My nerves stretched taut, listening to him. I had always thought of him as one of the sanctimonious ones, one of the priests most prone to judging others. Like I had in other matters, I now realized, I had misjudged him.
He sighed. “And now this. I can tell you this now, Jason, and your mentor was the only other man in the world I’ve admitted it to… I never believed in demonic possession. I’d keep quiet when my superiors would talk about it, but inside I always thought it was superstition. Overreaction. I never believed…”
“Was the incident with Casey Hartman what changed your thinking?”
He looked at me then. “You really want to know this?”
I nodded, though I wasn’t totally certain I did. The medicine they’d administered was nauseating me, and I was in dire need of a drink. I wanted to ask Father Patterson for one, but I sensed there was something in his words I needed to hear, whether I wanted to or not.
Still looking at me, he said, “I thought you killed Peter Sutherland.”
Oh my God, I thought. Oh my God.
A smile played at his lips. “Didn’t expect that, did you?”
“No,” I said. With an effort, I stopped shy of screaming.
“But now… now it all makes a weird kind of sense. The demon goes into Casey, Sutherland exorcises the demon. The demon enters Sutherland, and he leaps through the window to put an end to it.” He paused, frowning. “The demon then entered the nearest body,” he went on. “That was you. You tried to keep it a secret, but in the end, it became too much. Things came to a head in the tunnels, and then…”
“Did you see Malephar?”
He scowled and looked at the door. “Don’t call it that. Don’t give that thing a name.”
I sat up in bed, little beads of sweat breaking out on my skin. “You did, didn’t you? You saw—”
“I suspected strongly when you skewered yourself with that letter opener,” he said. “I wasn’t sure until I was in the reservoir.”
“What did you see?”
“Not a lot, thank God. It was way under the water by the time I reached you. But…”
“You still saw it?”
He hesitated. “I saw something. It was really big. Bigger than me, at least.” He looked at me for confirmation. I nodded. “It had… what, glowing red eyes?”
I nodded again.
He barked out a harsh laugh. “See, it’s crazy stuff. Horror movies and monsters and…” He frowned, sipped his tea. “And yet I saw it. I know I did.”
My throat was bone dry, but I had to get his opinion. Now that Peter Sutherland was dead, no one’s opinion mattered more.
Well, maybe Liz’s.
I hadn’t spoken to her yet, and as far as I knew, she hadn’t called or visited, which I took for a very bad sign.
I asked, “Do you think we’re in danger?”
When he didn’t answer straightaway, I asked, “Do you think Chicago’s in danger?”
“I don’t know, Jason. I know I’m scared to death of what they’ll find if that reservoir ever dries up. Or… what if a workman goes down there? Some poor scuba diver trying to make repairs?”
The prospect chilled me. I imagined the black depths of the reservoir, the oppressive weight of the water. Then a pair of vermilion eyes flashing huge and triumphant at the unsuspecting diver.
“One thing I do know,” he said, “is that the Sweet Sixteen will never kill again.”
“There were two killers,” I reminded him.
He gave me a wry look, studied his tea. “You’re right. I forgot about Raines.” He looked up. “Danny really cut his throat?”
“Does that surprise you?”
He looked like he’d tasted something bitter. “No, I guess not.”
I searched his face. “You jumped in after me.”
He averted his eyes.
“How did you find me?” I asked. “You were out cold.”
“Raines had a flashlight. I got all kinds of blood on my hands, but I found it. Then I just followed your voices and used the flashlight when I had to.”
“You jumped out of the tunnel after me.”
He flapped a hand. “Let’s not make a big thing of it.”
“It is a big thing,” I said, my voice thick. “I would’ve died if you hadn’t saved me. And then you squeezed the water out of me—”
“You didn’t have to puke in my face, you know.”
I laughed, but my eyes were wet. I cleared my throat. “Thanks, Joe.”
He gave me a small smile. Then he sighed. “I should’ve done the same thing for my daughter.” His eyes filled with tears. He gazed out the window across the room. “God, I wish I’d saved her.”
I leaned over, grasped his hand. “You saved me.”
“I’m glad of that, Jason, but…” He closed his eyes. “I wish that were enough.” Then, in a voice almost too quiet to hear, “I miss my little girl.”
He wept then, silently. I kept hold of his hand. We stayed that way for a long time.
¨¨¨
It was Saturday, and Father Patterson was scheduled to conduct Mass. But the events of the night before had taken their toll on him, as had his sleepless vigil by my bedside, which didn’t end until noon that day.
So with Father Sutherland gone, and Father Patterson too weary to speak, it fell to me to lead Mass. It was my first time, reason enough to send my nervousness into high gear. What complicated matters more, however, was the reverence and adulation my peers accorded me. After being discharged from the hospital, I had thought to sneak into my office that midafternoon to collect myself and devote some quiet time to prayer. My faith had grown a great deal over the past week, and I knew I had much to be thankful for.
