Under the Beetle's Cellar

by Mary Willis Walker

  Today NPR’s Lyle Baker was interviewing Thelma Bassett, the mother of one of the hostage children. Mrs. Bassett had emerged as the informal spokesperson for the parents. Molly had seen her interviewed several times on the TV news. As she listened to the soft twang, Molly could picture her—a rawboned young woman with limp pinkish hair and freckled milky skin. From photographs, it looked as if her eleven-year-old daughter, Kimberly, had inherited the same pink hair. Thelma Bassett was saying that she had asked the FBI to let her and some of the other parents talk to Samuel Mordecai directly. But the FBI had put her off, explaining that their highly trained hostage-negotiating team was currently in the middle of some extremely delicate discussions, and this was not the time for amateurs to get involved.

  “Now, I know,” Thelma Bassett drawled, “that Mr. Lattimore and the gentlemen in charge out there at Jezreel are the professionals, and I know they’ve been working real hard, night and day, to try to help our children. But it has been forty-six days, Mr. Baker, and we parents are craving some word of our babies. I’m just an average citizen, you know, a working woman, a mother, but I believe if I had the chance to talk to Mr. Mordecai from a mother’s heart, I might have an inside track at swaying him some.”

  Molly had always been amazed at how fearless and articulate average citizens could be when they spoke to the media, and Mrs. Bassett was one of the best, natural and persuasive.

  “Mrs. Bassett, what would you say to Samuel Mordecai if the FBI did let you speak to him?” Lyle Baker asked.

  “Well, Mr. Baker, first of all I’d tell him how much we parents miss our young ones and how much we love them. Now, I’ve read that Samuel Mordecai had a difficult childhood, that his mother had lots of problems and he was raised by his grandmother. I’m sure sorry about that. Also, I don’t believe he has any children of his own, so maybe he hasn’t had the opportunity to understand how much we parents love our children and how devastated we are without them. He may not know that we can’t sleep at night wondering … worrying that—” She choked, as if she’d suddenly gotten something caught in her throat. There were several ticks of silence before she resumed. “We haven’t seen them or heard their voices in all this time and … we don’t even know whether …”

  In his smooth radio voice, Lyle Baker said, “Tell us a little about Kimberly.”

  “Oh, my,” said Thelma Bassett, “Kimberly. Well, she’s eleven now, in the fifth grade, doing real well, especially in language arts, you know—what they call reading and writing these days. She’s had some trouble with mathematics—long division, fractions, but then so did I. It’s in the genes maybe.” She let out a half-laugh which choked off abruptly.

  After some deep breaths, she began again. “Now, all I’m asking for is a chance to speak to him. I believe that sometimes experts like the negotiators who are out there talking on their phones all the time, I believe they can lose sight of some of the emotions involved, and I believe that’s what I could add here—I could talk emotions to Mr. Mordecai. I’d like to tell him that I don’t know about all this apocalypse business—I’ll leave that to him, and to God—but I do know that it’s not right to separate children from their parents. Even if the world was ending it’s not right. Especially if the world was ending.”

  “And there are the health problems the Benderson boy has,” the interviewer said.

  “Yes. That is definitely something I want to talk to Mr. Mordecai about—the little boy, Joshua Benderson, who suffers from asthma. I believe if Mr. Mordecai knew how dangerous his condition is, to be without his medication, and in a stressful situation to boot, well, I believe he would let Joshua come out right now.

  “Now, what I really want”—her voice turned tougher, matter-of-fact—“is not just to talk on the phone, but to walk into that compound today, and talk face to face with Mr. Mordecai. I don’t fear for my own safety. I would be happy to release the government and everybody else from any responsibility for me—I’d sign anything. All I want, Mr. Baker, is to walk in there, just as a private citizen, a mother. I want to talk to Samuel Mordecai. I want to see Kim and the other children. Kim’s best friend, Lucy, is in there, too, and her parents are so broke down with grief and worry they don’t leave their house any more.

  “All I want is to see them, to try to help, or, if worse comes to worst … I want to be there with them at the end, to share their fate, whatever it is.”

