Eminence

by William X. Kienzle

  “It must be an intense faith. It must be a faith that does not hesitate or question or hedge or qualify. You see, Father Koesler, miracles are impossible. One must believe in the impossible. Don’t you see, ‘If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this sycamore, “Be uprooted and transplanted into the sea,” and it would obey you.’“

  What a remarkable grasp of Scripture the man has! thought Koesler. An appropriate verse for every question, every subject. He was surprised when Robert rambled on without an additional question to set him off.

  “Our battle, Father Koesler, is not against thrones or principalities. It is not against disease or illness. It is against Satan and the Powers of Darkness.”

  Koesler was startled by the statement. He was uncomfortable with the diabolical. Not that he didn’t believe in the devil. But just as he believed that God did not needlessly multiply miracles, so he believed that the devil did not need to get personally involved in human affairs. There was enough disease, illness, and natural disaster, enough evil in the human heart, to preclude the necessity for an enormous personal diabolic presence.

  “In Mark, One,” Father Robert continued, “we read, ‘The kingdom of Satan is being destroyed.’ Jesus shows His power over Satan when He commands a possessing evil one, ‘Be quiet! Come out of the man!’ And much more to the point, Father Koesler, in Luke, Seven”—Father Robert closed his eyes as if to read the text on the inside of his eyelids—“'At that time He was curing many of their diseases, afflictions and evil spirits. He also restored sight to many who were blind.’“

  Koesler wondered what he was getting at. Did he mean to imply that a devil had to be cast out before that Mrs. Whitehead had her sight returned?

  For the first time in many minutes, Father Robert looked directly at Koesler. “What evil have we done, Father? For what wrong deed are we to be investigated? Why are the authorities disrupting our lives? We come here in peace. Why not let us remain at peace?”

  Now, in addition to being embarrassed by his role as inquisitor, Koesler began to feel guilty. But not for long; there was a practical purpose to this investigation and a need for it to be concluded.

  “With all respect,” Koesler said, “I think you’ve got the shoe on the wrong foot, Father Robert. You came in peace and you were left in peace until your work caused a commotion. People have a right to know what’s going on. Like any other organization, religious or secular, if we don’t police ourselves, charlatans are bound to mislead people and cause a great deal of harm.”

  Father Robert hesitated and looked away from Koesler. For the first time this afternoon Koesler followed the other priest’s gaze. He was mildly surprised to find that Brother Paul was giving Robert some sort of signal. Paul, by slightly moving his hands, was transmitting some sign, far more subtle but not unlike that of a third-base coach to a batter. Once again, Koesler could not help wondering who was running this outfit.

  Father Robert spoke again. “Is it necessary for us to get some sort of license from the Archdiocese of Detroit to do the work the Spirit prompts us to do? Is there some obscure law that forbids us to do good? Like the Jewish law of the Sabbath? The chief priests took scandal when Our Lord cured on the Sabbath. But do you not remember what Our Savior said to them? ‘Should not this daughter of Abraham here who has been in the bondage of Satan for eighteen years have been released from her shackles on the Sabbath?’“

  Robert leaned back in his chair, exhausted but triumphant.

  Koesler sighed. Despite what he considered to be one of his better efforts, this interview was disintegrating. Father Robert, in less than an hour, had gone from a state of pleasant affability to one of aggressive and aggrieved hostility.

  “I think we are no longer communicating the way I hoped we could,” Koesler said. “I wish you could understand the need for—or even the inevitability of—this inquiry.” He sighed. “But whether you agree with it or not, it will take place. It will go on.”

  “Whether we cooperate or not?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “And what if we refuse cooperation? What if we refuse to speak with any representative of the archdiocese?”

  “You wouldn’t do that!” Out of the corner of his eye, Koesler could see Brother Paul sending signals furiously, almost as if he were signing for the deaf.

  “We might and we would.” The words were more forceful than Father Robert’s usual tone. Was he simply mouthing what Paul was signaling?

