San Francisco Night

by Stephen Leather

  Nightingale rang the bell and an overweight Hispanic woman wearing an apron opened the door. Nightingale gave her Karl Wood’s business card and asked to speak to Mr. or Mrs. Michaels. The woman nodded blankly and closed the door. Several minutes passed and Nightingale was just about to ring the bell again when the door opened and the maid gestured for him to come inside. The hallway was massive with a double staircase that wound around a chandelier that was the size of a small car.

  Mrs. Michaels was sitting in a room the size of a basketball court filled with white furniture. She was sitting on a white leather sofa that must have been twenty feet long. She was tall, stick thin with unnaturally blonde hair. She was wearing a UCLA sweatshirt and tracksuit bottoms and her eyes were red from crying. Like Mrs. Parker, she didn’t appear to have slept much. She was holding Karl Wood’s business card in both hands. She didn’t get up. “How can I help you, Mr. Wood?”

  “I’d like a photograph of Brett’s bedroom, if you don’t mind,” said Nightingale. “The picture editor wants to run it as a way of getting people thinking about Brett and where he might be.”

  Mrs. Michaels nodded. “I suppose that’s okay,” she said.

  “Is your husband here?”

  She shook her head. “He has a thing at work. He had to be there.”

  “Have you heard from the police?”

  “I haven’t. But my husband is in touch with them regularly.” She looked at the business card and frowned. “So are you a reporter or a photographer?”

  “We tend to do a bit of everything these days,” said Nightingale.

  There was bottle of wine on the table in front of her, half empty or half full depending on your point of view. And a glass that was very nearly empty. She refilled it with a trembling hand. Nightingale couldn’t imagine what it must be like to have a child taken from you and he hoped that it wasn’t something he’d ever have to experience first hand.

  “I’m so sorry about what’s happened,” said Nightingale.

  She smiled thinly. “Thank you.”

  “I hope he turns up, I really do.”

  She nodded and he knew how hollow his words sounded.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again.

  “Maria can show you to Brett’s room,” she said, saving him further embarrassment. The maid led him upstairs and down a corridor to a room that was at least ten times larger than his hotel room, with a door that led to a palatial bathroom. There were popstar and sports posters on the walls and a large screen TV connected to a PlayStation and a DVD player. It was a typical boy’s bedroom, just on a much larger scale than usual. There were stacks of comics, sports equipment, a guitar and amplifier and a collection of superhero figures.

  Nightingale put his camera bag on the bed while he took a few photographs. “Maria, do you know when Brett’s birthday is?” he asked.

  The maid nodded. “In two month’s time,” she said. “Mrs. Michaels was planning a big party.”

  “Which day exactly, do you know?”

  “Of course, it’s June 21st,” she said.

  CHAPTER 30

  Nightingale waited until he was back in his hotel room before phoning Gabriel Starr. He apologized for the lateness and then told him that the two missing children were born on the same day.

  “I am sure you have realized that cannot be a coincidence,” said Starr.

  “Gosh, do you think?”

  “I assume you are being sarcastic,” said Starr archly. “Now would you have the time they were born?” asked Starr. “That improves the accuracy of a chart no end.”

  “I don’t,” said Nightingale. “I couldn’t ask without looking suspicious.”

  “Well, beggars can’t be choosers, I suppose,” sighed Starr. “I shall do what I can with what I have.”

  “When will you be ready?”

  “It shouldn’t be too long,” said Starr. “Obviously there is only one chart to do and I’ll start on it now. What about the birth dates of the other missing people?”

  “I’m still working on that,” said Nightingale.

  Nightingale put the camera bag on the bed and took out the baseball cap and the brush before heading to the bathroom to shower. It was almost midnight before he knelt on the floor with the crystal. He used the hairbrush first.

  He said a short prayer as he held the crystal, then let it swing free. He focused on picturing a pale blue aura around his body as he took slow deep breaths, and then he began repeating Sharonda Parker’s name over and over again. Almost as soon as he began saying the little girl’s name, the crystal began to swing from side to side. Nightingale kept his mind focused on the aura as he repeated her name on autopilot. The trick was to disconnect his mind from the process so that it was the crystal that did the work. Slowly but surely the crystal began to move in an anti-clockwise circle. It picked up speed and Nightingale finally allowed himself the luxury of a small smile. Sharonda Parker was still alive.

  He stood up and paced around the room for several minutes, then repeated the process with the baseball cap. The crystal indicated that Brett Michaels was also still alive. Nightingale let out a slow sigh of relief. The crystal continued to move in a fluid circle, but Nightingale frowned as he felt a burning sensation in his fingers. Within seconds the chain had become too hot to hold and he yelped and let it go. The crystal fell onto the cap and Nightingale stared at the burn marks on his fingers.

  CHAPTER 31

  The screaming was ear-splitting, but none of the adults paid it any attention. Two Apostles, John and Thaddeus, each held one of Brett Michaels’s arms, and pressed his naked body down against the marble slab in the middle of the temple. The blonde woman, James, held the boy’s feet together so he couldn’t kick. The tall redhead, the one who called herself Peter, held the red-hot branding-iron between the boys shoulders, pressing down and inhaling the aroma of scorching flesh. Her green eyes were bright, and her throat was starting to flush.