  Molly felt the woman’s anguish right down to her toenails.

  Even the interviewer sounded choked up as he thanked her and said that the FBI spokesman, Patrick Lattimore, had not been available to comment to the press about Mrs. Bassett’s offer.

  Molly turned off Rio Grande into the parking garage and squinted up into the shadows. She hated parking garages and avoided them whenever possible. This one was the worst—dark and so low-ceilinged she felt the need to hunch her head down into her shoulders every time she drove through. A loud fan unit made an unpleasant racket, and the ramp curved upward so sharply that twice she had scraped the tail of her pickup. If there had been any other possible place to park near the office, she would never set foot in this garage.

  She pulled into her reserved space and took the elevator to a suite on the third floor where Lone Star Monthly had recently moved its offices, having come up in the world from the old second-floor walk-up on Brazos. Molly hated the new office because it had a marble lobby and elevators that made you feel you should be wearing panty hose.

  On her desk lay a stack of phone messages and a manila folder with the name Walter Demming typed on the tab. Molly sat down and opened it. On top was the UPI photograph that had been in the Patriot the day after the bus had been taken by the Jezreelites. It showed a thick-chested middle-aged man dressed in a white T-shirt and jeans. He wore wire-rimmed glasses, and his graying hair was pulled back into a stubby ponytail. A solid-looking man, dependable. For the kids’ sake, she hoped so.

  Under his photo were small school-type photos of five of the children smiling self-consciously into the camera. Molly resisted reading their names and ages. She didn’t want to get involved with them.

  Before she could read the file, the phone rang.

  She picked it up. “Molly Cates.”

  “Hello, my dear, Sister Addie here.” The voice was so sweet and positive, so sugary, that each time she heard it, Molly’s first impulse was to hang up. There was no way she could have anything in this world in common with the owner of such a voice. “Hey, Addie,” she said. “Any luck?”

  “Finally. It took some doing, but I found him. He just got back from a year’s sabbatical, studying prophecy in Jerusalem. That’s why I hadn’t been able to get him. I found him at home, unpacking. Crotchety and jet-lagged.”

  “Did you ask him about it?”

  “I surely did. He’d heard the news over there, but only the bare outlines of it.”

  “Is he the one?”

  “Yes. His run-in with Mr. Mordecai was several years back at the Southwest Prophecy Conference, but it’s a real sore subject with him and he hates to talk about it. Also, he’s scared, says Mordecai threatened him.”

  “Did you tell him he needs to get in touch with the FBI negotiators?”

  “Yes, but he resisted. He doesn’t much like the federal government.”

  “Neither do I. I hope you leaned on him.”

  “Oh, yes. I said if he didn’t call them today and volunteer this information, I’d do it. He’s just the sort the FBI ought to be talking with, not those Harvard Ph.D. theologians they’ve been consulting. Mr. Mordecai is light-years away from any mentality those consultants can get inside of. What they need is a Gerald Asquith.”

  “Isn’t he a Ph.D., too?”

  Addie laughed. “I believe his degree is an honorary one from the West Central Texas Bible College, or some such. I doubt he went to college. He’s the kind of fundamentalist preacher the negotiators need if they’re going to get into the mind-set of a Samuel Mordecai. Asquith despises Mordecai, but h
e’s much closer to him in worldview than those intellectuals who have been advising them. Closer to the lunatic fringe.”

  “Did you ask him about this Rapture of Mordecai business?”

  There was a long silence, during which Molly could hear the click of knitting needles. “Maybe it’s better for you to talk to Dr. Asquith yourself, sister, rather than have me filter it through my misperceptions and bad hearing.”

  Molly felt it—the pulsing of hot dread she’d had in her chest since this thing began. “You don’t want to be the bearer of bad news.”

  “My dear, I’m accustomed to bearing a great deal of bad news—unfortunately. It’s not that. It’s just—” She stopped.

  Molly was not about to let her get off the hook. “It’s just what?”

