by J. A. Kerley
“She’s not sure they can give out personal information. She’d have to check.”
“Oh!” I said. “Hand me the phone.”
I got a nice lady named Molly, who sounded young and I used a pleasant voice. “Hi! This is Detective Carson Ryder, Senior Investigator at the Florida Center For Law Enforcement. You just spoke to my assistant.”
“Oh! I did. I told her we might have employed someone of that name, but then I told her I’d have to check with—”
“To every thing a season, right?” I interrupted.
“Excuse me?”
“A time to reap and sow? A time to talk and a time to listen? It’s now time to listen, Molly: I need to talk to someone way above your pay grade. Have someone in authority – not your boss, maybe your boss’s boss – get in touch with me before the end of the day. Write this down …”
I gave her my number and had her read it back.
“Oh!” I said. “Perfect. I’ll be waiting.”
We returned to the investigations, checking recent prison releases of sexual offenders, talking with parole officers, then tracing offenders and verifying whereabouts at the time of the crimes. Eleven releases in the last six months, eleven alibis that checked out.
Dead end again.
39
Roland Uttleman was sitting in the deserted kitchen of the Schrum home, bored and passing time by sifting through the daily mountain of mail sent to the Reverend. Most offered prayers or homilies, or spoke of how the writer had been touched by Schrum at some point in his long career. Many cards and letters were from churches and signed by the congregation. Some writers – conditioned by Schrum’s years of entreaties for cash for his various projects – sent cash or checks. Uttleman set aside the checks and pocketed the cash.
He was alone in the downstairs, lesser employees of the network in the leased house, the low-wage worker bees and volunteers writing donation requests, updating program schedules, or praying for their spiritual leader, often for twenty or more minutes, which Uttleman was beginning to suspect was a form of malingering.
Uttleman cocked an ear upwards and heard singing, Andy Delmont with Schrum. Delmont had not done a single performance at COG since Schrum had sent himself into exile. The dim-bulb man-child was getting a salary of a hundred-twenty grand a year to perform, peanuts compared to what he made from record sales. It was time for the kid to go back to work at the studios in Jacksonville. The only problem was the singer relaxed Schrum. Uttleman recalled a newspaper story about high-strung thoroughbred horses made less skittish when a goat was in their stalls, a “calming goat” it was called.
Andy Delmont, calming goat.
Still, the songs were driving Uttleman nuts. And the room-rattling thumps when two-hundred-sixty pounds of Schrum would drop to his knees above, praying with Delmont.
Uttleman opened another letter and a twenty fell to the table. He gave a cursory glance at the page, pencil on yellow notepad.
Dear Reverent Schrum – I am sory you are sick and I pray four you a hundret times ever day. I now you will git well like you did the last time Praise God!!!! I have the sugar reel bad and the docters have to take off my other leg. Pleese sir If you have the time to pray for me I would apreciat it. I inclose an offering.
Uttleman sighed. The halt and lame were always wanting Schrum to send prayers their way, like the guy could beam them on demand. He pocketed the bill and pitched the letter into the trash as Hayes Johnson came in the back door, his face pensive.
“What is it, Hayes? You look distracted.”
“I just got a call from Tawnya. An agent from the FCLE called, asking about Darlene Hammond.”
“Who answered the phone?”
“Molly Holcomb. Since it was about employees, Holcomb told Tawnya.”
Uttleman forced his face to remain calm. “What were they asking about Hammond for?”
“The cop, a woman, said it was an inquiry into former employment, wondering if she’d ever worked at Hallelujah Jubilee. There was a second call. A man, a senior agent. He wanted to be called back today.”
“What will you do?”
“Tell him the truth: Darlene Hammond worked with us for a while over two years ago. That she was, uh … a fine employee who decided to move on.”
“I wonder what the little bitch got herself into?”
“I don’t want to know,” Johnson said.
Uttleman sat quietly as Johnson tapped out the number, said, “Detective Carson Ryder please. Oh, it’s you? I hope I’m not bothering you, sir, but this is Hayes Johnson from Hallelujah Jubilee. How are you this fine day? Excellent to hear. I got word that you were looking for some information on a former employee, a Darlene Hammond …?”
