“Pick up the dead ones,” said Tom. “Put them in the bucket.”
Andie took the bucket and entered the coop, careful not to crush the live ones. With each step she sent clusters of chicks scattering. Every few feet she found a dead one. She felt a mixture of pity and disgust, especially for the eviscerated ones that had been cannibalized by their sisters. Each carcass weighed practically nothing, but soon her bucket was heavy. She finished in a few minutes and returned to Tom.
He took the bucket and handed her another. “Now get the weak ones.”
“In a bucket?”
“Yeah. Like this.” He grabbed a chick that was stumbling around the fringe. It chirped pathetically in his hand. With one quick jerk he silenced it, then tossed it in the bucket.
Andie had seen much worse in her career, but Tom seemed to expect some revulsion from Willow. He somehow seemed to think he was impressing her. She played along. “I can’t kill an innocent little chick.”
“Yeah, you can.”
“But I don’t want to.”
“It’s your job, Willow.”
“But you do it so well.”
“And with a little practice, you’ll be every bit as good.” He winked.
It wasn’t easy to flirt with an obvious loser like Tom, but it seemed like a way to open the door. “I would think picking up chicks comes pretty naturally to a guy like you.”
“That was my other life,” he said with a smile.
“Quite the heartbreaker, were you?”
“Hmmmm, I had my fair share.”
“And now you’re…celibate?”
He quickly deflated. “Felicia will talk to you about that.”
“I just assumed that was part of the deal. All this talk about weaning oneself of earthly desires. Sex has to be right up there with cable TV and ice cream.”
He was obviously uncomfortable. Andie asked, “Am I making you nervous?”
“Just, men and women aren’t supposed to have this discussion. Felicia will talk to you.”
“I’m sorry. Somehow I just felt at ease talking to you.”
That seemed to please him. “Really?”
“Yeah. You know how you just get a good feeling about a person?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“But hey, if you’re uncomfortable, let’s just go back to killing baby chickens.”
“No, I wasn’t rejecting you.”
“I hope not,” said Andie. “It would be nice to have a friend.”
“I don’t think there’s anything in the rules against that.”
She glanced at his cigarette. “Not that the rules are written in stone.”
“Smoking is a minor infraction,” he said defensively. “More serious stuff can get you kicked out.”
“Like what?”
“Like…sex.”
“Why is that so bad?”
“Because it not only depletes your energy, but it takes you further away from the source. That’s the whole problem with satisfying your worldly urges.”
“So this entire belief system is based on abstinence?”
“No. It’s based on fulfillment. But it comes in ways you’ve never experienced before.”
“If it’s so fulfilling, why do you still enjoy things like smoking?”
“Because I’m still human. To be honest with you, I don’t really enjoy smoking all that much. I just do it. That’s the way it is with everything that binds us to this world. That’s the cornerstone of Mr. Blechman’s philosophy. He teaches us that our emotions, our impulses, our desires—they’re like an echo.”
“An echo?”
“Yeah. Any experience is most intense and gratifying the first time. Each subsequent experience is mere repetition, growing weaker and weaker, like an echo, until we are totally disconnected from the source of energy that inspired us to try something new in the first place.”
“I don’t want you to think I have a one-track mind, but I wouldn’t say the best sex I ever had was the first time I had it.”
“Get beyond sex, will you, please? Think of the first time you saw the ocean. The first time you rode a bicycle. The first time you flew on an airplane.”
“The first time you killed?”
He was taken aback.
“Like a baby chick, I mean,” said Andie.
“That works too. Anything that makes you feel a rush of energy and changes your level of vibration. After a while we simply become numb to it. But we keep doing it, hoping we can get some glimpse of the thrill we experienced the first time.”
“You get a thrill from killing?”
“I didn’t say thrill.”
“I’m sorry. I thought you did.”
He was nervous again, drawing on his cigarette though it had burned to the filter. “All I’m saying is that we shouldn’t be wasting our energy through repetition. We should be redirecting our energy.”
“Toward the source?” said Andie.
“Yes.” He crushed out his cigarette. “But you and I shouldn’t be having this discussion. I’m getting way ahead on your program. You know a lot more than someone is supposed to know at your level.”
Much more, she thought.
A band of clouds broke on the horizon. Golden rays of morning light pierced the coop’s slatted walls. As Tom glanced toward the rising sun, Andie studied his profile. She couldn’t quite place it, but he looked strangely familiar. He caught her staring, and she quickly looked away.
Andie picked up her bucket and returned to her task, watching out of the corner of her eye as Tom methodically moved about the flock and culled out the weak.
Fifty-eight
It wasn’t yet sunrise, and Gus was in Beth’s side of their master bedroom closet. Ever since he’d uncovered the fruits of her shoplifting, he’d wondered what other clues to Beth’s whereabouts might be hiding in there. Over the past two weeks he’d examined jewelry, photographs, memorabilia, and thousands of other little things that had found their way into the drawers and boxes that lined the walls of their oversized closet. Having sifted through some items for the third or fourth time, he realized this was becoming less a hunt for clues than a way to reconnect with Beth. It was his sanity in another sleepless night.