  “Well, you know how I am. A woman of ignorant and superstitious leanings. I guess I just don’t want to form these particular words. You see I have this … Oh, I should tell it to a shrink, sister, not burden you with it.”

  “Go ahead. Burden me.”

  “Dr. Asquith says the Rapture of Mordecai is a secret oral tradition passed from one Mordecai to the next. They all have visions—that’s what they call the rapture, and their doctrine they call the Heaven in Earth Vatic Gospel of the Jezreelite. It’s never been written down. It’s forbidden to write it down. Samuel Mordecai believes he is the latest and the last of this line.”

  “What is the doctrine, Addie?”

  “I don’t know, and if Dr. Asquith knows, he’s not saying. But it has something to do with the need for human action in starting the Apocalypse.”

  “What sort of action?”

  “Dr. Asquith says only the prophets in the direct line know, but that it’s heresy and gives prophecy a bad name. He says Mordecai makes his religion up as he goes. He drafted a bill of censure to get Mordecai censured by the Council of Bible Prophecy, and that’s the flap I was remembering.”

  “Did the Council censure him?”

  “No. Mordecai resigned from the Council before they took it up. That’s why they don’t have a record. Dr. Asquith says Mordecai is a dangerous extremist, and that is impressive coming from a man who preaches that earthquakes are the result of gay rights demonstrations. If Mordecai hadn’t resigned, Asquith would have pursued him to the ends of the earth, he says.”

  “Well, sounds like Dr. Asquith has some spine. It’s a good thing somebody does.”

  “My dear girl, give yourself a break. The world is chock-full of little pockets of wickedness and nitwittery, like boils just waiting to break open and spill out their poison. You and I, because of what we do, see more of these boils than folks usually do. So we know they are there, but, sister, we are just frail creatures of very limited vision. We have no way of predicting which ones will burst open and which will not.”

  Molly glanced down at the newspaper photos of Walter Demming and the five children. One of them was a very small dark-haired boy with a cowlick standing straight up like a patch of weeds. Bucky DeCarlo, age six. “Oh, Addie. I knew this particular boil was festering. I had a strong hunch it would break. But I let it go.”

  “Molly, my dear. You couldn’t have known. If you feel responsible for the actions of every lunatic you’ve ever met, you’ll go crazy yourself. What did you decide at your meeting? Are you going to write about this?”

  “Yes.”

  The click of the needles stopped. “I wonder if that is the best thing for you.”

  “I don’t know, Addie. I wonder, too. My editor thinks this is the story I’ve been preparing to write all my life.”

  “Well, maybe so. Maybe so. But what we prepare for in this life is not always what we ought to be doing. Now, I don’t know what’s right for you, my dear, but when I see a friend burst into tears when the television news comes on, it makes me think—”

  “I was tired. I watch the news all the time without crying, Addie.”

  “Well, I’m sure you do. But I suspect you might need some time off. How about a rest at our church retreat in the hill country?”

  “Thanks, Addie, maybe when I finish this. Is there any hope Dr. Asquith has anything in writing about this Rapture of Mordecai stuff?”

  “He says he’ll look for the notes he used to write the bill of censure. But remember, this was maybe seven years ago.”

  “I’d like to call him, Addie.”

  “I know. I told him and he said he’d be doing his radio show tonight—Prophecies in the Media. You should listen to it sometime. Station KLTX at seven.”

  After Addie gave her Gerald Asquith’s phone number, Molly hung up and sat back in her chair thinking about the next step. She looked at the file on her desk. Under the picture, there was just one sheet with a few typed lines giving the Austin address for a man named Jacob Alesky, who was an old friend of Walter Demming, a buddy from Vietnam. Molly stuck the folder in her briefcase. She’d follow that up this afternoon if time permitted, but for now she needed to force herself to do what she had been putting off. She needed to get out her two-year-old taped interview with Samuel Mordecai and listen to it. To refresh her memory so she could try to get back inside his head—something no one in her right mind would do willingly. But here she was, about to do it.

