by Rick Mofina
A task force?
Keller swallowed. His throat was dry. Almost raw.
So be it. His mission was sanctified.
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
The abductions have shaken the Bay Area to its very core.
“It’s every parent’s nightmare.” Charlene Munroe told reporters as she, along with her ten-year-old daughter and twelve-year-old son, combed Golden Gate Park’s wooded areas. “We helped in the search for Danny Becker. I’m a mother, too.” Charlene swept aside some grass with a stick, then called her children, who had ambled a few yards from her. “Stay close to me, guys! I just hope this works out for the best.”
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
Vince Vincent went on about the intense investigation, the rumors about a psychic being called and contacts with police who faced serial child murder cases in Atlanta, New York, and British Columbia.
Keller switched his set off. Scattered around him were the early editions of the major Bay papers. He had read every word, studied every picture, graphics, locator maps, everything on the case.
Let them search.
It was late, but he was not tired. He went to the worktable, looked through the heap of journals, binders and notes, stopping to study the time-worn snapshot of his three children: Pierce, Alisha, and Joshua. Laughing. A few weeks before they drowned.
They never found the bodies.
So let them search. For Raphael. For Gabriel.
They’ll never find the bodies. The Truth was revealed to him. His children were not dead. They were waiting to be reborn in celestial light. Only God’s Angels could rescue them, transfigure them. Then together they would walk in the Kingdom of God. How could police know his Divine Mission? They were mortals. How could they comprehend what was preordained?
They could never know the Divine Truth as he did.
It had been revealed to him. He had been chosen. He was the enlightened one who would show the world God’s wonder. Edward Keller had been ordained; he was the light beyond sorrow, the light beyond the veil of death, destined to fulfill a Holy Mission.
He was cleansed in the light of the Lord.
Soon everyone would know God’s love, His name, His glory.
Sanctus, sanctus, sanctus. Dominus Deus sabaoth.
The Angels, soldiers of God’s merciful love, were sent to him.
Keller smiled, for it was true. He had found the first.
Danny Raphael Becker, Raphael of the Powers. Healed by God. Chief of the Guardian Angels. Guardian of Mankind. Protector of Children.
And he had found the second, concealed as Gabrielle Nunn. Gabrielle. Gabriel. God’s ambassador to earth. The Angel who heralded the coming of the Messiah. Gabriel had come to him. She was the messenger. She was his.
She was in the basement with Raphael.
It went according to his prayers.
Thanks be to God. Praise Him.
Keller found the silver crucifix and slipped it around his neck. Then he reached for the binder with the names of his eldest son, Pierce, and the third Angel, caressing his meticulous notes inside. One more Angel to complete the choir. One more to complete his Holy Mission. One more and God would initiate the transfiguration. He would find his children. Be with them. Bring them back. Nothing could keep him from his holy destiny now. Nothing. He held his crucifix in a white knuckled grip. He’d come too far, endured too much pain. Nothing must go wrong now. Suddenly he heard something---
Screaming? Yes. Screaming.
Hysterical screaming from the basement where the angels were.
FORTY-TWO
Something as big as an elephant was inside Gabrielle’s head beating to get out. It hurt.
She tasted something horrible in her mouth, like vinegar and medicine. Open your eyes. Can’t. They’re too heavy. Maybe they’re stuck shut. Lying on something soft. A bed? Where is she? It didn’t smell like her room. Her house. It’s smelly here, like something rotten, like a scary place. Where was she?
Squeak-creak.
Where is she? What happened? The party. Joannie Tyson’s birthday party at the park. The carousel. Butterflies in her stomach. Rhonda King throwing up. Gross! The man outside the bathroom. Jackson. He found Jackson. A quick secret peek in his truck. Want a soda? You spilled some but--the wet cloth--can’t breathe--Jackson barking--the cloth dripping medicine--fighting--kicking.
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
Don’t open your eyes!
Something--someone touched her cheek. A soft warm hand. Small.
