A Passing Curse (2011) (34 page)

The second story was deserted. He ducked under the police tape and pushed the dead priest’s heavy door open. It smelled awful inside. Like a dead cat or something larger. Funny how the smell stayed.

He could barely see and cussed himself for not bringing his flashlight. He flicked his zippo lighter and the weak flame picked up three candles on a bench. He lit all three candles, leaving two on the table and taking one with him. The room brightened. They had cleaned up most of the blood. The little bit left in the cracks of the floor probably accounted for the smell.

To calm himself he recited his theory: the killer had hung Ramon, then slashed him to death before locking the door from the inside and escaping down a secret passageway. The killer was, more likely than not, a priest with some knowledge of the mission’s nooks and crannies. The killer had used Rusty’s sickle to avert suspicion, typical for the sneaky priests.

It could definitely be some weird sex thing, especially after what he’d just witnessed.

If he found nothing tonight, no one would be the wiser. But, if he found the secret door, found out how the killer had escaped, then he might make sergeant by next year. That is, if he wasn’t in LA at the police academy. If he cracked this case, Reese would sponsor him, at least put in a good word. He was sure of it.

He moved to the corner. He was thinking about Rusty, idly wondering if she had a sister, when hot wax hit his hand. He winced. A shadow quickly now in the corner of the room.

Before he could focus, the shadow disappeared. It vanished so quickly that he realized it was only the flickering candle.

He looked around the room again, shivered, and picked up one of the cement gargoyles sitting on the desk. The face was contorted and laughing and, in the dim light, unsettling. Using the back of the gargoyle’s skull and holding the candle at a slight angle so the wax would hit the floor instead of burning his hand, he went around the room at shoulder height, striking each of the two foot square blocks twice, listening for the dull sound that would mark the secret panel.

After one complete circuit, he moved down to the next run of stones which were connected to the floor. It was tedious work, and in thirty minutes he had circled the room twice. He tried the floor next. Starting in the corner, he hit the first slab of slate. It sounded faintly hollow. He hit it again, and he heard two knocks in response from the far corner. An echo? And then he turned. Movement.

He dropped the gargoyle. He dropped the candle. He pulled the small automatic from his ankle holster. He aimed in the approved kneeling style - one knee down, the other up and supporting his shooting arm.

“Come out now!”

The shadow did not move. Thomkins came up into the classic combat stance - feet spread, arms straight, the pistol at eye level and held on target. “Come out!”

Suddenly the thought struck him that it must be one of the priests, and if he killed a priest he would never hear the end of it, especially if the priest was naked. “I’m not telling you again,” he said but the shadow disappeared.

One-handed, he picked up the still flickering candle and checked each corner of the room. He looked under Ramon’s plank bed. He checked outside: nothing. If he called a patrol car to cruise the area for prowlers, they’d ask what he was doing at the mission, and if he told them he was looking for hidden doors, they’d laugh.

He’d often imagined himself in heroic situations, but now that he might be in a heroic situation he did not feel heroic and wished Reese were here.

He repeated his two favorite maxims: “The only thing to fear is fear itself,” and “He who dares wins.”

No fear, he thought, and moved his eyes, looking for any sudden movement, any target to fire at.

This time there was no mistake. The shadow came quickly and low. He was pulling the trigger, bringing the back on target after each shot, when he felt an icicle of pain shoot up his right leg. In a moment that hung like eternity, he emptied the pistol, the blasts a string of firecrackers. The shadow swung low and hit him again and again and he dropped the pistol and looked dumbly at the floor. His right leg was now shredded. Tendons and arteries fell to the floor. He watched one artery disappear inside his leg and recalled, briefly, the paramedic exam, how an artery would do that, and how to reach in with forceps and pull the artery back out before clamping it off. Blood came in long spurts. He realized how young his heart was and the waste of it all exhausted him.

No Fear. No Fear.

He felt air along his legs as if a fan had been turned on. He fell down in slow motion, something heavy on his chest, choking him. His hair came out in great handfuls, the roots tearing deep inside. Blood washed his face, into his mouth. No fear, no fear. He struggled, trying to kick back, his feet sliding and slipping. He screamed and felt himself still falling.

