“Will you just back off?” she shouted.
Copperwaite gasped and backed away as she had asked.
The message had been ripped and torn and parts of it were down the drain on the floor where it had splattered.
“We may have to exhume the other bodies to have a clearer look at this,” she pointedly said to Sharpe. Then Jessica turned to Dr. Raehael and said, 'Take a few photos of what remains of the wording, Doctor.”
The little Egyptian nodded, his mouth agape, displaying good teeth.
“O'Donahue's tongue can't be intact after all this time. Maybe Coibby, but I doubt it,” Schuller thought openly and loudly. “Soft tissue decay.”
“Coibby then!” Jessica firmly replied. “We've got to know what we're chasing after in the dark, and this, gentlemen, is the first bit of light we've had. It may prove a false light, but for now, it behooves us to treat it as a divine light, a gift.”
“Right you are, Doctor,” agreed Sharpe. “If the others have this same mark on their tongues, then it originated, most likely, with the killer. I shall see to the exhumation order personally.”
Shouldn 't have released the damned bodies to begin with, Jessica thought. The thought colored her features, but she withstood the desire to throw it into Schuller's now less than smug face. “As for me, I'd like to find that hotel room you promised, Inspector Sharpe. Get some rest, maybe a bite.”
“Absolutely. I'll see a car is waiting for you. Doctor.”
With that, Jessica tore from the postmortem room, ripping her surgical mask and gown away, tossing them into a large, green hamper. Her mind played over the possible single clue left them by the killer. The words Mihi beata mater reverberated in a chant, a tight, enticing, rhythmic chant.
-SEVEN -
Evil originates not in the absence of guilt but in the attempt to escape from it.
—M. Scott Peck, People of the Lie
The walls dulled all reverberation of the aboveground evening traffic that filtered down to them as a strange lilting chant resonating through the ancient stones, creating its own tone, pitch, note, and timbre. Even the walls chanted, remembering the words Mihi beata mater.... Theirs was a cave below the beleaguered city of London, a rat's den, yet a holy place where they might practice their special brand of religion unharmed and unrestrained. They were in complete safety from blind humanity above who went about their regimented lives like ants without question of time or space or God or soul. It was a place cool in summer and warm in winter, a place where only the sacred tred, where nothing profane nor evil could step one single foot before being smote into ash, so predicted their leader who had painstakingly sought out and found this place.
“Hear the walls?” he often asked. For here, the walls spoke a clear oommmmmm, oommmmmm, oommmmmm that never stopped, no more than the trickling water sounds could be stopped. Lately, the walls reverberated with the three words Mihi beata mater, Mihi beata mater, Mihi beata mater. . . .
The walls bled water that seeped in from the streets of London above the ancient, Roman-built catacombs where they met in secret ceremony. The walls became slick and mirror like in their wetness, the evening rains above finding them. The ancient walls told stories, spoke of Roman conquest, of debauchery and defilement, of a time when Christians had been slaughtered here, further making this place sacrosanct. The walls might as well run with blood as with God's tears, their leader had more than once declared.
“Why are we beseeched so? Why are we tested so? Why, Oh Precious One? Why do You make me blind that I will not know, but must accept all Holy Writ on faith and faith alone?” he preached aloud to those who followed him, in the makeshift chapel, where an ancient altar of thick, coarse oak, and an equally ancient cross of the same wood, stood as sturdy props—the only holy props aside from the torches and the branding fire that awaited use again. “Why are we tested so?” he repeated, his words like thunder.
“Offer us hope!” cried out one among the congregation.
Their leader looked out on his small following, which was dwindling with each new meeting. There appeared less than forty who would step over into the true millennium with him and the newfound Christ.
“Send Thy divine message through this wretched vessel, so that others might also accept Your grace and reckoning,” he continued. “Be not dismayed at our weaknesses, our failings, and give us Thy strength. If not in numbers then give it to us in power—the divine power that is You, Lord Jehovah.” He slavered at the mouth with his pronouncement.