  She found on her key ring the small brass key that opened her desk file drawer. Inside were boxes of neatly labeled and dated audiotapes—all the interviews she had done over the ten years she had worked for Lone Star Monthly. Writers were required to keep notes and tapes for only two years, but she held on to hers much longer. Her hand went immediately to the ones she was looking for—the ones marked Samuel Mordecai I and Samuel Mordecai II. She put them on the desk and then rummaged through her bag for the tiny Sony recorder that she always carried. Before she found it, her phone rang again.

  It was Stephanie in the front office. “There’s a Thelma Bassett here to see you, Molly.”

  It took several seconds for the name to register. Oh, God. The mother, from the radio this morning. Molly’s first impulse was to run. What did she want? Whatever it was, it was sure to be painful. She could say she was busy or just leaving. She really didn’t have time or energy for this woman.

  On the other hand, this was part of her story; sooner or later she’d want to talk to some parents. And from what she’d seen and heard, Mrs. Bassett was the best of the lot. “Okay. Send her back,” Molly said.

  She stood in the office doorway to wait for her. The woman appeared in the hall. She was nearly six feet tall, with broad shoulders and hips. She wore clogs and a blue denim shirtwaist dress with a silver concha belt. Her pinkish hair swayed with every move she made. Over one shoulder hung a huge canvas tote bag that looked so heavy Molly was sure she must be carrying all her files around with her—a mark of obsession. People who carry their files with them are either truly obsessed or truly terrified, or both. She knew this because there had been times in her life when she carried files around herself.

  “Mrs. Bassett, hello. I’m Molly Cates.” She held out her hand.

  The woman clasped it in both of hers. Her eyes were a light khaki color that matched her freckles. “Thanks for seeing me without an appointment and all. Do you have a few minutes to talk?”

  “Sure. Come on in.” Molly led the way and gestured to the chair in front of the desk. Thelma Bassett dropped her bag with a thump. As she lowered herself into the chair, she let her eyes close for a moment. The woman was terminally exhausted, Molly thought.

  “I heard you on NPR this morning,” Molly told her. “I have a daughter, too, and I can’t imagine anything worse than what you are going through. I’m so sorry.”

  The tan-colored eyes pooled with tears, but the woman looked determined not to let them fall.

  “Did you get any response from the FBI?” Molly asked.

  “No. Not yet. But I’m real hopeful. That’s why I came to see you, actually. To ask you a favor.”

  Molly sat in the chair across from her. “Well, go ahead.”

  “I believe Pat
Lattimore and Andrew Stein are at the end of their rope—tired and discouraged.”

  “They sure have been looking that way on the news every night.”

  “I don’t fault them. They have tried everything and consulted everyone who claims to know anything about how to do this. Have you been out there to the command post?”

  Molly shook her head.

  “Well, you can’t imagine what it’s like until you see it. They’ve got people coming in from all over the world—psychologists and psycholinguists and Bible experts and ministers and policemen and people who have been hostages and some men who teach about rescuing hostages at that FBI school up in Virginia. They’ve even got this psychic woman who wears a turban. But nothing works. Nothing. He just sermonizes and recites Scripture in response to anything they propose. I believe they are desperate enough to try something different.” She leaned forward. “I think they’re fixing to let me talk to him.”

  Molly must have looked skeptical, because Thelma became defensive. “Really. I have good reason to think that. Patrick has asked me what I would say if they let me talk to him on the phone. And they look at me like they’re sizing me up. I can see them thinking: Will she break down or can she carry it off?”

  Molly nodded.

  “I just read your article,” Thelma said, “the one you wrote last year—‘Texas Cult Culture.’ I stayed up late last night reading it.”

  Molly didn’t like to think about this woman sitting up in bed reading about the crazy zealotry of a man who was now in control of her daughter’s fate. No wonder she looked so tired.

  “What interested me most,” Thelma continued, “was you mentioning that he seemed to have this … ah, contempt, I think was the word you used, for women that went back to problems with his mother.”

  Molly nodded. Where was this going?

  “My friend says she heard you talk one time, and you said you do lots more interviewing than you use in writing, and that you tape-record everything.”