Please. Please. Please. Don’t hurt me.
She had to open her eyes. Had to. Okay. A little boy. On his knees looking down at her. A boy who was smaller than she was, staring at her. She blinked at him and sniffed. The boy looked sad.
“Who are you?” he said.
“Gabrielle Nunn. Who are you?”
“Danny.”
“Where am I? Have you seen my dog, Jackson?”
Danny didn’t answer.
“Where’s Mr. Jenkins? He knows my dad.”
Danny just stared at her.
“Where is this place?”
Danny said nothing.
Gabrielle sat up and looked at him until a tiny light of recognition glimmered on her face. “You’re the little boy on TV, the one who got kidnapped--you are!”
“Where’s my daddy?” Danny said. “Can I go home now?”
Newspapers covered the basement window. It looked dark outside. Were those bars, like jail? A dim bulb hung from the ceiling, like in Gabrielle’s dad’s garage, painting the grungy, cracked walls in a pale light. Where’s the TV? Were there people here who can take her home? Where was Jackson? Where was Mr. Jenkins? She was confused. She didn’t like this place. There were three mattresses, ripped, with stuff coming out of them. They smelled. Why three? The door was closed. Garbage and stuff plastered the floor. Yech!
“Danny,” she asked, “who lives in this place?”
He just sat there, his face dirty and white, like he was sick or sleepy or something.
“I don’t like this place. I want to go home now,” she said.
Danny offered her a chocolate-covered, vanilla cream cookie.
“It’s got a bite already.” She didn’t touch it.
Danny bit into the cookie.
Gabrielle knew she was with the boy who got kidnapped and had his picture on TV everywhere. The boy everybody was looking for all over the place. Suddenly she realized a terrible thing.
She was kidnapped, too!
“Danny, where is this place?”
He just stared.
“What’s going to happen to us now?” she asked.
Danny’s fingers were sticky from the cookie. He was really littler than she was. His chin crumpled and his eyes clamped shut and he began crying in a ragged voice like he had been crying forever. Gabrielle wanted to cry, too, but something inside took over. Big kids look after little kids, they told you in school. Gabrielle put her arm around him.
“Don’t cry, Danny.” She sniffed. “My daddy will take us home.”
“I want to go home, now.”
“Me, too. I wonder who lives in this place?”
Danny pointed a tiny finger to the door. “The man who took me.”
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak. He was out there!
Gabrielle’s stomach bounced. Gooseflesh crawled along her arms.
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
She hated Mr. Jenkins, whoever he was. He had tricked her. He lied. Where was Jackson? He must have stolen Jackson from her. He was a bad man. She was in trouble now. Her mommy and daddy told her never to talk to strangers. No matter what. But he had Jackson and said he knew Daddy. No matter what. She broke the rules and it was all her fault. Mom and Dad were going to be mad. She had to tell them she was sorry she broke the rules. They would come and get her if she told them everything. Maybe she wouldn’t be in too much trouble. Gabrielle knew what she had to do. She had to tell her mom and dad. But how?
&n
bsp; Telephone.
If you ever get lost, Gabrielle, just call home.
She would call home right now.
“Where is the phone, Danny?”
He pointed to the door. “Out there.”
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
She was scared. She looked around the room again.
“Danny, you sure there’s no phone in this room?”
“Out there.”
Gabrielle stood, she was a little dizzy. Maybe she should just sit here and wait. No! She had to do it. She had to, so she wouldn’t be in trouble. She had to phone home. And she had to pee.
Squeak-creak. Squeak-creak.
The grease-stained burger boxes and bags crumpled as she moved to the door. What if the man was watching from a spy hole, ready to come in at any second? The wrappers, napkins, empty drink cups, boxes, and bags rustled. Something squished. Yuck. A half-eaten burger. Stale ketchup bled under her shoe. In the far off corner some wrappers were moving.
By themselves!
Gabrielle froze.