He woke up. His hair felt stiff. His heels hurt. He reached for his head but his arms would not move. His hands felt numb. He could not move his fingers. His back felt broken.

The blur came from the corner, the red feet incredibly fast, the flurry of wings burning the air, the heavy pain and the light snit, snit of the cutting blades.

Wind from the flapping wings and nothing else. The light from the candle ebbed, revealing the abrupt and utter blackness. He would never see the sun rise and was strangely comforted. He was alone at last. He thought, He who dares wins, as the blackness came.

8:30 a.m.. Reese was running late by half an hour. He walked past several tour busses. The passengers grabbing gear from overhead bins. One bus empty. Its load of Japanese snapping pictures, talking, pointing.

He could not get the thought of her out of his mind. He’d left this morning without waking her. He could not wait to see her again. She was there, now, with him. He felt her smooth skin, the smell of almond in her hair. He carried with him the sight of her on the bed, on her back, naked, those lovely bright and ferocious green eyes half open and looking at the ceiling, mouth soft and slightly open.

From the long arched hallway spilled Father Lavour, almost running, his sandals clip-clopping, his robe a snapping flag. “Good Morning,” Lavour said, agitated.

“Something wrong, Father?” He could feel her skin, velvet. Her hands on him.

“The tourists are to wait for Father Demetrius to take their donations before entering, but now they are in the mission unescorted, going everywhere!”

“They’re harmless,” Reese said. “Take it easy.” Nothing would bother him today. Passengers streamed off one of the buses like ants. Midwesterners this time. Blue stiff cotton shorts and yellow shirts for the men. The same shorts but paisley puffed blouses and scarves for the women. The farm belt crowd elbowed in for quick pictures of the fountain and tower. The Japanese, more adventurous, spread through the mission.

Lavour stamped his foot. “This is a historical sight and now that Father Ramon has been killed so horribly - it was on the news last night - many are only coming for the infamy of the place, for the titillation.” He stopped, frowned. “When can we get the body back? I’m still in shock. Who would do such a thing?”

“Have you been questioned?” Reese asked.

“Questioned? You mean interrogated? Yes, I’ve been questioned, but why question me? It is obviously the work of a lunatic. This murder.”

“Did you notice anything peculiar that night?”

“Only what I told the police, that Father Ramon had been arguing with the girl. I knew we should not have allowed her into the garden section. It has always been off limits.”

“She’s really wonderful,” Reese said, ignoring Lavour’s look of agitation. He didn’t see Thomkins.

“Wonderful? She might have killed him. Her tool, whatever it was, had Father Ramon’s blood on it. His blood.”

“She didn’t kill anyone, Father. You need to calm down. You haven’t seen a cop hanging around have you? Red hair, thin? A young guy?”

“I have seen no one but these dreaded tourists.”

He left Lavour and followed the tourists. He would not let the glum priest ruin his mood. He’d give Thomkins a few quick pointers and then back to Rusty. Breakfast at Foggy Ben’s was a good idea. A walk on the beach. Perfect.

On the stone steps that circled up to Ramon’s room, a young, wide-eyed and frantic Japanese couple flew past him, knocking him against the wall, their camera bags bouncing as if both Rodan and Godzilla were after them.

Before he could react, he heard, “Waaaiiiieee!” and leaned deeper into the wall as two more tourists rocketed down, this time Americans and old, but moving damn fast for their age. “Hurry up, Martha,” the man in the Panama hat said over his shoulder. “Hurry up, woman!” Martha came, missing one shoe, her legs like pistons out of sync, her face red and sweaty. Terror in those eyes.

He ran the few steps to the second floor. Ramon’s half-open door. Martha’s shoe on its side. He kicked the door open. The broken bolt clanged against the stone wall. Sunlight through the door, a trapezoid of white on Thomkins, also on his side, naked.

His hands and feet were tied together behind his back with cotton rope, hog-tied. His body floating in a dark gash of blood. His red hair ripped out, leaving a center strip stroked with blood, spiky and fashioned into a rooster’s comb.

In the blood surrounding Thomkins’ head, tufts of red hair grew, a field of errant grass.

The face carried long slashes split to the bone. One eye hung by the milky blue optical nerve. The gaping carotid accounted for the blood.

