The ordained, p.17
The Ordained, page 17
I followed my moon shadow toward the giant oak that marked the start of the dry creek bed and the end of the moon’s realm. By the flashlight’s yellow beam, I descended the stone steps of the bed until I reached Batsto’s first resting place. “You’re hot,” the little voice was saying now. “You’re burning up.”
Batsto’s empty grave was still empty, but that wasn’t the relief I’d expected it to be. I knew the hole in the ground had drawn me from Krystal’s bed. It was the source of the feeling that had shaken me by the shoulder, the feeling of playing the same scene once too often. I knew I’d stood by that grave before. Not that morning, but twenty years earlier. Not in this forest, but in another like it, in another God-forgotten corner of Indiana.
In that grave, I’d found another missing man, another Clyde Batsto. His name was Michael Crosley. Like Batsto, Crosley had died of a blow to the head from something very like a rifle butt. I’d identified the murderer and seen him sent to prison. He was Krystal’s father, the man I’d come to Indiana to speak against. Curtis Morell.
I scrambled up the dry creek, slipping and sending stones down the hill, their clatter creating the illusion that Morell was a step behind me and gaining. My panic attack lasted until I reached the top and the moonlight. Then I accepted what I’d been repeating to myself. Morell wasn’t chasing me. He couldn’t be. He was safely locked up in Michigan City.
Or was he? I swung the flashlight beam around, but it wasn’t bright enough to compete with the moon. Of course Morell was still locked up, I told myself. At least he had been on Wednesday, when I’d attended his parole hearing. Prestina Shipe had already disappeared by then, so he couldn’t have been responsible. If Morell had escaped since the hearing, Brother Dennis would have heard. Morell couldn’t be loose in the woods around Rapture. He couldn’t have killed Clyde Batsto.
But I knew he had. All the light the moon could pump out wouldn’t make that black insight fade away. I backed toward the trailer, scanning the woods as I went.
Once I was safely inside, I thought of trying Fallon’s number again. But I could already hear the answer he’d give me. The crime had Morell’s signature because it had been committed by Morell’s daughter. She’d taken up her father’s profession, why not his modus operandi as well? That would fit in perfectly with Krystal’s warped sense of humor, Fallon’s catchall explanation for every oddity about the case. She’d wanted me to read her father’s signature on Batsto’s corpse, the DEA man would say. She’d wanted to frighten me, or give me a chance to guess that she’d reopened the family business. The worst of it was I half believed those possibilities myself. I didn’t want Fallon to convert me completely.
So I left the telephone alone. I used the last of the flashlight’s juice to search the trailer. I’d already determined that Krystal’s key ring was missing from the hook by the door. It was now in Dix’s pocket, figuratively speaking. I was looking for a spare key to the Jeep, thinking I’d start in the trailer and then search the underside of the truck itself if I had to. Maybe after the sun was up and all bogeymen had gone to ground.
As it turned out, I didn’t have to wait for the sun. I found the spare key in the bottom drawer of Krystal’s dresser, taped to the back of a lease agreement. By that time, it was six o’clock, and I’d begun to worry about Dix dropping in or being somewhere nearby on patrol. So I didn’t stop to clean myself up or to shave with one of Krystal’s disposable razors. I smoothed the bed, pocketed my empty beer can, and set the pane of glass back in the spare bedroom window as best I could.
Those attempts to hide my tracks were more or less ridiculous given what I did next, which was to steal the Jeep. I was sure Dix would see it that way, as grand theft auto, though I considered it a loan. The truck had a standard transmission. I’d spent my youth shifting the gears of a certain Volkswagen Karmann-Ghia, but my youth was a long way behind me. Luckily, no one was around to laugh as I bucked the Jeep out of its parking space and stalled it twice on the dirt lane.
By the time I’d ascended to the top of the ridge, I’d gotten used to the clutch. I could have given Dix a run for his money if he’d been on patrol. He wasn’t. I got my bearings and found Willie’s shortcut to Brookside. Half an hour later, I was eating a greasy sausage on a greasier biscuit and looking for the little green road sign that pointed the way to the airport.