  “Father Robert, I sincerely hope it doesn’t come to that. But if it should, I think all of you would stand a very good chance of being asked to leave the archdiocese.”

  “And if we would not leave?”

  “Then you would be told to leave.”

  “In that case, your Cardinal would have to deal with our Bishop Di Giulio! We are, you know, an institute of consecrated life of diocesan rite. We belong to Bishop Di Giulio. Our bishop was appointed by—indeed, sits in the shadow of—our Holy Father. Bishop Di Giulio gave us—our Congregation—canonical status, and he approved of our establishment here. And here we shall remain until, or if, called by him.”

  Feeling defeated, Koesler rose without further word and made his way out of the old, and now otherwise deserted, bank building. If nothing more, he felt he had enough material for his report. And once he made the report, he could sit back and once more wait for news and rumor to lead to the inevitable final chapter.

  For now, he would return to the relative calm of his parish, collect his mental notes of this meeting, and compose his report. And then torture himself as to whether he had done everything he possibly could. He felt he’d never know.

  CHAPTER

  19

  In a good and close friendship, as with a working marriage, people can grow so sensitive to each other that they can communicate on nonverbal levels.

  So it was with Inspector Koznicki and Lieutenant Tully.

  It was late Thursday evening, well after their shift was officially over. They were seated at a table in a nearly empty Greektown restaurant, nursing cups of decaffeinated coffee. Each had worked long, hard hours on entirely separate cases. They had not seen each other since early this morning. Yet Koznicki could sense that Tully needed him, needed a trusted sounding board. And so they had agreed to meet at the restaurant.

  Koznicki was talking. “I do not think the prosecutor’s office ever has been handed a more painstakingly put together case.”

  “What was the bottom line?” Tully was genuinely interested in the Morgan case; it did involve the family of a fellow officer.

  “Drugs,” Koznicki responded.

  “Drugs.” Tully shook his head. “Always drugs.”

  “The Morgans kept considerable money in their home, rather than in the bank. For some old-fashioned reason, they did not trust banks. It was their misfortune that someone they considered a friend knew that.”

  “How did it happen?”

  “Howard-the ‘friend’-was sure the Morgans had left on vacation. Actually, they’d been scheduled to leave early in the day. But Mrs. Morgan’s sister was taken to the hospital with a heart attack. So the Morgans left, not on vacation, but for the hospital.”

  “So,” Tully conjectured, “Howard cases the home, makes certain they’re gone, and goes in.”

  Koznicki nodded. “He had to ransack the place. While he knew they kept large sums in the house, he had no idea where. The couple returned from the hospital while he was still going through their things. They surprised him. He had a gun.” Koznicki didn’t need to complete the picture. Drugs and guns, the curse of many big cities, foremost among them Detroit.

  “Any holes in it?” Tully asked.

  “That is what I spent the major part of this day on. We have gone over every detail from every possible angle. There are no holes in the case. We believe we have enough for Murder One. The defense will undoubtedly contest that charge. But, whatever else happens, Mr. Howard will be going away for a long, long while.”
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  Tully nodded curtly.

  “And your day, Alonzo? What happened to your theory about the woman run down by the car?”

  Tully hunched his shoulders, then drained the cup. “Dead end. Quigley broke the case today. Coincidence, eh? Her name was Garcia, Mary. Thirty-eight, five kids. Husband’s José. Unemployed four years. Drank up their ADC money. They fought all the time. Should have split up long ago. This time he mixed booze and hash. Almost killed himself. Should have; would’ve been better that way. Instead, he got home somehow. Went after her with a butcher knife. She got out. But he got her later on.”

  “His car?”

  Tully shook his head. “Lost his car long time ago. Borrowed a cousin’s car. That’s what took us so long. The husband was the prime suspect from day one. But he set up an alibi by terrorizing his kids-and he didn’t have a car. But the guys kept on it and today they found the car. Tire prints match perfectly. Then, after hours of interrogation, the cousin finally talked. Once we had the guy in custody, the kids, one by one, started talking. And that was the end of José.”

