The Circuit Rider

by Dani Amore

  As well as the answers Bird was looking for.

  A door to the right opened to reveal a small closet with a single row of shirts hanging from a wooden pole. Tower checked each of the shirt pockets. Nothing.

  He went back to the middle of the room.

  Something was nagging at the back of his mind. He was missing something. When he had been an investigator for the detective agency, he had learned to depend on hunches. But what? What was he missing?

  And then it hit him.

  A Bible.

  A young man who volunteered for the church and was in some capacity an employee of the church would have a Bible in his room. Tower looked around the room again.

  He went to the bed and lifted the single pillow.

  Underneath it lay a Bible.

  Tower picked up the book and looked inside the front cover. There was no name or address there.

  A bookmark was placed near the back. Tower looked at the page. It was the book of Romans, and a line in the passage entitled “Sin and Death” was underlined: “We know that the law is spiritual, whereas I am weak flesh sold into the slavery of sin.”

  Tower turned more pages but saw nothing else marked. He looked at the inside back cover of the Bible. Nothing.

  He was about to put it back down on the bed when he went back to the page with the bookmark. He pulled the bookmark out. It was a thin strip of paper, blank on the front. He turned it over.

  There was a single line of text.

  New Divinities Revival.

  Tower slipped the bookmark into his pocket, took down one of the pentagrams from the wall, folded that, and put it into his pocket as well.

  He left the room, shutting the door behind him, and walked back into the tobacconist’s shop.

  He waited for a customer to finish his transaction with Mr. Giovanni, then approached him.

  He handed him the key.

  “Do you happen to know of a place around here called New Divinities?” Tower asked.

  Giovanni shook his head. “No, I’m afraid I don’t.”

  From behind them, someone spoke.

  “Did you say ‘New Divinities’?”

  Tower turned. It was the customer who had just made a purchase.

  “Yes,” Tower said. “Do you know of it?”

  “Sure, it was a church group. Just a few blocks from here.”

  “Was?” Tower said.

  “Yes,” the customer said. “Two days ago it burned to the ground.”

  Ninety-Seven

  Bird had never seen anything like the Palace Hotel. It was seven stories tall, with a huge, open lobby covered with thick carpets and packed with regal furniture. Men sat in plush chairs, reading the paper.

  Each floor formed a U shape around the lobby and featured a white railing. From above, natural light flooded the entire space.

  Bird went to the front desk, paid for a room for two days, and was directed to an elevator, or a “rising room,” as the front desk attendant called it. She rode it to the fifth floor and found her room.

  Inside, the room was the best she’d ever had. Her own bathroom, plus a balcony looking out over Market Street. The front desk had told her there was a button you could push and ask for anything you wanted. She thought she would give it a try.

  She pressed the button and set her gear on the room’s bed. Within a minute or so, someone knocked on her door.

  Bird held a gun in her hand as she opened the door.

  A man in a crisp white suit stood before her.

  “You rang, madame?” he said.

  “What are the two finest brands of whiskey you have here?” she said.

  He told her.

  “Great. Send up one of each, please.”

  Bird had barely begun to put away what little gear she had when the man returned. He gave her the bottles and told her the total would be added to her room charge. She tipped him and shut and locked the door.

  She got a whiskey glass, heavy leaded crystal that held about four full shots of whiskey, and filled it up.

  Bird sat down in a chair and put her boots up on a finely upholstered ottoman.

  The whiskey went down so smooth she almost cried at its luxury.

  She was home.

  In addition to it being the most luxurious hotel room she’d ever been in, it was also the quietest. She couldn’t hear a thing. So strange after the trail, where there was always some sound. Wind. Birds. Animals.

  Bird found the bottom of her whiskey glass and refilled it.

  Her body was warming with the liquor and she took off her boots, her shirt, and her hat. She even shrugged off her gun belt and set it on the bed.

  She went into the bathroom and poured herself a hot bath, then went back to the chair, sat down, and drank more of the fine liquor.

  Bird thought of Tower then. Wondered what he was doing, pictured him holed up somewhere in the church, praying for forgiveness for all of the things that had happened on the circuit ride. Things that God had nothing to do with but that people who believed in such things loved to act like were all part of some master plan.

  What a pile of cow chips.

  She sank back into the chair, noticed her glass was empty again, refilled it, and registered that the first bottle was already empty.

  How did that happen so fast? she thought.

  Mike Tower. What an interesting man, she thought. She figured no other preacher in the world had his background. A Civil War spy. A private investigator. And then a preacher. Carrying a Bible instead of a gun.

  Never in my lifetime, Bird thought. They would have to pry her guns from her cold dead hands before she went anywhere without them.

  The pistols were her twin saviors.

  And the six bullets they each carried?

  Her twelve apostles.

  Bird smiled and opened the second bottle.