Uttleman couldn’t hold in the smile; Johnson’s sincerity was glorious, the voice of a man born to sell.
“I had the records sent to me. It seems Miss Hammond worked for the park for just over five months. Yes, the dates were …”
Uttleman tiptoed to the fridge and retrieved a Coke. He would have liked something stronger, but with the low-level park employees in and out all the time, soft drinks were the choice. Some idiot kept making pitchers of Kool-Aid, the most noxious concoction Uttleman had ever tasted. He sat back down as Johnson continued to schmooze the cop.
“No, sir … she wasn’t with us very long, not unusual, many employees are here as a summer job. No, I never met her personally, or if I did I don’t recall. We’ve had hundreds of employees over the years. Her position?” Johnson shot a look at Uttleman. “Let me see … um, she was a character actor. That means dressing up as various women from the Holy Book: one day she might be Mary, the next she might be Eve, or Ruth, or Miriam. Or perhaps not a character, per se, but color, as in wearing period garb and populating our biblical settings. It’s an easy task, walking around and interacting with our guests. You get your photograph taken a hundred times a day.”
Johnson winked at Uttleman, secure in his salesmanship, his schmoozing, his polished sincerity.
“No, no … not a problem, Detective. We’re always happy to do anything we can for our fine friends in law enforcement. I hope I’ve been able to … pardon me? Who?”
Uttleman saw Johnson’s face go from pink to ashen in the span of a heartbeat. “Uh … I don’t have that information. I only requested records on Darlene Hammond. I can certainly do that. Um, let’s see … it’s past five now and the office staff have left. I’ll call in the morning and let you know as soon as possible. Certainly, sir, no trouble. Goodbye.”
When Johnson’s hand hung up the phone it was shaking.
“What it is, Hayes?” Uttleman said.
“The cop wanted to know if two other women had been employed at the park.”
“Who?”
“Kylie Sandoval and Teresa Mailey.”
“Jesus,” Uttleman whispered. “Why?”
“He didn’t say and I didn’t ask,” Johnson said.
“What are you going to do?”
Johnson looked at his watch. “Fly to HJ as soon as I can. I’ve got to get rid of a few files.”
“Will it be hard to make them, uh, disappear?”
“They were cash employees, remember? No official records, no tax forms or anything like that. I’m not even sure their names are anywhere, I just have to make certain.”
Harry Nautilus stood on his balcony, beer in hand. Celeste Owsley had returned an hour back with enough packages to fill Santa’s sleigh. He’d picked her up at the airport, relating that the day at Hallelujah Jubilee had been a delight.
“Becca wasn’t snarky?” Owsley had said as Nautilus unloaded packages from the Hummer. “I swear … some days that girl goes outta her way to jump on my last nerve. I love her dearly, and thank Jesus every day for sending her, but can’t wait for this phase to get past.”
Shop less, communicate more, Nautilus thought, the Owsleys seeming like three disparate worlds jammed under one roof, each spinning in its own orbit.
The sun was fadi
ng fast, the luminous western sun turning a cirrus-rumpled horizon into a bouquet of orange and purple. The park would be shutting down, animals turned out to pasture before tomorrow’s performance. Nautilus turned to the strange building at the far south edge of the park, the lone and slender tower strident against the pastel sky. What did the pastor from Mobile do every day in a tall and rickety-looking structure on the scruffy edge of a Christian theme park?
Maybe a little ride was in order. Some air to clear his head.
Nautilus drove past a small motel down the road, nondescript, two wings of rooms with scarred doors facing toward the road, one wing obviously closed, the windows boarded. The other – a half-dozen rooms – seemed open. A station wagon sat outside one room. There were trash cans in the lot, refuse piled to the top. The small swimming pools still held water. Someone was still making money from the place. The sign, unlit, said River’s Bend Lodge, though whatever river once there had probably been diverted to make way for the park.
Nautilus continued until seeing the turnoff to the structure, unmarked save for a Private Property sign. He pulled down the road a quarter-mile, past a bend that would hide him from the highway. A tingling crawled across the pit of his belly.