The naked chest sliced to the bone. The legs bad, long thigh muscles exposed.

A fighting gaff stuck in each heel. Through the heel pad and out the back.

At a glance, it appeared that Thomkins was running, but his face, its softness, looked more like a man sleeping in on Sunday morning than a murder victim.

Outside, now, Lavour crooked and stone white.

“Call the police,” Reese told him. Lavour nodded and disappeared down the stairs. Reese yelled at three tourists who appeared at the top of the stairs, wide-eyed and white-faced, to get the hell out. He faced the railing, the mansion on the far hill.

23

Reese heard the sirens first, then tires skidding across the parking lot and doors slamming and voices as the sirens wound down and feet coming fast up the stairs. Then four cops spilling onto the walkway, guns out, heads swiveling. A second to understand. “Thomkins?” one asked. “Is that Thomkins?” Reese nodded, starting to feel sick. One cop pointed his pistol inside the room. Reese grabbed his shoulder. “Put it away. There’s nothing to shoot.”

He told the others to put their guns up - he didn’t need accidents, stray bullets flying - and they holstered their pistols, all looking at Thomkins lying there. “Shit,” one said. “What happened?” Shock now. Something else. The dead had a way of making you look at yourself, or pissing you off.

He didn’t know what to say. More sirens and tires screeching as what he guessed were the rest of the police force raged up the steps in two and threes, seeing what there was to see, finally gathering in front of the door like a spent wave. All twelve of them. “What the fuck is going on?” one wailed. Others said, with some bravado, “I’ll kill the son of a bitch did this.” A young cop with spit-shined shoes kicked the stone wall. “It’s one of the priests.”

He wondered what they’d do if he wasn’t here. Roust the priests? Beat confessions out of them? Amateurs. County cops. They had a lot to learn.

He slammed the door, closing off Thomkins. Their mulling around made him nervous. He yelled at one cop to string yellow tape. He yelled at a few more to gather the priests for questioning. He told several more to keep the tourists contained, get them organized for questioning. He told others to fan out, to check the area for blood trails, for a knife, for bloody clothes. He told two officers to canvas the neighborhood, to knock on doors, to ask if anyone had seen or heard anything suspicious, out of the ordinary.

He told them to go easy. Thomkins had been dead at least six hours. The killer or killers were long gone. He told them to look for clues, for evidence - anything out of the ordinary - for witnesses. He did not want them shooting up the neighborhood. “Be professional, not personal, and think before you act. Log the names of everyone you interview. That means be courteous.” Looking at their young faces, he felt like an instructor at the academy.

No one questioned his authority. They wanted to be told what to do. They did not want to think about Thomkins. They wanted payback. Not for Thomkins, specifically, but for the fear inside of them. “Go,” he told them.

He put his hands on the handrail, squeezing it, and looked at the castle. He’d warned Thomkins to be careful. He’d warned him. He felt an urge for action and remembered what he’d just told the rookies - easy does it. His knuckles turned white. He couldn’t drive up to the mansion and shoot him. Not yet.

The Chief showed up red-faced and flustered, went inside the room, staggered out sweating, pasty, and flat voiced. “What was that? What did they do to him?”

“Gaffs,” Reese said.

“Gaffs? Rooster spurs? I warned him to stay away from those fucking chickens.” The Chief wrung his hands. A finger to loosen his tie. “I told him. Made him promise me he’d stop fighting them.”

“They weren’t chickens. The killers.” He figured at least two people, using metal gaffs in wood handles, had killed Thomkins, then left the gaffs in his heels as a message or warning. Maybe Ajax had used a glove tipped with removable blades, similar to the fake finger he’d stolen from the billionaire’s desk. And who was Ajax warning?

“And that shit they did to his hair?”

“They made him look like a rooster.” For now, he was not telling the Chief he’d been to a cockfight with Thomkins. No sense giving him too much to think about.

The Chief kept shaking his head. “He wanted to be a detective. He wanted to go to Los Angeles and be a homicide detective. That’s all he talked about. He lived for it.”

He didn’t answer. Maybe Thomkins had been here last night looking for clues, trying to prove he was good enough for the LAPD, good enough to make a cop in the city.