Masquerade

by William Kienzle

  Then, her first evening at the college, she had received an enigmatic note from the Reverend David Benbow. From the tone of the note rather than its literal content, she recognized that, for some reason he did not disclose, he was in the same predicament as she. She accepted his invitation to meet, which they did the following night—at about the time of Rabbi Winer’s death.

  As Benbow had no intention of revealing what it was Krieg held over him as blackmail, he made no attempt to discover Marie’s secret. They operated only with the tacit understanding that both were in a career-threatening bind and that Krieg held the whip hand that promised to devastate their lives.

  Cautiously at first, then boldly, Benbow suggested a plan at once subtle yet promising. It was a scheme born of the desperate corner into which they’d been forced by Krieg. It was clear as they plotted together that neither felt comfortable with what Benbow proposed. Yet neither could conceive of an alternative solution.

  It was agreed that Benbow’s plan would require at least two people to carry it out. Actually, it would have been more practical if more had been involved. At that point, Benbow admitted that he had sent invitations identical to Marie’s to Rabbi Winer and the monk. They had obviously chosen not to accept Benbow’s invitation, either because they were not threatened by Krieg as were David and Marie, or—and this seemed more likely to Benbow—they were in the same boat but, for their own reasons, simply preferred not to meet.

  Finally, David and Marie agreed they must and would act. They would use Benbow’s carefully constructed plan. They would act when Benbow gave the agreed-upon signal.

  The only remaining question was when to put their plan into motion. And that question was crucial.

  After considerable discussion, they agreed that the wisest course would be to defer action as long as possible, rather than seizing the present moment. For one thing, they had no way of knowing Krieg’s timetable. At some point during the workshop’s five days Krieg would undoubtedly drop the other shoe, as it were, and impose his ultimatum. Timing, then, was of the essence. They had to act before Krieg, and forestall his exposing them.

  Yet it was perfectly possible that either or both Winer and Augustine had a plan to thwart Krieg. Since neither Benbow nor Marie wanted to resort to violence—radical fear alone allowed them to even contemplate it—there was the possibility that Winer and/or Augustine might make it unnecessary for them to put their plan into action by striking first.

  The point then, as Benbow explained to Marie, was to allow just enough time for one or both of the others to take care of Krieg. Failing that, David and Marie must act.

  It was their final agreement, then, that the crucial factor of timing would be left in Benbow’s hands. He would give the signal if it were needed. And then they would put a stop to Klaus Krieg.

  Talk about God’s will! Praise God!

  22

  Was it something in his genes, his training, his nature? What was it that so regularly prompted Koesler to agree to requests, often without proper reflection? He wondered.

  From considerable experience, he knew that it was akin to academic suicide to walk into any classroom as a teacher without having done his homework. Yet, when Sister Marie asked him to take her class, he had agreed. She had tossed off the subject as something in which he had more than adequate experience. After all, he had had an unusual amount of contact with the police. How many priests had been involved in actual homicide investigations? Thus, according to Sister Marie, all he had to do was walk into a classroom cold, and field eager and reasonable questions on the subject. So, despite his experience, he had agreed to her request. And he had paid for it.

  Though it was a lovely, cool morning, Koesler was perspiring beneath his black clerical suit and Roman collar.

  One does not just walk into a classroom relying on some miraculous dabitur vobis. He realized that the moment he walked in and confronted the eager faces. One does not begin a class by inviting questions. Questions follow a presentation—sometimes. They certainly do not precede a presentation. Somehow he had managed to carry it off this morning—at least he hoped he had. But he had paid the price in emotional investment. No blood or tears, but there had been plenty of sweat.

  As he hurriedly exited the classroom, he almost literally ran into Sergeant Angela Moore, who’d been scurrying down the corridor. He apologized.

  “That’s okay, Father. This’ll save time in trying to find you. They’ll want you there for this.” She managed to sweep him along with her.

  “They’ll want me?” Koesler fell in step with her. “Some new information?”

  “Uh-huh.” She said no more, but led the way to the modest dining room that had become a makeshift headquarters for the police.