  “That’s enough, Peter,” said the blonde woman. “We don’t want to go too deep.”

  Peter shook her head, as if to clear it, and pulled the iron away. The child kept on screaming, then went limp over the altar. Peter placed the branding iron back on the charcoal brazier, then returned to study the boy’s back. She nodded in approval at the horrible, livid wound on his flesh. A pentagon, with a capital letter 'B’ placed inside it.

  “I’ll take him back upstairs,” said John.

  “Put a dressing on the wound, it’ll heal sooner,” said the woman James. “It might be better if he didn’t wake for a day or two, stop him rubbing at it until it scabs.”

  “I’ll see to it,” said John. “You and Peter fetch the girl. Be sure they don’t meet.”

  James nodded.

  “Do I get to do her too?” asked Peter, eagerly.

  “Not possible, I’m afraid,” replied Thaddeus. “The ritual states she must be branded by a man. My turn, I think.”

  Five minutes later, a naked and sobbing Sharonda Parker was carried in, placed face-down on the altar, and stretched out by the three Apostles. Thaddeus picked up the branding iron from the brazier, spat on the end and heard it sizzle, then pressed down.

  Again the screaming echoed around the temple.

  CHAPTER 32

  Nightingale cursed as he walked up to his SUV. The tarmac around the front passenger side window was littered with cubes of broken glass. There was more glass over the seat and as he pulled open the door, cubes tinkled down onto the ground. The only thing missing was the SatNav, and Nightingale knew that he wasn’t going anywhere without it. He took the rental agreement out of the glove compartment, phoned the car rental company and explained what had happened. A quiet-spoken woman said that the quickest way to resolve his problem would be for him to return the SUV to the airport and pick up a replacement. The traffic was bad and it took the best part of an hour to drive to the airport. When he did eventually reach the rental car office it took only minutes to exchange cars, this time for a white Ford Escape wit
h a new SatNav.

  The new SatNav had the same ice blond voice and he followed her instructions to the Our Lady Of Spring Bank Monastery. He saw the cruisers in front of the Welcome Center as he drove up the tree-lined road. He slowed and considered turning around but two uniformed officers were already looking his way and he knew that a U-turn would be suspicious. He slowed and started to plan what he would say. There was an ambulance parked behind the cruisers but the lights weren’t flashing which suggested there was no urgency, and there were two Crime Scene Investigation vans on the other side of the Welcome Center which meant that something untoward had happened.

  He parked and climbed out. A man in a gray suit with the world-weary eyes of a man who was used to being lied to walked over and flashed his shield. “Do you work here?” he asked.

  Nightingale shook his head. “I’m a visitor. Here to see Father Benedict. The Abbot.”

  “Is he expecting you?”

  “We hadn’t agreed a set time, I said I’d swing by this morning. Has something happened?”

  “Your name is…?”

  “Jack Keeley.”

  “And what is your business with the Abbot?”

  Nightingale shrugged. “It’s a social visit. We have a mutual friend and she suggested I drop by to say hello.” He grinned. “I’m a big wine drinker and the wine here comes highly recommended.”

  “You’re a Brit?”

  Nightingale nodded. “Born and bred.”

  “Tourist?”

  Nightingale nodded again. “Heading back to the UK next week. Is there a problem?”

  “I’m afraid the Abbot is dead,” said the detective.

  Nightingale had already guessed as much but he feigned surprise. “That’s awful,” he said. “What’s happened?”

  “We think he was killed during a robbery that went wrong,” said the detective.

  “He’s a monk, he wouldn’t have anything worth stealing.”

  “Monks use computers,” said the detective. “His laptop was taken.”

  “When did it happen?”

  The detective frowned. “Why would you want to know that?”

  Nightingale tried to look sheepish. “I know it sounds stupid but when I was showering this morning I had a premonition. You know? A bad feeling. I almost phoned Father Benedict but then I decided I was driving out anyway.” He shrugged. “It sounds ridiculous, I know.”

  “It happens a lot,” said the detective. “You’d be surprised how often it happens. But I can tell you that the Abbot died long before you got into the shower. We think it was the early hours of this morning. Four or five o’clock.”

  “How was he killed? Shot?”

  The detective shook his head. “He was stabbed. We think it was a junkie because…” He put up a hand. “Best I don’t say, it wasn’t pretty. Anyway, I’m sorry you had a wasted journey.”

  Nightingale continued to feign astonishment. “I can’t believe it,” he said. “Who would kill a monk?”

  “Junkies don’t care who they’re robbing,” said the detective.

  “Do you think you’ll catch him?”

  “We’ve got a CSI team in there at the moment looking for evidence. Junkies don’t tend to be over-careful when it comes to forensic evidence, so we’re hopeful.”

  “I hope the bastard gets the electric chair,” said Nightingale.

  “We tend not to execute our killers in California,” said the detective. “Unfortunately. And when we do, it’s by lethal injection.”

  “I think the Bible had it right. An eye for an eye. The punishment should fit the crime.”

  “Amen to that,” said the detective.