The bags moved a little, trembling like something was gnawing on them. Gabrielle watched. Maybe it was Jackson? What else could it be? It had to be Jackson. Gabrielle cut a path to the corner.
“Here, pup,” she cooed, lifting a large bag just as a giant rat with ketchup dripping from its mouth flew at her, coming so close she felt its tail slap against her palm!
Gabrielle screamed, jumped back, falling.
A vanilla cream cookie whizzed by the rat’s head.
“Go away!” Danny shouted, reaching into his bag for another.
Gabrielle scurried to Danny. Together they fired cookies at the rat. It had touched her. She was scared.
The door swung open.
Mr. Jenkins. Only, he didn’t look so friendly now. A big silver cross was swinging from his neck. He spotted the rat, disappeared, and returned with a baseball bat.
“Vermin!” he screamed, bring the bat down swiftly, missing the rat. It squealed, the bat went clank and garbage scattered.
He yelled, swinging the bat down again.
The fierceness of the man’s attack frightened the children more than the rat did. His eyes were huge, popping out of his head, the white parts as big as eggs. His hair wild like a nest of angry snakes. Spittle clung to his beard.
Keller swung again, making a wet, squishing sound. He laughed, his bat dripping with the blood of the rat. Gabrielle screamed. Keller looked at her.
“It is done,” he said, moving toward the children.
Keller’s expression changed. Raphael and Gabriel were before them. He saw their auras.
The light of one million suns shone upon him.
His rage was replaced by rapture. Like a victorious battle-weary soldier, he laid his foe at the throne. The bloodied, pulpy carcass, fur and mangled intestines, lay inches from Gabrielle and Danny. Gabrielle stifled her sobs, trying not to look.
“W-We want to go home, now. Please Mr. Jenkins,” she pleaded.
Keller did not hear her.
“You have come, Gabriel. God’s emissary. You have come to me!”
“Please, Mr. Jenkins! Let me phone my mommy and daddy!”
Remembering the bat, Keller lifted it to his face, examining the blood with fascination.
“I am cleansed in the light of the Lord. I have tasted the blood of my enemies. None shall defeat me, for my mission is divine and I am truly invincible.” He moved his fingers over the blood-slicked club. “I am cleansed in the light--I have tasted the blood of my enemies.”
“My mission is divine. I am truly invincible.”
Gabrielle pulled Danny tight to her.
Keller went upstairs to the bathroom and ran the bath water.
God had answered his prayers.
One more angel and the choir would be complete.
Then the transfiguration would begin.
Wiping the tears from his face, he stood and kissed his crucifix.
It was time for the second baptism.
FORTY-THREE
If Virgil Shook worshiped anything in this world beyond himself it was the Zodiac, the personification of power.
The Zodiac was the hooded executioner who had murdered five people in the Bay Area during the late 1960’s and mocked police in the cryptic letters he wrote to newspapers. His cunning eclipsed the best minds of the SFPD and the FBI. He owned the city, mastered its fear, yanking it by a leash at his leisure. The Zodiac was a visionary, a seer who knew that when he died, his victims would be his slaves and he would be a king in paradise.
They had never captured him. Shook sighed.
For a time last year, like the Zodiac, he had sipped from the cup of power. He had enjoyed Tanita, the little prostitute. Loved her to death and forced the city to tremble in the wake of his omnipotence. He had manipulated Franklin Wallace, outsmarted police, and taunted the priest with his confessions, spitting in the face of his God, compelling him to genuflect to the power of The One.
That was then. Now the city was under the spell of another. A new player was reaping the harvest of Shook’s work and Shook was enraged.
Who did this new guy think he was?
Shook snapped off the late-night TV news after absorbing the reports of Gabrielle Nunn’s abduction in Golden Gate Park. The horror in Nancy Nunn’s face had seared him. Her pain should have been his to relish. Yet he watched mournfully from afar, like a starving wolf contending with the mark of a new predator.
