God Told Me To (2 page)

Suddenly, and with no apparent reason—the evening was warm—a shiver ran through Nicholas.

Casey felt his trembling and said, “Don’t worry.”

Her voice sounded distant, seemed to come from another room, and he reached for her hand.

“Don’t worry, Peter. It’s the wrong time of month. My not using the diaphragm won’t make any difference.”

She had misinterpreted his chill, though the possibility of her becoming pregnant always worried him.

He squeezed her hand and tried for an explanation. “Must have been a draft.” And as he spoke, a wind chime that Casey had hung above their bed began to tinkle like a merry metallic laugh.

Casey got up to go to the bathroom. When she left their bed, Nicholas, without realizing or even thinking about what he was doing, reached out and picked up the remote control of the TV set from the nightstand. He switched on a mid-evening newscast. And for the next three hours he stared at the television, switching from channel to channel, news show to news show.

The first image he saw was that of Deputy Commissioner Hendriks:

“. . . approximately 2:14 today a sniper utilizing a telescopic rifle opened fire on pedestrians on Madison Avenue between Fifty-seventh and Fifty-ninth Streets. His first victim, Alfred P. Majors of Kew Gardens, was killed instantly when a .22-caliber bullet passed through his temple. Fourteen other citizens were mortally wounded, including Officer Frances Donnelly, on traffic duty at Fifty-seventh and Madison. Names of the other victims are being withheld pending notification of their families. Due to the tie-up of traffic, police found it impossible to reach the homicides and emergency vehicles were unable to get through . . .”

Nicholas paid little attention to Casey when she returned from the bathroom. She handed him the beer she had opened earlier. It was warm and flat but he shrugged off her offer to get him a fresh one.

He switched to another channel.

A woman, a plain middle-aged housewife, was making a statement from the porch of a suburban home. She was struggling without success to control herself, and near the end of her statement she collapsed against a man who came onto the screen and gestured angrily at the camera. Nicholas immediately realized that the woman was the sniper’s mother, around whom the newsmen had cruelly swarmed.

He said to the TV, “Bastards.”

“. . . I don’t believe my son had anything to do with this. He was a very good student. He was devoted to his entire family. I knew he sent away for a rifle but he was no good with it. Below average. I heard friends of his tease him about his poor shooting. He couldn’t possibly have killed all those people from that distance. There must’ve been a number of snipers on those roofs firing and the police are covering up . . .”

Nicholas snapped the remote control. He felt pity for the poor woman. He could imagine her pain and confusion, but it wasn’t right for her to talk about
covering up.
Her son had shot seventeen people. She must accept that.

He continued to snap the control until the dial returned to her.

“. . . my son. That’s who they’re blaming it all on. Why? Why would he do such a thing? Why would anybody? Why did my boy have to die? Ask that cop. Nickerson, Nicholas? Ask him! My boy is de—go ask that cop!”

Nicholas’s voice was hollow and dry. “The kid was alone. I had nothing to do with his death. Nothing.”

He faintly heard Casey say, “I know that, Peter.”

He lost count of the beers he drank. Casey kept bringing him fresh ones. He swallowed them without tasting any flavor. At some point Casey insisted he come to the dinner table. He positioned the television so he could continue watching while he picked at his food.

It was strange. Like seeing a movie he was a part of, as if a chunk of his life had been torn from him, cut and edited onto little strips of film, with the different scenes played and replayed in random order. His memories, his personal thoughts and feelings would also sometimes seem to focus on the screen. The TV was an old set—it had belonged to Casey before she and Nicholas began living together—and its tubes were weak. At times its black-and-white picture would blur, then streak into a stark contrast that clashed with the colors of his memory.

The first picture he saw of himself was a still photograph which the department must have released to the media. The photo was at least five years old, taken when he was still in his twenties. His dark hair was shorter then, his eyebrows not quite so thick, his cheeks thinner. There was a quality about the photo he didn’t like. The photographer had given him an almost fragile appearance; one that no way looked like a cop’s face.