I’d already decided what I had to do that day and that I couldn’t do it in Krystal’s truck. Dix would have an all points bulletin out on the Jeep as soon as he knew it was gone. He’d even have a pretty good idea who had taken it. He’d know by now that I hadn’t made it to the Double Nickel. He’d probably have heard from Ford about the plane crash. He might have figured that I was wandering around lost, more of a danger to myself than ever. None of that was a problem as long as Dix thought I was doing my wandering in the Jeep or on foot. But once the deputy found out I’d retrieved the Chevy—step one in my master plan—all units would be on the lookout for a faded red car with New Jersey plates. It came to me that I might solve the dilemma by jumbling Dix’s two bulletins, his Jeep one and his Jersey one, together.
When I got to Brookside Airport, I pulled into the deserted factory across the road. No hint remained of what they’d made there; they’d cleaned up after themselves that well. I parked the Jeep in a narrow loading bay behind the main building, where it couldn’t be seen from the road. Then I removed the truck’s single Indiana plate using my pocket knife, thinking of Ford using his knife on the Cub’s cowling while I waited for the plane to fall on us. The artwork on the plate was another reminder of the previous evening. It showed the black silhouette of a farm, backlit by the bloody afterglow of a sunset.
My Cavalier was parked where I’d left it in the airport’s gravel lot. I approached it using my best parody of stealth, remembering Ford’s remark about sleeping in the hangar with Trigear. He’d slept with the dog and his revolver both last night, I was sure. The pilot hadn’t let the air out of my tires or otherwise secured the car. I was able to back it out onto the road without drawing a single bark.
I switched plates on a deserted stretch of road just south of Bedford, stowing the two Jersey ones in my suitcase. While I had it open, I drew out my last change of clothes and my shaving kit. I could have stopped in Bedford to change and shave, but the town was too close to Rapture for comfort. That bit of nerves paid off for me. When I finally reached the interstate, I found a gas station that rented showers to truckers. And to amateur detectives, although they didn’t advertise that part of the service.
I used a phone booth out by the diesel pumps to call Brother Dennis. The monk sounded like he’d just gotten out of bed, but then he tended to sound that way. I had a story to knock the sand out of his eyes. He listened while I described Krystal’s disappearance and Batsto’s murder. Then he came up with the same answer I had, without the benefit of a nocturnal stroll in the woods.
“Morell,” he said.
I was more relieved than irritated at having my punch line snatched away from me. “That’s what I think.”
“But, Okie, it can’t be. He’s still locked up. The hearing at the prison isn’t till next week. If he’d gotten out somehow, I’d know about it. I still have friends at the prison from all the trips I made up there.”
“I was hoping you did. I need a favor. I need you to get me in to see Morell. Today.”
“That’s not possible, Okie. You have to set those visits up in advance with the Department of Corrections. You couldn’t get in to see him before next week. Maybe the week after.”
“It has to be today. Whatever is going to happen in Rapture will happen tonight. After that, it’ll be too late to help Krystal.”
“But the prison rules—”
“Did you schedule your visits in advance?”
“Yes. I mean, at first I did. I had to. Then later, when they got to know me, I’d just call a friend I had up there. But that was for me, not you. I’m a religious, you’re not. And they know me, they don’t know you.”
“How long will it take me to drive to Michigan City?”
“It’ll take you—I don’t know—four hours maybe.”
“I’ll call you back in three. You’ve got until then to talk your friend in Michigan City into it. If he has to know me to trust me, tell him the story of my life. That should leave you two and a half hours for wheedling. Tell him I’d from St. Aelred’s if that helps. It’s true in a way.”
“Even if I could swing it, Okie, it isn’t a good idea for you to see Morell. I told you, the man is evil. Irredeemably evil. It frightens me to say that. I feel like I’m blaspheming even to believe it could be true. But I do believe it.”