But I hadn’t even closed the door of my Civic before Father Richards materialized before me, exhibiting twice as much vitality as I’d seen him show in all my years of working with him. “Jason!” he said, his basset hound face alight with joy. “It’s so good to see you well!”
When I didn’t answer, he licked his lips, clapped his hands together and said, “Quite a week, huh? A successful exorcism. A robbery foiled. And then not one, but two murderers brought to justice?”
I gazed up at the cathedral. “Each of those came at a great cost, Father Richards. I don’t think you’re celebratory tone is entirely appropriate.”
Richards frowned, crestfallen. Then, he seemed to pep up again. “Are you all ready for tonight?”
“Tonight?”
“Your sermon,” he explained. “Ever since we changed the name on the sign—you know, ‘Tonight’s message will be provided by Father Jason Crowder’—there’s been a buzz at St. Matthew’s. After what you did at that 7-11, people were practically begging for you to give the Mass.” He bounced on his heels. “Now I guess they get their wish, huh?”
I gave him a surly look and moved up the steps to the cathedral, where I saw the words he had alluded to in the glass-encased sign. The white letters on the black background read exactly as Father Richards had said. Where there was ordinarily a specific message listed, the space was blank.
It occurred to me I had no idea what I was going to speak about tonight.
Meaning to scurry down the hallway so I could hole up in my office for the next several hours, I pushed through the heavy double doors and found myself face-to-face with Sister Rebecca.
I stared at her, at a loss.
She nodded toward the road out front, gave an embarrassed little shrug. “I watched you pull up from my window.”
Though the lion’s share of my affection was still reserved for Liz, I have to confess to being pleased by the girlish way Rebecca was acting. I once heard someone say that age was just a number, and looking at Sister Rebecca’s lovely face, her good-humored grin, I’d never agreed with the sentiment more.
Because I could think of nothing else, I said, “How are you?”
Her face stretched into an incredulous smile. “How am I? My goodness, Jason, the question is, how are you ho
lding up? What a terrible week this has been.”
Her words assuaged my nerves dramatically. Unlike Father Richards, Sister Rebecca wasn’t talking about the events of the past several days like the exploits of some ecclesiastical superhero. She could see the weariness and stress in my face, and she regretted that I had to endure all of it.
“I’m managing,” I said. “But I’m alive. I owe everything to God. And Father Patterson.”
“I’m thankful you both survived.”
“Where is he?” I asked. “His office?”
“The red room,” she said. “He was falling asleep on his feet, so I ordered him to get some rest. He’s been snoozing for a couple hours now.”
“Mind if I check on him?”
“Only if you don’t wake him up.”
Chuckling, I moved past her toward the staircase, but she stayed me with a hand on my shoulder.
“You’re sure you’re okay, Jason?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“You were shot in the side,” she said. “And you nearly drowned.”
“You make it sound more impressive than it was.”
“You stopped them,” she said.
I started to protest, but she squeezed my arm. “You did, Jason. They were stalking Celia Bittner, they were going to do to her what they’d done to the others.”
I shook my head. “Where did you—”
“It’s all over the news,” she said, and I was surprised to see that her eyes were glistening. “Your name hasn’t been released yet, but everybody knows it was you and Father Patterson who followed the killers.” Her voice was thick with emotion. “I know it was you who killed Danny Hartman.”
“I didn’t want to kill anyone.”
“I know,” she said, smiling. “And that’s why I’m so proud of you.”
And before I knew what she was doing, she leaned in and kissed me firmly on the cheek. For a moment, I could smell her breath. Sweet and laced with peppermint. My whole body grew warm.
Then she pulled away, smiled, and released me.
We went our separate ways, a pleasant heaviness weighing me down.
I made my way to the long basement corridor. When I reached the red room door, I carefully turned the knob, not wanting to awaken Father Patterson if he was still sleeping.
He was. I moved into the room and gazed down at him. His color had improved. He didn’t look quite as hardy as he had before our encounter with Officers Hartman and Raines, but he would recover.
I decided it was a good thing that the city didn’t know our identities, at least not yet. It would allow Father Patterson to rest, and I could reestablish a sense of normalcy if given more time.
Yet, inevitably, I realized, the truth would come out. The police had warned us of this in the hospital. The media would descend on the cathedral. Our parishioners would be confused, perhaps even alarmed.
Maybe it would be better if they heard it from me first.
I nodded, realizing exactly what I would speak about tonight. Closing the door noiselessly, I hurried down the hallway and locked myself in my office, where I wrote out my entire sermon.
Chapter Twenty
“Brothers and Sisters in Christ,” I began. It was the way Father Sutherland always opened. “I want to start out by setting the record straight on a number of counts, the first of which involves the rumors about Father Peter Sutherland’s death.”
The pews of St. Matthew’s were filled to capacity. Folding chairs had been added wherever possible to accommodate the parishioners, but even so, there were numerous people crammed in the corners of the sanctuary, standing shoulder-to-shoulder in the back, even peering from the chapel doorway to my right. The choir loft looked so packed that I feared it would collapse on the crowd below. I was nervous, yes, but I knew what I wanted to say, and no amount of jitters would prevent me from speaking the truth.