Just a quick look. Was it possible?
Probably. With a proper subterfuge.
Nautilus drove another quarter-mile past another lane branching to the south. He followed it to a dead end of sand and scrub brush and an old dumping ground, rusting appliances, old tires, molding cardboard. The fast-food bags and scattered beer cans suggested the locale was a party spot, local teens, probably. He climbed atop the Hummer and got his bearings. He couldn’t see the structure for the trees, but the thrusting cross of the park gave him an orientation.
He paused and thought, then nodded at a decision made.
Daylight fading fast, Nautilus upended an old washing machine, finding a rubber input hose inside. He pulled his pocketknife and cut it off inside the metal connectors, almost a meter of hose. His next step was piling together some small lengths of lumber, dried and brittle cardboard, and tossing a tire atop it.
He opened the fuel cap on the Hummer and dipped the tube inside, putting his thumb over the end before retracting it. It gave him a few ounces of gasoline, all he needed. He held the tube over his pile of refuse and lifted his thumb. Finally, he pulled out his lighter and touched the edge of the assemblage, a soft whump as the gasoline turned into bright flames.
He resumed driving and headed toward the structure, pulling to the guardhouse as a lone security guy exited, hand up in halt. It was the same guy Nautilus had seen when dropping Owsley off.
“This is a private road, you can’t … oh, it’s you. Harry, is it? Whaddaya want?”
“I was driving back to the motel and saw smoke from the woods. Far side of the enclosure. Don’t know if it’s park property over there.”
“It is. Restricted.”
Nautilus did nonchalant. “Yeah, well, I thought you should know, we both being in the protection biz and all.”
In the distance a trickle of black smoke climbed into the windless sky.
The guard scowled. “What you think’s causing it?”
Nautilus shrugged. “I’m just a driver.”
“Shit. I should probably check it out. But I’m not supposed to leave here.”
Nautilus nodded. “I hope it’s not some kind of forest fire starting up. Do you think the wind’s blowing this way?”
The guard looked between Nautilus and the smoke, now almost lost against the darkened sky.
“Be right back.”
The guy jumped in the security van and roared down the road. Nautilus gave it a five count, then slipped into the guardhouse, one door outside the gate, the other inside. He saw the lock control pad, pressed Open. Nautilus entered the inner compound, moving quickly over the fifty feet to the door of the towering metal structure. The entry door beside the huge equipment door wasn’t locked, the guardhouse the main protection. The door opened to darkness and Nautilus pulled an LED penlight from his pocket, scanning the area inside the door and finding a bank of switches.
He pushed the door shut and flicked the first two. The nearest half of the room illuminated, the lighting dim, most of the space in shadow. Nautilus started to flick on the other switches but caught himself … what if one turned on outside lights?
And whatever was in here, he just needed to know why everything seemed as hush-hush as Oak Ridge in 1943. He glanced at his watch: Ninety seconds elapsed. As his eyes adjusted to the low illumination, shapes emerged from the dark: Heavy-duty welding equipment, a forklift, a stack of heavy stud-link chain, the kind used in ship anchors. A track ran the length of the floor. At the far end of the building, deep in shadow, stood a heavy-duty crane body. Beside it, in section, the boom waited, not yet assembled.
Whatever needs lifting here, it’s big.
Nautilus checked his watch: two minutes gone. He had maybe five. Nautilus scanned the penlight over the area. It was too small to penetrate the depth, so he strode forward while beaming it toward the walls and corners.
There … huge-ass boxes.
In a far corner sat a quartet of wooden containers, duplicates of the one that had come on the semi. They were about twenty feet long and eight wide, a fourth box as long, but only six feet in width and breadth. Checking his watch – two and a half minutes – Nautilus jogged the dirt floor to the containers, dodging wiring and debris scattered over the floor. The massive boxes were two feet taller than he stood, three of them bolted shut. But the smaller one was lidless, its top leaning against the corrugated wall. Still, it was too high to peer into.
Nautilus saw a meter-square crate a dozen feet away labeled Brackets-1025-M - 10-count. Nautilus pulled it to the container, glancing at his watch: Three and a half minutes gone.