  Koznicki and Tully were standing near the center of the room. Various other officers were occupied in other parts of the room.

  Tully took one look at Moore’s face. “You found it, didn’t you?”

  “Uh-huh.” Koesler now noticed Moore’s flushed excitement. “Yeah,” she said. “This has got to be what Krieg found and the nun didn’t want to get out.”

  Koesler fought a sudden urge to leave. He felt as if he were eavesdropping. He had developed a liking and respect for Sister Marie. And Sergeant Moore was about to reveal the secret Marie so desperately wanted kept hidden. Hers was, after all, the one remaining confidential matter to be exposed. But he knew that Inspector Koznicki wanted him there. Koesler steeled himself to hear the worst.

  “It was an abortion,” Moore said, rather more forcefully than necessary.

  “An abortion!” Koesler’s involuntary reaction was so unexpected that it startled the others. However, their surprise was momentary.

  “When’d it happen?” Tully asked.

  “She was a senior in high school.”

  “A senior in high school!” Ordinarily Koesler would be listening to the experts and contributing nothing at this point. But he felt that someone should be standing up for this good woman. “High school!” he repeated. “That must be . . . some thirty years ago!”

  “That’s about right.” Moore turned slightly to face Koesler. He had entered this matter actively and neither of her superior officers was curbing him in any way. So she felt free to address his concern.

  “How . . . how could you uncover such a thing? I mean . . . thirty years!” Koesler said.

  “A fluke, mostly,” Moore admitted. “Although we might have uncovered it ourselves, given time. But, I don’t know . . .” She seemed to drift off in speculation.

  “How did you uncover it?” Koznicki brought her back to the present.

  “Oh, Stewart found it,” Moore said.

  “Stewart?”

  “Uh, Patrolman Stewart, Judith.” Moore located the officer’ name on the report she was holding. “She’s a rookie. Hasn’t got anything to do with this investigation. She’s stationed in the First Precinct. She was reading about our case and she thought the name sounded familiar. Marie Monahan. So, she thought about it until the bell rang. She thought she’d seen the name in one of the old abortion files.”

  “Isn’t that a bit contrived, Sergeant?” Koesler broke in. He was surprising himself that he was so actively responding to this charge against Sister Marie’s reputation. He couldn’t help himself. It didn’t seem right that a good person’s reputation could be so easily trashed. “Doesn’t the coincidence stretch credibility?”

  Moore didn’t know whether to engage this outsider in a pedantic debate when there was the serious business of a homicide investigation going on. She glanced around and caught the affirmative if slight nod given by Inspector Koznicki.

  “It’s not all that odd, Father,” Moore explained. “Our newer people especially like to visit the basement at headquarters where all these old records are kept.”

  “Why would they do that?” Koesler asked.

  “It’s just fascinating reading,” Moore said. “We don’t write up reports this way anymore. It’s the terminology as
much as anything else. Often as not, they use terms like ‘thug’ instead of ‘criminal’ or ‘perpetrator.’ They’re very . . . uh . . . emotionally written. They’re fun to read. Sort of like an old Batman strip. So, especially the newer people, when they find where these records are kept, well, it’s not uncommon for them to spend a little spare time browsing through them.

  “That’s what Stewart was doing recently, see? She was going through the records—just recreational reading—when she got into the abortion files. And today when she saw the name of the nun mentioned as part of our investigation—well, as I said, it rang a bell. She says she remembered it because it was so Irish. Stewart figured that back then, with a name like that, abortion would have been not only a crime, but a sin.”

  “I still find it hard to understand why you would keep records that old,” Koesler said.

  Koznicki had been quietly studying the police record of Marie’s abortion that Moore had handed him. “You see, Father,” he explained, “with the frequency of criminal appeals of cases, the police tend to hold on to all records, just in case. Just in case a civil lawsuit is filed, we will not be caught short. We throw nothing away. It makes for a cluttered basement, but it also ensures that we will not be caught needing a record that has been discarded.