“I’m not going up there to redeem him. I just want to talk to him.”
“It isn’t safe. Morell is as lost as a man in hell. As lost right now, alive and breathing, as any being in the pit. And he’d like nothing better than to drag someone down with him. I think he’d like you most of all.”
A semi pulled slowly away from the pumps, its twin stacks sending out puffs of black smoke in rhythm with the growling of its engine. I pressed a hand against my free ear. “Me?”
“He hasn’t forgotten you. He still hates you. I thought long and hard about that before I brought you back to Indiana for the hearing. I thought you’d be safe enough in Indy. But if Morell is somehow reaching out as far as Rapture . . .”
He caught himself then. In another second, he’d have convinced himself that Morell had horns and a pointy tail. He’d have convinced me, too, and I was frightened enough already.
“Do your best for me,” I said. “I’ll call back in three hours.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
I only needed to consult my auto club map once for the first three hours of my drive—the three hours I’d given Brother Dennis in which to work his miracle. There was only one road for all that driving, the road I’d been standing next to when I’d called the monk, I-65. The highway described a wavering diagonal line through the state’s center, Indianapolis, to its northwest corner, the sprawl around Chicago, which was called Gary on the Indiana side of the fence.
Except for the hour it took me to pass through Indy and its never-ending suburbs and a glimpse of the outskirts of Lafayette, the drive was through farmland. South of Indy and for a little while north of it, the farms and the ground they occupied weren’t unlike the ones near Brookside: small holdings on slightly rolling terrain with fringes of forest just thick enough to sustain the illusion that each farm might be the last. Around Lafayette, the land flattened and the farms flowed into one another. The isolated stands of trees stood out in the fields of corn like the peaks of drowned mountains.
Around noon I stopped at the town of Rensselaer to eat something and make my second call to Oldenburg. I ate first. I knew if I called first and Brother Dennis had come through for me I’d be too scared to swallow. I picked a nonfranchise restaurant named Wag’s where the waitress—who’d been in diapers when I’d last visited Indiana—called me “Honey” and generally treated me like a kid who’d left his school bus at the wrong stop. I ordered a Roast Beef Manhattan, as I was feeling more nostalgic than ever for the East Coast. It turned out to be a roast beef sandwich on white bread with stiff mashed potatoes and stiffer gravy piled on top. I ate a little of the Lower East Side and called it quits.
I made my phone call from a wall model mounted between Wag’s restrooms. Brother Dennis picked up so quickly I knew he’d been sitting with a hand on his phone.
“Okie, where are you?”
“Rensselaer.”
“Is that all the farther you’ve gotten?”
“I had to obey the speed limit. I’m using a borrowed license plate.”
“What? Forget it. Don’t tell me about it. You’ll have to hurry. I told them you’d be in Michigan City by one o’clock.”
“You got me in?”
“Yes. Now listen. I told them you were from St. Aelred’s, like you suggested. Remember that. You’re representing the seminary.”
I smiled a much needed smile at the monk’s concern. I’d been representing St. Aelred’s for twenty years and in some very unusual ways. It wasn’t likely that my stop in Michigan City would add much to the damage I’d already done.
“Are you sure you want to go through with this, Okie?”
“How do I get in?”
“Ask for a man named Benner when you get to the main gate. Robert Benner. There’s one other thing, something that could still gum up the works.”
“What?”
“Morell has to agree to see you. Bob is finding out right now if he will. They can’t force Morell to see you if he doesn’t want to.”
“You know Morell,” I said. “Do you think he’ll pass up this chance?”
The monk’s reply was unfortunately phrased. “Not on your life.”
• • •
Indiana kept its most dangerous criminals at arm’s length. The town of Michigan City was built right on Lake Michigan, not all that far from the state of the same name. I was late arriving because of traffic on I-94, the road I took east from Gary. I thought the prison might be on the lakeshore or maybe even out on the water, a rocky, Midwestern Alcatraz. So I wandered to the little city’s lakefront via blocks of older, run-down houses and businesses with nautical references in their names—Lighthouse Motors, the Blue Water Bakery, the Cove Diner—that were echoes of the Jersey shore. Specifically, the echoes were from the north Jersey shore, where the old urban sprawl runs all the way to the high-water mark.