  She carried it into the bathroom, took off the rest of her clothes, and sank into the hot water. She cleaned herself, even doused her blonde hair and scrubbed her face, then drank directly from the bottle.

  She sat up straight and ran her finger along the raised edge of the pentagram that Toby Raines had carved into her flesh so many years ago.

  She closed her eyes. Images of Mike Tower, of Toby Raines on his horse, dragging her, of the dead men left in her trail, flashed across her mind.

  She slept, and when she woke, the water was cool.

  Bird took a long drink from the bottle.

  She was drunk, she knew. But she felt rested.

  And she felt a burn in her belly not from the whiskey, but from the knowledge that Toby Raines was probably here in San Francisco.

  She got out of the tub, put on clean clothes, and strapped on her guns.

  As grand as her room was, she was not going to spend much time in it.

  It was time to find Toby Raines.

  Ninety-Eight

  Though there were no flames or residual smoke, only the stench of charred wood remained.

  All that remained of New Divinities was a few resolute interior walls, now black with creosote. Piles of burned wood fragments were mounded in several places on the building’s lot.

  Tower stood before the ruined space.

  It sat on the street between an empty lot and a schoolhouse.

  Next to the burned-out shell, someone had scraped together a large pile of the debris. Tower spotted something white underneath the mess, and he walked over and nudged a burned board over with his foot.

  Several sheets of paper, singed at the edges, were stuck together and still soggy from whoever had tried to put out the fire.

  He picked up one of the sheets.

  The top of the paper read, Religious retreat.

  The date was scheduled for the day of the fire.

  And at the bottom was the name of a church.

  With an address.

  It took Tower nearly an hour to find the church, thanks to a variety of people who offered him directions. It was a very small and humble stru
cture, just one room really, with a few benches.

  Tower walked toward the altar and saw a man placing a goblet into a wooden tabernacle.

  “Excuse me,” Tower said.

  The man turned, and Tower introduced himself, told him about the sheet of paper he’d found at the burned-out wreckage of New Divinities.

  “Impossible,” the man said. He had told Tower his name was Hallebeke. “I personally told that young Kirner fellow to cease any mention of my congregation with that group.”

  “Why did you tell him that?”

  The priest shrugged on his white robe and put a simple wooden cross hanging from a strand of leather around his neck.

  “Because I had gotten several complaints from a young woman who had chosen to go on one of those retreats.”

  Tower knew he was close.

  “And what happened?”

  “She wouldn’t say exactly, but I could tell it had been a bad experience. It is my hunch that she was given some sort of drug, perhaps an opiate. Because she had trouble remembering exactly what happened.”

  “Did you go to the police?”

  The priest shook his head. “I wished to, but the family involved asked that I not.”

  “So what did you do?”

  “I forbade the young man to ever try to recruit any of my parishioners for his religious retreats. I allowed him to continue to attend service here, but after our very frank discussion, he never did.”

  Tower got to his feet.

  “Thank you very much for your time, Father,” Tower said.

  “I only wish I could have been more of a help. Did you talk to the young man’s supervisor?”

  Tower, already at the door, stopped and turned back to the priest.

  “The young man’s supervisor?”

  “Yes, one time the young man came with his supervisor, an older man affiliated with the church. It was my impression that he was the organizer of the retreats and that the young man was more of a recruiter.”

  “Did the supervisor have a name?”

  The priest thought for a moment, then answered.

  “Silas.”

  Ninety-Nine

  Bird went to the hotel’s bar, ordered a rye, and asked the bartender if he had copies of the last few days’ worth of newspapers.

  The whiskey arrived first, the newspapers second.

  Bird scanned the papers until she found the news story she wanted.

  The dead girl’s name.

  Karen Britt.

  And the surviving members of her family, who lived on Abbott Street.

  Bird tossed down her drink, paid for it, and walked out of the hotel.

  She had gotten the general direction of Abbott Street from the bartender, and now she headed that way.

  The whiskey was thoroughly in her system and she felt a pleasant buzz throughout her body.

  And something else.

  A little nagging sensation that managed to poke through her alcoholic haze with an irritating persistence.

  Bird stopped in front of a store that sold candy. The display was a dizzying array of color, with more candy in more shapes and sizes than Bird had ever seen. She quickly turned from the window and glanced behind her. There were a lot of people out and about. A family. Several businessmen. And a woman was walking on the opposite side of the street.

  Was there something familiar about her?

  Bird turned back and pretended to look at the candy, but instead she watched the woman behind her in the reflection of the shop’s window. The woman had stopped directly across from Bird. She spent some time lighting a cigarette.

  Bird turned and walked on ahead.

  A tavern was on the corner of the next street.

  She ducked inside, went to the bar, and ordered a beer.

  Moments later, the woman entered as well and took a seat at a table on the opposite side of the room.

  Bird drained her beer and motioned to the bartender for a refill. Once her glass was full again, she went over, pulled a chair out across from the woman, and sat down.