The others wore the robes of monks—robes he had secured for them—their faces covered in hoods like cowls, and each looked up in solemn wonder at the depth of their leader's passion, his compassion and his faith. Each thought: He must know. He must indeed have the ear of God as no man else.
It made perfect sense, even if on the surface of it they did appear to have failed three times in their attempts at the resurrection of a life, a life which the Son would inveigh with His very own divine presence in the Second Coming, to mark the second millennium—the true millennium. Their leader, a man of worldly knowledge and otherworldly passion, of outward and inward beauty, had said so. He had explained it entirely and utterly to their satisfaction, more than once.
The message went forth clear and concise, a kind of soliloquy in which their humble leader lamented again his choice for the Messiah. “As spiritual father of the collective, believing in all that we do and have done in the name of the Father, I cannot now unbelieve anymore than I can undo the steps we have taken. I accept the wisdom of the Son and the Holy Ghost, believing in all that we have put our blessed trust into.... In Your name, Lord Jehovah, we beseech Thee to guide our darkened path.”
“It is dark indeed!” cried out one of the many.
“Show us the way!” pleaded another from behind closed eyelids.
Their leader had, after Coibby, turned to the well-to-do, bom-again radio personality, Theodore 'Ted” Burton. He had believed beyond any doubt that the man was the Messiah walking. . .. The Messiah, walking the Earth incognito, begging to be brought out into the light of recognition for all to see. For a time, Burton had looked like, felt like, sounded like, smelled like, and appeared to be God's Son—the Jew who had renounced Judaism in the name of Christ the Lord.
“Who better than a Jew to become Jesus, who was, after all, a Jew?” he'd instructed them back then.
“We all did love Burton for the part,” he reminded his congregation now. “For his having renounced Judaism and his embracing the true church. But in the end. Burton proved an even greater disappointment than the two previous sacrifices. What say you, my followers? Is it not time to select a new Messiah?”
He looked out over his diminished flock, and it—they— seemed to be disappearing, vanishing before his eyes. One here, one there ... They appeared defeated, tired, shriveled, atrophied as a group. They looked old, worn, frustrated, yet wanting guidance and reassurances. A fleeting thought beamed through the electrochemical network of his brain: He wondered if he were not they, and if they were not he, all in all, one in the same? Mannequins in a mindless world of chance and hallucination, smoke and mirrors, none of it real, none of it under the control of any universal power, more chaotic than Alice's Wonderland. But even as the thought formed in his head, he banished it with a more pious and self-recriminating one: How dare I exhault myself above the others, to stand here at this altar over their heads while they keep dropping off? Dying from view. I can't walk among them anymore, can't truly touch them ever again, so separate have I become. I, too, have vanished, and I, too, am weary of this tired world, but I have been called on, and I must heed His call to find the fourth Messiah.
Then it occurred to him: as a sea washes a lovely starfish to one's feet, so the idea came floating from an unseen hand. And it fit. It made perfect sense that God's Son would be a matrix of human qualities, that no single human posssessed them all. That in crucifying the others they had in fact created a kind of bank, a
holding place, for all of the virtues Christ must have for the Second Coming.
Now he must determine when, where, and how to best explain this new revelation to his followers. The simple poetic vision, the simplicity of the truth alone, must be seen by the others as Divine Intervention. He raised the blood of Christ to his lips and drank a toast to the beauty of it all, the perfect syncopation of a plan that he'd taken on blind faith but was now coming into full-blown focus.
The York proved absolutely gorgeous, a fabulous place to stay, and the plush bed that Jessica slept in had allowed for a good night's rest. Dining in the breakfast nook overlooking the Victoria Gardens proved so relaxing that she almost forgot why she had come to London. She cursed the fact that she did not have time to see the sights, to breathe in the history and romance of this ancient city. Her limited time here would be wrapped up with the dark underbelly of London and the bleakness of forensic work, the evil at hand, the evil destroying the peace, an evil staining all the beauty.