Nautilus jumped atop the crate, leaned into the yawning opening and shone his penlight inside.
40
The jezebel had made a mistake, Frisco Dredd thought, sitting in his van on the downtown Miami street. Maybe it was because she lived just a few blocks from the hotel where she was now doing filthy and unspeakable things to a man, but she had parked her little red car in a lot two blocks away.
No taxi tonight. No stepping from the bright lights of a hotel with people on the street or looking out from restaurant windows. She had driven her own little car and parked it in a lot two blocks away. A lot that had but two lights, one now gone from a single shot with Dredd’s Crosman CO2 pellet gun, the same one that had knocked out streetlamps along the stretch of road Teresa Mailey would travel.
Tick was the only sound the rifle made, and half of the lot went dark. The rest was just the waiting.
Dredd’s hand drifted to his shirt, making sure the top three buttons were undone. Jesus needed to see why the vixen had to be punished.
Harry Nautilus stared into the box, perplexed. Before him was the front segment of a rocket: four feet in width, tapering over its fifteen or so feet of length to a rounded point. It was burnished on the outer surface, sleek and beautiful and almost serene, like a Brancusi “Bird in Space” sculpture.
Nautilus aimed the light toward the tapered end, as round as an orange. He checked his watch: Four minutes gone. He startled to a horn honking stridently in the distance and retreated across the floor to the lights, retracing his route.
By the time the guard returned, Nautilus was sitting on his hood, drumming his thigh and whistling Ellington’s “Take the A Train”. He gave the guard a what’s-up eyebrow as the man jumped from the vehicle.
“Kids drinking, I expect. Found a buncha beer cans and trash. They’d built a fire. There’s over a hundred acres of scrub out there, old roads crisscrossing, and all sorts of drinkin’ and make-out spots. They musta seen me coming and took off. I flat-out mashed that horn to let ’em know I saw ’em.”
“That’s the way to handle it,” Nautilus said, thinking, What a yokel.
“Anyway, thanks, buddy. I’m
gonna tell the honchos they gotta block off that side road.”
“Have a good one.”
Nautilus faked a disinterested yawn and climbed into the Hummer. Twenty minutes later, back in his digs, he grabbed a beer and sat on his balcony, staring toward the dark building.
A rocket in a biblical theme park? It made no sense. Illogical from every angle.
Conclusion: not a rocket. Something that resembled a rocket. Theme park, tapering, pointed steel assembly. Welding equipment. Tracks in the floor. A big-ass crane waiting to lift heavy pieces into place.
It was a ride. Some kind of monorail maybe. No, given the twin tracks, a train … a sleek aerodynamic train. Or … was it the front segment of some newfangled roller-coaster, the hoist waiting to build the support system?
That made sense.
But so did a restaurant, like the Gatlinburg or Seattle space needles, the elongated cone in the building forming the spire atop the restaurant. That made sense as well.
Whatever it is, Nautilus told himself, it had something to do with a ride or a restaurant and, like everything else in the strange land of Hallelujah Jubilee, was created to inform, entertain, and make money.
Nautilus blew out a breath. He’d risked his job to discover the park’s next big audience attraction. He put his feet up on the railing and leaned back, looking out over the pasture behind the motel. There, four hundred feet away, an elephant grazed slowly in the moonlight, beside it a donkey and a dromedary camel, off from their shifts in Ark Land. The camel lifted its head and called across the fields, a quivering moan that seemed to linger unnaturally long, as if trapped inside the air.
Though the night was warm, Nautilus suppressed a shiver.
Two hundred bucks a day, he reminded himself.
41
Roland Uttleman sat in the dimly lit kitchen of the Schrum house reading a medical text. The project was in the increasingly capable hands of Richard Owsley, soon to have his own program on the Crown of Glory network, an electronic store, so to speak, where he could sell taped sermons, books, branded bibles, tout upcoming live appearances. Owsley would soon be living the life he espoused, Paradise on Earth. Manna from every direction, including Eliot Winkler, who had more manna than Croesus.
