to him, took the bag, and looked inside it. There was a pair of jeans, a sweater, underwear, socks, a fall jacket.

  “What is this?” I asked.

  He shrugged.

  “You found it in one of the vans?”

  “I really can’t answer that question. But I also don’t want to interfere with a police investigation. Frankie used to help me. That boy loved these vans, loved working on them. I owe him something.”

  He looked down at the bag of clothes, as if to say that what he owed was now in my hands.

  “Are these Frankie’s clothes?”

  “Can’t answer that,” he said. “But if they were, I suppose they would have his name on them somewhere. All the clothes have to be marked, you know.”

  I looked at the sweater and found “Frankie” written on the label.

  “Can you tell me which van these were in?” I asked.

  He could not. He did, though, let his eyes drift to the van he was working on. I picked up his clipboard, compared tag numbers, and discovered it was the van Brother Boniface had taken on Friday.

  “I suppose these vans are always unlocked, so anyone could be putting things in them,” Brother Eustace said. “Sometimes, you know, things get stuffed under the seats and folks forget them.”

  He was telling me where he had found the bag of clothes.

  “Do you know who killed Frankie?” I asked.

  The look in his eyes was one of sadness mixed with confusion. “I suppose if I knew that, I’d have found a way to let you know without telling you, wouldn’t I?”

  “Is there anything you can tell me?”

  He shook his head.

  “But do you know anything?”

  He again shook his head.

  “What day was this van brought back?”

  “I can’t tell you. Did you know that we have Mass on Saturday morning at 8:00 a.m.?”

  It was brought back Friday night or Saturday morning.

  “By whom?”

  He shrugged. He didn’t know.

  “What are you so afraid of?” I asked. “Have the brothers been told not to cooperate with us?”

  “Judas was paid thirty pieces of silver for betraying Our Lord.”

  “So you were told not to betray the community?”

  “He was lucky he wasn’t crucified.”

  “You’ll be punished if you talk to us?”

  “He hanged himself, you know. He despaired. I suppose that isn’t hard to do when you know you’ve betrayed the Son of God.”

  “But Bishop James isn’t the Son of God, is he?” I pointed out.

  He took his eyes away from me and made a face.

  “When Judas lost his place among the twelve disciples, a new one was chosen to replace him,” I said. “I have the feeling history will repeat itself.”

  “And that’s not always a bad thing,” Eustace said.

  “And what if you found out it was Judas you were protecting and not the Son of God?”

  He stopped what he was doing, became very still.

  “And what if Judas found himself in a jail cell,” I added. “What would the disciples do then?”

  He glanced at me, searching my eyes.

  “If you know something, you would be doing your community a favor by sharing it with us,” I said.

  “I don’t know anything,” he replied. “Only about the clothes I found, that’s all.”

  “You sure about that?”

  He nodded. “Could you help me? Could you put those clothes back under the seat and take them out yourself? And then if I’m asked, I can honestly say you were the one who found them.”

  This was Ethical Bullshit 101, but if it made him feel better, I could oblige. And I did. Afterward, I went to stand in front of him. “I’ve got two dead boys on my hands. Won’t you help me?”

  “I fix cars,” he said. “That’s all I know.”

  “I found a statue at the scene of Frankie’s death. St. Francis of Assisi. Ring any bells?”

  “Well, they sell that sort of stuff in the gift shop on the second floor, outside the main chapel.”

  “If I wanted to know who was killing these kids, where would I start?”

  He frowned, as if to say he really didn’t know.

  “What’s going on in this place?” I asked.

  “I used to think it was traditional Catholicism,” he replied.

  V

  WE walked back to the monastery, and I looked at my watch: It was just after 3:00 p.m. We went inside and stopped at the porter’s office. The porter gave us a wary look.

  “I need to speak to Brother Leo,” I said. The social worker said Brother Leo was one of the ones having sex with the boys. When the porter did not answer, I added, “As soon as possible.”

  “He’s no longer part of the community,” the porter said prissily.

  “Where did he go?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did he leave?”

  “He was kicked out by Bishop James, and that’s all I know.”

  I considered this in silence. “Did he have blond hair, by any chance?” I was thinking of those blond hairs we had found at the scene of Frankie’s murder.

  “Well, yes, he did,” the porter replied.

  “Is there any way we can contact him?”

  The porter shrugged.

  “Phone number? Contact information?” I prompted.

  “I can get that for you,” he said.

  “Good. Please do. What about Brother Francis? Can I talk to him?”

  “He has a class right now.”

  “It’ll just take a couple of minutes.”

  Scrunching up his nose, the porter hurried off to fetch Brother Francis, returning a few minutes later. He then went into his office and looked in his files, bringing back a piece of paper with the phone number and address for “Mr. and Mrs. Mattling,” Brother Leo’s parents.

  He retreated, ignoring the thanks I offered.

  We waited in the foyer. Another religious
brother appeared from within the shadows of the porter’s office.

  “Are you Brother Francis?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “Were you scheduled to take Frankie Peters to Kansas City this past Friday?”

  He nodded.

  “And did you?”

  “No.”

  “Who did?”

  “I’ve already explained this. Brother Boniface told me he had been assigned instead, got into the van, and took off. That’s all I know.”

  “Well, unfortunately Frankie Peters got himself murdered. Now we’ve found another one of your students, Eli Smalley, has also been murdered. Any idea why?”

  He lowered his gaze to the floor. A troubled look crossed his features. He was about my age, thin as a rail, with thinning hair that was turning gray.

  “I take it that means no,” I said.

  “They were good students,” he said, very quietly.

  “Somebody must not have liked them very much.”

  “Or perhaps too much,” he said, glancing up at me.

  “What does that mean?”

  He shrugged.

  “Do you know who killed them?”

  “If I did, I would have told someone already.”

  “Do you suspect anyone? Brother Boniface?”

  “Not in a million years,” he replied.

  “So you think someone else did it?”

  “I know it wasn’t Brother Boniface.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “He loved those boys. He couldn’t even bring himself to give one of them a swat, much less kill them.”

  “How much did he ‘love’ those boys?”

  “Maybe too much.”

  “Maybe he crossed a few lines here and there?”