  “And no help to you.”

  Tully held up the empty cup; a waitress refilled both their cups.

  “No, no help. My brain’s fuzzy, Walt. I gotta give it a night’s rest and start fresh in the morning.”

  “Sounds like a good idea.”

  “Somebody out there wants Pat Lennon. Little doubt of that. But who?”

  “Someone she wrote about . . . a probability?”

  Tully sipped the hot decaf. “That’s what I asked her to think about. I talked to her earlier today-by the way, her boyfriend is back from his Free Press assignment.”

  There was a pause, but Koznicki said nothing. He had wondered about Tully and Lennon. But that was Tully’s private life and would remain so unless Tully brought the matter up.

  “It’s a good thing he’s back,” Tully said. “He’s gonna stick close. It’s not foolproof but it should provide some protection. Matter of fact, I talked to him for a minute. He wanted police protection for her.”

  Koznicki smiled. “You would think he would know better. He must have seen too many movies.”

  “Yeah. I told him she could join the folks who are living voluntarily in our cell block because they prefer even that to certain death in the streets. From the first moment we knew Pat, and not McPhee, was the intended victim, I wanted her to hole up in an apartment, or someplace where we could provide tight security. But she was determined to go to work, be on the street . . . and that’s take-your-chances time.

  “Anyway, when I talked to Pat, she hardly knew where to start. She’s covered almost every beat-politics, crime, graft, drugs, the mayor, judges, lawyers, big business, street crime. There are crazies all over the place. And she’s written about most of them. If it’s one of them, which one?

  “But, she promised to give it a lot of thought and see if she could narrow it down. She really hoped that dead lady who turned out to be Mary Garcia would be the key.”

  “She does not yet know that that case proved to be a dead end?”

  “Not yet. I’ll call her tomorrow morning and tell her. And see if she’s thought of anyone who might be a hot prospect.

  “I didn’t have a chance to talk to her very long. She was off to cover that ‘Miracle on Michigan Avenue’ story.”

  “Speaking of that,” Koznicki said, “how is Alice coming along?”

  “So far so good.” Tully shook his head as if not believing what he’d just said. “She went to the doctor today. A clean bill of health.”

  Koznicki’s eyebrows rose a millimeter. “A miracle?”

  “Who knows? The doc says there’s a remission of all her symptoms. That’s it. He’s not into astrology.”

  Koznicki smiled briefly. “Are you a believer yet?”

  “Not hardly. I’ve still got some problems with that bunch.”

  “That reminds me: Father Koesler called.”

  “Your priest friend.”

  “Yes. Curiously enough, he has been appointed an investigator into the events there.”

  Tully thought about that for a moment. “Why?”

  “There are claims that what has happened to Mrs. Whitehead and your Alice are no less than miracles.”

  “Hmmm.”

  Koznicki realized that talk of miracles was foreign to Tully. “You see,” he explained, “the Church feels it is her responsibility to make a public pronouncement on whether these are bona fide miracles or not.”

  “What difference does it make?”

  Koznicki searched for an analogy. The complexities of Catholicism were not his field. “When someone dies from other than natural causes, we are expected to investigate the matter and make some sort of official pronouncement: death by accident, suicide, murder; murder in what degree. Perhaps what the Church does is similar to this.”

  “Un-huh.” Tully was not particularly interested in what the Church called it. All he knew was that Alice might be cured and might not. Only time would tell. For the moment, she felt well. And that’s all he knew. But Walt’s friend was involved, and for that reason Tully was willing to invest some concern. “When’s he start his investigation?”

  “Today.”

  “Hmmm. Is there some time limit?”

  “Tomorrow.”

  Tully chuckled. “Who do they think he is, Superpriest?”

  Koznicki smiled. “His is a preliminary report. A more extensive investigation will follow immediately.”

  “What’s the hurry?”