Tonight he had more focus. Something about that letter from Martha Goldstein yesterday had gnawed at his memory. It was more the paper itself than the message she had written on it. The unusually high linen content of her personal stationery lent the distinctive fuchsia blend a marble-like appearance. Somewhere he had seen it before. It had taken several hours of lying awake in bed to realize where.
Beth had kept a junk drawer of things related to his law firm. He had blown past it quickly in nights past, figuring it couldn’t possibly contain anything important. As he thumbed through the drawer this time, however, his opinion quickly changed. Tucked behind some old programs from past firm banquets was a fuchsia envelope. The postmark told him it was more than a year old. Neither the envelope nor the stationery inside bore a return address. It had been written anonymously on one of those blank extra sheets that come with each box of personal engraved stationery. It was an unsigned letter to Beth—penned in the same handwriting and on the same fuchsia stationery Gus had seen yesterday in the letter from Martha Goldstein.
He read eagerly, his anger rising in the second paragraph. “It doesn’t matter who I am,” she had written. “What’s important is that your husband has given himself to me, and it’s time you faced the truth.”
He stopped, stunned. She had chosen her words carefully, “given himself.” It was consistent with Martha’s view of them as soul mates. Yet the implication—the intended message to Beth—was that Gus was having sex with another woman. The whole deceptive package was classic Martha. The letter was unsigned, which meant Beth would have had to confront Gus if she wanted to know who had written it. It was written in her own script so that Gus would know it was Martha. Forcing him to tell his wife that the “anonymous” author was Martha would only make the lett
er more believable to Beth.
Somehow, Beth had figured out it was Martha on her own, since she’d filed the letter away in the drawer of law firm–related junk. Beth had never said a word to Gus. She’d internalized it, which went a long way to explain her paranoia about him and Martha.
A noise stirred him. In the pre-dawn darkness, the wind whistled through branches outside the bedroom window. The clock ticked in the hallway. All else was still.
He thought immediately of Dex’s warning that someone had followed him to the Red Lion Hotel last night.
He stepped quietly from the closet and checked the alarm panel on the wall. It was armed, no sign of intrusion. He left the bedroom and peered down the hall. Again, only silence. He walked slowly to the front door and peeked through the beveled glass. The car was still in the driveway. No one scurried across the lawn. He headed for the kitchen. The wind was kicking up outside, but the branches against the house didn’t sound at all like the noise that had roused him from sleep. He switched on the kitchen light and started.
The rubber trash can had been pulled out from under the sink and left near the dishwasher—not its usual place. It was upright but bulging, nearly overflowing. Something that resembled a tail was curling out from under the lid. Gus stepped closer and checked inside.
It was Garfield. One of Morgan’s big stuffed animals was in the garbage.
He pulled it out. Tigger was in there, too, along with a fuzzy cub from the Lion King collection, two more stuffed felines, and a ceramic Sylvester. They weren’t ripped, stained, or particularly worn out. They’d just been summarily discarded.
He hurried to Morgan’s room. The door was open and her light was on. “Morgan?” he said with urgency.
Her head popped from beneath the covers. “I can’t sleep.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Does this have anything to do with what I found in the garbage can?”
“You didn’t take them out, did you?”
“Yes.”
“Daddy, no! Put them back.”
“Why are you throwing them away?”
“Because.”
He recalled their earlier conversation in the car about getting a cat. “Morgan, your mommy’s allergic to real cats. Not stuffed animals.”
“I know. But if I keep all these fake cats around, I might forget.”
With soulful eyes he came to her and sat on the edge of the bed. “Sweetheart, you will never forget your mommy.”
“I don’t want to forget anything about her. Even little things. Like, I don’t ever want to forget she’s lergic to cats.”
“Don’t worry about that, okay? I’m going to do everything possible to bring Mommy home. And then you won’t ever, ever have to worry about forgetting anything.”
She was silent for a moment, then quizzical. “Have you forgotten things about Mommy?”
He wasn’t sure how to answer. He settled for the truth. “It’s funny, but since your mother disappeared, I actually remember more about her. That’s a good thing, I guess. You can get back the things you forget.”
“If you really strain your brain?”
“Not so much the brain, sweetheart.”
“Which part?”
He held her close. “The part I haven’t used in a very long time.”
After breakfast Felicia drove Andie into town in the old station wagon. In the backseat was a woman at Felicia’s supervisory level and a nineteen-year-old girl who was in her second month of training. Tom and his young male recruit drove separately in an SUV. Monday morning was when the cult purchased groceries and essentials that couldn’t be produced on the farm. It was viewed as grunt work reserved for the newest members, under the strict supervision of their mentors, of course.
They stopped at a big price-cutting warehouse that sold everything from radial tires to cinnamon rolls, mostly in army-like quantities. Andie had been to a similar place in Seattle with the bare cement floors and huge pallets of Twinkies and paper towels stacked sixty-feet to the ceiling. She felt like a Lilliputian.