  “This record, for example,” Koznicki continued, “of an abortion performed on one Marie Monahan, gives the name of the doctor who repaired the damage caused by an obvious amateur, who, it seems, almost killed Miss Monahan. So there is a complete medical record. But no name of the person who botched the original abortion. Apparently, Marie Monahan refused to cooperate with the investigating officer—which, I should mention, was not uncommon. That is why there are so many old records of abortion investigations in these files. Very, very infrequently did the victim of an illegal abortion agree to testify. And without the victim’s testimony, there was no case.”

  Koesler said nothing. Seemingly, he had run out of questions and challenges.

  “Well, that ties it,” Tully said. He seemed satisfied that they would be delayed no more by Koesler. “That’s a full house,” Tully continued. “Each of these writers has something in his or her past that they didn’t want revealed. Desperately didn’t want revealed. The rabbi had betrayed his own people. The monk is an alcoholic. The priest was an adulterer. And the nun had an abortion.”

  Somehow, stated so flatly, so abruptly, these sins—if such they were—seemed to Koesler to be best kept buried as they had been prior to this police investigation. Then he recalled that the police were only reacting to what had already been ferreted out by Klaus Krieg.

  “And,” Tully continued, “Krieg discovered every one of their secrets and threatened to publicize them unless they signed contracts with him.”

  “How do you suppose he dug up all these secrets, Zoo?” Moore asked.

  “Right now, I don’t know. But with his money, just about anything is possible. I got the feeling we’re getting down to the bottom line. It feels right.”

  “Just one more question, please,” Father Koesler said. “Doesn’t it seem peculiar to anyone but me that we suddenly know so much about everyone connected with this workshop with the exception of the Reverend Krieg? I mean, all of a sudden we know some of the deepest, darkest secrets of four very dedicated religious—secrets we wouldn’t even have guessed existed except that Krieg found out about them and because of him the police investigated and found them out. But Klaus Krieg—the one who started all this—Klaus Krieg remains in the shadows. Doesn’t this seem odd?”

  In the silence that followed Koesler’s question, it seemed the detectives were quietly passing around the responsibility of answering. Sergeant Moore fumbled through the sheaf of papers she was holding. She extracted three of them from the file and handed them to Koesler.

  “I guess we assumed that you knew Krieg’s background,” she said. “What we’ve got on him is no secret. Nor, with what we’ve got, is there room for many secrets. We weren’t trying to keep anything from you, Father. In fact, you know as much about this case as any of us. That’s the way Inspector Koznicki wanted it. But these,” referring to the background papers she had just handed Koesler, “should bring you completely up to date.”

  Once again Koesler felt embarrassed. In the context of what Moore had just said, his complaint about Krieg sounded to Koesler himself petulant and pushy.

  In mutual awkwardness the group was about to break up when Sergeant Mangiapane hurried into the room. Everyone could tell from the expression on his face and his abrupt manner that he had important new information. “We just got done searching their rooms—the three writers—”

  Moore interrupted. “Did you get their permission again?”

  “We got a warrant,” Mangiapane said.

  “So soon?” Moore pressed.

  “This morning,” Tully replied. “Remember, the mayor wants this one cleaned up in record time.” He turned back to Mangiapane. “What did you find?”

  The beatific look returned to Mangiapane’s face. “In Benbow’s room, a gallon can with some gasoline still in the bottom. In Sister Marie’s room, several gas-soaked cloths.”

  Tully looked thoughtful. “Maybe they got careless. Maybe one of them planted the evidence. Either way we get them together now and lay it on the line—the bottom line.”

  “They’re already together, Zoo,” Mangiapane said. “We got ’em in a classroom on the second floor.”

  The detectives left for the classroom without another thought about or word from Koesler. The priest was left in the dining room, holding, if not the bag, several papers outlining the life and career of the Reverend Klaus Krieg.

  Koesler lacked the stomach to watch what was undoubtedly going to be an intense grilling of Augustine, Marie, and Benbow, perhaps Mrs. Benbow as well. He sat at a table and spread the papers out before him. The first page was a publicity release; the other two, the summary of what the police had discovered.