  “It is odd. Particularly when you consider that the wheels of the Church historically grind very slowly. On the other hand, these occurrences have attracted a lot of publicity. That may explain the urgency.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably it.” Tully downed the remainder of his coffee. “Well, I better get home to my ‘miracle baby’ and see for myself how things are goin’.”

  As Koznicki watched Tully leave the restaurant, he reflected on Detroit’s Homicide Division. Koznicki had formed most of its personnel and was almost entirely responsible for its high esprit de corps. He was justly proud of what he’d built. But he knew full well that it would not be his forever. There was pressure for him to move up to the rank of commander. As such, he would no longer have day-to-day contact with the men and women of Homicide.

  More often lately he had pondered his successor. There were several homicide officers who would be excellent in the position. One was Alonzo Tully. But Koznicki knew Tully well. He knew that Tully was accustomed to setting goals for himself. And he knew that Tully was home. The position of homicide lieutenant was precisely his goal, and it had proven completely fulfilling.

  Tully shouldered easily the responsibility for the men and women of his squad. With little interference from whoever might be the inspector, he was, by and large, his own boss. He would never willingly give up his prerogative of hitting the streets and solving those puzzles. The fictional detective who gloried in finding out “whodunit” was mirrored in reality by Alonzo Tully.

  One day, Koznicki knew, he would offer the inspector’s job to Tully. But it would be no more than pro forma. Tully, to the end of his career, would wend his way through the streets, alleys, and homes of Detroit, paying vigilant attention to the silent but infallible secrets of the scene of the crime. He would follow the clues and build his case until he put the bad guys away.

  Well, Koznicki thought, God bless him.

  FRIDAY

  JULY 28

  CHAPTER

  20

  Joe Cox was dreaming. He was aboard a cruise ship. The manifest content of his dream undoubtedly sprang from his recent excursion up Lake Huron in the Mackinac Race.

  Cox’s fantasy ship had numerous decks filled to capacity with vacationers. On each of the five passenger decks Cox had a girlfriend—one per deck. The REM phase of his sleep was filled with action, as Cox raced from one deck to the next, trying to keep each relationship separate.

  For most men this would h
ave been a nightmare. Cox was enjoying every moment of it.

  Preliminary to his pleasant dreams, he’d had a pleasurable evening. After a busy day of accompanying Pat Lennon on her appointed rounds—and, for all he knew, protecting her—they had enjoyed a romantic evening, and lovemaking made all the richer by their mutual period of continence.

  Lennon, too, had found their tender, intimate time fulfilling and relaxing. So relaxing, indeed, that despite all her concerns, she fell asleep easily. But sex cannot erase reality indefinitely. So, very early this morning she was wide awake. She could hear Joe’s regular, deep breathing and she lay quietly lest she disturb him.

  As she watched night give way to day, her mind was busy sifting what Zoo Tully had asked her to consider—possible assailants. There were so many. In her position, if she did a good job, she would make enemies. She did and she had.

  There were entire categories of people who could have had motive, but she could not bring herself to picture any of them actually driving the killer car. Elected officials, appointed officials, men in government, the legal field, and so on. If she could not imagine them actually executing the murderous deed, she certainly could picture them hiring a hit man.

  Then there were those who could well have driven the car. Men who would not have given away the pleasure of murdering her.

  All in all, it was not a pleasant exercise. But, she agreed with Zoo, one that was necessary.

  Yet, of all those who paraded through her memory, no one stood out as a prime suspect. She tried to doze, without success; the cast of bad guys kept moving across the screen of her imagination.

  The sun was about to make its appearance. It looked as if it might turn out to be a pretty nice day. She could use one.

  Zoo Tully had been awake for a little over an hour.

  Alice had been waiting up for him last night, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. She felt great. And, after having felt like death warmed over for months, her exhilaration was difficult to contain. So she hadn’t. They had made love virtually throughout the house. Just like, Tully had been tempted to say, the good old days. Except that it was even better than the good old days.