On arriving at the hotel in late afternoon the day before, after her Burton autopsy, she'd walked out to the spot where Copperwaite and Sharpe had first encountered Katherine O'Donahue's naked body. In fact, Stuart Copperwaite, who had gallantly escorted her to the York Hotel, had offered to also accompany her to the Victoria Gardens Embankment. Below the bridge stumbled the same drunken bridgeman, who had frightened off the Crucifier and had run over the “evidence.” He foolishly waved at them as they searched the crime scene.
Jessica walked the path most likely taken by the Crucifier. Copperwaite and Sharpe had shrewdly assessed where the killer's “transport”—as they called his car—had most likely been parked so as to draw no attention. Copperwaite pointed out the spot. He also pointed out the likely trail where the body was carried toward water's edge before being dropped when the bridgeman's headlights surprised and frightened the killer or killers. No footprint impressions had been found as just enough rain fell in those hours before dawn to obliterate human tracks. Copperwaite explained, “But tire tracks were found and impressions taken that night. Unfortunately, the impressions matched literally hundreds of thousands of tires used in England, and so long as there remains no suspect, we have no suspect car to match impressions to.”
As she'd walked with Copperwaite last night, Jessica had asked, “How long have you and Sharpe been partners?”
“Not long at all, actually.” Copperwaite reminded her of Hugh Grant with some girth. He wore a perpetual, sly grin. “Sharpie lost his last partner in a gun battle over some drugs filtering in from Algiers. Nasty bit of luck. Then I come on with him, almost a month after. It's been two years now.”
“You seem awfully—I don't know—alike?”
“Alike? Sharp and me? Ha! As different as chalk and cheese, we are.”
“Close, then. You seem close.”
“Aye, that we are. Have to be close in every way, now don't we? Have to know the habits, the good and bad of one another to put your life in another's hands, you see. Isn't it done the same in your country?”
“Yes, very much so.”
“Sharpie's one of the best, if not the best. Ought to have had Boulte's job, you see, but then, you know how it goes. Over here, we have a saying 'bout that.”
She smiled knowingly but said, “Oh? And what's that?”
“Buggin's turn, we call it.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning every fool is given a turn at a job until all the fools have been exhausted. Meaning Sharpe was unfairly treated, and Boulte was promoted in order to demonstrate the height of stupidity in the Yard, to demonstrate Boulte's special brand of awe-inspiring incompetence.”
“I get your meaning.”
“You read what the Times had to say about our flaming Boulte? They're right on, they are. The man's a clot, a bloody, blinking, ballying, flipping, flaming, ruddy bastard! And he's a clawback as well, he is.”
“A 'clawback'?”
'Toady, I suppose you'd say. Claw at your backside as it were.”
She wondered what Boulte had done to deserve Copperwaite's total disdain. “Can you say that again, in its entirety, from the beginning?” she asked. “About Boulte. It sounded so resonant.”
They laughed. Jessica turned to stare out across at the majestic Thames that wound its shimmering, ribbonlike self about the palacelike structures on either embankment. Sightseeing boats and ferries dotted the water. The sunshine and surroundings defied the fact of anyone's having been murdered here, and she said as much to Stuart. Copperwaite handily replied, “Curly it was, awfully curly that dark morning we come on her.”
“Curly?”
“Awful gruesome, mum, Doctor. You can't imagine, seeing those bloodied hands, the gaping holes through 'em.”Jessica and Copperwaite walked back to the York where he had tea and she coffee with crumpets. Tired, she had said good night to Stuart in the lobby.
That had been last night. This morning, Jessica had taken the London Times, left at her door, down to breakfast with her, and read the lambasting given the Yard for having done nothing visible about the murdering Crucifier and for allowing the monster to roam freely through the streets of London. In a scathing attack on the steps—or lack of steps—taken by Scotland Yard, sidebar photos of the dead victims posed in life and in death framed the story. A reporter named Culhertson tore into Chief Inspector Paul Boulte as being unable to “rise to the level of competence.” She thought the quote sounded suspiciously like something that might have come out of Copperwaite's mouth.