He could bear listening to the voice-over for only a moment.

“. . . Detective Lieutenant Peter Nicholas became the hero of the day when he courageously climbed the water tower of the besieged Haskell Publications Building and engaged the suspect in conver—”

Then Hendriks was on the screen again.

The Deputy Commissioner was more politician than cop, more used to facing a camera than to chasing a thief down a dark alley. He spoke as if he might have been delivering a luncheon address. He had one of those long lean faces quick to smile in public, but the lines that ran down from his mouth were tightly constricted and resembled knotted threads. In public he always used the long convoluted sentences of the professional, and after uttering one or two his tongue would dart out like a little serpent to circle his thin lips.

“. . . At 2:24
P.M.
the Police Helicopter Patrol, which had been alerted, pinpointed the sniper’s position as being perched between the water tower of the Haskell Publications Building at 6077 Madison and the overhanging wall of the building adjacent to Haskell’s. The sniper was thus protected by both wall and the tower, thereby making it impossible for any action to be taken by our choppers. We then realized that we would have to send a man up on the water tower to apprehend the sniper who still appeared to have a great deal of ammunition.”

At first Nicholas didn’t recognize the picture of himself that filled the screen next. It had been taken even earlier than the previous photo, back when he was still in uniform. He looked like a kid. A wide-grinning, big-eyed kid. He was holding his cap in front of his chest, and the two things that stood out in the photo were his pure white gloves and round eyes. Eyes, he thought, that hadn’t seen anything, hadn’t yet experienced. He realized this was the picture snapped the day he graduated from the Police Academy. A picture which had been left behind when he had split up with his wife.

He mumbled aloud, “My God, are they going to go out to the orphanage and dig up a baby picture.”

He changed channels.

Captain St. Clair appeared. Nicholas considered the captain one of the best men on the force. Always calm, never blew his cool, but reacted quickly and properly to any emergency. He backed his men all the way and never grabbed any credit from them. A solid cop. Unfortunately he tended to become awkward when he stood before the public.

St. Clair nervously tugged an ear lobe. A slight stammer was in his voice.

“. . . uh—don’t know why Nicholas volunteered. He’s always doing something . . . something like that. Uh, he maybe thinks he lives a charmed life. On the force oh just about, uh, sixteen years. Never been wounded. Don’t know how many citations and not even a scratch. That’s a record. Some sort of a record so he I guess thought he was least likely to take one—uh, get hurt. If it was me in his shoes, well I’d have to figure it about time my number came up.”

Nicholas remembered what he had thought about while he climbed the rusty ladder to the water tower. Nothing at all about a number coming up. His first few steps he silently berated himself, I’m a lieutenant who’s supposed to supervise these operations—someday I’ll learn to follow procedure.

The rungs of the tower ladder were badly corroded. Flecks of rust came loose under his touch. The wind was strong at this high altitude. It blew steadily but at varying speed, gusting between the surrounding buildings like the drafts in a canyon. Bits of rust whirled into his face. He squinted his eyes to narrow slits. A metal eave ran around the top of the tower. Nicholas remembered the wind whistling a shrill, almost siren sound along the eave. He was listening for shots. Or any other sound that would alert him to the sniper’s exact position. He heard a roaring. The police helicopter was circling near. It had been Nicholas’s hope to talk the sniper into surrendering and his first worry was that the copter was too close, that it might send the sniper into a dangerous panic. Then Nicholas began to worry about the copter getting caught in the wind. A strong gust could swoop up the light machine and toss it into a crashing spin. The pilot had no business flying at such a dangerously low altitude. Not for a moment did Nicholas worry about himself.

He switched channels.

A replay of the interview with the sniper’s mother. He didn’t want to hear her cover-up accusation again. He snapped the sound switch on the remote control and watched the silent film. Near the end, when the man again came on screen and gestured angrily at the camera, Nicholas wondered who he was. The father? A family friend? Did it matter?