  A man in a dark suit appeared at the entrance to the Welcome Center and gestured for the detective to join him. “Duty calls,” said the detective. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “He was a friend of a friend, I didn’t really know him,” said Nightingale. “But I sure hope you catch his killer.”

  “You and me both,” said the detective. He nodded and walked over to join his colleague.

  Nightingale lit a cigarette as he watched the two detectives disappear inside. He doubted that they would be apprehending Father Benedict’s killer anytime soon. Drug addicts were notoriously lax at covering their tracks but the Apostles were more than capable of removing any forensic evidence. The theft of his SatNav now made perfect sense. They had used it to track its movements and had stolen both the Abbot’s computer and Mitchell’s diary. Nightingale blew smoke up at the mid-day sky as he pondered his next move. One thing was certain – he was running out of options.

  CHAPTER 33

  Nightingale drove up to Haight Street and parked close to the Written In The Stars store. Gabriel Starr was behind his counter and looked up as the bells announced Nightingale’s arrival. “Ah, Just Jack. Lovely to see you, my dear. Let’s close up for thirty minutes while I show you what I’ve found.”

  Once settled on the sofa in the back room, the astrologist passed some charts across to Nightingale. They didn’t make a whole lot of sense to him. “Can you explain it in idiot’s language?” he asked.

  “Of course,” said Starr. “I’m an expert with idiots. Let’s start with numerology, shall we? There are quite a few systems, but being a good Jewish boy, I work with the Hebrew system, the Gematra. Now, each letter in a name has a numerical value from 1 to 9. For example A is 1, B is 4 and to find your dominant number, we just add them up and reduce them to the lowest factor. So, Gabriel sums up to 40, then we add the 4 and 0 to get 4. Starr comes to 22, we add those together and get another 4. So, four is a big influence on me, but we can add the two 4s together to get 8. So, my major numbers of influence are 4 and 8.

  “I thought you said Kronstein was your real name?” said Nightingale.

  “It is, but I chose Starr, which makes it a powerful influence on me. Besides, Kronstein factors down to a 4 too, so it works either way.”

  Jack had a vague understanding of numerology, so his head wasn’t spinning as fast as it might have been. But the important question needed to be asked. “So, what about the names I gave you? The missing people.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Starr. “Now that was interesting. Very interesting indeed.”

  “Any chance of you cutting to the chase and telling me?”

  “Ooh! I do love a masterful man. 7s and 5s, Jackie...all of them, just 5s and 7s.”

  “Which means what?” asked Nightingale.

  “Which means it’s a hell of a coincidence...or they were selected for that reason. Personally, I’d be going for the second option, especially once we consider the Astrological evidence.”

  He was enjoying his dramatic pause, but Nightingale wasn’t about to ask any questions. He was far too experienced at the waiting game. The little astrologer broke first.

  “Different days, months and years of births, and without the exact times, I can’t be precise, But they’re all children of Mars, Jacky-boy and all with Neptune dominant.”

  “Is that unusual?” asked Nightingale.

  “Not at all, happens all the time...but the chances of five random people all sharing the same numerological influences and astrological houses must be fairly...astronomical, if you’ll pardon the pun.”

  “So, who’s targeting virgin Martians with a Neptune influence whose dominant numbers are 7 and 5?”

  “Beats me. I’m just grateful that I’m none of those.”

  “And what about the two missing kids with the shared birthday?’

  “Two little solstice babies, both born on June 21. And both virgins too, or so you’d hope at going on eleven. Yes, I’ve done the horoscopes for the two kids. They’d have been more accurate if I’d known their times of birth, or if I’d had something of theirs to pick up vibrations from. I also did a numerology and Tarot reading for each of them.”

  “Just tell me,” said Nightingale.

  “It comes up danger. They’re in peril now and it’s getting worse. But that’s not the worst of it.” />
  “Well?”

  “The danger ceases on the thirtieth. After that I get no reading from them at all.”

  “Which means?” asked Nightingale.

  “I think it means they’ll be dead then,” said Starr.

  “But that’s not infallible, right? You can’t be completely sure?”

  “I see what’s written, Jack, but it’s not necessarily the final version. But that’s what I see written for those two kids. Nothing after the thirtieth of this month. And that’s only five days away.”

  “Shit,’ said Nightingale.

  “That’s putting it mildly. You probably don’t know this but the thirtieth of April sees a second full moon of the month, a genuine Blue Moon. And on a Walpurgisnacht Wednesday too. Must happen about once in every hundred years. A very favorable time for all kinds of ceremonies. Oh, there’ll be magic afoot that night, Jackie-boy, you can rely on that. You’ve got till then to find those kids, I’d say.”

  “Gabriel, have you ever heard of Anton LaVey?”

  “Of course. He founded modern-day Satanism.”

  “I heard he had a daughter.”

  “Indeed, but she has nothing to do with the Left Path. But if it’s information on Anton LaVey you’re seeking, why don’t you pop up the road to dear Margaret’s shop, Pagan World. I’m sure she’ll be delighted to sell you a book or two. She’s far more knowledgeable about the Occult and Wicca than I am. She might even know some people.”