  Born in 1950, Krieg was now forty years old. That surprised Koesler. He would have guessed Krieg to be somewhat older. Not that he looked or acted particularly ancient, but that he had accomplished so much, built so much, raised so much funding in a relatively brief time.

  Koesler’s second major surprise was the fact—the boast, as Krieg put it—that the preacher had at one time been a Catholic. It was from the chains of authoritarian Catholicism that the minister had freed himself by being born again in the Spirit. A freedom from the bonds of sectarianism and sin that he offered to all who would join him in the baptism of the Spirit. However, make no mistake, the freedom P.G. Enterprises offered did not come cheap. The “initiation fee” was closely followed by special projects fundings, followed by good old-fashioned obligatory tithing.

  Another surprise: He was born in Imlay City, Michigan. This from the police report.

  Koesler had simply assumed that Krieg was a native Californian. Or, that if his origin were elsewhere, then certainly New York or Chicago. The assumption was based on the size of Krieg’s empire. How could such volume spring from little Imlay City?

  Then, Koesler was reminded of Jesus Christ’s extremely modest home town. So modest, indeed, that the more sarcastic of Jesus’ contemporaries remarked, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” So, why not? Koesler wondered whether inhabitants of Imlay City realized that the famous Klaus Krieg, multimillionaire and television personality, had once walked their streets.

  Koesler was familiar with Imlay City. It was, roughly, at the knuckle of the thumb. Since the state, at least the lower peninsula, was in the shape of a hand geographically, Michiganders tended to pinpoint areas in the state according to their position in the “hand.” Nowhere was that habit more prevalent than when the locale was in the “thumb” area, as was Imlay city, about halfway between Flint and Port Huron.

  In addition, it was within the boundaries of the Archdiocese of Detroit, and the pastor of Imlay City’s one and only Catholic church, Sacred Heart, had been one of Koesler’
s classmates. Which more than likely explained how Koesler happened to know its exact location.

  Interesting, Koesler mused as he succumbed to a daydream. Klaus Krieg born a Catholic in the Archdiocese of Detroit. He found religion so vitally important in his life that he apostatized from Catholicism and formed his own sect. What if he hadn’t done that? What if whatever had moved him to discard the Catholic Church hadn’t happened? Would that appreciation of religion have led him into the Catholic clergy? What would he be like as a priest today?

  A preacher of no little note, undoubtedly. Whatever else anyone might want to say about him, he could be a spellbinding orator. Another Charlie Coughlin?

  Or Billy Sunday?

  Or Elmer Gantry?

  Koesler found himself reviewing what little he knew about the Reverend Krieg from firsthand knowledge. While he was familiar with Krieg’s reputation as a televangelist, Koesler had never seen him on television, nor, for that matter, in any other way. So his first impression was formed when, just days earlier, Krieg had burst onto the Marygrove scene with the expected fanfare and his own private chauffeur and general factotum.

  Koesler allowed his reliable memory to wander through recollections of the past few days. To be frank, he was looking for telltale remnants of a former Catholic faith. Former Catholics regularly betray habits—most of them not consciously—of Catholic customs, practices, traditions, even superstitions.

  In their liturgies, Catholics make the sign of the cross so habitually the habit often carries over to completely unrelated events. At the conclusion of anything—a movie, a stage play, a concert, a lecture, whatever—it is not unknown that a practicing Catholic, or a one-time Catholic, might make the sign of the cross. The same could be said of genuflecting before entering an auditorium or theater row, or—in a situation where spontaneous prayer is called for—coming up with a distinctly Catholic prayer.

  Thanks to television, millions have seen a singular gesture usually made by an athlete with a Catholic background. The gesture consists of an abbreviated and hurried sign of the cross that does not quite reach forehead, navel, and the extremity of either shoulder. It is, if only because it could be nothing else, a sign of the cross, but it ends with the boxer, ballplayer, athlete, kissing his right thumb.