He turned the sound back up as his own face came on screen.

It was after everything was over and he was back down on the street giving his statement. His features were worn and troubled and streaked from the rust and grit of the tower. He had tried to avoid the interview but Hendriks had insisted he make a brief statement.

“. . . I arrived just before 2:30. The entire area had been cordoned off and the sniper’s position had been pinpointed. Our first concern was medical care and then it became evident that there were no wounded to take care of. They were all dead. Though at the time we still did not know exactly how many victims there were . . .”

Nicholas hadn’t been aware of what he said while making the statement. As he watched himself he had the odd feeling that he was living those few moments for the first time. He was embarrassed by his dirty face. But around his eyes his face was strangely clean, as if he’d been wearing goggles. He didn’t recall rubbing or wiping his eyes after coming down from the tower.

“. . . I’ve never come across such accuracy in any similar situation. At any rate we limited the sniper’s ability to fire. He was wedged in behind the tower and we cleared the avenue of any possible targets . . .”

I should have said
victims
, Nicholas thought, any possible
victims
.

“. . . The sniper had made no attempt to escape when he could have. He simply holed up and waited for us to come and get him. It seemed evident we were dealing with a psychopath and that it might have been possible to talk him into surrendering. I got permission from Captain St. Clair to go up and talk to the man.”

“And I succeeded,” Nicholas said to his televised image. “I had him ready to surrender. What went wrong?”

Detective Jordan appeared on the screen.

Nicholas sneered, “There he is—my so-called backup man.”

Jordan was always around to collect a little glory. He was overweight and puffy and wore a suit too expensive for his salary. He hid behind a big beefy smile.

“Usually, see, we use a bullhorn or somethin’, but Nicholas, he insisted on climbing up. I told him, Hey this guy’s killed seventeen people, you can’t . . .”

You’re lying, thought Nicholas. At the time we still didn’t know about the two bodies that had rolled under cars. All you said were curses and complaints.

“. . . but like Nicholas is a very religious guy. He goes to Mass every morning. The kind of guy, separated from his wife but won’t get a divorce because he is such a good Catholic. I don’t put him down for it but that’s how he thinks. Like he’s got Jesus in his pocket. Maybe he does. So anyway up that ladder he goes and me, I act as his backup.”

Nicholas spoke with anger: “Any further back and you’d have been in Pittsburgh.”

An off-camera reporter asked Jordan:

“Detective Jordan, what exactly happened once you and Lieutenant Nicholas confronted the sniper?”

“Well, I think you fellas are pretty much aware of the resultant tragedy. We’ve still got to write our official report. I imagine the department will be releasing more details to the media a few hours from now. In the meantime you can tell one and all the lieutenant is one hell of a cop.”

Once more Nicholas remembered climbing the ladder. He felt the grit blowing into his face. Heard the whining wind. Before poking his head over the top of the tower, he had called out:

“I’m coming up. I’m Detective Lieutenant Peter Nicholas. I just want to talk.”

He had paused for a moment. When no response came to his call, he slowly peeped over the edge.

The sniper had not climbed back onto the roof of the tower. But exactly where he was crouched Nicholas could only guess. He waited for a telltale sound. Then he heard, very clearly despite the noise of the wind and the helicopter, a tiny pathetic sniffle.

“I haven’t come up to arrest you. I want to find out who you are and why you’ve done this. We have plenty of time. Neither of us can go anywhere.”

Nicholas crawled the narrow lip of the tower roof. He unsnapped his holster so that he could reach his weapon.

“My name is Peter Nicholas. Is there anybody you’d like us to call, notify them you’re up here?”

He reached the far side of the tower. A slip here would send him falling to the street. He knew that the moment he looked over the tower’s edge the sniper could easily blast him. He listened some seconds to the sad sobbing noises the sniper made and felt confident there would be no more shooting.

“Won’t you talk to me?”

The voice of a boy said, “My name is Harold Gorman.”