Shook paced his dirty flophouse room, oblivious to the opera of sirens piercing the foul of night air of the Tenderloin. If he was going to be immortalized like the Zodiac, it was time to up the ante. Time to teach the challenger a lesson in a way even more thrilling than it had been with poor little Franklin Wallace, when he plucked him like a harp, savoring the danger of it to the point of arousal.
Franklin? It’s me.
Oh, Lord, don’t call me at home like this. Lord don’t!
They know, Franklin, he lied. They know about Tanita. Me. You.
NO!
They know everything. And the press knows, too.
No!
They found the pictures of you with her in Dolores Park. They are coming for you soon. You know what that means.
No!
Remember our pact, Wallace. We must pay for our sins. We both know that.
But, Virgil, I--
Think of your family, the insurance. They won’t pay if you’re connected to anything criminal, Franklin. They are coming for you.
Wallace was sobbing, a sickly, man-child kind of weeping.
Virgil, please! I don’t know what to do.
You do know. We both know. Good-bye, Franklin.
Virgil--No, wait.
May God have mercy on you, Wallace.
Shook fired the blank from the .22, dropping it with the phone on the floor. Wallace screamed through the earpiece, his voice tiny, distant. An hour later, Shook stood safely out of sight near Franklin’s house, smiling to himself when that fool he called at the Star appeared on Franklin’s doorstep, like an obedient lapdog.
Everything flowed. Beautifully. The Zodiac would applaud him.
Time to move on. Time to teach a new, painful lesson, one that would transcend his work with Franklin, one tempered with rage for the new guy.
Shook pulled on a pair of gloves and went to the corner newspaper box, returning with two fresh editions of the Star.
He went to his bed, a huge steel-framed monstrosity from a St. Louis hospital that had burned down. He unscrewed the middle hollow bar from the head and carefully tapped out several rolled-up Polaroids snapshots of himself with Tanita Donner. No one had seen these pictures. And no one knew of the tantalizing clue he had left police before he dispatched the little prostitute to paradise.
Shook traced gloved fingers tenderly over the photos before selecting two. He ripped the Nunn abduction story from the first newspaper and scrawled a note over the text, using a blue felt-tip pen, like the Zodiac. He folded the clipp
ing, put it in a plain, brown envelope along with one of the Polaroids. He sealed the envelope, scanned the phone book, then addressed the envelope to Paul Nunn.
He made an identical envelope and addressed it to Danny Becker’s family. Then Shook left his room, taking the subway to Oakland, where he would drop the two letters in a mailbox.
Another yank on the leash.
FORTY-FOUR
The Ayatollah Komeini glowered at Reed.
EYE OF THE HURRICANE. AMERICANS HELD HOSTAGE AT THE U.S. EMBASSY IN TEHRAN. EL SALVADOR TEETERING. MOUNT ST. HELENS SPEWING ASH AND ROCK. SOVIET INTERVENTION IN AFGHANISTAN. All there in black-and-white, bleeding on the front page.
1980.
All there except for Keller’s tragedy. Wrong page? Reed checked the skyline. Wrong date. He hit the advance button on the Minolta and whisked through time along a microfilm torrent of photographs, headlines, and advertisements. The take-up reel buzzed. It was late.
He stayed at the paper after reading the old Star clip on Edward Keller’s boating tragedy. Alone in the news library, searching the past. Reels of microfilm newspapers and opened news indices were piled next to him, signposts to Keller’s case. The Star’s clippings were a start. He was also going through the Chronicle and the Examiner for their takes, looking for something extra, any vital piece of information that would...what? Connect Keller to the kidnappings?
He had a beard and looked like the guy in the fuzzy home video footage. And there was something strange about Keller, something that just didn’t sit right.
Be careful, Reed. This ain’t no movie. Hunches are mean, wild horses. You rode one last year and ended up getting stomped. The memory of Wallace’s widow slapping his face still stung. Wallace’s little girl clinging to her father’s leg hours before he put his mouth around a double-barreled 12-gauge.
“Leave my daddy alone!”