They broke into teams of two, each recruit with a mentor. Each team had a list of things to retrieve from different parts of the warehouse. They were to buy only what was on the list. Salt, flour, and raw sugar. Soap. Toilet paper. Matches and batteries. Basic medications, such as aspirin and rubbing alcohol. All of the things Blechman regarded as necessities.
Andie pushed the shopping cart as Felicia retrieved items from the shelves. They talked very little. Andie couldn’t stop thinking about “the echoes” concept. Her bookend theory had been out the window for some time, but “echoes” seemed apt. Two men and three women had been murdered in echo-like fashion.
Her discovery made her restless and eager to brainstorm. Isaac had given her until Wednesday to check in, but she wasn’t sure when she might get away from the farm again. She had to seize the opportunity.
“Felicia? I’m going to use the bathroom, all right?”
“Okay. I’ll be right here.”
The rest rooms were in the rear of the store, near the butcher department, behind a pair of swinging doors and at the end of a long corridor. Andie hoped there would be a pay phone nearby. There was. She quickly dialed Isaac’s private number.
“Isaac, it’s Andie.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. I can’t talk long.” She feared Felicia would burst through the doors any second. In two minutes she summarized her weekend, focusing mainly on “the echoes.”
Isaac said, “Of course, even if his philosophy spawned the murders, it doesn’t mean Blechman is our serial killer.”
“I wondered what your take would be.”
“It could be one of his demented followers. It might even be some psycho who read or heard about his teachings and is simply mocking the echo idea. After all, his seminars are open to the public. Who knows what kind of demented ideas people get?”
“That’s what I want to find out.” With a nervous glance she checked the hall, thinking she’d heard footsteps.
“Andie, you’ve done a good job. But for your own safety, I think it’s time we pull you out and just move in.”
“But I haven’t seen a single sign of Beth Wheatley yet. I couldn’t even tell you if she’s here.”
“Then maybe she isn’t.”
“But if she is, she could be dead the minute the FBI starts knocking on the door.”
“We might consider a more aggressive takeover. Take them by surprise.”
“That’s a terrible idea, and you know it. Remember Waco?”
“You’ve been inside. You think there’s a potential for mass suicide?”
“I don’t know. But think of what you said earlier. What if the killer is just someone who might have passed through the cult and is no longer here? The FBI will want the cult’s cooperation in identifying people who came to their meetings. Invading their compound is not going to endear them to the FBI and make them want to cooperate.”
Isaac was silent. Andie checked the doors again at the end of the corridor. Through the little diamond-shaped window she could see Felicia coming down the aisle. This was taking too long. “Just give me forty-eight more hours. And give it to me now, before they catch me on the phone.”
He was thinking. Andie’s heart pounded as Felicia neared the doors. “Isaac, please.”
“All right, you got it.”
“Thank you. Gotta go.” She slammed down the phone and started walking toward the doors just as they swung open.
“There you are,” said Felicia.
Fifty-nine
Beth lay alone in the darkness. It was a helpless feeling, but she had learned not to pound on the walls or scream for help. That kind of behavior would only get her handcuffed and gagged. One night she had carried on so long he had revoked her lights-on privileges. Two days of total darkness, including meals and bathroom breaks. She guessed it was two days, based on the number of meals she had eaten. With no cloc
k or windows there was no way to be sure.
Good behavior did seem to have its rewards. The lights used to come on only during each meal and bathroom break. Now she seemed to get a grace period before and after. Once, she had even been allowed outdoors to work at the chicken coop, albeit not without the electronic belt locked around her torso. It worked like those invisible fences for dogs, only this one would hit her like a stun gun if she got too close to the electrified boundaries. It had been good to get outdoors, though the farm had been strangely deserted that day. Almost everyone was away, perhaps on a retreat. Beth knew about retreats. It was how she’d gotten caught up in the first place.
In hindsight, it was easy to understand the initial appeal of Blechman’s philosophy. She had been tired of wasting her energy trying to put the magic back in her marriage. It was like an echo, intense at first, then fading over time. It was as if each anniversary were just another hollow ring in the distance, each one a little weaker and farther from the source, until it was completely inaudible, nothing left. The idea of redirecting her energy and changing her level of vibration had been a revelation. She was revitalized for a time that included many a day-long visit to the farm when Gus was out of town. On the positive side, they had helped her identify and talk out her anxieties. Ultimately, however, she and her mentors came to a bitter disagreement over the root cause. They saw it as a huge problem, but she didn’t see it as a problem at all.
She still loved Gus.
The way they wanted Beth to handle that problem was something she could never bring herself to do. The result was solitary confinement. She wasn’t getting much direction from the leaders, but she assumed the idea was to isolate her from worldly influences until she channeled her energy properly. All of this time alone, however, had only separated her further from their way of thinking. With no one to talk to, she conjured up pleasant images from her past. Morgan was a frequent subject. There was quite a lot of Gus and the way they used to be. Had they read her mind, her mentors would have been furious.
Under Cover of Darkness Page 34