  “That seat is reserved for someone,” the woman said, with a furtive glance toward the door.

  Bird laughed.

  “Yes, it’s reserved for a woman who would be happy to shoot you right now and dump your body in the harbor. Which is why I sat down. This is my chair.”

  The woman drank from her beer, and Bird noticed that her hand wasn’t exactly steady.

  “Who are you?” Bird said.

  The woman looked away from Bird, tried to ignore her.

  Bird drew her pistol and set it on the table between them.

  “Let’s try that again.”

  The woman glanced down at the gun, at the muzzle pointed toward her.

  She sighed and seemed to come to a decision.

  “My name is Rebecca.”

  She hesitated.

  “Britt. Rebecca Britt.”

  Bird looked at her.

  “Karen was my cousin.”

  One Hundred

  “Can we talk somewhere else?” Rebecca Britt looked around the saloon. Bird could tell the woman was tired. Her eyes were bloodshot, her skin pale, and she had the harried, unfocused look of someone who had gone a long time without a decent night’s sleep.

  Bird went to the bar, ordered a shot of whiskey, drank it, and paid for her beer as well. She went back to the table and gestured for the young woman to follow her.

  They walked out together into the cool afternoon air.

  “I work about a half mile this way, if you want to walk me back,” the girl said. “I told them I was going to lunch and that I had a doctor’s appointment. I’m already late getting back.”

  “I don’t mind a walk,” Bird said. “Especially if you tell me why you were following me.”

  They waited at the corner for a horse-drawn streetcar to pass.

  “Did you hear about the cable cars?” the young woman asked Bird.

  “No.”

  “They use a cable under the street. So horses don’t have to pull the things up the hill. It’s going to change the way people move around the city.”

  Bird nodded. Interesting, but she could not care less.

  “So you were going to tell me why you were following me,” she said. “And what it has to do with your cousin’s murder.”

  “I was waiting to talk to Detective Burgoines when I saw you. I figured he would tell me again there was nothing new with the case, so instead I thought I would follow you.”

  “So what do you know about Karen’s murder?” Bird said.

  “I know that if I had gone with her, I would probably be dead, too.”

  “Gone where?”

  “It’s a long story,” Rebecca said. “But I think I might know where Karen went that night. I was going to pass it along to the detective, but I left it at the office. That was another reason I decided to follow you instead.”

  They turned the corner and went to a building whose exterior was painted green. There were no windows, but one door. The door was painted white. There was no sign out front.

  Rebecca used a key to open the door, and she walked through first.

  Bird followed her, curious to see what kind of business operated in a building —

  The faint sound of a boot on a wooden floor caught Bird’s ear, and then pain exploded from the back of her head. It raced forward, covering her face like a mask.

  Her neck went numb, and the numbness spread down the rest of her body as she sank to the ground.

  The last thing that went through her mind was that it didn’t hurt to fall on the floor.

  It didn’t hurt at all.

  One Hundred One

  Tower found Silas at the church, in a room just off the altar. He had a paper and pen, probably composing a new sermon.

  “Tell me about New Divinities,” Tower said as he walked into the room. Even though he had tried to sound neutral, he recognized that his voice had sounded sharp. Not friendly.

  Silas straight
ened up.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “New Divinities. Revivals. Supposedly some kind of religious retreat or something that you and Bradley Kirner shopped around to at least one church I know of, and probably a lot of others.”

  Silas put the pen down on his paper and looked up at Tower. His eyes were blue, with a hint of fiery reproach in them. “I am telling you the truth, Mr. Tower. I never approached anyone, or any church, about a religious retreat with Bradley Kirner. I have no idea what you are talking about.” The deep baritone voice sounded true to Tower’s ear.

  And he had looked directly into the heat of Silas’s eyes.

  Tower suspected he was telling the truth. He thought about everything that had happened. About Bird. The carving on her chest. About the pentagrams in Bradley Kirner’s room.

  It just didn’t make sense.

  When he had been an investigator, Mike Tower had come to believe that cracking a case always came down to making connections. Connecting previously unrelated motivations, events, or relationships.

  So he started with what he knew and he went backward. He went back to the beginning.

  Because the pentagrams in Bradley Kirner’s room were more than just a shocking sight.

  They tied in to Bird’s history with the church.

  And with him.

  And then Tower felt the connection slam him with a force that let him know he was right.

  What if Bird had been hired as his bodyguard for a reason?

  What if it had been a part of someone’s plan all along?

  Of course!

  It meant that the incidents along the trail and here in San Francisco weren’t an accident or a coincidence.

  It was all part of someone’s plan.

  Which meant that whoever had planned it was here. Now.

  And had plans for Bird.

  One Hundred Two

  Even before she opened her eyes, Bird knew she was in handcuffs.

  Her face was pressed against a cold stone floor.

  Her arms were pinned behind her back; she could feel the metal cutting into her wrists.