“The only ray of hope in all of this horror,” wrote Erin Culbertson, “is that Inspector Richard Sharpe is leading the investigation and has wisely brought on a well-known forensic specialist, Dr. Jessica Coran, from the FBI, America.” After this, Culbertson listed Jessica's previous wins, ignoring all the losses, many of which were supremely personal losses accumulated over a life given to chasing such abhorrent creatures as the Crucifier.
She walked the short distance to the Yard, enjoying the beauty of London along the way, feeling somewhat overwhelmed and yet fulfilled here on her second day at Scotland Yard.
On entering the building, Jessica found herself immediately besieged by the duty sergeant with a message. Having left an overseas E-mail address for the Yard with J. T., she felt not at all surprised to electronically hear from John Thorpe. Informed of the transmission and directed where to go in order to read her E-mail and respond, she found herself alone in a vast array of computers manned by computer drones. J. T.'s transmission read:
Wish you all the best of British luck over there, and you know how lucky the British are, right? Right. Currently, having some difficulty tracking down the artist who did the fantastic artwork on our dear friend Horace the Tattoo Man, but have found someone who actually recognizes the art and artist, a so-called cutting-edge artist in the field a fellow named Jurgen Dykes, who takes his inspiration from a mentor named Kyle Winterbome, who takes his inspiration from H. R. Giger, whom everyone knows from the Alien trilogy of movies, his artwork famous the world over. Fantastic stuff in every sense of the word.
She electronically replied:
At least now you know the name of the artist. You can begin to track him down. Have you a location on Dykes?
She didn't expect a ready answer, realizing that J. T. was not likely out of bed yet, given the hour in America, much less at his computer terminal awaiting a reply from her.
She continued to read the remainder of his message:
Last known location of the artist somewhere in upstate New York and Florida before that, but he appears to have vanished off the face of the Earth. Will continue to investigate. Have plenty of help from division.
Jessica typed in an addendum to her earlier question, and then she looked it over for correctness and clarity. It read:
So far, here, J. T., it's not going so well with the Crucifier case, either. Please, keep me informed of your progress there, and I will do the same from here regarding our case at
the Yard.
Jessica took in a great breath of air and signed off, hoping the best for J. T. and the strange case of Tattoo Man, when she looked up to find Inspector Richard Sharpe coming directly for her. He held an enervating glint in his eye and a sly turn to his lip.
“They told me I'd find you here. Is all well in the States? Hope you found the York to your liking.”
“Yes to all three questions, and how are you this morning?” He seemed in a fantastic mood. She wondered what had brought it about.“I've been better. The Times article has Boulte on my backside, I'm afraid. The least of my worries, however, the least.”
Jessica guessed that seeing Boulte made red in the face had done the job for Sharpe, and that even as Boulte lit into him for lack of progress on the case, Sharpe enjoyed seeing the man out of control.
Sharpe continued, almost chipper. “I understand you had a go-round the O'Donahue site with Stuart last evening?”
“Yes, I had ... a go-round, yes.”
“Anything strike you?”
“Nothing that will change the opinion of the Times, or help you with Boulte, no.”
He shook his head and frowned. “Politics, really. Has no bloody place in the Yard, but then it's endemic now, actually. They wouldn't know how to ran the place without politics.”
“The press pushes buttons here like they do in America. A strong force.”
He shrugged this off. “Culbertson's a friend. She rather prints what I feed her, rather dislikes Boulte for good reason. He treats her like an anaconda.”
“Is she?”
“In some sense, yes, she is.”
“How well do you know her?”
'Too well, some would suggest.”
“Boulte, you mean?” She wondered if the reporter woman had slept with Sharpe, either figuratively or literally.
His half smile answered her unasked question. “You are a quick study, aren't you, Doctor?”
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