I negotiated a tiny traffic circle and came to a park that was set against the water’s edge. I left the Chevy in a public lot next to a marina that had more slips than I’d ever seen in one place. The park—Washington Park—was an old one with a birdcage bandstand and crumbling stone walls along its paths. The same stone had been used to build benches with rounded backs that rose out of the ground like Neolithic tombs. The benches were all occupied on this Saturday afternoon, and picnickers had staked out most of the grass. The open stretches were patrolled by pigeons and gulls and crows, the last a nice Indiana touch.
That left no room for me, so I walked along the edge of the marina, first west toward a huge power plant with a rusted smokestack and then back east toward the park. I justified the walk by trying to plan my approach to Morell, something I’d managed not to do through all my long drive. But my mind kept straying to the comings and goings in the marina and out to the crisp horizon where a dozen pairs of white sails were visible.
I might have hidden among the pleasure boaters all afternoon if something hadn’t made me glance toward the Chevy. A policewoman was standing next to it, examining the windshield. I managed to cross the parking lot without appearing to run. Still, I drew her eye.
She was built like a grammar school linebacker, and her brown face hadn’t a line or a wrinkle. It hadn’t a trace of an expression, either, which might have explained why it was wearing so well. “This your car, sir?”
I admitted it and asked whether there was something wrong, saying Officer as every other word.
“I was just noticing your inspection sticker. It’s from New Jersey. But you have an Indiana plate.”
I couldn’t see a patrol car, but I had no trouble spotting the boxy radio she wore on her gun belt. If she got curious enough to use it, I would be knocking off early.
“I’m from New Jersey,” I said. “I just moved out here. I haven’t had an Indiana inspection yet.”
“We don’t have vehicle inspection in Indiana, sir. Didn’t the highly trained BMV staff tell you that when you registered your car?”
“No,” I said, trying to smile enough for both of us. I was feeling like an illegal alien caught wading in the Rio Grande. I’d been feeling that way for days, and I was sick of it. I longed for some common ground where a Hoosier and a Garden Stater could meet as equals. Something the officer had said had given me a glimpse of that promised land, and I slid for it, headfirst.
“At least I don’t remember them telling me. You know how those motor vehicle places are. By the time you get through the line, you’re lucky to remember where you parked.”
“I hear you,” she said and smiled.
I took the smile as permission to change the subject. “How do I get to the prison?”
“Screw with me,” she said, her smile disappearing in a blink. She held the deadpan for what seemed like an hour. Then she laughed, a surprisingly girlish, musical laugh. “Relax. That’s our standard joke around here. Like, ‘How do I get to Carnegie Hall?’ ”
“Practice,” I said, laughing unmusically.
“Right. We get asked about the prison every other day. It’s on the western side of town, over by Indiana Dunes State Park. How’d you get way over here, somebody give you bad directions?”
“I’m just stalling,” I said. My heart missed a beat when I realized I’d accidentally said what I was thinking, but there was no turning back. “I don’t really want to go there.”
“Visiting a relative or a friend?”
Either lie would have served, but I stayed with the truth. “An enemy. A guy I knew twenty years ago when I was out here going to school. He killed a friend of mine. Not a friend really. A classmate.”
“What did he do to you?”
“I guess he tried to kill me, too.”
“You’re not sure?”
“I’m sure. I just don’t like to say it out loud.”
She settled back against the side of the Cavalier, placing her hand between the butt of her gun and the paint. “I wouldn’t like to say that, either. So why go to see him?”
“I think he may have gotten another friend of mine into trouble. Just this week.” I expected the cop to call me on that. Brother Dennis had, despite his almost superstitious faith in Morell’s evil. She didn’t speak, so I called myself. “It’s a stupid idea, I guess. He’s locked up tight.”