Or at least most of it.
“Father Sutherland,” I continued, “was an amazing man. A bastion of faith and a pillar of this church.”
Nods and murmurs of assent. Several older ladies in the front pews looked misty-eyed. They had probably harbored secret crushes on my friend, I thought, smiling inwardly.
“And he died in service to God, in service to members of this wonderful congregation.”
A ripple of movement from my left drew my attention, and when I looked that way I saw Liz Hartman seated in the front pew, her children flanking her. I had been so intent on delivering my message that I hadn’t even noticed her presence. I tried to read Liz’s face for signs of malice, but gave up after a moment. There would be time to address matters later. If she was still willing to speak to me.
I couldn’t even meet little Carolyn’s gaze.
I took a breath. “Therefore, when you hear a rumor about Peter Sutherland that portrays him as something other than what he was—kind, loving, patient, brilliant, brave, steadfast, a true fisher of men—crush that rumor for the lie that it is, and in doing so, honor the man who gave his life for Christ, who sacrificed everything to serve Him.”
A smattering of applause and a general wave of approbation.
I continued, my voice growing stronger. “Speaking of rumors.” I paused, swept the crowd with my eyes. “I gather there are a great many rumors about me being bandied about. I would like to set the record straight about those as well.”
Another ripple from the crowd, this one not as boisterous, but even more electric than the prior ones had been. As I studied my notes, I felt the hungry eyes crawling over me, weighing me, comparing what they’d heard about my actions to the man who stood before them.
I muttered a breath prayer and went on. “Concerning that dark night, the night on which our beloved Peter Sutherland lost his life, I did assist in an exorcism, and though Father Sutherland perished as a result of the ceremony, the offending spirit was driven from the host.”
Shocked gasps followed this, a reaction I had expected. After all, why wouldn’t an adherent of the Catholic faith react strongly to the news that a supernatural evil had preyed on a child?
“As I have said, Brothers and Sisters, I was only an assistant in the rite of exorcism. Father Sutherland was responsible for saving the host, and it is to him—and to God—that we should give our thanks.”
More murmurs of assent. My eyes happened upon Sister Rebecca, who was watching me from a side door. I winked at her, eliciting a brighter smile. She nodded and went out.
The murmurs died down. “What happened this week at a local 7-11 is another matter entirely.”
As one, the crowd seemed to lean forward expectantly.
“What occurred in that store was a nightmare and not something I wish to relive.”
A disappointed sigh from some corners of the cathedral.
“But I will say this,” I continued to a quickening of excitement. “The three perpetrators of the convenience store crimes were lost souls who needed, at some point in their lives, someone to intervene. They needed Christ’s love, and though I don’t regret doing what I did to stop the sexual assault of a young woman and what would almost certainly have been further violent crimes inflicted on the innocent people present that night, I do regret that the perpetrators’ hearts were so closed to Christ that they resorted to sadistic behavior rather than seeking shelter in love.”
I could tell that the parishioners were surprised by my direction. Perhaps they had expected a vengeful condemnation of the criminals or a tearful apology for the deaths I had caused, but they clearly hadn’t expected me to express sorrow for the criminals’ waywardness.
“This is why, Brothers and Sisters, I urge us all to renew our dedication to loving our fellow man rather than to despising him. I encourage us all to destroy the barriers that divide us, rather than thickening these walls as though we’re inhabitants of some medieval keep instead of a house of God.” I allowed my eyes to strafe the crowd for emphasis. “The House of Christ is not an elite club. It is open to all, regardless of any diffe
rences, whether they be real or perceived.”
A restless muttering here and there.
I frowned, peered down at the lectern. “Unfortunately, friends, evil does not discriminate either. I am referring, of course, to the unthinkable turmoil that has gripped this fair city during the past several months. I am referring to the Sweet Sixteen Killer.”
All sound in the sanctuary ceased.
I had begun to sweat, not due to the size of the crowd and the avidity of its attention, nor because of the spotlight focused on me. I had selected my words about Danny Hartman and Tyler Raines with care, especially in the case of the former individual, who after all had been a longstanding member of this congregation, as well as a highly respected police officer in the neighborhood, and who had now been unmasked as a serial killer.
Yet I hadn’t considered the fact that Liz and her children might be present. What would she make of this portion of my sermon? Just as importantly, how would Carolyn and Casey feel? To them, their Uncle Danny had been a foundational element in their lives.
My eyes flitted toward the Hartmans, and again I toyed with the notion of scrapping this section. Hadn’t they endured enough already? Liz had suffered through the demonic possession of her son, physical abuse at the hands of the demon, heard terrible revelations about her husband, seen her entire existence irrevocably altered. And now one of the few people in whom she’d placed her trust had proven to be the fiend responsible for seven savage murders.
But Liz was strong. And there was the central issue of my involvement with the case. As selfish as this sounds, I knew I could never move forward with my life if the shadow of the killings still hung over me in any way.
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